Now and Then

Doris overheated a cup of leftover coffee in her rush to get to the nine-o-six on time. It would be a long ride into the city and she did not like running for a train. Running was the folly of youth. A folly she had long ago used up. Now as she sat in the tightness of a window seat on the train, working hard not to make eye contact with the commuters across from her, she felt the slight graininess of the coffee burn on the roof of her mouth. She ran her tongue over the spot that was sore, did it again and again, and reminded herself that she was the reason for this slight pain. She reminded herself that this small incident was a mere memory, not a catastrophe waiting to happen.

There was often an indistinct line for Doris that defined what was a memory and what was happening in the moment. She mulled this over, much as she had the small burn, as she sat on the moving train. It was a common occurrence for her lately, this back and forth between what once was and what was now. She leaned into it, heavily, and then leaned into the soft, cold plexi-glass of the window and let her mind weave what it may.

There was a truth worth running from in her past, but today was today and the merging of then and now was a known tonic she would use to calm her nerves. A flash of her oldest memory, of early childhood, of soft spring grass against the yet un-calloused softness on the soles of her feet, in the evening as she came out into the yard. The image lit-up then quickly faded from her memory. The flicker in her mind’s eye passed as quickly as the scenery rushing by on the other side of the trains’ window.

Spring. Again. Always the most difficult of times for her memories, but also the most delicious season, the lengthening days filled with longing and hope. She looked out at the greening scene rushing past her.

In the then time, long ago, there had been farms. Now there were houses, so many of them. So close together. She laughed to herself at the memory of a photo in an album at Sam’s childhood home in Toronto. So close together the houses were there. She’d commented, naively. She had laughed at the neighborhood then. Now the memory merged with the scene rushing by her. A day in her life passing her, crowded with other passing days. Then and now. Green new grass on soft un-calloused spring feet. Just a memory.

Doris Lanski sighed. No more playing in the minefield of these memories. That past would do her in if she let it. Her stop was after two more stations. She had to prepare. She opened the cavernous battered purse sitting on her lap and extracted an equally battered, small black notebook.

She pulled away the cloth covered elastic holding the bulging scrapbook closed. A lifetime of use showed in the softness of what was once the book’s brittle cover. Opening it randomly, a page of printed snippets greeted her. This was her cheat book of ransom notes, advice on the fly, she consulted her scrapbook multiple times a day. This lifetime of wisdom clipped from multiple sources, pages torn from waiting room magazines, verses from greeting cards, text that fit her life, all framed with her own sloppy handwriting. These writings of her own wisdom came to her from thoughts or conversations which she hastily jotted down preserving the treasured pearls.

Now she opened to a page containing the long-ago cookie fortune from a no longer remembered lunch. It told her: “Don’t be hasty, prosperity will knock on your door soon.” She was sure it was a sign for her to dive into the day ahead.

On the next page a square of text printed out on patterned stationary reminded her that “At your center you know who you are and you know what you want.” If only. She gazed again out the window and finished her meditation. Reluctantly, having found no calm, she replaced the book securely in her bag and readied herself for the station.

She stood as the train stopped, too quickly, and fell back into her seat, then struggled to get up and out past the tangle of legs that distinguished her train mates. She was on the platform and searching for Tilly before the doors of the car had closed.

She wasn’t hard to spot, a cluster of spring color in the funereal black of the bustling crowd. Only Tilly, so inappropriately named Matilda, only she would wear a lavender suit and tangerine blouse in what was still considered the fashion dregs of late winter.

There she was, coming toward Doris, reaching for her with longing and purpose.

“You made it,” she said taking Doris by the arm, “I worried you’d miss it. Have you had coffee? I haven’t. Let’s find somewhere to sit. And something sweet for breakfast. I need something sweet. God, if it weren’t ten-thirty in the morning I’d have a drink.”

Doris took it all in, and remained silent. A drink. That would be heavenly. A Mimosa or a vodka tonic, maybe something tropical. A morning shot. They would have done that in their twenties. Especially on a day like today. After. They would have a drink after. Though for the life of her, Doris had no idea what after would look like.

Tilly guided her effortlessly through the crowd which was quickly thinning. They found a small table amidst the chaos of a coffee shop and both sipped quietly watching the insanity that came from too many choices. To them it was simple, black or regular. Coffee was not a practice or a ritual, it was their liquid courage, hauling them through the long days.

“Did you bring it?” Tilly finally asked.

“Of course I brought it,” Doris answered sharply. “I’m not an idiot.”

“I didn’t say you were.” Tilly fired back and let a moment pass. “Henry is there already. He’ll smooth the way. He’s good at these things you know. He has presence.” And she smiled, emphasizing that she had a son to brag about, knowing Doris had only memories.

“Let’s go then” Doris said standing. Her cup was empty and she attempted a lighthearted toss to the trash bin. It failed, but a lovely young man with a ponytail of curls reached down in a graceful movement and placed it in the bin. He then smiled up and back, solicitously, at Doris.

The crowd had dissipated on the sidewalks as well. The work day was begun and the stragglers and meeting goers were the only cattle left in the chute steering them toward mid-town. The women’s destination was two blocks away.

“I shouldn’t have worn these heels.” Tilly said before they’d crossed the first avenue. “My toes will be bloody before the day is out.” She looked longingly at Doris’s ballet flats, and then at the bright femininity of her own encased feet and marshalled on.

The building they finally approached was of medium height, a nondescript gray with a heavily bronzed door. Its art deco heritage was mostly hidden by a recent renovation and the seemingly endless need of all government offices to exist within a certain realm of blandness. Doris took in a deep breath and clutched her purse to her chest as they waited for the elevator.

Memories started singing in Doris’s ears. She felt a smile brewing on her lips as Sam’s image passed before her eyes. Sam as a tall young man. Leaning over to whisper to her as they waited for the elevator taking them up to the room they had for after the theater. Sam, over her in bed in that same room with the window open, letting in air like the air outside today, hinting at warmth and smelling of the approaching season.

A hard ping announced that her memory was over. She boarded the waiting elevator with Tilly and a dozen strangers. All together in the small elevator, but as separated as caged animals.

Tilly held tight to her arm.

“Six please” she announced to the young woman closest to the control panel. She went unheard, and realized then that there were tiny white protuberances coming from the young woman’s ears blocking communication. Tilly reached across her, rudely, and punched at the “six” button until it lit.

Henry was waiting for them with a kiss landing on his mother’s cheek and a brief squeeze of Doris’s arm.

“They’re about to start, I thought you wouldn’t make it” he said. “Go grab a seat Ma, Doris, I need you to come with me.”

She obeyed, as only the old and the new were prone to do, and followed him down the drab hallway. She stopped when he did, at the door to an office numbered 643 on its opaque glass front.

“Are you ready?” Henry asked. His eyebrows were raised slightly, and Doris remembered that he always had struck her as having a bit of a question mark for a face. He had arranged this for her, however, and she was grateful. Navigating these corridors was not her strong suit.

“I think so.” Doris answered, reaching again into her purse for the scrap book. The small pink envelope, the size of those used by florists to attach a card to your arrangement, “Get Well Soon,” “Happy Anniversary,” “Sincerest Condolences,” fell to the floor as Doris unwrapped the worn notebook.

“That’s it,” she said to Henry and he folded himself downward as Sam once had, the plight of a long journey for the very tall to reach the ground, and retrieved the small flat parcel, which he placed in her outstretched palm.

“OK then, in we go.” He said putting his hand on the door’s knob.

“No, wait,” Doris answered. “I’m not sure I’m ready.”

She wanted this last moment of her known life to be something memorable, not this awkward standing in the hall with her friends’ impatient son. She closed her eyes and again there was Sam. Sam next to her, their hands knotted as they walked into the ocean too early in the season, their exchanged glance before both had gasped at their shared bad judgment; Sam across from her at dinner, his face between the flames of the Shabbos candles looking up at the same instant she looked up at him; Sam laying still in the morning as she called Tilly, sobbing for her to come and asking what she should do.

She opened her eyes. Henry’s face was now an exclamation mark of impatience. Had she been gone long?

“I’m ready,” She said and opened the pink envelope she’d found in Sam’s overcoat pocket. The mysterious pink envelope that would always leave her wondering how it had come to be there, that silly little envelope, with no flowers for her. Henry opened the office door.

“Mrs. Lanski,” the brown man behind the desk said to her, “We’ve been waiting for you. We’re just about ready to begin. The press is already inside the auditorium.”

“Yes,” Henry said, “Doris, this is Mr. Wright, he needs to verify things first.” She pulled the small, folded paper from the nest of pink where it had been kept for the last 11 months. 11 months and 9 days to be exact. Since Sam had left her. She’d taken her time. Now she was here. There was no way back to where she wished to be. Her hand shook slightly and she raged inside at her age and infirmity. She unfolded the thin paper as gracefully as possible.

“Here it is,” she said to both Henry and Mr. Wright, but handed the unfolded square to Henry who passed it off to the bureaucrat for her. Involuntarily her eyes looked past him, and there was Sam, smiling at her, over Mr. Wright’s left shoulder. Slyly, he was there, smiling with that glint in his eye he got only when a zinger landed squarely or a mood left him in a particularly devilish state of mind.

“Well Mrs. Lanski, you are a lucky woman.” Mr. Wright exclaimed after examining the small square of paper for authenticity. He held the lottery ticket a moment longer than was necessary before placing it carefully into the scanner on his desk. “Shall we go in to the event now. We have a very LARGE check with your name on it.” He paused to emphasize the word large by spreading his arms wide. “Your life will never be the same.”

Doris didn’t need that rhetorical remark. Her life had not been the same since the day she put her had in Sam’s pocket, looking for his phone and coming up with the small square of pink instead. They were waiting for her, but she merely smiled back at Sam still lingering behind the metal desk left vacant by Mr. Wright.

They were waiting for her still. The door to the office was open. She turned toward the doorway, then suddenly reluctant, looked back over her shoulder to the empty space where Sam had been. She walked out of the too small room, back to the drab hallway and into the chaos of the auditorium.

She knew she was awake as she sat next to Tilly, but still she was dreaming of her life with Sam in the new house under contract and ready to go to when this was all over. For now there would be crowds, there would be press, there would be those who would try to take her for all she suddenly had. That was now, and now was really just a blend of what had been, what was, and what would be. She was comfortable with the blur of these lines, that being here in this room, was not who she was, but merely where she had landed.

In the aftermath of this event when she woke and was no longer a snippet of news others would envy, she would still be herself, still Doris Lanski. She would finally move out of their crowded suburban flat and go to the house off the Shore Road in Cape Neddick. She would wake to the sound of the ocean they loved. Finally, she would be in the place they loved most, awake in that paradise, her and Sam, now and then, alone and together, richer