THE UNEXPECTED

Short story by Lorna Woods

Meg had died in Charles’ arms on the day after Christmas. Charles faced the New Year alone. They’d been married thirty-five years. An aneurism, the coroner said. The last few days before Meg collapsed she’d had headaches and dizzy spells. Still, his wife’s death at age 49 had shocked Charles.

Seated at the kitchen table, Charles stared out the window at the tranquil waters of Alaska’s inside passage. The snow-covered mountains turned to gold in the setting sun. The phone on the table trilled. Their daughter, Lynn—she and her husband and two sons lived in Florida. Too far and too busy to come to the simple celebration of life held in the little church Sunday right after the regular service. No one who’d made it there through the ice and snow had to go home and come back later. After sharing special moments and memories, the celebrators sang, I’ll Fly Away, oh glory, I’ll fly away, and I’ve Got a Mansion Just Over the Hilltop, two of Meg’s favorites. Afterwards sandwiches, salads, and cookies were served with coffee and tea.

Charles forced down resentment and answered her call.

“Dad, I’m sorry I couldn’t make it to the service for Mom,” Lynn said, “but I’m so glad we flew up this summer to visit you guys. I’d rather have seen Mom alive than come to her funeral.”

What about me? Charles wanted to say, but didn’t. I’m alone. I need you. He’d gladly pay his daughter’s way to Alaska.

“I’m sorry I can’t come right now. We spent Christmas with Gill’s family, and I didn’t want to spoil the holiday for the kids. Gill and I are leaving tomorrow, New Year’s Day, for a Caribbean cruise, his Christmas present to me.”

Charles wanted to tell Lynn her desertion of him in his time of need was okay, but he couldn’t say the words.

She waited for his response. When it didn’t come, Lynn’s words rushed in and filled the silence. “Dad, why don’t you sell your place and come live with us? We’ve got space. There’s boats and fishing here, too.  You could lie in the sun and soak. I know you and Mom were retiring and planned to stay there, but now that she’s gone . . .”

Sell the house on the beach he and Meg had built together with their own hands? Sell the boat they’d fished and hunted from for so many years? Leave the peace and beauty of Southeast Alaska and live somewhere else for the rest of his life?

“You know me. I’d dry up and blow away with all that sun. Why don’t I come for a visit in February? It’s usually pretty nasty weather around here. I can’t get out and do much. I’ll hire someone to watch the house, and take care of Tiz.”

Tiz. Short for Tizzy. Charles patted the little dog who sat beside his chair as he talked on the phone.

“I love you, Dad. Happy New Year.”

“I love you, too, Lynn. Happy New Year. Bye.” Charles set the phone in its base.

Winter dark wrapped the world and cold settled into his bones. He should light a fire in the woodstove. Meg always liked the door open on the stove in the winter evenings, like having a fireplace but with lots of heat warming the house. Charles couldn’t bring himself to build a fire. Meg wasn’t here. Besides, the chill inside him came from his heart, not the air around his body.

Charles poured a cup of coffee. Real coffee. Didn’t matter if it kept him awake, he wouldn’t sleep anyway, alone in the bed. He glanced out the side window through the dark toward their nearest neighbor, whose house set back a bit further from the beach than theirs. A light shone in the neighbors’ window.

Marty and Beth. They were good people. Beth had fought a bout with cancer. Meg had said her friend was in remission. Good news. Especially since three of the woman’s five children were still at home, the youngest girl three years old. Marty and Beth were probably celebrating tonight, staying up late to toast the New Year at midnight.

Suddenly, Charles didn’t want to be alone. Alone with death. He thirsted and hungered for life. It was barely eight o’clock, not too late to drop in. He and Marty weren’t close, not like Meg had been with Beth. The women dropped in on each other for coffee, exchanging recipes, gardening tips, town and family news, and prayers. Marty and Charles were cordial and neighborly, but didn’t spend time together.

He wouldn’t stay long. Charles pulled on his boots, threw on his coat and left the house. He felt drawn to the glow from the neighbors’ window, like the moths in summer clustered around his porch light. Charles tramped down his plowed drive and trudged through the foot-deep unbroken snow to the shoveled walkway leading to his neighbors’ door. The crunch of his footsteps broke the stillness. His chest heaved with exertion and Charles drew in deep breaths of cold, clean-scented air. At the door he switched off his small flashlight. From a nearby spruce tree an owl hooted. Charles knocked.

The porch light flared on. The lock clicked, the door opened and Beth stared at him, brown eyes wide. Stray curls escaped from coffee-colored hair pulled up and fastened on her head.  A peach sweater and brown pants hugged her full figure.

“Charles.” She glanced behind him as if seeking Meg, like she’d forgotten for a second that her friend was gone. Then her gaze flashed to him.

“Come in.” She stepped aside and Charles entered the room, hit with its warmth, the hominess.

He stared at the rumpled afghan on the couch, the toys scattered on the floor. The Christmas tree still up, lights glowed and garlands sagged. A tabby cat slept curled next to a discarded unwrapped box at the tree base. Charles’ heart ached.

“Are you all right?”

The compassion in her voice and the caring in her eyes undid him. Tears lumped in Charles’ throat and backed up in his eyes. “No.”

Beth’s eyes clouded, her mouth trembled. “Neither am I. Martin left me.”

Shock stiffened his body. “What?”

“Let me take your coat. Would you like some coffee?”

“Yes. I would.” The cup he’d poured sat untouched on his table at home. Charles removed his coat. Beth laid it across the back of the couch. She headed for the kitchen, and he followed.

They sat opposite each other at the table, a plate of frosted Christmas cookies between them. Beth answered his question. “While I lay in the hospital dying, Marty went out and got himself a girlfriend, someone to take my place. I didn’t die. The cancer went into remission, so the doctors say, although there is no sign of cancer anywhere in my body. I say I received a miracle healing from God.”

Charles acknowledged Beth’s story with a nod. He reached for a green frosted Christmas tree cookie covered with red, yellow and blue dots. He bit and the sweet, crumbly cookie reminded him he hadn’t eaten since breakfast when he’d forced down a slice of toast.

“I came home December first and Marty stayed with us until after Christmas. Yesterday he served me with divorce papers and moved in with his girlfriend. He says we’re selling the house so he has the money to go south.” Beth’s hands twisted together, clasped and unclasped. “What am I supposed to do? Where are the kids and I supposed to live? Lily is only three. Our surprise baby. I’m forty-four years old and the last time I worked at a paid job was seasonal cannery work in my twenties.”

Before he thought, Charles opened his mouth. “You can come live in my house.”

Beth’s mouth fell open, closed. She stared at Charles.

Heat rose up his neck. “I don’t mean, have an affair with me. I have this big house. My wife has died, I’m alone.”

“I’m so sorry Meg is gone. I miss her too. But Charles, I have children, they’re busy, noisy.”

“I love children. My grandchildren live far away.” Charles squirmed in his chair. “I can sleep on the boat, it’s a live aboard—hunt, fish. February I’m going south to visit my daughter and her family.”

Hope dawned in Beth’s soft brown eyes. “But I couldn’t live off of you. That wouldn’t be right. I’ll have some child support, if Marty pays it.”

Energy flowed through Charles, lighting his brain with ideas. “Your oldest boy has worked for me on construction jobs.”

“Yes.” Beth’s brow wrinkled as if she tried to make a connection.

“I was in the process of retiring the business because my son-in-law is an attorney and he and my daughter have no interest in taking over. Why don’t I have you and your son run Island Construction instead? If your boy’s interested, I’ll train him and help get you going. You can keep the books, a paid position, of course.”

“You really mean this, don’t you, Charles? Meg talked about you a lot, and I envied her. You sounded like such a great husband and father, a genuinely good person. I-I could cook for you, wash clothes, take care of your home.” Beth lowered her eyes. “People would talk though. They’d be horrified that you’d move another woman into your house so soon after your wife died.”

Warmth flooded Charles. He felt as sure as if Meg sat there with them, smiling and nodding. This was right. “Meg would want me to do this. And her opinion is the only one that matters.” Hers and God’s. Most of the time, they had appeared to Charles to be one and the same.

Tears streamed down Beth’s face. “You don’t know what this means to me. We had health insurance, but still used up our savings and had to second mortgage our home. After the bank is paid, there won’t be much left from the sale of the house to divide.”

Charles covered her clasped hands on the table with his. “I’m the one whose life is saved. I don’t want to be alone, Beth. You, the children, you’ll give me someone to care about, to live for.” He moved his hands to pull away and Beth held on.

“There’s only a six year difference in our ages,” she said. “I’m attracted to you, Charles. I won’t pretend I’m not. Nearly dying has taught me to grasp life now, don’t wait for tomorrow. None of us knows if tomorrow will come.”

Charles’ heart thumped hard in his chest. “No one knows that better than I do. Christmas morning, I had no idea it would be my last day with Meg.” Or this morning, New Year’s Eve, my first day with you. “I’ll be honest. I’m attracted to you, too, Beth. But first, I want to help you and the kids, no strings attached. Then we’ll see where our relationship goes.”

Beth smiled through her tears. “Deal. Thank you.”

Charles tried to conjure up guilt over how good he felt about helping Beth, holding her hands in his, thinking they might have more than a platonic future together. All he could feel was joy.

A True Christmas Story

ALL I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS IS A TOOTHBRUSH?

I loved the piano, it was my favorite instrument. When I was five in 1947 living in Wrangell, an island town in Alaska, I’d go for walks with Mom. I’d always say, “Let’s walk a little further, Mama.”

She’d tease me and try to head back home. “No, Mama, just walk a little further.”

Until we’d get to Mrs. Dibble’s house where she had a piano, then I’d say, “Let’s see if Mrs. Dibble is home and has cookies.” But the real reason I wanted to go to her house was because she had a piano.

Mrs. Dibble didn’t have a phone. She didn’t know we were coming, but it was no surprise. She always let us in and let me make rolling thunder on the base keys and then tinkling rain on the high keys, ending with calm sunshine on the mid-range.

Mom said Mrs. Dibble didn’t mind me playing on her piano. She said I never made noise even though I couldn’t play a note.

After my tenth birthday my mother let me take lessons although we had no piano. I walked a mile and a half to my Aunt and Uncle’s house to practice on their ancient out-of-tune upright. My Aunt played piano or accordion for local dances.

Seeing that my determination to learn was not just a passing fancy, Mom and Dad bought me an old used upright. Now I could practice every day.  I was eleven in the fall of 1953 when I had a severe case of measles. I recovered from the measles but had a return of rheumatic fever which I had overcome in early childhood after spending thirty days in the local hospital.

This time there was no doctor in Wrangell, and a doctor in Petersburg, a neighboring town also on an island, treated me. I could attend school mornings, and must spend the afternoons in bed. I had to quit my piano lessons because the lessons were too stressful.

The next summer I could play the piano again, and this time I taught myself using the material from a correspondence course, the U.S. School of Music. Meanwhile, I had fallen in love with the popular music of the day.

A family friend, who’d once played piano in the same dive in Chicago as the now famous Liberace, tuned our piano. I loved to listen to Johnny play. He played three hundred songs from memory. One day he taught me how to keep the base beat to popular music. His long fingers stretched across ten keys, I could only do eight, an octave.

I placed a sheet of music on the piano, The Tennessee Waltz, made famous by singer Patti Page. With my left hand, I played octave, chord, chord, octave, chord, chord, ONE, two, three, ONE, two three, using the chords written for guitar. I pumped the loud pedal at the start of each measure. With my right hand I played the melody notes written on the score. I easily played the waltz, composed in the key of C with no sharps or flats. My first attempt at playing popular sheet music and I loved it.

August of 1956, after the summer salmon seine fishing season ended, Dad and Mom and I moved from Wrangell to Ketchikan. Dad had a year around job as a welder in a shop owned by a friend. The friend allowed Dad six weeks off to fish the summer seining season. I would go to high school in a town of 6,500 people instead of in Wrangell with 1200.

“You don’t feel sad at leaving your friends?” Mom asked.

“Mom, I’ve gone to school with the same kids all my life. I am so excited about getting to meet new people.” Two of the girls I grew up with I had considered close friends. But life had changed as boys and girls became more interested in each other. Girls no longer spent so much time with their friends. There was nothing to miss.

Except the piano. “Mom, I wish I could take my piano. I know Dad can’t get that heavy monster to the float and aboard our boat to haul it to Ketchikan.”

“The couple who are renting our house while we’re gone will keep heat in and dampness out. The piano will survive.”

“I know. But I wish I didn’t have to live without my piano.”

Our first Christmas in Ketchikan, Mom said we didn’t have a lot of money for presents. “Useful gifts are all we’ll have under the tree this year.” I didn’t care. I was busy with all my new friends and school.

“I always wanted a fake fireplace for Christmas, but never had one,” Mom said. “Your dad is going to build me one.”

My dad was famous for his jury-rigging and bad carpentry. At my mother’s request he added a new bathroom in our house in Wrangell. He put all the plumbing in front of the walls because it was easier. There we were with metal water pipes running from basin to tub to toilet on the surface of the fake green wall tile.

No surprise to me that the cardboard fireplace covered in brick printed paper looked cheap and ungainly. We barely had room enough for the tree beside it in our small apartment over the welding shop.

Whatever. Mom was happy, she had her fake fireplace.

As was our tradition, we opened our gifts Christmas morning. Dad wrote rhyming poetry, and he said, “Since we’re having a small Christmas this year, I’ve written you a poem. Each line is in a present, so you need to open them in order.”

“Okay.”  This was really different. I opened each present and it seemed they got smaller and lesser in value. The next to the last line in the poem said, “To find a gift from St. Nick,” I picked up the last present under the tree and unwrapped it. I couldn’t believe it. My parents had given me a toothbrush! For Christmas! I read the final line. “Take a look behind the __”   My mind went as blank as the missing word on the piece of paper. I couldn’t make sense out of the poem at all. My brain was stuck on the unbelievable, a toothbrush as a Christmas present.

Finally, Dad said, “Maybe there’s a gift that fell down behind the fireplace.” He pulled the fake fireplace slightly out from the wall.

Mom led me over to the fireplace. Finally, I saw the smooth, dark mahogany wood, then the gleaming black and white keys. The name, Baldwin written in gold letters. I gasped as Dad pulled the fireplace completely away and revealed my brand new piano.

Not a toothbrush for Christmas after all. Only something needed to hold the last line in a poem. I laughed and hugged my parents, sat down at the piano, my hands roaming over the keys. I heard the most beautiful sound flow from beneath my fingers.

I’d had to leave my precious old piano behind. Now, thanks to the love and generosity of my parents, I’d received a gift I’d thought I’d never have, a brand new Baldwin.

New Book on Kindle- Storm Tossed Heart

I grew up in Southeast Alaska. My dad, Al Binkley, was a fisherman. For a number of years beginning in 1957, he trawled for shrimp. Those memories birthed my novel, Storm Tossed Heart, which I set in contemporary times, although commercial trawling for shrimp is no longer done in Southeast. Many of the events in the book actually happened, but are fictionalized. When I was growing up, Rusty the boat cat, a character in my story, was our cat for several years.

I’m a Bronze Medalist

My soon-to-be-published novel, Storm Tossed Heart won a bronze medal in the My Book Therapy Frasier 2014 contest.

Will Eden’s storm tossed heart find its safe harbor?

Eden Evans wants to continue to deckhand on her uncle’s shrimp boat in Storm Bay, Alaska after her aunt retires as boat cook. She’s determined to run the cannery when Uncle retires. He insists his partner’s son who oversees the canning operation will take over. The son wants to marry Eden, but she doesn’t want him. Eden’s granny wants her to follow in her footsteps and become a missionary in Alaska. Eden harbors a secret fear of storms since her parents’ boat sank and they drowned when she was ten.

Uncle hires inexperienced Todd Tremore as deckhand, fresh from college having a summer Alaskan adventure before he settles for CEO of his father’s business in Sacramento, a job he doesn’t want. Eden is cook and trainer and sets out to force Todd to quit or get fired. She tries to prove to Uncle she can both deckhand and cook.

What happens after this you’ll need to wait and read the book when Storm Tossed Heart makes its debut on Amazon kindle, planned in late summer or fall of 2014.

Life Flight 1945

Life Flight 1945

By Lorna Woods

Based on a true story

Aboard the cutter from Wrangell, Al Henry handed three-year-old Lori to the young Coastguardsman. Thankfully their neighbor on Farm Island had a shortwave radio to call the Coastguard. The small cutter stationed there during the war came as close as they could to Farm Island and sent a small motorboat up the slough to the cabin.

“We’ll take your wife to sickbay where she can lie down,” an officer assured him and Henry watched Edith led away doubled over with pain. Edith was a strong woman. She had to be to have lived with him the last three years in a three-room cabin on an island in the mouth of the Stikine River in Southeast Alaska. Surely she was strong enough to live.

“So what do you do out there on the river?” The Coastguardsman in the mess asked handing Al a cup of coffee and Lori a cookie. The three sat together at the narrow table.

Al took a welcome sip of the strong, fragrant brew. Diesel engines thrummed beneath his feet as the propellers thrust the vessel through the water at thirteen nautical miles an hour.

“Dad and I own a 160 acre farm. We grow a thousand pounds of spuds, raise a hundred head of hogs and fifty head of cattle. I also own a twenty-eight foot boat and seine for salmon during the six week summer season.”

Al patted Lori’s shoulder. “When the Japanese invaded Alaska in the Aleutian Islands I moved my wife and baby out of Wrangell onto the farm. We’re safe from bombing there, I figure. I’m strong and healthy, but farm and fishing are essential to the war effort so the army didn’t draft me.”

Now this, Edith’s insides hurting so bad she couldn’t stand or walk and starting to bleed too.

“Sorry about your wife. Too bad there’s no doctor or hospital in Wrangell. Only 1200 people there, but still, they need medical facilities.”

Al’s hand tightened on the cup. There was a doctor in Petersburg on another island forty miles from Wrangell. He planned to get Edith there. “I know a bush pilot with a biplane. Tony will fly us to Petersburg.”

“I wish you luck. Weather can be pretty crappy in February.”

“Yeah, it can. But we’ll make it.”

They had to. Edith’s life depended on it.

 

Lori safely in Wrangell with his niece, her husband, and one-year-old daughter, Al and Edith climbed aboard Tony’s floatplane moored at the float behind the town hotel. A brisk wind blew and waves rolled in. Tony loosed the cabin biplane from its moorings and the plane bounced and tossed. The wind and waves shoved the plane toward the shore.

“Get out and hold on until I can start it,” Tony yelled.

Al jumped out of the plane into the icy, waist-high water, glad he was six feet tall. He held the plane from going ashore while Tony started the motor. The single engine coughed once, and took off, a welcome sound for sure. Soaked to the waist and shivering, Al climbed aboard into the seat next to Tony. Edith huddled in a seat behind them.

Al saw the wing tip hit the float twice as they took off, tearing the fabric. Tony swore. Airborne he spoke over the engine noise. “It’s snowing toward Dry Pass. We’ll head for the Wrangell Narrows.”

The short flight would take a couple minutes longer was all. Just before they got to the narrows they hit a snow squall. The plane bucked and dipped in the wind and all visibility vanished.

Tony swore again. “I can’t see a dang thing. I gotta land.” The engine drone changed, the pontoons sliced the water; they were down. “We’ll have to taxi through the narrows.”

A boat would have been faster.  Al peered through the windshield as Tony steered them along the narrow, winding, rock-strewn passage. The snow thickened until visibility reached zero.

“That’s it. I gotta shut ‘er down until the weather clears. It’s down on the deck and I can’t run blind.” Tony killed the engine. Silence filled the cabin. The plane rocked and rolled, drifting aimlessly.

Al turned to the back, checked on Edith. She huddled against the side of the cabin her face gray and drawn with pain. She gave Al a despairing look. He wasn’t much for praying; but he hoped she was.

“You okay?” Of course she wasn’t but what else do you say?

“It hurts,” she said her teeth clenched.

He reached for her fist on her lap. He squeezed, then patted. She didn’t relax her hand. Al turned back to face the front. He hated that there was nothing he could do to comfort her.

A snowstorm could last a few minutes, a few hours, or a few days. He could leave it all up to the vagaries of nature. Or he could take the buck by the antlers. “Okay,” he muttered, “ if there is a God like they told me when I was a kid and Mom forced me to go to Sunday school, then I’m asking, stop the snow and help us make it to Petersburg.”

“You say something?” Tony peered at him.

“Not to you I didn’t.”

It didn’t stop snowing, but it lifted off the deck and Tony started the plane, rolled the side window down, stuck his head out so he could see, and taxied forward.

“Hey, Tony. You’re going the wrong way.”

He pulled his head in and snorted. “No I’m not.”

“Look at the compass, dingle-hoof. We’re going south when we should be going north.”

Tony looked and clapped both sides of his leather aviator’s cap. “Ach. I can’t believe I did that.” He turned the plane around and headed the right way.

Tony kept his head out so he could see where he was going. Frigid snow-scented air filled the cabin. Al’s wet pants that had warmed with his body heat chilled his legs again. Edith must be cold, too, but getting close to him as wet and cold as he was wouldn’t help her.

By the time the snow quit, it was dark. “Here we go.” Tony revved the engine for takeoff; they plowed through the water, but didn’t go airborne.

Tony rubbed his face with a hand. “That’s it. We can’t take off, too much snow on the wings. We’ll have to taxi all the way to Petersburg.”

“I’m glad,” Al said. “I have no wish to be flying around in the dark.”

At last they were almost there, only a mile to go. The engine sputtered and quit. Tony threw up his hands. “We’re out of gas.”

He called Petersburg on the radio and later two men in a skiff powered by an outboard motor arrived carrying a five gallon can of fuel. One man kept the boat steady against the plane while the other poured in the fuel. Tony taxied the last mile into town.

Edith was admitted to the hospital that night. The next morning, Dr. Benson entered her room where Al sat by his wife’s side. The nurse had given her a shot of morphine and Edith slept.

“She has endometriosis and I will be doing a hysterectomy. We’re waiting a day before surgery to see if she catches a cold from her exposure. Also, we have a problem. Edith has a rare ab negative blood type and we’re searching for someone in Petersburg with that type to donate blood.”

The doctor left and Al stood, walked to the window and gazed out over snow covered roofs. Petersburg was a bit bigger than Wrangell, 2,000 people. What if there wasn’t anyone else on the island with her rare blood type?

The snow had lifted enough so Tony could see to taxi into town. They had made it safely, like he’d asked. Al decided to try one more time. Okay. It could have been luck, but just in case . . . If that was God, thanks. Now if God would just send one person with ab negative blood to the hospital today to donate for Edith . . .

After lunch the nurse in her white uniform and cap bustled in with a smile on her face. “Good news, you two. Rusty Johnson staggered in to donate blood. He’s the only person in Petersburg with your rare blood type.”

Al knew who Rusty Johnson was: a middle-aged hopeless alcoholic. He looked at Edith. She lay awake, still under the influence of the morphine and feeling no pain. She smiled. “With all that alcohol in my blood from Rusty I won’t need anti-freeze; I should stay warm all winter.”

Al squeezed his wife’s hand. Did God, if he existed, have a sense of humor? Edith sure did. At least Rusty Johnson did one good thing with us life: he helped save hers.

Next morning Al sat in the waiting room watching the door to surgery. He had thumbed through the True magazine, and an old issue of Life; tried to read a story in the Saturday Evening Post, couldn’t remember what he’d read so gave it up. The approximate time Dr. Benson told him the surgery would take had passed.

Were there unforeseen complications? He wouldn’t let himself think the unthinkable . . . what if she died?

The door opened and Al leaped to his feet. Dr. Benson hurried out, his smock covered with blood. Her blood. Fear electrified him. He froze. His breath stopped.

The doctor smiled. “Edith is fine.”

Al pulled in a breath. She wasn’t dead. Edith was okay. He nodded, unable to speak. His legs went weak, he sat.

“You can go on up to her room, she’ll be up shortly.”

Al regained his voice. “Thanks, Doc.” Tears smarted behind his eyes.

Three days later, Al and Edith flew to Wrangell with Tony. They landed in front of town and the plane’s engine stopped. The battery terminal had broken and a local fisherman towed the biplane to the float with his boat.

The three stood on the float, Tony eyeing his passengers. “You two sure are bad luck for me.”

Al grinned. “Maybe so. But that battery terminal didn’t break until we landed safe.”

Al took a last look at the four-passenger biplane and knew the need for the life-flight had changed their lives. No longer would he keep his wife and child on a 160 acre farm on an island in the Stikine River away from town. Dad was ninety and would need to go to live in the Pioneer’s Home in Sitka. Sadness washed over him. Al pushed it away. That was just the way it had to be. The war would be over soon and then he was moving his family back to Wrangell.