Patricia Rockwell - Essie Cobb 04 - Ghosted (4 page)

CHAPTER SIX

“The past is a ghost, the future a dream, and all we ever have is now.”

                                         
––Bill Cosby

Much later, Essie was still seated in her recliner as her relatives swooped around rearranging her belongings—and apparently—her life for her. 

“And you just press this button when you want to hear the messages,” said Ned, pointing to a large black square at the top of the white plastic box now resting ominously on
Essie’s end table.  Wires ran from the box to her telephone, to the outlet on the wall behind her chair and back.  A mound of food wrappers and leftover trash from some fast food that Pru had gone out for an hour or so ago was strewn around Essie’s small living room.  Her apartment smelled of cheap hamburgers, she thought.  The Happy Haven chef made much more appetizing burgers than the one she’d just eaten.  It tasted more like several layers of cardboard and it smelled worse.  But the beverage was another story.

“And what if I don’t want to hear any messages?” she asked her grandson
, leisurely sipping a strawberry milkshake from a large paper cup.  He chuckled and smiled warmly at her.

“You don’t have to listen to any messages until you want to, Grandma.”

“Which may be never,” said Essie with a twinkle in her eye.    “Yum, this is good.  It’s been so long since I’ve had a milkshake.”  She stirred the ice cream at the bottom with her straw.

“Now, Grandma,” cautioned Ned
in a whisper, “don’t get me involved in this little battle you’re having with Mom and Aunt Pru.  I’m just a handyman following orders.  If someone tells me to unhook this answering machine, I will.  I don’t want to get caught in the middle!”

Essie looked at her young grandson’s sweet face.  Ned always seemed so eager and enthusiastic
—so different from his more lethargic and seemingly surly brothers.  She could never be mad at him, and she guessed his mother never could either.  He could probably use those angelic looks to charm some young woman someday too. 

“So, I press this button?” she asked, placing her finger on the one in question.

“Right!  Here, let’s try it.  We’ve already set up your voice mail greeting.  I’m going to call you.  Don’t answer the phone.  Just let the machine answer and I’ll leave a message and then you’ll see how it works.”

“What?” said Essie as Ned rose and pulled his cell phone from his pocket and headed to the bedroom.

“Don’t answer the phone, Grandma!”

Immediately the telephone began to ring.  Essie looked at her trusty landline phone, now hooked up to the strange answering device as if it were an ailing invalid on life support. 
She set her half-finished drink on the end table.  Her inclination was to reach for the receiver but she resisted.  After two rings, the answering machine made a clicking noise and Essie could hear her own voice saying, “This is Essie.  Leave a message and I’ll call you later.”  It was eerie to hear her own recorded voice.  Then there was another click and she heard Ned’s voice say, “Hi, Grandma.  This is Ned.  This is our test call.  Bye.”  Then she heard another click and Ned returned from the bedroom. 

“Did you hear that, Grandma?
” he asked.

“Yes,” she said.  “So, now what do I do?”

“Just imagine, Grandma, that you were out playing poker—”

“I don’t play poker!” snorted Essie.

“Okay,” said Ned, “that you were out playing Canasta…”  Essie smiled.  “You weren’t here in your apartment and someone called and needed to talk to you.  So, now when they call and you’re not here, they’ll hear this message and they’ll leave a message.  So when you return from… Canasta, you can play your messages and find out if there’s anyone you need to call back.”

“Won’t this thing be recording messages when I’m here?” she asked, confused.

“No,” said Ned gently.  “You turn it on with this ‘on’ switch here whenever you leave your apartment.”  He pointed to another button next to the ‘play message’ button.

“So complicated!” retorted Essie.

“Just a few buttons to remember, Grandma,” said Ned as he squeezed her hand.  “Just one you press when you leave and want to turn the answering part on.  One you press when you want to hear the messages people leave.”

Ned continued in this vein, explaining and re-explaining the answering machine and helping Essie practice the various features until
he eventually felt as if she had mastered all of its working parts.

“You’re a pro, Grandma!” he said
, brushing a lock of wayward blond hair from his forehead.  “Anyone would think you’ve been using answering machines all your life!”

“That would be hard, as no one knew what an answering machine was for most of my life!” she said with a chuckle that the young man shared.

As they were laughing, the rest of the group re-entered from the bedroom.

“Grandma’s a whiz at the answering machine
!” announced Ned to his mother who was carrying a large cardboard box.  Pru followed her, also with several smaller boxes.  The two younger boys, Bo and Dugan, trailed behind carrying loaded sacks and additional boxes.  Neither of them looked terribly enthusiastic and Essie felt sorry for the two youngsters whom she thought should be out doing what teenagers do on a beautiful fall Saturday afternoon. 
Oh
, she mused,
maybe that would be sleeping
.

“Good!” replied Claudia, placing the boxes before Essie’s feet.  Pru and the boys added their boxes to the pile.

“What’s all that?” asked Essie.

“Th
is is all from the back of your closet, Mom,” said Claudia.  “We’ve been sorting through this while you and Ned were busy on the phone.  Bo, you and Dugan hold open those sacks and we’ll put charity items in this one and throw-outs in the other.  Ned, you help too.”

Claudia and Pru
ripped open the first box and began pulling out items.  This box contained old Christmas decorations.

“Oh, my!” said Essie.  “Those are
decorations we used to put on our tree when you girls were children.  I remember that one.” She pointed to a paper star covered with glitter.

“Mom,” said Pru, “you don’t set up a Christmas tree anymore.
You don’t have room enough.  Plus, Happy Haven has that big, beautiful tree they do every year in the lobby.  Do you really need to keep old tree decorations?”

“I guess not,” replied Essie, somewhat forlorn.

“It would be different, Mom,” noted Claudia, “if you used these decorations, but it’s obvious that you haven’t even opened this box in all the years since you’ve been at Happy Haven.”

“Yes, Mom,” added Pru
. “Look!  The box is covered with dust!”

“You’re right,” agreed Essie.

“Toss them?” asked Claudia, holding up several of the sparkly items in both hands like an auctioneer.

“All right,” said Essie, resigned.  “Toss them.  I guess you can’t give them to charity?”

“Mom,” said Claudia, “these are things that have meaning only to our family.  It doesn’t make sense to donate these things.  We’ll donate some items, but that’s what we need to decide now.”

“Yes, Mom,” added Pru, “we need you to help us decide which items to toss and which to donate.”

With Essie finally on board with the sisters’ procedure for cleaning out her closet, the girls moved quickly.  The pile of ten or so boxes from the back of Essie’s closet was quickly unloaded and the items inside separated into bags for either charity or trash.  The trash pile was soon the largest.  As the center of Essie’s living room was piled high with shiny black bags, Claudia directed the boys to start transferring the bags outside to either the van or the Happy Haven dumpster, which they did.

Next
, the sisters started bringing in hanging items of clothes from the back of Essie’s closet.

“My goodness, Mom!” cried Pru as she entered, her arms filled with trousers, shirts, and dresses on hangers.  “I’ve never seen most of these clothes.”

“This is a beautiful dress!” exclaimed Claudia, setting down her pile on a nearby armchair, and lifting one fancy black cocktail dress up high.  “Have you ever worn this?”

“Oh, I think I did
—once,” said Essie from her recliner.  “I may have worn it to one of your father’s business functions.”

“It’s lovely!” noted Pru, moving over to her sister to examine the dress.  “Do you want to keep it?”

“Oh, no,” said Essie.  “Where would I ever wear it?  It’s much too fancy!”

“I wish I were as small as you, Mom,” added Claudia.  “I’d take it and wear it.”

“Me too,” added Pru.  “You’re so petite!”

“Ha!” said Essie, laughing.  “Tell that to
Dr. Graves.  He’s always telling me to lose weight.”

“Do you have any photos of you wearing this, Mom?” asked Pru.  “You must have been stunning in it.”

“Dad’s eyes probably popped out,” added Claudia.  “He loved it when you wore low-cut dresses like this.”

“Too low-cut, if you ask me,” said Essie.  “Hmm.  He did like that dress
, I think.  Maybe that’s why I kept it.  I can’t remember.”

“What should we do?” Pru asked Claudia as the sisters looked at the dress, fingering the material gently.

The three boys returned.

“All the
charity boxes are in the van, Mom,” said Ned.  “Now what?”

“Start folding the
clothes in this pile and put them in a bag and then take them out to the van,” said Claudia, motioning directions to the boys.  The three young men quickly hopped into action and began stuffing clothing into the bags.

“Give it to charity,” said Essie.  “You’re right.  There’s no place for me to wear something like this now
—if I could even fit into it.”

Claudia added the cocktail dress to the charity bag and the boys gathered the new items and headed out.  Claudia and Pru headed back into Essie’s bedroom, soon returning with more clothes.

“I wear that!” cried Essie when she saw her favorite top.

“Good!” said Pru, setting the item aside on Essie’s sofa.  “What about this?”  She held up another item for Essie’s response.  The sisters brought out each and every
piece of clothing hanging in Essie’s closet.  If Essie couldn’t remember wearing the garment within the last year, the sisters put it in the charity pile.  Soon they had removed every box, sack, and hanging item from Essie’s closet.  Essie had given her thumbs up or down on each and every one.  But the sisters weren’t done yet.  They now returned carrying armfuls of folded clothes.

“What’s that now?” asked Essie.

“These are all clothes that we found stuffed in your dresser drawers,” said Claudia.  She set the pieces on an arm chair and started counting.  “Mom, you have over twenty bras!”

“And over forty panties!” added Pru.  “How much underwear do you need?  You surely don’t wear all of this.  Most of it
’s new.  The tags have never been removed.”

“And besides,” added Claudia.  “Pru and I do your laundry
every week, and I know I’ve never seen most of this underwear.  So, I know you don’t wear most of it!”

“Maybe it doesn’t fit,” suggested Essie.

“Then give it away!” said Pru, “and clear out some space in your drawers!  Mom, if we had this much junk in our drawers and closets when we were kids, you would have killed us!”

“Don’t be silly, girls!” said Essie.  “I would never do that.”

“You would have surely made us clean them out,” cried Claudia.

The boys arrived from outside and Essie motioned to her daughters to cease the discussion about underwear.

“Okay, guys,” said Claudia.  “How is the van?  Do we have any room left?”  Pru had wandered back into the bedroom.

“Plenty, Mom,” said Ned, turning and eyeing his brother Bo and his friend Dugan.  “Half full, maybe
?” The two younger boys nodded.  Pru returned with two jewelry boxes.

“Mom,” she declared
, “why do you have two jewelry boxes?”

“What?
” asked Essie.

“I know this one that sits on your dresser,” said Pru.  “But I found this other one in your bottom dresser drawer under all that extra underwear.  It’s full of jewelry too.”

“I don’t know,” said Essie, furrowing her brow.  Pru brought the boxes over to her mother and set them on the end table.  Claudia reached over and opened both boxes.  Inside were a variety of necklaces, brooches, earrings, and rings.

“Some of this is beautiful, Mom,” said Claudia, bringing out
a few of the necklaces and holding them up.

“Oh, look at this lovely
necklace,” cried Pru as she held up a light blue cameo surrounded in what appeared to be pearls and diamonds.

“That’s a lot of diamonds,” said Claudia, taking the brooch from her sister and examining it.

“It’s probably not real,” said Pru.  “I mean, those are surely fake diamonds.  But it is pretty.  Where’d you get this, Mom?”

“I can’t remember
,” said Essie.  “I believe your father gave it to me for an anniversary one year.  But you know me, girls.  I’m just not into jewelry all that much.  You can give it away if you like.”