A Table Set for Nine

 

Frida sat on the high-backed chair and waited. The grandfather clock ticked as the minutes passed. The sky rumbled, portending storms. She gazed upward with a wary eye and hoped the thunder and lightning would hold off until they arrived.

She set the dining room table for nine people. Her children and spouses were finally coming to dinner. Frida hadn’t seen them since their father died. A lightning bolt flashed through the window and Frida sighed. The house smelled of roast and cookies and now the storm threatened to ruin her much expected evening. 

Frida glanced at her watch. They were late.

She surveyed the room; all was in order. Her eyes rested on the little figurines on the mantelpiece. They were stone figures and metal amulets of the Old Norse gods she loved so much. On the walls hung pictures, paintings she’d done herself of the same old gods as she imagined them and over the doors she’d placed carvings of runes.

An old familiar pain stabbed her heart as she remembered Wayne, her husband, telling her to throw that shit out. She had put them all in a box for thirty years and unearthed them after he died, once the walls had stopped echoing his voice and the floors had ceased creaking with his footsteps. Frida grabbed her old tattered copy of Norse Mythology and pressed it to her chest as she’d done for years whenever Wayne’s remarks stung her soul. She shut her eyes and held it tight and told herself when she opened them, she would see the clean, dusted and vacuumed room she’d slaved over for the past week, and not the shabby pigsty Wayne always said she kept.

The past days had revolved around this dinner. She’d planned the menu, shopped at three different markets for the perfect ingredients, and spent days cleaning the house down to the last nook and cranny.

Fat drops pounded on the roof and window. The grandfather clock ticked merciless as the evening dragged on with no sign of her children. Each ticktock sang “not-coming” and “hate-you”, and “stu-pid”, and “use-less” until the ticking got so loud it morphed into Wayne’s raspy voice and her children’s echoed the words. Frida clutched her book tight and laid her head back against the chair. She fought back tears, and a lump formed in her throat.

The hail pattered down as the tears burst through her eyelids. It thumped and banged and the whole house sounded like a hard-rock concert (another pleasure Wayne had stripped from her).

A tap on the door startled Frida out of her misery. She stood up in a flash, and still clenching her book, glided to the door. Could it be? Did they come after all? Did they brave the storm to see her?

Frida opened the door with a smile which vanished when she saw two tall men on the stoop. One dressed in a dark cloak, half of his face hidden by a lock of hair that covered his eye. The other was muscular with hair so red and wild his head seemed aflame.

“May I help you?” She bleated and cursed herself for not peeking through the peephole.

“Madam, could you spare food and shelter for weary travelers? My sons and I have walked a long way, and we saw your light…”

The cloaked man’s voice was soothing and familiar, as if she’d heard it a long time ago.

“Sons?”

“Hello!” The mellifluous voice came from behind the cloaked man and a smiling blond face appeared. He lit up the night and Frida’s fear and apprehension washed away from her as the young man’s smile warmed her heart.

“Please come in,” she said and stepped aside.

The tall men filled the hallway. She offered to take the cloak, but the man refused.

“You are expecting company?” The red-head asked, pointing to the dining room.

“My children. They are late.”

“Ah.”

“Bad storm out there,” the blond man said and his voice tickled like a baby’s soft laugh.

“Yes.”

She led the men into the kitchen and offered to pack them a meal to go, but as she glimpsed the lovely table, an idea popped in her mind.

“I don’t think my children are coming. They were close with their father, not so much with me.”

“That’s a shame.”

“Would you gentlemen share the meal with me?”

The three men smiled and followed her into the dining room. The storm raged outside but inside the house burst with merriment. Ms. Williams, the neighbor, glanced once or twice in their direction, puzzled by the laughter that broke through the rumble of the storm. She knew Frida was unhappy and marveled that her children had shown up at all.

“They think I’m an idiot, you know,” Frida blurted out.

“Who?” The red-head asked.

“My children. Their father taught them I am weak and stupid. It embarrasses them to be with me in public. My presence shames them,” tears sprang to her eyes as her voice broke, “perhaps they are right.”

“They are not,” the cloaked man spoke in a voice so deep even the thunder quieted, “you have forgotten who you are, but you are not weak.”

The men held her gaze, and the room went silent.

“We have been watching you forever. You are better than you think. We are here to take you home.”

“Who are you?”

“You know who we are,” the cloaked man fixed his piercing blue eye on her.

Frida glanced from one man to another and the fog of insecurity and oppression Wayne had woven around her dissipated. She looked at her paintings, and her figurines and at the book she’d set on the table, and all fell into place, as if she’d found the missing piece of a puzzle. The cloaked man whose hair hid his eye socket because he had no eye. He’d exchanged it for wisdom. The muscular red-head who filled the room and whose footfalls rattled the house and appeared on a thunderous evening, his arms folded above a glistening belt. Finally, the man whose radiance lit the darkest night and whose kind smile melted the stoniest, loneliest of hearts.

“You can’t be…” she stuttered.

“Say our names, and we’ll bring you home.”

“Home?”

“You know where, all you must do is say the words.”

Frida gulped. She’d dreamed this for years. As a child, she’d wished they were real. As a teenager, she’d asked for their help. And, as a married woman, she’d shoved them to the back of her mind yet always hoped they’d take her away.

She pointed to the cloaked man, “Odin.”

Her gazed fixed on the red-head, “Thor.”

She beamed at the blond, “Balder.”

The three men smiled.

***

Ms. Williams followed the policemen into Frida’s house. She’d alerted them because she’d not seen her neighbor since the night of the hailstorm. The house was empty, the grandfather clock the only sound.

Ms. Williams stood in the dining room; she pressed her hands to her chest and whispered, “Wherever you are, Frida, I wish you the happiness you never had.”

A thin veil of dust had settled on the dining room table. It was set for nine.

 

In the Forest

 

The sun shines through the trees and casts playful shadows on the forest path. I know this path well; it leads home. My footsteps crunch the leaves and pebbles underfoot. Birds sing in the trees and the forest is alive with sound. A breeze blows and I catch a whiff of pine and moss. A cloud covers the sun and I sit on a fallen trunk and wipe the sweat from my forehead.

I remove my shoe to tend my aching foot and groan at the blister growing on my toe. I feel I’ve walked for days, yet I set off early, well fed and rested from a good night’s sleep. Why am I so tired?

The sun beats down on the trunk and the heat weighs on me. I wipe my sweaty forehead again and take a swig from my water flask; the cool liquid soothes my parched throat.

My eyes grow heavy and the ground, so mossy and cool, beckons me to lie down and nap.

“Don’t,” I croak to myself, “remember the stories. This is how they start. Changelings, elves, fairies appear to weary travelers as they stop to rest.”

But the fatigue and heat are too much, and my words sound stale in my ears. I want to nap; I want to lie on the cool, damp earth and close my eyes. This forest is as alive with stories as with flora, and sometimes the sprites bring good, and other times they’re harbingers of evil. I’ve always suspected these encounters were dreams.

I give in and welcome the cold dew as it seeps through the back of my shirt. My eyes grow heavy and my body falls away, as if I’m floating.

I jolt and open my eyes; there’s someone beside me. A young boy sits on the fallen trunk and gazes at me, his head resting on his hand.

“Hello,” I say, “are you lost?”

The boy shakes his head and giggles.

“Are you from around here?”

He shakes his head again.

“Where are you going?”

“Home,” he answers.

“Where’s that?” I ask.

“Here.”

“The forest?”

The boy smiles. I gaze into his sparkling eyes and a faint memory tugs at my mind.

“What’s your name?” I ask.

“You know my name.”

“I do?”

The boy nods again. I rack my brains; I’ve never seen the boy, but then, I left years ago. Could he be an old friend’s son? Yet, when I study his broad, freckled face and his wide smile, I recognize no one.

“Are you… Rumpelstiltskin?”

The boy laughs like the chatter of squirrels.

“That’s a fairy tale!”

“Peter Pan?”

“No, that’s only a play!”

“I give up then.”

“You know me in other forms, I’ve been with you all your life. I’ve guided you, taught you, chided you and consoled you. Have you forgotten me?”

He fixes his bright eyes on me; images, memories, flash through my mind, and I’m on the cusp of understanding, of grasping his identity, but it pulls away like ocean waves.

“Are you a ghost?”

“No.”

“Angel?”

The boy smiles, and the sun’s rays beam on him; the brightness stings my eyes. I blink. He’s gone.

“I’m always with you,” his voice whispers in my ear as the wind whooshes through the trees.

I stand up and put my shoes on. The sun is low and sets the forest afire with its last rays. I resume my walk; I have a strange sensation this was no dream. 

 

Campfire

 

“A great beast haunts this forest,” Nicky said, “they say it takes children.”

The glow of the roaring fire pit cast eerie shadows on his face.

“That’s a load of bull,” Chris answered, “can you prove it?”

“No, but can you prove it’s not haunted?”

“Ghosts and beasts don’t exist,” Chris pouted.

“Oh yeah, so how did Johnny disappear, huh? He vanished from his own room, like magic.”

“My dad says his father killed him and buried the body somewhere,” Jerry, a quiet, buck-toothed, freckled, big-eared boy, spoke up, “he says someday they’ll find him and people will know the truth.

“Your dad also says the moon landing is a fake and that Paul McCartney’s been dead for years,” Nicky retorted. Jerry shrugged.

The boys sat around the fire pit Nicky’s dad had lit for them. It was a warm evening, and the boys were camping out in Nicky’s backyard. They’d set up the tent and sat on camp chairs. Nicky gazed at the sky, the moon a mere sliver while Venus shone bright. Crickets chirped in the trees and the crackling fire made it seem they were somewhere in the wilderness; like Jack London, Nicky thought.

They loved camping at Nicky’s because his house was old and the backyard was unfenced. They could walk past the mown lawn and immerse themselves in the forest. Chris and Jerry lived in new houses, in new subdivisions with felled trees and fenced backyards.

Nicky poked at the fire, despite Dad’s orders.

“What do you think happened to Johnny?” Jerry whispered while Chris stuck a marshmallow on a stick.

“I dunno, maybe the beast took him,” Nicky mumbled through toasted marshmallow stickiness, “he lived down the road, ya know.”

They toasted more marshmallows.

“Dad knew Johnny,” Nicky said after a while, “they were friends.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, he says Johnny called him that day because he wanted to show him his new magic kit, but when he entered Johnny’s room, it was empty. They looked everywhere, but never found him.”

The boys talked and laughed and told ghost stories until the fire died. They put on their pajamas and were unrolling their sleeping bags when a rustle in the trees caught their attention.

“Who’s there?” Nicky called out; he’d heard footsteps.

Jerry trembled beside him; the ghost stories unsettling in the dark night. A crack of twigs and Chris whimpered. The forest was pitch black and the boys couldn’t see beyond their noses. Glowing embers remained of the once roaring campfire and the weak porch light did not illuminate the forest.

The ground shuddered beneath them and the boys huddled together, their gazes trying to pierce the thick darkness. A tall shadow and two glowing yellow eyes appeared in the sky. In the dim light of the gibbous moon, the boys beheld a head towering high above the trees. A dull growl shook the branches.

With one long collective scream, the boys burst through the back door, ran up the stairs and barged into Nicky’s room.

“What is it? Are you all right?” Dad ran in and found the boys huddled on Nicky’s bed.

“The beast! We saw the beast!”

The room filled with voices as they all talked at once, and Dad tried to calm them.

“Listen, guys!” He yelled over the hubbub, “The beast doesn’t exist, it’s just an urban legend. I’ve lived here all my life, I should know.”

“But it came out of the forest, I swear!”

“It’s just your imaginations running wild. Come, I’ll show you there’s no one out there.”

They slunk behind Dad. The fire was out and only the tent and the faint outline of the trees were visible in the pale porch light.

“There’s nothing there,” Dad assured them, “maybe it was a forest animal, and you scared it away with your screams.”

The boys admitted defeat; no glowing eyes, no giant face above the treetops.

“Can we sleep in my room?” Nicky asked while Dad fixed them glasses of warm milk.

“Of course.”

The boys glanced at one another and nodded; no one felt like camping now. They wiped their milk mustaches off with their sleeves and shuffled upstairs. Dad walked out onto the porch and gazed towards the woods.

“You ain’t taking these boys, ya hear?” He commanded and stood with arms on his hips in his best Superman pose, “They ain’t for you!”

A grumble in the woods, but Dad stood his ground. He entered the house and locked the door. As he climbed the stairs, he wondered where Johnny was.