First Installment of Short Story

The first time I met Miss Margie, I was crying.

It was spring, and I had endured an entire autumn and winter of school trials, particularly arithmetic and little Betty Haysmill, who was a monster worse than fractions themselves. I was walking home the long way that day, in order to avoid meeting any of the others along the road, and so I went way out down by the edge of Walker’s Eddy, where the cattails were waving kindly in the wind and the birds’ songs soothed my tattered soul. That is where I saw Miss Margie.

She was standing on her front porch, a saggy affair that had probably been a beautiful old Victorian porch when Miss Margie’s father had first breathed it into existence. Now it was old, older than the hills that cradled it. The whole house was a coffee-stained color, and the front window had a cracked pane. Miss Margie wore a blue cotton dress and had her hair pinned tightly up on her head. She was barefoot.

“Hey there,” She called to me. Wiping my nose, I glanced up at her. I had never seen a woman more wrinkled and tan. Her white hair was the lightest thing about her, next to her eyes which were so blue they reminded me of the island and fishing and too much sun and not enough time to explore.

“Hey,” I called back, not eager to be on my way. I wanted to be well through with my cry before I got home, otherwise my mother would see my red nose and ask me what was wrong, and the others would avoid me all night until bedtime. No one wants to play with a crybaby.

“Was you cryin’ for?” She asked softly. There was a lilt to her voice that made it sound like music, but old music, the kind that would play out of a phonograph, all crackly and distant.

“Nothin’.” I said. I had reached that age of unparalleled wisdom when it seemed to me that grown-ups never wanted anything but to make trouble or spoil your fun if you were having any. In those days kids kept their mouths shut if possible, and didn’t waste words when it wasn’t. At least in front of most adults. But Miss Margie wasn’t most adults—that I could tell even in those first few minutes.

“Little girls don’t just cry for nothing. I was one once, so you can’t fool me. Come on up and have a cookie.” She said, smiling. Her teeth were glaringly white, like her hair.

“Okay,” I said, brightening a bit. I was still wary, but cookies where a rarity never to be passed up.

We sat down on her porch. The chair she offered me was considerably less grand than her manner in pulling it out for me. She sat down herself and wiggled her toes, sighing like all old people do when they settle into a chair after they have been standing a long while.

“I’m Miss Margie Atkinson.” She declared bluntly, sticking out an old, skinny hand. I shook it and mumbled my name lowly.

“Mary Ellen Dewberry.”

“Pleased to meet you Mary Ellen,” Said Miss Margie.

“Nobody calls me Mary Ellen, ma’am.” I said.

“What do they call you?”

“Mickey.”

“Mickey it is, then.” She grinned again, and held out a plate painted with pink roses. On it was a pleasant array of stale molasses cookies. I thanked her and chewed slowly, wondering if my nose was back to its normal color yet.

As if reading my thoughts, Miss Margie swallowed her cookie in practically one gulp, and returned to the prior subject. “Now,” She said resolutely, brushing the cookie crumbs from her hands. There was a pitcher of watery looking lemonade sitting on the table in front of us and Miss Margie poured me a glass while I chewed. “What was it you was crying for, exactly?”

I hesitated. Clearly, Miss Margie was an ally. Everything about her reeked of kindred ambition, but still, she was a stranger, and talking wasn’t my specialty, even amongst friends.

“Betty Haysmill and all them at school.” I finally choked out feeling my eyes begin to burn again. I pulled another cookie from the plate without asking. Something told me Miss Margie would understand.

“Betty Haysmill?” She didn’t seem to recognize the name or the problem, so I sought for more words.  

“She made me cry, Ma’am.” I explained clumsily.

“No, child she didn’t.” Miss Margie laughed, a gloriously rich cackle that filled the air with the smell of hope.

“What you mean?” I was confused.

“Nobody can make you cry, sweet thing. You chose to cry, an’ no Betty c’never make you.”She bit into another cookie, wincing a little at its stiffness. 

I thought of Betty and winced myself. “I can’t keep myself from crying, though ma’am. She tells the other girls I’m ugly. And she’s right.” I admitted sadly.

Miss Margie looked at me closely for the first time and squinted those dazzlingly blue eyes.

“Well, you look alright to me.” She snorted. “Now, look here, Miss Mickey.”

“Yes, ma’am?”

“There’s some things you’ve got to know about women, if you’re to survive in this world.” Miss Margie ate another cookie and swept the crumbs from her lap again. I finished my own cookie and mimicked her. She leaned towards me. I leaned back.

“What’s that, ma’am?”

“Women, are at a disadvantage.” She said grimly.

“What’s a dis-ad-van-tage?” I struggled through the large word.

“It means that the world is harder on us than it is on men.” She swatted at a mosquito as it bandied about the mouth of the lemonade pitcher. I pitied the mosquito. Miss Margie’s hand was well trained and looked tougher than leather. The insect retreated to the opposite end of the porch, and seemed to be planning attack strategies. Miss Margie rose to her feet as she went on. She stood with her back to me, and peered out across the fields that must have belonged to her, and out across the street, and the houses in the distance where the town was sleeping in the shade.

“Y’see, Mickey, back when the earth was a whole lot newer than it is now, women was like cows and dogs and land—men traded them back and forth as part of a money-makin’ opp’tunity.”

“What’d they ever do that for?” I asked, wide-eyed.

“Because they didn’t know better, I s’pose.” Said Miss Margie. She sighed heavily. “Them was bad times for us women, though, Mickey. Marryin’ was like hiring, except women didn’t get paid to work for a man for the rest of her life, her father did.”

“That doesn’t make sense.” I said indignantly, the plight of the historical female gripping me strongly for the first time.

“No, it don’t.” Miss Margie sat back in her chair, in order to bat away the mosquito as he crept up on her pitcher. Satisfied with his defeat, Miss Margie smiled and went on.

“When the Lord came to the world, He taught men and women that they ought respect one another, males and females alike. Since then things got better. But y’see, that wasn’t good enough for some women, Mickey. Some of ‘em have got the idea that women should run things altogether. Now, that seems to me like taking more of our fair share.”

“Yes ma’am, it sure does.” I nodded.

“But you want to know what I think?”

I nodded again.

“I think those women are still just afraid of becoming like cows and dogs and land again. They’s afraid some man is going to take everything they’ve got an leave em’ in the dust.” She chewed on her lip for a minute. “Tell me, what’s your daddy like, Miss Mickey?”

Surprised, I smiled. “My daddy? He’s tall and he has dark hair—”

“No, no,” She interrupted, waving a hand at me. “What’s he like? He good to you?”

Shocked I nodded emphatically. “Oh yes ma’am. He is.”

“He talk to you?”

“Yes ma’am. Every day.”

“He do other things with you?”

“Yes ma’am. Right now he’s teaching me how to throw a baseball so I can play next year. And he reads to us out of a big book every night. I can’t remember the name though.”

Miss Margie smiled. “Then I think you are mighty lucky.”

“How do you figure that, Miss Margie?” I said with a flicker of sass, scowling. I didn’t think any girl who had been called ugly at school that day could be very lucky on any account.

“Because I don’t think your Miss Betty Haysmill has that kind of a daddy.” She said.

Then for a few moments we were silent, me trying to wrap my head around the thought that Betty had a father at all. I’d never given much thought to it before.

“What’s that got to do with women being like cows and stuff?” I asked. A splinter of sunlight poked its nose around the edge of the house and speared me in the eyes.

“Well I’ll tell you, but you’s goin’ to have to come back around tomorrow an hear it. I think it’s about dinner time, and your mama would be madder than a wet cat if she knowed I was givin’ you cookies. Scoot along home and come see me again after school t’morrow.” I glanced over at the hill, where my house sat placidly among the others, and I could tell Miss Margie was right. Nobody was out playing in the yard, which meant I’d have to hustle if I was to make it back in time for dinner.

“Thanks for the cookies, ma’am,” I said, hurrying to pick myself up. “And it was a pleasure t’meet you Miss Margie.”

“It was fine meeting you, Miss Mickey.” She replied.

I hurried off and watched her wave at me, a solitary figure on that lonely stretch of road. The house seemed even older than when I’d left it, but Miss Margie seemed younger. Her back was straighter than a yard stick and twice as tall.