MINERVA (standard:romance, 1823 words)
Author: BENTLINK	Added: Nov 18 2004	Views/Reads: 3611/2346	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
A chance for a little more "Muskrat Love" is what keeps us all going.

Click here to read the first 75 lines of the story

stereo played "Muskrat Love" and a sudden upwelling of large tears 
almost ruined her so carefully applied makeup. Hearing this song by The 
Captain and Tineal invariable brought up floods of memories.  Sweet 
reminders of her and Max together; pink edged visions of the funny ways 
they had found to twist, turn, and intertwine all over the bed after 
making love. Needing desperately to keep touching but at the same time 
not wanting to look at one another as though they were unworthy or 
ashamed of taking and giving so much pleasure.  Other vision always 
quickly followed, sad dark things, memories from later in their lives, 
near the end when Max was deathly ill, with the cancer eating his will 
to live away.  Images of her holding him and rocking first one way and 
then another seeking a position, an angle that would lessen his 
suffering and her pain at not being able to help.  "NO! Max is gone," 
she loudly said interrupting her tears. 

McDees was as busy as usual.  It was amazing when you stop and think
about it, all this early morning business just by selling hot coffee 
and egg things to people too busy to cook at home. Minerva had always 
thought of her self as a good cook and knew she could easily prepare 
any of the things she purchased here each morning at the local McDees.  
But still even after a year, she did not like being alone in the cold 
and empty house early in the morning. It was the nearness of others not 
the egg things that brought her here each day to the yellow arches. 

She parked her car then entered the McDees by a side door and made a
"bee line" for the ladies room to fix her Muskrat damaged makeup.  This 
really was a "New Minerva" she observed. The old Minerva would not have 
been wearing eye makeup and even if she were would not have cared if it 
got a little damp. 

Tears dried and makeup restored she returned from the restroom to find
the line of people waiting to place orders was long and seemly made up 
for the most part of men with small children.  Saturday she thought 
divorced men having visits with their kids.  She formed a mental 
picture of the men's tiny apartments and of the new someone they had 
met just last night still sleeping, while their new lover makes like 
Dad for a day.  She found herself thinking more and more about men and 
sex.  She had also become very critical of men and their behavior.   
These were both healthy signs according to the counselor she was 
seeing.  "Its normal and natural that you should have anger towards 
men" the counselor had told her  "You may even at some point discover 
that you are very angry with Max for leaving you with all this 
heartache and responsibility even though he could not avoid it" 

The serving line to the counter had moved very slowly because the
"Saturday Daddies" seemed even more unsure than the kids about what to 
order and what plastic toy was included with what breakfast item. 

"Yes please" she replied to the counterman, "some catsup for the hash
browns would be nice" Minerva made her way laterally along the 
stainless steel serving counter to where the coffee pot, cream and 
sugar were all stationed within easy reach of the McDees customers.  
McDees patrons were quite accustomed to stepping over and around the 
many underfoot children in order to fill their cups or pour their own 
refills. 

For a while after Max died she found herself wishing she had his child.
Someone to help share the pain and loneliness Max's passing had 
created. 

Later she came to see this had been a completely selfish wish on her
part, an effort to substitute something, someone for Max and fill the 
dreadful void his passing had made in her life.  After a little more 
time she understood the true extent of her pain but still felt ashamed 
that she had ever thought about causing an innocent child to grow up 
with out a father just so she could have someone to share her grief. 

As was usual for the weekend children were moving to and from the
serving counter of McDees, in an unsteady stream.  Unsmiling, a look of 
hard concentration etched on their faces, again and again returning to 
the counter to collect the forgotten napkins or replace a dropped 
utensil.  Judging from the expressions on their faces this getting and 
eating Saturday breakfast with Dad at McDees was serious business. 

A little girl wearing a sundress caught Minerva's eye. The dress and
matching ribbon in the girl's hair were both very much like the things 
Minerva had worn as a child.  Minerva still had the old family photos 
of herself, her family members and pets.  Thin slices of how things had 
been in happier times.  Silent photographic reminders waiting in her 
half filled album to be joined by photos not yet taken, photos from the 
new life Minerva was determined to have. 

When Minerva was twelve she had discovered an adolescent sparrow that
left its nest too soon.  The tiny bird had been doing hop-flaps across 
the front yard of her home scarcely one pounce ahead of Shadow, her 
family's black house cat. Minerva interrupted the cat's deadly game of 
tag by using some loud handclaps and a scorn laced shame-on-you to send 
him scurrying for his dark hiding place beneath the side porch.  She 
carefully collected the tiny exhausted bird in both her hands and held 
it gently to her chest just above her heart.  The bird rested there for 
only a few moments before it began to flutter its little wings.  
Suddenly and out warning standing here at the McDees counter that same 
gentle sensation was with her again, small-feathery softly fluttering 
wings near her heart. 

The fluttering feeling had begun the moment she first noticed the man
about her own age watching and smiling as she poured coffee into her by 
now overflowing plastic cup. 


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