Annie Kate Limerick: I bought it

After Andrew died I bought a beautiful little house in Chestnut Hill. Martin and Siobhan were finally having children and as tradition dictated, they moved into the big house and I moved into a little house. I took my jewelry box, my wardrobe, and my housekeeper, except that everything in my wardrobe I dyed black. Everything else I bought new from the shops of Philadelphia and New York.

Martin insisted I come for Sunday dinner every week after mass. It’s not that I didn’t want to see them, but I disliked those weekly visits. Siobhan attacked my house like the Devil. Gone were my light walls of beige, blue, green, and white, gone were my French provincial divans, chairs, and cherry wood tables, and gone were the French impressionist paintings I’d bought from the gallery. Siobhan replaced everything with dark and heavy: deep red velvet draperies, dark red and blue rugs, heavy mahogany furniture, foreboding paintings of religious figures. Always the Virgin, too, she looked down at us in every room of that house. Dark, dark, dark.

One at a time, I started refusing Martin’s invitations, even if it meant I’d be seeing less of Patrick, less of little baby Agnes. An adorable grandchild, that one. She’s got red hair and green eyes, just like me. One day, I’ll tell her about being born the year of the Great Famine, growing up poor and waking up every morning, not knowing who’d survive the day, not knowing where the food would come from. And then I’ll tell her our secret, what got us here now. Work like the Devil, I say, work like the Devil.

Brian Larney: In preparation

The train arrived at Penn Station early Saturday morning. Brian wouldn’t have to be at Carnegie Hall until Sunday late afternoon. A whole day to play in New York City! Of course, Brian knew, he’d go to the hall to practice, limber up his fingers, go through his recital a few times. But he knew perfectly well he’d have a lot of free time to wander the streets of New York, go into a few ale houses for some beer, even perhaps meet someone special for the night.

“Name, please,” the eyes greeted him through a narrow slit as he knocked on the street-level door.

He looked about him, pleased with the weather. Greenwich Village always sparkled in May, the sun’s rays shining through new green leaves on the maples, oaks, and elms. He knew exactly how to answer to gain admission.

“Theda Bara, of course.”

A burly man with a walrus moustache and hairy forearms opened the door and let him in. “Right this way, Miss Bara.”

Brian walked inside – dark for a Saturday just after lunch, but he knew the shutters of this establishment would be closed, regardless of the time of day. He sat at the front bar and took a look around. Six men, all over fifty and wearing light-colored suits, sat around a table on one side of the bar, nursing martinis during a rummy game. Two heavy-set men in black funeral suits stood at a barstool, eyes for no one but each other. Three other men sat at the front bar, talking with the barkeep. Brian sat next to the man on the far left side.

“How do you do today?” the man asked Brian. He turned to look – sharp, chiseled features. About thirty or thirty-five, and married, judging by his wedding ring. He’d met them before, usually here in New York. He never dared to go out in Philadelphia – too close to home. But here in New York, he’d always come out and meet someone, married more often than not, but looking for an afternoon siesta.

“I’m better than usual,” he answered with a wink and a nod, “and I expect it’s going to get better this afternoon.” The man smiled, Brian smiled back, confident in the power of his youth. And an afternoon in his hotel room with this married man would be the best preparation for his Carnegie Hall recital he could imagine.

Gracie Honeywalker: Trees in the downpour

They done took me to a damp cellar in Cincinatti, told me wait here, you be safe til the lawyer comes morning. I looked about me, small window up near the ceiling. Cold as a witch’s tit, cold as rain freezing on snow, cold as frozen gray ground.

Looked out that window. Saw nothing but barren trees, barren as the missus who had no children, sure made the master mighty sour. It snowed two weeks at Christmas, bless baby Jesus, then done rained another solid two weeks, no let-up, no stop. Where the good earth not frozen solid, it sure is muddy, muddy as after plowing a field after a thunderstorm.

I’m hiding here, waiting til the lawyer he comes. Maybe he comes tomorrow, maybe he comes in a few days. But they can still get me back, sure as gun’s iron, they can still get me back. Those Kentucky farmers, they got the Cincinatti police in their pockets, John Brown and Abe Lincoln, don’t matter if them Republicans run the land. Got to get out of Cincinatti, soon as the underground opens up a path. Waiting here in the cellar, who comes in next? Lawyer or police folk?

Cristina Rosamilia: Creamy

More sex. Always more sex with him, can’t he just stay off me? And to make matters worse, it’s a hot, muggy afternoon. He stinks to high heaven. He doesn’t even want to go upstairs. This is my mother’s kitchen. They’ll be home any minute! I just want to read my book. I don’t even know where I put my glasses. My hair’s a mess. I’m not sure when I last cleaned up myself. Angelo smells like old fish. Did I mention we’re in my mother’s kitchen?

Maybe I hear the front door – no, Ma and Pop, they always come in the back door. Surprise, Ma and Pop! Here’s Angelo, violating your only daughter right on your kitchen table. How about some antipasto and red wine before dinner tonight?

I can’t resist the fuzzy teddy bear. Worse yet, Angelo knows it. He knows I can’t resist his hairy chest, bouncy tummy, and worst of all the hips. He shakes those hips at me and I go all googly-eyed. And he knows it, I can’t stand it. Got to keep the fool in line, you know. Got to let him know, hey mister, I’m the boss around here.

There he goes. He tosses his shirt over the stove. Why can’t it light a fire? Then he’d have to stop. But no … he has to lit a fire in his pants, that one. And then off come his dungarees. Oh, that’s nice. He’s got me going now. And it feels warm and creamy.

The back door, am I hearing it opening? Nope, that’s the roof creaking.

“Angelo,” I say to him, “when you’re done, go fix that roof for Ma and Pop.”

Norman Balmoral: Now is the time

Without letting go of her left hand, he turned his lips to kiss her right fingers, a wet and needy kiss. He felt the smooth, spongy texture of her tongue and it electrified him.

He mustn’t go any further. Norman knew from the women of Italy – from Cristina, too – that once he passed a certain point, kissing a woman as intriguing as Agnes Limerick, he’d be unable to stop himself. But this kiss with this girl! Unlike any other he’d ever experiences with a woman, it seemed divine providence intervened to bring their bodies together. He felt the stirring of passion in his pants. It felt so good, rubbing back and forth against his shorts, the head poking out from his boxers, feeling the smooth cotton of his chinos as his shaft grew to a full arousal.

He began to thrust his body toward hers. For the first time, he knew she wanted him, just as he wanted her. Her eyes, her mouth, her tongue all told him, I want this, here and now. This is your purpose for me, the one thing you can give me that really matters. He felt the erection between his legs, a protrusion that now stood straight up between his legs, demanding release. He could not be tamed now.

He buried his lips into hers, his tongue deep inside, kissing her in a way he never thought possible. It felt exactly right. He broke free and breathed hard. He read in her eyes. Take me with you now, Norman. I need to be connected to you. Now.

Norman went over and locked the front door, feeling the bobbing pleasure between his legs with every step. He came back, grabbed her by the waist, and led her to the back office. Once inside, they shed their clothes. He plunged himself inside her.

Gracie Honeywalker: Describe the silver lining

Got me a real good farm now. You might say, I got it good. Place to live, a roof over my head, eleven youngs ones helping out with the chickens and cows. Ain’t nothing more a widow could ask for. All things considered, it ain’t too bad.

Old Man Honeywalker, he done died two months ago. He done brought me to this place back in ’71 from Cincinatti. That’s where I escaped back in ’62. Underground took me there, before Lincoln’s soldiers done freed the place in ’63. Shoot, could’ve waited just a year and wouldn’t a had to escape on the underground. Could’ve walked right out the front gate and throwed a tomato at Old Master and Old Miss. What’s done is done, I say. Got me a real life here up the state in New York.

We got us a real cold winter here. Rain’s bone-chilling cold. Got us a leak in the roof in December, just before Old Man kicked the bucket. Aloysius, our oldest, fixed the leak. Then after Old Man died, it froze over something fierce and we had an ice Christmas like none other I ever experienced, not even in Cincinatti before I met Old Man.

Nothing could stop me, though, being faithful at Christmas. Got me and the young ones out to St. Bartholomew’s for a real nice Christmas mass. Near done got frostbite from the cold on the walk down the hill to church. Beetrice, the youngest at three, she near slipped and fell. But we got there, all twelve of us, healthy and happy. No husband, no heat in the house, just four fireplaces and kindling. Happy to wish Jesus his birthday praises.

Collin Doherty: An old man alone

The musty parish rectory creaks in the rain and I remember Kathleen. I am grateful for the sound of rain on the slate roof, I am thankful for the creaking sound of ancient floor boards beneath my unsteady feet, I am blessed by the pitter-pat of rodents coming from the attic. The noises soothe me, they comfort me.

When mass is over and the people go home, I walk up the narrow, groaning staircase to this apartment. When the workday is over and my secretaries go home and the nuns go back to St. Monica’s, I retreat to the rooms I’ve called mine for nearly forty years. By myself, it is just I, Father Collin, monsignor of St. Patrick’s.

Alone upstairs I remember Kathleen Gallagher with her dark brown hair, her saucer brown eyes. I remember when she came to me first and I remember when she left me last. We would sit, side by side – an old, white-haired man with black glasses and the young girl, not yet eighteen, the world hers for the asking – and I advise her on the lessons of life.

She’d take my advice, she’d ignore my advice, but she’d always smile those saucer brown eyes at me. When she visited me, her company would ease the silence of the unending hours at the upstairs rectory. I would remember her silky soprano, the vibrato of her gentle laugh, her long brown hair that would bounce when she turned her head. And then she’d shake my hand and be gone.

Now Kathleen has married and moved to Lancaster, I am back to my routine. Mass, then upstairs. Work in the office, then upstairs. Walk the hallways of the school, then upstairs. Thankful for the creaking noises of the rectory, the rain on the roof, the rodents in the attic.

Siobhan Limerick: Every month

Lately it’s more difficult it’s become, I can tell you, managing my children, all six of them. Ever since James has closed down Limerick’s Bricklayers, Patrick done nothing but haunt the house. Just because the lad is out of a job, it doesn’t mean he can just stay at home. I never had this difficulty with my son – always out and about, that one, gallivanting through Olde City with his friends from school, the good Lord doing God knows what. I just wish my brother had better influence with the lad. For goodness sakes, Patrick certainly saw enough of his Uncle Collin at St. Patrick’s School all those years.

At least Agnes is now out of the house. My daughter, always smart and lucky, she has a new job – working at the parish office at St. Monica’s. An easy job for the lass to get, I can tell you, for my brother holds a lot of sway with the priest at St. Monica’s and Lucy, that’s Agnes’s aunt on her father’s side, God rest is sainted soul, she’s been in the convent at St. Monica’s for more than twenty years.

Mother Limerick understands, but Patrick wouldn’t understand why, on the first Monday of every month, I head out to Gladwyn in the ’23 Ford his father bought for the family. Patrick mostly drives it this day, but I’m capable, too, you know. Simply because I’m a woman doesn’t mean I can’t drive. But it is a luxury, spending the money on gasoline, money being so scarce these days. But since Agnes is now bringing some money home, I can afford my monthly trips to St. Mary’s.

Today is a beautiful spring day – the beginning of June. All the trees have sprouted their leaves, the impatiens are in full bloom, and the geraniums are just around the corner. Philadelphia at its most lush, a sight to behold, even from behind my thick glasses and widow’s weeds. I’m going to visit my other four, just like I do every month, rain, snow, or shine.

St. Mary’s is just beyond the Stoneleigh estate, and I can see the twelve foot hedges surrounding the Hass family’s mansion. They’ve been so good to St. Mary’s, donating time and money to the park’s restoration. But for them, it might’ve gone to seedling pine. So I drive into the park and go up to my appointed spot – always the same, month in, month out. And I walk across the lawn to the burial ground. Always, today being no different, I make a sign of the cross and kneel at Martin’s grave. God bless my husband, now gone 13 years. And then I lean down to the empty space next to him – this one, without name and without stones, where my four babies rest, one on top of the other, the last one gone now more than twenty years ago. Perhaps one day 

Cristina Rosamilia: Last night, verging on sleep ...

Pearl Buck has a house just one block away from Agnes. I'm so jealous I could spit. Spit on Angelo, I mean, for being too poor to move away from Christian Street. After nearly ten years of marriage, we're still living in my parents' house. True, we did have our own apartment until Angelo lost his job back in '30, but that was seven years ago. He tells me every time I ask, he's saving enough money for us to buy a house, but it hasn't happened yet. When it does, I doubt it'll be to Rittenhouse Square. My favorite neighborhood in all of Philadelphia, with the square, fountains, forty foot oak trees, and lots of birds trilling in the park. Mothers and babies, too, like Agnes, who walks with Grace around the perimeter with Baby Harold in his stroller.

Last night I was reading "The Good Earth" in bed, Angelo snoring beside me. Goodness, I wish he'd wear some clothes to bed. We're not teenagers anymore, you know. Instead of every day, we now do it maybe once a week. Having the two boys'll do that to your you-know-what life. But there he is, sawing away, naked as the day he was born, his hairy chest and legs rubbing up against my arms. I have to admit, it feels good. Yes, he still does it for me, but must I be distracted when I'm trying to read Pearl Buck's masterpiece? It's enough that the boys distract me right until they fall asleep. Always a hard chore.

I nodded off last night to the strangest of dreams -- Norman came back to me, told me Agnes had run off with his mother to become a Chinese missionary. Norman said, Cristina, let's elope now, while we still have the chance, case Agnes comes home. We'll go live in San Francisco, Las Vegas, or maybe even Pocatello, Idaho. Always wanted to live in Pocatello, says Norman in my dream. And all of a sudden, Norman and I are running through a waterfall. But then I wake up, and I've got this terrible post-nasal drip running down my throat.

Victoria Balmoral: A nurse

She sat in her bedroom in the rear of Agnes's house, drapes closed, door shut and locked, the bed made, all her clothes put away. When she'd moved into the house, Agnes had given her a plush armchair and nightstand. She kept these by the back window for its view of the sidewalk and Philadelphia's oak trees, but these days she kept everything shut. She needed it that way. Victoria stared into space, nothing to read, nothing to sew, no one to talk to. Agnes went about the house downstairs, cooking meals for the children, dusting and cleaning the house. How she did it, Victoria had no idea.

Today Victoria could hear the pitter-pat of her hard soles on the wood floors above her. Grace and Harold's bedrooms were on the third floor, and little Harold right above Victoria. Her grandson had come down with scarlet fever three days ago and Agnes played nursemaid to the 8-year old boy. Poor little Harold, a fever of 102 and nothing to do but lie in bed and listen to Grace read "Johnny Tremain" to him. He hated novels and he didn't especially like his big sister. But she read to him nonetheless. And Agnes, who seemed too happy and carefree these days, diverted her thoughts from the abyss to taking care of her son.

Victoria remembered years ago when Norman and Neil had various illnesses in their house. All gone now. The house, lost to the Depression almost a dozen years ago. Cornelius, dead for three years. The family's general store, sold seven years ago. Neil, married and living in Doylestown with his nasty Bavarian wife. Victoria could barely bring herself to say her name, even if she was mother to three grandsons. And Norman -- the very thought sent her into a crying tailspin, Norman -- dead now six weeks, killed in that London bombing raid. How could Agnes go on, paying any attention to Grace and Harold, cooking, cleaning, going about her life, when everything had come to a screeching halt the morning the priest had walked up and knocked on the door?

Norman Balmoral: Not what I planned

The cable holding the upright piano snapped and the instrument fell to the ground, right in front of the entrance to the Versailles. Too bad no one was standing there, Norman thought. It would've been nice to see someone get killed in this precise moment. Good or bad, the incident diverted their attention from what they were discussing as everyone rushed to look at the scattered remains of the instrument.

"It was a Wurlitzer," Agnes said. "I knew it just by looking at the pedals. But oh, that poor piano!"

Agnes noticed everything about pianos, but then again, she performed classical piano better than anyone Norman had ever known. Obviously she'd noticed the instrument as the crane lifted it up toward the sixth floor window. But, Norman thought, astounded and bug-eyed, how on Earth could Agnes Limerick care a whit's end about a mass of wood, steel, ivory, and piano wire? Absurd, just absurd, as if the instrument had a living, breathing soul! Given their problems, how on Earth could Agnes care?

That poor piano, what about poor us? He thought it, but didn't say it. He had to be sensitive to what she'd been saying, right out here on Locust Street, right in front of his family's church. St. Mark's Episcopal. If the priest walked outside and overheard the conversation, he'd have a thing or two to say to Norman. He'd tell Norman just how he'd sinned, how he'd committed one of the worst of all possible sins -- and then he'd tell him, you have to pay the price. You need to seek absolution. You need to make amends. Oh, yes, Norman Balmoral knew very well what he had to do. He shuddered at their future together -- and their baby's future, being born into a world like this. They'd have to get married. But the money? Where would the money come from? Norman had no job, his parents could barely make ends meet, living above the general store in West Philadelphia. Why, every day they had to look out the front window at the vacant house across the street, where his parents had spent thirty years of marriage, a house that now bore a "Foreclosure Sale" sign on it. Marriage and a baby: not what he'd planned.

He pursed his lips, looked up at the sky, breathed in through his nose, and exhaled through his mouth. Dear God, it felt good to see the sky.

"Agnes, sweetheart," making his voice as velvety smooth as his baritone would allow, "we need to get married. That's all there is to it."

Why did she look crestfallen at his words? Did she still give a hooty-patooty about the demolished piano?

Brian Larney: Tell us how easy it is

"Wrong!"

Agnes hadn't gotten beyond the second measure of "L'isle Joyeuse" before Brian baritoned his "Wrong!" and did one of his collapsing expressions, glasses twisted on his face and tongue hanging out the left side of his mouth. Agnes couldn't help but laugh. Brian playing facial games and poking fun at her piano playing always amused her, especially when she was trying to master a really difficult piece.

Debussy must've had really thin fingers, because the music he wrote always seemed to happen in the space of half an inch. All those fast notes, so close together on the piano. With her big paws, thick fingers, and her killer thumb (that's what Brian called it), she had to admit, Debussy just killed her, practice though she might.

"Let's try it again, Agnes ... this time give it some sexiness. Like you're getting the best lay in the world. Even from Norman!"

Brian was always playing the sex card with her piano playing. The way he talked, you'd have thought the piano was a sex toy, a way for Brian to seduce women. Oh, wait a minute -- a way for Brian to seduce men. How could she forget? It was one of his most endearing qualities.

"Let's go to the ending now and make me cream my pants."

Oh, Brian, please, the children are upstairs! Norman had only been dead six months, Brian had moved in just four months ago, Grace was upstairs reading "Little Women" and Harold was playing with his toy cars, and Victoria sat in the parlor, knitting a sweater for Grace. Agnes worried about Victoria. Her mother-in-law sat alone in the parlor, knitting, too many hours of the day. She hadn't really gotten over Norman being killed in the London bombing.

Back to Brian and "Isle of Joy." Okay, she'd give him an orgasm at the end of this piece. Hopefully, she wouldn't also blow the roof off the house. That'd be expensive.

--

James M. Wood

Author, "The Grace of Agnes Limerick" (available Spring 2012)

http://jmw-daily-write.blogspot.com/

333 Sunset Drive

Four Seasons 206

Fort Lauderdale, FL 33301

(954) 465 9856

Allow me to introduce myself again

At the present moment, I'm focused on being the son of Elizabeth Barlow Wood. She's not quite 79, in fact on Thursday she'll reach the precise age of her step-mother on the day she died -- and will then "out-survive" her parents. All three of them. Her father lived to be 77, her step-mother lived to be 78 plus nine months plus 29 days -- Mom's age on Thursday -- but her biological mother, Mary Gallagher Barlow, died in January 1940 at the age of 29. My mother's on my mind all the time right now. Three weeks ago, she had a massive cerebral hemorrhage that led to a stroke, disabling her in ways we don't yet know. She's recovering and it's likely she'll live some time longer, whether a month or ten years, we don't know. But on Saturday, she was finally able to mouth words and sentences through her tracheostomy. Before I left to return to Florida, I said, "I love you, Mom," and she mouthed back, "I love you, too." A priceless memory for me, no matter what happens.

Mothers, we owe them so much. I learned even that from my own -- how, even days before her stroke, more than 70 years after her mother Mary's death, she mentioned her mother, how she missed her still.

What Mom and most other people don't know is that my novel is a tribute to her mother. My heroine, Agnes Limerick, and her story are based on the life of Mary Gallagher Barlow. But with a lot of twists, because in my story, Agnes lives, prospers, and becomes an early feminist in 1930s-1940s Philadelphia. Mary may have died in real life, but I've resurrected her in the form of Agnes Limerick. And I've allowed her to live a long, rewarding, and fulfilling life. I've also brought many other characters to life -- some real, some not so real. And most people don't know that. Her husband, Norman Balmoral, was really my grandfather, Ralph Barlow. Her daughter, Grace, is my mother Elizabeth. Her mother, Siobhan Doherty Limerick, was really Mary's mother, Eleanor Enright Gallagher. Her piano teacher, Brian Larney, was really my own piano teacher, Ralph Zitterbart. Her dear mother-in-law, Victoria Balmoral, was really my other great-grandmother, the first Elizabeth Barlow. And other characters are brand new: Gracie Honeywalker, Cristina Rosamilia, just to name a few.

This is my fourth round robin, and I'm planning to repeat what I did in the third one, which is to do the daily writes from the points of view of my novel's characters. No one knows that, either.