The beginning of December

She took a walk, just to the corner, where Helderberg met New Scotland. It was cold, she had her favorite mittens, white and silky, like skin, like milk, and her comic bonnet which she knew made her a character on the street with the lads, which is what she called the schoolboys, the Ormond’s twins. If they weren’t in school they’d be laughing innocently behind her back. If she had had children, they’d be about as old as the lads were now, fifth graders. In the fall, on the first day at School 19, she always found a reason to take a walk, if it wasn’t raining too hard, and she’d follow right behind the lads, walking on either side, hand in hand, with their daddy, who walked too fast for them and rushed them along the sidewalk. She’d want to pick one up, it didn’t matter which, they were identical, and whisper in his ear, mind your daddy, move those little feet, it’s a big day for you, but just another day for him. She could see their lives rolling out in front of them, from this day forth, growing into strapping lads, Albany lads, firemen, maybe, or policemen with good girls as girlfriends and then wives. Her lads. Right now they were in school, old Miss Thompson’s class, same teacher as she had oh, twenty years ago. Same room even, next to the library, first floor, seat by the window looking out at the flagpole, unable to concentrate, thinking, it’s December, only 17, 16, 15, more days ‘til Christmas Eve. Now she hated Christmas Eve almost as much as Christmas Day. 17, 16, 15, more days to go, passionately grateful it would be over, she could get back to little walks to the corner, warm enough with her fur-lined white coat, her bonnet, and her favorite mittens, silky like skin, her husband would have said, back then.