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  Mr. Hancock’s Signature: The dead walk in Monteray. The corpse of a nearly forgotten farmer named Hancock arrives via train. Ian Washington remembers Mr. Hancock and vows to return the body home. Yet Mr. Hancock's body will not rest while Ian works to reopen a cemetery, and the corpse staring each morning upon the doorstep forces the town to choose between the isolation of their fear or the hope of their fellowship.

  The House on Maple Street

  Brian S. Wheeler

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  This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or places, events or locales is purely coincidental. The characters are productions of the author’s imagination and used fictitiously.

  Copyright © 2013 by Brian S. Wheeler

  The House on Maple Street

  Contents

  Chapter 1 – Concealing the Gray

  Chapter 2 – Secrets Lost

  Chapter 3 – Wardrobe and Magic

  Chapter 4 – A Pair of Old, Brown Shoes

  Chapter 5 – A Drop of Ink in the Snow

  Chapter 6 – A Mask and a Reunion

  Help Spread the Story

  About the Writer

  Other Stories

  Chapter 1 - Concealing the Gray...

  "That charm looks splendid around your neck, Max," Gerald winced as a splash of dye stung in the corner of his eye. "Why, that old key hasn't lost a bit of its old shine."

  "Flattery will get you everywhere, Gerry," Maxine stretched to reach a paper towel on the kitchen counter, and the bronze key jangled at the end of the silver necklace her husband Richard had given her as an anniversary gift. "Now sit still before I get any more of this stain into your eyes."

  Gerald tried his best to deny a chuckle and held still upon the folding chair set in the middle of Maxine's kitchen, linoleum floor. Maxine was in high spirits that Saturday, and Gerald wished to do nothing that might frustrate her efforts to summon a young shade of dark black back to his aging, gray beard.

  "Well, look in the glass," and Maxine waved a small, hand-held mirror across Gerald's face. "You tell me if you see any spot of gray I might've missed. I'm still too young to be dating a man with gray in his beard."

  Gerald nodded as Maxine held the mirror, hardly breathing to prevent any more of the black dye from seeping off his apron to stain his shirt.

  "I think the beard looks fantastic, Max."

  Maxine pinched Gerald's ear. "Don't be so quick to answer. I tell you, I'm still too young to be sharing a bed with a gray, old man."

  Gerald was certain that Maxine had painted each course hair of his beard a deep color of black several times over. He had sat upon that folding chair placed in the middle of Maxine's kitchen each Saturday morning during the course of the spring and summer and waited while Maxine did all she could to paint clean the traces of his age. Maxine had dyed his beard black for such a long string of Saturday mornings, and yet Gerald knew that it would do no good to remind her of the previous weekends' successes, regardless of how long the boxes of dye promised effectiveness. Her mind would still regard that morning's session with Gerald as her first attempt to combat her lover’s age. Thus Gerald each Saturday morning bent his stiff knees into that folding chair without protest. He never grumbled about the fumes. He never complained about the stains. Gerald had no desire to remind Maxine of her slipping memory.

  So Gerald took the mirror into his hands and slowly passed it along his face. Old age was a cruel and diligent worker. He knew the reflection did not lie. Yet when exactly had the wrinkles expanded so wide from the corners of his eyes? When had his bronze cheeks faded into a surface of rough parchment blotched by so many age spots? How had his forehead grown so high? Why had his hair turned so wispy and thin?

  "Now that I give it a second look, Max," Gerald held the mirror above his right ear, "I think there might be a trace of gray here in my sideburns. Just enough gray to need a little more attention."

  "I'll have you looking as young as the day I first spotted you in the snow." Maxine winked, and the key fastened upon her silver necklace glistened in the kitchen's light. "I was thinking, Gerry, that we might drive by the home on Maple street later this afternoon. Would do my mood a little good to see that old house another time."

  The decades had not scraped as deeply across Maxine's face as they had Gerald's. Yet Gerald thought time had been downright wicked in its dealing with his life's one, true love. The years had refrained from so savagely contorting Maxine's face with wrinkles and splotches. Instead, the years claimed terrible measure upon Maxine's memory. Her dark eyes sparkled with all the twilight they had held when Gerald had come upon her lonely, crow figure seated upon one of the old library's cold steps in the middle of the snow. Her black hair never suffered gray's blasphemous touch. Her skin had hardly wrinkled at all, though she was but a few years younger than Gerald. For a while, after circumstance had brought precious Maxine back into his life, Gerald had envied his only, true love, before recognizing that time demanded a more terrible price from Maxine.

  "I don't know, Max," Gerald proceeded cautiously, "I don't know about looking at that old house on Maple street again."

  "Dammit! Don't move, Gerry!" Maxine flooded Gerald's sideburn with dye, and black dripped down her subject's face. "Hold still so I can reach that gray!"

  "I am holding still." Gerald hissed through his teeth.

  "One more move and I'll smack you with my fly-swatter."

  "I won't even breath, Max."

  "Sit still and we'll finish with your beard before driving to see that old house one more time."

  Gerald worried if he had invited ghosts to haunt Maxine when he had offered her that old, bronze key now tied to her necklace. He tried to deny the hurts the new days delivered to Maxine's mind. He tried to ignore the dents he found in the bumpers and panels of Maxine's car. He tried to pay little attention to how Maxine's refrigerator crowded with unopened bottles of maple syrup. He did his best to chuckle whenever Maxine repeatedly asked him to revisit that empty lot along Maple St. where an old home no longer stood. But Gerald could not ignore all those things together. He could not deny how time faded Maxine's mind.

  Maxine stepped back from the chair and smiled. "You can keep your invitation to my bed a little longer, Gerald Hollenkamp. You're not so young, but at least you're not so old as to have dried up all gray."

  Gerald smiled, very
much relieved that Maxine's thoughts retreated from floating memories of that old home along Maple St. "That's pleasant to hear. Think we might turn the television on and watch the ballgame as we wait for my beard to dry?"

  Maxine rummaged behind the bottles of maple syrup stacked in her refrigerator before retrieving two cans of beer. Gerald grimaced at his first pull. He didn't want to think how stale the contents of that can may have grown at the back of Maxine's refrigerator. He watched Maxine's lips curl as she hesitated in the center of the kitchen.

  "The remote control's probably beneath one of the couch cushions, Max."

  "There's no reason for the remote to be there."

  "I think I might've left the remote there last night."

  Maxine frowned. "But you didn't sleep over here last night, Gerry."

  Gerald forced a smile, though his heart cracked to realize how Maxine's memory failed to remember his arrival yesterday afternoon. "Try the cushions all the same. Those remote controls sure have a strange way of crawling from one place to the next during the night."

  Maxine found the remote beneath a green couch cushion just as Gerald said she would. She had no difficulty in remembering what button powered the television console. She showed no trouble in finding the proper channel for the baseball game.

  "Here we go, Gerry," Maxine reclined into her favorite spot upon the couch. "I think Ace Henderson's on the mound this afternoon. Should be a certain win for the boys in blue with him throwing. Did I ever tell you of the weekend I spent with Ace Henderson?"

  Gerald pulled long at his old can of beer so that he did not sigh. Ace Henderson had not pitched for well over four decades. How many phantoms trespassed upon Maxine's days?

  "His complete game that October was sure something, wasn't it Max? A two-hit shut-out. They might not have won the championship, but no one can fault Ace Henderson for it. A shame the boys in blue haven't even made it back to the playoffs since."

  Maxine's eyes sparkled as they watched the players rotate around the diamond glowing upon her television. "I'll never forget the party we threw that year at the shoe factory. I'll never forget how widow Thurston shut down the factory so all of us could watch that game. I brought cheese potatoes for the pot-luck. Ray Smith brought a keg of beer for all of us. It tasted like champaign after Ace got the last out. That sure was something. Don't you remember that party?"

  Gerald feared Maxine didn’t recognize him as she turned her sight away from the television to regard him. Her face softened into a gaze Gerald recognized she had never intended to share with him, a look Maxine had given to a man other than Gerald Hollenkamp. Gerald didn't move on that folded chair set in the middle of Maxine's kitchen. He prayed she would still know him. He feared to consider a time that may come when she would only know him as a stranger. Gerald held his breath while he watched Maxine search for her husband Richard, twenty years ago lowered into his grave.

  Maxine frowned, and the stone strength usually so customary to her face returned with a flash. "Oh, forgive me, Gerry," Maxine sighed, "I forgot for a moment that you were still serving in the Army when the widow Thurston threw that party at the shoe factory. Forgive me if I made you feel left out of something. It was just a very special party."

  Gerald grinned and felt the dye dry upon his beard.

  "It's a wonderful to hear you describe it."

  "The boys in blue will win a championship in our time, Gerry. You just wait and see. I promise to keep you a little longer so we can share in the memory of it."

  "Promise?"

  "I promise."

  Gerald watched the game's first two innings from his fold-out chair in the kitchen. Between the top and bottom of the third, Gerald joined Maxine upon the couch, the plastic apron still fastened around his neck to keep any dye that might still be moist away from Maxine's furniture. Maxine said nothing more to him, nor he to her, as the game's outs were recorded. Both dealt with the ghosts and regrets as they knew best.

  Together, they prepared baked lasagna for dinner with the items Gerald had carried to Maxine's home. Maxine remembered each of that recipe's ingredients and steps. She betrayed no hardship in lighting the stove's burners. She promptly cleaned each pot and pan. Gerald hoped that Maxine's earlier confusion was only a sign of afternoon fatigue, of a lethargy that also came upon him, like a weariness that only needed a good, black cup of coffee to deny.

  But then Maxine opened her refrigerator and for a minute only stared at the contents she had therein gathered. She took one bottle of maple syrup after another from the cool shelves until her kitchen table crowded with the sweets. Gerald's heart mourned to see how Maxine struggled to recall any reason for purchasing such stock.

  "Maybe you were thinking your grandkids were visiting this weekend." Gerald extended his arm and softly gripped Maxine's wrist. "Maybe you wanted to be prepared for breakfast with all those grandkids over at once."

  Maxine sighed in relief. "Of course. I need all that syrup for the French Toast you and the grandkids love so much."

  Gerald's shoulders fell. He had never liked Maxine's French Toast. That sweet had always too painfully hurt his teeth. It had been Richard who had loved the French Toast Maxine made in her oldest, black skillet. Maxine again saw her late husband's ghost lingering upon Gerald's dyed, black beard.

  Gerald knew he possessed no power with which he might exorcise those ghosts who came to haunt Maxine. He knew he would be powerless as he would watch that fog settle and cloud everything Maxine had ever loved.

  "For the kids tomorrow," Maxine smiled. "We'll fill them up on French Toast, and then we'll take them along Maple St. to see that old home. Don't you think that would do us both some good?"

  "Of course," Gerald winked. "I would love to look at that house one more time."

  * * * * *