The Laughing People.
A short story about life and memories.
“Of all the ghosts, the ghosts of our old loves are the worst.” Arthur Conan Doyle
Minnie Flowers heard them as she walked past the old stone foundation and lichen-covered charred timbers. She heard their voices in the wind, the trees, the water lapping against what remained of the crumbling wharf. She called these voices the “laughing people” because everyone seemed to laugh back then, including her own family.
This was before the Great Lodge burned down, of course. Everything died after that. Her mother and father, aunts and uncles, the community itself. Minnie was in her twenties back then. She was eighty now. She’d come back to see the remains one last time.
She remembered a young man doing handstands on the three-tiered diving platform for his girlfriend. They were both very happy. Minnie wondered if it was all they knew.
Her grandsons brought her over in the launch earlier. She walked with the help of a cane up to the old pool. Nothing was left but a hole in the ground, filled with leaves, loam and other detritus. Minnie knew where it was, though, the deep end, shallow end. She remembered a young man doing handstands on the three-tiered diving platform for his girlfriend. They were both very happy. Minnie wondered if it was all they knew.
She wore a uniform in those days, a white starched shirt, black vest. Her mother did her braided hair up in a bun. One young man told Minnie she was attractive. He was sitting in the pool house when she came in with towels. He told her he was going off to war. She’d slept with him. She wasn’t embarrassed or proud of it. He came back years later with a new family.
That’s just the way it was after the war. Everyone had their own happiness to think about, even Minnie. She eventually got promoted to the front desk. She didn’t sleep with any more guests. She took her job seriously.
Everything changed the night of the fire. The flames rose high above the trees, the sparks setting roofs alight. Within an hour, the lodge was gone along with most of the town nearby.
Some went off to the city, too. One son came back broke with two kids.
Minnie’s father died the following year, then her mother. The brothers went off to the city. She stayed and married and had children. Some went off to the city, too. One son came back broke with two kids. She took them in, they grew up. Now they were waiting for her in the launch.
Jimmy, her eldest grandson, finally came up the hill with his hands in his back pockets. “Grandma?” he said. “We should be getting back. They need us at the marina.”
After the fire, the local band council had applied for government grants and loans. They built a marina and a store. A town grew up around it, serving the cottagers and anglers. Now her two grandsons fixed the boats and dry-docked them in the fall. Jimmy was the responsible one, unlike his father — or Wolfie, his brother, for that matter.
“You still hearing your ghosts?” Jimmy said.
He always had this glint in his eye when he asked.
“A few,” she replied.
“Any ghost in particular?”
“Maybe.”
“Midgie said you had a lover.”
Midgie was Minnie’s younger sister.
“She did, did she?” Minnie said. “She had a few herself, you know. I’m going to talk about that.”
She stepped over a root growing across the path.
“Be careful where you walk,” Jimmy said. “That old pool is one big sinkhole. I fell in there one time.”
“I know where to walk,” she said. “Is your father up yet?”
“I called from the launch. Wolfie’s picking him up later. You wanna go to the casino tonight?”
“No,” she said.
He started to walk away. “Say hello to your ghosts for me.”
“Well,” he said, “if you’re finished with your ghosts, Wolfie and me need to get back.” He started to walk away. “Say hello to your ghosts for me.”
“I’m done,” she said.
“You sure?”
“When I say I’m done, I’m done.”
“Let’s go, then,” Jimmy said.
They walked slowly down the old path, Jimmy supporting Minnie. She listened to the wind.
“So, the pool, that’s where it happened, huh?” Jimmy asked.
“Where what happened?”
“Your lover.”
“I was a stupid girl.”
“Don’t beat yourself up. He was going off to war.”
“He never got further than the duty clerk’s office.”
“How’d you find that out?”
“He told me one afternoon by the pool. His wife was upstairs with the babies. Maybe he was proud he didn’t go. I don’t know.”
“How’d you feel about that?” Jimmy said.
“Like I just said, I was a stupid girl.”
“You’ve done okay for yourself.”
“At least I didn’t die when I had the chance.”
He told people he’d seen the fire, but he was a baby at the time. He hadn’t seen much.
She’d contracted pneumonia in the late fifties. Her older sisters pulled her through before dying themselves. Minnie started a gift shop after that. Her daughter, Rachel, ran it now. They all lived upstairs. Her son sat in the shop occasionally, under pictures of the Great Lodge. He told people he’d seen the fire, but he was a baby at the time. He hadn’t seen much.
“Grandma?” Jimmy asked.
“What?”
“We going?”
“Yes.”
“You seem a bit out of it.”
“There’s a lot to remember.”
Minnie took his arm. They went down to the crumbling wharf. Wolfie had turned the launch around. Jimmy helped Minnie down into the stern seat. “How’s your old ghosts, Grandma?” Wolfie asked her, winking at Jimmy. She nodded and pulled her blanket coat tighter around her. “Just get me home,” she said. “And stop winking like you think I can’t see.”
As they moved out of the inlet, past the rebars sticking out of the water like black reeds, Jimmy moved up to the wheelhouse next to his brother. “You want a blanket?” he called back to Minnie. She didn’t hear him. She was looking back, seeing the lodge as it once was, the many windows and doors.
They were still there, all in their summer’s best, drinks in hand, wide straw hats.
She thought about the “laughing people,” the ones who came in their shiny cars with their new luggage and baby carriages. They were still there, all in their summer’s best, drinks in hand, wide straw hats. If she listened hard, she could hear them. But they were growing distant now. Maybe it was her hearing. Or maybe, like old loves, they’d run out of things to laugh about. That’s it, she thought to herself. They’d finally run out of things to say.
