The Last Minute Boarder, Chapter I, Scene 4: 28 A Street

“Almost ready,” Lena said when Anni appeared in the doorway.

While Lena busied herself heating the water in the silver kettle and gathering the necessary accouterments for tea, Anni sat at the white breakfast table that had belonged to her grandmother. She traced the Japanese country scene painted in black on the porcelain top and tried to remember the names she had given to each figure when she was a child. They all had names–the woman holding the giant fan, the man standing nearby looking out over the lake. Even the cranes standing in the tall grass next to the pergola.

Lena poured the hot water over the teabags in both their cups. “Cream?” She held out a small stoneware pitcher.

“Yes,” said Anni and Lena set it on the table.

Anni loved this room but more so the other living areas in the house, like the sitting room and the drawing room with its massive fireplace and rich wood paneling and wool carpets. After rigorous polishing and a lot of repair, the house looked almost as it had when her grandparents were alive. Her grandfather’s books still filled the floor-to-ceiling bookshelves in the library. But she knew the kitchen with its delicious smells and promise of nourishment from food and conversation would be the gathering place for them and their boarders, as it had been for her when she was a child.

Lena hummed and smoothed the white tiled countertops with her hands as she brushed passed them. She sat at the table across from Anni.

“We’ve done good work,” she said.

Anni smiled. “I hope so.”

The large rectangular kitchen was Lena’s masterpiece and where she had invested most of her time and creative energy. The hardwood plank floor had needed the most work and Anni suggested covering it with vinyl, but Lena wouldn’t hear of it.  “These floors are a treasure,” she said and set about sanding and staining and massaging them back to their original deep walnut beauty. She painted the old wood cabinets white, replacing the fronts with glass on a few to show off her favorite dishes, and gave the room some color with a coat of barn-red paint on the pantry door. Stretches of countertops ran beneath the cupboards on the long walls, interrupted by the stove, the icebox, and the built-in china cabinet. White lace curtains hung across the middle and at the top of the large bank of windows over the kitchen sink, allowing light to pour in from the morning sun.

Anni bowed to Lena’s vision, and the house was better for it. Even so, something was off and she couldn’t shake a sense of foreboding. With deliberate calm, she said, “I’m feeling funny about tomorrow. Are you feeling funny, Lena?” She sipped tea out of a pink teacup and held it with both hands to warm herself.

“No,” Lena said. She dropped a sugar cube into her cup, waited, then dropped in two more and stirred. She frowned at her friend and tasted her tea. “Don’t do this, Anni.”

“I’m not doing anything.” Anni rolled her head back to ease the tension and took another sip of tea.

“You are. You’re having one of those hallucinations.”

“The word is premonition,  and I’ve told you I don’t get premonitions. I have a gut feeling, that’s all”

Lena rested her forehead in both her palms. “Please don’t ruin this for us.”

“Okay, okay. Forget I mentioned it.” Anni breathed in and looked out the kitchen window. The first handful of snowflakes floated down from the night sky. A storm was coming tonight—maybe the strange turning in her gut was no more sinister this time than weather. After all, changes in the barometric pressure made her left knee and the knuckle on her left thumb swell. Maybe it could make her anxious as well. A small voice in her head reminded her that she left Chicago because of a gut feeling. And it was snowing then too.

“How about some cinnamon toast?” Lena got up and opened the tin breadbox. She reached for the cinnamon shaker in the spice cabinet and dropped the bread in the toaster. “Hot buttered bread with cinnamon and sugar sprinkled on top will help you sleep better. You won’t even dream.” She opened the butter dish and pulled a knife out of the silverware drawer.

Lena deserved a verse etched on a plaque, dedicated to her alone—“Give me your nervous your tired your angry your sick your sad your afraid your underdressed and embarrassed who I yearn to feed. I lift my tea and toast at their hungry door.”

Anni set her cup down on its matching saucer and accepted the toast. “Thank you. And thank you for always looking out for me. I don’t do change well, even good change, and I’m sure that’s all this is—fear of change. I’m sorry, Lena.”

“No,” Lena squeezed Anni’s arm. “Don’t be sorry. What could I say about your premonition when it was your gut that told you to take me on. I am grateful for that.”

Anni nodded. “So am I.”

Lena sat down and looked in Anni’s eyes. “Let’s see what happens tomorrow. One step at a time, all right?”

They finished their tea to the hum of the icebox as they watched the snowflakes fall faster from the kitchen window.