The wrinkles in the red dress had all but disappeared, and Maggie slipped it on over the half slip, the nylons and the garter belt (gasp!), and the strapless bra Lizzie had pilfered from Irene’s drawer. The slip kept the net skirt from irritating her legs, and Maggie wondered why slips had ever gone out of style. She’d never worn a slip or hose. The garter belt dug into her skin, and the nylons were torturous, but they weren’t so different from dance tights, so she endured them. The bullet shape of the bra still embarrassed her, but she had to give it props. The girls never looked better...or more deadly.
Lizzie tried to douse Maggie in Irene’s perfume, but Maggie declined. If she got close enough to Johnny tonight for him to smell her perfume, she didn’t want him to think of Irene. Instead, she dabbed the spot behind her ears, the inner crease at her elbows, and the barely visible valley between her breasts with a little rose water that Lizzie had been given for Christmas and never used.
When she was ready, she twirled for Lizzie and picked up the little silver purse that had still been wrapped around her wrist when she had awakened to find herself in a time long since past.
“You’re so pretty....even with that old-fashioned hairstyle,” Lizzie sighed, her smile slightly dreamy. “I wish I could come.” Lizzie sat up suddenly. “Maggie? How are you going to get there?”
Maggie had thought of that already. She would walk, of course. It was only three blocks down and three blocks over. She would be fine and told Lizzie as much.
“You can’t walk!” Lizzie said, horror—stricken. “You can take Nana’s car. She’ll never know.”
“I can’t take her car!” Maggie gasped, equally horrified. “What if she discovers it’s gone and calls the police, and I get thrown in the slammer and have to try to explain who I am and where I came from.”
“Let me take care of Nana!” Lizzie resisted the notion that Mary Smith would ever discover her car had been absconded by a teenager from the future, posing as her young charge’s cousin.
“I will walk, Lizzie.”
“Maggie!” Lizzie got all watery-eyed and serious immediately. “You can’t walk in the dark, at night, completely alone.”
Maggie tried to brush Lizzie’s worries aside. “See these red shoes? I’ll just click my heels three times and wish myself home.” She thought Lizzie would laugh. But Lizzie just shook her head soberly.
“If you disappear, no one will ever know what happened to you. No one here will even know to look for you! And I will worry about you.....forever.”
Maggie had no response, and Lizzie knew she’d won.
“I will get the keys and distract Nana. She always watches Perry Mason on Saturdays. I think she’s in love with him. After that it’s Lawrence Welk. When Daddy’s gone, she doesn’t budge from the couch all night long. I’ll go down and tell her your mother is coming to pick you up, and then I’ll sit with her and whine about wanting to watch Dick Clark, and I’ll make sure the television is plenty loud. Go out to the garage, start the car, and before you go, give a loud toot on the horn. I’ll run and call up the stairs that your mother is here and then talk for a moment like I’m saying goodbye. Then I will walk to the front door and open it. When I shut it, wait a few seconds, and drive away. She’ll be fast asleep when you get back, but there is a key under the rocking chair on the porch just in case I fall asleep too, all right?”
“How old are you, Lizzie?” Maggie had to laugh at the devious mind of her young maternal grandmother. She had a sneaking suspicion she had inherited it. She gave the girl a fierce hug and suddenly felt close to tears.
“Lizzie, I don’t know when or if all of this will end. If I don’t come back tonight, then you’ll know why, okay?”
“But I need to know what happens. I want to know if Johnny falls in love with you!”
“Well, I guess you’ll just have to ask Johnny,” Maggie winked, and Lizzie huffed, folding her arms.
“I will, you know!” Lizzie grinned impishly. Then she turned and ran out of the room. In seconds she was back with the key to Nana’s car. She threw herself at Maggie, hugging her around her waist, and then without a word ran down the stairs again. Maggie took a deep breath and descended the stairs just enough to hear what was going on below. Sure enough, Lizzie commenced whining, and Mary Smith commenced sighing. Then the volume on the television was turned up, and Maggie sneaked the rest of the way down the stairs and out of the house.
She raced to the garage and found Nana’s car parked in its stall. Very little had changed in the unattached building in fifty years. It even smelled the same. Maggie felt a sudden tugging, as if the smell of home had telegraphed a message to some far-off time and place and received an immediate response. Breathing through her mouth, she heaved the garage door upward, wincing as it refused to ascend quietly. She jumped behind the wheel and shoved the key into the ignition. Without turning on the lights, she backed out of the garage and halfway down the drive. Then she laid on the horn, causing her heart to bounce erratically, as if trying to escape its bony confines. She laid a hand across her chest, soothing it as she searched for the headlights. There they were; the beams hit the windows on the front of the house, and twenty seconds later the door swung open and then shut again almost immediately. Maggie counted slowly to ten and then backed out of the drive.
She didn’t see the door open and Mary Smith rush out into the front yard seconds after she had pulled away.
~12~
A Time to Dance
The dance was already in full swing when she arrived. Maggie saw only one couple walking along the sidewalk towards the entrance of the school gymnasium. When she slid into an empty spot and turned off the engine, she could hear music pouring from the building. Fear and adrenaline shot through her in equal measures. What was she thinking going to a prom all by herself? What would she do once she got inside? Maggie considered turning the car around and high tailing it back to the relative familiarity of home, even though it wasn’t currently her home.