Aunt Maggie

The last time I saw my Aunt Maggie was New Years’ Eve, 1999. I had just turned 10 a few weeks before that, and Aunt Maggie had joined us at our house for my birthday celebration. Up until then, I hadn’t seen much of Aunt Maggie; she “hadn’t been feeling well,” according to my mom. But after she left the party, my mom remarked that she had been “on her best behavior.” I had found it strange then to hear a grown-up talking about another grown-up like that. I had thought that only kids were instructed to be “on their best behavior,” like when at a fancy restaurant, or at a “don’t touch” store, where expensive items lined the shelves. In any case, because Aunt Maggie had apparently behaved well, and she was my mom’s sister, after all, she was invited back to celebrate New Years with us.

Aunt Maggie lived in an apartment in New York City, with a few other adults she called “roommates.” She didn’t have a car, or drive at all, for that matter, so she had to take the train up to Westchester, where we lived, which was only an hour north of the city. I offered to go with my dad to pick her up from the train station: my dad had just started letting me sit in the front seat, and I savored the feeling of riding next to him, as if we were equals, rather than father and son.

Even though it was barely past five, it was already dark outside, the sky black and starless, and the icicles hanging off the eaves glittered in the car headlights as we pulled out of the driveway. While we drove, the weatherman on the radio talked about an upcoming snowstorm, encouraging everyone to “hunker down.” We arrived at the station a few minutes before the train was due to arrive, and my dad parked the car in a spot near the stairway. “We just did this for your birthday, so hopefully she’ll remember where to meet us,” my dad said.

When the train pulled up, we watched dozens of passengers stream out in steady packs, some hoisting overnight duffles, or carrying shopping bags. I looked for Aunt Maggie, but I didn’t see her, even after the train pulled away. My dad sighed, as if the Yankees lost to the Red Sox in the 12th inning. He pursed his lips and clucked his tongue. “Let’s wait, maybe she’ll show up. Hopefully she made the train in the first place.” While all the other passengers dispersed, we sat in the car, the hot air from the vents keeping our faces warm. A light freezing rain started, and my dad turned on the windshield wipers. Finally, Aunt Maggie appeared at the top of the stairs, her face flushed from the wind and bitter cold. Her brown hair was covered by a black ski cap topped with a furry pompom. She wore a long black puffer coat, her thin legs emerging from the bottom like black matchsticks. She energetically bounded down the stairway, her large black purse bouncing against her hip. When she reached the bottom, she looked around and noticed our parked car. Her face brightened and she waved maniacally, a spindly arm outstretched over her head. She ran to the car, puffs of breath materializing in front of her face, and yanked open the backseat door.

“Hi, guys!” she chirped. “Sorry, I went out the other side of the station by accident.” She plopped her bag on the seat next to her, and sat back and exhaled. “Alright, let’s roll.”

My dad looked back at her for a long moment, as if he were studying an artifact at the natural history museum. “Maggie, please put on your seatbelt.”

She snorted in response. “Okay, Dad.” She clicked her seatbelt into place and leaned forward to shake my shoulder. “What’s up, bud!” I slightly winced at her touch; her hand was ice cold against my thin long-sleeved T-shirt.

“Hi, Aunt Maggie,” I responded. “How was the train ride?” My dad pulled away from the station and turned up the speed on the windshield wipers, the sleet falling faster now.

“It was good!” she replied. “So crowded. I was shocked – I thought I was the only loser not partying in the city on New Years.” She snorted a laugh and reached into her bag. She pulled out a huge tub of Vaseline, popped the top off and smeared a glob onto her already shiny lips. “What are we doing tonight?” Her jaw worked on a wad of gum as my father went through the plan: dinner, dessert, maybe some games. My parents had said I could stay up until midnight this year, and I was both anxious and excited to see what would happen when the ball dropped and it was officially the year 2000. In the last couple weeks, I had been half-listening to the newsanchors talk about Y2K as we watched TV in the den: would the clocks know what to do? Would we have a complete blackout? Would aliens invade the earth like my friend Mike at school had claimed?

When we entered the house, my favorite food scents were wafting through the warm house: roasted chicken, garlic mashed potatoes. My mom had hung a black and gold Happy New Years’ banner while we were out, and tinsel-lined party hats and noisemakers sat on the coffee table in the living room. I watched my mom and Aunt Maggie greet each other in the kitchen. They embraced, but I saw my mom make a face and suddenly pull back from the hug, as if she smelled something funny. She kept her hands on Aunt Maggie’s arms and stared at her face longer than my dad did, but eventually her shoulders appeared to droop slightly, like when she finally puts her sweats on after a long day at work. My mom shooed Aunt Maggie out of the kitchen to spend time with me.

We went downstairs to the basement, where I had my Legos, and a TV, and a new Nintendo 64, by far my favorite birthday gift that year. I was hoping Aunt Maggie would want to play Donkey Kong with me, but before I could ask, she excused herself to use the bathroom, bringing her bag with her into the small half bath in the basement. She was in there for longer than I expected her to be, and I flipped through my video game cartridges while I waited for her to finish up. When I finally heard the toilet flush and the sink run, I sat up at attention, expecting her to emerge from the bathroom in the same sunny mood she had entered in. But when she walked out, her legs moved slower than they had earlier, as if she were concentrating hard on her steps. Also, her face looked slightly melted, like it had been left out in the sun too long. She came and sat next to me on the floor, then leaned over my shoulder to look at my games. Her breath smelled a little like the mouthwash my mom used. Whatever she had rinsed her mouth with in there, it remained on her tongue and stung my nostrils as she talked. “What’s this?” she asked, tapping a long bare fingernail on one of the cartridges.

“Donkey Kong,” I replied. “Wanna play?”

She blinked slowly, then softly said, “Maybe,” her eyes suddenly looking tired. “Let’s go up to your room, I want to see your birthday presents.” She heaved her purse onto her shoulder and we went back upstairs, then to my room on the second floor.

Aunt Maggie opened the door and immediately starfished herself facedown onto my bed. “Oh, so comfy!” she exclaimed. I perched on the corner of the bed, watching her, curious about how an adult can act just like one of my kid friends. She rolled onto her left side to eye Chompy, the stuffed dinosaur I had since I was a baby. Even though I was in fourth grade, I still liked to cuddle Chompy at bedtime. “Aww, Dino,” she cooed. I corrected her with his real name, confused: she had met Chompy dozens of times before.

“Oh, I brought you a belated birthday gift!” Aunt Maggie reached into her purse and pulled out a white plastic bag, the words “THANK YOU” appearing in red block lettering many times down the front.

“This is for me?” I asked. Whenever my mom or grandma gave me a present, it was usually wrapped in shiny paper, the edges taut and neatly taped. I had never received a gift in a grocery bag before.

She smiled shyly and nodded. “It sure is, bud. Open it.” She watched my face as I pulled apart the bag handles and peeked inside. A small paperback book sat at the bottom. I pulled it out of the bag and studied it. It looked like one of the books my mom liked to read, fat and compact, unlike the slim and lean picture books that sat on my bookshelf, their covers shiny and smooth. The book’s dusty, dull cover featured a boy, maybe 15 years old, wearing medieval armor and standing proudly in front of a big stone castle.

I read the title out loud. “The Boy Warrior. Are there any pictures in it?” I thumbed through the pages, noting lines and lines of text without any drawings or illustrations. Some of the pages had dog-eared corners, and certain passages were underlined, with little notes written in pencil in the margins.

“What do you think?” she asked, tilting her head, the same dreamy smile pasted on her face. “I saw it at the thrift store. Do you like it?”

“Sure, yeah.” I replied. “Thanks, Aunt Maggie.” My mom called us downstairs for dinner then. I placed the book back in the grocery bag and left it there on my bed. I started heading towards the dining room, and turned around on the stairs to see if Aunt Maggie was behind me, but she was still in my room, the door open just the tiniest bit. I could barely see her through the crack, but I noticed that her head was tilted back as she drank heartily from a Gatorade bottle, her throat muscles moving with each big sip. When she finished, she made a face as if she had just eaten something really sour, like a wedge of lemon, and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. She placed the bottle back in her bag and zipped it up. She then emerged from my room to follow me, leaving her bag on the bed next to my new book. I watched her carefully walk down the stairs, her hand gripping the banister, as if to brace herself. The energy she displayed at the train station seemed to have left her body. She was like a balloon at the end of a party, slowly deflating until it lies listlessly on the floor.

Mom had perfectly set the dining room, as she always did, and the table was full of steaming dishes: the chicken and potatoes, green beans, and fresh dinner rolls with butter. There was a drinking glass full of water with ice at each table setting, but my mom asked us if we wanted anything special. I asked for apple cider, and Aunt Maggie asked for a club soda. My mom and dad were both drinking ginger ale: I never saw them drink brown stuff, like I had seen my grandpa do when he was alive, or wine, like my grandma sometimes did. As we sat down, Aunt Maggie clapped her hands together and complimented my mom on such a nice job. She proceeded to fill her plate with a glistening chicken breast, a big spoonful of mashed potatoes, a stack of green beans, and a roll slathered in butter.

Once we were all sitting and ready to eat, my mom raised her glass of ginger ale. “Alright, guys, let’s toast to a new year. Maggie, it was great for you to join us again. So good to see you twice in just a few weeks!” She smiled sweetly at her sister, who was sitting to her right, and we all clinked glasses. I sat across from Aunt Maggie, on Mom’s left, and watched her slowly cut all of her food into tiny pieces. She carefully peeled the chicken skin off the breast and pushed it to the edge of her plate. It sat there crumpled, like a used tissue. I felt sad because that was my favorite part of the chicken, and I considered asking her if I could have it, but I didn’t want to sound like I had bad manners, so I stayed quiet. My mom spoke up instead. “So, Maggie, how’s work going?”

Aunt Maggie took a sip of her club soda and said, “Oh, so good. I mean, I hate everyone in the office, especially my boss, but other than that, it’s great!” I watched her push the food around her plate with her fork as she continued, her words running together, like the way people talk when they’re waking up from a deep sleep. “I mean, they’re all out to get me. They know I’m super talented, so they’re threatened by me, you know?” She struggled to spear a tiny bite of chicken onto her fork, but after a few attempts, she succeeded, and had to focus to bring the morsel to her mouth. She chewed slowly, and her eyes were mostly closed at this point. I was worried she might fall asleep at the table, and I imagined her drowsy expression facedown in her mashed potatoes. A strange, unfamiliar feeling passed through me then, and I looked at my mom, hoping she’d look back at me with a reassuring smile. Her eyes were trained on Aunt Maggie, though, until she and my dad exchanged a look I couldn't decipher.

The dinner table was usually a happy place for us, where we talked about our days at work and school, but for some reason, this dinner felt charged, like an ice cyclone was forming. The freezing rain pelted the windows and the wind whistled as Aunt Maggie wiped her face with her napkin and placed it on the table. “I have to go pee,” she announced. She stood up and left the table, but instead of going downstairs to the half bath, she went back upstairs, towards my room.

My mom and dad met eyes once more before my mom stood up and followed her. I rose to go as well, but my dad gently placed a hand on my arm. “Stay here with me, bud,” he insisted in a soft voice. “Let them have a sister moment.” I sat back down and looked at my plate: the mashed potatoes were congealing, and the chicken was drying out.

Hushed voices argued behind the closed door of my bedroom. Aunt Maggie’s voice sounded panicked, and she might have been crying, it was hard to tell. I heard my mom say the words “no alcohol” and “drinking in secret” and “you promised you wouldn’t.” They went back and forth for another minute or so, and then Aunt Maggie stormed out of my room, her bag firmly planted on her shoulder. Her face was red and tear-streaked, the sunny disposition long gone. Without saying goodbye, she grabbed her coat and stormed out, slamming the front door behind her.

“Where’s she going?” I asked my dad.

He shrugged and took a sip of his ginger ale. “Not sure, bud. Let’s wait for Mom to come down.”

My mother then descended the staircase and took her seat at the table, her chest heaving like she had just played a challenging tennis match. Her mouth was set in a straight line, and she looked down at her plate for a long moment. Then she got up and walked into the kitchen. She pulled the telephone book out of the cabinet and placed it on the counter with a thud. I heard her flipping pages, then pick up the phone receiver. “Yes, I need a taxi to the train station.” She gave them our address and replaced the receiver with a click. My mom rejoined us then. “Eat,” she said to both of us. “Our food’s getting cold.” I watched Mom stab a couple of green beans with her fork.

“What happened?” I asked.

Mom quietly put her fork down and looked directly at me. “Aunt Maggie kept a secret from me, that’s all. Sometimes adults do that. They keep secrets and sometimes they also break their promises.” She then ate her green beans, chewing furiously as she exhaled through her nose.

The remainder of the meal was fairly quiet, and after dinner, we had chocolate cheesecake and played Monopoly. The party hats and noisemakers sat untouched on the coffee table, and by 10:30 I was too tired to stay up to see the ball drop.

When I woke up in the morning, I rolled over and glanced at my alarm clock. Sure enough, it showed the correct time. We had survived Y2K after all. I got out of bed, Chompy snug in my arms. I opened the window blinds. There was no sign of Aunt Maggie, but a heavy snow was falling outside, fat flakes flurrying across the expansive front lawn. I remembered then that the storm was coming, and that it would snow heavily for days; however, what I didn’t know at the time was that this year, the icy weather would persist well into spring, and the cold snaps would keep us shivering for longer than any weatherman could have predicted.