With full acknowledgements for the inspiration of this story, to Colleen Thomas, and her 'Irish Eyes'. My apologies if she is offended.
Prologue.
It was just turned three-thirty on a hot August summer afternoon, in 1982, and the very air itself was sleeping, one eye drowsily open. The occasional drawn-out protest from a whirling flock of blackbirds, as they were threatened by an imaginary foe, was the only thing to disturb the dozy quiet of the riverbank.
The river itself was called the 'Deben', and it ran along the eastern edge of the little country town of Woodbridge, in County Suffolk, not far from Felixtowe, a sea-side town on the east coast of England. This river was not one of your sparkling waterways, that are sometimes part of various commercials promoting tourism. Nevertheless it was a part of history, and history has a habit of showing it's age after a while.
Of course, human history depends on how it's perceived... or even needed, but rivers are a different kind of cat. They have been there since they were formed a millennia ago, and this sometimes rather muddy one, was still grumbling at it's luck in being tidal. Rather than being fed by fresh mountain streams, like some of it's distant cousins that the sea had hinted at from time to time, as it surged in slowly.
Right now, the quiet river was the only thing moving, it was hours past that delicious sublime high point that it reached twice a day - changing tides, and eager to join it's brethren in the nearby sea. The few tourists that were visiting the scenic area, fell easily into the spirit - or lack of it - of things. Sitting and lying in the shade of the trees, they languidly fanned themselves with various brochures that urged them to visit this, and do that.
One of the attractions was located at nearby Sutton Hoo.
It was a graveyard for the bones of a dinosaur, but a dinosaur without legs... this was an ancient wooden ship, and a burial site for an Anglo-Saxon king who had reigned here, fifteen hundred years ago. Somehow, the languid waters still conveyed the memories of when only yesterday, invaders had appeared from nowhere, carried in strange vessels that seemed to fly over the waters.
Then a movement disturbed the tranquil scene, and now another invader, a sleek car... a two-door 'Jaguar' saloon, eased its silent way into the parking lot overlooking the quiet river, and stopped. For a while, nothing happened, then the door opened on the driver's side, and a woman got out and stood looking around.
Then she took off her lightweight cotton windbreaker that she wore over her dress - the 'Jag.' was air-conditioned of course - and put it on the seat, picked up her purse and closed the door. She slowly made her way to an empty bench under the trees that overlooked the river, and sat herself down.
Her graceful movements would have spoken volumes to a keen observer, expressing as they did, her presence to the world around her.
She was very beautiful still... she was fifty-two, and time and genes had been very kind to her. She looked no older than in her thirties, and she thanked the fates every morning, when she looked into the mirror.
Her thick and lustrous pale golden hair, which normally hung loosely down to the small of her elegant back, was today pulled back in a lusciously fat pony-tail, bound in a colourful scarf. Several loose strands of hair were casually arranged on each side of her lovely face, framing it artistically.
She was fairly tall, and her short summer dress, though loose, couldn't hide the very shapely body, her thrusting breasts and her almost sinful bottom. Her legs were a sweet continuation of that sin; her calves and trim ankles were accentuated by the high-heeled wedged sandals, that she wore.
The keen observer might well have concluded, that here was a beautiful woman who knew her place, and how to keep it. In short, a woman who had it all, and sought nothing else out of life. And would have been right... and also wrong in just one respect.
Because Megan.. that was her name.. was on a pilgrimage. A trip to nostalgia, back through time to the golden years of her first lesbian love affair. An affair with her long time girl-friend... they had grown up together, gone to school together, worked together in the same office, then finally become lovers.
Her friend and lover had been named Chelsy, and the last time Megan had seen her was back in 1956, twenty-six years ago....
Chapter 1.
Megan had arrived yesterday in the late afternoon, and checked into the fondly remembered hotel at the main intersection. She had carefully parked the Jag. in the inner courtyard, easing it in between the lesser cars.
She had been pleasantly surprised, although she had mentioned it to her travel agent, when she found that she actually had the same room that she and Chelsy had occupied often, many years ago. She was to be pleasantly surprised even further, when she was taken up to the room, and found that it had been completely renovated.
It had been enlarged, it was now a suite, and a large full bathroom had been installed, all very modern. Everything looked new... except for the queen-sized bed, with it's old brass bedstead, and Megan had flopped out on it in pleasure. She chuckled to herself... Chelsy would have liked this!
Mind you, the old single room had seemed big enough to them thirty-odd years ago, big enough for their shenanigans.... even with the white porcelain pot under the bed, and the bathroom down the hall.
Then she smiled to herself, realizing that everything here seemed smaller to her assimilated North American standards, that she had lived with over the years. It had been the same in reverse, when she had first gone to Canada long ago.
The main street, now called the 'Thoroughfare' , had been changed to one-way traffic only. The sidewalks had been widened, but some quaint little stores still seemed to be tripping over each other. The town had obviously embraced the growing concept of tourism as a means to economic survival, and seemed to be doing a pretty good job of it, she thought.
She chuckled as she thought back to the old days, when traffic was both ways... you took your life in your hands on the narrow sidewalks at night, when cars piloted by inebriated drivers, roared recklessly past.
She had unpacked, hanging up her clothes in the large mirrored closet, and put her other stuff away in the lavender scented drawers. The windows of the second floor suite overlooked the main street, and she pulled up a chair to the window and people-watched for a while.
Finally she had run a bath, and piling her thick hair high on her head, and sticking a few clips in it, luxuriated in the faintly scented bubbles of the supplied sachet. Then she had drained the tub and quickly showered, being careful not to wet her hair. She dressed conservatively, 'twin-set and pearls', and went down to the dining room for dinner.
She was pleased to see that the big dark magnificent 'side-board' was still there. She ordered the "Lightly fried calves liver in herb sauce, with sautéed onions and tiny button mushrooms," and was delighted, when it came with a small chafing dish of broiled tender kidneys on the side.
And another small dish of "... gently mashed potatoes, with small baby cauliflower florets, very carefully blended in whole," and little golden nuggets of frozen butter here and there. She found she was hungry, and wolfed the lot down - to hell with watching the calories, she was on holiday... at least for the moment.
Afterwards, she wandered into the small lounge-bar, and perched on a stool at one end of the curved bar. The bartender was quite fascinated by her beauty, and when he found out from their sporadic conversation, that she was an 'old-timer' here, he introduced her to the regulars that gathered around the bar.
One of them, a man about her own age, stood quietly listening to their desultory conversation as the night wore on, and his handsome face triggered something in her memories. But she couldn't put a finger on it. Megan thought he had shown a sudden interest, when he had heard her tell the bartender her maiden name.
And that she had worked as a civilian secretary-typist, at a nearby one-time R.A.F. base, in the fifties. However he had said nothing, and she had forgotten about it, and she went on to become the hit of the evening, with the local crowd.
She had begged off fairly early, gone to bed, and slept like a log for fourteen hours straight, her 'jet-lag' finally catching up with her. She had woken up with a slight hangover, late this morning, and had finally rolled out of bed, and into the bathroom, where she did her thing.
Then she slipped a shower cap over her tousled golden mane, and stepped gratefully under the shower. Later, refreshed, she had called room service, and then relaxed in hedonistic pleasure, as she drank her tea, and ate her toasted buttered crumpets. She had lazed around in her room for a while, people-watching out of the windows again, then she went down for a late lunch.
She found when she got to the dining room, that she wasn't very hungry after all... must be the crumpets she thought, and chuckled to herself. So she ordered a small fruit salad, and 'toyed' with that as she thought out her next move. By now, she was the only customer left in the room, and she looked around her as she ate leisurely.
She looked at the side-board that had to be at least two hundred years old, and at the finely cracked glazing of the dish that held the salad, and she was suddenly caught up in the very 'Englishness' of everything.
Suddenly she laughed out aloud, and the waitress had looked at her, startled. Megan had just remembered some lines from Jerome K. Jerome's novel, 'Three Men in a Boat', where the heroes in the book had done exactly the same thing, before a sculling trip on the river Thames, that flowed through London.
Except that they had 'toyed' with steak and onions, followed by rhubarb tart. And also that the river Thames was a lot more pristine, at least up-river, than the Deben, she seemed to recall. All of a sudden, she was glad she had come back - no matter how the chips fell, this was nice!
