Winter Trifle
by Catherine Mesick
“When
the time comes, I want you to make sure it goes to the library.”
Hannah stared at Mrs. Mumford.
“Your time’s not coming for a while
yet,” Hannah said.
“It might be sooner than you think,”
Mrs. Mumford replied. “I’m not afraid. Not afraid at all. Just make sure it
doesn’t go to them. I don’t know what happened to those kids.”
Hannah was used to Mrs. Mumford’s habit
of introducing topics at random. She was also used to her leaving things out.
She knew from long experience that ‘those kids’ referred to her niece and
nephew, who were now grown and a constant source of anxiety to her.
Mrs. Mumford sighed. “They’ve finally
done it this time. I’m fed up. They’ve done something I can’t forgive.”
Hannah waited for Mrs. Mumford to give
her the details of their latest run-in with the law, but instead she returned
to her earlier lament.
“I don’t know what happened to those
kids.”
Mrs. Mumford sighed again and became
businesslike, which was unusual for her.
“The state says I have to give it to
them. Well, not really. I can disinherit them. But they can contest it. That’s
what my attorney said.”
She paused and then said as if reciting,
“A disinherited beneficiary named in a prior will can seek to challenge the
validity of the current will.”
A little bell dinged, and Mrs. Mumford
got up and bustled over to the oven.
“Be right back, dear.”
A moment later, she returned to the
table and placed a plate in front of Hannah. Mrs. Mumford had a beach towel draped over her arm that she'd been using as an oven mitt
“Ginger snaps," she said. "Go on, dear. Have a few
while they’re nice and warm.”
Hannah eyed the cookies before her. She
picked one up and carefully took a bite. The cookie was brown in color, but
that was all it had in common with normal ginger snaps. It was dry and
tasteless and somehow seemed to be all flour—it was even a little gray on the
inside.
Feeling Mrs. Mumford’s eyes on her,
Hannah smiled and made appreciative noises.
“Do you like them?” Mrs. Mumford asked.
“They’re my own recipe. Well, actually I took one from one of my old books and
improved it. You know how I like to experiment.”
Hannah nodded as Mrs. Mumford turned
away and began to prepare a new batch of cookies for the oven.
Hannah quickly concealed the rest of the
cookie in her paper napkin and was considering hiding a second one there when
Mrs. Mumford returned to the table.
“There now,” Mrs. Mumford said, huffing
and puffing as she sat down. “Standing up and sitting down isn’t as easy as it
used to be.”
Hannah glanced over at Mrs. Mumford. She
was staring straight ahead and seemed to be really struggling to breathe.
“Are you all right?” Hannah asked.
Mrs. Mumford nodded and waved a
dismissive hand, breathing heavily all the while. Then her eyes shifted to
Hannah’s plate.
“You’ve barely touched your cookies. Go
on, have another. You’re a growing girl.”
Hannah smiled wanly and picked up
another cookie. She was relieved to see that Mrs. Mumford’s breathing was going
back to normal, and she bravely bit into another cookie.
“So how old are you now?” Mrs. Mumford
asked. “Sixteen?”
“Seventeen,” Hannah replied.
“I remember when Lisa—my niece—was
seventeen,” Mrs. Mumford said wistfully. “She’s twenty-four now. Seventeen
seems like a lifetime ago. I don’t know which one went wrong first—her or that
brother of hers.”
Hannah glanced at the little sideboard
table. She seemed to remember that an old picture of the niece and nephew with
Mrs. Mumford and her deceased husband had once sat there. The table was now
bare.
Mrs. Mumford shook her head.
“But as I was saying, they can contest
it. And I don’t know what will happen. I don’t really understand it. But I want
to make sure they don’t get it. I want it to go to the library.”
“What is ‘it’?” Hannah asked. “Do you
mean the house?”
“Yes, the house,” Mrs. Mumford said. She
winked. “By the way, do you like the wallpaper?”
Surprised by the change in subject,
Hannah turned to look at the wall. It was covered with paper bearing a
blue-and-white snowflake pattern, and the paper itself was noticeably marked by
bumps and creases.
Hannah frowned in an attempt to recall
what the wall had looked like on her last visit.
“Is it new?”
“Yes, it is—I just bought it online. I
put it up myself.”
Hannah hesitated. “Isn’t it a little
lumpy?”
Mrs. Mumford laughed. “Yes, it’s lumpy
all right.” She winked again.
The timer dinged once more, and Hannah
got up.
“I’ll get those cookies for you, Mrs.
Mumford.”
“No, that’s all right, dear.” Mrs.
Mumford waved Hannah back down and rose herself with some effort. “It’s
important for me to do what I can while I still can do it. And I’ll make you a
plate of those cookies that you can take with you.”
“How was your visit?”
Hannah and Alex were sitting in a booth
at a Chinese restaurant the next day, which was a Sunday. It was their lunch
break.
“I don’t know,” Hannah replied. “I love
her, and—”
She stopped.
“And?” Alex prompted.
“And it was confusing. Mrs. Mumford said
she wanted to tell me something, but she never actually did. She said she
didn’t want her niece and nephew to get something after she died, but she never
said what that something was. I think she disinherited them.”
“Why?” Alex asked. “What did they do?”
“I don’t know,” Hannah said. “Mrs.
Mumford just said it was bad.”
“What are their names?”
“Lisa and Jack—no, Jonah,” Hannah said.
“Lisa and Jonah. McDonough. McDonough was Mrs. Mumford’s maiden name.”
“How do you spell that?” Alex asked.
Hannah spelled the name for him. “Why do
you want to know?”
“I’ll look it up tonight.”
“It may not have been something you can
look up,” Hannah said. “Maybe it was personal—you know, family related.”
“From what you’ve told me about those
two, I bet it was something I can look up,” Alex said. “A little googling will
turn up the truth.”
Hannah glanced at her phone. “We’d
better get back to the bakery.”
Alex glanced at his phone, too. “Yeah.
It’s about that time, isn’t it?”
The two rose and went to pay the
cashier. As they finished their transaction and stepped out into the cold,
mid-December afternoon, Hannah stopped abruptly and turned back.
“I forgot my fortune cookie.”
“You and your fortune cookies,” Alex
said.
Hannah hurried to the table and picked
up her little plastic-wrapped cookie. Then she hurried outside to join Alex. As
the two began to walk toward the bakery, Hannah broke her cookie open.
“Oh!” she said.
“What is it?” Alex asked.
“My fortune cookie,” Hannah said. “It’s
empty.”
Alex shrugged. “So?”
“So, I want my fortune,” Hannah said.
“You know they’re mass produced in a
factory somewhere, right?”
“I know. It’s just that—”
“It’s just that you’re superstitious.”
“I’m not superstitious,” Hannah said.
“You totally are,” Alex replied.
The next morning Hannah went to school,
and when she returned home, she found her mother in a state of distress.
“I’m so sorry, honey,” Mrs. Lynn said as
Hannah set her bag down on the table.
“What’s wrong, Mom?” Hannah asked.
“I know how close you were to Mrs.
Mumford.”
“Mrs. Mumford?” Hannah felt a chill run
through her. “What’s happened?”
Mrs. Lynn rushed to give her daughter a
hug. “I’m so sorry, honey. She’s—she’s passed on.”
“Passed on? You mean she’s—”
“It was kidney failure. Apparently,
she’s been ill for a long time. She passed away yesterday.”
“Oh,” Hannah said quietly. Suddenly, she
couldn’t move—she could scarcely breathe.
“I knew she wasn’t feeling well,” Hannah
began. She felt the tears slipping down her face.
“Have a seat, honey,” Mrs. Lynn said
gently.
Hannah sat down, and the world in front
of her dissolved in a haze of grief. When she was calmer, Hannah looked up at
her mother.
“When is the funeral?”
“It’s Thursday,” Mrs. Lynn said. “I’m
going to cancel my trip to the expo this Friday.”
“No, Mom, you need to go. You’ve been
looking forward to this expo forever.”
“Handmade soaps can wait,” Mrs. Lynn
said. “You’re sad right now. Besides, I don’t want to leave you alone. With
your dad off visiting his brothers, you’d be alone all weekend.”
“Dad will be back Sunday night.”
“I still don’t want to leave you alone.”
“I’ll be okay,” Hannah said. “Don’t
cancel your trip.”
“I don’t know,” Mrs. Lynn said
doubtfully. “We’ll see how things go.”
“Please don’t cancel it,” Hannah said.
“We’ll see,” Mrs. Lynn said again.
Tuesday after school, Hannah went to
work at the bakery.
“Are you okay?” Alex asked as Hannah
tied on her apron.
She looked up at him. “Yeah, sort of.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Mrs. Mumford died on Sunday.”
“Oh, Hannah,” Alex said. “I’m really
sorry.”
“Thanks.”
“You okay with being here today?” Alex
asked.
“Yeah. It’s better to keep busy.”
And Hannah and Alex were indeed busy.
The bakery soon filled up with customers stopping by at the end of the work
day. The two of them rushed around behind the counter while Elise, the owner,
ran the cash register.
“Was everything all right with Mrs.
Mumford’s death?” Alex whispered as they worked.
“What do you mean?” Hannah whispered
back.
“Was it—natural?”
“Yes, it was” Hannah said. “Why?”
“I just wanted to be sure,” Alex said.
“I know you’d mentioned her niece and nephew being in trouble recently.”
“Did you find out something about
them?”
“No—I looked them up, but I didn’t find
anything. I just wanted to be sure, that’s all.”
Hannah nodded.
“So, do you want to get some Chinese
food tonight?” Alex asked.
“Tonight?” Hannah said. “After work?”
“Yeah,” Alex said. “Maybe we could have
kind of a late dinner. In honor of Mrs. Mumford.”
“I’d like that,” Hannah said.
The bakery closed at seven thirty and by
eight o’clock, Hannah and Alex were seated in their usual booth at the nearby
Chinese restaurant. They ordered what they usually ordered and talked about
ordinary things, but Hannah felt comforted by it. She was feeling a
little less gloomy as they went up to the cashier.
“Did you remember your fortune cookie
this time?” Alex asked, holding up his own.
“No—I forgot it.” Hannah turned to go
back and banged her knee painfully on the corner of the counter. She reached
out to steady herself and brought her hand down hard on a dish of mints. The
mints flew up in the air and rained down all over her.
“Careful,” Alex said. “It’s not worth dying
over.”
“Sorry,” Hannah said, but an amused
waitress waved her off and began to sweep up the mints.
Limping a little, Hannah hurried over to
her table and retrieved her plastic-wrapped cookie. Then Hannah and Alex
stepped outside.
“You know, Mrs. Mumford used to make a
really, well, terrible dessert out of fortune cookies,” Hannah said as they
walked to her car. “She called it her finest achievement.”
“Really? Do tell,” Alex said.
“It was called ‘Winter Trifle,’” Hannah
said. “It was layers of crushed fortune cookies, strawberry jam, and whipped
cream. She always made sure the topmost layer was fortune cookies, and then she
sprinkled the top with powdered sugar—so it would look like snow.”
“Wow. That sounds—indigestible.”
“It was a little too sweet,” Hannah
said. “To say the least.”
“Well, in honor of that dessert,” Alex
said. “I propose a toast.”
He tore open the plastic on his cookie.
“To Mrs. Mumford.”
Hannah tore hers open also. “To Mrs.
Mumford.”
They clicked their cookies together.
Alex broke his open. “I got ‘You will be
invited to an exciting event.’ And I also got a list of lucky numbers. What’d
you get?”
Hannah had broken open her fortune
cookie, and she was frowning at the little slip of paper in her hand.
“Wait just a minute before you tell me,”
Alex said. “You’ve got a mint in your hair.”
He plucked a little pastel candy from
her hair and flicked it aside. Hannah did not look up.
“So what is it?” Alex said. “Is it blank
or something this time?”
“No, it’s not blank,” Hannah said.
“Then what does it say?”
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