THE OLD MAN/Short story

THE OLD MAN

     It was raining again, Meggie ran for the bus down the dark sidewalk. She was always late for the bus, even when she left work early; she just wasn’t good at keeping time. She finally arrived just as the bus pulled up to the bench. The bus was loud and it puffed exhaust all around them as it screeched on its air brakes. The door folded open and she waited for someone to come off but nobody did. So she climbed up the stairs and onto the bus. The driver was a young man in his twenties. He had a mustache and long hair tied back into a pony tail.

    He looked tired. "That will be two dollars, please." he said to Meggie in a raspy voice.

   Meggie dropped her two dollars into the machine then moved away from him to find her seat. All the front rows were full so she moved further down the bus aisle to the very back. There was one empty seat in the last row, she sat down. It was nice to sit after running for the bus she was tired and ready to go home. As she sat there she noticed she wasn’t the only one tired, an old man sat across the aisle from her and he looked sound asleep. He was very old she thought, with deep wrinkles and large dark bags under his eyes. He was so small, all bone and baggy clothes. He was well groomed though with no facial hair and a clean hair cut.

 As she looked at him, his eyes opened and he looked right back at her. “I could feel you looking at me," he said to Meggie with a big smile. “it is okay," he laughed as he seen the look of embarrassment on her face. "I had to get up anyway, this is my stop." The bus slowed down, then veered off the road and stopped at the bench on the corner of Pear St. and Vine Ave. The old man got up slowly. Meggie was still embarrassed about staring at him so looked down at her feet as he passed by her. “Have a nice night now young lady." Meggie heard him say, as he walked past.
   She mumbled "good night," back with a quick smile then stared again at her feet.

    The bus started to move again so she knew the old man had gone. She glanced over to where he had been sitting and he was gone, but there on the seat was a chain with a large locket on it. 'Oh no,' she thought. She leaned over quickly, grabbed the locket and put it in her jacket. Soon it was her turn to get off the bus, but before she did she stopped to talk to the young driver in hope that he might know who the old man is so she could return his locket. To her luck he knew the old man’s name, it was Seymour Wilson. So with that knowledge and the locket she went home. She was so sleepy, returning the locket would have to wait till morning.

   The next day she left early for work so she could use the phone book and call the old man before her day started. When she got there she asked the front desk for the phone book and looked for his name, she found it very quickly. She phoned the old man but had no answer; she waited a few minutes and tried again, still no answer. ‘Well,’ she thought to herself, ‘I guess I will try again at lunch.’ When lunch came there was still no answer, so Meggie decided after work to take a taxi to the old man’s address she found in the phone book.

   The day went by very slowly after that because Meggie was getting very curious about the locket. As she sat there at her desk, she decided to take a closer look at it. It was a big locket, round and made of gold. It was so clean and shiny it looked brand new. She noticed it had a small engraving around the edge of it that read ‘My Son 1971’ Meggie tried to open it but the clasp wouldn’t budge. Then she noticed a small key hole. She had never seen a keyhole in a locket before. ‘That is strange,’ she thought. Then she put it back in her pocket and got back to work. At five o`clock she got her things ready and called a taxi. She stood outside waiting for the taxi; it didn’t take long to arrive. It was a green taxi, and smelled of pizza. She told the women driving to please take her to 2378 Pear St. It was a short drive she knew so she thought about what she was going to say to this old man
Seymour.

    Before she could really think about it, she saw an ambulance coming in their direction. The taxi quickly drove off to the side of the road so the ambulance had a clear way through traffic. The ambulance flew by and drove off in the direction of the hospital. The taxi driver started back up the road.

    When she arrived a moment later she noticed the door to the old man’s house was open. She asked the taxi to wait for her and started down the sidewalk that leads to the front door. Before she got there a middle aged women with short, curly, grey hair came out.

   She was quite tall and wore a pair of very large, round glasses. “Hello,” she said in a sad tone to Meggie.

   Meggie could tell she had been crying because she still had tears in her eyes and her face was red and blotchy. “Hello,” said Meggie back to her, “I am looking for a Seymour Wilson, does he live here?”

The women nodded, “He did. He passed away this morning at breakfast, I’m sorry.”

   Meggie didn’t know what to say, she just stood there for a moment staring at the women. Finally she spoke, “I’m sorry for your loss, I didn’t actually know Seymour but I seen him on the bus yesterday and he left this locket behind.” She held up the locket. “I wanted to return it to him.”

   The women looked at the locket in Meggies hand. “Yes, that was his,” she said, “he used to take it everywhere with him. I have never seen what is inside. I am Sarah by the way. I was Seymour’s landlord. Seymour had no friends or family that I am aware of. He lived alone and never had any visitors.

   Meggie sighed. Then she remembered the engraving on the locket. “He had on son.” Meggie said as she showed the lockets engraving to Sarah.

   “So he did,” the women said back, “well you could maybe go down to the City Hall and request information on Seymour. Now that he has passed his records are public.”
   “That is a great idea,” Meggie said with some hope. “I will do that tomorrow, thank you Sarah for your help and I am sorry again for your loss.” Then Meggie turned around and took her taxi home.

    The next day at City Hall, she requested all the information they had on Seymour Wilson. They told her it would take awhile for the papers to come in and asked her to come back in a week. So she left and went home.

    Later that night she was on her computer browsing the web, when she thought she would search the old man’s name on Google. She didn’t really expect to find anything. Then right on the top of the list of results was the old man’s name and an article from 1973 titled ‘Man lost at sea.’ The article read ‘Seymour Wilson 41 years old has been missing for a year now. Nobody, including his wife and child, have seen him sense he left on fishing boat one morning. There was a storm that day and the boat was lost and with it Seymour Wilson. His wife was taken over with grief and took her own life last week. As a result, his only son will be adopted by a young couple here in Victoria at the end of the month.’ Meggie finished reading with a sigh. Could this be the same man? She wondered if that was possible. ‘He was lost at sea,’ she thought, ‘it doesn’t say anything about him ever being found.’

    Meggie could not get the story out of her mind. Could this be why he had no friends or family, maybe he came back to find them all gone or forgotten about him. Meggie thought about that for a minute. She couldn’t imagine being lost for years then coming home to find her spouse dead and her child with a new family. What could she do? She couldn’t just come along and take a child, that had no idea who you where, from the only parents it ever knew. ‘Wow.’ She thought, ‘If this was the same man he had a hard, sad life.’ So with all these thought in her head, Meggie turned off her computer and went to bed.

    A week later, she went back to City Hall to collect the information on the old man. The secretary gave her the file of papers and she left. She went to a small coffee shop near her house called ‘Java Buns’. She ordered a coffee then sat down to examine the papers about the old man.

   There were a lot of papers, school records old driving tickets, tax files, health records, and then she found something. It was a wedding certificate between Seymour Wilson and a women named Emma Flat. In the same pile was a birth certificate for Emma Flat and a death certificate for Emma Wilson, but nothing about a son. So she kept digging through the pile, then she noticed a large thick sheet of brown paper near the bottom of the pile and pulled it out. It was an adoption form. It said that a couple named, Hubert and Nancy Green adopted a 3 year old boy named Fredrick Wilson. It showed a spot where a biological mother and father would sign; in both places it was stamped ‘Deceased’.

   Meggies heart felt light and heavy at the same time. She was right, it was the same man, she was sure of it. That poor old man, never got to see his son grow up or enjoy his marriage with his wife, all because of a stupid storm. Meggie wasn’t sure what to do now. If his son already believed his dad was dead, how was Meggie going to explain all this to him. ‘Well, she had to try, this locket belonged to him,’ she thought. She was sure the old man would have wanted his son to have it.

    A few days later, after looking up Fredrick’s name in the phone book, with his adopted name Green, she went to his home. He had red roses growing on both sides of the gate that opened into his grassy yard. He had a small stone walkway that lead to the front door. There were kid’s toys littering the grass. ‘So he has children of his own.’ Meggie thought as she rang the door bell.

    A small, blond girl, about 5 or 6 answered the door. “Hello.” She said happily to Meggie.
Then a man appeared behind her. He was short and very skinny for a grown man. He had shaggy brown hair and a thin mustache. He looked like he was about 40 years old.

  “Hello, how can I help you?” He said to Meggie.

   Meggie took a deep breath, and then started with, “Fredrick Green?”

    “Yes.” The man said.

   “My name is Meggie,” she said, “If you are the man I am looking for, then you were adopted in 1973 and your biological fathers name is Seymour Wilson. Is this you?”

    “Umm, well, yes, that is me.” He said, looking confused. “How do you know about my father? He was lost at sea when I was only one. I don’t even remember him.” The man’s voice became shaky as he said those last words.

    “I am sorry,” Meggie said while handing him the locket. She told him the story of the bus ride and going to the old man’s house. Then she gave him the papers from City Hall and told him what they said. She hoped this would be enough to make him believe her story.

    It was. “Thank you,” He said slowly, “I don’t need any more proof. The moment I seen the key hole in this locket I knew your story was true. Then he pulled a necklace out from under his shirt. Hanging there, all by itself was a tiny little key. “My parents told me as a child I would not let them take this key away when they adopted me, so they let me keep it. I always knew it was for something.” Then he took the key and opened the locket.

    It had a picture inside of a man holding a baby boy and a caption that read, ‘My Little Man.’ Fredrick began to cry. His daughter, who had been quietly listening the whole time, grabbed her dads hand and told him it was okay.

    Meggie felt it was time to leave. “I am very sorry for your loss, but I think I will let you be with your family now.”

   But before she could leave, Fredrick hugged her and said, “Thank you so much, you have no idea what this means to me.” Then he pulled away. He turned to his daughter and said, “let us go inside now and I will tell you all about your grandfather.” Meggie felt amazing. Now the locket is where it belongs.

THE END

Robin Shaw