September

Ida DeHugh Ransfield couldn’t stand pears. Years before entering Hilltop Manor Retirement Village, she would deliberately wheel her cart widely around the early Fall produce section while grocery shopping. She claimed that it was just the smell of all those pears she couldn’t stand and insisted the slightly mealy texture also offended her. “It’s not crisp, like an apple, and it’s not soft like a cantaloupe. It’s useless!” she would explain to anyone who asked her why she hated *pears* of all things; no one had asked her in at least 18 years, however.

So it was not out of character for her to shove her bowl away angrily when she spotted cut-up pears in the fruit salad; no one really knew her long-standing aversion- it was more that it was not uncommon for 92-year-old spinsters to have fits of childish pique in places like Hilltop Manor.

Zahra Afridi noticed on this day, and she was always on the alert about her residents’- she called them all her friends’-nutrition. Zahra’s parents had come from Morocco, and they had instilled in her a love and reverence for elderly people. At age 58, she was without them or her husband; all had died earlier than she, and as far as her husband went, she was secretly glad, because while she had taken her marriage traditions seriously, her repeated miscarriages seemed to put a permanent scowl on her husband’s face and made each day feel heavy, like a wet bag of leaves. Zahra had worked her way up to Resident Coordinator, a job that required the skills of a diplomat, surrogate parent, counselor, and teacher. She would wander among her friends, asking about their day; for many, she was the only one who ever asked. So it was Zahra who noted Ida’s decisive banishment of the fruit salad.

“What’s the matter Ida- not hungry today?” She asked; placing her hand on Ida’s stooped shoulder. Ida was normally not a chatterbox; she noticed how hard Zahra worked, and she would be damned if she was going to add to Zahra’s load. She would watch Ellie Schauffler clutch Zahra’s forearm and natter away; with her blonde pouf of styled hair, she reminded Ida of a peeping insistent chick. Zahra would never deny Ellie or anyone, and Ida noticed that although Zahra never once seemed impatient, she had dark circles under her eyes and often ate while leaning against an empty table- usually some leftover meal from home that Ida was pleased to note never smelled of pears.

So Ida surprised mostly herself when she said “I hate pears” in barely above a whisper, looking into Zahra’s brown eyes, with an expression that was gravely serious. Zahra normally tried good-naturedly cajoling those with any food reticence to “try a little!” which invariably worked with what few men were at Hilltop, but Ida’s flat statement made Zahra pause. She sat down with Ida.

“Why do you hate pears, Ida?” And she asked with such concern, Ida found to her alarm and shame that she felt the burn of tears. Because the truth was, Ida hadn’t really thought about that September, that pear tree, in 70 years.

Ida’s family had been one as the saying went “of good stock”; prosperous merchants in the early 1900s in Virginia, they were comfortable, decent people who believed in education and hard work in equal measure. Ida was their only child left by 1923: a miracle late unexpected baby, and as such, fiercely adored. Her family’s home was adjacent to sprawling acreage, including the small family graveyard where older brothers Herman, George, and baby Clifford had been put to rest; Ida missed the bold but unlucky brothers she never met and had a solemn reverence for their fine but plain stones. Her family’s rolling land provided places for her to ride her ancient pony Mephistopheles (as racy and cheeky as her father ever got; so named because when the pony wasn’t finding ingenious ways to scrape off riders, he was pinning his ears at everything else), and it was not unusual for her to take a picture book and sit under the many pear trees on days with no school lessons. Back then, it was understood that Ida would become a school teacher, even though she really wanted to study engineering. Between studying the classics, riding, church, and reading, Ida was sheltered from many of the harsher realities of the Great Depression. Her father wisely sold some of his land before the bottom fell out of the country, and he could afford to be generous with credit and bartering for those who still needed to buy goods. He was one of the few who came out unscathed, and because he didn’t believe people should live beyond their means, he hadn’t chased “sure things” that promised instant wealth beyond fathom one day, worthless paper the next.

As such, Ida was able to attend college. While at UVA, she met a handsome boy named John, whose hazel eyes were gentle and crinkled from a slight myopia. He seemed to enjoy Ida’s matter-of-fact bluntness, which was the opposite of his shy smile and idealism. Ida adored John. Although her parents doted on her, her unconsciously brusque manner scared less understanding suitors, who seemed to prefer the laughing lyrical honeyed voices of less complicated girls. John saw that behind the no-nonsense lioness, there was a tender, loyal, secret romantic who cared deeply for the underdog and who was unerringly kind. John was horrified at the bombing of Pearl Harbor, and like many young patriotic men, enlisted as an officer in the Navy. Ida and John were married in a hasty ceremony, and before they could strike out on their own, John had to leave. Ida stayed with her parents at the DeHugh house, rode, read, worked at one of the mills, and volunteered. She would still sit under the orchard trees and read, wondering absently with a sly smile if the dearly departed Mephistopheles was running a herd of devilish ponies in the underworld. John wrote when he could, and Ida treasured the few letters that came. He was too shy, even as a husband, to pour out flowery passionate sentiment, but his ernest sincerity touched Ida nonetheless.

It was the first week of September when the pears in the biggest tree were at their most fragrant. Ida miraculously found one not chewed by worms or seducing the frightening wasps the size of her pinky, and bit it. The warm juice dribbled off her chin onto her collar, and she was wiping it when her father rounded the tree, saying her name. He wasn’t alone. Two officers in impeccably clean uniforms flanked her father, whose sorrowful expression seemed to land on the pear juice on her collar. For a moment, Ida had the absurd thought that her father was ashamed of her stained garment in front of the other two men. Then the import of the visit hit her at the same time the fragrant scent of the pears seemed to fill her entire head, and she dropped the formerly perfect pear, now indented with the commas of her fingernails, the single bite mark already browning at the edges. She had no recollection of the rest of her day, and she was strangely calm and resolved. Logically, she knew her beloved sweet John hadn’t been alone in his sacrifice, and she was nothing if not pragmatic. But the secret lovable softness that only he recognized remained hidden, and Ida threw herself into decades of teaching high schoolers about Heathcliff, Romeo, and Mr. Darcy. She was fortunate- financially comfortable, a fox hunter in her spare time, on several charity councils, and what people might call a woman of substance. She assuaged her loneliness with a series of Jack Russell Terriers, her horses, and a cantankerous donkey incongruously named Sunshine from a defunct petting zoo she rescued from going to auction. And for decades, she avoided pears.

“Oh. They just remind me of September.” She said to Zahra, a tear escaping her eye. She didn’t want to burden exhausted Zahra with a bunch of biographical hoo-ha, so she patted Zahra’s brown hand resting on her arm and looked away. Zahra made a comforting noise, heaved herself out of the chair, and whispered quietly “I hate September too, Ida”, squeezing Ida’s arm one last time before shuffling away. Ida said nothing, but after a few seconds, she smiled a radiant smile, pulled the bowl over and bit into a chunk of pear.