Familiar Spirit

Beverly and Sarah had met as freshmen, thrown together by the whim of the computer as dormitory roommates. They had quickly become the closest of friends, and had continued to room together until Beverly’s marriage to Pete Marchant, an assistant teacher who was working on his doctorate in psychology. Sarah and Beverly were now graduate students in the American Studies division at the university, uncertain what they would ultimately do with their degrees, but both reluctant to leave the familiar comforts of Austin and academia. Sarah and Pete had liked each other from the start, and when Sarah began dating Brian, the two couples had spent a lot of time together. Since the break-up, though, Pete and Beverly had sided wholeheartedly with Sarah, effectively declaring war on Brian. Their response cheered her, although she was ashamed to admit it. Except in the depths of tearful misery, Sarah liked to voice the civilized sentiments of the modern lover, and told all her friends that they mustn’t take sides. But, in honesty, Sarah was pleased to hear Pete and Beverly express their anger against Brian, although sometimes it seemed but a dim reflection of her own.

As she opened the door to the Marchants’ apartment, Sarah felt herself at once enveloped by the comforts of their world. The air was filled with the warm fragrance of roasting chicken, and soft, eerie music which Sarah recognized as the soundtrack from a German film called Heart of Glass—modern German cinema being one of Pete’s enthusiasms.

“Hello,” called Sarah, closing the door behind her. Pete’s hollow-cheeked, pale face appeared above the bar separating kitchen from living room. “Hello, with you in a second. I’m just basting the chicken. Want some wine?”

“Sure,” said Sarah, tossing her books onto the big brown couch. “We can celebrate. Where’s Bev?”

“She ran out to the store. What are we celebrating?” He popped out of sight again, and Sarah heard the oven door close and the refrigerator door open.

She sank down onto the gold shag rug, leaning her back against the couch, and waited until Pete appeared, bearing two large glasses filled with white wine.

“I found a house,” she said, reaching up for her glass and smiling.

Pete grinned back, his normally melancholy face transformed. “Great! Where is it?”

“You know West 35th Street? The other side of the expressway, the way we drive to Mount Bonnell?”

He nodded.

“There’s a house by the back gate of the National Guard camp. An old green house, set way back from the road. We must have passed it a hundred times. I remember wondering who lived there. It never occurred to me it might be for rent.”

He frowned, obviously trying to visualize it.

“Maybe you never noticed it. It is pretty far back from the road, and it blends in with the trees around it. I noticed it because I thought it was cosy and mysterious at the same time.”

“You’ve got the whole house?”

“The whole house, all to myself. And—you won’t believe this—only eighty-five dollars a month!” She laughed at his expression.

“Oh, I get it. A dollhouse, right? Two feet by two feet.”

Sarah shook her head, still laughing. “It’s huge! Two bedrooms. And so much land around it I could grow my own vegetables and keep chickens in a pen in the back—”

Now Pete laughed. “You’re dreaming! Is this place for real?”

“Absolutely. It’s a real, down-to-earth, old-fashioned farmhouse with a rent fixed sometime in the past. The windows are all covered with leaves so it’s like a treehouse, or a house in the middle of a forest. It’s magical.”

Pete leaned forward and touched her face with the back of one hand. “Hmmm, no fever. You didn’t eat some funny mushrooms today, did you?”

She made a face. “I’m not high, I’m just happy. I found a house—a perfect house—and I’m looking forward to living there. That’s the whole story.”

The door opened then and Beverly came in clasping a bag of groceries. Pete leaped up and took the bag from her. “Sarah’s found her dreamhouse,” he said. “We’re celebrating.”

Beverly rushed across the room and dropped to the floor beside Sarah, embracing her.

“Sarah, that’s marvelous! Where is it, and what’s it like? Cheap and two blocks from here, I hope.”

“Cheap, but on the other side of Lamar. The other side of MoPac, in fact,” Sarah said. She began to recite a litany of the new house’s marvels, enjoying the dramatics of Beverly’s reactions as her pretty, expressive face mimed first astonishment and then delight.

Pete soon joined them on the floor with the bottle of wine and a glass for his wife. “How did you happen to find this prodigy of cheapness and space?” he asked.