LAKEFRONT

Ingrid took the towels from the linen closet, to walk

down and meet the girls at the lake. But she

lingered at the closet door and took in the crisp, fine, smell, regretting that the summer was almost over. The girls had been hers for the past three months, and her heart was heavy with their eminent departure. For the past eight summers they had been hers and she had feared that, too, was almost over. One, maybe two, more summers and they would disappear from her life. Then what?

Oh, there would be the promises - let's keep in

touch - but Ingrid knew the day would come when

'summers' meant trips to Europe and points beyond, that did not include her. What would she do, hire herself out to another family? At her age she wondered if she had it in her to start anew with

someone else's retinue. She would be hard pressed to start with someone young, her years declining, not so gracefully now.

She very quietly shut the closet door and stood

silent, listening to old house, listening to the lapping from the lake. It had been her privilege, but that, too, was closing. She held the towels close to her face and breathed in. Summers.

She heard the girls squealing out by the raft and set out down to the lakefront. The back stairs moaned under her weight. The grass, so lush and green, felt like velvet under her feet. Then the pebbles, so smooth and rounded, down to the shore and the kiss of cool water up to her knees. She took it all in.The lake, the house, the woods beyond, a magical place she sensed she would miss even before leaving. Ingrid sighed deeply but her reverie was broken by the girls, who hurled themselves into the water and swam frantically ashore, and into her arms. She dried them briskly, both giggling, as the sun was setting and hints of Fall were already the air.

Their laughter continued to fill the early evening,

and night would mean sitting around the campfire,

perhaps one last time. The parents would arrive

tomorrow, stay a few days, perhaps a week, but it

wasn't the same, and then they'd be gone.

V