Fiction

The old man seldom marked time by the calendar. There wasn't much point up here in the North where winter stretched a month too long and the sun cast long shadows at noon even in summer. Instead, the measured tread of his seasons were paced by a series of events. The first day you could go outside without a coat; the morning you looked out of the window and noticed the fresh green fuzz on branches that had been dormant all winter; the first frost; the first home grown raspberries. Today was such a day. It was the first day he could have the windows open. They had been closed all winter, a defense against the arctic weather that lurked outside the house, hungry to gain entrance. Today was different. The breeze wasn't warm, but it didn't knife through his sweater and shirt. There were scents in the air, a mixture of thawing ice, mud and hints of small animals awakening. He could almost hear the bears stirring uneasily in their winter beds. He felt a faint energy. It made him want to tidy up around the house, something he had been promising to do all winter. He knew that he would have to start with his papers. He had always been a disorganized and untidy man. He also hoarded things. He had papers going back decades, stuffed into an old filing cabinet in the corner of the small room. It was as good a place to start as any. He walked over, slippers trailing, and pulled open the top drawer. Files, scraps of papers, old bills overflowed the edges. He pulled out a page at random and sat in the old leather chair, a smile on his face.

It had been 50 years since he had been a student …