The Lover: A Short Story
Silvia Moreno-Garcia
She’d always known her lover would come from beyond the forest. It was foretold when she cast a divination spell. It was a game she played with the other village girls—quaint superstitions passed from one generation to the next. The spell required a maiden to take off her shift and place it under her pillow during the night of the full moon. The girl would dream of a man’s face, and in the morning, she would find an object by her doorstep that would offer a clue about her future husband’s identity.
Judith could not remember the face when she awoke. Nevertheless, after she dressed in a hurry, hardly bothering to brush her hair, she saw a twig upon the steps of her home. She knew it stood for the trees, the forest. Which was just as well, since she disliked the village and its people, instead preferring to imagine the vistas of distant lands and the abodes of handsome lords.
A few months later, the prophecy came true. A stranger stumbled into their midst. He was a hunter, wearing a gray woolen coat and black half boots, muttering as he walked into their store. A wide-brimmed hat shadowed his face.
Beginning in the spring and into the fall, a farmers market was set up every other week, but in the cold of winter, her sister’s store was one of the few spots where a traveler could buy certain supplies. Alice had married well. When her husband passed away, he’d left her the guesthouse with its plum-colored door and the adjacent shop. There was an inn, but it was shuttered until the thaw. The tavern offered flea-infested beds. Anyone who needed a decent place to lodge during the winter stayed at the guesthouse.
“They tell me you’d know how I can secure a room,” the man said as he entered the store and removed his hat.
He had light-brown hair and a handsome, strong face. Judith lowered the old book she was reading and nodded. “My sister runs the guesthouse next door. The rooms are clean, and the food is plentiful. You can peek inside the rooms before you lay down your money if you like.”
“I’m sure it will be fine,” he said. “You look trustworthy enough, and if it’s not terribly expensive, I should be satisfied.”
He gave her such a smile that she practically dropped the book.
“Come with me,” she said.
She guided the man. As they walked together, she thought, It is him, it is him, it is him.
The hunter’s name was Nathaniel, and he stayed that whole winter, exploring the nearby woods and creeks, then returning with hares and foxes that were skinned for their furs. He was the only guest, though Alice and Judith and the children lived in the house too.
Before Alice had married and birthed two children, the sisters had lived with Grandmother in a smaller house. Judith had to help with the washing Grandmother took in, her hands rough since she was a small child. Alice never had to rub a cake of soap against the clothes because Alice was beautiful, and Grandmother expected she’d marry a gentleman. She did. Grandmother and Judith went to live in the guesthouse together with Alice, and while Alice was able to buy velvet dresses and a muff to keep her hands warm, and Grandmother spent the rest of her days in comfort, Judith’s existence had remained the same.
Judith was eighteen now, but she still did the washing; only now she washed for Alice, the twins, and their guests.
The hunter’s name was Nathaniel, and he was even more handsome than at first glance, with beautiful, expressive eyes and a good laugh. He shaved his face with diligence and combed his hair neatly. He told stories at dinner that made the children squeal with joy—the twins were four—and brought a smile to Alice’s face. Judith smiled, too, and she laundered his clothes with the utmost care, scrubbed the floor of his room spotless, and dusted throughout the house to ensure he had no complaint. Nathaniel had the good looks of a gentle-born man, and she wanted to treat him as such.
“Good morning, Judy,” he would say. How lovely his voice sounded—deep and clear.
“Good morning. What are you hoping for today?” she’d ask.
He would tell her whether he hoped for the pelts of foxes or skunks, or something else. He’d talk about cutting stakes or building cubbies, or how he’d gone trapping in his spare time as a youth but now was attempting to become a professional hunter, for there was money to be made in this endeavor if one was wily enough. And money was what he sought. He’d wave her goodbye with a wink and a smile. On a few occasions, he offered compliments. Pretty Judy, I’ll see you later, he said, making her blush.
Unfortunately, Nathaniel was not the only one hunting that winter. Judith did not realize it until it was much too late. Alice had worn her widow’s garb for a year, and on the first day of spring, she declared enough was enough. She reclaimed the colorful dresses she’d left in her armoire.
Shortly after this, it became obvious to everyone in town—except perhaps Judith, who was blinded by her exuberant dreams and fantasies—that Alice was thinking of making the guest a permanent fixture of their house. He was young and good looking, and the villagers gossiped: Alice’s first husband had been sickly, ugly, his wealth making up for his physical deficiencies. This time it would be the other way around. The man had clearly won the lady’s favor, thanks to his charm.
Although a few people raised their eyebrows at such a quick match, everyone agreed a widow of twenty-three couldn’t be expected to run a business and a household by herself. The hunter was polite; he could read, write, and do sums. He could conduct business in the town that Alice could not possibly conduct. He would do fine as a second husband.
The hunter’s name was Nathaniel, and he married Alice in the summer. He moved from his room on the ground floor to one of the rooms upstairs. His wife bought him new clothes, a dressing case tooled in fine leather, and a lovely silver-plated pocket watch. Life continued as it had before, only now he stepped into the store on certain days to go over the sums and order the boy behind the counter around.
The hunter’s name was Nathaniel, and, alas, he was not Judith’s lover.
In the fall, Judith sat outside the house, on those same steps where she’d once found a twig and thought it prophesized romance. She looked in the direction of the forest, which stretched close to them, the trees turning from green to gold and red.
“It’ll be a bad winter,” Nathaniel told her, coming down to stand next to her.
“How do you know?” she asked.
“I can tell. The skies warn us,” he said.
But she’d lost her taste for omens, so she shrugged, indifferent to his prediction.
“Yes, it’ll be a bitter winter. You should stop with your mushroom gathering. The wolves, they’ll be eager for a morsel, and it’s growing too cold now, anyway,” he said.
Then, for a moment, a prickle of something spread across her body, the faint stirring of dread. She shook her head dismissively.
“Wolves never wander this close to us,” she said. “I’ve lived here longer than you have.”
She kept swinging her basket back and forth and creeping into the forest, her head bent as she looked for the chanterelles that sprouted around the ash, the elm, the oak. As the fall progressed, she had to move deeper into the forest, past the creek, until she reached the old apple orchard full of dead trees.