September Song by William Humphrey

you’re shown, and you’re not easily pleased. But the retirement home you’re looking for will be your first, and you want to make sure it’s your last.
    At the end of your weekend in the country the agent says, “If you’re interested in any of the properties you’ve been shown, all have been inspected, appraised, approved, and we will be glad to help negotiate the mortgage with our local bank at quite attractive rates.”
    I say, “I have never in my life bought anything on credit. You won’t find me in Dun and Bradstreet.”
    There is no bill to pay when we check out of the inn.
    We get away in time to beat the traffic down to the city.
    Monday morning bright and early it’s back to sorting mail.

September Song

W HO HAS NEVER DAYDREAMED that the phone will ring and the caller be an old lover?
    Virginia Tyler was now seventy-six, and that fantasy, foolish to start with, had become embarrassing. Yet though it was twenty years since she had heard from John Warner, sometimes, sitting by the fire at night and studying the flames, it returned to her. She would have to shake her silly old head to clear it of its nonsense.
    And then it happened! As she would say in her letter to the children announcing her intention to divorce their father and remarry, her heart leapt. She had thought it had withered and died, and been half glad it had—unruly thing! She did not know until then that it had lain dormant, like those seeds from the tombs of the pharaohs that, when planted, blossom and bear.
    Toby was in the next room, doing his daily crossword puzzle.
    â€œIs it for me?” he called.
    Outwardly calm, she said, “No, it’s for me.” Inwardly, both ecstatic and furious, she said, “It’s for me! Me!” His smug assumption that every call was for him!
    Into the receiver she said, “Hold on. I’ll check it out upstairs.”
    The phone had to be left off the hook so as not to break the connection. But she had no fear that Toby might listen in on the conversation. He was incurious about her private affairs. As far as he was concerned, she had no private affairs, no life of her own apart from his. And he was right: she didn’t have, though she had once had, and a wild one it was.
    It is said that as we die our lives pass in review before our eyes. It was as she was brought back to life that Virginia Tyler’s did.
    Listening to that voice on the phone, she was lifted into the clouds. She saw herself in flight, alone, at the controls of her plane.
    To join her lover she had taken flying lessons. Her friends all thought she had gone out of her mind. At her age! Then already a grandmother!
    â€œThis grandmother has sprouted wings! I’m as free as a bird!” she said as she touched down on her solo flight.
    Toby, who had a fear of flying, was proud of her. He gave a party in her honor to celebrate the event. Actually, though she pooh-poohed it in others, she too was afraid of flying. Her fear was a part of her excitement, and a source of pride. For her love’s sake she risked life and limb. Winging her way to him, earth-free, added zest to the affair, and youth and glamour to her image of herself. Outward bound, leaving home, she was a homing pigeon. Her path was so direct the plane might have been set on automatic pilot, guided by the needle of her heart.
    John too was a licensed pilot. It was he who first interested her in flying. They were winged; they were mating birds. They nested in many far-away places. She did not share Toby’s interest in cathedrals, art museums, yet though she resented his pleasure in traveling by himself, his lone European pilgrimages gave her the opportunity to be with John. He would tell his wife that he was off to a conference in Cleveland, Birmingham, Trenton. She would wonder why they always chose such dreary places, and decide to stay at home. The lovers would alight for a week on Nantucket, in New