Meeting Miss Imogen M. Coates
When Claudia was six, trying to get and keep her mother’s attention was like running after a pretty butterfly with a cheap net. Drawing her a picture earned her the gold star words “Good job, honey,” and a coveted spot on the fridge, still running though the salad days were long past. Daddy being a banker ensured they could have any Sears appliance they desired.
Once, Claudia drew her parents as rabbits eating salad though she preferred family portraits: Mommy, Daddy, Claudia, Harold the dog, the house, and the sun. The upper right hand corner of the page was reserved for her name.
If she had a bad attack of what Mommy called the Look at Mes,
Claudia turned to drama. One time, when Mommy was busy doing grownup stuff like refolding the silk scarves in her armoire, Claudia waved a dripping red finger in her mother’s face. The ‘blood’ was really raspberry preserves.
“Ouch, it hurts so much! You need to take to the hospital right now!” Claudia wailed, venturing as close to her mother as she dared.
“I should have named you Sarah Bernhardt.” Mommy shook her head in dismay, making her blond Vidal Sassoon hairdo thrillingly untidy.
“Do not get the bedpread dirty.”
Claudia was always getting dirty. She was six. Why couldn’t she wear OshKosh B’gosh overalls like every other kid in Kindergarten? Maybe then, someone would want to be her friend.
The night of the grownup party, Mommy wrestled Claudia into an itchy peach dress, ballet tights, and Mary Janes that pinched her toes like baby crocodiles.
“You will behave,” Mommy warned.
Behaving meant Claudia was expected to dance for her parents’ guests. The Olds. How was she supposed to remember their names when they couldn’t remember hers? Darling, cutie pie, sweetie. Anything but Claudia.
Claudia knew that a ballerina never turned down a chance to perform. She twirled on the living room kilim, something she wouldn’t have been allowed to do on an ordinary night. Her father often grumbled that the Turkish carpet cost more than private school tuition. Her parents’ friends, strangely glamorous in their red lipsticks and mustaches, cooed in several languages and clapped until she was no longer Claudia. She was Coppelia now-the perfect, pretty, mechanical doll in the ballet of the same name.
If she was Coppelia, Claudia wouldn’t care about loneliness. She wouldn’t have any thoughts at all. The adults didn’t know or care that the real Claudia was friendless. To them, she was just a chubby cheeked amuse bouche of six, not quite as interesting as the lobster thermidor and champagne her father vomited on the flagstone path outside. It would be scrubbed the time she woke up for cereal and Saturday morning cartoons.
Once her parents clasped that first crystal highball in their elegant hands, they became Jeanne and Tony, no longer Mommy and Daddy. Claudia must not have been a very good ballet dancer if her audience forgot she was even there. Forgot she was just a little girl who needed her bedtime story in order to fall asleep.
Claudia found herself crying on the stairs leading up to the second floor. She didn’t want to be in her four- poster bed where two Cabbage Patch dolls guard, nor did she want to be downstairs in the living room underworld.
“My my, aren’t you cozy up here? This particular step you are sitting on, I know it well. A perfect place to exchange confidences.”
Claudia looked up, tears pooling in her eyes like they hadn’t decided if it was safe to fall or not. An old woman stood over her, dressed in an old-fashioned black dress with a ruffled lace collar that reminded Claudia of the collar their dog Harold wore once.
“It’s Edwardian, dear.” The lady smiled kindly albeit awkwardly as if she hadn’t smiled in some time. “I am aware it’s not the height of modernity, however I was never one to follow the whims of fashion.”
Claudia didn’t understand the big words but she liked the soft pink energy the lady wore around her like a warm shawl. It made the little girl feel warm too.
The old woman sat down two steps below Claudia so as to make her feel comfortable. “ Miss Imogen M.
Coates, pleased to make your acquaintance.”
She shook Claudia’s hand, which was much better than a cheek pinch. Claudia found it strange that the gloved fingers the old woman extended were feather light, as if there were no flesh and blood hand inside the glove.
“Whom might you be, my dear?”
“Claudia,” she whispered.
“Well, that’s a fine name for a young lady.” A lavender handkerchief suddenly appeared in front of Claudia. It was embroidered with the initials IMC. She wiped her swollen lids, puffy as two marshmallows.
“It’s been so long since I was a girl of six,” Miss Coates sighed.
Claudia’s jaw dropped. “ I am six. Did Mommy tell you? You aren’t like Mommy and Daddy’s usual sort of friends.”
Miss Coates laughed. “I should think not, my dear Claudia. I’m not a usual
sort of person.” She leaned close to her and whispered, “The house told me.”
Claudia stared. “This house?”
“Between you and me, this house has always been a terrible gossip.”
“Gossip means telling tales,”
Claudia said brightly. “Mommy’s always telling me not to gossip. But I don’t. I just have a big imagination.”
“You hold onto that big imagination.
Many adults lose theirs when they grow into aged crones like me.”
“You still have your big imagination, don’t you, Miss Coates?”
“Yes, I do. Some people lose it as easily as they lose their hat, my young friend.”
“I’ve never had a friend before.” Claudia grew shy.
“Would you care to be my friend?”
“Yes, please.”
“I am honored to be your first friend. Young ladies with big imaginations must make their own choices in all things.”
Miss Coates looked at the gleaming wood staircase, the green walls that were once covered in embossed cream wallpaper. “Many years ago, this was my house. I turned six here, like you. I danced here, like you. I’d put Strauss on the phonograph and waltz around the room.”
“I want to be a prima ballerina, not a horse rider like Mommy because riding horses is scary and Mommy hurt her back so she doesn’t ride much anymore.”
“I’m sorry to hear that, Claudia.”
“I don’t want to be like Daddy cuz he’s like the king in his counting house, counting all his money.” Claudia sang the last part and Miss Coates laughed.
“My parents once tried to marry me off to a shipping heir in Oyster Bay.”Miss Coates shivered. “I threatened to go over Niagara Falls in a barrel if they persisted in inviting every eligible suitor on Long Island to Sunday tea. That put an end to the whole ordeal. They didn’t want their names splashed in The New York Times for the wrong reasons.”
Claudia thought about Paulo, her babysitter’s seven year old son.
Was he her friend? He never said “Will you be my friend?” and then given her a gift of gummy bears. Words were important but so were presents. That’s what Daddy did so Mommy would be happy.
Claudia did her best to listen to her new friend. Listening is also understanding, she thought. Then yawned loudly.
Miss Coates wouldn’t scold her for yawning. She wasn’t Madame Kaleria, her Russian ballet teacher and Claudia’s favorite, despite the fact she was angry with her for
yawning the day after another grownup party.
“I’m sleepy.” Claudia yawned again. “Are you sleepy too, Miss Coates?”
“You may call me Imogen,
my dear.”
“Imogen,” Claudia said slowly, trying not to mispronounce her friend’s name.
“It’s been a long time since I was sleepy, my dear Claudia.”
“Will you please read me my bedtime story? Daddy normally
does it but he’s busy right now doing grown up stuff.” Her nose wrinkled in distaste.
“I would love to,” Imogen smiled, touched that Claudia had asked her.
“But I must ask you to turn the pages. I’m afraid my old hands
aren’t up to the task.” She wiggled her fingers slowly and with great effort.
“I can do that!” Claudia beamed.
“Daddy says I’m a good helper.”
Imogen rose to her feet. “After you, my dear.” She gestured to Claudia who clambered up the rest of the stairs to her bedroom, eager to grab her book from its treasured place on the shelf, next to the striped seashell she found in Maine and her well loved Go Fish cards.
Imogen followed, black kid leather boots never touched the stairs.
Miss Imogen M. Coates was the first ghost Claudia would befriend but certainly not the last.