I awoke with a start in my room, back in my own time, in the middle of the afternoon. Duke was lying approximately where Edith had been, with his head perked up and his eyes staring at me in obvious confusion. I suppose I didn’t know how it worked for me - did he see me just wake up from a dream, or did I suddenly appear in thin air to him?
I stood up, throwing on a pair of pants absently, still lost in thought from the afternoon’s encounters. Part of me thought I could still smell her dusky aroma on my lips, but I wasn’t sure if that was a reality or just wishful thinking. I pulled out my phone to check the time - it was dead again, so I rolled my eyes and threw it on a charger. The time blinked up instantly - just after 2 p.m., plenty of time to call the historical society today. I googled the number and clicked to call. There was a surprising number of rings before anything broke the pattern, but eventually, what sounded like an ancient woman answered the phone. “Lake County Historical Society, this is Glenda, how can I help you?”
____________
An hour later, I was in my car, on the way to the historical society headquarters. It was a small, dark-looking building just south of downtown and when I got there, it felt like I was the first person to have stepped through those doors in years. The reception area was dimly lit and filled with couches and chairs from what had to have been the 80s at least. The air had the stale aroma of old books, which made sense, considering the bookshelf behind the desk was filled with an antique collection of books that probably were only referenced once a millennium. Behind the counter, as well, stood a woman who looked old enough to have lived through most of the events that the historical society had seen - she was maybe 4’9”, her spine stooped, and her curled, tight-cropped hair was as white as fresh snow. “You must be Glenda,” I said, stepping forward and offering out my hand for a handshake.
She took my hand, with fingers so arthritic that she could hardly grab a hold of it. “And you must be Brian. Nice to meet you - it’s always great to see a new face who’s interested in the history of this area.”
“I would imagine, good to have people coming through the doors!” I agreed. “Sorry to be so specific on the topic, though.”
“Not at all - it’s very common that people want to know about things that have been happening in their own house.” She gestured to me to take a seat on one of the ancient couches, so I did. She followed me over, and after what felt like 10 minutes of watching her hobble across the floor, she made it to the seating area and sat down across from me. “Now Edith Bowman, she was an interesting character! We don’t have a ton of information on her business practices, of course, since most of her work was done outside of the law. However, there are a few references to the brothel, the name of which is The Blue Room, scattered about in other documents. From what we can tell, it seemed like everyone in the town was aware of the brothel and was accepting of it.”
“Was that very common for the time, or was there something about this particular place that people were accepting of?”
She nodded. “Great question. While it wasn’t uncommon for brothels to be persecuted at that time, a lot of them were left alone, especially if they were outside of the city limits, like your house was. The city wouldn’t do anything about it because it was out of town, and the sheriffs often didn’t want the trouble. Still, I would say that, in my personal opinion, I feel like The Blue Room was held in a slightly higher opinion than a lot of the ones around here. Obviously, I don’t know if it was comparable with other brothels in the country - you’d need to go on a bit of a historical society road trip to figure that out. Around here, though, I would say it was held in a better light than a lot of the other brothels that we have in the historical record.”
She gestured to a pitcher of water on the table and I shook my head. She took a glass herself, probably not used to talking so much, and then continued. “The Blue Room was most likely so highly regarded because of Edith herself. Edith was a keen businesswoman, as I’m sure you’ve no doubt suspected by the fact that she was a woman who was able to purchase her own house at that time. She worked as a courtesan in the city for many years, saving money to purchase a business of her own, and she was able to complete that goal by the age of 31. She then worked as the madam of the house rather than one of the women. The men frequented The Blue Room often enough that she started to become well acquainted with many of the men on the city council at the time. There is even speculation that she was in a relationship with the head of the city council for a time, but all we have on that are rumors that were written in diaries that we have managed to acquire. The city councilman was married at the time, so if it was true, it would have been pretty hush-hush. The only confirmation we can offer is that, around the time that the rumors were written about, there were several city measures that passed that would have been of benefit to The Blue Room, but whether that was because of a relationship, or whether rumors of the relationship started because of the measures being passed is a mystery that has been lost to the sands of time.
“Edith, herself, managed to run for city council in 1912 but did lose the race, which is not wholly surprising given that women were not allowed to vote at the time. However, she was the first woman to run in the campaign and was generally well-favored by both men and women in the town. She was frequently at city council meetings, petitioning and speaking in favor of positive changes to the town. She was an active suffragette and was one of the first women to talk about voting rights in a city council meeting. One of the benefits of her profession and establishment was that instead of the scorn that the topic usually received, it is generally accepted that the men of the city council allowed her to speak, and even offered to bring her to the state legislature to speak. The state, however, would not accept her as a speaker, so a man went in her place to discuss women’s voting rights.
“As far as I was able to tell through our records, and mind you, it’s a little hard to tell because of the lack of clarity regarding her profession, the house stayed in her ownership until her untimely death in 1924.”
“Untimely?” I asked, the shock clear in my voice. If I did my calculations right, she would have been only in her 40s at that time, and that just seemed improbable to me somehow. I knew she had already died - she had been alive more than a century ago, after all, so that was a given. For some reason, though I’d been picturing that she had died in her sleep, old and gray, having moved on to a more peaceful sort of life.
“Yes - unfortunately, even though she was generally well respected in town, Edith’s profession was less accepted by some than by others. The case was one of many of the unsolved cases of the time - she was unfortunately found behind a grocery store, stabbed to death. There was suspicion that there was some mob activity starting to branch into the city at the time, and there were quite a few murders of some of the more powerful people in town. However, that theory was never able to be proved, and there was no case brought to court, so officially it’s still considered to be a cold case. There was a noted memorial for her at the house, but given the amount of violent activity that had been starting to happen, her murder, unfortunately, didn’t make that big of a stir around town until The Blue Room closed.
“At the point of her death, it was transferred to her longest-running employee, Josephine Warner, as she had no living relatives on record, and she had never been officially married in the court of law, nor had she been in any relationship since the purchase of the house that would be able to qualify for a common law marriage. It was then sold by Ms. Warner to a man named Abel Mattock, who owned it for a little over one year before selling it to your grandfather. On paper, it was noted that Mr. Mattock was planning on living in the house, but he rented out an apartment just two weeks later. I believe that’s what spawned some of the ghost stories for the house - I’m not sure if your grandfather told you, but we have a ghost tour that goes around town every year, and we always take the trip out to your house to discuss it. We don’t go inside though, don’t worry. But, if you have anything ghostly happen, be sure to let us know! Your grandfather never reported anything, so we’re a little sparse on the story aspects, we just explain how the old owner was run out, and then add in a story from a tour that we took, where a patron stated that they saw the figure of a woman standing in a window. I’m not so sure it wasn’t just your grandmother, but we’ll take whatever stories we can get at this point.”
I heard the tone of the woman talking for longer, but I started to phase out of the conversation at that point, as I wasn’t particularly interested in the history of the house after my grandfather had acquired it. My mind couldn’t help but wander back to the fact of Edith’s murder. While I didn’t want to think about it, it stuck out in my mind, wishing there was something that I could do about it, but also knowing that it was already written in the past. I wasn’t sure how I was able to talk to, much less physically interact with, her ghost, but I was sure that telling her wouldn’t make a difference.
I thanked the old woman, helping her from her seat when she failed to manage to push herself up and headed back toward my house. There was a part of me that was happy that I had taken the time to look into Edith’s history - it confirmed what I knew about her already, which was the fact that she was a badass businesswoman, but it was interesting to know that she also had such an impact on the politics of the town. Had she lived today, I had little doubt that she would have been able to run for office and get in immediately. I couldn’t wait to tell her about it tonight.
___________
I spent most of the rest of the afternoon clearing out the gutters - it was fall, which meant that the leaves could accumulate enough to have them overrun in a day’s time, so it felt like it was a full-time job to keep them clean. This time, though, I made sure there were no heavy objects above my head before I started to work - while I loved to go and visit Edith, I much preferred the times when I didn’t have a huge head wound.
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I got ready for bed that night in a very unusual way - I put on some cologne and then put on a nice, button-down shirt and a pair of jeans. I was sure the fashion had changed since Edith’s time regardless, so I wasn’t particularly worried about the style, but I still wanted to look nice for her. She deserved that sort of treatment. Then, I went to my room and hopped onto my bed, waiting for a sign. Duke laid next to me, his tail wagging, as though he were waiting for the same.
After nearly 20 minutes of playing on my phone and keeping an ear out for any noises, I started to talk aloud myself, hoping that my voice would trigger hers to work. I told her about my day what I had found, and about how badass I thought she was. I trailed off when I was done, not sure what else to say to her, but it didn’t matter. After a moment of silence, I heard a strong voice ring out “Oh, so is that what you found out about me? They have a lot more about me than I would have imagined.”
I laughed, happy that I was able to end up getting into contact with her. I was worried that our date had been postponed, and while that wouldn’t have been the end of the world, the finite nature that had been her life kept weighing on me. I knew that the days passed by in her world and that her life kept changing as time moved on. Therefore, it only made sense to me that we would also be inching closer and closer to the day of her murder. What happened then? Since she was a ghost, would she just disappear, or would she be stuck in a Sisyphean loop of her life? I assumed the former, as she was here now, and I wasn't so conceited as to assume that my presence here had started her life. And when she restarted her life, would she still remember me, or would all aspects of her life reset and her memories of this time be gone? Selfishly, I hoped that she would remember me, but I also didn’t know if there was a way for her to break out of this (although I assumed to - wasn’t there something about telling ghosts to go toward to light? I’d have to ask Charlie about it), and if not, I wouldn’t want her to occasionally miss me for the rest of existence. “I mean, you’re an impressive woman,” I answered finally. “It would be difficult to capture all of your accomplishments into a book. Especially since, you know, a lot of them are outside of the law and all.”
“Well, if you want to actually make changes in your world, sometimes you have to go around the law to do it. But it is good to know that I made enough of an impact on the town that wrote about me. Now, go to sleep, I’ve got a surprise for you when you get here.”
My mind raced, picturing all of the possibilities that might constitute a surprise. You know, you’re sure great at getting a man to fall asleep,” I joked.
“Almost like that’s the exact opposite of my job most of the time,” she answered with a laugh.
_______________
After what felt like forever, I felt a firm grasp on my shoulder. I opened my eyes to see Edith lying next to me, fully dressed, but looking more radiant than she had ever been. I propped myself up on my elbow, taking a full beat to look her up and down, appreciating every hill and crest.
“Oh good, you’re not just in boxers today,” she said, smiling at me, then rolling to get off the bed.
“Do you not like it when I’m just in my boxers?”
“Usually I do, but today, you’re going to need clothes. I had stolen some that some of the gentlemen had left behind,” she said, gesturing at her desk chair, which was indeed covered with various pieces of mostly brown clothing, “but I doubt much of it would fit you. You’re quite tall, which poses a problem.”
I don’t think I, a 5’9” man, had even been described as “quite tall” in my life, but I realized that compared to her and the other women around the brothel, I was a giant. Maybe people were just built shorter in that time - that would certainly explain the slightly low door frames in this house. “But we can’t leave your room, you said. What about your reputation?” Based on my research, I knew she kept her reputation up, and while I wasn’t sure if my actions here would have any effect on them, I wasn’t about to be the one to check.
“I told everyone that there was going to be a night auditor here - he was going to check out the house, and then we were going to work on our finances together. And most importantly, that I didn’t want to be disturbed.” She smiled a clever grin, knowing she’d come up with a great plan.
“But won’t some people know who I am?” I asked. “I mean, a few of them saw me on my first day here.”
“Well, you were covered in blood at the time, and that really does change the appearance of a man. Besides, I don’t think any of them will have any chance to recognize you. If you understood just how many men these women see on a weekly basis, you would better understand why they wouldn’t be able to remember a new face. Half of them have trouble with the regulars, much less someone who came to town one day who they saw for 10 minutes.”
“Hey, Clara saw me for more than 10 minutes,” I argued. She cocked an eyebrow at me, and I backed down immediately - in fairness, she was right, that first day I hadn’t lasted hardly any time at all, what with the blood loss and the exciting confusion around the event. I got off the bed and walked around to her side, offering her my hand. “If you’re comfortable with it, then I’m comfortable. Allow me to see you to wherever we are going for our first actual date.”
She took my hand and rose from the bed, her eyes giving me a quick once over. “I feel like you could still benefit from a hat to fit in,” she said. She swept over to the chair and pulled a bowler hat off the pile, then set it on top of my head. “It would be better if we could get you a mustache, but I suppose this will have to do. Come along.”
Edith grabbed my sleeve and pulled me toward the door with her. I followed happily - while there was a part of me that would be more than happy to explore more of the outside world (after all, how many people get to take a look into the past), I knew that a vast majority of it was just that I was happy to follow Edith wherever she was going. When we got to the hall, she dropped my sleeve and I started following her, just a pace behind. “You see, sir, everything is quite up to the highest modern standards,” Edith said. I was confused for a moment and then realized that she was talking to me as though I was the inspector. I looked around as we walked, trying to pretend that I was noticing aspects of the house. Despite being a hundred years ago, there were still a lot of things that my house shared in common - the floor was now carpeted, but the floorboards looked to me the same. The ceiling was, too - hopefully not the same paint, but it looked like the next owners had kept the same color going.
“And this,” Edith said, directing me toward the main staircase, “is our entrance area. You might remember it,” she joked wryly at me. I looked around to see if anyone else was going to catch the reference, but I didn’t see anyone in earshot. I realized that she was probably continuing with the tour at this point just in case someone came out of their rooms. “Every guest or I suppose at this point, almost every guest that has entered this house has come through those doors.” She swept down the staircase, telling me more about the architecture, which I probably should have been listening to as she seemed like she knew more about this house than anyone else who had stepped foot in it, though. However, I was having a hard time paying attention to her actual words and was instead just focused on the passion she displayed while she was speaking. I’d never heard someone so blatantly invested in a house, nor had I seen many people talk about things that they were truly passionate about. That, itself, was a marvel amongst Edith’s many marvels.
“Now, if you’ll follow me outside, I can show you the exterior of the house.” She led me toward the big front doors, the same that still stood in the door today. Though the inside of the house had been relatively familiar, save for the amount of people bustling around inside of it, the outside of the house was completely different. Not the actual exterior of the house, so much - that was a different color, but without any drastic changes. But the world around the house was so different that it was hard to even recognize it. Instead of the paved driveway, there was just grass in the front of the house, with a worn dirt trail leading up to the house. She caught me eyeing it and explained “That’s been on my to-do list for quite some time - when I first bought the house, I didn’t have the money to fix up the front walkway. I wanted it to be stepping stones, but we left it as grass, and over time, the customers wore it down. Now, I have plenty of money to fix it if I want to, but I’m too busy with other things. Yourself not included.”
I nodded, half thinking that I could help her put in her stone walkway, but then realizing that I probably wasn’t here for long enough each night to do so. Plus, it would be dark soon, and while it did seem like electric lights were a thing, there weren’t work lights that could light up what I was doing. Unless I wanted to start taking naps in the middle of the day to alter history, I suppose, but I thought that there would be better things that I would want to change.
I looked out at the town - there was now a dirt road leading to that, too, rather than the asphalt highway that headed in that direction. From here, you could hardly see it - there were some buildings off in the distance, but they were far enough away that I wasn’t able to make them out. The Blue Room, a name that I now understood, considering the blue coloring of the entryway, must have been quite the place for people to come all the way out here. Granted, as the woman from the historical society was saying, maybe it was a benefit to have it out of town, as none of the police departments bothered to deal with it.
Edith walked me around the house to the back. In the backyard, there was a large, wooden gazebo that had been taken down before I was born. She grabbed my hand, pulling me toward it as the light began to fade quickly from the sky. “I figured this would be a cute place for an actual date,” she explained. “Far from town so that there’s no rumors starting, and by design, none of the windows of the house face this direction. We want to maintain a level of privacy for any guests who choose to use this area, after all. We walked into the gazebo, and the whitewash showed what little light there was left. There was a gas lantern hanging on the far side, and Edith took it down and lit it. “I’m not sure if this is still there in your time - probably not, it’s already a little wobbly as is,” she said, returning to me. “But I thought you might enjoy seeing it.”
“It’s nice to be able to see your house as it was in its prime,” I agreed. “But to be frank, it’s nicer to be here with you.” I reached over and grabbed her hand, giving it a quick squeeze. She smiled and returned the gesture, then moved to sit on the bench. I sat with her, facing her as best as I could considering we were seated in the same direction.
“It’s nice to be here with you, too,” she said. I held out my hand for hers, and she willingly took it, with both of hers, running her fingers over the crests and valleys of my knuckles. “And that’s weird to say for me. I’ve always prided myself on being this independent woman who doesn’t have time for any men that come her way, and now here I am, planning events and waiting for a man from the future to show up to woo me.”
“Hey, you’re still a strong woman, and I sure as hell haven’t done anything to make you less independent. I’ve shown up here a few times and we’ve had sex which was…amazing,” I said, wishing I could come up with a better way to describe how great I thought it was, but also knowing that that was not the point. “And I’m starting to really look forward to going to bed, just in the hopes that I might get to see you. But I can tell you right now, with or without me, you are still the same woman who manages to be in complete control over this world of yours. You’re just having a bit more fun doing it.”
Edith looked up at me and smiled. “I’m glad you think that. I’m supposed to go help a city councilman up in the capital next week - he’s giving a talk about women’s right to vote, and I’m going to help him with it because I was the one who kept bringing it to the city board. Do tell me, in the future, do women have the right to vote?”
“They do,” I answered, and her smile beamed harder.
“Then I have to go help him,” she insisted, as though I was arguing against it. “I wanted to stay because I’ve been enjoying our time so much, and I doubt I’ll be able to get in contact with you there unless you happen to take a trip up to the same city, I suppose.”
“I can try if you want, I’ve got some time off saved up,” I said with a shrug. “But I think it would be good for you to go alone. That way, you can focus on what you’re doing. And I’ll be here when you get back. Yeah, we’ll miss a few days together, but you’ve got to go help make history and that’s more important.”
Edith half stood out of her seat and reached her arms around me in a huge hug. It seemed less romantic and more grateful, but I still couldn’t help but notice the feeling of her breasts pressed against my chest. I tried my best to ignore the feeling, though, as we were in the middle of a moment. Part of me wondered, given the world that she was living in, if this was the first time that a man had approved of what she was doing, but I didn’t think that mattered at all. Edith was so smart and determined, that I knew that she would do whatever she needed to, regardless of other’s opinions. I wrapped my arms around her, joining her in her embrace, and I felt her melt into me in the cool chill of the night.