The Tennis Party

The Tennis Party
by david macpherson
It was a tennis party that we were about. We found ourselves with tennis rackets, so we deduced that that was our purpose.
There were seven of us in our finest dresses. We wore kid gloves and fashionable Parisian hats, except for Mrs. G—‘s oldest daughter, whose head was bare. This would have been scandalous if the day did not seem to be one of athletic pursuits.
We walked down beautifully tended lawns, wondering if we would soon encounter a tennis court, a net, lines, chairs to sit, a table to hold a pitcher of iced lemon water.
On either side of the stretching lawn were eight foot hedges. We could not traverse them if we desired. All we could do was move forward or turn back to where we began, and we were not the type to commit such folly.
Every few minutes we came upon large topiaries of women: green, well trimmed, and quite proper.
The sun became hot. Several of us took the liberty of unbuttoning our collars. Yes, we were that desperate.
The rackets were heavy in our arms. We wondered if our husbands had missed us, or at least, the servants. They must have noticed the absence of our guiding presence.
Mrs. A—began to sing hymns. We suffered because she was never of fine of voice, though we were loath to inform her of that fact.
We heard a gasp behind us. We turned around to see nothing, only a topiary we did not recall passing.
A half hour on, we realized Mrs. H—was no longer with us.
Wrens flew down , swarming us in brown and feather. We waved our rackets toward them. They departed. We moved forward.
There was but six of us now. Not a good number. Not a good number at all. The grass appeared to be greener then ever we saw. Even with our eyes closed, the lawn was quite green.
Sure the tennis court was before us, we walked on. We six.