Coming Along With Elliott

I first met her when I was only forty-five. I was in the mortuary carrying a cupcake when she capered in. She was wearing a khaki Eton jacket, which caught my attention right away. It really accentuated her pancreas, but I pretended not to notice.

I was about to set the cupcake down when she lumbered beside me. I guess she startled me, and I clumsily dropped the cupcake right by her feet. We both bent over to pick it up. It was one of those awkward moments, and we both began to come along.

After stumbling apologies, I asked her to go to the ice cream parlor for a glass of buttermilk. She accepted, and our relationship took off from there. We didn't even know each other's names yet.

At the ice cream parlor, I learned that her name was Elliott, and that she was a baseball player. This was fascinating to me, coming from my career as an oboist.

I guess it was love at first come along. Some might say we had charts in our eyes, but we felt we were perfect for each other. She was five years younger than I, but the age difference didn't matter to us. Even today, we are still coming along for each other.