She just materialized one day, the mother’s sister Rebecca had hardly known.

She must have found the hallway door ajar and let herself in: There she was, in the middle of the little living room. She didn’t introduce herself, apparently assuming Rebecca would recognize her. “You have a spare room in your apartment, child, with a kind of day bed, if I’m not mistaken. I’d be pleased to stay with you a few days. Maybe a week at most.”

She was unencumbered by anything save an oversized handbag that seemed made of old carpeting. Not much taller than a broomstick and just as straight, with a long dark skirt and a luminous corona of white hair, she looked like Mary Poppins. But no umbrella, so not a figment of imagination – although it occurred to Rebecca to wonder if the wind were from the east.

Aunt Carrie never explained how she knew about that spare bed, just as she never explained where she’d been all these years.

The carpetbag’s pattern was faded beyond recognition. It might be the same one, Rebecca mused, that this aunt had when she visited Mother years ago. Indeed, decades ago: she herself had still been Becky then, just starting high school.

Which would make Aunt Carrie very old. Ancient, although her cheeks were less corrugated than Rebecca’s. Mother’s older sister. Rebecca, having never married, had moved in to take care of Mother in her long illness, and then stayed in the family home another decade. She’d moved here to Harmony Acres because Dr. Ross, who’d become her “principal physician” when old Dr. Jamison retired, advised it.

“You don’t talk to anyone but drugstore or supermarket cashiers from one week to the next,” Dr. Ross had said. “That’s not healthy.” Rebecca might have ignored that advice, but the doctor told of an older patient who died alone at her home and wasn’t discovered for a week, by which time . . . “Well, we don’t need to go into grisly detail about how bodies decay.”

Here at Harmony Acres, Rebecca was confident, her death when it came would be noticed. Every night, after midnight, a security person walked through the entire senior living complex, turning up a little metal tab pinned over each door in such a way that it would rotate down when the door was opened. Rebecca had soon learned to routinely open her door every morning so that tab fell – because at ten every morning another security person made the rounds, knocking on any door that hadn’t been opened, solicitously asking if the resident was alright.

Although she’d made door-opening part of her daily drill, Rebecca after a month still hadn’t gotten into the busy rhythm of the place. Aunt Carrie seemed to know that, too. The first morning they shared a robust breakfast of juice, soft-boiled eggs and tea, along with raspberries that materialized in the fridge. Then she produced a laptop computer from that carpetbag, set it on the coffee table, and demanded to be left alone.

“Becky dear,” she said, “you may remember from my visit years ago that I write. And by long habit – it’s a weakness, I confess – I don’t write well if distracted. I think there’s an exercise class in a few minutes that you haven’t been to. Perhaps you could go to that class this morning so I can have an hour for writing.”

Rebecca remembered Mother’s words: “I frankly have no idea what she writes, nor for whom, nor how she gets paid. IF she gets paid. She seems to travel all over the world, and must be writing about those travels. She always has a writing pad with her.”

A vivid image came back: She had glimpsed this aunt, younger but even then Mary Poppinsish, writing with a dark pencil on a yellow, legal-length lined pad. Quite elegant cursive. And now she had mastered a laptop. Astonishing. Rebecca thought she herself should have a computer, but kept postponing a decision, not sure she could learn to use it.

She got herself ready for exercise class. Aunt Carrie insisted she get into loose-fitting slacks, a flannel shirt and sneakers. “Child,” her aunt asked as she started out the door, “what’s your Amazon account number?” Whatever that was, Rebecca knew she didn’t have one.

The exercise class turned out to be a huge success. The young instructor was attentive, showing her moves that the other dozen women had down pat, all to recorded music. After class everyone had a healthy glass of some special fruit juice, introduced themselves, and chatted amiably.

Rebecca had been postponing this sort of thing, fearful that after living alone so long she would be awkward and not fit in. But she did fit in, so it was more than an hour before she got back to Aunt Carrie.

Her uninvited house guest had been busy at more than writing. “I’ve been exploring your fridge, child, and it seems a bit sparse. We could go up to the dining room for meals, of course, but they might get fussy about your having a live-in guest, so it’s probably better to eat right here for the few days of my stay. There’s an online grocery service nearby that delivers, so I’ve ordered a few things that ought to arrive soon.”

Rebecca thought she must be imagining all this. They were standing side-by-side in the living room, looking out the huge window into a yard exploding into color, flowers and shrubs in bright sunshine. The big glass reflected the two of them as though they were out in that yard. Rebecca was a full head taller than Aunt Carrie, and a bit plumper.

That tableau was interrupted by the appearance of a van with fruit and vegetables painted on its panels. Aunt Carrie confidently led the way out to Rebecca’s ground-level porch – which Rebecca had hardly explored – where a pleasant young man handed over two big grocery bags.

“You must learn to do this,” she said as Rebecca began putting things in the fridge or cupboard. “That car of yours is an ancient wreck, and your reflexes aren’t what they used to be. If you learn to order online, you can give up the car, and probably save enough on insurance to buy a laptop and still afford an Uber or Lyft now and then.”

Aunt Carrie had to explain what Uber and Lyft were and how to get them; Rebecca carefully wrote that down on a notepad, as well as how to order more groceries.

“What’s your taste in movies?” Aunt Carrie asked that evening over the frozen-now-thawed dinners that had been delivered.

“Oh, I don’t go out to the movies. I don’t like to drive after dark.”

“Don’t need to. How about an old Broadway show tonight? Flower Drum Song?  Carousel? Sound of Music? All available to stream on your new Amazon Prime account, free or practically free.”

So Rebecca learned about Amazon, her new account, how to order things and how to stream movies. She wrote that all down, and spent an unexpectedly pleasant evening with Rodgers and Hammerstein.

She wasn’t surprised when at breakfast Aunt Carrie sent her off to a meeting of the Gardens and Greenhouse Committee while she did her writing. “It’s time you did some committee work,” Aunt Carrie instructed. “And on the way back, stop by the package room. There should be something there from Amazon. Nothing too heavy for you to carry.”

Rebecca hadn’t known there was a room where incoming packages were delivered, but one of her new friends on the garden committee showed her. Over lunch, Aunt Carrie opened the box and introduced her to a new electronic toy, which she plugged in here and there. “If you have to get up in the middle of the night,” she explained, “you shouldn’t be in the dark. Dangerous.” She raised her voice: “Alexa, turn on the hall light.” And the light went on!

It was Monday afternoon when Aunt Carrie arrived. By Thursday evening Rebecca had been to a second exercise class, wearing a new yoga suit that arrived from Amazon. She’d also been to three committee meetings, made several dozen new friends, streamed another movie, and driven with Aunt Carrie to a car dealership where they sold the car and took an Uber home.

“Child,” Aunt Carrie said over another TV dinner, “I’ve been doing some homework. I was sure that a place like this must have someone to help old people learn to use computers, and it does! There is a young man, Jeffery, whose job is exactly that. I’ve made a date for him to come late tomorrow morning for your first lesson.”

“But I don’t have a computer!”

“It will be in the package room. You can pick it up first thing in the morning.”

And so, after breakfast, Rebecca went to get her new laptop and headed back to the apartment to await her first lesson – wondering how she was going to explain her aunt’s presence.

By the time she got back, Aunt Carrie had finished her writing and was stowing her own laptop in the carpetbag. “Child,” she said, “you’ll soon be addicted to your new toy. Young Jeffrey will help you get an email address, and you’ll spend too much time hunched over your desk. Bad posture, bad for health. You must learn to take breaks. Come, let me show you.”

They stood together looking out the big window again, the bright sunshine reflected warm on their faces. Standing as ordered a bit farther apart, she followed Aunt Carrie through a series of sidewise and back stretches and deep forward bends. “These are rudimentary,” she instructed. “Your exercise person may suggest some other postures. What’s important is that you take regular breaks, so as not to grow old and stooped.”

Rebecca only half-heard her: She was fixated on their reflections in the big window. Her aunt was small, but she ought to cast some shadow. She didn’t seem to.

Rebecca did another deep bend to look through her legs at the rug behind her. Sure enough, her own shadow was back there, bent over, but there was no shadow beside it.

“Aunt Carrie,” she said as she pulled up erect again and half-turned, “your shadow has disappeared!”

So had Aunt Carrie.

Astonished, Rebecca went out to her little porch. Sure enough, the wind had changed.

-End-