4

Bea Taylor had spent a bit longer shopping than she had wanted. She and Clara had only wanted to stop briefly at the New Market Mall to check it out and ended up getting in a fight with a shoe salesman named Al Bundy, encountering heiress London Tipton with her new best friend Jackie Burkhart and then lunch at a small dinner cafe with waitress Alice Hyatt and a housekeeper named Alice Nelson. They had only barely met, but it seemed as if they had known each other for years.

Back at the Taylor household, Bea started as per her daily routine of taking care of her nephew's Andy's home and watching over young Opie with the same motherly guidance with which she had raised Andy. Opie had tore through the house just minutes before with his friends. All of Opie's young friends ranging from Ben Seaver and Richie Petrie seemed to be good young men as was Bobby Brady, the young man from the family over on Clinton Street, but that Eddie Munster, was something else. He sort of always had a weird pale look to his face. Upon meeting him the first time, Bea had thought he was sick and tried to send him home to his mother, but Eddie just insisted he was alright and raced off with Opie and the others. And then there was the matter with his ears: they both came to points like something from another world. The boys loved the way Eddie could open bottles with his ears.

Continuing with her cooking and cleaning, Bea remised for a moment by the radio listening to her daytime radio program on WKRP out of Atlanta starring that charming Pamela Moran, a daytime talk hostess. She was much nicer than that loud and raucous DJ Mork McConnell claiming to be from the planet Ork for comedy effect. Between breaks in Pam's show, Freddy Fillmore was giving away free tickets to the Tropicana with Ricky Ricardo and later on, Ryan Seacrest continued with American Top Forty. Ryan then broke off as Fillmore came through with tragic news from the west coast of the country. Aunt Bea listened closely to the radio as the music stopped for the announcement.

"Ladies and gentlemen," Freddy's voice became solemn. "I've just been handed an announcement to let you know that Oceanic Airline Flight 815 from Melbourne to Los Angeles has just gone down somewhere in the South Pacific. The authorities are searching an area of a thousand miles where the plane went down, but they are not very optimistic about locating any survivors."

"Goodness." Bea made a mental note to pray for those good people and their families. She had done the same thing after the explosion in Oklahoma City and the events of September 11, 1999. She and Clara had even done all they could to gather relief for the victims of Hurricane Katrina with the added support of the Mayberry PTA. She wasn't sure why she knew these events; she just did. A few days ago, she thought the calendar on the wall read 1965, but now when she looked at it, it read 2005. Maybe she should be distressed over the loss of forty years, but she wasn't. She had been born in 1947, but sometimes she thought she'd been born much earlier than that. She heard the front doors opening and looked out to Andy coming in to the house.

"Hello, Andy..." Bea came out to greet him. "How was your day?"

"Aunt Bea..." Andy rubbed his head distraught. "I think I'm losing it. This town is going crazy. Houses and streets popping up out of nowhere, farms vanishing and reappearing miles away, a female mayor I've never met, people calling me asking me for directions or the date, people I don't know coming by the courthouse... poor Sara quit the switchboard because she couldn't keep up with the calls now. I've got crazy ladies over on some street called Wisteria Lane, distant explosions from the Addams House, Candace Flynn screaming her brothers are building something, Brian Hackett describing flying saucers over the airfield, Mrs. Kravitz screaming about oddball neighbors in the Munster House and Barney trying to lock up everyone who looks strange. I've just about had it. Thank god, Barney hired that new deputy from across the county line. I need all the help I can get."

"New deputy?" Bea tried to calm him. "Is he any good?'

"I dunno..." Andy sat picking up the Mayberry Gazette. "Name's Enos Strate from up out of Hazzard County... Don't ask me where it is because I don't know, and I don't want to know."

"Well, Andy..." Bea dried a plate as she spoke with Andy. "We all get a little forgetful. I was just talking to Alice this morning..."

"Alice?"

"Alice Nelson, my friend. She's the housekeeper for the Brady's on the next block." Bea reminded Andy. "They live across the street from that Major Anthony Nelson."

"Well, what about her..." Andy grumbled lightly as he sat in his chair.

"Alice and I talked about there's a lot of places in town we both used to visit and have forgot about." Bea looked out to the front yard. "I mean, that Curious Goods antique store, I don't recall ever being in there, but Jack Marshak remembered me and asked how you were doing."

"Is that the one run by that Melinda Gordon?' Andy tried recalling faces too. "Barney's got a bit of a crush on her."

"No, this is the one back behind the Gateman Funeral home and next to Harry's Hardware Store that was once run by Lewis Vendredi... his niece and nephew took it over." Bea rattled off names and places she was becoming aware of. "I used to think Michelle was related to the Foster Furniture people. She's now dating Sean Finnerty."

"Finnerty." Andy recalled that name. "She's better off without him. That boy's just not to be trusted."

Opie started coming down the stairs ahead of Ben, Richie, Bobby and the Munster kid. Opie stopped near Andy's chair and Eddie just grinned that creepy smile that made his pointed ears bend out even more sharper.

"Paw, is it okay if I go out?" Opie asked. "We're going to catch up with Beaver and Larry at the toy store. Mr. Schultz is going to tell us more stories about Colonel Hogan from the war."

"I reckon." Andy replied. "But be home by six." With that permission, Opie and his friends from school hastened for the front porch where Zack and Cody Martin were just coming on to the front porch. The two boys were blonde twins who usually lived at the Tipton Hotel in Raleigh, but their father had them in Mayberry to go fishing.

"You guys ready?"

"Yeah." Richie cried out first. Eddie jumped off the porch first and Zack and Cody ran circles around Ben Seaver. Hearing the voices of Cody and Zack screaming and yelling, Andy cringed and looked out through the front windows of his house.

"Aunt Bea," Andy remorsed. "Why didn't you warn me the Martin boys were back? Last time they were in town, they nearly burned down the Rimshaw house!"