Letters From Home (32 page)

35

February 1945—Later that evening
Evanston, Illinois

E
very sound in Evanston ricocheted off the chilled night air, yet nothing was louder than the silence that hovered over the Stephens home.

Liz gripped the arm of the porch swing and stared at the bare cherry tree. The copper glow from neighbors’ windows accentuated its features, as telling as the pages of a scrapbook: the trunk knobs she and Dalton had climbed as kids, the small crooked initials they’d carved, the weathered bark she’d leaned against when they shared their first kiss, brief and awkward in its innocence.

Moonlight sieved through the branches, creating a claw that reached across the snow-spotted yard. Liz shivered at the shadowed fingers. They gripped her heart as she waited for Dalton’s response.

“And this is what you want?” He turned to her, his expression grim. “You’re willing to throw away everything we have, for some soldier you hardly know?”

But I do know him
arrived on her tongue. She swallowed the unnecessary words.

“Dalton,” she said simply, “this isn’t about him.”

“There’s a good chance he won’t be coming home. You realize that, don’t you?” His voice rose.

She paused, considering, accepting. “Yes.”

“So you’d rather be alone than with me?”

She wanted to reply, but honesty would only hurt him more.

He emitted a sharp, humorless laugh. “That’s great, Liz. Then why the hell did you agree to marry me? If this is how you felt, you should’ve saved us the embarrassment.”

“Dalton …I’m so sorry.”

“Just tell me why. If it’s not about him, then
why?”

Because after peeking over the wall of contentment, she couldn’t reverse the ways in which the view had changed her. Yet how could she tell him that, and have him understand?

He slung his gaze toward the street. After a long moment, he relaxed, a revelation settling. “This is about the clerkship, isn’t it?” he said, facing her. “It’s consumed more of my time than I planned, I know.”

She shook her head. “It’s not the clerkship.”

“Okay,” he said. “It’s school. Our schedules have been madness. But remember, we’ve only got a few terms left until—”

“It’s not school.”

“Well…if it’s the wedding, if you feel like we’re rushing—”

“That’s not it either.”

“Then what is it? What’s changed?” His tone coarsened. “Is it because I’m not in the service? Because I’m not wearing a damn uniform?”

Thrown by the question, she hesitated.

His mouth tightened, then his eyes. “That’s it, isn’t it?”

“What? No.”

“You think I’m a coward, because I didn’t go off to war like your Army hero.”

“Dalton—”

He cut in, nearly yelling. “Don’t you think I would’ve enlisted if I could have? If a goddamn ulcer hadn’t made me 4-F?” He stared into the air before him, his cheeks blotched from emotion. In the resounding quiet, Liz digested his words. His secret.

She was well aware of the stigma the 4-F classification carried, had read about guys who’d committed suicide after labeled medically unfit for the military. She’d just never dreamt that Dalton Harris—the overachieving son, student, and future lawyer—adhered to anything less than perfection.

“Why didn’t you say something before now?” she asked gently.

He raked his bottom lip with his teeth and released a weighted exhale. “Do you know what people would say? What it could do to my father’s career? And my own?”

“But you could have told me.”

“For what?” he said. “So you could pity me?”

Instinct urged her to embrace him, extending an apology, a retraction. Instead, she touched his hand resting on the swing’s wooden grooves. “I would never pity you or think less of you for not enlisting. I just would’ve liked to have known the real reason why.”

“Would it have mattered?”

She pondered the question, sighed. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “But I wish we’d been able to share more about ourselves with each other. Maybe we wouldn’t have become so different.”

For several seconds he closed his eyes, grasping her fingers. “Lizzy, please.” He looked at her gravely. “Give me a chance to show you we’re not as far apart as you think. Inside, I’m still the same guy you’ve always known.”

“No,” she said. “You’re not.”

“I am.”

“Dalton, you’re not. You’ve grown up. We both have.”

“That doesn’t mean we have to grow apart, not if we still love each other.” He contracted his brow. “You do—love me, don’t you?”

“From the bottom of my heart,” she said easily. The next sentence would be harder. “The problem is, I’m not…
in
love with you.”

He let go of her hand. “And you know this because of a few letters? I’m the one who’s shared a history with you. Not him.”

She nodded in thoughtful agreement. “You’re right,” she said. “And I wouldn’t trade the years we’ve spent together for anything. You’re a wonderful person. And you have an unbelievable future ahead of you—making stands, fighting for causes.”

“You make it sound like
I’m
the senator instead of my father,” he muttered.

Had he not seen what everyone else could? The respected leader he’d already become?

“I’ve seen you at political events. I’ve seen you on stage giving speeches. The crowds adore you. You belong in that world,” she told him. “But I don’t.”

He hunched his shoulders, barely waiting to propose an alternative. “So we’ll adjust. I can contribute in other ways. I don’t have to be the guy at the podium.”

“No, but you should be. It’s what you were meant to do.” All of a sudden, she viewed his military exclusion for what it was: a gift, not a misfortune. She balanced her next words, heavy in truth, to communicate why. “Maybe in all this craziness, there’s a good reason you weren’t supposed to go off to war. Because back here, at home, is where you’re going to make the biggest difference.”

He shifted in the seat, swaying them, his demeanor clouded with uncertainty. “Yeah, I guess. Maybe. I don’t know.” He shook his head, postponing the thought. Back to the puzzle, its solution just beyond reach. “Lizzy, tell me what you need to hear, what it would take to prove that we can make this work.”

The conversation showed no signs of progressing, stuck on its circular path.

Growing weary, Liz glanced back at the house. She thought of Julia in her bed, asleep with her veil. The image reminded Liz why she couldn’t put off her confrontation with Dalton another day.

She spoke only loud enough for him to hear. “Christian was killed.”

“What?” he said, jolted.

“Julia got his farewell letter today.”

“Oh God,” he breathed. “Is she okay?”

“No. But she’s resting now. I sat with her until she fell asleep.” Liz met his gaze. “And that’s when I knew I had to call you.”

Confusion tugged at his face. He approached his reply carefully. “I’m sorry about Christian, honestly I am. I don’t understand, though. What does
their
relationship have to do with us?”

“Dalton, there’s no denying we feel deeply for each other. I’d be horrified if something ever happened to you. But tonight, watching Julia’s heart being ripped out, that’s when I knew—we’ll never have what they had. We’re a good match, we always have been. But we don’t need each other like that.”

He moistened his lips, as if to help craft a reply. “I know what you’re getting at, Liz, but, given time—”

“Given time, we’ll forget we deserve that kind of love too. Maybe neither of us will find it, but we have to at least try. Don’t we?”

He went to respond, but faltered. No rebuttal. No deferral. In lieu of words, an unmistakable message glinted in his eyes: Although with reservations, deep down he agreed.

In a slow sinking motion, he reclined. They sat without moving for an endless minute.

Then Liz slid the ring from her pinkie. She handed the heirloom over with the care it deserved. “Believe me,” she said, “one day you’ll look back and realize this was the right decision.”

The diamonds shone like the moon, gray from borrowed light, the emerald dark as an ancient gem.

“You think so, huh?”

“I know so.”

He ran his thumb over the band before he gave a slight nod. Somehow, the gesture said it all. There was no need for anything more.

But when he grabbed his trilby hat from beside him, a final thought nibbled at her. An offering she should voice. She tried to push it away. She worried he’d heard enough, and perhaps it wasn’t her place. As his friend, though, as someone who would always care, she softly submitted the words. “In case no one tells you, it’s okay not to be perfect. You’d have lots of company, I promise.”

They exchanged a look, an understanding stemming from history, tinged with the ache of loss.

Finally, rising from the creaky swing, he slipped the ring into his trouser pocket. Liz followed him to the stairs, as she always had to say good-bye. He stopped only one step down and shifted toward her. Sternness rode his eyes.

“When that soldier comes home, I’d better not hear about him mistreating you. You understand?”

A multitude of emotions whirled inside her, quivered her chin. Her one relief was that, this time, regret wasn’t among them.

Dalton placed his hand on her shoulder and sweetly kissed her forehead. “See you around, kiddo,” he said. Then he walked away.

36

June 1945
Paris, France

L
aughter and chatter bounced off the stone walls of the bar. In the corner, a U.S. Army regimental band traded eights in a battle of jazz. The reek of smoke and stale beer was overpowered only by the smell of victory. And more notably, Hitler’s defeat.

From the doorway, Morgan scanned the dim room bulging with well-groomed GIs. They puffed on cigarettes and chugged down pints, flirted with the ladies swarming about them.

“I think I’ve died and gone to heaven,” Jack mumbled through a mouthful of bread. His gaze traced the Mae West figure of a blonde sauntering by. She turned and blew him a kiss. Before he could catch it, a sailor grabbed her around the waist, squeezing a giggle out of her curvy frame.

“Sure you don’t want to do more sightseeing?” Morgan joked.

“What do you think I’m doin’ right now? Best sights in town.”

On three-day leave from their camp in Germany, Morgan had towed his friend on a tourist race against the clock. The Notre Dame Cathedral, Eiffel Tower, Arc de Triomphe. Clearly, nothing had impressed Jack more than the majestic beauty of the Parisian female form.

“So many dollies, so little time.” Jack sighed.

“Don’t you ever take a break?”

“Can’t. Too many dames would be disappointed.” Jack chomped on the last bite of his baguette. “What about you, Mac? See anything you want for your birthday?”

“You offering yourself as a gift?”

“Hey, you know I would, but I’m saving myself for marriage.”

Morgan smiled. “Listen,” he said, “I still need to buy a present before we leave tomorrow. Why don’t you grab a beer and I’ll be back in two shakes.”

Jack didn’t answer, just nabbed Morgan’s jacket sleeve as a stunner displaying more skin than clothing shimmied past. “Hoo boy, it’s a tough call. I had Belgium in the lead, but now I’m thinking the French might have the hottest broads, after all.”

Thank goodness the war hadn’t changed Jack’s youthful humor. Never a dull moment in his company. The one difference Morgan had noticed, however, was a look in his eyes. A dullness that said he had seen things he’d never talk about.

But then, who among them hadn’t?

Already Morgan knew there were memories he too would never share. Not even with Betty. And to think, he’d actually believed he had witnessed the worst of war before visiting the liberated confines of Dachau. The satanic masterpiece housed such evil it should have collapsed into the molten center of the earth.

At the concentration camp, he and two other GIs, one of whom spoke fluent German, had trailed behind a skeletal inmate who spattered his accounts like a racing propeller. He’d toured them from one ghastly site to the next: crematorium with gas chambers, boxcars for corpses, a courtyard for mass executions. The laboratories for medical experiments were too heinous for a wax museum of horrors.

How were humans capable of imagining such atrocities, let alone committing them?

In a moment of needed solitude, Morgan had gripped a chain-link fence and bowed his head. It was then that he uncovered the single answer to his bitter questions of “why.” Tears pooling, he peered into the sky and whispered, “This, Charlie. This is why we were here.”

Morgan’s first impulse had been to purge the encounter in a letter to Betty. After all, she was the one person who was certain to believe his claims, not discount the speculative facilities as exaggerated propaganda—a crime he himself was guilty of before knowing better.

Ultimately, though, he had spared Betty the recap. Rather, he’d filled his pages with just about every other subject, each of their posts growing in openness and affection. He felt there was nothing they couldn’t tell one another—except maybe a few romantic things he would reserve for whispering in her ear someday. At least he hoped for that chance. Until then, he would continue to share snippets about himself, his family, and his unit, which he’d rejoined in early February. With mixed emotions, he had already written her about the Purple Heart he’d received from a colonel in a bedside ceremony. And most recently, he’d described the surrealism of civilians in an intact German town shopping and strolling the streets. Such a display intensified his desire to resume his own normal life in the States, but as usual, he’d have to wait his turn in line.

“Jesus, Mary, ‘n’ Joseph,” Jack exclaimed, “would you look who’s here.” He pointed toward the center of the bar.

Through a small clearing, Morgan sighted their old squad buddy. “I’ll be damned.”

Sure enough, there stood Boomer, with his black cowlick and bushy eyebrows. One foot propped on a chair, he swooshed a pint glass while undoubtedly reciting one of his humorous gems to the GIs circled about him.

“No way you can leave now,” Jack said.

Morgan tossed a glance at his watch. The stores would be closing soon, but he couldn’t go without first saying hi. “After you,” he said, and followed Jack’s lead.

On the way, Jack stopped at a table of flyboys. He snagged the backs of two empty chairs. “Mind if we take these?”

“All yours,” the larger guy said in a subdued tone, barely audible over Boomer’s mock Irish brogue.

“ ‘Ah, Murphy,’ “ Boomer cried in a falsetto voice, “ ‘being that it’s yer eightieth birthday, yer friends hired me as a special treat. In honor of yer big day, I’m goin’ to give ya super sex.’ “ He lowered his vocal key. “Confident that sex with the young lass would end his life with a heart attack, Murphy answered the gal, ‘Well, thank ya, miss. But, if it’s all the same to ya, I’ll take the soup.’”

His audience broke into laughter.

Jack parked his chair in an opening and said, “Any room for some
real
Irishmen here?”

Boomer’s face beamed. “Well, what do you know?” He greeted both of them with a swift hug and slap on the back.

Morgan couldn’t believe the chances of running into the guy. “Thought for sure you’d be basking in the Florida sunshine by now,” he told Boomer.

“Nah. Just recooped in an evac before they reassigned me to G Company.”

Jack settled in his seat. “So how’s your girlfriend holding up?”

“Swell as ever.” Boomer displayed his infamous tattoo. “Her jugs are little lopsided, but she can still dance.” He shuffled his knuckles—Charlie used to love the shake of her hips—in a presentation that spurred more laughs. Then he guzzled his pint and turned to the bar.
“Madame, s’il vous plaît.
Another round.”

Minutes later, a buxom French woman arrived toting a tray filled with pints of dark, foamy beer. The soldiers seized their glasses and bid
merci
while Boomer handed one to Morgan.

“Actually, man, got a quick errand to run.” Morgan tried to give it back.

“What are you thinkin', refusing a perfectly good stout? Wanna piss off your ancestors?”

“Sit your ass down, Mac,” Jack hollered. “It’s your birthday.”

“Birthday?” Boomer cried. “Now we really have something to celebrate.” He raised his pint above the group. “To the birthday boy!”

“Hear! Hear!” they all chorused.

What choice did Morgan have? Besides, his bad knee was starting to act up after a full day of covering the city on foot. A short rest would do him good.

He sat down and took a chug of the thick, room-temperature drink that tasted like tree bark. A reflexive cough fought to surface, challenging his pride.

Boomer lifted his pint again. “To going home!”

“To going home,” the group echoed, commanding Morgan to take a second but smoother swig.

Camp scuttlebutt had run rampant about the possibility of GIs being transferred to reinforce Allied offensives against the Japanese. Either word hadn’t reached the guys at Boomer’s table, or they’d chosen to focus on their homeward cruise regardless.

“Gentlemen.” Boomer’s speech began to slur. “May you all live to be a hundred years, with one extra year to repent.”

For once, Morgan wished he’d followed Jack’s example. Waiting to eat his own baguette would have been a wise decision, since the drink in his hand was markedly more potent than 3.2 beers at the PX. Another good reason to sneak out soon.

As he turned back to the table, the guys clanked his glass. He downed what was to be his last hefty swallow, but the thought took a backseat to the tingling in his legs, followed by his feet. Before he knew it, another round of pints had arrived. Then another. The soldiers swayed to “Bless ‘Em All” and “Roll Me Over in the Clover,” their volume growing with each serving.

Morgan was fairly certain he himself had made a couple of toasts, though he couldn’t recall what he’d said. All he knew for sure was he couldn’t feel his nose and mouth. While patting his lips to make sure they were still there, he felt two hands massaging his shoulders. He tipped his head back and slowly took in the hazy upside-down view of a ravishing young woman.

“Allô, monsieur,”
she said in a come-hither tone. She swung around his seat, dizzying him as she slid onto his lap. A scanty black corset laced her tiny waist.

“Mac, this is Monique,” he heard Jack say.

The girl smiled with red painted lips. She tossed her long black mane off her shoulders to reveal the paleness of her flesh. Before Morgan could speak, she ran her hands through his hair. His eyelids drooped closed. The lulling movements of her fingers hypnotized him. He breathed in the heady scent of her sugary-sweet perfume, even more intoxicating than the stout he’d consumed.

“Consider her a birthday present, m’friend.” Jack’s remark yanked Morgan from his daze.

He opened his eyes. Monique’s generous cleavage stared back.

The sight caused a physical reaction that would have mortified him had he been sober enough to care.

Monique appeared amused. She wet her lips as she stood and guided one of his hands to follow her.

“Have fun, Mac.” Jack grinned like the devil. His arm dangled over the shoulder of a brunette seated sideways on his lap. “Just don’t forget to cover your rifle,” he warned.

The Army was so paranoid about the spreading of venereal diseases, along with the image of immorality among soldiers overseas, they distributed packs of condoms like an infinite supply of candy to children. But other than rolling them onto the muzzle of his rifle to prevent the bore from rusting, Morgan had never considered actually using the prophylactic devices during his European service.

His body suddenly had other ideas.

In a passing blur, Morgan was swept out of the bar and into a dim, barren apartment. Lights from the street flickered through the window, waving shadows across Monique’s curves and the sheeted bed behind her. Silently, they stood facing each other. With a seductive smile, she took his hand and placed it on her bare shoulder. She pulled his fingers across the shelf of her breasts and his legs turned to jelly. He’d forgotten what it was like to have a woman so close, to feel a gentle touch on his skin.

She stepped forward and pressed her lips to his neck. When she rubbed her thigh against him, he shuddered and closed his eyes. She trailed the tip of her tongue up toward his earlobe, stealing his air. He felt her hands glide down his shirted chest beneath his opened jacket. Every abdominal muscle tensed as she approached the waistline of his trousers.

“Oh, Betty …” The name drifted out in a gasp.

And with that, the fantasy began to slip away, towed by a feeling of betrayal against the woman he loved.

“Wait,” he said meekly.

Either ignoring or misinterpreting the word, Monique knelt at his feet. She briskly unfastened his military belt buckle, demonstrating her familiarity with the accessory.

Carnal instinct implored his conscience to look the other way, to savor an act of pleasure that, for a brief passionate moment, could erase all that haunted him.

Still, his heart battled for control. “We …need to stop.”

Her overpowering perfume throttled his senses. As she unbuttoned his pants, two words scratched at his mind:
Dearest Morgan.
His will returned with a vengeance. He jumped back out of Monique’s reach, and her face clouded.

“Monsieur?”

“I’m sorry. It’s not you. I just—have to go.” He hightailed it out the door, refastening his pants and belt to the best of his impaired ability. On every corner, servicemen and their female companions embraced. To his left, to his right. Definitely not helping his cause.