Lovey

The Nicest Boy

May 1949

My momma always said that you didn’t stop dating until there was a ring on your finger. So, I didn’t want to, but, to appease her, I went on the occasional date when I was at WC. Well, more to the point, I went on hundreds of dates with Dan and a few with other boys. I’ll admit that it got harder and harder to see the other girls come home with rings on their fingers, leave school early to get married. There were even a few that left school and got married because they were pregnant—but we didn’t talk about that out loud. Just behind our hands in hushed tones after she was gone.

Dan and I dreamed of our wedding day. When he went home for Christmas break, he negotiated with his parents that he would work for one year after college, get his feet on the ground, and we would get married. It was longer than either of us wanted to wait, but it was better than the five years that his father’s parents had demanded of him.

Dan was coming to pick me up that night, and I couldn’t wait to see him, to go dance, to feel his strong arms around me, our lips on each other’s. With only a couple of weeks until graduation, we could see the light at the end of the tunnel. And I had found a teaching job in New Bern, where he would be working as a banker, and a group of girlfriends to live with. At least we would be in the same town now and could see each other all the time.

Dan handed me the telegram before I realized that there were tears in his eyes. Before I could even finish reading it, I was sobbing. “If they had just let us get married. Why didn’t they let us get married?”

“How could this happen again?” Dan asked. “Don’t they think I’ve served my time?” He punched the hood of the car, and I didn’t blame him. I wanted to too.

Dan hugged me close to him. “Will you wait for me, Lynn? Please, please promise that you’ll wait for me. We are getting engaged the minute I get home, my parents be damned. They can have their house and their money and their rules.” He kissed my head and lowered his voice, looking down on me. “All I want is you.”

We cried a lot that night, but Dan told me not to be scared. “I won’t be fighting this time, Lynn, so you don’t have to worry.”

“They aren’t fighting now,” I cried. “But what about later? What if the war heats up? Oh, I can’t bear the thoughts of knowing that you’re in danger.”

He had kissed me passionately and said, “I promise that I will come home to you. And when I do, we’ll get married. And I’ll spend the rest of my life taking care of you and making it up to you.”

I was supportive. My parents were not. Since Dan wasn’t going to New Bern, it seemed silly for me to. So, instead, I went back home. I was twenty-three already, and most of my friends were married, having babies, starting their lives. And I was so jealous I could scarcely breathe.

That first night back home I realized I had made a huge mistake. I should have gone to New Bern with my other single girlfriends.

I was sitting on the living room sofa, crying my eyes out because my Dan was gone. The love of my life was on the other side of the world. War had brought us together and war had torn us apart again. It didn’t seem fair.

“Look,” my daddy said. “I know you’re brokenhearted, Lynn, but we think it might be time to move on.”

“Move on?” I spat through my tears. “I will not move on. Dan is the love of my life.”

“Of course he is, darling,” my mother soothed. “But, in the meantime, the nicest boy wants to take you out.”

I glared at her. “Momma, have you not been listening? I’m in love, for pity’s sake. I am marrying Dan the moment he gets home. I’m waiting for him. I’m not dating a bunch of people I’m not interested in. I did that in college because you made me. I’m done now. In my mind, I’m married to Dan already.”

She shook her head. “Darling, I don’t know how they do it where you’ve been, but, ’round here, I think you know there’s no such thing as going steady until there’s a ring on that pretty finger. Nobody’s gonna pay for that cow when they can get the milk for free.”

“First of all, no one is getting my milk, Momma. So let’s just get that straight.” I fluffed my hair. “Second of all, there will be a ring on my finger before you know it.”

“Well,” Daddy interjected, “I was telling Ernest’s daddy all about you being summa cum laude and all that time you spent in New York, and I promised him a date when you got back home after graduation.”

“Ernest . . .” I thought with my finger against my lip. “Ernest Wake.” I shook my head. “Daddy, no. No way.”

Ernest had been nicknamed Booger in middle school because, far past the age when children become self-aware, he still picked his nose during class. He had curly red hair, freckles, glasses and bad teeth.

“He’s quite the catch, young lady,” Momma said.

“No, Momma,” I said, stomping my foot softly. “He’s rich. Not a catch.”

“Well,” my daddy tried to soothe, “I promised him a date, so you’ll need to go out with him.”

“This isn’t some impoverished country, Daddy! You can’t just marry me off to some rich man, trade me for a couple of cows.”

“Oh, don’t be ridiculous.” Daddy sniffed through his laughter. “They’d have to give me some chickens too.”

“Besides,” Momma said, perhaps feeling slightly more empathetic than Daddy, “no one said a thing about marriage.”

And they hadn’t. Not yet.