CHAPTER 8

Silent anguish had come to Bynum. Misery rolled in with a telegram, strong enough that, to Alice-Ann, it seemed it would never leave. Even more so, Alice-Ann believed the town itself mourned as it laid her martyred son to rest, the first since that day a little over two years ago when her special day had turned pear-shaped. Upside down, like a sand-filled hourglass, spilling its contents much too quickly.

There were times when Alice-Ann thought the sands would never reverse. Living under the oppression of rationing books —even though farmers had it easier than most —and the fear brought about by pulled blackout curtains. Aunt Bess fussing about trying to help her friends in town by sharing things like sugar, Papa stressing about overworking his mules and tearing up the plows, Irene complaining about everything, Nelson trying to keep everyone’s spirits up, and herself, riding a bus to work and back, driven by a bus driver who, in keeping with the gas restrictions, wasn’t allowed to go over thirty-five miles an hour. There were days when she thought she’d die on that bus, whether heading to town or back home again.

Now that thought had practically taken shape, breathing in and out, like a living thing.

It had been too easy, she’d told Mack in her next letter to him, to believe that one day —someday soon —life would simply return to the way it had been before that awful day when the Japanese chose to fly their planes into American skies.

But in reality, she’d penned the night after receiving the news about the handsome redhead with a spray of freckles across his upturned nose,

I am old enough now, Mack, to know that this can never be. I’m no longer the child you watched walk toward the front porch of the farmhouse. The girl who declared her undying love for you.

My love has not changed other than it has rooted more deeply. I cannot ever see myself loving anyone but you, ever. I know you haven’t given me much encouragement —except those few times when you shared with me private thoughts you have always carried so deep within your heart. All I have are my dreams and a prayer for you that I speak every night. I ask the Lord to keep you all safe, Mack, but you most of all.

I’m not sure I could bear a life without you in it.

Please don’t laugh at my words. Please don’t pass them off as continuing to be some silly high school crush. I’m not in high school any longer, Mack. I’m a grown woman now. I have a job and I help with the household finances. And with this war, I see things through the eyes of an adult, not a child.

In case you’ve wondered, I only go out with my friends.

Not that there were many young men knocking on her door, asking her out. Young women with fuzz for hair, pale eyes, and even paler skin . . . young women with a mouth full of teeth, two of which crossed slightly in the middle of too-generous lips . . . didn’t have a beau calling every Friday night and Saturday afternoon. Young women like herself, she knew, were more than grateful for the men who might look beyond the book’s cover and want to know about the story inside.

Men like Mack, who had known her for her entire life.

I wait for you. I told you once that I want you to be the first man I ever kiss. The last. The only.

Nothing has changed, except that there is a sudden sadness hanging over us now. A dark cloud that rains and rains.

I beg you, Mack. Stay safe.

More than that, she begged God.

On the following Friday after work, Alice-Ann said good-bye to Nancy at the corner, then crossed the street as she did every afternoon. She nearly trotted in the cold to the five-and-dime, her hand holding the skull-fitting beret she’d squirreled money away for. The one she’d hoped would make her look more like Miss Gene Tierney, the way she looked in one of Irene’s magazines.

The store’s doors had been decorated with green wreaths wrapped in red velvet ribbon, and the windows had been made to look as though the town had experienced a dusting of snow. Above it, a large sign encouraged Bynum’s citizens to come inside and buy war bonds and stamps.

Maeve stood behind the counter, handing change to Ernie’s kid sister, Mary Etta, a pretty fifteen-year-old who stood with her saddle oxfords pressed together as though a tension cord had pulled her erect.

“Hey there,” Maeve said with a smile. “Got something for you.”

Alice-Ann ignored her. The last thing she needed was for Mary Etta to hear that she’d received a letter from Mack. Knowing bobby-soxers as she did, Alice-Ann reckoned Mary Etta would waste no time in telling her best friend and then probably mention it again at dinner, which meant that Ernie would hear, and then —

She smiled at Mary Etta. “How’s school, Mary Etta?” she asked, hoping Maeve got the subtle hint.

Mary Etta fastened the oversize buttons on her coat, then grabbed the small brown paper bag and held it up. “I’m out of erasers.” She frowned. “Well, I was. Now I’m not.”

“Only a few more days until Christmas break, I imagine?”

“We’re out now, Alice-Ann,” she said, pulling a knit cap from the recesses of her coat pocket and sliding it onto her head, pressing the dark-blonde curls to a scarf around her throat. “Christmas is only a week away, you know.”

With that, she walked out, leaving Alice-Ann and Maeve to gawk at one another.

Alice-Ann shrugged. “Honestly,” she said, walking to the counter. “What with Irene throwing her guts up every ten minutes and Marty Dibble getting himself killed and the whole town mourning and Mack getting ready to —” She stopped herself.

“Mack getting ready to what?”

Alice-Ann shook her head. She’d chosen not to tell Maeve or Claudette —and who’d seen much of her lately? —what Mack had told her about going to Emirau. She’d somehow managed to find time to go to the library during her lunch break on Monday, skipping the opportunity to eat her sandwich and drink from the thermos of coffee Aunt Bess had packed for her earlier that morning. Avoiding the librarian’s eagle eyes, she looked up the location of the island, along with some photographs in an oversize and heavy encyclopedia. What she’d learned had kept her from being hungry again until the next day’s breakfast.

“Nothing,” she said. She smiled. “Do you have a letter from Mack for me?”

Maeve shook her head, her brown curls barely moving under the layers of homemade setting lotion she’d taken to using of late. “Uh-uh.” She pulled an envelope from her smock. “But you did get a letter from my brother.” She grinned as she handed it over. “And so did I. Wait till you read it.” She walked around the counter to lock the door. “He probably tells you pretty much what he tells me, without the ‘Give Mama and Daddy a hug for me’ stuff.”

Alice-Ann stared down at the chicken-scratch handwriting of Maeve’s older brother —her name on the envelope, but addressed to Maeve’s post office box. “What does he have to say?” she asked, flipping it over, then back again, choosing not to open it right then.

“He told me about how the people over there in England talk. They sure have some funny ways,” she said, turning the key and dropping it into the same pocket she’d pulled the letter from. She crossed her arms as she stepped over to Alice-Ann. “Hey, Ernie and I are going to the Methodist church tonight to hear their cantata. Want to join us?”

Alice-Ann offered the best smile she had to give. “No, but thank you. It’s been a hard week and I’m sort of beat. I also think Aunt Bess wants to try to find a Christmas tree tonight.”

Maeve glanced over her shoulder, out the window to the heart of Bynum, where streetlamps had begun to flicker. They wouldn’t stay on long; once darkness fell, the whole town faded to black. “Getting dark, already,” she said. “I bet she won’t go out in those woods tonight to cut down a tree.” She bounced on the balls of her feet. “Come on, Alice-Ann. Come with Ernie and me. It’ll be fun.”

Alice-Ann slid Carlton’s letter into her coat pocket as she shook her head again. “No. I wouldn’t have any way of letting Aunt Bess know and if I just didn’t show up, Papa would cut a switch for sure.”

Maeve’s mouth gaped open and Alice-Ann laughed.

“I’m kidding, Maeve,” she said, walking toward the door, hoping she was right. Since Marty Dibble’s death, Papa had been anything but easy to live with. “Thanks for the letter from Carlton.”

“You do write him, too, don’t you?” Maeve asked, coming up behind her to lock the door again.

Alice-Ann nodded halfheartedly. Of course she wrote to Carlton. Short, kind letters telling him of the weather and the latest book she’d read or a movie she’d seen. She figured he got enough heartfelt sentiments from Betty Jo Shannon.

“Of course I do,” she said. “Doesn’t he tell you these things too?”

Maeve shrugged. “Not really, no.”

“Oh,” she said. “Well, I do write to him. At least once a week.” Or so . . .

Maeve smiled. “Good. You’ve got such a way with words, Alice-Ann. And I imagine he’s seeing some awful things over there. I just want him to have something to smile about.”

Well, of course she did. Alice-Ann would want the same for her own brother. She gave her best friend a hug before walking out, returning to the corner in front of the bank, and then crossing the street to the bus stop. Only when she made it to her usual seat —four from the back, left side —did she pull Carlton’s letter from her pocket.

Dear Alice-Ann,

I wish you could see the way the boys flurry around when the words “mail call” are shouted out. You’d think no one had ever received so much as a postcard before. But these are more than just letters from home and from our loved ones. They help us forget what we’re seeing, what we’re doing, and maybe even a little of who we’ve become, which isn’t all bad. Especially now with Christmas coming.

I also wish you could hear the people over here talking. Ha-ha. Some of the Yankees I’m stationed with think I talk funny, but then we heard these British. They say things like “Bob’s your uncle,” which means “and that’s that.” Isn’t that the funniest thing you’ve ever heard? So, if you were telling me how to get from your farm over to our place, you might say, “You walk down the drive, take the bus to town, get off across from the bank, cross two streets into the center of town, and Bob’s your uncle!”

You can use that sometime on Maeve and Claudette. I haven’t told Maeve (I told her about the “roundabouts”) and I don’t write to Claudette, so have at it.

We have to leave out again early in the morning, so I guess I’d better stop writing for now and turn in. Most of the boys already have —I’m the lone wolf. Keep Maeve out of trouble, will you? When she writes, she goes on and on about Ernie and I think it’s beginning to worry Mama and Daddy. (Oh! Another thing. Over here, they call their mama “Mum” and their daddy “Dad.”)

All right, then. Bob’s your uncle!

Take care,

Carlton

Alice-Ann couldn’t help it: she smiled. Then, as the bus neared her stop, she read it again, this time imagining Carlton sitting up on his cot, one knee bent, the foot flat against the sheets, his stationery splayed across a book that rested on the other outstretched leg. She pictured him as she had so often seen him, the fingers of one hand combed through his thick hair.

For sure, Carlton Hillis was a catch for Betty Jo Shannon. She was one lucky girl.

Later, before she turned off her light and said her final prayers, Alice-Ann pulled two random letters from Mack from the stack she kept hidden in her closet in an old handkerchief box under her straw hat and tied off with a red ribbon she’d once worn in her hair. She marked their place by pulling the letters beneath them out a fraction of an inch, then climbed into her bed, sitting cross-legged beneath the covers as she read.

August 15, 1942

Dear Alice-Ann,

Have I written to you yet about all the walking we do every day? Sometimes I think I put in more miles each day than Nelson does out there on the farm. If we’re not marching, we’re walking to mess (that’s where we eat), and if we’re not walking to mess, we’re walking to where we shower, and that’s not even where we go to the bathroom. (Sorry to talk about such as this. I think I’ve grown a little calloused to it all.)

I know some people think the farmers are the lucky ones because they stayed behind to work the land, but sometimes I think we are. I don’t mind telling you that I’m not at all keen on fighting and maybe dying, but at the same time, this is what I want to do for my country. Whenever I get afraid, I think of my folks and you and Nelson and Irene. I think of Aunt Bess and your daddy. I think of everyone in Bynum, doing their part. And I know you are all worth dying for.

I know this letter is a little morose, but when you’re stationed here and when you see the leftovers of December 7, you start to think about things like that.

Send news from home, will you?

Love ya,

Mack

November 12, 1942

Dear Alice-Ann,

How’s life on the farm? I have to tell you, little gal, it’s not too shabby over here in “paradise,” as they call it. Of course, that doesn’t mean it’s all fun and games. We’re up early, we work hard, and then most nights we collapse on hard bunks and we don’t get much sleep in between. I’ve really bonded with these boys. One in particular. His name is Horace. He’s from Idaho, where they grow the potatoes. Ha-ha.

What’s Nelson and Irene up to? Any little ones coming along? Wouldn’t that be something? You tell ole Nelson that if he and Irene have a baby, I want them to name him Mack, after his wonderful uncle. Of course, if it’s a girl, they’ll have to name her Mackenzie or something like that.

All right then. Lights out and up and at ’em before the sun barely peeks its eyes over the Pacific. Take care.

Love ya,

Mack

She read the first letter again, her eyes focusing on one particular line: “I don’t mind telling you that I’m not at all keen on fighting and maybe dying, but at the same time, this is what I want to do for my country.”

Alice-Ann folded the pages, sliding them back into their envelopes and tucking them both under her pillow. Maybe with his words so close she’d dream of him that night. Maybe.

For a while, as her eyes fought hard-earned sleep, she allowed her mind to venture back to other words in other letters. Over their two years of correspondence, Mack had shared so much with her. Surely he would fall in love with her. Love her like she loved him. And if not, she felt certain she could love him enough for the both of them.

But surely he would. Perhaps he already did but had chosen to wait until he could say the words to her face. Whisper them in her ear . . .

After all, he’d already shared such private things with her. Things men only said to the women they loved. Things he said he’d never revealed to another living soul. Like about the problems he’d had with his father —not only in the days and weeks as he prepared to leave for training, but before that. He’d shared them all with her, asked her to keep them tied in a bow and in her heart. And she’d told him she would. Of course she would. Always.

Forever.