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Dafne read her father’s note a second time. He was right, she knew. But that didn’t make it any easier.
It had been two weeks since her outburst at Elsa. Though they had resumed normality, something was different. Their relationship was now almost purely professional. Dafne missed the friendship they used to share.
She folded up the letter and looked around her bedroom. How she loved this little apartment, even though it had hardly provided the life she dreamed of finding in New York City. She would be sad to leave it, more for what could have been than for the memories she’d actually made here. The best times—those first few months—had been so brief.
In these times, everyone had to give a little. Now it was her turn.
Her parents had asked her to come back to Lindenhurst. Elsa had to be let go. She understood; she had expected it. But she also determined to do all she could to find a way to stay in the city. She couldn’t give up. New York symbolized all her dreams, even if Lindenhurst held her best memories. Why go back to the place of her memories when those years were finished and beyond renewal? She had to stay and prove she could make it in New York. Somehow.
She would have asked her parents to take Elsa back into their employment, but her father had anticipated this and addressed it in the letter. Katherine was now working in the house beside her father. There was no need for translation work anymore, thus no place for Elsa. Still, Dafne determined to help Elsa find another position. She—and her parents—owed Elsa that after she served their family faithfully for six years. Dafne had grown apart from her servant, but she still loved her dearly and wouldn’t see her working in the factories again. Elsa would come out of this okay.
Would she?
Dafne sighed and walked to the window. She looked out at the green trees lining the busy street. How she loved the energy and pace of these city streets.
Life without Elsa frightened her. Even though she had been cross and cruel with her lately, Elsa steadied her and helped her in so many little ways. Dafne knew how to cook a little, and she could figure out how to do other things. Perhaps her father would let her take a smaller, cheaper apartment. Or at least come back to the city after the war. But there were so many other voids than cooking and cleaning that Elsa’s departure would create. Dafne was afraid of being alone.
How she wished the war would end. Then New York could return to being the city she loved. Strangely, Hal didn’t play a very large role in her postwar vision. Would they still be together after the war? She didn’t know, but if New York became the vibrant city it used to be, she could build her place in it once again. Her charm and her beauty would be enough. She didn’t need Hal any more than she needed Glenn. As the months passed, she found she hardly missed either of them anymore. She missed the life.
She didn’t have the courage to talk to Elsa yet, but she needed to talk to someone. She called Thelma and went over to her friend’s home that same evening. Sitting together on the couch, Dafne told her everything, then started to cry. Thelma pulled Dafne’s head down onto her lap.
“We’ve grown apart recently. But I love Elsa, and I need her. Without her I’ll feel so alone. I’ve never been alone before.”
Thelma stroked her cheek. “Dear Dafne. Sweet Dafne. You never need to feel alone.”
“But I am alone now. I don’t know what to do. I can’t bear the thought of returning to Lindenhurst.”
Thelma turned Dafne’s face with her hand and looked down at her earnestly. “You are not alone.”
Dafne smiled up at her friend. She understood what Thelma meant, and it comforted her.
After relaxing a few more minutes, Dafne got up and retrieved a handkerchief from her purse. She wiped her tear-stained eyes, feeling much better.
Thelma sat back on the couch with her legs crossed and arms out over the back of the furniture.
“Everything will work out okay,” she said. “Trust me.”
Dafne smiled, reassured by Thelma’s confidence.
“You know, Hal hasn’t written a single letter since he left for France. I only found out secondhand that he had really gone. I don’t care anymore.”
Thelma nodded.
“For all Glenn’s faults, I know he’s a good man. He wasn’t right for me, but he’s a good man. With Hal I’m starting to feel like I was just one more girl he can brag that he bedded.”
She sat back on the couch beside Thelma, and saw her friend’s inquisitive eyes.
“No wonder he kept pursuing me so hard after that night at the Biltmore,” Dafne continued, answering the question Thelma was too shy to ask. “I didn’t sleep with him until much later. I thought I wanted to, despite the risk to my reputation. I always thought I wanted to with Glenn, too.”
“And?”
Dafne just shrugged. That single word was a loaded question, particularly from Thelma. She didn’t want to discuss the experience further.
“You must be starving,” Thelma said, and Dafne knew that she understood. “Let’s go have dinner together.”
Dafne looked down at her day dress.
“In this? I couldn’t.”
Thelma laughed. “I’m not taking you to the Ritz Carlton. I know a casual place close by where you’ll be the best-dressed girl there.”
Dafne chuckled. “Okay. Let me fix my face, though. I can’t let you see me like this.”
Thelma, with her children and their maid, lived in a large apartment on 88th Street, toward the river. It wasn’t the most prestigious neighborhood, but that allowed the Sandersons to have more space for the price. They walked to a restaurant in the nineties that Dafne could only describe as a dive. She had never been this far north on the island. Sure enough, Dafne, in the dress she couldn’t possibly go to dinner in, looked more formal than anyone else in the place. They ate greasy meals and drank beer. Dafne thoroughly enjoyed it. She felt ready for a new adventure—for something fresh and exciting.
Throughout the meal they talked easily. Dafne felt she could tell Thelma everything. She couldn’t believe she’d once felt jealous of this wonderful woman.
After dinner they walked hand in hand to a nearby nightclub where a four-piece band played jazz music. Dafne had never been in this kind of club. It was very dark inside, but still felt warm and inviting. She didn’t recognize any of the songs. This music was too new to have made it down to the dances at the big hotels yet. They sat in the back, at a table lighted by a single candle, and ordered two more beers. Thelma rested her hand on Dafne’s leg under the table as they listened to the band.
Dafne asked Thelma to dance with her. Although they were the only two dancing, nobody gawked at them the way the men had watched at the Biltmore two weeks ago.
When the band took a break, they sat back at their table in the shadows. Thelma looked at Dafne and held her eyes, then tenderly placed her hand on her cheek. The scant inches between their faces dissolved into the darkness of the club.
Dafne closed her eyes and waited hopefully . . . welcomingly for Thelma’s kiss. When her lips touched hers they felt soft and smooth. Thelma began to pull away, but Dafne grabbed the back of her head and made her kiss her for a few seconds longer. They smiled at each other and laughed shyly together. Dafne knew if there had been light to show it, her cheeks would be flushed, but inside she felt warm and happy.
Returning to Thelma’s apartment, they both felt sleepy from the heavy food and beer. Dafne borrowed a nightgown and shared Thelma’s bed.
She awoke in the morning disoriented. Sunshine poked through the cracks in the curtain to light the unfamiliar room, the big bed and the warm body beside her. Then she remembered everything and felt happy.
Thelma, seeing her eyes open, leaned up on her elbows and smiled at her. Dafne saw herself reflected in Thelma’s smile. She felt lovely and loved. She reached up her arms and pulled Thelma down to her, hugging her tightly.
Until that night, Dafne hadn’t consciously realized what was happening between her and Thelma. She couldn’t point to a moment when, once past, this became inevitable. But now, in each other’s arms, she knew that it had to be . . . and this had been true for some time.
She could have lingered in bed all day but knew Elsa would worry. She dressed in yesterday’s clothes, hoping to make it home without being seen by anyone. Before allowing her to leave, Thelma put both hands on her waist and looked earnestly in her eyes.
“Dafne, love, write to your father. Tell him you are coming to stay with me. Be my companion.”
“What about Michael?”
“Don’t worry about Michael. That is a matter for another day . . . after the war.”
“Okay.”
“I’m not letting you get away . . . now that I’ve found you.”
How good it felt to Dafne to be spoken to that way. How different this assurance was from Glenn’s timidity and Hal’s frivolity. She wondered why she had been wasting her time and her heart for so long. She trusted Thelma and wanted to let her take care of her.
They kissed again on the doorstep, both hands held at their sides and their bodies pressed together. Dafne closed her eyes for a moment before stepping back with both of Thelma’s hands still grasped in hers. They exchanged a look that meant more than any words could have said.
––––––––
Elsa and Dafne both cried on the morning they said good-bye.
Despite promises to keep in touch and to see each other from time to time, Elsa knew that wouldn’t happen. She wouldn’t have much free time in her new position, and Dafne would never come out to Queens. As she left Dafne in the boxed-up apartment, Elsa knew the possibility was very real that she would never see her long-time mistress and friend again. She left early with her single suitcase of possessions. Dafne waited with all the boxes marked either to be sent back to her parents’ house or to come with her to Thelma’s.
Elsa took the new subway train under the East River from Grand Central Station, stopped two stations into Queens, walked half a mile, and checked in at the building indicated on her telegram.
She had been hired by a maid service that employed a dozen other girls. The agency had both residential and commercial clients who didn’t need someone on their own staff but still required maid service once or twice a week. Above the office was a dormitory she would share with the other girls. Dafne had been instrumental in helping secure her the job.
After signing the necessary paperwork in the office, she took the stairs up to her room. She didn’t mind sharing the facility with the other girls but was glad to have a small bedroom to herself. Perhaps she would make new friends. Setting down her suitcase, she looked out the thick glass at the street below and the warehouse building across from her. It wasn’t much of a view, but the room was well lighted.
Today certainly lacked the excitement of the last time she took a train east from the city for a new job. Yet she felt glad and even relieved. She had needed to move on from serving Dafne, and she was good at this kind of work. It was better than sewing uniforms in the factories. Furthermore, something told her this was only a temporary position for her.
She reminded herself of the pride she felt that first night in the Graham house, when she realized that she had earned the right to call herself a career woman. Her hard work had earned that opportunity and would earn her another. Her emotions were frayed right now, but she still had that strength within her. She still believed in herself.
So ironic, that she had saved for years for a time just like this, and now her savings were all but gone.
She had no regrets about helping Sonja and Christof. They had already started on the repairs of the bakery, and thanks to her, had been able to restock and open for business in the least damaged part of the building. Elsa couldn’t imagine a better reason to have saved.
Everyone was struggling to support this war, either directly or indirectly. She was lucky to have a new job. For her and her family, the first thought had to be surviving the war. Once it was over many things would change.
How these changes would impact her life, she could only imagine. After the first indulgence in her dreams about Glenn, it was hard not to keep imagining a future with him after the war. This new job would allow her to dream quietly without risking her security.
She wanted to write to Glenn immediately, to tell him her new address and to describe her new home. She always wanted to tell him everything. But this afternoon she couldn’t start. She was afraid.
Although she wrote to him at least once per week, she hadn’t received a letter from him for over a month. She feared he was dead. The papers spoke of large battles in France. She always read the names of the dead, but in war there were unknown casualties. She had no assurance that he was alive.
Almost worse, however, was the fear that he had forgotten her. His last letter had felt short and distant. Then nothing. Had he come to his senses and talked himself out of his brief fancy for a servant girl who wasn’t even all that pretty? Had he used her to help himself get over Dafne and now was ready for a new romance in his own class?
So many times, growing up, her mother warned her not to let herself be swept off her feet by a man. Others—girls in the factory and elsewhere—had told stories of “swells” talking pretty to working girls, only to leave them with broken hearts . . . and often a baby to provide for as well. Elsa had never thought of herself as the kind of girl to be taken in so easily, yet here she was, her heart as vulnerable as could be.
She knew Glenn was a good man and wouldn’t hurt her intentionally, but these things happened.
She still had no idea whether Glenn thought of her the same way. She could have imagined the tone she read in his early letters. Maybe it was only friendship to him.
Her free time was almost up. She was expected downstairs in the office in half an hour. She sat down and forced herself to write the letter to Glenn. Hard as it was to write to someone from whom she had stopped expecting a response, she would continue for as long as it took. She had taken her chance. If he were dead, or had forgotten her, then her heart was already doomed to be broken.
It had only been a month. She tried to keep hope. Deep in her heart she felt he needed her love and prayers now more than ever.