“Do you think her parents have reason not to believe her?” Audrey asked.
“No. I think they just won’t believe her, just don’t want to believe her.”
Audrey returned the letter to Ruth. “Does she have other family she can go to?”
“She said no, but I wonder if it’s because she’s too shy or maybe too afraid to ask.”
“So she will be sent back home and you plan to help her through letters.”
Ruth nodded. “I told her that she has to watch for the mail each day and once she reads my letters to burn them. I wouldn’t want the letters to agitate the situation. But I’m thinking that it won’t be enough, not after this letter.” She held Audrey’s gaze and asked, “He’ll try to do it again, won’t he?”
Her answer, “Yes, probably,” held little effect except to reinforce Ruth’s fear. Instead she asked, “What do you know about him?”
“Only what I could pull out of her about how it all started. He’s her father’s brother and lives next door. He’s not married, so Amelia’s duties are to clean house for him and do his laundry on Saturdays. When his work schedule changed and he didn’t work Saturdays anymore, she found herself alone in the house with him.”
“How long has it been going on?”
“Since she was eleven.”
Audrey tipped her head back and closed her eyes for a moment. “This is making me sick to my stomach. What the hell does a man tell a little girl to justify that?”
“That she’s his special girl. That he’s teaching her how a man should love her.” Ruth’s tone sharpened. “No one teaches how to love. I told her that. And that what he did to her had nothing to do with love. Nothing.”
Ruth was angry. Clearly and righteously angry. And fearful. Audrey could sense it, from the quiver she heard beneath the force of her words, and the moisture threatening the corners of Ruth’s eyes. Fearful of letting down someone who was depending on her. “How can I help?” Audrey asked.
“I don’t know. I want to think that there is something, and that I just haven’t found it yet. If you have any ideas,” her eyes searched Audrey’s, waiting, hoping.
“We know you can continue the letters while she’s in the Home, right?”
“As long as no one finds out. Nurse Lillian sneaks my letters in and Amelia’s out. The rules of the Home are very strict. No contact with anyone outside during the whole time the girls are there. They can’t leave the grounds—no walks, or visits, or shopping—except for the times that Nurse Lillian is able to get permission for them to go to her home on holidays or special occasions.” Audrey didn’t have the whole picture yet, and that was fine. There wasn’t time for complications, only solutions. They needed to slow down the panic of time passing and concentrate on what was most important and probable.
“Then you need to use those letters,” Audrey was saying, “to give Amelia the strength of Samson and the resolve of Moses.”
Ruth stared blankly somewhere past Audrey’s shoulder. Slowly, as if she was answering an unspoken question, she shook her head. “What do I say? What makes you think I can make that kind of difference?”
“The part of you that spoke out against the man in The Bomber. You didn’t hesitate or apologize, you just said what you believed. It was an unselfish thing to do.” Audrey locked her eyes onto Ruth’s. “Can you put into words what gives you that kind of confidence?” The answer that Audrey wanted for herself ever since that day in the restaurant. It was what made this woman different—that she was so sure, so confident—and the very thing that made her so dangerous. But now the answer had a reason beyond herself, her own selfish curiosity, a reason bigger and much more important.
“Right now?” Ruth asked. “I don’t think I could think my way through a letter right now.”
“No, don’t worry about the letter. Tell me how Ruth Evans became a waitress, living on her own, with the conviction of a Suffragette.”
Ruth hesitated, introspective, before she answered. “How did I become who I am,” she said, with the beginning of a frown. “I had no plan to be where I am, who I am. I had a lot of questions. But instead of answers I got expectations—other people’s expectations of who I was and what my life should be. I was meant to do what they expected. And I tried to be that person. But you know what I found out? That I couldn’t be that person.” As Ruth continued to talk, Audrey pulled a pad of paper from a drawer on her side of the table. “I’m not meant to be a waitress, either, or any one thing.” Audrey was writing. “No one else is going to decide that for me, I won’t allow it. Months ago I wrote the letter that I had to write to tell my family just that—that their restrictions, their limitations, their expectations no longer apply to me. I will decide where I should live, how I should live—and who I should love. I will make those decisions. I’ll make my own mistakes and let them make me stronger. I get to decide who I am.” She took a deep breath and stared intensely at Audrey. “What are you writing?”
“The best testament I’ve ever heard.” She looked up to meet Ruth’s eyes. “You are amazing. Whatever made you doubt your ability to help Amelia believe in herself?”
“I’m sure you wouldn’t think me amazing if you knew of the mistakes I’ve made and the pain they have caused others. I’m far from amazing, I only hope that what I’ve learned can help someone like Amelia.”
“You will,” Audrey said, pushing the paper across the table, “this will. Write the letter. Write as many as it takes. Start with your own strength, and counter each of her fears with something you know is sure and proven.”
“Is it wrong of me to be glad that I disrupted your evening?”
Audrey smiled. “Well, now I have a friend with no shame.”
Ruth finally smiled back. “Yes, I’m afraid you do.” She folded Audrey’s paper together with Amelia’s letter and rose from the table. “But I do have a smidgeon of manners, enough to let you get to bed at a reasonable hour.” She checked her watch. “And if I hurry I’ll be able to catch the next bus.”
“Wait,” Audrey said, jumping to her feet. “It’ll only take me a minute to dress. I’ll walk you to the bus.”
“And destroy this image of a hard-boiled apron who defiantly walks the streets alone? Oh, no. It has taken me months to earn that image, and I’m rather proud of it.”
They stood at the door as Audrey replied. “I think you have a ways to go before you match my trouser-wearing, wage-earning, family-destroying image.” She added a grin. “I will admit, though, that mine came rather easily. The company Star Man made that clear the first day I started work at the plant. Not everyone is happy about women being so independent.”
“Well, I for one am through worrying about what they think. It’s caused me too much heartache.”
“I know about heartache,” Audrey returned. “I know it all too well. So if I can help you help someone else avoid it, I’ll be happy to.”
“It might be more than that,” Ruth said, stepping toward Audrey and reaching to close her arms around her. “We might be saving a life. Thank you,” she said softly as she released her embrace.
Audrey nodded, and asked the question that she had promised herself not to ask. “Will I see you tomorrow?”
“It’s our ice cream day, isn’t it? And I’ll show you my letter before I send it.”
The door closed on the smile that would keep her awake tonight. For moments after Ruth left, Audrey could still feel the arms around her, the crispness of the starched white blouse pressing against the soft cotton of her nightgown. The scent of Ruth lingered in the air.
Avoiding heartache, so easily said, she thought. Was it even possible? Could she, or they, save another from it when they hadn’t been able to do it for themselves? Did she dare think she could save another when she had already been responsible for such a horrible loss? If Nona’s God was truly a loving God, maybe this was her chance for redemption. Help save a life for one that was lost. She wanted to believe it was possible. She wanted to believe it
longer than just tonight.
Chapter 18
“If we weren’t on our feet all day long and working as hard as we do,” Audrey said between savored spoonsful of ice cream, “we wouldn’t dare gorge ourselves like this. We would have to discipline ourselves to once a month and a single scoop with a dribble of chocolate on top. But,” she said, raising her eyebrows, “luckily for us, we do work that hard.”
Ruth dropped her gaze to her nearly empty dish. “I’m already tempting the girlish figure that it took me months to regain.”
Audrey let the remark pass without reply, without question. She had decided when the connection to Amelia had first allowed an assumption that it wasn’t her question to ask. She finished her last bite of ice cream.
“Before you read my letter to Amelia,” Ruth continued, and pulled an envelope from her purse. This time she spoke while looking directly into Audrey’s eyes. “You know why I was at the Home with Amelia, don’t you?”
“I’ve learned that’s it’s better not to make assumptions. Things aren’t always what they seem to be.”
“Well, if you had assumed that I had been working there, or that my mother or sister worked there, you would have been wrong. I was there for the same reason as Amelia. But, unlike her, it was because of my own mistake, one of a number of mistakes. I have no business asking you for your help, or for your friendship, if you don’t really know me. I’ve hidden things about myself for too long. It has caused too much heartache, and when I left the Home and started fresh I vowed that I would never again do that to people I care about.”
It was heartfelt. Audrey saw it in her eyes, a confession long in coming, an honor saved for now. Audrey’s honor—to hear it first, right here, tucked in the corner of a soda shop, spoken quietly over ice cream.
She answered the doubt punctuating Ruth’s words. “You don’t have to worry. If making mistakes changed how I felt about our friendship, I’d be the biggest hypocrite in the world.”
But the doubt was still there. “I think we need to talk about them,” Ruth said. “At least I do.”
Not hard to do, Audrey thought, to listen, to let her say what she hadn’t been able to until now. A lot harder might be Ruth hearing the horror of a mistake that Audrey couldn’t forgive herself for. There was one way to know, and it was inevitable, wasn’t it? Sharing, chancing, accepting—or not. At least temptation, the niggling what if that had refused to go away, was no longer a concern. Ruth would not be a threat to her resolve not to ruin another lover’s life. Instead, Ruth would be another friend like Nona, there for the time most needed to be each other’s support and confidant, there until their lives changed. When Nona and Ruth found the men that they would share the intimacies of marriage with, Audrey would bless them and miss them. And in a strange way that was a great relief.
“Then we’ll talk about mistakes,” Audrey replied. “But not here. Come on, let’s walk down by the river.”
The new spring grass blanketed the stretch of park that hugged the edge of the river as it wound its way through the center of town. The early evening air smelled of dampened earth and sweet, wet grass, settled over the low murmur of slow-moving water and soothed away the tensions of the day.
“I don’t want to get this wrong, Audrey. Mistakes rarely hurt only the person making them. I know that from experience. I don’t want to do something that makes things worse for Amelia.” They settled on a wooden park bench as the sun rested temporarily on the treetops. “That’s why I’m so grateful for your help.”
“Honestly, Ruth, I may not have any solution, either. And I’ve made serious mistakes of my own. To do nothing, though, letting status quo be the rule just because an alternative isn’t easy, might be the biggest mistake.”
Ruth watched the flickers of gold and orange dance across the surface of the water as she spoke. “I’ve made that mistake. I knew what was accepted and what was expected by my family and my friends. I knew what my life was supposed to be like.” She left the dancing flickers and met Audrey’s waiting eyes. “And I knew that wasn’t who I was. At least, I thought I knew. I don’t know now if I was doubting as much as I was wishing. Being someone else was easier than being me.”
The relief Audrey was sure she had found was quickly disappearing. With each word, with every second Ruth’s eyes held her own, the initial nuances and signals that Audrey had sensed grew more and more valid. More worrisome than that, though, was that she didn’t want her to stop. She wanted to know who Ruth was.
“I don’t know exactly why,” Ruth continued, “maybe your confidence, or, I don’t know, a lot of little things that made me feel like you’ll be okay with who I am. I don’t want to lie to you, Audrey, or let you think that I’m someone I’m not.”
There of course was no other answer. “I will be fine with who you are.” It’s myself I’m not fine with.
“I hurt someone that I cared a lot about because I was trying to be someone else,” Ruth explained. “His name is Paul, and he was my best friend. I loved his sweet temperament and the way he smiled at things that delighted me. I loved how considerate of me he was. He’d sacrifice his jacket if he thought I was cold and tell silly jokes when I was sad. I loved so much about him, enough to believe it could change me. Enough to let him believe that I loved him and to let him make love to me before he went overseas. I knew he loved me and I knew how afraid he was to leave. He tried to pretend that he wasn’t, but I could tell. He wanted me to know how much he loved me—just in case he didn’t come home. I knew. But it didn’t change who I am. Having a baby changed me, but not in the way I once hoped.”
There was a softening in Ruth’s eyes, a distant lingering on a past that was just that. Maybe a cleansing, Audrey thought, a much needed cleansing for the heart. She watched the distance fade.
“I may not have to say this,” Ruth said. “I don’t know. I’ve never done this before. But I want you to know that what I’ve already said will probably be the easiest part to accept.”
“You don’t have to warn me, Ruth. I’ll be fine.” Warning wasn’t needed, or useful; it couldn’t do anything to ease the turmoil that what she already knew was about to unleash. All that was left now was to face it.
“What none of that changed,” she said, looking intensely into Audrey’s eyes, “is that I couldn’t love Paul, as good and sweet a man as he is, like I would love a woman.”
Validated now. Said out loud. No chances left for Audrey to convince herself otherwise.
“You know what I mean, don’t you?” Ruth asked. “The intimate love that seeps so deep into your being that you can’t imagine a moment without it, can’t imagine a breath without its strength.”
Yes, she knew. The words sparked and flashed through her, bringing back that first purity, bright and true. Breathless honesty that named itself with the first touch of Velma’s lips.
“Have you felt that, too?” Ruth asked.
“Yes,” she replied and closed her eyes. “Yes.” When she looked again, the relief on Ruth’s face made it easy to keep the focus off herself. “What happened to that love?” Audrey asked.
“It wasn’t for her what it was for me. And it took too long to find that out. She was everything I admired, everything I wanted to be. I didn’t want anything else, anyone else from that first time I saw her greeting customers at her father’s business. She was confident and funny, and people loved being around her. I loved how she could talk about so many things; she spoke her mind on politics and the war in Europe, and she knew the batting averages of the best hitters in baseball. I wanted to spend every day with her, and it seemed that she wanted to spend that time with me. . . . Then she loved me. And I didn’t care what anyone thought. I didn’t care what was supposed to be. Nothing else, no one else mattered—only our love for each other.” The space between Ruth’s brows pressed into a deep crease. “I didn’t realize until afterward that she had never said forever. She never meant forever.”
Forever. The word hung in the silence
between them. It seemed to dare dismissal. Something that until now had not been a conscious thought. It would be now—troubling, improbable, and conscious. “Do you think she was afraid that someone would find out? She could have been afraid of what would happen if they did.”
“If she was,” Ruth replied, “I never knew it. One night we were having dinner at a restaurant, and a friend who was going to join us cancelled. We were just talking casually about what our day had been like and then, just as casually, she said that she was going to start seeing some man. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I sat there not knowing what to say for I don’t know how long. I was lightheaded and felt like I was going to throw up. Finally I asked, ‘What about us?’ And do you know what she said? What we had been doing was just preparation for marriage. In that moment everything I thought I knew about my life dissolved. My legs were so weak I didn’t think I could stand, but I did, and I left her there—and never looked back.”
“But you have.”
“I didn’t realize at the time that that’s what I was doing.” Her slow nod seemed introspective. “But, yes—when I lied to Paul and said that I loved him and I knew it didn’t mean what he wanted it to mean.” She turned her focus across the river. The sun had become an orange filigree behind branches of maple and pine. “And again when I realized that my baby would never know me.” Her eyes came back to Audrey’s. “I decided that even if there is never another woman to love in my life, I will not live my life the way someone else wants me to live it—not my family, or the church, or Mr. or Mrs. No-name passing me on the street. They don’t have to be me. They don’t have to know what I know or what I feel. I’m not going to live for them and I’ll pay no more of their consequences.”
Audrey stared, allowed the seconds to stand undisturbed. Ruth made no attempt to pull her eyes away. There wasn’t so much as a blink to soften their message, solid, unwavering. “You,” Audrey said, “are one of the strongest women I’ve ever met.”
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