She's Gone: A Novel

by Emmens, Joye

  Her checks warmed. She felt her hair. Today she had coiled two braids around her head Norwegian style. “Coffee?” Nick said again.

  “Oh, sorry,” she said, laughing nervously. She poured him a cup and went off to take another order. She came back and poured more coffee. “How are your classes?” Was her hand trembling?

  “Hard and competitive, but interesting. I still want to take you on a historic walking tour some weekend.”

  “I’d love that, but Central Underground has taken off. It consumes my weekends.”

  “I know, everyone’s reading it. It’s far better than the other rag that went under. People trust the content.”

  She smiled at him and moved away to take an order. She tore off the order sheet and put it on the counter for Dimitri.

  “Who’s your boyfriend?”

  “Pardon me?”

  Dimitri nodded his head to Nick.

  “Oh, he’s just a friend.”

  Dimitri’s eyes twinkled and he wore an amused smile but said nothing more. Her cheeks warmed again. She returned to offer Nick more coffee.

  Nick came in two or three times a week and waited for a seat if her bay was full. They talked about civil rights, women’s rights, the war, Nixon, environmental degradation, and the books they were reading. Jolie kept putting off Nick’s offer for the historical tour. She said she was too busy at Central Underground. She was confused by her nervousness. Was she being untrue to Will when she talked with Nick? She liked to talk to him. Their conversation was effortless and he listened to her. Will seemed far off when she talked to him, like he was in another world. It made her feel her ideas had no importance.

  Every week for the past month Jolie had gone into the camera store in the Square to look at cameras. When she picked out the one she wanted, Niles, the sales clerk, amused with her earnestness, put it aside, slightly hidden from view in the display case until she could afford it.

  One evening after Will went back to the office, she poured over the books on photography she’d gotten from the library. Daniel came in the living room and peered over her shoulder.

  “I have darkroom equipment at my parents’ house. I can dig it out of storage this weekend when I go home.”

  “Really?” she said. “I’m getting my camera this weekend.”

  “I’ll teach you how to develop photos. You’ll have to buy new processing chemicals and paper.”

  “Okay. Where can we set up the darkroom?”

  They looked around. Daniel walked into the small windowless utility room off the kitchen. The room contained an old laundry sink and cleaning supplies.

  “In here. This is perfect,” Daniel said. “I’ve been wanting to take black-and-white portraits of my students. To give them something.”

  “I can help you develop them if you show me what to do.”

  “It’s a deal.”

  She went back to the books and studied the darkroom process. She glanced at the clock, eleven p.m. When was Will coming home? He was so consumed with the office. Was Marlena there? It was too late to walk there by herself.

  Today was the day. It was Saturday in late May. The weather was warm and the sky a deep blue. Jolie walked to the office with Will. She’d baked cookies the night before, some for the house and some for the office. She felt guilty for not spending the day working with him, but today she was going to buy her camera. The cookies were her peace offering.

  The streets flowed with pedestrians in the summer-like weather. Jolie wore a skirt, a pale blue T-shirt, and leather sandals, happy to feel warm weather. On the front steps of the office, several volunteers waited for Will. They had retrieved the mail from the mailbox and picked up more stacks wrapped in rubber bands that the mailman had left on the porch. They followed Will inside. Adam and more volunteers streamed in behind them.

  Jolie placed the cookies on the kitchen counter and turned to leave.

  “Where do you think you’re going, Jolie girl?” Adam stood with his arms crossed, a mischievous grin spread across his face as he pretended to block her departure.

  She smiled. “I’ll be back later.” She ruffled his neatly trimmed blond hair.

  Will waved to her, a phone to his ear. Back in the bright May morning she ducked into the nearest T station. At Harvard Square, street musicians belted out tunes on every corner.

  In the camera store she walked over to the used equipment case. Niles, the clerk appeared. She pulled out her wallet and set it on the polished glass counter. “Today’s the day.”

  He took the camera out of the case and handed it to her. “It’s all yours.”

  “It’s beautiful.” She turned the camera over in her hands, feeling the sleek body and weight of the lens.

  Niles walked to the back of the store and returned with a well-worn black leather case and a colorful webbed strap. “These go with it.”

  She looked up at him. She knew they were sold separately.

  “Thanks.”

  “You’ll need film. Black and white or color?”

  “Black and white, please.”

  He set four rolls of Kodak film on the counter. “Your first film is on the store if you promise to bring in some of your photographs.”

  “Really? I will.”

  He showed her how to load the film so as not to expose it. She paid and walked out of the store. The camera hung from the strap around her neck. Overjoyed, she stood buoyant on the sidewalk with a new eye for seeing the world. Tomorrow she and Will were going to another anti-war protest in the Common, but this time, she’d be there as the photographer for Central Underground. She had a new purpose.

  She wandered into the Cambridge Common, past a string of panhandlers dressed in faded denim jeans, ragged plaid shirts, love beads, and leather headbands. They looked so young, like boys. Were they runaways, too? At the entrance to the Common, a trio of musicians played a Grateful Dead song. She snapped a photo of the motley group in their army jackets and cowboy boots. She continued on, looking for more subjects.

  A small group of Vietnam Veterans Against the War, dressed in their camouflage army fatigues, had gathered in a peaceful protest. She took a few photos. These guys had been there and had seen the war firsthand. They were lucky to have survived.

  One held a sign: Q: And babies? A: And babies. She shuddered. The sign referred to the My Lai massacre and the Army’s Criminal Investigation hearings into the Vietnam tragedy. U.S. soldiers had killed five hundred unarmed men, women, and children. She met the eyes of the young man holding the sign. Lifting her camera she gave him a hopeful look, her way of asking permission to take his picture. He nodded. She carefully composed the shot and took his photo. Their eyes locked when she lowered her camera. He smiled at her. His shaggy dark hair fell just below his ears and his dimples disarmed her. It was hard to imagine that this young man was even old enough to be in the army, much less to have already served in Vietnam. He flashed a peace sign, and she smiled back at him. His blue eyes were haunting. What had he seen over there?

  She walked on, glancing back at the protesters. She met the eyes of the young soldier again, and she felt his pain sweep through her. She wanted to give him a hug. A lot of good that would do after what he’d been through.

  She found a park bench and sat next to two girls wearing Radcliffe T-shirts. In the warm sun, she watched a stream of students pass. When she went to college, what would she study? How could she get in? She hadn’t even finished high school. The two girls on the bench talked and laughed. She felt so lonely. If only she had a good friend like Zoe to talk to. She had come close with Jasmine and Deidre but Will told her never to trust anyone with the secret of her age so she always kept her guard up.

  She thought of the Vietnam Veteran she had photographed. He looked to be her older brother’s age. She hoped her brothers didn’t get drafted. The elation of her new camera quickly crashed to a
n ache for her family. She’d been gone from home for ten months. How were her parents doing? They had been good parents. She was the defiant one, following her own path. How did they explain to family and friends that their daughter just disappeared? Tears filled her eyes. They must be ashamed. Daughters didn’t just wander off. She hoped they weren’t being judged for her act of independence. She wanted to call and hear their voices and let them know she was safe, but Will thought her parents’ phone was tapped and they could trace incoming calls. She couldn’t mail a letter. The postmark would give them away. She needed to find a way.

  23

  All Good Things Are Wild and Free

  Nick ambled into Brigham’s after the lunch mob was gone and slipped into Jolie’s bay. He ordered coffee.

  “What’s happening?” she asked.

  “I’ve got finals this week, and then I’m going home for the summer.”

  “You’re going to Chicago for the whole summer?”

  “I have an internship at a law firm. Doing grunt work, but I’ll be back home with my folks and younger brother. I actually kind of miss them.”

  Jolie didn’t reply. She missed her family too. She scanned her bay. Everyone was content with their orders. It would be a long summer serving customers while he was helping the poor, doing something worthwhile with his life.

  “Why so sad? Are you going to miss me?”

  Heat spread to her face, and she dropped her order pad. He always had that effect on her. “Yes, I think I will.”

  “A bunch of us are going out to Walden Pond this Saturday to celebrate the end of finals. Come with us.”

  She hesitated. Will wanted her with him at Central Underground on the weekends. He didn’t like her doing her own thing, alone or with others. But there were plenty of volunteers there, and she’d read Thoreau’s Walden in school and now she’d get to go there. She’d bring her camera.

  “Well…okay. One of my favorite quotes is from Thoreau.”

  “Which one?”

  “‘All good things are wild and free’.”

  Nick smiled and rose to leave. “See you at ten Saturday morning. Meet us at the entrance to Harvard Yard across from the Common.”

  A wave of anticipation swept through her.

  “Ciao,” Nick said.

  “Ciao.”

  That night Jolie talked to Will about buying a VW Bus. She had saved more now that Will had some money coming in, although most of his money was spent on improvements at the office. She opened a small tin and pulled out a stack of cash, separate from her bank account. It was only a portion of her tips. “I’ve saved enough money to buy a bus. We can go camping on weekends and explore Maine, Vermont, Connecticut, and New Hampshire. They’re all only an hour or two away.”

  “I’d rather visit D.C. and check in with the national scene.”

  “But it’s summer. Let’s explore the lakes and streams and the ocean at Cape Cod, the calmness and the energy, the yin and yang of nature. We can do both.”

  “The yin and yang of nature? I’ve got an agency to run. I don’t have time to contemplate my navel in the woods.”

  She sat silent. He was obsessed with the agency. They were like yin and yang. She longed for peace and harmony, and he was organizing for a revolution. Why did he always put down her spirituality? It was part of her and it kept her grounded.

  Will picked up the stack of bills. “It would be good to have wheels, though. How much is here?”

  “Five hundred dollars.”

  “You saved five hundred dollars?”

  In the evenings after work, Daniel and Jolie set up the darkroom. Jolie had purchased the photo developing supplies from the camera store. They cleaned out the utility room and created a lightproof space. He constructed narrow work tables on either side of the cast iron laundry sink. They laid out the film and print processing trays, hung hooks for the tray tongs, and strung an overhead line with clothespins to hang the developed film and prints. Daniel positioned the enlarger, safelight, and lightproof paper holder. In his organized teacher style, he wrote out notes on the development technique and tacked them to the wall above the work table.

  “We’re ready to develop,” Daniel exclaimed. In a practice run with the lights on, he walked her through the film-loading process and developing sequence.

  She excitedly held the two rolls of film from the weekend before. With the lights out in the pitch-black room, they proceeded to develop her first negatives. What if she screwed up? All of her pictures would be ruined. She loaded the first film roll into the spool and put them into the development tank, checking the gasket to make sure it was sealed. She walked through the steps out loud in case she forgot anything. At the end of the process, Daniel flipped on the light, and she unfurled the roll of film and hung it up to dry.

  The following night, Daniel taught her the process of creating a contact sheet, a thumbprint-sized preview of all the negative images. From this she selected one photograph from the anti-war demonstration. It was an image of a young woman in jeans and a tie-dyed T-shirt holding a sign with her left hand that read Give Peace a Chance. The woman looked right at Jolie and gave her the peace sign with her right hand. They processed a test strip, playing with the exposure until they settled on the best contrast. Daniel showed her how to create an eight-by-ten print of the negative. The first print was botched when she overexposed it. She tried again, following the steps exactly. The resulting photograph was stunning in its simplicity. The woman’s eyes stared back at the observer.

  “It’s magical. I can’t wait to show Will.”

  “Nice,” Daniel said. “Well, I’ll leave you to it.”

  She was high on the whole process, experimenting with the tones of light and dark. She was anxious to show Will and Adam the contact sheet for any photos they wanted to use in the weekly press.

  She picked out another of the Vietnam veterans’ protest and developed a print. The veteran with the My Lai sign stared straight back at her. He was smiling, and his dimples added a sweetness, an innocence, but his haunted eyes brimmed with an inner turmoil. His gaze unnerved her. She clipped the print on the line to dry.

  On the back porch, she inhaled the fresh air. Darkroom chemicals lingered when she breathed. When would Will be home? He stayed late every night, preoccupied with managing Central Underground. He liked the far-reaching network, all connected to the common aim of revolution. He was part of the inner circle now, part of a band of brothers. The cadre, linked across the nation, had powerful personal bonds and he was at the heart of it.

  Restless, Jolie left the house and walked to the office. Will, Adam, and some students were sitting around the work table. Pizza boxes lay open on the kitchen counter. Marlena was there, a constant fixture at the office. A bad vibe inched up Jolie’s spine. Her intuition told her she was not to be trusted. What was it about her? The group discussion continued.

  “The national media is only covering ten percent of the demonstrations. They’re purposely blacking them out,” Will said. “It’s a crime of silence and inaction.”

  “Meanwhile, two hundred U.S. soldiers are killed each week in combat,” Adam said.

  “We’ll keep them on the front page,” Will said.

  Jolie looked around at the group. There were at least ten people she didn’t recognize. She was proud of Will but worried by his visibility in the movement. The FBI read every free press article and was infiltrating protests and meetings with undercover agents. A message was taped to each of the Central Underground phone lines: This phone is tapped. A constant reminder to the volunteers.

  Will had told her about one guy who hung around Liberation Books. Will and Adam were sure he was an informant. They purposefully led him on with false information for the fun of it. She glanced around. Marlena now sat next to Will. Did she have to sit so close? Marlena repeatedly flicked her bangs out of her eyes, glancing at W
ill as he talked with the others.

  Jolie went into the kitchen to make tea and was surprised to find it fairly clean. Two young women were putting away dishes and organizing the chaos amid a discussion. She put on the tea kettle and sat and read the latest issue of Central Underground.

  Jolie observed the two women while she read. They were pretty college students, dressed in shorts and T-shirts. They sounded smart as they debated whether communism was a good thing for the people or a single-party dictatorship. It bothered her that women were assigned the more menial chores, typing and mimeographing. At the office, a woman’s point of view was talked over. The Movement was male-dominated, the same as in broader society. Nothing had changed there. Where was the equality they expounded on?

  Adam jarred her out of her thoughts. “Hey Jolie girl, can you mock up this layout for me? It’s Will’s masterpiece.”

  The headline read: Constitution Attacked!

  “Amendment 1: Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press.”

  The article listed the most recent FBI raids on underground newspapers and reported on the ensuing court trials challenging free speech. All the cases had been thrown out of the courts.

  “Anything for you.” She glanced over at Will and Marlena. Anything to get Will home sooner.

  24

  Walden Pond

  Saturday morning dawned muggy under a faint blue sky. Will came in the kitchen. “What are you doing?”

  “Making trail mix and brownies.” Jolie slid a pan of brownies out of the oven.

  “We have to get to the office. I have people coming in from New York.”

  “Remember? I’m going to Walden Pond today.”

  “No, I don’t remember. I want you to meet them.”

  She stopped stirring the nut mixture. “We talked about it twice. I’m meeting work friends and we’re driving to Walden Pond.”