The Pieces We Keep

by Kristina McMorris

  “Stop it,” she ordered. “Jack, stop!”

  His elbow boomed against the hollow wall. She managed to grab hold of his wrists, to keep him from hurting himself. Within her grip, he twisted and pulled and yelled, fighting to escape. Several minutes of battling slicked her grip with sweat. His left arm broke free and slammed a corner of the night table. The crack alone communicated the damage, even without the wail of pain that projected from Jack’s mouth. He retracted into a ball and his body shivered. His cries faded to a soft whimper. The dream had released its grasp.

  For now.

  “You’re going to be okay, Jack.” She stroked his back, the motion no steadier than her breaths. “Mommy’s right here.”

  He raised his head and his gaze flitted around the room—to the lamp, his pillow, his comforter, all strewn across the floor. What happened? he asked without words.

  Because she had no real answer, she simply held him. Her arms trembled, more from anxiety than exertion.

  When he agreed to let her, she picked him up with a know-how for handling scared, wounded creatures. She carried him to the car, a blanket over his body, and drove to the closest ER.

  They didn’t return until three in the morning.

  Once they settled in, Audra’s dreams, like Jack’s, were so vivid they were hard to discern from reality. She was prepping for surgery, scrubbing her hands and donning latex gloves. A little girl appeared in the corner. Hair covering her face, she wept into her knees. Audra asked what was wrong. The girl choked out, “You said my dog, Max, would go to heaven. And you lied.” Audra glanced around the empty room, her technician nowhere to be seen. The clinic ached with quiet. “But how do you know he’s not there?” Audra gently challenged the child, who then stopped her crying and lifted her head. Her skin shone pale, thin as a sheet of tissue, but her voice turned hard as stone. “Because I’m dead,” she said, “and he’s not here.”

  Audra wiped her hairline, dampened from the dream. She rolled over on her bed and discovered Jack asleep—she’d laid him there after the hospital. Daylight filtered in around the closed white blinds, gracing Jack’s face with a peaceful glow, spotlighting the half cast on his arm.

  Careful not to wake him, she edged out of the room.

  At the kitchen sink, she filled a glass with water. She retrieved her vitamins from the cupboard, and noticed an old container of fish food partially hidden on a shelf. Between Devon’s allergies and her full-time job, a dog or cat had never made sense for their family—ironic, considering her profession. They’d once treated their son to a pair of goldfish. When the pets died, Jack grieved for days.

  Audra tossed the fish flakes into the trash. Another lesson learned.

  She downed the cool water, soothing her roughened throat. Sounds of a televised sports game reverberated from the tenant above. Audra’s head felt full of helium, light enough to fly away. When was the last time she had eaten a meal?

  A knock on the front door startled her. She hoped it hadn’t wakened Jack.

  She investigated through the peephole. Meredith stood beside Robert, who wore a Trailblazers cap, both of them in coats. It was Saturday morning. Why would they—

  The cemetery. The flags.

  Damn.

  Audra scrambled to unlock the door before they could ring the bell.

  “Hi,” she said, letting them in.

  “Good morning . . .” Robert’s inflection implied more of a question.

  Meredith cocked her head, as though rethinking her greeting. Her eyes flickered over Audra.

  From a glance downward, Audra recalled her appearance. Between the frazzled hair and wine-doused shirt, she must have been a beauty. “It was a long night. I fell asleep with a glass in my hand.” She released a quick laugh at herself.

  “Ah,” Meredith replied, and smiled.

  “So,” Robert said. “Is Jack ready for us?”

  Audra pictured her son curled up cozily in her bed. She couldn’t imagine disturbing his serenity after the night they had endured.

  “Actually,” Audra said, “I don’t think today’s a good day for the cemetery visit, after all.”

  Robert and Meredith exchanged surprised looks.

  “He’s actually still asleep. He was having—”

  “Grandma?” Jack emerged from the bedroom, rubbing his eyes.

  “Gracious. What happened?” Meredith rushed over to him and knelt down. She examined his cast as though it were a futuristic contraption. “What did you do here?”

  Jack shrugged, kept his gaze low. He couldn’t remember.

  “It happened during a bad dream,” Audra told them. “He accidentally hit the nightstand with his arm.”

  “Is it broken?” Meredith asked her.

  “It is, but not too badly. The cast shouldn’t be on for more than a month.”

  Robert piped in, “See what a tough nut he is? We’ll have to start calling him The Giant, instead of Beanstalk.”

  Jack’s eyes lightened.

  “So, whaddya think?” Robert said. “Want to plant flags with your old gramps?”

  Jack answered with the start of a smile. “Yes, please.”

  “Oh, kiddo,” Meredith said, and sniffed twice. “Did you have a little accident?”

  Audra sighed. After three apple juices in the ER, liquid Tylenol to help him sleep, and water to wash it down, his poor bladder had hit its max.

  “Let’s get you cleaned up,” Meredith told him.

  “Are you sure?” Audra said. “You really don’t have to.”

  “It’s no trouble.” Meredith was already leading Jack to his room.

  On any other day Audra would feel uncomfortable leaving that chore to someone else. But Meredith was family, and honestly, part of Audra’s brain was still in sleep mode.

  “Can I get you anything while you’re waiting?” she asked Robert. “Juice, water?”

  “OJ if you got it.”

  She poured him a glassful that he drank in a few swallows. Then he launched into small talk, about a new construction manager and the unusual weather—springtime in Portland usually meant ten types of rain. Audra followed only half the conversation, her head aching from lack of sleep.

  Not long after, Meredith returned with Jack, now dressed in jeans, a rugby shirt, and his favorite hoodie. He slipped on his shoes and Meredith double-knotted the laces.

  “Last chance to change your mind about coming,” Robert said to Audra. “We can wait if you’d like time to get ready.”

  Audra envisioned the cemetery, the type of site she hadn’t been to since the funeral. So much green in that rolling grass, cultivated by countless tears.

  Before she could decline, Robert smiled. “Next time maybe.”

  “Maybe,” she said, grateful he played along as though the possibility were real.

  10

  Apprehension hung over London, thick as a show curtain preparing to drop. On the train to work that morning, Vivian was shaken by the worry in people’s eyes, the pleats in their faces. Not in the children, of course, whose priorities hadn’t been swayed from games of marbles and cravings for sweets. Rather, the adults old enough to recall firsthand the blistering devastation of war.

  “It doesn’t start with an explosion.” Mr. Harrington stared vacantly out the shop window. “It bears far more subtlety. A simmer beneath the surface, as if bringing broth to a boil.”

  He spoke this to no one in particular, though Vivian was the only other person in the store. Customer visits had slowed to a crawl since the startling news broke the day before. The announcement had come mere hours after Vivian’s talk with her father, which clarified the tension in the den. Her father had known, or at least suspected, what was headed their way.

  A non-aggression pact had indeed been signed, but between the Nazis and Soviets. All this time, even through the Anschluss, when Germany annexed Austria, the English had managed to turn a cheek. But now, a hand had been raised to strike the Queen herself. Hitler’s march toward domination cou
ld no longer be dismissed, at least not by Vivian.

  While in the basement that morning, seeking bleach for a coffee stain, she had caught her father’s muffled voice. The heating duct projected his phone call from the study. She had balanced her weight between stacked crates and an Oxydol box to bring her ear close to the vent. The words she was able to discern nearly made her tumble.

  How she wished today’s hours would quicken. Nearly a full workday remained before her date at the theater, where she could divulge her news to Isaak.

  At the store counter, she checked her watch, again. A plunk alerted her that she had dropped her pencil, again. She swiped it from the floor and resumed transcribing receipts into the tall brown ledger. She erased one line, and another, corrected more entries. For her efforts, the basic equations might well have been algorithms that challenged the likes of Einstein.

  “Take the day off,” Mr. Harrington said.

  “Sir?”

  “You heard me, love.”

  He had never released her prior to closing. Though kindhearted, he was a businessman who lived by the clock. She didn’t know how to respond.

  “Go and enjoy,” he said solemnly. As if, like her father, he already knew.

  A campus-wide search posed more challenges than Vivian expected. The staff roster was so large and students so scarce, on account of the summer holiday, she could not find anyone familiar with Isaak. Twice she phoned his dorm, but no one answered.

  Admittedly, more than a message delivery propelled her. It was also a longing to see his room. To touch the down of his pillow, to learn in detail how he lived. If only women weren’t forbidden from the building. He had often bemoaned this rule in the heat of their kissing, damning his inability to bring her there. For Vivian, it had been a relief, lessening the temptation to compromise her morals. Now she cursed those blasted morals, in light of her family’s pending departure-a development of which Isaak wasn’t aware.

  In the university library, Vivian expanded her hunt to include Professor Klein. Since Isaak assisted the man with research, the two might work in the same vicinity.

  “He teaches European history,” she explained, inquiring at the counter.

  The librarian suggested a jaunt over to the History Department, where Vivian might have more success. She hoped so. If not, she would have no choice but to pine away the hours until the scheduled time of her original date.

  After finding the correct building, she wandered the halls, to no avail. She was on the verge on giving up when she peeked through the pane of a door. Two men stood in a large vacant classroom. Even from a distance she knew those golden curls.

  Quickly she smoothed her own hair, pinned up at the sides, forgetting for a moment the reason she had come. She grasped the doorknob, discovered it locked. She knocked on the dense window.

  The men took no notice. Arms crossed, parked before an enormous blackboard, they appeared intent on their conversation. Isaak was wearing cuffed trousers with the burgundy sweater-vest she loved, and the other gentleman wore a bow tie with his suit. Was that Professor Klein? His chiseled features and ink-black hair, as thick as his eyebrows, came as a surprise. She had envisioned the history professor to be well into his sixties, with a beard like Mr. Harrington’s and spectacles low on his nose.

  Vivian hated to interrupt but trusted Isaak would be grateful. She gave the door a pound, hearty enough to summon their gazes. She raised her hand in a small wave.

  Neither man moved.

  Was the window too narrow for clarity from their view?

  But then recognition set into Isaak’s face, a merging of delight and bewilderment. He spoke briefly to the man, then slipped into the hall.

  “What are you doing here?” Isaak asked, shutting the door behind him. “However did you find me?”

  “I have news from my father,” she blurted.

  The lines of Isaak’s mouth lowered. He looked around, acknowledging the context, the urgency. “Come,” he said, and guided her into another empty classroom.

  He closed the door, leaving the fluorescent bulbs off. The mid-morning sky provided ample light through the windows. “You told him about me? And my family?”

  “No ... not yet.” She hoped he didn’t perceive the delay as proof of her father’s disapproval-though it was a stance Isaak had rightly predicted, much to Vivian’s shame. “I just thought, from what you said, it would be better to wait. For now.”

  “It is.” He nodded staunchly, to her relief. “So what news did he tell you?”

  “He didn’t tell me, exactly. I overheard him on the phone. It was difficult to catch all of it, and I could only hear his side.”

  “And?”

  “From what I gathered,” she said, “Britain is entering into a Mutual Assistance Treaty.”

  “Another alliance? With whom?”

  She quieted her voice, despite their being alone. “Poland.”

  “My God.”

  In a game of global chess, he understood what it meant, as did she. If Hitler invaded Poland, the United Kingdom would declare war.

  Isaak gazed across the room, lost in his thoughts. “I should go back,” he said finally, as if to himself.

  It took her a moment to comprehend. He was referring to Munich.

  “No. Isaak, you can’t do that.” On the screen in her mind, she saw the newsreels of British Spitfires, their airmen grinning while loading bombs and ammunition, all of which could soon be headed for Germany.

  “What I can’t do,” he said, “is stay here and do nothing.”

  “Yes, I understand that. You want to be there to help your family. But don’t you see? If you go back, you’ll be the enemy.”

  He squared his shoulders and stared at her. “The enemy. Just as my family is, you mean.”

  “What? No, of course not. I wasn’t saying ...”

  Isaak shook his head, stepping away. He raked both hands through his hair.

  No silence could have been louder.

  Vivian defied the tension that guarded him by moving to his side. She placed a hand on his arm. A muscle flinched beneath his sleeve, yet he didn’t pull away.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. And she was. Not just for her choice of words, but for the burden he had to carry.

  He slid his gaze downward to land on her grip. His fingers followed and layered her hand. “It’s nothing you’ve done, darling. You’re the only thing good in this god-awful mess.”

  Moisture clouded her vision. She felt her heart rising, expanding. “I love you,” she whispered. It was only the second time she had dared to say it loud enough for him to hear, and suddenly regretted ever refraining.

  He turned to her with a wisp of a smile. As he cupped her cheek, she leaned into his touch and closed her eyes. Teardrops streaked her face. Then his mouth was on hers, and everything but the warmth of his kiss and feel of his hold faded from existence.

  At last, he drew his head back. In a matter of seconds, his attention again went adrift.

  She debated a suggestion. The solution seemed so obvious it bordered on insulting. “Is there any way ... for your family to leave Germany? Perhaps it will be easier if they go now.”

  “Maybe. I don’t know. I wish it were that simple.”

  She sensed it best not to push.

  “I’d better go,” he said.

  The very mention of leaving reminded her of the discussion with her father, his estimation that they would return to the States “rather soon.” She ought to tell Isaak. But how could she right now? Such an issue was trivial in comparison. Besides, no plans were etched in stone.

  And so, she merely nodded.

  “I’ll contact you soon,” he said. “Thank you, darling, for telling me.”

  “If I hear anything else, you’ll be the first to know.”

  A partial smile stretched his lips. Then quick as a wink, he was gone.

  11

  The scene, in another lifetime, could have been a snapshot of war.

  It was Memo
rial Day at Portland’s Rose Festival. Bunting of red, white, and blue draped Waterfront Park. Stick flags fluttered in the hands of passing children. Patriotic performances drew listeners to the far outdoor stage as uniformed servicemen threaded through the esplanade. Below them on the Willamette, massive naval ships would soon congregate. Annual Fleet Week would fill the streets with sailors, who these days, to Audra, looked no older than twelve.

  But for now, she noted the contrast of elderly veterans being escorted in their wheelchairs. What generational shock they must feel amid the high-tech carnival games and reggae tunes from the band. The Skankin’ Yankees were light-years away from the classic styling of the Andrews Sisters.

  “Can we do stuff yet?” Jack impatiently scuffed the dirt.

  “Hold on a few more minutes,” Audra said. “I’m sure they’ll be here soon.”

  He heaved a breath, clearly in doubt. It was actually refreshing to see him excited about any event.

  In an attempt to kill time, she revived a game Robert used to lead. “I see ... Charlie Brown.” She subtly gestured toward a stranger who resembled the cartoon character. For each accurate designation, the player earned a point. “Ooh, there’s Olive Oyl. And that guy there is definitely Shaggy. I’ve got three already. You’d better catch up.”

  “I’m hungry. Can we get one of those?” Too distracted to play, he pointed toward kids with pink and blue cotton candy. The feathery bouquets were larger than their heads.

  With dinnertime so close, she imagined the “right” answer was no. “Let’s have some real food first. Then we’ll see.”

  As a child, Audra had indulged in plenty of treats that were no better; her Fun Dips and Pixy Stix were the equivalent of powdered-sugar injections. Yet that was also in an era when no one locked their doors and sleeping babies rode in cars on the floorboards.