by Lucy Lambert
“Are they going to make you go back, when you’re recovered?” Already, I was plotting a million ways to keep him safe with me. No draft board in the world could take him, not this time.
“No, this is it. I got my discharge after they released me from the field hospital. I’m back to Halifax and Kitchener on the next boat going that way.”
I’d been so overwhelmed by getting my Jeff back that I’d completely forgotten about the news from Kitchener.
“Jeff, there’s something I need to tell you…”
Epilogue
Losing his mother hit Jeff harder than any artillery shell. Losing his home and belongings poured salt into the open wound. But other things soon occupied our lives.
For one, our marriage. Jeff proposed to me on the grand staircase of the Olympic on the trip back. He offered a plain steel band, which to me was worth more coming from him than all the gold in the world. We got married within a week of returning to Kitchener, despite all the tumult of sorting through the wreckage of our lives.
Thankfully, Jeff got a hero’s welcome and a manager’s position at Lang’s. I made amends with my mother, and we stayed with her for a short time before finding a little place of our own, down on Albert Street in Waterloo.
Marie, our daughter, was born November 11th the following year, Armistice Day. It was an incredible time. Everyone across the world knew that something had been irrevocably changed in mankind by that terrible conflict. But now was a chance to rebuild our lives, to make things better for everyone.
In the summer of 1920, Jeff took the family back across the Atlantic. We got passage on the Olympic, converted back to the luxury liner she was built to be. It was strange to be back on that behemoth, not seeing crowds of soldiers everywhere, not having to wonder if a submersible stalked us.
Our hotel looks out upon the Arc de Triomphe across the way. It’s a lavish room, with plenty of gold trimming and sumptuous, decadent French style in the antique furniture. More than we can afford, really, but Jeff insisted that we do this in style.
Marie’s getting heavier in my arms, but thankfully she’s quiet. Something about the pretty lights, the way the wind ruffles the leaves of the trees lining the streets, calms her.
The door opens behind me, and Jeff smiles as he walks in. He looks good in his dark suit, the gold chain of his pocket watch resting against his vest.
He still moved a little stiffly, and bore the scars of the war under his clothes. But he lived. That was what counted.
“How are my beautiful women?” he asked, giving me a kiss on the lips and Marie one on her forehead. She burbled happily.
“We’re merely wondering what took you so long, and where you might have gone off to where we couldn’t join.”
With that, Jeff smiled. He reached into his jacket and pulled something out. “There was something I forgot to get you while I was over here.”
“What are you talking about?”
Jeff opened the box to reveal a generous cushion cut diamond set into a golden band.
“Oh, Jeff, it’s beautiful!” I said.
“I told you I would get you one. It just took a little longer than I first thought. Here…” he started sliding off the steel band he’d given me on the Olympic, but I stopped him.
“No, this one’s more precious to me than any diamond.” Instead, I held out my right hand, and he slid the ring down on that ring finger. We looked at the light glinting off it, the way it sparkled in the Parisian sun.
“Do you like it?” he said.
“I love it! Just promise me you’ll never again run off on an adventure to get another. Once was more than enough for me.”
Jeff hugged me from behind and we looked out onto Paris. It was funny to think how just a few years ago the Germans came within a few miles of the city.
“Never again. I never want to be without you,” he said.
THE END
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Lucy Lambert
Published by Lucy Lambert
Copyright 2014 Lucy Lambert
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