Connie would have felt battered by the mayhem of it, but the Wallaces kept her close and she felt the protection of the family. Felt the welcome. If only every person there hadn’t known John quite so well. Within moments of each one greeting John, she could feel the looks turning her direction.
Some, like Dave, smoking a whole side of beef, grinning and giving her knowing winks. Others telling her what a good boy John was and how happy they were for him, though they never quite said why. And the young women, even the ones with a husband and a brood of children, eyed her as if to assess what she possessed, what she had that they hadn’t.
Everyone was making assumptions and she liked it less with each passing moment. This had to be stopped. But every time she got near John, there was another friend, ex-girlfriend, old friend of the family, relation, or who the hell knew what.
When she finally tracked him to the parking lot, she was hitting her limit.
Before she could speak, he pulled her tight against him. Before she could protest, he pointed.
“Here they come.”
Paps’s truck pulled into the parking lot. As he pulled even with them, she could see the old John Deere gleaming as if newborn on the trailer.
Connie was rapidly drawn into unlocking and unloading the machine. When they tried to get her to drive it, she refused. This wasn’t hers to do. She didn’t want to be seen. Didn’t want to give all of those people yet another reason to look at her.
“Grumps,” she offered in desperation. “It’s his. He should drive it. Or his son. Or his grandson. That’s even better, John. The history of it all. You should drive it.” Please. Anyone other than her.
He shrugged amiably when his father and grandfather waved him aboard.
It started clean with a thud and a roar. Everyone gathered close as he backed it off the trailer, shifted, and drove into the park.
She did her best to hang back, but Grumps took her hand and tucked it under his arm. Trapped, she headed to the park, though they lagged behind the others.
“The old beast never did move much faster than a walk, but I don’t move even that fast anymore myself without a little help.”
So they moseyed in behind John and the others as they circled the building, cut wide around the dormant cherry trees, and pulled into the head of the main meadow.
“Johnny’s quite gone on you, young girl. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Connie kept her gaze ahead as the old man chuckled softly. Next time she and John were alone, that was another thing she’d be straightening out.
“Well, you’ll see soon.”
“See? See what?”
He just shook his head and left her to wonder as they arrived beside the tractor.
***
Paps shouted for the crowd to quiet down.
They didn’t respond much until John thought to kick the old engine a bit. It roared for a moment, as if digging in deep for one last time, drowning any conversation across the whole field. He let it drop to an idle and then choked it down into silence.
Paps stood at the front of the tractor, beside the plaque he’d bolted on but covered with a cloth.
“Welcome all to The Night Before The Night Before,” his shout carried as John came down to stand beside him.
A round of cheers echoed across the meadow.
“Now, I know it’s braggin’ a bit, but it’s a braggin’ sort of night for the Wallaces.”
Hoots and laughter came from the meadow.
“I remember my dad and granda’ first talking about the USS Drum and then the Batfish. I remember him and many of your da’s and granda’s gathering around and doing the same. And here she sits, still proud despite more than thirty years beached.”
John spotted Grumps holding Connie’s arm and waved them forward.
Connie escorted him up beside John but faded back into the darkness before John could snag her hand.
“I need to thank each and every one of you who has labored these last few years on replacing her deck.” He paused and John could feel the crowd hesitate. “But there’s a side of beef cookin’, so screw that.”
Laughter and applause erupted. It was a good night.
“This old tractor is parked here for a reason. My dad was too young for World War II but not too young to work. He rode this tractor from four years before the Batfish was commissioned. Never too weary to help, he drove this tractor on many of your farms to help when help was needed. And like good Oklahomans, you did the same.” He waited for the next surge of applause to fade like the former mayor that he was. “Old Grumps drove her straight through until four years before the USS Batfish came to stay on our good Muskogee soil.”
This time the applause overrode him for several long minutes. During that time, he uncovered the steel plaque, then read it aloud when the crowd quieted.
“‘This 1938 John Deere Unistyler L served twenty-six years on the nation’s finest farmland keeping our people fed, while the USS Batfish kept our seas free for the same number of years. Donated this date to the museum.’ I warned ya’ll it was a bragging night!” He shouted down the next round of applause. “I’m almost done, then we can eat.”
John felt a tug on his sleeve as Paps pulled him forward.
“First, I want a moment of silence for our nation’s heroes. For those standing beside us,” he patted John’s shoulders, “for those not lucky enough to be home for Christmas, and for those fallen.”
Caps were doffed, heads bowed. John could feel the silence. Could feel why he served. To guard these good people and this good family. He bowed his own head and thought of the people he’d lost and the ones he was still privileged to fly beside. He thought of his buddies still over in the ’Stans, at Bati field especially.
The silence hung in the night air until all he could hear was his own breathing.
Paps’s gentle throat-clearing carried easily over the silent crowd.
“And now, my last announcement. I have another reason to celebrate. Sergeant?” He called out the last loud and clear.
John looked up abruptly, but Paps was facing back into the dark.
And there stood Connie in her uniform. Not her dress greens, but her ACU. The mottled tan, gray, and green of an Army combat uniform.
“By request, I’m pleased to present U.S. Army Sergeant Connie Davis of the 160th SOAR.”
The crowd remained silent. John tried to make sense of it. She’d been wearing Noreen’s big coat, but now she wore full uniform, billed hat, and her Beretta sidearm that she must have had on underneath. Somehow in the last twenty-four hours he’d forgotten the soldier that was such a part of the woman.
She dropped to parade rest and faced the crowd. Her earlier meekness had evaporated. The soft woman who’d slept spooned against him and woken him in the best way possible was gone. A SOAR Sergeant now stood and faced the crowd, and beware any who messed with her.
John could see that those fierce shields she kept around herself were firmly slammed into place.
“There are exceptional young people in the world…” Connie’s voice, normally so soft, carried easily on the silent night air. “And they are often the ones you’d least expect. These young men and women face a challenge that most would shirk. They do what others not only can’t imagine but wouldn’t do even if they could. These people are to be looked up to and encouraged for they place one thing higher than themselves. It is their country.”
John applauded uncertainly along with the crowd. Didn’t she know this wasn’t a time to lecture a crowd of Okies on patriotism? She was going to make a fool of herself if she continued with a recruiting speech. He went to step forward, but Grumps put a restraining hand on his arm.
“She knows what she’s doing. Now stand tall, son.”
His voice wasn’t all that steady as he spoke. He’d never served. What was going on?
Connie turned smartly to the dark behind them and shouted out, “Cadet Captain Wallace.”
Wallace? Who the—
Noreen stepped forward. But it wasn’t Noreen. She strode forward in precisely gauged steps. Her dress greens immaculate from her green beret, her jacket decorated with several awards, her blue pants with the gold side-stripe, and shining black shoes. Her long hair back in a neat ponytail. White dress gloves accenting her hands in the bright park lights.
Connie motioned his parents forward as John’s world turned under his feet.
Paps and Mama removed the three pips from Noreen’s shoulders. They replaced them with the single gold bar of an officer before stepping back.
“Cadet Captain Wallace…” Connie spoke loudly enough for the crowd to hear. “Please allow me to be the first to salute the U.S. Army’s newest officer, Second Lieutenant Noreen Wallace.” And Connie shot his sister a perfect and sharp salute with her right hand.
First, Noreen offered a silver dollar to Connie, left hand to left hand, and then returned the salute. Connie took the coin and tucked it into her breast pocket, Noreen snapped down her salute sharp as could be.
Then they hugged.
The crowd erupted. Roars, cheers, hoots, and hollers.
John shook his head even as his sister came up to him.
She saluted him.
Reflexively he saluted back.
Then he roared into her face, “What the hell, Nori?”
Chapter 44
Connie flipped the coin over and back.
She’d found a quiet place over by the park’s track-mounted, five-inch gun, a large, nasty piece of work.
A silver dollar. The payment due from an officer for their first salute from an enlisted soldier. A tradition reaching back no one knew how far—1800s, 1700s? A payment for receipt of respect due the new rank and position.
Connie twisted it in the moonlight. Fifty years old.
Noreen had whispered as they’d hugged, “It’s a half-century coin, so that we can look at it together when we’re a half-century older.”
Connie twisted it again in the moonlight.
She knew it was stupid. Knew she was digging her own pit but couldn’t stop it. Couldn’t stop the downward spiral.
Half a century.
Her father had been there for her just twelve short years. Her mother for three that Connie didn’t even remember in her nightmares. Death awaited her and all she flew with. She knew that. Her goal was to give as much as she could while she could.
Sergeant Ron Davis had taught her that.
And her thirteenth birthday taught her that death waited in the dark for all of them.
She could almost welcome it. But someone had thrown her a lifeline; she now held a fifty-year old coin. And there was more happening inside her that she didn’t want and didn’t understand.
As if called by her thoughts, a shadow came striding toward her through the night, outlined by the lights brilliant at the other end of the park. No mistaking the scale of John Wallace or the easy stride, even in silhouette.
He came to her as if shining with a light of his own.
He didn’t speak. He didn’t pause either. No thought of hesitation.
John simply walked up to her and folded her into his arms. She buried her face in his chest and breathed him in. Breathed in the quiet and safety.
“I can’t believe Nori. I can’t believe she did that and never told me.”
Connie didn’t need to ask his reaction, she could hear it in his voice. A sense of wonder and pride.
“She’s going CSAR, that’s why the premed. Can you imagine some poor, shot-up son of a bitch when my sister jumps out of a combat search and rescue chopper with a med kit strapped across her back? He’s gonna think he’s died and gone to heaven.”
John kissed her on top of the head.
“I’m so proud that you stood for her. I’ll never forget that. Never.”
Connie could only nod against his chest.
It wasn’t a moment she’d be forgetting soon either.
She held the coin hard in her palm.
Noreen had given her a fifty-year dream.
She’d never even had a five-year one.
Chapter 45
They walked back toward the banquet hand in hand. No hurry. But John’s family waited for him there and Connie couldn’t hold him back.
It was easier in her uniform. She knew who she was in her camo. She’d face the crowd, both the welcoming and the jealous. She’d be strong for John’s and Noreen’s sake.
They came upon the old tractor. Grumps was sitting on her left side. There was an almost natural seat there where you could sit on a frame member and lean back against the driveshaft housing.
He looked comfortable there, sleeping quietly. A bottle of beer held loosely in one hand rested on his thigh. How many times over the decades had he rested in just that spot?
John slipped the bottle free before it could spill.
“Come on, old man. You’ll freeze if you stay here.”
He reached out and then jerked back as if he’d been bit.
Connie stepped forward and touched Grumps’s skin.
Cold.
She checked for a pulse beneath the thick woolen scarf Bee had wrapped around his neck.
Nothing.
Her ear, just a half inch from his slack mouth, felt no brush of warmth, heard no breath.
She turned to John.
“John, you need to get the truck.”
He didn’t move.
“John!” she snapped out, and he jerked back to life like a puppet with half its strings cut. “John, you need to go very quietly and get the truck.”
He nodded. Turned for the parking lot. Turned back. Turned away again.
Too much too fast. Connie stepped up to him and rested a palm against the center of his chest until his jumping gaze finally steadied on hers.
“Give me the keys, John. You sit here with him. I’ll be right back.”
He fished out the keys, then dropped them in her palm.
“Okay, John. You just sit with him, all right?” It was what was needed. She could remember the Army psychologists who always showed up whenever you lost a teammate. They spoke softly, they did their best to make it okay. And no one hated them more than the survivors of the team. Outsiders who didn’t belong there. No one outside knew the guilt of being the one still alive when your crewmate ate a round. Just part of how the dynamic worked.
“Okay, John?”
He nodded his head. Then shook it.
“I can carry him. I can’t—” He looked toward the bright lights of the park. “I can’t let it ruin their night. Paps and Mama work so hard for this all year. And Nori, it’s her night.”
Connie patted his arm. “Just wait a moment. Then we’ll take him together, okay?”
He squatted down and took the old man’s cold hand in his two warm ones as if waiting for him to wake.
Connie trotted toward the edge of the picnic and spotted Larry. Exactly who she was after.
It took a moment to extract him from the woman chatting him up.
The woman said something like, “Isn’t one enough for you?” before leaving in a huff. Connie had learned long ago to focus on what was important and ignore the chaff.
She towed John’s brother to a quiet spot near the twin propellers of the Batfish, despite his protests, and told him the news.
It hit him as hard as it hit John, but he recovered faster.
“John and I. We’re going to take him home. Just tell anyone who asks that’s what we’ve done. Can you do that?”
“Yes… Yes. Good plan. Good.” Then his eyes focused on her. “You’re the best, Connie, for thinking about the family like this. John’s a very lucky man.”
Connie puzzled at the statement all the way back to the tractor.
None of them understood.
Not Larry, not Noreen, and not even John.
There might be the now, but there was no future. There was no point in planning for it either. People just died.
And they did it at the worst times.
Chapter 46
John stumbled through the day as he’d stumbled through the night. Visitors, well-wishers, helpers, family, and more family. Those handling it better gave him comfort. Those handling it worse, he comforted. No plan of action. No direction to turn anywhere on the farm that didn’t remind him of Grumps. When a little girl sat in Grumps’s armchair, he’d wanted to heave her to the floor. When Mama set out lunch, she used the bread-and-butter pickles she put up special for Grumps each year and John had to leave the room.
The house pressed in on him. The people squeezed at his heart until he couldn’t stand another moment. Another instant.
He flailed about until he found the kitchen door and bolted through. He came to a halt a half-dozen steps past the porch, blinded by the low evening sun. Without turning, he could feel all that pressure and all that noise of the people in the house. Brimming over with stories and tales and, even worse, normal everyday goings-on, as if nothing momentous had erased all other concerns from the face of the earth. It built until he thought the overpressure might bust him at the seams. It drove him a step and another farther away.
Quiet. Just a moment of peace. He needed to go find Connie and just sit somewhere. Maybe go out to the sub and sit on the deck as the sun set into the west.
He hadn’t seen her in a while, but he knew her. She’d be in the barn, fixing something. It’s what she did. She better not have touched the GTO, that was his and Paps’s project. Though at the moment, he wouldn’t even grudge her that after the way she’d taken care of them all through the long, sleepless night.
Leaning forward, like a chopper tipping nose down to get some forward motion, he managed to place one foot in front of the other.
A large pickup rolled up in front of him and came to a halt.
More people.
He didn’t need more people.
Wait Until Dark (The Night Stalkers) Page 18