Family Secrets

by Zina Abbott

  There was also my concern about his nightmares.

  A few days before we were married, noticeably restless, he paced around my apartment living room. I could tell something important was on his mind. He finally sat me down and very seriously told me he was giving me some instructions, and it was essential that I follow them exactly.

  He told me about his nightmares where in them, he was back in Vietnam. He told me I was to never try to wake him by touching or shaking him. Instead, I was to get out of the bed and move as far away from him as possible, close to the door in case I needed to get out of the bedroom quickly. I was to turn on the light and then wake him up by calling out to him and talking to him until he was fully awake.

  He warned me to never let Christy get into bed with us, especially on his side or between us. I noticed that while we were still in my one bedroom apartment, he set up the used crib we bought at a garage sale in the living room.

  Other than those instructions that one time, he made it clear he didn’t want to talk about his time in Vietnam. I didn’t press him on it, but I didn’t forget, either. As much as I wanted to experience all aspects of motherhood myself, I waited a few years to have another child because of his nightmares. I hoped that over time they would gradually go away. I wanted to give him a chance to get past them before I added the stress of a newborn child to the family.

  We had been married for less than a year when we received a phone call from Ozzie telling us Sherrie had died of an LSD overdose. I thought it was considerate of Ozzie to let us know about her death, but Mike didn’t share my appreciation. He said that, from his conversation with Ozzie, the man was looking for money so they could bury Sherrie. Since he knew Mike worked for the Postal Service, Ozzie wanted to know if by chance Mike still had an insurance policy on Sherrie.

  Mike didn’t. He had already changed all his insurances over to show me as the insured spouse. And, like Mike said, if he had still had a policy on Sherrie, he would have used the money to finish paying off his lawyer for all the expenses he incurred finding Christy and bringing her home to us.

  Chapter 30 – Jennie

  Jennie sat in her bedroom pondering the two histories she had recorded of Grandpa Mike and Grandma Jan. She knew she needed to leave soon for the December GOFT meeting. Her mouth watered as the scent from the coconut-custard tarts that were cooling on the kitchen counter drifted through the house. They were her contribution to the evening’s refreshments. The tarts, a favorite treat enjoyed by the Portuguese branch of her family that had immigrated to California’s central valley from the Azores, were made from a recipe her Nana Amy had shared with her.

  Jennie briefly wondered what other countries comprised to her ethnic background. Based on her parents’ surnames, Graves and Carpenter, she suspected some of her ancestors came from Britain. Then again, didn’t she remember something from world history about England being invaded by others, such as the Vikings, some tribes from Germany and the French? Or, was the invasion from France really people who were originally from Scandinavia, same as the Vikings? She couldn’t remember. All she knew for sure was that she had some Portuguese ancestry in there somewhere.

  Jennie had not intended to go to a second GOFT meeting. She decided to accept Donna Moore’s invitation after learning she was scheduled off work that Tuesday night. She knew some of the GOFT ladies were curious about the results of her efforts to record her grandparents’ oral histories. Perhaps it was because she was still basking in her success that she wanted to share the good news.

  No, she did not intend to tell them all the details. But, she did want them to know how learning more about her own family had helped her. Sharing those stories had brought her loved ones closer together. She now had a richer, fuller sense of family.

  Jennie grinned as she envisioned the goofy ladies wanting to know if she followed all the suggestions she had received at the November meeting. She wondered how they were going to react when she told them that although she went prepared, the secret of her success had been to stumble around attempting to set the stage, and then, when her grandparents started talking in spite of that, she sat back quietly and listened.

  Jennie’s eyes strayed to her bedroom wall. Next to her framed portrait of Gerald in his Army dress uniform, Jennie had recently added a large shadow box to display Grandpa Mike’s Army patches, ribbons and pins.

  Jennie remembered back to the day she and Christy had picked up Grandma Jan and they all had driven up to see Jennie’s great-aunt, Pat Givens. On the way home, when they stopped to drop off her grandmother, Jan had disappeared in the house for a few minutes, only to return with a bulging envelope which she handed to Jennie.

  “A few days after Thanksgiving, your Grandpa Mike told me to give these to you,” Jan explained. “After he returned from Vietnam, he told his mother to throw them away. She never did. They were packed away at her house. Mike’s father gave them back to Mike after his mother died.”

  Jennie remembered looking inside the envelope while Jan continued the story. She saw military patches and pins. She didn’t know what they stood for; but to her, it was like looking into a stocking full of goodies on Christmas morning.

  “After his father returned them to him,” Jan continued. “I watched as he silently studied each of them, one at a time, before he put them back in the envelope. Then he told me to throw them away. I took the envelope from him and promised him I would keep everything hidden. I’ve been saving it all this time. But now, Jennie, he wants you to have this.”

  That evening, after Jennie had put Garrett down for the night, she had spread all her grandfather’s war memorabilia out on her desk. Using the information from the DD-214, she spent several hours on the computer researching her grandfather’s engineer battalion, particularly for the year he was in Vietnam. After visiting numerous websites, she also identified what each of the patches, ribbons and pins in the envelope stood for. Now they were mounted on her wall as a tribute of his service to the nation.

  Grandpa Mike was one of the most patriotic people Jennie knew, yet he wouldn’t have anything to do with those things that remind him of the war.

  Jennie reached for the three-ring binder that held the documents she had received from her great-aunt by way of her mother. She looked as all the documents and pictures that were now in her possession. Two months earlier, she had not known they existed. She was not sure exactly when she had been designated the family’s historian, but she felt determined to take care of the family pictures and records. Following Donna Moore’s suggestion, the documents were in plastic sleeve protectors so that she wouldn’t smudge them.

  Jennie again studied the documents she had collected. The marriage license for her Grandpa Michael James Carpenter and Sharon Grace Smith, showed her parents’ surnames and where they were from. Her mother, Ellen Grace Anderson, was born in Illinois and her father, Edgar Smith, was born in Minnesota.

  Smith has to be the most common name in the English world, thought Jennie. That will be a tough name to research. She decided she may need help from the goofy ladies for that one.

  Jennie then focused on Anderson. Isn’t Anderson Scandinavian? Was her birth mother’s family originally from Denmark, Norway or Sweden? Would that explain the blonde hair and blue eyes in the family?

  Jennie wanted to look into it when she had more time. She remembered that Donna Moore said she knew how to do Midwest research. Jennie hoped her neighbor would be willing to give her some tips on where to start. For tonight, though, Jennie knew she was going to pay close attention to anything Desiree´ shared about Sweden.

  Jennie caught sight of the legal-size envelope peeking out from beneath her stack of text books and papers for her English class. She reached over and traced her finger along one edge, but did not pick it up. She knew what was there. Inside was her restraining order against Gerald and her temporary custody grant for Garrett. Among the provisions for Garrett, his father was not allowed to have visitation with Garrett unless the times and
dates were approved by the courts prior and at no time was he to take Garrett out of California without obtaining permission from the court first.

  On the advice of her attorney, she had also filed for legal separation. It was necessary to keep both her and Garrett safe. Still, it filled her with sorrow.

  Jennie had not heard from Gerald since the night of the fiasco in San Luis Obispo. It was difficult to explain to Garrett why his daddy had not contacted him yet on Skype. She still did not know if he had received an injury or if he was suffering with combat stress, or worse. She just hoped that if something had happened to Gerald over in Afghanistan, he would get help. If not, he could end up struggling with it all his life, like Grandpa Mike.

  Jennie realized that her court documents, along with her birth certificate, high school graduation diploma, her marriage certificate with Gerald and Garrett’s birth certificate were her official documents to date. Someday, long after she was dead, unless she wrote her own history, those documents would play the biggest role in defining her life to her descendents.

  Jennie put her binder with the Carpenter documents away in the office box that she had dedicated to the storing of family information. It was time to gather up Garrett and take him and her coconut-custard tarts over to Donna Moore’s house. From there, her next stop was the Golden Oaks Family Ties ethnic Christmas party.

  So many family secrets had finally been brought to light over the past few weeks, she thought. And, she was anxious to see what new discoveries lay ahead of her.

  About the Author

  ZINA ABBOTT is the pen name used by Robyn Echols for her adult Golden Oaks series which includes Family Secrets, the first book in the series.

  Except for the first year of her life, Robyn Echols has lived in California. She started her young life in San Diego and has had gradually moved northward. She has been writing since she was in junior high school.

  After working several jobs, including that of being a rural carrier and union steward for the California Rural Letter Carriers' Association, Robyn has spent years learning and teaching family history topics. She enjoys focusing on history from a genealogist's perspective by seeking out the details of everyday life in the past. Several of her family history articles have been published in genealogy magazines.

  Robyn resides with her husband in California near the "Gateway to Yosemite." When she is not piecing together novel plots and characters, she enjoys piecing together quilt blocks.

  Zina Abbott links:

  Website: www.zinaabbott.homestead.com

  Blog: http://zinaabbottbooks.blogspot.com

  Facebook Page:

  https://www.facebook.com/zinaabbottbooks?ref_type=bookmark

  Pinterest: www.pinterest.com/ZinaAbbott

  Also by Zina Abbott

  A Christmas Promise

  A Christmas of second chances and a promise for a brighter future.

  A sergeant plans to muster out of the Army after twenty years in order to go into ranching--and start a family. A new widow, grateful to have work as a housekeeper, struggles to provide Christmas gifts for her two children. An eleven year-old boy, still fiercely loyal to the dead father who neglected him while alive, struggles to learn how to grow to be a man. A younger sister is starved for the attention and affection only a father can give. This heartwarming tale of a bleak Christmas set in 1873 Wyoming tells of the gift of second chances and a promise for a brighter future.