The Memory of Us: A Novel

by Camille Di Maio

“Hey, OK. We can do that.” He turned back to the group that he’d been talking to. “We’ll catch up later, then. David—call me on Tuesday. We can meet at my club and talk it over.”

  “Right, my friend. Looking forward to it.”

  Roger shook hands with everyone in the group before taking my arm. He looked down at the basket. “Did you get something to eat?”

  “Yes, but I’m not sure it agreed with me.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that. That was a bit of stuff our cook made yesterday. I didn’t have time to make it myself as I’d hoped.”

  “It was fine. It tasted fine. Could we go walk that way?” I pointed south near the end of the park, which was much less crowded.

  “Absolutely. I’ll just leave these here,” he said, stepping on the blanket, “and we’ll get them when we come back.”

  We walked to the end of the park until we reached Church Street, and just continued on. The passing cars were a welcome exchange for the glad-handing of a few minutes ago.

  I finally spoke. “I’m sorry about that. I’m feeling a bit better now.” I pulled my hair back and twisted it into a tight bun before releasing it.

  “No, I’m sorry, Julianne. I wasn’t paying any attention to you. I hadn’t seen some of those fellows in a while, but we can get together another time.”

  “Really, I’m fine. It will help to talk about something else, though.”

  He nodded. “Liverpool beat Leeds United, did you catch that?”

  “No, I don’t really follow football.”

  “I don’t imagine you do. It’s quite the thing in our house. I played a bit in school myself. Mum’s a sport. But she’s not your typical girl.”

  “No?”

  “No. She’ll kick the ball around with me for fun, and she doesn’t hesitate to light up a cigar with Pops, but you get her out to a party with him and she dazzles.”

  “I understand that your father is in Parliament.”

  Roger’s eyes lit up. “Yes. He’s been in for a while now. We don’t see him much now, as he spends most of his time in London. He was a major promoter of Neville Chamberlain for PM, so that kept him fairly busy.”

  I bit my lip, but made a contribution. “I don’t follow politics much, but I know that my father didn’t really want Chamberlain to become prime minister. He thinks he’s too focused on domestic policy, and he doesn’t like the Non-Intention Committee, either.”

  Roger laughed. “I think you mean the Non-Intervention Committee.”

  “Yes. That’s the one. You know, how Chamberlain wants to make friends with Mussolini and how he praised Nazi Germany in his first speech as PM.”

  “He didn’t praise Nazi Germany.”

  “He didn’t? My father ranted about it for days.”

  “No, he wasn’t praising them, exactly. He was just congratulating them on their military restraint.”

  I wasn’t sure I knew the difference. Roger explained.

  “Look. Chamberlain knows that we’re on the brink of war. We lost a million boys in the previous war. No one wants that to happen again. Warmongers like your father stand to make a lot of money if we fight, but the PM doesn’t want to see us lose another generation.”

  I felt the heat rise to my face. I walked ahead of him with clenched hands and turned into the graveyard at the side of Saint Peter’s Church. I sat on a bench that overlooked some moss-covered tombstones. Some names were so old that they had eroded into oblivion. I envied them at this moment.

  Roger came to sit next to me. “Hey, I’m making a mess of this. I didn’t mean anything against your father. It’s just that there’s a lot of tension right now, and no one seems to agree on how to best handle the threat on the continent. Germany is taking over territory like a hungry dog and making an ally of Italy, but Britain should stay out of it. I, for one, agree with Chamberlain. I don’t want to go to war. I don’t want the bodies of our boys strewn all over Europe. Do you want that?”

  I hung my head. “Of course I don’t. I didn’t mean to get started on this.”

  He grinned. “I can get carried away. I want to be an MP as well someday, and I guess having an opinion comes with the territory.”

  I looked across at the graves and imagined a future where hundreds of thousands of British soldiers could die before their time. I turned to him. “The world just seems so troubled right now. I don’t always understand it, nor do I have the answers. I mean, just a couple of weeks ago, the IRA tried to assassinate the king when he was in Belfast. It’s mad! My father rants about Catholics and pacifists and tariffs. I just wish things would go back to how they were when I was a little girl.”

  Roger softened and patted my hand. “I know. We all wish times were different.”

  I stood up and smoothed my dress. “I think I’m ready to get back to the picnic now.”

  “Are you sure?”

  I nodded, though in that instant I knew that was the last thing I wanted. “On the other hand”—I breathed in and out, beginning to steel myself for the upcoming conversation with my hopeful mother—“I think I’m ready to go home after all.”

  As he opened my front door upon our arrival at Newsham Park, I turned on the threshold to give him the obligatory “Thanks.” I noticed that for all of his good looks and confident ways, Roger did have a crooked nose.

  The steward appeared with the tea tray, and I pulled myself out of remembering that unfortunate day. The egg salad sandwiches lay untouched, but he made no mention of it.

  “May I get anything else for you, Miss?”

  “Just the tea, please. Chamomile.”

  He poured it deftly, despite the jostling of the people who had begun to enter the dining car, and as he did so, the steam rose with ghostly fingers from my cup. I watched the swirling of the light-golden brew and closed my eyes, inhaling its comforting scent. I sipped at it, knowing that it would scorch my lips but welcoming any sensation that would replace the numbness that had taken its residence in me. With each drink, it mellowed, and I settled back into that state where the line between memories and dreams are nearly indistinguishable.

  The countryside blurred as we raced past it, and within a few hours we pulled into Victoria station. Through the steam, I could see the porters already unloading bags and trunks from underneath. Ladies were dressed more fashionably than in Liverpool, with stylish hats, and some were even wearing trousers. My mother would die before being seen in trousers. I wondered if I could get away with it.

  When I stepped down, I inhaled the bustling sounds of whistles and the scents of the food vendors lining the terminal. I checked my papers and hailed a cab, giving the driver the address in central London. I felt anonymous among the bustle and crowds, a stranger even to myself. Here, I would be no one’s daughter, no one’s girl, and I had only my own ambitions to fulfill. Everything would be left behind, and I could start a new chapter in my life.

  No, not a new chapter. A new book.

  Well, almost. For one thing, I could never forget Charles and Lucille. Charles was my own flesh and blood, and Lucille was as much a sister to me as anyone could be. She had told me at the train station that there were “twenty thousand things” that she would miss about me, just as we both burst into tears. I would never find another Lucille among all of the millions of people in London.

  And of course, there was Kyle. I’d resolved to forget him, to see my little fascination as nothing more than that. He was on the other side of the country, a world away, a mere page to be ripped out.

  Chapter Seven

  “What’s that?”

  “Nothing!” I snapped.

  My one concession was the photograph of Kyle that I had shot from Charles’s window, which I kept under my pillow. I didn’t look at it, but somehow slept better knowing it was there. It had slipped out as I made my bed, practicing the rigid technique that we had learned in our first week of class.

  “Mmm, handsome. Let’s see.”

  My roommate had been trying relentlessly to pull pers
onal information out of me, and I suppose I hadn’t been very cooperative. She, on the other hand, was abundantly forthcoming. I already knew that the redheaded beauty had lived here for four years, and her father was a diplomat from the States. She liked strawberry ice cream and novels about politics, and she found it fascinating that anything built in the eighteenth century here was considered new. There was no corner of her life that was not up for discussion.

  “It’s nothing, Abigail.” I put the photo back in its place.

  “Well, you don’t put nothing under your pillow. I’ll bet he’s your married lover. Or a convict!”

  “Do all Americans have imaginations like yours?”

  “You bet. That’s how the West was won. Wild imaginations and a pioneering spirit.”

  “But you’re from Virginia. Isn’t that in the East?”

  “It doesn’t matter.”

  She tossed her copy of the Materia Medica aside. “The tiny print in all these books is making my head spin,” she said as she lay on her bed and looked up at the ceiling. “And if I’m going to get dizzy, I’d rather do it dancing. You game?”

  I couldn’t argue that this sounded preferable to the evening of studying we’d planned, so I chose a pink dress and some matching shoes from the wardrobe. We knocked on the door next to ours and invited Dorothy to join us. She was already in her nightgown, and Abigail insisted that no one in her right mind was in bed on a Saturday night.

  “I know just the place,” Abigail pressed and turned to leave. As I followed her, Dorothy shrugged and told me that she would get dressed.

  We agreed to split the cab fare to the Jitterbug Club and found one just as we stepped outside. Abigail sat opposite to me and leaned over to pull the top of my dress lower on my shoulders. She sat back to admire her handiwork and adjusted it once again, this time pulling the middle down to reveal a lower neckline than the one that had been designed. She crooked her finger over her lips and nodded.

  “That’s more like it,” she said smugly. “We’re going to have those men rocking on their heels.”

  I exchanged looks with Dorothy, who grinned, but who folded her arms over herself and refused to let Abigail fiddle with her.

  “Phooey on you,” the southern girl bemoaned. “Look like a prude for all I care. It’s the cat that catches the mouse, they say, and I’m going to teach this one to be a cat.” She slapped me on the knee.

  Abigail’s adjustments did, indeed, make me feel more like the old Julianne than I had since that day before the auction when I’d paraded around in newly purchased gowns, and Lucille made me giggle about the absurdity of falling in love with a seminarian. Now Liverpool was far away, and I lived in the horrid white frocks that we wore as uniforms. They had long sleeves, buttons that went all the way down the middle, black shoes and stockings on our feet, and awful, itchy hairnets for our heads. And if that wasn’t enough, I’d learned how to take a pulse, interpret blood pressure, and bathe a patient. No wonder Mother didn’t care for my chosen profession.

  Our cab pulled up to a nondescript building, but the queue that stretched around the corner announced that we had arrived at the right place. Abigail said that everyone in the city came to the Jitterbug Club, from the students to the politicians, to the upper crust and the soldiers. On a dance floor, everyone was equal, and the threats we’d begun to hear of Hitler and fascism felt a world away.

  When our turn finally came up, we stepped under the blue-and-white-striped awning. The three of us held each other’s hands in excitement.

  “If we . . . parated . . . ner . . . stand,” Abigail said.

  “What?” I shouted back at her.

  She spoke right into my ear, loud and slow. “If we get separated, meet by the corner of the bandstand.” The music was blaring; conversation was impossible.

  I nodded in acknowledgment.

  “Tell Dorothy,” she mouthed.

  The band was in full swing, and the people on the wooden dance floor spun in a dazzling display of color. A couple vacated their table just as we walked by, and Abigail slid into one of the chairs, elbowing aside a pair of competing girls.

  Dorothy and I ordered champagne, and Abigail a dirty martini. Hers came with three olives, which she ate slowly and deliberately as three sailors watched. I became aware of my toe tapping to the beat.

  As men came over to say hello, I noted that Abigail’s accent became more and more southern. I had to hand it to her. The girl was a master coquette.

  “Just look at all of the alligators out on that floor!” She looked hungry as the bright lights reflected in her eyes. She looked at me. “You’re going to let down your hair a little, right? No pining for your Pillow Man?”

  She was right. This is what I came for. I could be as forward as any American. I picked up my champagne flute and drank it in one gulp.

  Pulling out the combs keeping my hair up, I let it cascade down my back. I ran my fingers through my blond tresses, and tossed my head from side to side. God, I hadn’t felt this good since the beginning of the summer. I could do this. Maybe. I grabbed Abigail’s martini and swung it back as well.

  She looked shocked—no easy feat.

  “I’ll buy you another one. Don’t worry,” I shouted. But she already looked proud rather than piqued.

  It wasn’t two seconds before I had an offer to dance.

  I tried my hand at the Lindy Hop, as it provided the most room for improvisation. I liked to dance as I felt the music, not according to a choreographed step, so it was ideal for me. However, it was mesmerizing to watch those who could do the American import, the Balboa. Two skilled partners were required to get this precisely right. Twirl. Spin. Step. The movements were captivating. The dancers held their bodies close most of the time and moved with intuition and sensuality. Jump. Jive. Hustle.

  With two drinks in me, I imagined that I was good at the Balboa, too. I barely saw the faces of the men with whom I was dancing, and I couldn’t say how many there were. I just swayed and moved as the music took me. My head began to feel heavy, and I kept my eyes closed whenever possible. I could have sworn that someone kissed me at one point.

  Hop. Swish. Twist. My feet became a blur beneath me and moved faster than my head could react. I could feel my face grow damp under the hot lights, and I became thirsty. I sent my latest dance partner for another martini, promising to stay exactly in this spot until he came back. I lost count of how many I’d drunk through the evening, and I’d developed an unlikely appetite for olives.

  “Let’s go, Julianne.” Dorothy was suddenly at my side, and she put her arm around my shoulders.

  “I can’t go yet. He’s . . . um, I can’t remember his name. But he’s getting me another drink. And he’s so good-looking!” The room spiraled around me as I leaned on Dorothy to keep my balance.

  “He wasn’t, Julianne. He had a huge head and pockmarks all over his cheeks.” She shifted her weight as we walked toward the door. “Here, I brought you some water.”

  “What about Abigail?”

  “She’s waiting right over there. She already hailed a cab.”

  “I got kissed, you know.”

  “Yes, we saw. Let’s get you home.”

  “What is that noise?”

  “What noise?”

  “That crackling sound. Can’t you hear it? It’s so loud!”

  Dorothy looked around the room to see what I was talking about. “I don’t hear anything. Wait. Could you mean the sausage? I just brought some up for you. Fresh from the pan.”

  I looked at the plate on my nightstand.

  “I think I’m going to be sick.” I ran into the lavatory and locked the door behind me. I leaned over the sink, gripping its cold white side. But the sensation passed, and I looked up at the mirror. I was aghast at my reflection. My hair was a bird’s nest, and mascara had left murky smudges on my face. My head felt like a hammer had beaten it over and over, and the light made my eyes throb.

  I could almost understand why Mother did this.
Why she drank. It was to keep her from remembering Charles. Last night, if only for a few hours, I had erased Kyle McCarthy from my mind. I’d tried to numb myself to the hole that his absence in my life had created. It was difficult at first. Every time a man touched me, or brushed against me, or even tried to kiss me, I wanted it to be Kyle. It was his hands that I imagined around my waist, and his shoulder that I wanted to lay my head on during the slow numbers. It was the heat of his breath I wanted to feel on my neck. It wasn’t until deep into the evening and some ungodly number of martinis that the discord of voices and touches blended together sufficiently to liberate me from the ache, if only temporarily. But I couldn’t do it again. My body felt like it was split in two.

  There had to be a better way to get over him.

  I dragged myself back to our room and into my bed.

  “Well, if it isn’t the Swing Queen!”

  “Abigail,” I croaked. I was so thirsty. “I. Never. Want. To. Do. That. Again.”

  “Do what? Have all sorts of guys queuing up to dance with you? Getting kissed by a couple of good-looking soldiers? No, you’re right. Let’s never do that again.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  Dorothy came over to sit next to me on the bed and patted the space next to her. I curled up and laid my head on her lap. She took the hairbrush off my nightstand and started stroking the bird’s nest. She started at the ends, very gently, and worked her way up.

  “Abigail knows what you mean, don’t you, Abigail? We shouldn’t have let things get that far. You just looked like you were having such a good time.”

  I sighed. “Don’t blame yourself. It’s my own fault. I could have stopped and I didn’t.”

  A banging sound pounded my ears. I looked up, and our dormitory monitor popped her head inside.

  “Is anything wrong? It sounded like you girls were up awfully late last night.”

  Abigail spoke up. “Just some girl talk, Gertrude. We’ll try to keep it down next time.” In reality, I recalled hazily that they’d been trying to wrestle me into pajamas against my hysterical protestations.