Last Christmas Card

by Briggs, Laura

  "See what I mean?" she said. "I want the right person to read those words. I know they're supposed to be private–that I wasn't supposed to open it. It was meant for whoever lived in my house sixty years ago."

  "So you found this in your house," he said. She shook her head.

  "No, it was delivered. By the Post Office," she added. "A couple of days ago."

  He raised his eyebrows. "They put this through the slot with the rest of your mail? After all these years?"

  She shrugged. "These things happen. Envelopes fall through the cracks, get discovered again. You read about it on the internet all the time. The important part is, it came to me and I'm going to find its owner."

  "But its owner is Bette Larsen," he pointed out. "Not the soldier who mailed it."

  She shrugged. "I'm trying to find the Larsens, but it's not exactly working out. Apparently, they haven't lived in this house for ages. The current owner hasn't even heard of them."

  Releasing a long sigh, he slid the envelope in front of her. "How long have you been living in the house?" he asked. "Long enough to look for any clues to the former owner's identity? Go through the closets and shelves and the like?"

  "Only a week," she answered. "I'm just there temporarily. Between projects, since I finished my last mission trip."

  "You're a missionary?" He glanced towards the Bible at her elbow. Before she could reply, the waitress approached with a pad and pencil.

  "You two ready to order?" she asked.

  "Just a turkey sandwich and chips, please," said Samantha. Her companion glanced over the menu briefly, taking in the list of items.

  "Burger and fries," he answered. "Hold the ketchup, please. Just water to drink." He cleared his throat and reached for the napkin holder.

  "Are you a believer?" The suddenness of Samantha's question took him by surprise. He paused for a moment, then shrugged his shoulders.

  "Sort of," he answered. "I used to be. Sometimes life makes it hard to keep on, that's all."

  "You were overseas, weren't you?" she said. "You were in the war."

  He chuckled. "Yeah, that's right. How'd you know?" He patted his thigh with one hand. "Did my stiff knee give me away?"

  The grin illuminated his face, transforming the lines of pain with a sudden glimpse of warmth. He ran his fingers through the sandy hair trimmed close to his head, telling her the pain in his leg was a sensitive issue.

  "Actually, it was what you said about your faith," she answered. "See, I've met former soldiers before. On mission trips and when I was working in villages. They told me that war either drives you away from God or pulls you to Him."

  She flipped open her Bible, turning the pages a few times before she drew something from inside. "That was T.J. He became a medical missionary pilot after his time in Afghanistan was up. He used to talk about what it was like to see women and children killed in village raids. To see children forced into battle by radical ideology or fear." She held up the snapshot of a dark-skinned man in camouflage and denim, one hand resting on a light aircraft.

  "I was in Iraq," Ty answered, after a moment. "Bomb squad. Five years of training and service until I ended up here." His voice tightened slightly.

  "What happened?" Samantha tucked the photo in her Bible again. As she looked into his face, she regretted asking the question. The grin vanished, the momentary softness in his face replaced by something cold and hard.

  "There was a land mine buried outside a village," he answered. "We found it the hard way. Three civilians, two soldiers, and me. Only two of us were lucky in the end."

  The waitress slid their orders from her tray, along with a paper-wrapped straw. Ty lifted his glass and took a long sip, his eyes fixed on a point away from Sam and the waitress, taking in the scattered customers and grey scene outside the cafe windows.

  A sudden warmth on his hand made him glance down to see Samantha's fingers touching his own.

  "I'm sorry," she said, gently. "I shouldn't have asked. I'm kind of ... blunt sometimes. I forget that not everybody wants to say what's on their mind."

  She half-expected him to draw back, but he didn't. For a moment, his hand lingered under hers, before he removed his fingers. Gently, however, as if he was afraid of hurting her.

  "Well, that's the past," he said. "Now I work behind a desk. Looking up addresses for people who have plenty of spare time for returning lost letters." He tucked a napkin in his lap and reached for a fry on his plate. "Up until now, I assumed this was some kind of family thing. Maybe a lost grandfather or great-uncle. Maybe a big will or inheritance involved." With a subtle wink that revealed he was kidding.

  She chewed a bite of her sandwich. "Nope," she said. "Just a concerned citizen. No family left to give me anything more than a Christmas card." Waving the envelope as proof before sliding it off the table, away from the condiment bottles between them.

  Across from her, he took another bite from his burger, using a napkin to swipe a smear of mustard from his jacket sleeve. The fabric so battered she wondered if it had seen more than one tour of duty. Had his family been military, too?

  "Is your family all in the service?" she asked.

  "No," he answered. "No family. Just me."

  His brusque tone stung slightly; she bit her lip and glance down at the table to avoid letting him see that. Until now, she had been tempted to ask him more about his life. Something she would skip, since she sensed that he didn't feel the urge to explain.

  Crumbling his napkin, he tossed it next to his half-eaten burger. "Look, there's a lot of names in the database, but he's in there somewhere," he said. "I'll see what I can do about finding Private Hydberg for you."

  "You will?" Her voice betrayed surprise. "I thought you didn't believe in this."

  He shrugged. "I just thought you could use a hand. Since it's so important to you to find a home for that card." Pulling his wallet from his pocket, he tossed a card in front of her.

  "That's my number at the office and my home number below," he said. "In case you 're not in reach of a phone book." He pulled a few bills from the wallet and tucked them beneath his food basket.

  "I'll call you if I find anything," he said, rising from the booth.

  It was a signal their meeting was over; she took the hint and offered him a farewell smile.

  "Thanks," she said. Tucking her Bible into her bag, slipping the card he gave her inside its pages.

  A step towards the door and he hesitated a moment. "Keep me posted if you find something first," he said.

  "So you won't waste your time," she guessed. "Sure, I can do that."

  He lingered between the booth and the exit, as if debating his reply.

  "Yeah," he said. "Thanks." With that, he pushed open the door and moved stiffly to the sidewalk. Keeping his stride as normal as possible so long as he was in sight of the girl in the booth.

  *****

  The database for military records was vast, organized by name, date, service, unit, and other pertinent details. This time, Ty was careful with his search parameters.

  Hydberg Mac, Private. Massachusetts. The date was harder, since he had no idea what time span Private Hydberg's tour of duty encompassed. He was somewhere in Belgium in 1947–but so were thousands of American soldiers.

  The screen spit out a long list of matches. More than enough were exact, more than enough were deceased. He repressed a groan as he scrolled through the names, looking at the possibilities. Printing off a list of candidates, he watched as the printer issued page after page.

  This would mean hours of work, probably making phone calls and contacting veteran's hospitals. The kind of thing he already wanted to escape, only now he was doing it without pay and without any kind of reward–except maybe a smile of thanks from the girl with the Christmas card.

  Samantha Sowerman. For some reason he kept thinking about her even as his phone remained silent except for business calls. There was something about her that made him curious. That made him long for something just out
of reach. She reminded him of things he never had, of things he wanted to have, but had no proof that she was any of those things.

  Didn't she say she had no family? That she moved around a lot? How was that any different from the life he had always known? The only difference between them was her faith. Rock solid while his was sliding like gravel towards the canyon below.

  He couldn't put his finger on it, but it was definitely there. Even if it was just his imagination making reality out of nothing.

  Releasing a long breath, he worked a pencil over the names, crossing off the least likely candidates with imperfect name matches. The ones who returned to the U.S. before 1947. What was left would require a little more work on his part. As he circled the soldiers who were listed as Boston natives or part of the surrounding community.

  He hoped wherever she was, Samantha Sowerman was making better progress than he was.

  *****

  Weeks passed since Samantha had taken the bus to meet Sergeant Lars in Connecticut. The last of the red leaves from the maple chased each other across the entrance to the brownstone, its exterior cool and damp in the days leading up to Thanksgiving.

  Inside, she huddled over a cup of warm tea and her laptop, proofreading the drafts of her column before mailing them. Remembering her first and only Thanksgiving celebrated in Australia, thousands of miles from her homeland. Someone in their group had molded a turkey out of tofu and stuffed it with a spicy dressing that burned her tongue. A far cry from the holidays of her childhood, her mother's turkey roll and sage dressing.

  It was part of the long-past traditions that Samantha remembered from her childhood. Fragments of Christmas trees and cards strung from greenery boughs, of carved pumpkins and patriotic cupcakes in the summertime. The kinds of things she had done without since life on her own.

  As she typed, she sniffed the air periodically. The turkey soup on her stove had bubbled over a few minutes before. She wasn't as handy with modern pots and pans as she was with the clay cooking dishes she handled in the remote villages. Her mother would have wondered how someone could struggle with a saucepan and stove who had spent months cooking over an open flame. Or boiled noodles over a burner using nothing but a tin cup and a pair of unused surgical tongs.

  Pinned to her refrigerator, the envelope was visible beneath the butterfly magnet. Over the last few weeks, Samantha had combed through the online phone listings and local phone book, searching for any sign of the Larsen or Hydberg families. Dialing the numbers of strangers in hopes that one would claim Bette Larsen or Mac Hydberg as their own.

  "No, sorry, never heard of her," was the response of one man. "I think you have the wrong Larsens."

  "Nobody in our family ever went by the name of Mac," said a woman she phoned a few hours later.

  "Sorry, this is the Gillis household. Either you have the wrong number or you're trying to call the previous owners." This person hung up before she could ask them anything else.

  She was beginning to feel as if these two people and their families disappeared from the planet altogether. Maybe Sergeant Lars was right about this: it was an impossible task.

  She had called his desk once or twice out of curiosity, but he was always out. The female officer who answered didn't seem to know where he was most of the time. She left messages, but there was no response.

  Once she reached a civilian worker, a chatty girl who enjoyed having something to do besides push paperwork. Happy to discuss anything, even a coworker she had only known for a few months.

  "It's kind of sad, actually," she told Samantha. "I mean, he had such an impressive record of service. They said he was one of the best until his accident. Now he barely comes into work some days."

  Samantha bit her lip, unsure how to respond. Were they talking about his muscle pain–or his emotional state? But the girl had moved on to the subject of finding an office email address for Samantha to contact.

  When the phone rang in her apartment, Samantha lifted the receiver, expecting the voice of her landlady or maybe one of the neighbors on the other end. She shifted her cup of tea away from the keyboard, to the space beside her bowl of soup.

  "Hello?" she said.

  "Miss Sowerman, this is Sergeant Lars." At the sound of his voice, she felt a jolt of surprise.

  "Did you find something?" she asked. "And it's Samantha. Miss Sowerman sounds kind of strange to me."

  She heard a slight cough on the other end that might have been a laugh. "I think I found something for you, Ma'am," he said. "A couple of definite Boston residents who were stationed in Belgium during 1947. Now, they might not be the ones–"

  "What are their addresses?" Already her fingers were poised over the keyboard as she waited.

  "Well, one is deceased," answered Ty. "But the second is alive in Pennsylvania. An address near the state line, so it's not exactly close to Boston..."

  Her fingers typed quickly, even as her mind absorbed the news. She had half-hoped Mac Hydberg was still somewhere in Boston–or at least Massachusetts–so returning the card would be simple.

  "I could mail it there, but I want to return it in person," she said, thinking out loud. "I'm supposed to rent a car over Thanksgiving to run some errands. Maybe then I could ..."

  "...could drop by and hand it over," finished Sergeant Lars on the other end.

  She couldn't suppress her laugh in response. "Yeah, I guess so," she answered. "I suppose you think I'm crazy for wanting to do this face-to-face."

  "I didn't say crazy," he said. "The easy way would be to pop it in an envelope and hope for the best. But I suppose you want to be dead certain before you hand it over."

  She thought she detected a slight note of bitterness in his voice. His good humor vanished quickly, she couldn't help but notice. Like a flock of birds startled from a tree, leaving the branches and trunk bare of life.

  "Well, anyway, thanks for helping, Sergeant," she answered. "If I make contact with them, I'll let you know. If you want."

  "Sure," he answered. His voice sounded faraway now. "Here's hoping it's the right one."

  When she hung up the phone, she studied the address intently. It was a long distance to travel simply to return a lost card. Ty had informed her their phone number was unlisted, otherwise she could contact them in advance. As it was, maybe she was better off sending a letter than taking off for the Pennsylvania border to drop in on total strangers.

  But where was the adventure in that? Surely a card delayed for sixty years deserved a better delivery into the hands that may have been waiting a lifetime for it.

  *****

  She was definitely crazy for doing this. But there was no better way, she decided. As she straightened the collar of her best shirt above her only non-holey sweater and checked her reflection in the rear view mirror.

  The day after Thanksgiving, Samantha had rented a car and driven outside of Boston to help an old friend pack her things for a cross-country move. Originally she had planned to drive to the coast for a few days, but plans change. With a Christian rock cd blasting from the speakers and a road map unfolded on the seat beside her, she wound her ways towards the Pennsylvania border.

  She pulled onto the street of the Hydberg house on Saturday morning and parked on the neighborhood curb. Old trees filled the front yard of the home, marked with white gingerbread trim and dark green nandina and holly bushes bursting with red berries along the neighboring fence. She felt hesitant about actually walking up to the front door and ringing the bell. Reaching for her shoulder bag, the envelope protruding from the outside pocket.

  As she walked up the sidewalk, she spotted a figure approaching from the opposite direction, slamming shut the door of a small car with military plates. There was something familiar about their stride, even at this distance. Something too familiar.

  "Sergeant Lars?" She slowed, staring at him as he approached. "What are you doing here?"

  "The same thing you are," he answered. "Seeing if this is the right place." A half-smile c
rept across his face as he opened the gate.

  "I don't understand." Confusion crept into her voice for her reply. "I mean, you didn't believe in this...you never said anything over the phone about coming here ..."

  He shrugged his shoulders, his arm steering her through the gate before he closed it behind them. "I just thought I'd check them out for you."

  "But you knew I was coming here," she protested, as she climbed the steps. "Anyway, you knew I was thinking about it–"

  "Look, are you offended that I came?" For a moment, his smile disappeared as he paused halfway up the house steps. Samantha blushed, realizing the way her protests sounded. Like a child whose ball was stolen by a neighborhood kid.

  "No," she stammered, a rush of dismay sweeping over her at the thought of hurting him with those words. "Not at all. I'm just ... surprised, that's all."

  He didn't say anything as he knocked on the door. The rap was sharp against the carved panels, an etched glass window occupying the upper half. She could see the smoky outline of a face on the other side, peering through the glass before opening the door.

  "Can I help you?" The man on the other side of the threshold smiled cheerfully, middle-age lines stretched into warm creases.

  "Yes, actually," said Ty. "Is Mac Hydberg here? Private Mac Hydberg of the U.S. Army?"

  The smile on the man's face dimmed slightly. "You mean my grandfather," he said. "He's not anymore, I'm afraid. He's been in a nursing home these past two months." He glanced from Ty to Samantha and back again.

  "Are you two here to see him?" he asked.

  "We wanted to ask him a question," Samantha said. "About whether he knew a Bette Larsen and whether–" she drew the envelope from her bag, "–he mailed her this."

  The man turned the envelope over in his hand, studying the address. "Why don't you two come in?" he asked, opening the door wider.