Today We Go Home

by Kelli Estes

Larkin moved her arm enough to allow one eye to see her cousin. “Are you babysitting me?”

  Jenna didn’t even bother trying to pretend otherwise. “Yep. And that means I’m in charge.” She bounced off the bed and crossed over to open the blinds. Sunlight filled the room. “My first order is for you to get in the shower and get dressed. Then we’re leaving the house.”

  Larkin slid her arm back over her eyes. “I don’t want to leave the house. I like it here.”

  “We can figure that out later, once you’re up and you’ve eaten something.” She paused and Larkin hoped she’d gone away. That hope was dashed a moment later when Jenna said, “I’m not leaving until I see you go into the bathroom. Once you’re in there, I’ll go downstairs and heat some of the spaghetti Grams left in the fridge for you.”

  Larkin’s stomach growled in response, her traitorous body siding with her cousin. “Fine, I’ll get up. But close the blinds first.”

  Three hours later, Larkin had to admit she felt better than she had in days. After her shower and lunch, Jenna had compromised on her plan to get Larkin out of the house by agreeing to help her carry in all of Sarah’s boxes and bags that had sat in Larkin’s car for the past five days.

  Sarah’s possessions were now stacked along the wall in Larkin’s bedroom, except for one box in the middle of the floor that they were sorting through. Bowie snored in the doorway.

  “What about this?” Jenna asked, pulling off the cap of a silver lipstick tube and twisting it to reveal an inch of dark pink. “Garbage?”

  Larkin took the lipstick from her and carefully twisted it back down before replacing the cap. “I was with her when she found this shade and fell in love with it,” she told Jenna, her memories as real as if the images were being projected on the bedroom wall. “She’d convinced me to go to the mall with her so we could find dresses for the Regimental Ball our senior year at Norwich. She talked me into makeovers at the Clinique counter, and of course, she left looking beautiful. I looked like a tramp.”

  She carefully placed the lipstick in the “keep” pile next to the Ziploc bag of bracelets and earrings and the old T-shirts already there. So far, nothing was in the piles designated “give away” or “garbage.”

  Jenna pulled a stack of photographs out of the box. “She sure was pretty, wasn’t she?” She handed the top one to Larkin.

  In the photo, Sarah was wearing her service uniform, her curly black hair slicked back into a tight bun under her maroon beret. Sarah’s smile lit her whole face, and her dark-brown eyes gleamed like she was laughing at something the person taking the picture had said. From the trees in the background, Larkin figured it had been taken when Sarah was stationed at JBLM before she’d deployed the last time.

  “Do you know who these kids are?” Jenna handed over another photo.

  Larkin looked at the two smiling kids, their arms wrapped around each other and their heads bent together. The girl in the picture was clearly Sarah. Her hair and her smile gave her away, even though she couldn’t have been more than five or six. The boy with her was much older, a teenager. “I think it’s Sarah and her brother, Zach.”

  “I didn’t know she had a brother.” Jenna took the photo back to look at it again, closer. “You never mentioned him.”

  Larkin shrugged. “She didn’t have any contact with him. That’s why she left all her stuff to me instead of him, I guess.” She looked at several more photographs as Jenna handed them to her. “I think she said he was ten years older than her. When their parents divorced when she was six, Zach must have been around sixteen. He went to live with their dad, and she stayed with their mom. From the way she told it, her dad and brother abandoned her, and her mother became an abusive alcoholic. Sarah invited all of them to her Norwich graduation, but none of them showed. I felt so bad for her that day.”

  “That’s so sad.”

  “Yeah. She wrote them off after that.” Larkin fingered a picture of her and Sarah, taken one weekend when they’d both been on leave during their deployment so they’d flown to Paris, a dream for both of them. In the photo, they sat together at a café in Montmartre, both wearing cheesy Eiffel Tower sweatshirts they’d purchased the day before, toasting the camera with full glasses of red wine. “God, I miss her.”

  “Want to take a break?”

  Larkin looked at her cousin and nodded. “Yeah. Let’s find a bottle of wine to open. Kaia should be home soon, too.”

  As Jenna scooped everything back into the box and placed it on the pile along the wall, Larkin carefully propped the Paris picture against Sarah’s urn on her nightstand where she’d see it every morning and night.

  Downstairs, they found a bottle of Malbec with a label from the winery Jenna’s dad ran in eastern Washington. As Jenna poured two glasses, Kaia arrived home.

  “How was work?” Larkin asked Kaia as she kicked off her shoes.

  “Great,” Kaia answered and looked pointedly at the wine in Larkin’s hand. “I’m putting together an exhibit for the Nordic Museum in Ballard on hygge and lagom that opens next month. It’s been a lot of fun.”

  Kaia had carved a profession out of part-time curator positions at various museums around Puget Sound, as well as the occasional research job for companies and nonprofits. She also wrote a popular blog on food history and how people have prepared and used food throughout the ages, which was her true passion.

  Larkin ignored Kaia’s obvious judgment of her drinking and asked, “What are ‘hueguh’ and ‘lawgom’?”

  “‘Hygge’ is a Danish word that acknowledges a moment that feels especially cozy or charming. ‘Lagom’ is a Swedish concept that embraces just the right amount, or restraint.” With a sly look toward Jenna, Kaia asked, “What did you two do today?”

  They told her about Sarah’s boxes.

  “You know,” Jenna said as she carried her wine to the table and sat, her feet propped on the chair next to her, “I’ve been thinking about Sarah’s brother.” She explained the photo and the siblings’ lack of a relationship to Kaia and turned back to Larkin. “I think you should track him down. He’d probably want that picture, and maybe some of Sarah’s other things. Whatever you don’t keep yourself.”

  Larkin admitted the idea had crossed her mind. “But from the way Sarah made it sound, he’d made no effort to contact her over the years. Ever. Why should he want any of her stuff now that she’s gone?”

  “Maybe he wanted to get in touch but thought he’d have plenty of time later,” Kaia mused.

  Bowie stood and trotted out to the entry hall, signaling Grams’s arrival. Larkin reached into the cabinet to get another wineglass. The subject of Sarah and Zach was forgotten as Grams breezed in wearing a Christmas sweater and carrying two large pizzas.

  As soon as they’d all loaded their plates with food and refilled their wine, they gathered around the table.

  “You’re spending the night, right, Jenna?” Grams asked.

  Jenna nodded as she picked up a slice of Margherita. “Yep. Evan is meeting some friends after work for drinks, and I thought it would be the perfect opportunity for us to have a girls’ night.”

  Grams set her slice down and wiped her hands on her paper napkin. “When are you going to tell us what’s going on with you two?”

  Jenna’s eyes widened, but she quickly recovered and waved her hand in the air dismissively. “Oh, we’re fine. Really. Nothing’s going on.”

  Larkin could tell by the expressions on Grams’s and Kaia’s faces that they didn’t believe her. For that matter, Larkin didn’t either. Still, if anyone understood the desire to keep private matters private, it was her. Taking pity on Jenna, she asked, “Anyone up for a game of gin rummy for old times’ sake?”

  Soon, with cards in hand, Larkin looked at the faces gathered around her and felt a mixture of emotions. For her entire adult life, Larkin’s tribe had been her fellow soldiers. Sarah and all
the others she’d served with had been her family. She would have happily given her life for them, and she unquestioningly trusted them with her own.

  For the last few months, after being told she’d have to take medical retirement from the Army, she’d believed that feeling of belonging was gone. She’d believed that she would never again feel so close to another group of people, and the loneliness of that had gnawed at her.

  But she’d forgotten about her original tribe. The women who had been there since she was a kid, who had believed in her and celebrated with her as she achieved her goals. Tonight, sitting at the table with them as she’d done too many times to count, she remembered, and as she did, she felt a tiny chunk of the wall she kept between herself and the rest of the world break off and crumble away.

  As they played, Grams met Larkin’s gaze across the table. “Besides old photographs, have you come across anything else interesting?”

  The diary sprang to mind, even though she hadn’t looked at it in days. “I did find an old diary written by one of Sarah’s ancestors. I haven’t gotten far, but Sarah once told me she was a woman who disguised herself as a man and fought in the Civil War.”

  “What?” Kaia dropped her cards, placed both palms flat on the table, and looked at Larkin as though she’d lost her mind. “You have a primary source from the Civil War, and you didn’t tell me?”

  Larkin ducked her head. “Yeah, I guess I forgot.” Kaia had been a fanatic about history from a young age. How Larkin hadn’t thought to show her the diary already was beyond her.

  Kaia was practically bouncing in her chair. “I’ve read there were hundreds of women who fought in that war, most of them disguising themselves as men, although it is impossible to know exact numbers since those known were either women who were discovered or outed themselves in newspaper articles or memoirs written after the war. The rest kept their secret hidden or were killed in battle without being discovered. Some bodies have been exhumed and found to be women.” She leaned close to Larkin. “Will you let me read it? Please?”

  Larkin agreed. “When I’m done with it, sure.”

  “Why don’t you go get it right now and read a bit to us? I’d love to hear it,” Grams said.

  Larkin shook her head. “I’m taking a break from it right now.”

  “Oh, Larkin, please?” Kaia had clearly forgotten all about the card game. “I’m dying to know what it says!”

  Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad reading the diary if she wasn’t alone. “Okay, fine. I’ll go get it.” Larkin went upstairs to her bedroom, hobbling a little from her knee acting up. When she got back to the kitchen, the deck of cards had been put away and someone had started a pot of coffee.

  She gave them a summary of what she’d read so far, and then she opened the diary to the next entry and began to read it aloud.

  September 25, 1861: I dared not write about our plans until after we’d gone, in case someone discovered this diary and interfered. Ben and I have left home. We are joining David. We will follow his camp and support him in whatever means possible. As long as we are together, I care not that I give up the comforts of home. We’ve lost Pa. We need to be together.

  When we received a letter informing us that David has fallen ill and was sent to a hospital in our nation’s capital, we made our plans and we left. I am finding train travel to be an exciting, although tiring adventure. I’ve shared train cars with soldiers, families, widows, and politicians. I was surprised to see that free black folk have a train car of their own at the back. I don’t understand why they aren’t allowed to ride with us.

  I do hope we arrive in Washington soon and that we find David recuperating. I will be happy when the three of us are together again.

  “I bet he has cholera,” Kaia told them almost gleefully. “Or it could even be something like syphilis. STDs were rampant among the troops.”

  Larkin shrugged and kept reading. The next few entries were about Emily and Ben’s travels, and then they arrived at the hospital.

  October 3, 1861: David is engaged in a battle none of us foresaw when he left home. This one is not against secesh, but fever. We are nursing him the best we can. I cannot lose him. Not so soon after losing Pa.

  October 6, 1861: Today I made a decision and while I can’t risk putting it into writing, it will change the course of my life. Of that I am certain. I started this diary for Pa so he might know all that had happened at home during his absence. I found the writing of it helped me sort through my thoughts and emotions, and so I continue to write even though Pa will never read these words. Because I am about to embark on what could prove to be dangerous, I must write of my activities obtusely in case this diary should fall into the wrong hands. For now, all I will admit is that I will soon have more in common with my brothers. I must go now. A kindly soldier by the name of Private Franklin Thompson who works here as a nurse is calling for me. David must need something.

  “No way!” Kaia jumped up. “Wait here. Don’t read another word. I’ll be right back.” She dashed upstairs.

  Larkin exchanged amused glances with Jenna and Grams as Kaia hurried out of the kitchen. Grams got up to pour them each a cup of coffee.

  Kaia came back carrying her laptop. “Here it is, just like I thought.” Her smile was smug. “Sarah Emma Edmonds, alias Private Franklin Thompson, was one of the known women who disguised herself as a man and served in the Army during the Civil War. She was in the Second Michigan Infantry and served the first six months or so of her enlistment in DC-area hospitals. She later served as a courier and orderly for General Poe. Later, she volunteered to be a spy.” She nodded toward the diary. “This woman is legit.”

  “And Emily didn’t even notice she was a woman?” Larkin had her doubts. “How could women possibly fool people into thinking they were men simply by cutting their hair and donning a uniform?”

  Jenna nodded. “I was wondering the same thing.”

  Obviously happy to put on her historian hat, Kaia launched into an explanation. “You’re making the mistake of judging the situation from contemporary eyes. Society was very different in the nineteenth century. Women never wore pants, only dresses with corsets to make their waists tiny and several skirts that completely hid the shape of their lower bodies. But it was more than clothing. Society’s unwritten rules specified that women were to be demure and sweet, and they were to gracefully allow the men in their lives to manage all aspects of business and war. To people of the era, a woman did not put on pants and go to war any more than a man would’ve put on a hoop skirt or birthed a baby. So, if it looked like a man, it was a man. Simple as that.”

  Thinking of her experiences in Afghanistan, Larkin laughed. “Times sure have changed. Twice I discovered a man trying to smuggle weapons past security checkpoints by wearing a burqa.”

  Jenna leaned forward. “Remind me. Is a burqa the black one that covers all but a woman’s eyes?”

  Larkin shook her head. “No, you’re thinking of an Arabian niqab. A burqa is the usually blue covering worn by women, mostly in Afghanistan, that completely obscures her from view. Even her eyes are covered by a screen.” A memory of one particular burqa-wearing woman came into her mind, but she pushed it, and the accompanying pain, away.

  “How did you know the weapons smuggler was a man?”

  Jenna, Grams, and Larkin all gave Kaia a look of disbelief. “Believe me, you can tell during a pat down,” Larkin told her, laughing.

  “Yeah, Kaia wouldn’t know about that,” Jenna teased. “She hasn’t had a boyfriend in so long, she probably forgot what a man’s body feels like.”

  Kaia shot her a look, then ruined it by smiling. “Do all women wear burqas in Afghanistan?”

  Larkin shook her head. “No, not at all. Sure, the more religiously conservative ones in places like Kandahar do, but many women dress in suits and business attire to go to their jobs in Kabul as elected government offi
cials, attorneys, or business owners.”

  Jenna cocked her head to the side. “Are the women in burqas as oppressed as media would have us believe?”

  “That’s difficult to answer.” Bowie bumped against Larkin’s leg, and she reached down to rub the dog’s head, realizing she felt agitated talking about all this, and Bowie was likely picking up on her discomfort. “By western standards, yes, many are oppressed. But, conversely, there are women who choose to wear the burqa for the freedom anonymity brings them. You see, Pashtun people believe that a woman should not show her face in public, and if she were to converse with a man who is not her relative, she would bring dishonor upon herself and her entire family. In a burqa, she does not bring scrutiny upon herself and, like some of the women I met, can even meet with her boyfriend in a public park with no bystanders able to identify her.”

  “How did you talk with them?” Grams patted her own leg, and Bowie eagerly went to her for more attention. Grams rubbed both hands on the sides of Bowie’s neck as she listened to Larkin’s answer.

  “We had a female terp.” At their looks of confusion, Larkin explained. “Interpreter. We arranged to have at least one female terp accompany every unit that might need to engage with local females. I made certain every unit had female soldiers as well.”

  “Did you say you lived at the police station in Kandahar?” Grams propped her slippered feet on the chair next to her, engrossed in what Larkin was telling them. Bowie lay on the floor next to her and went to sleep.

  “As company commander, I made my rounds checking in with my platoons, which meant that I was usually on one FOB—forward operating base—or another, although sometimes my team and I stayed with my officers at the various Afghan police stations. Sarah was waiting for her paperwork to go through, promoting her to captain, so she volunteered to be attached to my company as platoon leader. This meant that she went back and forth between the FOB and the Kandahar police station in district one.”

  Larkin could see that her cousins and grandmother were enjoying hearing more about her work. She was surprised she felt like sharing it with them. She went on, “As military police, we were tasked with support and training of the Afghan National Police in all matters of the job including patrols, security, detention, community relations, law and order, gathering intelligence from the population, searching suspects, protection of evidence, and raids on suspected Taliban strongholds. We also performed route security for any military operations in the city.”