Mrs. Lieutenant: A Sharon Gold Novel

by Phyllis Zimbler Miller

  "I'm ready," Robert says now.

  Sharon hands him two bags of potato chips and a large bottle of Coke, then picks up the plate of hotdogs and a stack of paper cups. "I hope no one's going to get drunk," she says.

  Robert holds open the front door for her. "An officer is a gentleman. We have nothing to worry about."

  "And the officers' wives?" Sharon asks.

  **

  "South Carolina is hot, too," Wendy says, swatting away a fly hovering over the apple pie. "You get used to it."

  The women sit at the picnic tables talking and watching over the desserts. In a few minutes Sharon will call the men back to the tables.

  They have already cooked and eaten their hotdogs. Then the men separated, moving off towards a still-hot barbecue grill. During dinner, food talk was the focus. Now the men will discuss more serious things: their AOB class, their army commitment, maybe even Vietnam.

  Sharon wonders why the women aren’t discussing their husbands’ time in the army, their fears of a Vietnam tour. Is something not real if you don't talk about it? Or is it because it is only their husbands’ decision – they have been brought up to support such choices regardless of their own feelings?

  In a letter last week to her mother she wrote: “In many respects one could think we were on a huge college campus, but the war hangs over everything. The career men’s wives don’t seem as worried about it as the wives of other second lieutenants who want to serve their time and get out. Of course, the career women could be putting on a front because they have to.”

  Sharon watches Wendy, Kim, Donna and the others chatting about the food in the commissary and the bargains at the PX. How many of these women believe the war in Vietnam is right? How many feel it is the duty of their husbands to fight?

  The truth is, she is relieved the women don't talk about their feelings because undoubtedly they would expect her to reciprocate. She doesn't want to share with these other women her opinions and fears. Ever since ... ever since sixth grade she has chosen not to reveal her innermost thoughts. There are things even Robert does not know.

  She blinks away the moisture in her eyes and walks towards the men to see if they’re ready for dessert.

  As she approaches she hears Jim talking, gesturing with his hands. "The South has a long history of military tradition," he says. "At my college graduation the Confederate flag was bigger than the American flag."

  Sharon's breath catches. How can this be? Then she remembers Anne's words when they visited Elizabeth – "These Southerners are in love with the 'noble duty' of the army." And in psychological terms, doesn't it seem reasonable that the descendants of the losers would continually strive to prove that Confederacy soldiers are as good as the Union ones?

  Sharon reaches a spot behind Robert just as a man with a shaved head laughs. He's in cutoff jeans and an olive green sweatshirt cut out at the armholes.

  "You guys don't know shit about what you're talking about." He grins and looks at the other men. "Now you should see the dinks fight. That's something to see."

  Sharon leans close to Robert to whisper in his ear. "What does he mean by dinks?" Robert turns his head to look at her, then places a hand on her arm and leads her away from the group.

  "Don't listen to that guy. He and his warrant officer pals are the helicopter pilots in our class I told you about. They're a little rough."

  Sharon glances back at the man. "I still want to know what he meant by dinks."

  Robert hesitates. "It's a derogatory term for the Vietnamese." He pats her arm and returns to the men.

  Sharon's face flares hot. She sinks down on a picnic table bench as Kim walks towards her.

  "Sharon, this is a great idea. I'm so glad you thought of it," Kim says.

  Donna stands behind Kim. "And it was so nice of you to invite the entire class. Not everyone would have."

  Sharon smiles, picturing herself in the dining hall of her sorority house. They'd come downstairs in their pajamas, hair wrapped around jumbo rollers, bunny or puppy slippers on their feet, after taking off the cocktail dresses worn for this final stage of sorority rush. Time to vote on which potential pledges to offer places to in the sorority. Who would be living in their house next year, learning the secret handshake and password, wearing the special jeweled pin?

  Several girls were voted in with minimal discussion. Then they got to Amanda. Not the most attractive potential pledge – Amanda could have a better haircut and her clothes could be more fashionable. On top of this, she came from a small Midwestern town instead of an affluent suburb of Detroit or Chicago.

  Only one blackball vote would keep Amanda out of the sorority. From the way the discussion progressed it looked like she'd get more than one blackball. At that moment Sharon, surprising herself, burst into tears and said: "We shouldn't exclude people just because they are a little different. There's nothing wrong with Amanda except that she's not so attractive!"

  The outburst had been so unexpected – Sharon not known for histrionics – that the naysayers had withdrawn their potential blackballs. Amanda was voted a member of AEPhi.

  "Sharon, thank you so much for the invitation," Wendy says, standing next to Donna. "This is terrific."

  Sharon looks at Wendy. There were no blacks in her sorority. Of course the Jewish sororities were first organized because Jewish girls couldn't join the non-Jewish sororities. Sharon shakes her head at the memory of that terrible first stage of sorority rush at MSU when potential pledges had to visit all the houses on campus. At the Kappa Kappa Gamma – I'm so glad that I am a ... – house Sharon felt as if she had fallen through Alice's rabbit hole into a world populated by blond-haired and blue-eyed giants. She had been as anxious to exit the elegant, two-storied house as they had probably been anxious for her to leave.

  She smiles at Wendy, Kim and Donna. "Let's get the men. It's time for dessert."

  **

  Sharon lies in bed that evening while Robert brushes his teeth. All in all, everyone seemed to have a good time and no one got noticeably drunk.

  Yet for Sharon the barbecue’s light mood was overshadowed by that helicopter pilot’s derogatory term for the Viet Cong. Because regardless of what you called the Viet Cong, their soldiers could kill your husband.

  Sharon fingers the bedspread. She stares around the bleak bedroom.

  After the ROTC protest that day she met Robert, Sharon resolved to better understand why young men would willingly enroll in ROTC. She told herself this was simply an academic interest on her part with no connection to the young man she’d let bleed on her Villager sweater.

  Ten minutes before the end of class Sharon slipped into Wesley Fishel’s classroom. As “State News” feature editor she’d assigned herself a feature piece on Professor Fishel's current views on the Vietnam War. One of the U.S.’s first civilian advisors in Vietnam, Fishel was blamed by some for encouraging the U.S. to become more involved in the ensuing conflict. He’d written books on Vietnam, and of course he’d previously been interviewed by “State News” reporters. Sharon had read those old articles and then convinced herself the paper needed an update from him.

  Sitting in the back, she spotted Robert sitting two rows from the front. Her stomach lurched, her palms perspired. Then she realized it made sense for an ROTC guy to take this course – to hear Fishel explain his beliefs why the war couldn’t be won the way the U.S. was fighting it – the military not being allowed to bomb North Vietnam into submission.

  "That's all for now," Fishel said to the class. "I'll see you on Monday."

  Sharon inched up towards the front of the classroom. Turn around and see me, she thought. Robert did not turn around.

  "Hi, Robert," she said, coming up alongside him.

  He turned around. "Sharon!"

  She pointed at Fishel, talking to another student. "I've come to interview him."

  "He's a fascinating guy."

  "You can read my story in the ‘State News.’"

  He smiled. "Why don'
t you tell me in person? A friend of mine is having a party tomorrow night. I could come by the sorority house at 8."

  She hesitated. Shouldn’t she stop this right now?

  "That'll be great" came out of her mouth as if someone else said it. Before she could snatch back the words Fischel said, "Miss Bloom, I'm ready for our interview."

  "See you tomorrow night," Robert said.

  Fishel waved her to a classroom seat. She took her reporter’s steno notepad and a pen out of her purse.

  "I'm not sure there's anything I can add to my previous interviews," Fishel said. “We’ve screwed this up, probably beyond repair. We’ve gotten ourselves entangled in Vietnamese politics. We don't understand the Communists or what to do to fight them. We don't have the staying power. But we still have the responsibility not to abandon our allies."

  Fishel's familiar responsibility refrain. Sharon's pen dashed across the lined pages of her notebook, capturing his remarks with a combination of handwriting and shorthand symbols.

  "What about our responsibility to the Americans who are dying over there for a war that can't be won?" she asked.

  The professor swiped his arm across his eyes. “It’s always soldiers who die because of inept leadership.”

  The perspiration drips down his face, oozing into his eyes and sliding over his mouth. He swipes at the beads dripping from his nose with the arm of his filthy fatigue shirt. "This heat is unbearable," the armor officer says to the 19-year-old enlisted man quivering beside him inside the tank. "How do the Vietnamese survive?"

  The officer pops the hatch, standing upright in the commander's seat to check the terrain. The enemy hides somewhere nearby.

  The explosion lifts his body up into the air, twisting it around before dumping it on top of the tank, his sweat-stained face turned downward as if searching for the softest place to land.

  The 19-year-old screams.

  DONNA – II – May 25

  Over 100,000 construction workers, longshoremen, and clerical workers in New York City demonstrate in support of Nixon's war policies ... May 20, 1970

  “When your husband returns to civilian life, his military record will be his only recommendation and reference for the past two years.” Mrs. Lieutenant booklet

  Five o'clock. The first bars of a bugle blowing retreat over the loudspeaker system. As required even for civilians, Donna stops her Buick at the side of the road, gets out, and stands at attention. The bugle sounding retreat always bring memories of other posts, of a small girl clinging to her mother's hand, of feeling special, as if she too, for the moments the bugle played, was a real American.

  Donna thinks about her father, an army supply sergeant, and the places they lived throughout the U.S. and in Germany and the Orient. In Korea they lived in an apartment so cold they only took baths once a week. In Germany her father's rank didn’t entitle them to army housing, so they lived "on the economy." They overcame the prejudices of their German neighbors and were greeted on the street in the same formal way Germans greet each other. In the U.S. they lived in small towns and on large bases. At each post she and her family learned to adjust, working hard to be accepted in the enlisted men's community and by their neighbors.

  A tremor shakes Donna. Although her father is now stationed at Ft. Riley, Kansas, her brother, her only brother, is a forward artillery observer in Vietnam. For him it's the price of going to OCS, of becoming an officer. Donna knew, without her brother telling her, that forward observers spend their first six months in Vietnam living in trees, positioned ahead of the rest of the troops, peering into the jungle praying to spot the enemy before the enemy spots them.

  Whenever she thinks about her brother her entire body trembles. She hasn't always felt this way about Vietnam. That was before ...

  This morning she reread her brother's last letter, trying to gauge between the lines his mental state. No clues in the few scribbled words. She felt compelled to write him today even though she could mail him a letter next week that could get to him before the one she mailed today. Writing was almost like saying Hail Marys when she was a child. If she just wrote enough, if she just believed enough, her prayers would be answered.

  Retreat ends. The sudden silence causes Donna to look around herself, the wooden buildings of Ft. Knox pulling her back to the present. She gets back in the car and drives the few remaining yards to where she will pick up Jerry.

  Because she doesn't carpool with anyone the way Kim and Sharon do, if she wants the car for the day she has to drive Jerry both ways. In the morning she doesn't always have time to dress and she'll wear a robe just to drive. This doesn't seem to bother Jerry although she's gotten looks from some of the other men as she’s pulled up to drop off Jerry.

  Now she parks her car and waits.

  Last night Donna lay next to Jerry after they had sex. "Did you have a good time?" she asked.

  "Yes." He leaned over to bite her shoulder, then put his arm around her and drew her closer. Within seconds he fell asleep.

  Donna watched his chest rise and fall, his blond hair almost invisible against his pale skin. A strand of her dark hair fell across her eyes and she brushed it away. How unlikely that the two of them had married.

  Jerry's parents hadn't been overjoyed when he brought her home to St. Louis to meet them. They expected an all-American wife for their all-American son. Instead they got a Puerto Rican and a ...

  Donna pushed the thought out of her mind. Instead she pictured Jerry's father displaying Jerry's high school tennis trophies. She had to laugh. Tennis was not high on the required skills list for the daughter of an enlisted man – bowling at the PX alleys more her speed. She'd been suitably impressed.

  His mother took her up to the attic to show off Jerry's school papers. In a corner of the attic stood a small filing cabinet along with a bookcase of photo albums.

  In the filing cabinet the elementary, junior high and high school report cards had a special file of their own. "See all the As and Bs Jerry got," his mother said. "And all the teacher comments are so wonderful. We didn't reward him with a $1 for each A – not like some parents did. He did well just for himself." And for you, too, Donna thought.

  Donna flipped through the other files, one for each school year. At the file marked "School Year 1965-66" she stopped and pulled it out of the file drawer. Jerry had once told her about a paper he did senior year of high school. She wanted to see it for herself.

  And here it was: "The Future for Diverse Ethnic Groups in the United States by Jerry Lautenberg." While his mother watched, Donna skimmed the paper. She already knew it offered an optimistic thesis, fueled by Jerry's belief that the civil rights movement began a nationwide acceptance of people different from the white majority. Although Jerry still believed in his premise first proposed four and a half years ago, Donna thought this envisioned utopia seemed unlikely to be achieved in the near future.

  "Come on, dear," his mother said, rustling at her side. "I have some other things I want to show you." Donna put the file back as his mother lifted the first photo album off the shelf.

  "These are Jerry's own souvenir albums. The family albums – with the good photos – are downstairs; you've already seen those. These are the ones Jerry made of his souvenirs from trips and other things he did. He even saved the stubs from all the movies he saw and labeled each movie."

  Now Donna watches the first few men of the AOB class exit their classroom building. Jerry isn’t among this first group.

  Donna thinks about how, when Jerry asked Donna to marry him, she hadn't considered saying no because of his ROTC commitment. "It's this way or be drafted as an enlisted man," he told her. "I'd rather be giving orders than receiving them."

  Whenever Donna thinks of her fear – the fear that Jerry will ... – she distracts herself by thinking of what they did the night before, what they will do tonight, and tomorrow night – together.

  The entertainment committee is a welcome activity, a good excuse to get out. In her apartment b
uilding there's nothing to do and no one to talk to. Elderly couples occupy the other units in the building. At night they probably put glasses up to their adjoining walls to listen to what she and Jerry are up to. One old woman always passes her on the stairs with a penetrating stare.

  Jerry tells her to ignore the other occupants, to enjoy herself. After their weeks here they'll move on to Ft. Holabird. In Baltimore they can take advantage of the big city, get a little culture. Here she should just soak up the sun, work on her tan. "I'm already dark enough," she tells him. He laughs and kisses her. "I like women with swimsuit marks. It's sexy."

  Donna laughs at the thought as Jerry walks towards the car, his smile for her lighting up his face. He could have had his pick of apple-pie American girls. Instead he chose her! She prays that Jerry won't have to serve in Vietnam. Hasn't her family done enough?

  **

  The next day Donna dumps the potato chips into a black lacquer bowl and sets the bowl on the imitation wood coffee table. She volunteered to host the meeting of the entertainment committee today – Sharon asked if they wanted to take turns having the meetings.

  Donna would like to serve a Puerto Rican favorite, fried green bananas, but she can't get the right bananas around here. She'll have to wait until her mother comes to visit her and brings the bananas. Then she can show these women a true Puerto Rican treat.

  Glancing around the living room, Donna thinks that the apartment isn't so bad. The few personal items they brought with them make it seem cozier.

  Her eyes land on the black lacquer bowl. She looks away. She told Jerry it comes from when her family lived in the Orient. This isn't the truth. And even though the truth is painful, she can't bring herself to give the bowl away or even not use it.

  The doorbell rings. Wendy stands outside.

  "Hi," Wendy says, holding up a slim booklet. "I brought my copy of ‘Mrs. Lieutenant’ like Sharon asked us."