Mrs. Lieutenant: A Sharon Gold Novel

by Phyllis Zimbler Miller

  Robert’s expression doesn’t change.

  "Jerry never said a thing."

  He wouldn't have. Admitting you are the second husband at the age of 22 probably isn't something a man would relish.

  Sharon looks at Robert. He's eating as if all she's said is "please pass the milk."

  "Kim and Wendy don't know. Donna only told me and I didn't tell them."

  "I won't say anything."

  "That's not the point." She hesitates. "Apparently it entitles him to an exemption from Vietnam."

  "Is he going to use it?"

  "Donna told me the moment she found out he was eligible. He didn't even know at that point."

  Robert gestures with his sandwich. "I'll bet he isn't going to use it. He's pretty patriotic. There's another guy who's going to use the sole surviving son exemption – the sole support for his parents' old age. Jerry doesn't think much of the guy. Ol' Jerry is pretty gung ho on doing his duty."

  Duty. Robert's friend Kenneth did "his duty," Donna's first husband did "his duty." And what did it get them?

  Death.

  **

  "Are you sure you really want to go to this?" Robert asks her two days later on Sunday as he heads the Fiat out of the apartment parking lot. "We don't really know anyone."

  For response Sharon clutches the grocery bag on her lap filled with three different kinds of chips. True, she isn't enthusiastic about this picnic sponsored by the Jewish Wives Club. She has already learned at Judy Weinstein's house that she doesn't have much in common with these women. Yet the picnic is something to do, a distraction from her concerns.

  A "Whiter Shade of Pale" sung by Procul Harum fills the Fiat. Waves of heat press down on Sharon as they drive past trees whose leaves look desperate for a cool drink. Even the heat here is different – the humidity worse than in Chicago.

  The concept of being different keeps recurring to her. Growing up, she lived in an area with a large number of Jews. She was part of an imagined, if not actual, majority. She attended Jewish summer camps, took after-school classes in ballet, swimming, and tennis with other Jewish kids, and, after a bumpy start at college, belonged to a Jewish sorority and socialized with the college newspaper's editorial staff, a large percentage of whom were Jews.

  Until the first day of college, when she met her assigned roommates, only one other time in her life she could remember feeling like an outsider – the summer when she'd been 12 and hurt herself in a bike race with Howard. She'd run into a tree, so intent had she been on winning, and cut her left knee wide open. The cautious orthopedic surgeon decreed: "You'll have to be on crutches for a week. We want to ensure that nothing more serious develops."

  Unfortunately, that week Sharon and her family had reservations at Fidelman’s resort in Michigan. She spent the entire vacation on crutches – no swimming – although she participated as fully as possible in other resort activities.

  One afternoon she signed up to go horseback riding, a perfect activity she figured since she'd be seated. The mother of some other children saw Sharon preparing to go. The woman came over to Sharon and said, "How can you go riding? You're a cripple, honey."

  Rage coursed through her body. Rage at being made to feel diminished, less than other humans. On top of it the woman was wrong. That afternoon Sharon rode as well as any other novice.

  "Here we are," Robert says as he swings off the highway. Although there are “No Parking” signs along the edge of the grass, all the other cars have parked there. Robert pulls alongside. "These guys must know something we don't," he says.

  Sharon and Robert walk across the ground towards the men and women. Children play with balls nearby. All the women at the meeting at Judy's are here – obviously Nancy hasn't had her baby yet, plus a couple others. The men, of course, she has never seen.

  "We just started cooking the hamburgers," Elaine says by way of greeting, then she introduces Sharon and Robert to the others.

  Sharon can't remember all the new names. She does catch that the dark-haired man supervising the hamburgers is Judy Weinstein's husband Fred.

  A muscular man in shorts and a plaid shirt asks Robert what he's doing at Ft. Knox.

  "Armor Officers Basic school."

  "How'd you do that?"

  "ROTC."

  The man shakes his head. "Why join ROTC?"

  Before Robert can reply Fred asks, "How could you sanction this war by voluntarily joining the army?"

  Sharon's palms tingle as Fred doesn't give Robert a chance to answer. "It's one thing for us to take the army's money,” Fred continues, “so we could afford to go to med school – and hell, these people deserve good medical care too – but to volunteer to be part of the war machinery!"

  Robert fixes his eyes on Fred. "All Americans have a duty to serve their country," Robert says, his hands hanging straight at his side, “regardless of whether the country is engaged in a 'righteous cause.' How many Americans weren't in favor of going to war against Hitler? They still served."

  "Hey, guys!" someone shouts from behind them.

  They all turn towards another man in shorts standing in front of the parked cars. An MP stands next to the Fiat writing something.

  Robert leads the way across the grass. As they all reach the car, the man who shouted asks the MP, "Why are you only writing up the Fiat and not any of the other cars?"

  "The rest of the cars have officer tags, sir," the MP says.

  Fred steps forward. "This car also belongs to an officer." He gestures at Robert. "It just doesn't have officer tags because he's a student here, not yet permanently stationed."

  The MP turns to Robert. "May I see your ID, sir?"

  Robert fishes his wallet out of his back pocket and extracts his official army ID card.

  "Sorry, sir," the MP says. "Please obey the 'No Parking' signs in the future."

  Fred waves a hand in the departing MP's direction. "He was going to give an enlisted man a ticket but not an officer for parking in a 'No Parking' zone. What a place!"

  Sharon passes her hand across her perspiring forehead, the heat pressing in on her.

  Rank may have its privileges but rank won’t save Robert from being killed in Vietnam. Before the branch transfer to military intelligence came through, Robert had the shortest life expectancy in Vietnam – as a second lieutenant in infantry.

  **

  The next night Robert hands Sharon a drink as he joins her at an Officers Club table occupied by some of the AOB class members and their wives.

  "Hey, Gold!" someone from the other end of the table yells. "Let's drink to long life!" The man holds up his beer glass.

  "I'll drink to that," Robert shouts back.

  "You should,” the man says. “You came awfully close to buying it today!"

  Sharon's heart flutters. "Robert," she says, tugging on his arm to get his attention. "What's buying it mean?"

  "Nothing."

  On her other side a man who looks familiar says, "He was damn lucky today on the firing range. Some idiot pointed in the wrong direction and missed your husband by inches."

  "It's not real ammunition, is it?"

  "What else would we use?" the second man says. His laughter almost muffles his words. "That's why Gold almost 'bought the farm' – a little piece of earth!"

  Robert was almost killed today!

  "Lay off, Geist," Robert says to the man.

  Geist again!

  Robert then turns to Sharon. "Accidents like this happen in shooting practice."

  Geist's face twists into a sneer. "Good thing it wasn't a fragging. Then you probably would have 'bought it'."

  She's drowning but she has to know. "What's a fragging?"

  "Hey, guys, little lady here wants to know what a fragging is!" Geist yells up the table.

  "Come on, Sharon, let's dance." Robert pulls her to her feet.

  Geist takes hold of her other arm. "It's a slang term – officers getting killed by their own men – on purpose."

  She collaps
es back into her chair. "I don’t understand."

  Now Robert faces her. "Fragging is when an enlisted man purposely kills his officer – usually by tossing a grenade at him."

  "Happens a lot in Vietnam," Geist says.

  The bile rises in her throat. She staggers up out of the chair and rushes from the room. She stumbles out the front door of the club and slams her right foot against the curb. The stabs of pain slow her down.

  Robert catches up to her. "Sharon!"

  She collapses onto the ground and fights to catch her breath.

  "Robert, it's horrible enough to be killed by a heartless enemy. To be killed by your own men – on purpose!"

  He crouches beside her. "It doesn't happen that much. Reports are highly exaggerated. Geist should have kept his mouth shut."

  "Why do they kill their officers?"

  Robert offers her his hand to pull her up. She doesn’t take it.

  "The men are drafted. They don't want to fight in a war that makes no sense to them. There's lots of drugs. They hate their officers who risk getting them killed. So they get rid of their officers. The next ones may be better."

  Her knees shake. She can barely stand. She wraps her arms around her chest. "I want to go home."

  "I'll drive you back now."

  "Home to Chicago."

  Robert puts his own arms around her, then shakes his head.

  "You're an officer's wife now – for better or worse."

  The tears drip down her nose.

  DONNA – IV – June 18

  Senate approves, 82-11, the preamble to proposed legislative curb to the president's war-making powers in Cambodia ... May 26, 1970

  “To repay an elaborate dinner with a hamburger cookout, minus apologies, is quite appropriate and your thoughtfulness will be appreciated.” Mrs. Lieutenant booklet `

  Donna staggers through the door of Wendy’s trailer. "Where's the bathroom?"

  Wendy points and Donna runs. She heaves into the toilet.

  When she emerges, water drops clinging to her face, Wendy asks, "What's wrong? Are you sick?"

  Donna sinks onto the couch. "It must be something I ate."

  Wendy sits next to her and studies Donna’s face. "How long has this been going on?" Wendy asks.

  "A couple of weeks."

  "A couple of weeks! You need to see a doctor. Promise me you'll go to the clinic tomorrow morning."

  Donna nods. "I'll go. I'm awfully tired of feeling so sick."

  There's a knock at the door. "It must be Kim and Sharon," Wendy says.

  "Please don't say anything to them," Donna says.

  **

  The next morning Donna drops Jerry off without telling him where she's going. She's been assuring him for days that she's fine, just indigestion. She isn't about to let him know it could be something more.

  At the post clinic there's already a line this early in the morning. She stands behind a young black woman holding the hand of a little boy in a white t-shirt and blue shorts.

  A medicinal odor floats towards the line. Donna gags. What is the matter with her?

  Ahead of her the boy whimpers. The woman gives him a piece of bread, then turns to Donna. "He’s hungry again. We left Louisville real early this morning to get here."

  "Why do you live all the way in Louisville?" Donna asks. "Don't you live in housing around here?"

  "Louisville is the closest we could afford,” the woman says. “We just come here for the free medical care."

  The stab of nausea isn't from whatever is causing Donna to stand in this line. This woman's husband must be an enlisted man in Vietnam. That's why she doesn't live on the post or right near it.

  "Is your ... is your husband ..."

  "Dead. Killed in Vietnam when I was eight months pregnant with him." The woman points to the little boy.

  Donna steps off the high dive and falls, falls towards the water below.

  "I went berserk, out of my mind,” the woman says. “When the baby came I didn't know what I'd do." The woman glances at the boy. "Then I had to take care of him, feed him, change him. I had to get in control. And most days I'm okay ..."

  The boy tugs on his mother’s hand. “Mama, more bread.”

  Donna sinks onto the floor.

  **

  Donna opens her eyes. A man in a white coat leans over her. She’s lying on an examining table, her skirt bunched around her waist. His hands move over her body.

  "You're going to be fine, Mrs. Lautenberg," the doctor says, writing on a piece of paper. "You just fainted. Which is nothing unusual for someone in your condition. You're pregnant. No reason you shouldn't have a normal pregnancy and delivery."

  Pregnant! What will Jerry say? He knows how much she wants a child. He'll think she did this on purpose.

  "How can that be? I've been using a diaphragm every time. Checking carefully to make sure it's positioned correctly."

  The doctor looks up. "Diaphragms get holes, the rubber gets old and cracks. You lose weight and it doesn't fit anymore. There are numerous ways."

  **

  A few hours later Donna sits in the car waiting to pick up Jerry after class for the day is over. She’s trying to decide how best to tell him about the baby. For distraction she rereads the letter received today from her brother in Vietnam. It has been written three weeks before.

  The short letter in English says: "Thanks so much for your letters. I got six from you all at once. I'm back at a base for supplies. Tonight I had a hot meal for the first time in weeks. Say hello to Jerry for me."

  Donna refolds the letter. Maybe her brother is lucky that he doesn't have a wife at home waiting for his safe return. Or a baby who might never know him.

  What if Jerry never knows his child? What if she becomes like the woman in line at the clinic? Going through the motions with her child but not really there.

  At least that woman has something of her husband. There’s nothing of Miguel.

  Donna pats her still flat stomach. There will be something of Jerry.

  She'll tell him tonight.

  What she can't answer even though she's been thinking about it for hours is this: When she fainted this morning at the clinic, was it because of the pregnancy? Or was it the memory of the third telegram triggered by what the woman in line said? The first morning in the apartment here she had fainted when the Western Union man delivered that telegram by mistake. She was probably already pregnant then.

  Telegrams and hospitals jostle in her mind.

  Miguel lived three days – or almost three days. She can't be sure all three telegrams reached her in the same amount of time. So the army’s medical personnel must have helped him. They must have thought he could be saved.

  She knows what the word triage means. Heard her father explaining it one night to her mother after Miguel died when her parents thought she was asleep. "The medical personnel in Vietnam practice triage – giving priority to those who have the best chance for survival," he said in Spanish.

  She had crept closer to the open kitchen door.

  "When an evacuation helicopter sets down at a field hospital, the medics run with their litters. A doctor or a nurse or even an orderly has seconds to make these decisions."

  Hidden by the kitchen door she was enraged by the unfairness! Each of those soldiers had been fighting for his country; they all deserved an equal chance!

  Her mother asked the question on Donna’s mind. "Why must they decide such things? Can't they try to help everyone?"

  "There's not enough medical personnel when so many wounded come in at the same time," her father said. "Someone has to decide."

  She bit her lips to keep from screaming as her father continued: "I'll tell you what an army nurse told me. For the hopelessly wounded all they can do is hold the soldier's hand so he doesn't die alone. Sometimes they don't have enough personnel to do that."

  Donna crashed onto the floor with a shriek that brought her parents rushing from the kitchen and the other children from their
bedrooms. Led back to bed, she prayed, prayed that Miguel hadn't died alone.

  Please may someone have held his hand, told him it was going to be all right. Even though it wasn't. Even though it never would be.

  Now the moment of truth has come – she’ll tell Jerry about the baby as soon as he finishes brushing his teeth.

  "I’m coming," Jerry calls from the bathroom.

  Moments later Jerry asks "How do you feel?" as he slides into bed.

  It's the same question he asked after the first time they made love, the night they got back from their trip to St. Louis. She didn't ask if he meant was it "as good" as with Miguel. All she said then was "wonderful."

  Now she feels wonderful too. If only Jerry can understand.

  "I went to the clinic today."

  "What did the doctor say?" Jerry strokes her breasts.

  "He said ... he said I'm pregnant."

  "What?" Jerry's hands stop.

  "He said we're expecting a baby."

  Jerry sits upright in bed. "How can that be?" He looks at her with eyes that say betrayed. "Didn't you use your diaphragm?"

  She sits up too. Nausea stabs her. Is the baby reacting to Jerry's response? Or is it her own anxiety?

  "The doctor says it can happen. There's a tiny hole, or the rubber cracks, or something."

  Anger sweeps through her. He's the one who doesn't want to use the Vietnam exemption. He should realize what this baby means to her. That no matter what happens, there'll be something of him to love.

  "Jerry," she says, taking his hands in both of hers. "I've never talked to you about Miguel after the first time I told you about him – I wanted only to talk about us." His hands tighten in hers. "And I don't really want to talk about him now." The hands don't relax. "I didn't try to get pregnant – you must believe me. Yet I'm so happy to be having your child."

  "Darling," he says, releasing his hands and gathering her in his arms.

  She says into his shoulder, "I won't try to make you use the exemption. I just want this baby! I want a part of you so that ... if anything ..." Tears choke her voice.

  Jerry lays her back down on the bed and kisses her.