“Excuse me?” Mother’s face went from pale to red within seconds. “You want to do what?”
Daddy released her shoulders, and she walked toward me like she might just get a switch and wear me out. “Journalism,” I said, my voice growing smaller. “I want to—”
“What on earth would make you want to study that?” she demanded.
I looked to Daddy for help, but he almost looked amused. “Mother, I know you don’t like reporters, but I wouldn’t be like them.”
“Like what? Dishonest? Writing lies and distortions just to grab headlines and get attention? Destroying the reputations of innocent people?”
“Not all journalists are like that,” I said. “I want to write about real events. I want to explore all the changes going on in the world. We’re living in a time in history like no other, and I want to be a part of it.”
Mother threw her hands up and stormed out of the kitchen. I looked at Daddy, my eyes stinging for a second before I got them under control. He let out a deep sigh and rubbed the back of his neck, before following Mother into the living room.
I couldn’t decide if I should give them a few minutes or go in there and reason with them. Daddy was right when he’d said I didn’t need their permission, but it sure didn’t feel that way. Maybe I didn’t need their permission, but I still didn’t want to disappoint them.
I closed my eyes and did what they’d both taught me to do in situations like this. I prayed.
Lord, please give me wisdom and courage to speak with them. I want to honor them, but I have to make my own path too. Even if they don’t like it. Please help me talk to them. Help me to honor You and them on this new journey.
I walked into the living room and found Mother standing by the window looking out toward the water. Her arms were folded across her stomach, and her brow furrowed with worry. Daddy sat on the edge of his recliner, his elbows resting on his knees, his hands folded together. I hated making them upset. Maybe I should just forget the whole thing.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“You don’t have anything to be sorry for,” Mother said without turning around. “You did an assignment, and you followed where it led you. You never know why God leads you down certain paths. But I hope you’ve prayed over this new direction for your life.”
“I have,” I said.
Mother closed her eyes and shook her head slightly. Then she turned to Daddy. “All right, then. I think she should come with us next month.”
Daddy looked up at her like she’d just grown another head. “Come with us? Why, I haven’t even decided if I’m going yet.”
“We should go. And we should take Hope and Henry with us.”
“Go where?” I asked.
“The Philippines,” Mother said, her voice low, almost respectful. “Your father and I have been invited to attend a ceremony by the Philippine government. He’s being honored along with some others who served with him.”
“I don’t think I should go,” Daddy said. “You know what will happen.”
“It happens anyway, every year around the same time. The dreams will come anyway. We should go.” Daddy shook his head, but Mother ignored it. “We’ll call Homer. I’m sure he would love to come too, and he can talk to Hope about her new career choice.”
“Homer?” I asked. “You don’t mean…Homer Freeman. You know him?” Mother ignored me.
“Ruby,” Daddy said quietly. “I can’t.”
She stepped over and knelt in front of him, taking his hands in hers. “Matthew, it’s been nineteen years. It’s time to bring him home.”
***
July 5, 1964
Nichols Field, Manila, Philippines
For four days in July of 1964, I watched my parents in awe, as if I’d never truly known them before now. The ceremony at Nichols Field near Manila on July 5 was only the beginning of the drawing back of a curtain I’d never known was present in my own life. Before it began, Daddy shook one hand after another, slapped countless backs, and received so much adoration I couldn’t help but be proud to stand near him.
He introduced me to a short, dark-skinned man named Raul Diego, who Daddy said kept him alive at least three hundred separate times. He laughed when he said it, but there was also something about the way he looked at Diego that told me it might not have been much of an exaggeration.
There was a big parade, and the Philippine Secretary of Defense personally pinned eight different medals on Daddy that day. I stood beside Mother and Henry as they called out the medals one by one—the Distinguished Conduct Star, the Distinguished Service Star, the Gold Cross, the Wounded Personnel Medal, the Philippine Legion of Honor, the Sagisag Ng Kagitingan, the Philippine Defense Medal, and the Philippine Liberation Medal with Bronze Service Star.
Mother shone with adoration for Daddy, standing tall with an occasional tear on her cheek. Henry, for once in his life, treated the whole thing with reverence and awe. He asked Daddy to explain almost everything, from the meaning of his medals to the rank structure of the guerrillas he’d commanded. I hadn’t realized until recently how much the military interested Henry, or how much concern that seemed to cause Daddy. He colored every explanation with warnings about the true nature of war, about the horrors of what happens to a man who has to kill someone. But this didn’t seem to deter Henry one little bit.
I could relate to how Henry felt. Mother insisted that I speak with Mr. Freeman about his experiences, and I could tell by his response that she’d prepared him for the conversation. He did his duty, sharing stories of bombs exploding, people dying, and the terror of being shot at. But when Mother wasn’t around, I pressed him for the truth.
“Hope, I care deeply for your parents,” he said when we were back at the hotel in Manila. I’d asked him to meet me in the restaurant while Mother and Daddy rested from the day’s activities. “I don’t wish to undermine them in any way.”
“I’m not asking you to undermine them,” I said. “I just want to know what you really thought of being a war journalist. I mean, you were there, right in the middle of everything. If you had it to do all over again, would you change anything?”
He took a sip of his whiskey and pressed his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “All right then. Honestly…no. I wouldn’t change anything. For me, traveling to all the places I’ve been, writing about the human experience in different places and different times, has made me the man I am today. In knowing the people around the world better, I’ve known myself better. And I’ve helped others to see outside their own little bubbles, to see parts of the world they would otherwise never know about. I love doing it. I can’t imagine doing anything else.” He paused and took another drink. “But if you tell your mother I said any of that, I will deny it until the day I die.”
***
The next couple of days of our visit were difficult on so many levels, both physically and emotionally. Along with Diego and Mr. Freeman, we were accompanied by officials from the Department of Defense and a team of scouts to travel northwest in search of my uncle Henry’s grave site. We first took a small private plane to Tarlac City, and from there loaded onto trucks to drive northwest for hours into the mountains. I tried to keep a basic understanding of where we were according to the map Mr. Freeman shared with me, but it was useless. All I knew was we were slogging through jungle.
When the trucks finally came to a stop, I thought we’d reached our destination. But we were only bedding down for the night in a tiny village Daddy called a barrio. We were tucked into various huts with total strangers, sleeping on cots with legs inside of tin cans filled with water. Mother said this would keep the ants from crawling on me while I slept.
“Is this what it was like when you were here before?” I asked her as we sat on our cots facing each other.
She pulled her long brown hair around her shoulder and began braiding it for the night. “No, dear. It was much worse than this. We were starving. Bombs were going off every day all around us. We were surrounde
d by sick and injured men. We were sick ourselves most of the time.” She looked around the hut. “This would’ve been heaven on earth to us at the time.”
After she made sure I was fairly comfortable, she stole out of the hut where we were to sleep. I figured she went looking for Daddy. My curiosity got the better of me, so I peeked out to try and find them. When I didn’t see her anywhere, I debated on whether I should just return to my cot or look around for a few minutes. The screeches and chirps of the jungle around me convinced me not to go far. I stepped out of the hut and walked along a path that I knew led to the center of the barrio.
Off to one side, I saw them sitting together by a fire. Nothing extraordinary was going on. They just sat next to each other on a large log, Mother’s head tilted over onto Daddy’s shoulder. She ran her hand over his back, stroking up and down. I felt like I was trespassing, so I went back to my cot.
The next morning we hiked further into the jungle. Daddy and Diego led the way, pointing and conversing in Spanish and English. Henry stayed by my side, helping me climb over rocks and push through heavy palm leaves. At one point he leaned over and said quietly, “Did you know Dad could speak Spanish?”
“No,” I said. “But I’m realizing there are a lot of things about Daddy and Mother I didn’t know.”
“Me too,” he said. “Did you see the way he moves through the jungle? Like a cat or something. Did you know about all this already?”
“About what?”
“This. His time fighting as a guerrilla with Uncle Henry. He never told me a single thing about it.”
“No, he never told me,” I said, glad I was able to answer honestly without explaining everything I did know.
After several hours of toil through the jungle, our procession stopped. Daddy and Diego walked in a small circle, pointing at trees and muttering to each other. I came up beside Mother and took her hand.
“You doing okay?” I asked.
She squeezed my hand and nodded her head.
“You think Daddy is okay?”
“He’s as well as he can be. This will be a difficult day for him. He loved your Uncle Henry like a brother. They were very close. Losing him was one of the toughest things your father ever faced.”
“What was Uncle Henry like?” I asked, noticing my brother had come up on the other side of Mother.
She slipped her arm around his back and laid her head on his shoulder. “Much like your brother, actually. He was fun-loving, a great athlete, loved to play pranks, and he kept me laughing through some very difficult days. I’ve missed him every day of my life since we were separated.”
After some bustle near one of the thickest palm trees, Daddy stepped out from the group and looked over at Mother. “Ruby, you want to come over here?”
She let go of us and walked over to Daddy. Henry and I trailed behind, not wanting to intrude. The group of men stepped back from the tree, where they’d worked to clear some of the overgrowth. A long mound of rocks lay beside the tree with a makeshift cross at the head. Vines had overgrown the cross, and it was nearly tilted over.
Mother let out a deep sigh and held a handkerchief to her nose. Daddy wrapped an arm around her, his own face showing signs of struggle to hide his emotions. Then Mother knelt beside the grave, her hand resting on top of the rocks.
“I know this wasn’t your final destination, and that you aren’t even here anymore. I just want you to know that we still think of you every day, and that you were loved beyond measure.” She stood and took Daddy’s hand as he came alongside her. “So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?”
Daddy cleared his throat, and when he spoke, his voice strained with emotion. “Lord, we come here today to honor our fallen brother, Lieutenant Henry Graves. He was brave and true to the end. He made us laugh, and he gave us strength. Thank you for allowing us to find him and bring his earthly remains back home with us. We know this earth is not really our home, and that Henry is rejoicing along with the saints of old. We thank you for preserving us, and we wait with hope for the day we can all be together in Your kingdom. Amen.”
Mother and Daddy turned away as several men stepped in to begin the excavation. Daddy reached out for Henry, and Mother put her arm around me. We held onto each other in that sacred place, together and whole. Daddy finally released just a fraction of his sorrow with a short sob. He pulled Henry even closer. “Do you understand how much I love you, son?”
Henry nodded his head. “I do, Dad.”
“I only want you to live a life that honors God and the gifts He’s given you. If that means serving your country like I did, like your Uncle Henry did, then so be it. I’ll make peace with that somehow. Just…please, pray over it. Be as sure as you can be. And serve God with your whole heart. Surrender to Him completely. It’s the only way to truly find peace.”
“I will, Dad.”
Daddy looked over at me, his eyes damp. “That goes for you too, little bunny.”
I managed a small smile, and squeezed in tighter with Mother. I even put my arm around Henry to complete our circle.
“Listen, both of you,” Mother said. “Remember the things your father and I have taught you. Fear and doubt and loneliness…they’ll all come at some point. But remember the verses we’ve taught you. Remember the lessons you’ve learned at church, from your teachers, from us, about who God is, and who you are as His child. He says in Isaiah 41, ‘For I the Lord thy God will hold thy right hand, saying unto thee, Fear not; I will help thee.’ Remember that always. Your salvation is secure. Nothing on heaven or earth can separate you from your heavenly Father’s love. Nor ours.”
***
On our last day in the Philippines, the four of us went out on our own with Diego. We left Manila carrying two shovels and a short curved sword Diego called a bolo, and took a boat across the bay toward the Bataan peninsula. Mother told us all about her trip across the bay just after Christmas in 1941. Our boat landed only a kilometer west of where that boat had been when Japanese planes bore down on them. Mother had dove to safety, leaving her suitcase exposed on the beach.
“When I finally recovered it,” she said as the wind whipped strands of hair across her face, “there was a bullet hole in the corner, and the gun your father had given me was destroyed. But your grandfather’s Bible was untouched.”
Henry shook his head in amazement. “Why have I never heard these stories?”
“They may seem like amazing experiences now,” Daddy said, “but they were terrifying at the time. We don’t remember them as adventures, son. We remember our friends who died. We remember how hungry and exhausted we were, and how close we came to death. We don’t relive those days willingly.”
We climbed out of the boat and caught a ride on a truck that was heading west. Daddy and Diego sat in the front, telling the driver what to look for. Mother sat in the back with Henry and me.
“Where are we going?” I asked for the tenth time that day.
“Probably nowhere,” Mother said.
I couldn’t understand why she and Daddy wouldn’t just tell us, but I decided to stop asking. After only a few kilometers, the truck slowed down. I saw Daddy pointing at a marker on the side of the road. We drove past it a little ways, and then the truck turned off into a dense section of jungle.
“Mother,” I said, with a bit of alarm. “This isn’t a road!”
“I know,” she said. “Hold on to something. It could get bumpy.”
We bounced along in the truck a while longer, finally coming to a stop in what looked like the middle of nowhere. There was no town, no barrio, no road. Just palm trees, and dense vegetation.
Daddy got out of the truck and helped Mother climb out of the back. I hopped over the tailgate after Henry, and we both looked around, bewildered.
“You think t
his is it?” Mother asked.
“As best I can tell,” Daddy said. “It doesn’t exactly look the same.”
Daddy thanked the driver and got the shovels out of the back of the truck. He handed one to Diego and they began walking further into the jungle with Diego leading the charge with his slashing bolo.
I threw my hands up and followed. “Mother, what is going on?” I asked again.
She sighed and continued picking her way through the leaves and vines. “We’re trying to find the site of the hospital where I was a nurse.”
“Why?”
She shrugged. “We figured we’d take a chance that it was still here.”
I couldn’t understand why it was so important, or why we were bringing shovels. But I decided it could be interesting, and if I was going to be a journalist, I needed to follow challenging roads to find worthwhile stories.
After turning around a couple of times, arguing over the location of the dental clinic—“Ruby, I helped build it, I think I know where it is!”—and uncovering a few rusted pieces of shrapnel, Daddy and Mother finally agreed that they had found it.
“Found what?” I asked. “I don’t see anything but jungle.”
Diego kept on slashing away at vines. “Here you are,” he said.
I walked over to the area he’d just cleared. There were bamboo bed frames completely overgrown with vines. Mother walked around the area in a circle. “It’s just so overgrown,” she said. “I don’t think I can work out where it would be.”
Daddy walked several yards away from her. “I think this would have been the front of the ward. Henry and I came up from that direction…maybe.” He pointed behind him. “I think your tent was about over…there.” He walked another several yards away.
“This is silly,” Mother said. “We’re never going to find it.”
“Can’t hurt to try,” Daddy said, thrusting a shovel into the ground.
Diego took his bolo and started cutting away at the growth near Daddy. He called Henry over and handed him the other shovel. So Henry and Daddy dug several holes in an area about ten feet by ten feet.
Abiding Hope: A Novel: Healing Ruby Book 4 Page 42