“Kate says she’ll teach me to drive after Jay gets home. She thinks she’ll have more time then.”
“She quitting at the paper?” Graham sounded surprised.
“Sort of. Two of the men who worked there are due back from the Army. Kate’s pretty sure they’ll give her job to one of them. She’s hoping to work until Christmas.”
Christmas. Tori hoped she could dig up some Christmas spirit for Samantha this year. Last year every bit of her joy had been smothered from knowing Sammy would never be with her at Christmas again.
“She won’t like giving up that camera, but it’ll be good to have her back home in Rosey Corner.”
“It won’t be the same.” She glanced over at him almost as if hoping he’d tell her she was wrong.
But he didn’t. “Nothing ever is. Just look at you, still a kid to me but with a baby of your own.” Graham smiled over at Samantha. “Things do have a way of changing.”
“Everything’s changed for me.” Tori fastened her eyes on her cork again. “With Sammy gone.”
“That’s one of those hard changes. Sammy gone.” He reached over and gave her arm a little pat.
“Now you’re going to tell me life goes on.” She couldn’t keep a hint of irritation out of her voice. She’d heard that over and over in the last year.
“Nope, those words weren’t in my head at all.” He moved his hand from her arm to Chaucer’s head. The dog’s tail thumped against the ground. “But it does. The sun keeps coming up. The little ones keep growing and us old folks get older.”
“You’re not that old.”
“Not that young either.” Graham blew out a breath. “But I don’t have any happiness problem. Here with the sun on my shoulders, two pretty girls for company, and an old dog at my feet. Ahh, I know a happy moment when I feel one.” He looked over at her. “Happy will come visit you again too. Sammy would want that for you.”
“I know.” That was another thing people kept telling her. Sammy wouldn’t want you crying all the time. Even Sammy’s mother told her that.
A breeze lifted her line and she reeled it in a bit. When Graham stayed silent, she glanced over to see if he’d dozed off like Samantha, but he was staring up at the red oak leaves above their heads.
“The leaves will all be gone soon,” she said.
“Till next year. That’s the way of nature. To everything there is a season.”
“Ecclesiastes.”
“Yep. The words of the preacher, the son of David,” Graham said.
“I’d just as soon skip over winter.” Tori looked back out at the water.
“But the ground gets thirsty for the snow. Besides, little Samantha will be big enough to like snow this year. You can teach her to make snow angels.” He smiled over at Tori and then looked back up at the tree.
“If I don’t, Lorena will. I’d better get Mama to order her some boots.”
“I was up at the store awhile ago. That Clay Weber stopped by.” Graham kept his eyes on the tree. “He asked after you. Seemed sorry you weren’t there to wait on him.”
“Sammy and Clay were friends.” Relief whispered through her that she hadn’t had to find a way to say no to whatever Clay would have asked her to do.
“The boy had a right hard time after his daddy died.”
“He didn’t have to go the Army.”
Graham switched his gaze from the tree to Tori. “That wasn’t his choice. He got in line with the other boys.”
“I know.” Tori stared out at the pond until the water shimmered. Sammy used to tell her if they stared like that long enough, they might see a fish jump out of the water and stick its tongue out at them. She kept her eyes on the pond. “Do fish have tongues?”
“I reckon they have fish tongues, but nothing to compare with us or Chaucer here. Never had one lick me or give me the raspberry.” Graham threw away his grass stem and sat up straight. “Hook that one nibbling on your bait and we’ll see.”
The little fish, barely big as her hand, had something that passed for a tongue, but nothing it could ever stick out at her. She worked the barb out of its mouth and let it slide back into the pond where it flashed toward the deeper water. She wouldn’t be catching that one again anytime soon.
She stared at the spot where the fish disappeared. “It wasn’t supposed to be this way, Graham.”
“There’s more fish in this old pond, Victoria girl. Some you can catch with hardly any bait at all. Good fish.”
Samantha picked that moment to open her eyes. When she saw Graham, she let out a squeal and scrambled to her feet. Chaucer jumped up to lick her face. Graham called him back, but Samantha giggled and reached for the dog.
Tori didn’t bother baiting her hook again. Fishing was over for the day. That was all right. She really didn’t care whether she caught another fish right now anyway.
6
Jay felt a hundred pounds lighter when he climbed down off the ship in New York after the long voyage home. His number had finally come up to be transported home. Red Cross volunteers lined the dock in the cold December wind to welcome him and the other soldiers home with coffee and doughnuts. It didn’t matter that the coffee wasn’t exactly hot anymore. It was coffee served to him in America by an American woman that he could drink with his feet back on American soil. At last.
Not exactly home yet, but a lot closer than he’d been for a long time. A few men kissed the ground when they got off the ship, but Jay wanted to wait until he was on real home ground. Rosey Corner ground.
Rosey Corner. A smile curled up inside Jay at the thought of walking down that road again. Home. So what if he’d only lived in Rosey Corner a few months and never owned any kind of house there. Before Pearl Harbor and the Army, he’d just borrowed a bed from Graham Lindell. Then after he married Kate and they went back to Rosey Corner until he had to ship out, they stayed with her aunt Gertie.
Home was more than a house. It was a place in a person’s heart. A place to belong. A place he’d been hunting since he was a kid.
He and Kate hadn’t had much privacy sleeping in Gertie’s front parlor, but Kate had an apartment now in Lexington. As soon as he had his discharge papers in hand, he looked forward to a little privacy with her there. His insides went soft at the thought of her in his arms.
But he’d be glad to have his feet on Rosey Corner ground again too. To see Birdie running to greet him with Scout chasing after her. He could hardly believe the long-legged girl in the pictures Kate sent him was his Birdie. A kid could change a lot from ten to fourteen. He wondered if she’d think she was too old to hug him now. He hoped not. He wanted to do a bunch of hugging when he got back to Rosey Corner to see Kate’s family. His family now.
A funny feeling, thinking about having a family. He’d left behind his own family a long time back. Then just when he was ready to embrace a new family in Rosey Corner, the war tore him away from them. He spent some lonely nights huddled down in cold foxholes, not sure he’d see the sun come up, wondering if the Lord had something against him having family. Seemed like things kept separating him from the people he loved. But he wasn’t the only soldier far from home.
Not so far anymore. Just a few more days until he’d hold his release from the Army. They sent him to a discharge center in Virginia where they counted up his service months and the times he’d seen action. He could have gotten points for kids, but he was just as glad that hadn’t happened yet for him and Kate. He needed to get used to being married first. He had no doubt Kate would be a wonderful mother, but he did have some doubts about the kind of father he might be. His own father lacked plenty in that department.
The Wednesday before Christmas, he finally had his discharge papers in hand and a train ticket to Lexington. Home for Christmas. The train didn’t leave until the next morning, but he saw no need to rent a room for the night. After the places he’d slept during the war, the depot was practically a luxury hotel.
During a slow time between trains, the ticket agent
struck up a conversation with Jay. “How about I get you on an earlier train? My son’s waiting for transport from the Pacific and I wouldn’t want him to have to cool his heels at a train station on the way home.” He studied Jay’s ticket, then ran his finger down the train schedule. “Let’s see. Lexington.” He glanced up at Jay. “You got somebody waiting for you there?”
“My wife.” Saying that sent a thrill through him.
“No kids, huh?”
“Not yet. We were only married a few weeks before I went overseas.”
The man looked up and winked. “One of those whirlwind romances, eh?”
“I guess you could say that.” Loving Kate had made him feel like he was in the middle of a whirlwind often enough.
“Well, let’s get you home to that anxious bride of yours.” The man found Jay a new ticket. A little farther in miles since the train went to Cincinnati, then back to Lexington, but with an earlier departure time.
He should have slept on the train, but he couldn’t. He kept picturing how Kate would look when he surprised her by getting to Lexington hours earlier than she expected. Happy, excited, bursting with life. That’s how she looked when they exchanged vows in Georgia with her father standing up with her and a nurse from the infirmary standing up with him. Backwards maybe in the best man and bridesmaid way, but it worked for them. He had a feeling that was going to be their way. Maybe not always by the book, but a way that would suit them.
On the ship home, in spite of the cold, he’d spent time up on the deck, looking toward the west. Toward Kate and his future. He wasn’t going to be afraid of it. He’d been afraid enough the last few years. And not just during the war. Before that, he’d been afraid to allow anybody close to him. Afraid they’d let him down. Even more afraid he’d let them down.
The same bit of Scripture that had circled in his head then as he stared out at the cold ocean waters ran through his head again in time with the train wheels. Perfect love casteth out fear. Kate quoted that verse to him back when he’d been so timid about revealing his heart to her. It took some searching, but he had finally found and marked the verse in the pocket Testament he carried through the war. First John 4:18. But the love John was talking about was the Lord’s perfect love.
Jay was far from perfect. Fear lurked around a lot of corners for him. Kept him alive a few times when something raised the hairs on the back of his neck.
That kind of fear could be a soldier’s friend. Keep him from doing reckless stuff to get himself killed. “You’ve seen it happen,” Sarge had told him. “A soldier not keeping his head down. Running into fire like he thinks he’s wearing tank armor.”
“Sometimes that’s fear too,” Jay said. “Crazy fear. The get-it-over-with fear because you can’t stand it another second.”
They’d been keeping their heads down as they ate their rations back behind the lines. The artillery was a constant rumble in their ears, but it wasn’t their turn to face it yet. Instead they kept their ears tuned for enemy planes, ready to dive for cover.
“I’ve seen it happen,” Sarge admitted as he spooned out the last bite of his K rations. It didn’t matter about the taste. A soldier ate what he was given. “Just don’t let it happen to you. I’m expecting you to have my back when we move on up. And don’t stop to take some fool picture and get your head blown off like Archie.”
“It’s my duty now to take pictures.”
“Not when you’re getting shot at.” Sarge gave him a hard look. As two of the older men in the unit, they’d been through a lot together. “Not when I’m getting shot at.”
“Yes, sir.” Jay saluted. “Gun first. Camera second.”
Sarge let out a sigh and pitched his empty can to the side. “A man can get killed either way.”
“Do you get scared, Sarge?” Sarge was so tough, Jay never thought about him being afraid.
“What do I look like to you, Tanner? Some kind of machine?” Sarge glared at Jay. “I’d be a fool not to be scared when bullets start flying or we have to step our way through a minefield.” He tipped his canteen up for a drink and wiped his mouth on his sleeve. “A man tells you he’s not scared, you give him a wide berth. He’ll get you killed straight out.”
“All kinds of ways to be afraid.” Jay chewed on one of the hard biscuits in his rations and thought about Rosey Corner food. A man missed real food. And a woman’s arms around him. He looked over at Sarge. “You’ve been married a long time, haven’t you, Sarge?”
Sarge let out a snort that was half laugh. “You sure are jumping around today, Tanner. You thinking of home?”
“Who isn’t?” Jay said.
“You aren’t lying there. Me and the old lady, we’ve been married since I was twenty. Going on fifteen years now.” He narrowed his eyes on Jay before he went on. “What’s the matter? You get a bad letter from the wife?”
“No, no, Kate’s great. Busy. Full of what we’ll do when I get home.” Jay finished off the last of his rations.
“You not wanting to do what she’s wanting to do?”
“It’s not that.”
“What you got stuck in your craw then, Tanner?” Sarge sounded impatient.
“It’s just thinking about being married.” Jay rubbed his hands off on his pants.”We weren’t together but a few weeks after we tied the knot and now it’s been years.”
“You get a pile of letters every mail call.”
“Yeah, but that’s just words on paper.” Jay stared off down the road where the artillery boomed. The noise didn’t seem to matter any more than a train rattling past. It ought to matter. Somebody was probably dying.
Sarge leaned over and stared him in the face. “You’re sounding like you’re scared of being married?”
With a self-conscious grin, Jay dropped his head down to stare at the ground. “Maybe I am.”
“You’re an idiot, Tanner. A certifiable idiot.” Sarge grabbed his pack and gun. “Come on, soldier. Time to go down the road and see if we can get ourselves killed. I figure the two of us are on borrowed time already.”
Without another word, Jay got up. He didn’t know what it was about Sarge that had him always talking about things that might be better kept inside. Sarge was right. He was an idiot.
The other men in the unit were falling in behind them when Sarge looked over at Jay with a sideways grin. “Idiot or not, you’ve got a pretty good handle on what being married can be. It’s God’s own truth that a good woman can put a scare into a man if he don’t do right. You just make sure you do right for that girl and you’ll be fine.”
The screech of the train brakes jerked Jay back to the present. As he climbed down from the train, he looked around at the crowded platform. No way would Kate be there, but she’d be in his arms soon.
Perfect love casteth out fear. The verse ran through his head again as he walked away from the train station. He might not be perfect, but he did love Kate. And she was only a few blocks away. His heart started pounding. Not with fear, but anticipation. He picked up his pace, hating the very air that held him back and kept him away from her.
He found the newspaper building easy enough. He stared at it, wishing she’d look out and see him. He thought about throwing something up at a window. Like Romeo getting Juliet’s attention. But he had no idea which window.
Instead he went inside to the front desk where a girl with sausage curls was on the phone. She hung up and smiled at him. “Can I help you, sir?”
“I hope so. I’ve got this story. A big story.” He flashed a smile back at her and color bloomed in her cheeks. Maybe he hadn’t lost all his charm in the Army. But he wasn’t interested in charming her. He had another girl on his mind.
“I’ll call someone down to talk to you.” She reached for the phone again.
“I’m not giving my story to anybody but this woman reporter who works here.” He pretended to think a minute. “Kate something.”
“Tanner?” she suggested.
A little thrill inched thr
ough him. Kate Tanner. His wife. “That’s the one. Nobody but her. I’ve read her stuff. Trust me, it’s a story she’ll want to write.”
7
It’s almost quitting time.” Kate couldn’t believe Francine was calling her with something like this. Not today when she knew Jay would be home soon.
Kate looked at the clock on the wall. In two hours and eight minutes. Kate’s heart gave a little jump at the thought. She shut her eyes and pulled up Jay’s face. The years hadn’t dimmed his memory. He won’t be the same, she reminded herself. War changed people. She didn’t want to be like Evie and expect nothing to be different. But Kate couldn’t think about Mike and Evie right now. Tonight was her night.
Francine broke into her thoughts. “I know, but he says it’s a big story.”
“What kind of story?” In spite of herself, that itch started up inside her. To be first to break a story. She grabbed a pencil to scribble down the date, 12-20-45, and checked the clock again for the exact time. 4:45 p.m. Writing the time broke the spell. She couldn’t write the story. She had a hundred things to do before Jay’s train came in.
“I don’t know. He won’t say.”
Kate cut her off. “Look, Francine, I’ll get Tommy to come down.” It didn’t matter how big the story was. She wasn’t going to write it. She wasn’t even going to stay until quitting time. With the telephone pinned against her ear, she covered her typewriter and dropped her pencil into the drawer.
“He says he won’t give the story to anybody but you. He asked for you.”
“He asked for me?” Kate frowned. Who would ask for her? She tried to remember how long it had been since a story had carried her byline. Gus Black, the editor, didn’t think news stories needed bylines. “Are you sure?”
She grabbed her purse out of the drawer and shrugged on her coat as she listened to Francine say she was very sure.
“I don’t care. He’ll just have to tell his story to Tommy,” Kate said.
She heard the mumble of the man’s voice telling Francine something. No doubt that he had the story of the century. She didn’t care if he did. She wasn’t staying late today.
Love Comes Home Page 4