by Sarah Smiley
The truth is, I think I would have nearly died. Losing my mom has always been one of my greatest fears, a survival instinct that surely stems from having a father who was gone more than half my life. Without Mom to fall back on, what would I do?
When I was seven, just two years older than Hannah, I had a neighbor named Shirley whose mother suffered from lupus. I didn’t understand the illness at the time, of course; I just knew Shirley came to stay with us unexpectedly when her mom was “feeling sick.”
Shirley was my older, more mature friend. She wore a bra—and showed it to me before I knew what one was for—and she was the one who broke the bad news to me about Santa Claus not being real. So Shirley had an exceptional amount of influence over me (as well she should: She wore mascara).
During one of the times she stayed at our house while her mom was sick, Shirley and I were asleep in my antique four-poster bed when there was a knock at the front door. I remember Mom shuffling downstairs in her robe and slippers and asking, “Who’s there?” before cracking open the door. Then I heard her saying, “Not now. Not like this.” And suddenly a man—Shirley’s father—was standing beside my bed. “Your mother has died,” he said, and Shirley broke down crying.
What followed was six years of night terrors during which I’d wake up sweating and calling out for my mom. It was something I never got over as a child, and it only increased my anxiety about being left alone.
And now here I was with a shy, scared girl in my care, and the best I could do was serve her hot dogs and macaroni and cheese. Secretly I worried I had failed Hannah. Failed myself.
Then one night, long after her bedtime, Hannah came to sit with me on the couch. She curled up quietly, drawing her knees to her chin, and put her head in my lap. I covered her with a blanket. When she started to weep, I couldn’t think of anything else to do but sing: “I’m gonna wash that gray right out of my hair.” I sang it over and over again, and Hannah hugged me tight. For nearly an hour I patted her back and sang commercial jingles until she was asleep.
On the last night Hannah stayed with me, it was time for a bath. I know, I know. She probably should have had a bath long before this, but unlike my toddler boy with grass stains on his knees, Hannah seemed unnaturally clean and without need of a washing. But she was returning home to Melanie the next day, so a good bath was in order.
The whole thing seemed like an easy enough process, and Hannah took her bath as quietly and helpfully as she did everything else. But because it’s been ages since I had long, straight hair of my own, I didn’t know enough to comb through Hannah’s wet hair before putting her to bed. And for whatever reason, Hannah failed to mention this very important step to me.
The next morning, she was standing beside my bed when I woke up, and the rat’s nest atop her head was at least twelve inches tall. Tangled masses of blond hair were gracing her scalp like a fuzzy ball of yarn.
“Oh, no!” I shrieked, throwing back the covers and rushing to her side. “Your mom usually combs your hair, doesn’t she?”
Hannah nodded.
That’s it, I thought. I’ve definitely failed.
But Hannah was staring at me with pleading eyes, her hands neatly clasped behind her back, and I couldn’t give up.
“Well,” I said, straightening my posture, “we need to take care of this before your mother sees you. That’s for sure.”
Hannah reached up and felt the pouf of hair with her hand. Tears came to her blue eyes and the bridge of her nose started to crinkle.
I grabbed her forearms and said eagerly, “No, don’t cry! It will be all right. It’s just hair.”
Tears were rolling down her cheeks now as she sniffled.
“I know! Should we pray about this, Hannah? Would that help?”
“Yes,” she said in a hushed voice.
I looked around the room anxiously, as if I were searching for someone to help.
A prayer for hair? Why on earth did I suggest that?
I took a deep breath and said, “Honestly, Hannah, I don’t know any good prayers for hair emergencies, so why don’t you say it? I’m sure you’re much better at it than me anyway.”
She looked at me doubtfully, but I smiled and nodded, so she bowed her head and said, “Dear God, please make Mrs. Smiley more responsible in the future. Please make sure I don’t need to cut off my hair to get out these tangles. And, God, please make Mommy better so I can go home.”
Another bath and a cupful of heavy conditioner got rid of the tangles and restored Hannah’s shiny blond hair. I took her home to her mom that afternoon, and if Melanie noticed anything amiss about her daughter’s hair, she never let on.
A week later, the Spouse Club met at Courtney’s house for a “surprise announcement.” Everyone had their guesses at what the “surprise” might be, but the most delightful to consider was Trish’s theory that maybe the men had come home during the night and would be waiting for us there. Rumors like this are common during a deployment and never (to my knowledge) come true, yet we wives get sucked into believing anyway, like a child who’s old enough to know about the tooth fairy but hides fallen teeth under his pillow anyway.
So naturally we were more than a little let down when the only thing waiting for us at Courtney’s house was a plateful of crackers and cheeses with names no one except the hostess could pronounce.
Courtney was positively aglow with the possibilities of Kate’s surprise. She could be so optimistic sometimes! I arrived early to help set up, but after watching Courtney flutter about her yellow-and-blue kitchen wearing a gingham apron that reminded me of June Cleaver, I found myself feeling a bit useless. She was buzzing here and there, mumbling gibberish about the “cocktail napkins” and “wine charms,” while I sat perched on a barstool at her counter.
“You’re nesting,” I said. “You’re getting all domestic because you really believe the news has something to do with the men coming home. Am I right?”
Courtney wiped her hands on a sunflower dish towel and looked at me. “That’s ridiculous,” she said. “I’m not nesting. And what does that mean anyway?”
“It means you’re scaring me with your cheese knives and cocktail napkins. What’s gotten into you?”
She turned toward the stove and stirred something in a pot. “I’m just excited about the possibilities,” she said, taking a deep breath and gazing up at the ceiling. “Haven’t you ever felt in love with a possibility?” She turned around to look directly at me. “I haven’t felt this alive since the guys left. And I don’t care what Kate’s surprise is. I’m just grateful for the idea of it.”
Courtney had a point. Ever since Kate’s cryptic e-mail arrived in our in-boxes four days earlier, the mood had shifted from one of drudgery to one of excitement. Just thinking about the “surprise” was like a nugget of hope in the middle of a long string of nothing. Instead of sitting around talking about our angst, Jody, Courtney, and I had been giddy over the possibilities of what awaited us.
Yet somehow, now that the night was here, I didn’t feel up to it.
I left Courtney to her humming and baking, and went to sit in her wood-paneled living room. It was a muted, dark room with lots of navy blue and gold. Sometimes when it rained and drops hit the skylights in the roof, the living room felt like the under-cabin of a ship, and maybe that’s why Courtney chose nautical decor and had lighthouses on the mantel of the fireplace. This was a key difference between Courtney and me: Whereas I try to rid my living space of any reminders of Dustin’s job aboard a ship or airplane, Courtney seemed to revel in it.
I sat down on the denim-covered couch and curled my feet beneath me. I knew I should be feeling excited—I’d spent the last few days anticipating the meeting and the surprise—but as I sank into the throw pillows with ship appliqués, I felt a sense of dread. Maybe Courtney was right; maybe none of us really wanted the hoping and guessing to end. Maybe it was the anticipation we enjoyed. It had made the week fly by, and I didn’t want that to end. What woul
d get me through the next week?
The rest of the spouses arrived soon after. Usually there are a few stragglers who take their time getting to the meeting—and make everyone else angry in the process—but not on this night. By five after seven, everyone was seated around Courtney’s coffee table and whispering anxiously. Some wives were definitely dressed sexier than usual, and I felt a twinge of triumph when I saw Sasha struggling to sit comfortably on the floor in her miniskirt and boots. Despite her usual insistence that she knows military life better than anyone, she had obviously fallen prey to the rumors about the surprise.
Kate sensed everyone’s excitement, so she opened the meeting without delay. Her platinum hair was pulled back in a loose knot, and she sat cross-legged on the red brick of the hearth, poised as ever, with a black high heel dangling from her left foot. “Wow, what a great turnout we have,” she said. “I guess everyone is eager to hear the exciting news. I’m sorry if I have raised some people’s hopes about the men coming home, but maybe what I have to say will be just as rewarding.”
I watched Sasha’s face go from an electric smile, to a frown, to a blank stare presumably meant to mask how stupid she felt for believing.
Courtney stood in the kitchen doorway, still dressed in the apron and with a slender hand at her throat. I knew she could barely wait to hear the news, but I also knew she’d experience a letdown once the excitement was over. I knew because I was already feeling deflated and I didn’t even know what the news was yet.
Kate smiled playfully and continued. “I’ve received word that the ship will make one last port call in France before heading to the Persian Gulf, and the CO and XO have deemed this stop safe enough for the spouses to fly over and meet them—”
Before she could say anything more, women jumped to their feet and started hugging one another. They were clapping and shouting, and I swear Courtney was already talking about what she was going to wear. “France, can you believe it?” she said to no one in particular. “Think of all the shopping . . . and the cheeses . . . and the wine!”
I stayed on the couch and sank farther into the cushions. I knew this day would eventually come. One of the highlights of military life is the opportunity to fly overseas and meet your spouse in a foreign port, usually with groups of other wives, making it yet another bonding experience. My own mom had once participated in this age-old tradition when I was a baby. She flew to the Philippines to meet up with Dad and left me and my brothers with Doris and Big Jack. I have no memory of her leaving or returning, but I do know she never went on another overseas flight again. Apparently Mom’s fear of flying (handed down from Doris) kicked in, and for the rest of Dad’s military career and various deployments, she said, “No, thanks,” when the other wives planned trips to go abroad.
I couldn’t have imagined Kate telling us anything worse, other than that one of the guys had had an accident. Besides the whole flying issue, I wasn’t sure I wanted to go to France. I wasn’t sure I wanted to see Dustin. Which surprised me because I had just spent the last several days hoping he’d be at Courtney’s house that night.
When Jody spotted me on the couch, she pushed her way through the excited women and came to sit down next to me.
“Aren’t you excited?” she said.
I looked at her, confused. “Excited? You know me better than that. There’s no way I can go. Unless you know of any boats to get me there.”
“We’ll get you some medicine,” she said. “And some beer. You’ll never even know you’ve been on a plane once you get there. Come on! You can’t miss out on this.”
I shook my head. “I can’t, Jody. There’s just no way. It would take a lot more than medicine and alcohol to get me on a plane.”
“What then?” she said. “What would it take? Just tell me and we’ll do it.”
I looked at her and smiled. “It would take your hitting me over the head with a two-by-four and knocking me unconscious.”
“Great!” she said. “I can do that.”
That night, Dustin called. I knew it was him because the caller ID read “US Government,” but I didn’t answer. I couldn’t answer. I knew, without a doubt, he would try to convince me to fly, and I didn’t know what to say. Then, sure enough, when he left a message, I knew I had done the right thing:
“Hey, Sarah, I was hoping to talk to you. Guess you’ve heard the news by now. I hope you’ll consider flying out here to meet me in France. Just consider it. That’s all I’m asking. We’ll get you whatever you need—medicine, tranquilizers. Just please come. Love you. Bye.”
I had no trouble going to sleep at a reasonable hour (one a.m.) that night. Perhaps I was emotionally drained, or maybe the anxious grinding of my teeth ever since I’d left Courtney’s house had made me tired, but once I got in bed, my eyes shut, and I was asleep.
An hour later, I woke to a startling noise. A blaring siren whirled in the hallway, bouncing off the wood floors and echoing so that one piercing sound fell into the next. I sat straight up in bed and put a hand to my chest. The noise was deafening, and I imagined it circling around my brain, swirling around my ears. The bedroom was completely dark, and I couldn’t see anything, except one flashing red light on the wall near the door.
The burglar alarm.
My heart was beating in my throat and banging against my chest. I had gone from being peacefully asleep to feeling like I had drunk twenty cups of coffee.
I reached for the phone beside the bed and dialed 911, but got it backward and ended up with 1-9-9. “Dammit!” I yelled and threw the phone down. The siren was getting louder and the whirling seemed to be getting closer and closer. My hands were cold and wet.
I fumbled with the phone and tried the number again: 9-1-1.
This time it rang.
“911, what’s your emergency?” a dispatcher said in a drone voice.
“Someone’s in my house,” I yelled. “Please, help me!”
“What’s your address?” The dispatcher sounded calm, almost bored, as if this were routine.
“I don’t know right now. Call my neighbor,” I said.
“I’m sorry, I can’t hear you. You need to turn off your alarm.”
I screamed louder. “CALL MY NEIGHBOR!”
“Who’s your neighbor, ma’am?”
“Brent!”
“Brent who?”
“I don’t know—just call him!”
The dispatcher tried to be patient, but irritation came through her staccato words: “Ma’am, I can’t call Brent unless you give me his last name or phone number. Now I need you to stay calm and answer some questions for me. Are you alone?”
My hands shook the phone. “No,” I said. “I have two children in another room.”
“I need you to put down the phone and go get your children,” she said.
My breath caught in my chest. “I don’t think I can move.”
“Listen to me,” she snapped. “Put down the phone and go get your children. I won’t hang up and I’ll be here when you get back.”
My legs were like weights. It was like a bad dream when you want to run but can’t. I felt frozen. “I can’t move,” I said and started to cry. “I don’t want to see what’s happened to them.”
Just then a dark shadow came across the floor outside my bedroom door. I screamed into the phone, “Help me! Help me! Oh, God, please! My children!”
Then I looked up just as Brent came out of the shadows and stepped through the door. He was bare chested and wearing a pair of SpongeBob SquarePants boxer shorts. He had a baseball bat in his hand.
“The police are on their way,” he said. “You’re going to be OK.”
I threw down the phone and ran to him.
When the red-and-blue lights of police cars lit up the cul-de-sac like a disco party, neighbors stepped out onto their front stoops in bathrobes and squinted their eyes to see across the street. There’s nothing like a mysterious emergency in the middle of the night to bring out the community spirit in everyone.
Brent bundled me and Ford and Owen in blankets and brought out chairs for everyone to sit on while the police searched the house. I was still shaking, but I had stopped crying . . . until I remembered Tanner. “Oh, my gosh, Brent!” I yelled. “Tanner! Tanner’s still inside.”
Brent dashed back inside to get her, like a fireman running into a burning building.
I pictured Tanner shaking and whimpering under my bed. I pictured her crying because I hadn’t thought to bring her out with the kids. I pictured her hating me for the rest of her life. She’ll never get over this, I thought. She’ll be scarred and frightened forever.
But when Brent came back out a few moments later, he was holding a very irritated and sleepy Tanner with fluffy bed head sticking out in all directions.
She was less than scared—she was indignant.
“Where was she?” I cried, reaching out to hold her.
“Asleep under your bed,” Brent said. “Have you had her hearing checked lately?”
A police officer came out of the house and I recognized his stiff walk and mustache. He was the same one from before, and here I was again in my driveway . . . in my pajamas. Thank goodness I was wearing flannel this time.
“Looks like you have a warped back door,” the officer said as he scribbled notes on a pad of paper. The radio on his belt clicked on and off with nothing but static and mumbling voices. “It probably popped out when the temperature changed tonight,” he said. “And that was just enough to trip the alarm. But everything looks good and we’ve reset the system.”
I sighed with relief and clutched Tanner closer to my chest. “I can’t thank you enough, Officer,” I said.
He smiled as he flipped the pad of paper closed. “Don’t worry about it. We’re glad to help. But hey, you might want to get a better watchdog for yourself.” He laughed and tousled the fur on Tanner’s head. Then he looked at my face and his eyes brightened. “Wait a minute,” he said. “Aren’t you the girl—the girl in the cowboy shirt and flip-flops?”