The Summer Garden

by Paullina Simons

  Blushing, embarrassed, exceedingly pleased, Tatiana said hoarsely, “Husband, it’s unseemly for you to be this excited by a pregnant woman.”

  Alexander smiled, his arm going around her. “Why? You think making love to a pregnant woman is redundant?”

  Her hands resting on his forearm, they stared at each other, blinking, twinkling, at a loss for words.

  “What?” she asked.

  “Nothing.” He roamed her face. Still can’t take my eyes off of you. Holding her head to him, caressing her stomach, he kissed the freckles near her nose, kissed her lightly pulsing lips. “How is our potato pancake baby today?” Referring to the desperate November spawning that finally produced a fry, a fingerling.

  “Moving, marching, shoving, kicking,” she replied. “A true warrior like his father.”

  Alexander remembered helping her out of the bath last night, watching her dry herself, and when he couldn’t take it anymore, kneeling in front of her, his hands spanning her great, taut, still damp, naked belly, and pressing his mouth against her navel. “If it’s a boy,” said Alexander at Bobo’s, “I want to name him Charles Gordon—after the warrior-saint defender of Khartoum. To the Sudanese he was the Gordon King, or as they called him, the Gordon Pasha. And we can call him Pasha.”

  Tatiana blinked, once, twice. “Anything you want, my love,” she said.

  “If it’s a girl, I want to name her Janie.”

  “Anything you want,” Tatiana whispered, “my love.” She took a small sip of champagne and placed his obeisant cheek into the palm of her hand. “The white night I left you in the Summer Garden I sailed home on wings through azure skies. I grew red wings—I fell in love with you— that summer night when I was barely seventeen and you were twenty-two...”

  With all the flowers and the gifts, Alexander took Tatiana home in his faithful 1947 Chevy truck that had 194,000 miles on it. They left her car in Bobo’s lot.

  The midsummer night had a thousand burning stars, the Queen of the Night, the orchid cactus, opened, and at lilac dawn the swallows sang.

  The Second Coming

  One sweltering August night, two weeks in their brand new magnificent adobe pueblo house with a red-rust tile roof, a home that smelled like new wood and fresh paint and cut flowers, on top of their great bed where they slept and loved and fought and bled, with the blankets off and clean sheets on, in the blue light of night, under a waxing gibbous moon, Tatiana was almost at the very end. They had propped her up at the lower part of the bed. The curtains over the French doors to their secluded garden were open and the moon shined through, otherwise there was no other light in the bedroom, just darkness to soothe her. Anthony was in his wing on the other side of the house.

  Their good friend, the registered midwife, Carolyn Kaminski, was sitting on a stool at the foot of the bed, and Alexander, who was supposed to be sitting on his own stool up near Tatiana’s head, kept jumping up every few minutes and going to stand next to Carolyn. The central air was off; the room was the temperature of the womb. Alexander was so hot that he had to excuse himself to Carolyn and take off his T-shirt, and now stood bare to the waist, in his long johns, saying, when, when, when, she can’t do this much longer.

  I can do this as long as I need to, Shura, whispered Tatiana from the bed.

  Alexander, go sit next to your wife. Hold her hand. Give her a drink. There is nothing to see here, folks, nothing yet.

  Alexander would go, give Tatiana a drink, sit for a fidgety second, rub, stroke, hold, wipe, whisper, kiss, and then, as soon as he felt the belly tighten, up he was again, by her legs, crowding Carolyn.

  Tania, your husband is impossible. Is he always this impossible?

  Yes, Tatiana breathed out. He is always this impossible.

  He is crowding me. He is making me nervous. Alexander, go. Give me some room, your wife needs you when she bears down. I’ve never had a husband present at the birth, said Carolyn, and now I see why. This is very stressful. I don’t think this is for men. Tania, tell him to go sit. Alexander, you obviously won’t listen to me, but you’ll do what your wife tells you, won’t you?

  I will do what my wife tells me, said Alexander, standing like a post at the foot of the bed.

  Tatiana smiled. Carolyn, let me push my foot into his hand. My feet keep slipping off the bed when I bear down. Shura, sit on the stool, or however you’re comfortable, and hold my foot steady while Carolyn holds the other, okay?

  He went on one knee on the floor and held her foot steady, while Carolyn sat on the stool and held the other. The belly spasmed, Tatiana bore down, and Alexander breathed out. Carolyn, look—is that the crown?

  Yes—and now even Carolyn smiled. Almost here. That is the crown. Alexander had thirty seconds to get up, to lean over, to put his lips on Tatiana’s wet face, to whisper, you’re doing great, babe. The crown, Tatiasha, almost, oh God, almost.

  Hurts, Tania? asked Carolyn. You are being so brave. Alexander, your wife is being so brave.

  She always does quite well.

  Yes, Tatiana said. After all, my threshold for pain has been set so high. I can walk under that limbo stick.

  The span of Alexander’s arms was wide enough that he was able to, while kneeling, hold Tatiana’s hand with one hand and her foot with the other. The next time she bore down was the worst time for her, she might have even been screaming, but Alexander could barely hear, seeing only the baby’s head appear in slow motion. Tatiana’s stiff body relaxed for a few panting seconds, and Alexander, letting go of her foot, reached past Carolyn to put his hand on the sticky soft grapefuit-sized head.

  Alexander, don’t touch, said Carolyn.

  Carolyn, let him touch, said Tatiana.

  Alexander, calm down, this is it, said Carolyn. The baby will be here in half a minute. I’ll clean him up, I’ll wrap him in a blanket, I’ll give him to you to hold, but please, for the love of God, let me do my business now. Go sit by your wife.

  Where’s the rest of him? said Alexander, hand on the baby’s head, moving slightly to the center instead of to the side.

  Be patient, Alexander, the rest is next. Go sit, I tell you.

  A panting Tatiana said nothing, her eyes barely open. She motioned for him. Not surrendering his new position a millimeter, Alexander pulled up, and propping himself on one arm, leaned fully over a naked Tatiana—his other hand still between her legs on the baby’s head—and kissed her. He was so hot, he was drenched, almost like she was drenched. When he straightened up, he refused to move out of Carolyn’s way, and she kept saying, move, Alexander, move just a foot over, move to the side where you were. Tania! Your husband is not letting me do my job.

  Alexander’s intense eyes were only on Tatiana, who smiled and said, Carolyn, can’t you see? He is pushing you out of the way.

  I see. Tell him to stop.

  Let him, Carolyn, Tatiana whispered. Let him. Show him how to catch that baby.

  Tania, no!

  What are you afraid of? Just look at him. Let him catch his baby.

  Thank you, Tatiana. And Alexander went on one knee between her legs, as Carolyn was anxiously bent by his side, her hands next to his. The order of the universe, Alexander felt, was restored.

  The belly tightened, Tatiana clenched up, one soft slippery push, and the purple baby glided out, swam out face down, front down into the waiting, grasping, open hands of his father. It’s a boy, Tania, Alexander breathed out without turning his son over. Hold him, just like that, don’t move, Carolyn was saying as she cleaned out his mouth and Alexander finally heard his first sound all night.

  “Wah . . . Wah . . . Wah . . . Wah . . .” Like a little wailing warble. And with his first breath he became pink not purple.

  Alexander let the boy be placed front down on Tatiana’s stomach, keeping his hand over him and over her, and after Carolyn tied up the cord, he picked up his warm sticky infant, holding him in his palms, and brought him close to Tatiana’s face, whispering, Tania, our boy. Look how small he is. />
  He pressed his wet forehead into her wet cheek.

  Look at him flailing, squirming, wailing. Buddy, what? Been cooped up too long?

  He held the boy in his fanned-out palms.

  Oh God, how can he be so blessedly tiny? He is smaller than my hands.

  Yes, my love, said Tatiana, one hand on her husband, one hand on her child. But then you do have very big hands.

  Standing up, Alexander walked over to the open French doors so he could take a better look at the baby in the moonbeam light. Charles Gordon Pasha, he whispered. Pasha.

  The baby stopped squirming, moving, crying; he relaxed all his limbs and lay sticky and small and completely still in Alexander’s open palms, blinking, clearing his eyes, blinking, clearing his eyes, trying to focus on his father’s face so close.

  Tania, whispered Alexander, pressing his damp son to his bare chest, to his heart. Look, Tania, look, what a small, little, lovely, tiny baby.

  Book Four

  Moon Lai

  Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying,

  “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?”

  And I said, “Here am I. Send me.”

  ISAIAH 6:8

  Chapter Fourteen

  The Man on the Moon

  The Wages of Harold Barrington, 1965

  Tatiana and Alexander are watching Anthony. It’s just the three of them in their kitchen this morning, just like before, when there were just the three of them. The babies are still asleep. The morning is Tatiana’s favorite time of the day in her favorite room of the house. The kitchen—just as they had dreamed it—is sparkling white, with off-white limestone floors, white glazed cabinets, white appliances, pale yellow curtains, and every morning sunlight rises in the kitchen and moves through the house room by room. In the mornings they gather here to make their cereal and their coffee, to eat the croissants and the jam she’s made.

  But early this morning, at seven thirty, only Anthony is eating, sitting on a high stool at the island while his mother and father stand at attention, across from him. Alexander, like a pillar, just stands. Tatiana clutches the back of the bar stool. As if oblivious to them, Anthony drinks his coffee and picks up his second croissant.

  “Guys, at ease,” he says. “My food is getting stuck in my throat.”

  They don’t move.

  “Mom, the jam is unbelievable. What is it, blueberry/raspberry?”

  Anthony! Tatiana wants to cry. Anthony. She is speechless before her firstborn son. Twenty-two in three weeks! Tatiana has a twenty-month-old baby girl, still in diapers, whom she is still nursing; she has two primary-school-age boys. And two days ago Anthony graduated from West Point.

  The whole family flew out east to see him throw his white cap in the air. A frail Aunt Esther came down with Rosa from Barrington and cried through nearly the entire ceremony. Sam Gulotta and his wife came up from Washington. Tom Richter and Vikki came, estranged yet together. Richter gave the commencement address. Richter, in full military dress with bars and stripes and a lieutenant-colonel’s insignia, standing tall at the podium, speaking to five hundred men and their families, all in oppressive, melting June heat on the open fields, speaking loud and clear to Tatiana and Alexander, speaking to Anthony Barrington.

  “You walk in the footsteps of Eisenhower and MacArthur, Patton and Bradley, the commanders that saved a civilization. The eyes of the world are upon you.”

  Richter has been in Southeast Asia since 1959, an officer in a military advisory group, training the South Vietnamese to fight the North, but he is a big wig now in MACV—Military Assistance Command, Vietnam—the brain that controls the entire body that is American involvement in Southeast Asia. Rosa was so impressed by him, she asked to be seated next to him at dinner. The boys demanded to sit next to their cadet brother, but so did Aunt Esther. They wouldn’t budge. Neither would she. They ended up, sulkily, sitting between their parents, while Anthony was flanked by Aunt Esther on one side and Vikki and Richter on the other.

  Tatiana and Alexander rented the Pool Terrace Room at the modern and opulent Four Seasons restaurant in New York City, where they spent a raucous evening. Even Aunt Esther was raucous. At eighty-six, nearly deaf, sitting very close to Anthony—ostensibly to hear him better—all she wanted to hear was his cadet stories. Anthony tried to stay circumspect just like his father had taught him. He behaved well, he said; played football, Army against Navy, won finally, Army’s first win in six years. He played pick-up basketball games on the open courts— “Basketball,” Anthony told his aunt, “that was more like rugby.” He played tennis, and his coach was Lieutenant Arthur Ashe, and Esther said, “Who’s Arthur Ashe?” and, before Ant could reply, stated firmly that she wasn’t in the least interested in Anthony’s athletic escapades (and this is where Tatiana wanted to concur) but was “most interested” in his romantic ones. Anthony smiled and said nothing (the good boy), but Richter, always ready to stir some trouble, said, “Lieutenant, why don’t you tell your great-aunt about your two demerits in Chicago.” And when Anthony flat-out refused, Richter happily regaled Aunt Esther with the story of how, when the West Point Firsties came to Chicago, Mayor Daley’s wife arranged for all the cadets to have dates with the good local girls from fine families. “Some great times for the cadets,” Richter said with a grin.

  “Yes, and a mess for the Daleys,” Anthony added dryly.

  “Details, Anthony, details!” cried Aunt Esther.

  Tatiana smiled while feeding Janie sweet potatoes, glancing at Alexander, who was also smiling, though tensely, while telling Pasha and Harry to pipe down and stop flicking their peas and shooting bread balls out of their straws. Vikki wanted to know if there was more drink. Aunt Esther asked Anthony if he was going to follow the honored West Point cadet tradition and get married right after graduation at the academy chapel, and Rosa said only if it was a Catholic chapel, and Richter said only if he got married “to a good local Chicago girl,” and Anthony deadpan replied that he couldn’t find one. “Despite his best efforts,” piped up Richter, and oh, how everyone laughed, and Vikki said where is that wine already, and Tatiana said, “Harry, you fire one more bread ball at Anthony . . .” And Harry said, “Mom, they’re not bread balls, they’re buckshot.” And Alexander said, “Tom, how are the South Vietnamese holding up—Harry, what did your mother tell you!”

  They talked about everything and anything, except the one thing they needed and had to talk about—Anthony’s future. That was the burning question on everyone’s mind, and has been the only thing on the minds of Tatiana and Alexander since August 1964 when the Tonkin Gulf Resolution was passed by Congress, authorizing the use of any and all appropriate force to keep South Vietnam free from North Vietnam, the way South Korea had been kept and was still being kept free from North Korea. Tom Richter had been with MacArthur in Bataan and in the dense jungles of New Guinea during WWII, he’d been with MacArthur in Japan after the war, and then leading MacArthur’s men from Port Inchon to the Yalu River in Korea, and now MacArthur had heard the bugle call and crossed his own river, and Richter was with Westmoreland (West Point, ’36) in Vietnam. He didn’t speak much about what went on there, but Tatiana knew from Alexander that Richter ran clandestine special ops units. Obviously letting the South Vietnamese defend themselves with only a small U.S. presence had not done the trick. They were not holding up. They were getting run over. The North Vietnamese, the Viet Cong, the Viet Cong Self-Defense Forces, the Viet Cong Secret Self-Defense Forces were better supplied.

  Something more was needed.

  “You think you are entering a world far different from the one your fathers entered, but you’re not. I graduated in June 1941, and six months later, on December 7th, our Naval officers saw something so out of line on their radar screens that they ignored it. It must be friendly planes, they said. And thirty minutes later, nearly our entire Naval fleet was destroyed. I’m telling you now, in the face of imperial communism, our greatest threat is complacency. During the Ameri
can Civil War, Union General Sedgwick looked over a parapet toward Confederate lines and said that they couldn’t hit an elephant at this distance. Those were his last words. At that moment a sharpshooter took his life. For the last twenty years, the East and West have engaged in stand-offs, in proxy wars, all against a backdrop of a nuclear Armageddon. Soon the time for pretend will be over. That is the world you are entering as West Point men.”

  This bright Arizona morning Tatiana and Alexander are waiting for Anthony to tell them how he intends to enter that world. Tatiana feels Alexander so tense behind her that she backs away from the island, squeezes his arm, looks up into his stone-like face and whispers, “Shh,” and then says, “Darling, do you hear Harry in the front yard? Why is he up already?”

  “He’s convinced he can catch a Gila monster in the early morning,” says Alexander, not taking his eyes off Anthony. “He thinks it’s like fishing.” He pulls his arm away from Tatiana. “Ant, do you want to talk later? I have to save Harry from himself.”

  “If you have to go, then go, Dad,” says Anthony, not looking up from the paper. “I have a reception at Luke Air Force base at ten.”

  “I don’t have to go, but once the kids come in, talking as you know will become impossible,” Alexander says. The kids are noisy, especially the boys. Like wild dogs, they never stop moving. The girl is marginally quieter—but attention must be on her at all times. Once they get her up, there will be no adult conversation until her nap time.

  Anthony! Do you see what you’re doing to your father’s heart, to your mother’s heart? We can’t speak, our throats are so full of our pride, of our love, of our fears for you.

  “Let’s talk later then,” Anthony says, his head in the paper. “I just got here. My first morning back. I’ll be here two months. Can we just please ease up...”

  “Anthony.” That’s Tatiana. Finally she speaks. His name is all she says.