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Authors: Elizabeth Berg
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quickly closed the door.
Out in the hall, Kitty rubbed her fingers along the rough edge of the envelope in her pocket. Was this divine intervention? Was she being given a chance to reconsider her imminent misdeed? She leaned against the wall and stared up at the ceiling, debating. In the corner, she saw a huge spiderweb, the owner and occupant hanging heavy in the center. Tomorrow, she’d clean it away, although she was frightened to death of spiders. Penance. And here came the sound of the chain being pulled and the toilet flushing. Yes. God had made a deal with her.
Go ahead in there and read it, now that we understand each other.
Frank came out of the bathroom and kissed her cheek as he passed by. “Night, darlin’. Give my regards to the wee ones.” The fairies, he meant; those beautiful gossamer creatures he used to tell his children would visit at night, but only after they fell asleep. Which made them struggle to stay awake, of course, hopeful of seeing one. Only in the last year or so had Binks abandoned sleeping with a Mason jar by his bed.
“Night, Pa,” she said, innocent as an angel. Really, she could be an actress. She wasn’t the only one who said so.
Seated again on the toilet lid, she pulled out the letter and read.
26 April 1943
Somewhere in England
Dearest Louise,
I knew I would miss you like bing, of course, but the severity of my longing is taking me a bit by surprise—my heart is quite literally heavy all the time. Guess I’m homesick in a big way: I miss you and my parents and you and steak and you and fresh fruit and you and the baseball games with the gang and you and Lake Michigan and you and movies and you and you and you! (Remember how I used to tell my English students to avoid redundancy? Never mind—don’t you know there’s a war on?)
The train ride was largely uneventful—extremely crowded, of course, and boisterously loud at some times, then strangely silent at others. A lot of guys lost inside their heads, I imagine, wondering what their fates would be, myself included. A couple of times, waking up disoriented from a nodding-off kind of nap, I came close to regretting the day that Julian and I decided to enlist together. (Honestly, we were not drunk!) But as I tried to explain before, there are some things I just have to do. I want to feel at the end of this thing that I did my part, and not by staying at a job deemed essential to the war effort. I know it doesn’t make sense to you, Louise, but I want to be on the front lines, with the infantry. If I’m going to be in this thing, then let me be
in
it. You can have all the air and sea support imaginable, but in the end a war is lost or won because of the foot soldier. I have a great deal of admiration for the Marines fighting at Wake Island who were being pounded by the Japs in ’41. Do you remember that story? How when the Navy was finally able to get through to them and asked if they wanted anything, they said, “Yeah, more Japs!”? I confess I am not so interested in dying in battle as they seem to be (some Marine sergeant is said to have bellowed to his badly wounded platoon, “C’mon, you sons of bitches, do you want to live forever?”), but they do have my utmost respect.
Anyway, I got off the train at the New York Port of Embarkation and onto a huge ocean liner, painted a cheerless gray. It was something being out in the middle of the ocean, knowing that here, there, or anywhere could be submarines with entirely unfriendly intentions. I spent plenty of hours with my nose in my Service Bible!
We docked at a port that’s about a day’s train travel from where I am now. We were given a lunch for the train ride, and in it was a pie. Well, I saved it for dessert, of course. Turned out to be
meat
pie, all cold and doughy—not the flaky apple and cinnamon concoction I was so looking forward to. I ate the thing for the sake of the person who so kindly made it, but it
Out in the hall, Kitty rubbed her fingers along the rough edge of the envelope in her pocket. Was this divine intervention? Was she being given a chance to reconsider her imminent misdeed? She leaned against the wall and stared up at the ceiling, debating. In the corner, she saw a huge spiderweb, the owner and occupant hanging heavy in the center. Tomorrow, she’d clean it away, although she was frightened to death of spiders. Penance. And here came the sound of the chain being pulled and the toilet flushing. Yes. God had made a deal with her.
Go ahead in there and read it, now that we understand each other.
Frank came out of the bathroom and kissed her cheek as he passed by. “Night, darlin’. Give my regards to the wee ones.” The fairies, he meant; those beautiful gossamer creatures he used to tell his children would visit at night, but only after they fell asleep. Which made them struggle to stay awake, of course, hopeful of seeing one. Only in the last year or so had Binks abandoned sleeping with a Mason jar by his bed.
“Night, Pa,” she said, innocent as an angel. Really, she could be an actress. She wasn’t the only one who said so.
Seated again on the toilet lid, she pulled out the letter and read.
26 April 1943
Somewhere in England
Dearest Louise,
I knew I would miss you like bing, of course, but the severity of my longing is taking me a bit by surprise—my heart is quite literally heavy all the time. Guess I’m homesick in a big way: I miss you and my parents and you and steak and you and fresh fruit and you and the baseball games with the gang and you and Lake Michigan and you and movies and you and you and you! (Remember how I used to tell my English students to avoid redundancy? Never mind—don’t you know there’s a war on?)
The train ride was largely uneventful—extremely crowded, of course, and boisterously loud at some times, then strangely silent at others. A lot of guys lost inside their heads, I imagine, wondering what their fates would be, myself included. A couple of times, waking up disoriented from a nodding-off kind of nap, I came close to regretting the day that Julian and I decided to enlist together. (Honestly, we were not drunk!) But as I tried to explain before, there are some things I just have to do. I want to feel at the end of this thing that I did my part, and not by staying at a job deemed essential to the war effort. I know it doesn’t make sense to you, Louise, but I want to be on the front lines, with the infantry. If I’m going to be in this thing, then let me be
in
it. You can have all the air and sea support imaginable, but in the end a war is lost or won because of the foot soldier. I have a great deal of admiration for the Marines fighting at Wake Island who were being pounded by the Japs in ’41. Do you remember that story? How when the Navy was finally able to get through to them and asked if they wanted anything, they said, “Yeah, more Japs!”? I confess I am not so interested in dying in battle as they seem to be (some Marine sergeant is said to have bellowed to his badly wounded platoon, “C’mon, you sons of bitches, do you want to live forever?”), but they do have my utmost respect.
Anyway, I got off the train at the New York Port of Embarkation and onto a huge ocean liner, painted a cheerless gray. It was something being out in the middle of the ocean, knowing that here, there, or anywhere could be submarines with entirely unfriendly intentions. I spent plenty of hours with my nose in my Service Bible!
We docked at a port that’s about a day’s train travel from where I am now. We were given a lunch for the train ride, and in it was a pie. Well, I saved it for dessert, of course. Turned out to be
meat
pie, all cold and doughy—not the flaky apple and cinnamon concoction I was so looking forward to. I ate the thing for the sake of the person who so kindly made it, but it
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