I'll Be Seeing You (20 page)

July 1, 1944

V-mail from Seaman Tobias Vincenzo to Roylene Dawson

Tire swing. Front porch. Whitewashed and sun-baked. Not a hint of sorrow in it. The
three of us. Together.

Yes.

Of course I’ll marry you.

Toby

July 7, 1944

ROCKPORT, MASSACHUSETTS

Rita,

My telegram came. He’s alive. Seriously wounded in action. In the hospital.

I was swimming down in the cove with Levi and the kids. It was Corrine’s first time
there...a baptism of sorts. She took to the water right away like a little chubby
mermaid. Her hair has grown (finally) and the blond curls turned the color of caramel
when wet. Just like Robert’s. I was thinking of him. Wishing he was there to watch
his children—Corrine so like him, Robbie so like me.... And Robbie was swimming, too.
It was like a miracle. We were laughing and healing in the deep salty ocean.

The bicycle on the road above glinted in the sun. Caught in my eye like sand.

I swam for the rocks, and took the trail up the road. I ran fast, hiding behind trees...pretending
I was a forest fairy. I kept thinking,
He’ll go past the house, he’ll go past the house,
but no one else on our road has anyone in need of a telegram.

I met the boy before he got to the door.

Has it ever happened to you, Rita, that you see a young person that you think you
recognize, only to remember that it couldn’t be that person at all, because you are
all grown up? Well, for a moment that boy looked exactly like Robert when he was fourteen.
Shaggy-haired, too-tall, graceless teenage Robert. All arms and legs. My love. But
it wasn’t him at all, was it? No. It wasn’t.

In the time it took for him to meet me with his outstretched hand I lived two lives.
One without Robert, and one with him wounded.

I’d not stopped (for fear of losing him in my sight) to towel off, so when I reached
for the telegram, drops of seawater fell from my fingers and wet the paper before
I could grasp hold of it.

Salt from the sea, not from my eyes as it should have been.

It’s punishment is what it is. It’s my fault.

I should be dead. Or in a hospital in France. I can no longer face Levi or this house
or this town.

I’m going to Connecticut to be with my mother.

Glory

July 14, 1944

ASTOR HOUSE

Dear Rita,

It’s cold in Connecticut. I won’t close the windows and the wind feels more like March
than July. How is it that this bed still smells of her, after all this time? I keep
burying my head deeper and deeper into the down pillows to find her. What a rabid
mind I have, that makes cheese out of everything I think I know. I’m a ninny. Did
I have babies? Ninnies shouldn’t have babies. Nor should whores. Only women like you,
Rita. Only women like you should be allowed to have and raise babies. Maybe people
like me shouldn’t be allowed to even live among the rest of society. Maybe it would
be better if the rotten apples fell from all the trees. I have holes in me. All over
me like a moth’s been at a sweater. I wonder where Robert’s holes are. Through his
eyes? His arms? Leg? Heart? Head?

Oh, my. I suppose I should begin again. You must think I’ve gone around the bend.

Do you like the stationery? So fancy. Just like my mother. She liked fancy things.
I’m sitting up today (in her bed...but upright, which is an improvement and allows
me to hold a pencil). I somehow managed to get from Massachusetts to Connecticut with
myself and the children in one piece, though I don’t recall much of the drive. I’m
beginning to feel a little better this morning, though it’s been a hell of a couple
of days.

I hope my letter to you about Robert made sense. I jotted it down and handed it to
Levi to post. He begged me not to leave. I couldn’t even look at him. Looking at him
seemed as bad as touching him. I thought I’d vomit and faint at the same time. So
I did the only rational thing—I put the kids in the car and drove off like a mad woman.
And even as I was driving—even in my grief over what has befallen Robert—I still could
not get Levi’s burning gaze out of my mind. God help me, Rita...if you could see him,
perhaps you’d know why. The depth in his brown eyes. The smolder just beneath the
surface. How is it that the mind and the body can crave two different things? I keep
trying to talk to my mother, but she won’t talk back. She’s not a good spirit. Or
she’s stubborn. Either way, she’s quiet. Maddeningly so.

I’d not been back here since her funeral. And you know when you revisit somewhere
you remember being large, and then you go and it’s much, much smaller? Well, that
isn’t what happened. The opposite, really.

This house—it’s enormous. I think I had a better handle on its size when I ran through
its halls as a child. It even has a name. Not overly original or creative.
Astor House
.

I couldn’t believe how well kept the place is. I mean, I sign the checks for the caretakers
each month, but I thought it’d be overgrown and dusty. Like a secret place or something.
Dead like my mother and father.

Not so. It’s perfect. It’s like we never left it. Spooky, really.

When we drove up there was no one there to greet us, as I hadn’t called or written
ahead. So I opened the grand front door, my hands shaking, convinced the key wouldn’t
work. I was holding Corrine in one arm and Robbie was clinging on to the bottom of
my spring duster. They were so quiet, both of them. No trouble at all. And then there
we were, in the grand foyer. All the air came out of my chest. I sat down on a small
chair by a marble-topped side table. The children sat at my feet. I don’t know how
long it was until the car was noticed and Michael and Gwen (the couple who takes such
good care of the estate) came fussing. But I felt as if we were statues, the three
of us. Me in my hat and gloves...hands folded properly in my lap. I stared off up
the sweeping staircase, waiting for my mother to come down. And my babies sat so still.
Little marble garden gnomes...quiet as clouds.

“Miss Astor, are you all right?” asked Gwen. I didn’t know her well. I hired the couple
after my mother died. But she seemed sweet in a ruddy sort of way. I didn’t know how
to answer her. I tried to form words with my mouth, but none came out. Michael cleared
his throat.

“Gwen, why don’t you see to the children while I put on a pot of tea?”

That’s all it took. They are good people. People who realized I needed to sit there.
Good enough not to ask me any questions.

Gwen swept the children upstairs with superb grace. They were laughing with her, I
think. Glad to be away from my hand-wringing. Michael backed away from me. I think
he wiped tears from his eyes as he left. I couldn’t fathom why, but then I lifted
my gloved hand to my own eyes and realized my whole face was wet with tears, wet enough
to seep through the cotton. I had a dizzying moment where I thought perhaps I was
still reaching for the telegram, but I wasn’t. I was home.

I sat there, with my ankles crossed (the way Father always asked me to sit) and with
my handbag on my lap and my driving hat pinned on. Like a visitor. And I stared at
the staircase for a long time. Waiting for her to linger, lovely on the landing, and
welcome me home. The stained-glass window on the landing soon caught afternoon light
and the colors danced across my feet. I used to practice ballet here in this hall.
Chaîné, chaîné, plié...and again.

I don’t know what finally moved me. Boredom? The smell of something cooking? But my
legs were stiff so I must have been there a long time. I walked through the drawing
room on my way to the kitchens. Lifting a white sheet off my piano on the way. I touched
the keys. Out of tune, sour. Like me.

The servant’s kitchen, on the other hand, was warm and inviting. Michael tried to
get me to eat some toast with my tea. But I couldn’t. It was then that he asked me
what had happened, and though I tried to tell him, I opened my mouth and the words
wouldn’t come. The tears. Only the tears. How disgusting it was. I don’t know why
I couldn’t just contain myself.

Kind Gwen came down and then brought me back up to my childhood rooms. I stayed safely
outside the door frame, just close enough to see my babies happily at play...so comfortable
among all my old things. And just close enough for them to see me there, to know that
I was still with them. But I couldn’t go back into those sweet pastel rooms. Baby
rooms. Rooms for my babies, not for me. I am no longer an innocent.

And to be quite honest with you, Rita—my thoughts went wild as I watched them. I was
thinking,
Who are those children? How does Miss Gloria Astor have children?
I thought I was going to be a ballerina, in France. I quit dancing years ago. After
mother died...but still...maybe I should run away to France. Would everyone be better
if I were just gone? Plenty of people I grew up with left their children in the care
of other people to live lives abroad. Why not? Oh, but my heart wants to kiss butter
off Corrine’s chubby fingers. And kiss sweet Robbie on the forehead after he’s gone
to sleep. He smells of honey and cut grass, that boy. How did I get here?

I’d never leave them. And France is different now, I suppose. The world is forever
changed by war. We are forever changed.

I walked toward my mother’s quarters. “Are they made up, or empty, Gwen?” I was able
to ask, though I didn’t recognize my voice.

“You never told us what to do with her things, so the room is just as she left it.
It’s fair dusted, though, and clean as clean could be. I’m sorry, miss, if that doesn’t
please you.”

Miss? I chase chickens. Really. I touched her face. “Please call me Glory.”

“Yes, miss,” she said before she left me in front of the double doors that led to
my mother’s suite. And then she turned around. “Don’t worry about the children. Michael
and me love children and we’ll keep them safe and fed until you feel well again.”

The first thing I did was open the windows. Because the smell in the room was about
to make me faint. My mother, concentrated. Tea rose. Glycerin. Cigars. (Yes, she had
that man’s vice. Though she didn’t smoke them outside her rooms.)

I didn’t know what to do. And she wasn’t there. And even if she was, she wouldn’t
council me, would she? So I crawled on her big four-poster bed, like I did when I
was a little girl and they were in Europe. And fell asleep. With my gloves on.

The next few days were a blur. Gwen brought me coffee and soup. But I had her draw
the curtains. Make it dark. Like a cave. And I kept on sleeping.

But this morning? This morning I feel better. And I said to myself, “Glory, if there
is stationery in your mother’s bedside table, then you must write to Rita!” and low
and behold when I opened the drawer, there was her stationery set.
Violà!

So here I am. I have a lot to think about. I told Levi to phone me here as soon as
he gets a letter from Robert or another telegram. I need to know the extent of Robert’s
injuries. I need to prepare for the worst.

I also need to know if I’ll be able to care for him. Am I doomed to be the caretaker
of the sick forever? Is that a selfish question to ask? Of course it is.

But the question haunting me more than any other is this: “How will I tell him about
Levi?” I’m a harlot just like Claire Whitehall always thought.

I think I’ll dress like her today, my mother. Wear her things and look in the mirror.
Conjure her and demand advice.

I believe I’ll be here for a bit. Feel free to write me here. The address is on the
envelope.

Please don’t worry too much over me. I’ll be fine.

I also want to say that I read your last letter at a rest stop on the way here. I
swept it into my handbag before I left Rockport. Tell Roylene congratulations! I am
so, so proud of her. What a monumental decision. She’s in my thoughts. Her bravery.

I’m trying to learn from her. I’m trying to be brave.

The sun plays games with its shadows here. My mind is working in waves. There’s no
more air left inside today. Maybe there will be more tomorrow. Rita, does the air
have favorites? Does it choose to blow life into certain people and not others? Does
God have favorites? How does He choose? How do any of us choose?

Glory

July 21, 1944

IOWA CITY, IOWA

Dearest Glory,

I am worried.

I know what it’s like to draw in the sketchbook of memory. Everything is recreated
with fine lines and precision, though the models are not in front of you, only remembered
through the haze of fantasy and longing. It’s real, but then it isn’t. And it lies
to you sometimes.

Don’t get stuck there, hon.

Your letter made me think of that Fitzgerald novel,
The Great Gatsby
. Toby read it in school and loved the book so much he left it on my pillow for me
to read. It crushed me. Oh, that Jay Gatsby, standing on his pier with arms outstretched
toward the green light he never could quite touch. He hooked his hopes and dreams
on to things unworthy of pursuit. That’s the tragedy of his story.

Toby always said Gatsby was about the inability to accept change. That idea and the
image of you wandering through the lifeless Astor mansion made me think of him, but
that’s where the similarity ends.

Unlike poor Gatsby, you already possess the green light—it’s just buried under memories,
fear and a war that has covered this entire world in ash.

It takes and takes, this war. But it has to give in some ways—it’s the law of nature,
isn’t it? To keep balance in the world? Your husband lost something on the shores
of Normandy, but you, you have been given an opportunity to see what you’re made of.

I think you’ll be pleased to find it’s not just sugar and spice.

Thinking about you,

Rita

P.S. Thank you for your lovely words about Roylene. She’s settling in nicely with
Little Sal, and is seeking a job in earnest. We hadn’t heard from Roy, but a few days
ago he left a moldy apple crate on my front porch, filled with Roylene’s personal
effects: a few worn summer dresses, a hairbrush and a pair of wool socks with some
lace trim she won’t take off even though it’s hot as Hades around here.

I doubt Roy’s done with her. He doesn’t seem the type to give up without having the
last word. I just hope he sticks to words, you know? Words we can handle.