Semper Fi (37 page)

She smiled sadly. “You’ve never looked at anyone the way you do him. When he left, you were so broken hearted. It was plain as day.”

Panic flapped its wings against Jim’s ribcage. “You knew? Does everyone?” He thought he might be sick on the grass.

“No, love. Don’t fret. I’m sure no one else gave it another thought. But they don’t know you the way I do. Since you were a little boy at my skirts asking for another cookie when you and Stephen would play.”

Clenching his hands to keep them from trembling, Jim took a shaky breath. “When? Just when Cal left—that’s when you knew? Or before?”

“One day I brought Adam out to the orchard to say hello since he was missing you. You and Cal were there—not doing anything, just sitting under a tree. But your head was in his lap.”

Jim cringed. “I’m sorry.”

“No need to apologize. I just turned back and announced our arrival so we didn’t startle you. Can’t get much by me, I’m afraid.” She smiled. “Don’t look so frightened. I won’t tell a soul.”

“But it’s wrong! It’s a sin!” Didn’t she understand that?

Mrs. O’Brien sighed. “There was a time I would have agreed with you. Would have blindly condemned you without another thought, the way many people would. But after Stephen died, the world became a different place. I began to question many things I’d taken for granted. Happiness can be so fleeting, Jim. We have to take it where it comes, and be grateful for it.”

She can’t mean it.
“But it’s unnatural.”

Mrs. O’Brien snorted. “Says who? Not the ancient Greeks, if I recall. Homosexuals have been around since the dawn of time. Does it feel unnatural to you?”

His cheeks flaming, Jim struggled to answer. “I don’t know.”
No.

“Forget about what anyone else thinks. If it were just the two of you on a deserted island, would you give it a second thought?”

He rolled around the idea of being truly alone with Cal. No fear or shame. Complete freedom. “No. I wouldn’t.”

She nodded encouragingly. “There’s your answer.”

“But I’m a sinner!”

“We’re all sinners, Jim. Each in our own way.”

“Not you.”

She laughed and brushed away a strand of hair that had slipped free of her bun. “Why not me? It may not look like it now, but I was young once.” Her face took on a wistful expression. “Oh, the trouble I’d get up to as a girl in the old country. Paddy McFarrell used to brew a wicked
poitín
out in his granddaddy’s barn on the sheep farm. You’ve never had moonshine until you’ve had Irish moonshine.”

“You were young. All kids get up to that kind of trouble. It’s not the same. It’s not against the word of God.”

“Don’t kid yourself. We were breaking commandments left and right.”

Jim struggled to find the right words. “These feelings I have…I shouldn’t have them. They aren’t right.”

“Have you seen Trevor Turner lately?”

Jim blinked at the abrupt change in subject. “I don’t think so.”

“I saw him last week at the market with his parents and his new wife. She’s pregnant with their first.”

“Oh. I’ve been so busy here I haven’t been paying attention to the neighbors. Uh, I’m glad to hear it.”

“Are you? I wasn’t, you see. Do you know what I thought, when I saw them all? Joan and Lewis, and Trevor and his new bride? I thought, I wish that was me. Me and Gerald, with Stephen and poor dear Rebecca. I hated that it wasn’t. I stood there in that marketplace with a smile on my face, and the feeling in my heart was sheer jealousy. Hateful jealousy and a bitterness that I don’t think will ever truly leave me as long as I live.”

Jim tried to think of what to say. “I’m sorry.”

“Why them? Why are they the lucky ones? Why didn’t
my
son come home? Why is he in the ground across the sea with a million other boys like him while Trevor Turner gets to live? Why should Joan’s son return without a scratch while Stephen was blown to bits? It isn’t fair, Jim. It isn’t fair.”

“I know.” Tears gathered in his eyes.

She rubbed a hand over her face. “It’s a terrible thought, isn’t it? To be jealous of my friends’ happiness? To begrudge them their son and their future grandchildren? To want them to share my loss? It’s cruel, and the very meaning of sinful.”

“No.” Jim shook his head emphatically. “It isn’t. It’s human. We’ve all felt things like that. No one would ever judge you for it.”

She reached for Jim’s hands. “So why should anyone judge you for your thoughts? For your feelings? Feelings of
love
, not resentment and anger. Yes, some would judge you, but to the devil with them. Don’t ever hate yourself for loving.”

Jim had to swallow hard over the lump in his throat. “It’s not that easy. I wish it was.”

“What worth having is ever easy? Not much in my experience. Does he make you happy?”

Jim nodded. “But—”

“But nothing! I’ve watched you grow into a fine young man. You were always a good friend to my Stephen. He never got the chance to have his own family, and I’ll be damned if I watch you throw away your happiness. The people we love are what matters in this life, Jim Bennett.”

“What about the children?” Jim clung to Mrs. O’Brien’s weathered hands, her wedding band digging into his finger. “Don’t they deserve a mother?”

“They had a mother, Jim. Ann was a good soul, but she’s gone. Nothing will bring her back.”

“I could remarry. Sophie needs a mother. She needs a woman to guide her.”

“What am I, chopped liver? I’ll be around until you get sick of me and tell me to shove off.”

Jim had to laugh. “I would never do that.”

“Besides, it’s not in you to marry some poor girl knowing you’ll never really love her. Is it?”

Thinking of Rebecca, Jim sighed. “No.”

“Cal’s a good man. He’s mad about you, that’s for certain.”

Jim’s stomach flip-flopped foolishly. “You think so?”

“For God’s sake. Of course! Came rushing back here when you needed him, didn’t he? He’d do anything for you and those children.”

“But what would we tell Sophie and Adam? No one could know. Can you imagine what people would do if they found out? We’d go to prison. I’d lose my children.”

She sighed. “Yes, I’m afraid this will have to be your secret. You and Cal must be very careful if you decide it’s worth the risk.”

“I don’t want to live a lie.”

She squeezed his fingers. “Either way you have to lie. Be happy with Cal and lie to the world, or find another woman and lie to her. Or be alone and miserable, lying to yourself. I wish it didn’t have to be so. You have a difficult choice to make, and whatever you decide, I’ll be here.”

Nodding, Jim took a shaky breath.

She pressed a kiss to his cheek and let go of his hands. “Now you’d better go talk to Cal, and I should make sure Adam is still napping and not burning down the house.”

As she walked away, Jim blurted, “I don’t really remember my mother.”

Mrs. O’Brien turned back, her lips pressed together.

“But you always made the best cookies, and kissed my knee when I scraped it falling off the handlebars of Stephen’s bike. I haven’t thanked you enough for…all of it. Everything.”

“No need for thanks.”

“I can’t imagine a finer mother than you’ve been to me.”

Tears shimmering in her eyes, Mrs. O’Brien returned and threw her arms around him. She was warm and smelled faintly of cinnamon, and Jim clung to her.

“Thank you. Thank you,” he repeated.

She kissed his cheek again. “Go on now.”

When Jim returned to the cider house, Cal was dressed and pacing back and forth, looking for all the world like a man awaiting the executioner. Before Jim could reach for him, Cal spoke.

“I’ll go. We can talk on the phone about business if we need to, but I’m sure you’ll have it all under control.”

Jim blinked. “Is that what you want?”

“God, of course not.”

“Mrs. O’Brien said…” Jim’s mind still spun like he’d been riding the tilt-a-whirl at the county fair.

“Look, people might think it’s wrong, but that doesn’t mean we have to listen to them.”

“She doesn’t.” He could still hardly believe it.

“She doesn’t what?” Cal hesitated. “She doesn’t think it’s wrong?”

“No. She said you and I should be happy together.”

Cal’s eyebrows shot up, and he grinned. “She’s a hell of a woman.”

“She’ll keep our secret.” It felt strange saying the words aloud. Someone had found out, and the world hadn’t ended. Jim wanted to give in to the elation, but worry still churned his gut. “But others won’t. We can’t expect this from everyone. It’s still illegal. Sophie and Adam, they…” He took a deep breath, trying to calm himself.

Cal’s smile faded. “I know. We were reckless. I’m sorry.”

Jim ran a hand through his mussed hair. Mrs. O’Brien’s words of encouragement warred with the voice telling him to put an end to it now once and for all. “I don’t know what to do, Cal.”

“Neither do I.” He smiled softly. “I wish I did. I wish there was some magic solution to all of this. But there isn’t. I’m supposed to leave today anyway. I’ll come back in a week. We can think about everything while I’m gone.”

Jim nodded, even though he ached to beg Cal to stay. Was this how it would be between them forever? Furtive encounters followed by separations with neither of them ever truly happy?

“If it had been someone else, this could have ended very differently. I’m sorry I let things get out of control.”

Jim had to smile at that. “As I recall, you weren’t acting alone.”

“I suppose not.” Cal glanced at the press. “Well, it’s up and running now. Let me know if there are any problems and I can talk to my cousin.”

“Okay. Sure.”

They stared at each other. Then Jim squared his shoulders and turned away. As they walked back to the house, Cal fell into step with him, easy like always. Jim missed him already, and knew that nothing about their situation had really changed.

Yet he couldn’t stop the hope from blooming.

“Do you think it’s true, Sarge?”

“What’s that, Gambler?” Cal led his squad down a ragged ridge as part of a bigger convoy as their company moved across the island. He leaped over a gap in the rocks at the bottom.

Still clearly delighted by his nickname, a flash of a smile brightened Tim’s face. He fell into step beside Cal as they neared a green farmer’s field. “About the fighting down south? The trouble the army’s having?”

“Yes.”

Gambler blinked. “Oh.”

“I know you new boys can’t believe it given how our company’s had pretty much a walk in the park the last month, but our luck’s going to run out.”

“Didn’t you hear it last night?” Sully asked.

“The thunder?”

“That wasn’t thunder.” Jim spoke quietly, his attention on a plough horse tethered to a low fence.

The horses they’d come across had all looked similar, more like overgrown ponies. Jim had an affinity for them, and Cal watched as he pulled out a lump of sugar from his rations.

“Here you go, boy.” Jim scratched the horse’s muzzle, murmuring to it.

A Marine called Husky passed by with his squad. “Gonna make your getaway, Johnny? Don’t think that beast’ll go fast enough.”

“Fast enough to outrun you, Husky,” Jim replied with a smile.

Cal joined him, patting the horse’s flank. “You know between the horses and the kids, you’re not going to have any rations left.”

“Like you’re one to talk. You gave away your last candy bar days ago.”

Cal shrugged. “Damn kids with their big eyes. We’re all going to be starving by the time this battle finally finds us.”

“Or we find it.”

“Either way.” Cal stepped away from the horse. “Let’s get moving. Have to keep up.”

After climbing another small ridge, they came across a group of Okinawans. Of course the young men had been pressed into service, so the company had only encountered women, children, and old men. The locals watched them silently. They were being put into internment camps, which Cal understood the need for. Yet whenever he saw them, bedraggled and seemingly shocked and confused by the invasion, his stomach tightened.

A lieutenant called out, “Take ten!”

Sully and some of the men from other squads pulled out rations, and after a bit of hesitation the children gathered around. Cal walked to a small stone well, aware of the uneasy gaze of the women and old men. The water was cool, and he filled his canteen, breathing deeply.

Next to him, Jim dipped his canteen. “Nothing quite like the smell of pine.”

“God, I missed it. I was actually cold last night. Was confused for a minute by the unfamiliar sensation.”

Jim smiled softly and watched Sully and the others playing with the children, who laughed. “It’s strange, isn’t it? The only soldiers we’ve seen have been dead by the roadside. But there are civilians everywhere. Makes me think of…”

Cal screwed the lid back on his canteen. “What?”

“Home. Of what it would be like if war came to Tivoli. To Clover Grove. If I was herded off my land and put in a camp.”

“I hadn’t thought of it that way.” Now that he did, Cal felt decidedly uneasy. The idea of foreign troops marching up Fifth Avenue seemed impossible, but surely the people of Okinawa had never expected Americans on their doorstep.