The Pieces We Keep (5 page)

T
he air was moist from the river below, crisp with summer’s decline. On the block of concrete stood a lone iron lamppost. Beside it, Vivian pulled her cardigan closed and hugged her elbows atop the rail.

She stole a glance at a passing couple, then a second pair and a third, half expecting to spy Isaak’s face. As if catching him with a lover would put her feelings to rest.

It had been several hours since they’d parted in the storeroom; still, the ache refused to dull. She trained her attention on the landscape. The setting sun cast London’s skyline in silhouette. Orange rays poured liquid ribbons over the Thames, guiding a flock of boats downstream.

Following long workdays, this spot was her cherished retreat.

Faced by such surroundings-the vast winding river, the grand Houses of Parliament-many would be discomfited by a feeling of insignificance, reduced to but a speck in the universe. To Vivian, the scene gave proof of purpose. For why else would humans exist? Each played a small but integral part of a massive design, so intricately crafted that only upon its completion could one grasp the perfectly logical beauty.

The theory required faith, of course-an asset of hers now put to the test. She leaned her head against the cool metal post and listened to the rush of the current. A force even stronger had swept her away the day she first met Isaak.

She was buying fruit at the outdoor market when an air-raid siren wailed. Another tiresome practice drill. Startled from her thoughts, she knocked a large tomato onto the cobblestone road. Its juices sprayed an arc over a pair of wingtips. When she looked up to apologize, expecting a stuffy man to fill the suit-after all, what in England wasn’t stuffy?—she instead met eyes that drained her of words.

The craggy vendor interrupted, demanding due pence for her loss. Fear of poverty trumped that of a German attack. Vivian hastened through her coin purse while the siren blared and people all around bustled toward shelters.

“This should cover it, ma’am,” the suited man said, paying the vendor double. Before Vivian could object he wrapped her hand with his. Words again eluded her. “Come with me,” he said, not a question, and she wasn’t sure which surprised her more: his American accent or her willingness to follow. Not that her assent was fully voluntary. A magnetic pull radiated from his touch, making every layer of her skin hum.

He guided her into a public air-raid shelter. It was there she detected a trace of his German vowels-residual of his time spent in Switzerland, he explained, after moving from the States. Only a year her senior, he spoke of the American delights he missed, the drugstore confections and radio shows of his youth. She nodded along, prodding him to continue. Like cold fingers to a flame, she was drawn to the danger of his warmth.

Never before had she been disappointed by the all-clear signal. To this day, so vivid was the memory she could hear Isaak’s voice even now. She glanced over her shoulder. At confirmation of his absence, her spirits sank.

When she turned back to the river, she heard him again.

“There’s no other woman. I swear it, Vivian.”

She questioned if she was going mad until, past the concrete block, she glimpsed male hands on the railing. She recognized the ridges of his knuckles, the curves of his fingers.

“I have good reason for being distracted. But it has nothing to do with my fondness for you.”

It was the start of a likely excuse.

“And? What is that reason?” She meant to sound challenging, but failed.

“My family.”

An unexpected answer. “Go on.”

His profile edged out from the lamppost. Beneath his flat cap, his skin gained luminescence from the sun’s orange glow. “My family lives in Munich,” he said, just loud enough for her to hear. “But they’re not Nazis. They’re good people trapped by a dictator consumed with power and greed.”

“By family ... you mean ... ?”

“My mother. Yes.” His gaze stayed forward, as if borrowing the anonymity of a confession booth. “She lives there with my uncle and aunt. They have two teenaged daughters. Bright, kind girls.”

The newsreels. No wonder Isaak took such an interest. With all those snippets of Germans cheering at massive rallies, the films conveyed unity, a whole country bowing to Hitler. She hadn’t considered opposition festering within those borders.

Then again, neither had she questioned the tales of Isaak’s life.

“But you told me you moved to Switzerland, after your father died.”

“It was a wish,” he said. “Ever since I was a kid, my mother would describe Lucerne like a magical kingdom. I had planned to graduate from the university and work for my uncle’s newspaper, as I told you, but just long enough to save funds. Then I was going to pack up and take her there.”

Vivian’s thoughts churned as she tried to visualize how all the pieces fit. “So-why can’t she go now? If she’s a Swiss citizen? Surely it’s safer there.”

Isaak said nothing, letting the curtain fall free of the entire façade. Here, in the impossible quiet of London, a revelation took shape.

“Your family isn’t Swiss,” she breathed.

His eyes snapped to hers. “That isn’t true. My ancestors are, from my mother’s side.” He attempted to protest further, but weakened by the flimsy argument, his words trailed off.

“Then it’s all been lies. A splendid heap of lies.”

Always she sensed a barrier hanging between them, an invisible bridge. Yet she had no inkling of how wide the stretch, or how many deceptions filled the gap below.

If his admission was meant to help, he was mistaken. She had been played a greater fool than she’d realized. The urge to flee overtook her and she did not bother to fight it.

She was several yards from the lamppost when he called after her.

“Vivian, stop.” He gripped her shoulders from behind. “Damn it, you’re always running away from me.”

She was plagued by the truth of this. But then she recalled it was likely his one and only truth, and she tried to break away. “Just let me go.”

“I can’t do that,” he told her. “I love you.”

Her body went still.

Weeks ago, as they necked passionately in a secluded park, those very words had escaped her lips. He had smiled in return but replied with merely a kiss. She had managed to hide her disappointment, and ever since refrained from the same mistake.

At last, he had reciprocated in kind. But how to gauge his sincerity?

“Did you hear me?” he said, his mouth beside her ear. He nuzzled the side of her hair. His moist, heated breath sent a shiver down her spine. “I love you, Vivian.”

She worked to recover her voice. “We don’t even know each other.”

“You know that’s not true.” He relaxed his hold and slid a hand down her sleeve. Beneath her unbuttoned sweater, his fingers settled on the waist of her skirt. He guided her around to face him. His purposeful touch dissolved every layer of fabric.

“Darling, please, think,” he said. “Your father fought in the war. Against Germans, for God’s sakes.”

The Great War. Her father’s service. Her mind hadn’t yet ventured there.

Vaguely she did recall her father’s grousing, back when she was a child, about a local German plumber said to have swindled the neighbors. A
dirty Kraut
was the term her father had used. But it was an emotional slip, and once little Vivian asked him what it meant he never repeated the phrase. Times had changed.

“That was decades ago.”

“Yes. But he’s still an American diplomat. Political relations are worsening. I didn’t know how he’d feel about-how
you’d
feel about me, if you knew.” He moved his hand to her cheek, and she cursed her inability to pull away. “Besides, you can’t blame me for keeping my guard up.”

“Oh? Then who is to blame?”

“You,” he said, and Vivian’s gaze sharpened.

“Me?”

He arched a brow, as if no answer could be more apparent. “You’ve made it clear from the start, you have no intention of staying. Sooner or later your father will be transferred, and you’ll get what you’ve always wanted. You’ll move back to America and travel from one coast to the other. Bathe in the blue seas of California, pitch pebbles into the Grand Canyon, ride bareback through the Texas plains. You’ll live as you please, no one tying you down. Isn’t that what you said?”

For Vivian, the memory of sharing those picturesque dreams was somewhat faint. A generous glass of red wine during one of their evening picnics had lubricated her words. Lying on his arm as they gazed at the stars, she had described the places she would visit, each one inspired by tattered, dog-eared issues of
National Geographic.

It hadn’t occurred to her that he would harvest so many of those details.

“Now do you understand?” he said. A look of vulnerability seeped into his deep-set eyes, dissolving the remnants of her will.

She found herself nodding, unsure how the situation had both tangled and untangled in such a short span. All she knew for certain was how much she suddenly needed him close.

She moved forward and delighted in the feel of his arms enfolding her. She rested her head against his neck, absorbing the thrum of his pulse, the scent of his skin. A lavish mix of tobacco, vanilla, and sage. “How did you know where to find me?” she murmured.

“At the end of a long day, your favorite place to go?”

It was testament to existing in another’s world, of being greater than a speck of dust.

“I know you, Vivian. And you know me.”

She raised her head. A tingling spread through her as she placed her lips on his. He returned the kiss with such intimacy her knees almost gave out.

Once more he held her for a long, wordless moment. Finally he said, “I suppose you’d better get home. Wouldn’t want your parents to fret.”

Though reluctant, she agreed. Another lecture from her mother held no appeal.

His arm curled around her shoulder as they walked toward the Underground. They were a pair of the strolling lovers whom only minutes ago she had envied.

Three blocks later, stained concrete stairs led them down to a station platform. Together they waited for her train, bound for Hyde Park, a brief jaunt from her family’s home.

Beneath the brim of his cap, Isaak stared off in silence. This time she knew what he was thinking.

Cautious of listeners, she asked, “What will you do? About your family?”

He shook his head and sighed. “I don’t know yet. Find out all I can to help them, I suppose. Pray to God we don’t wind up in another war.”

Without foresight of what was to come, there was little to say.

Too soon the train arrived. A final kiss, a squeeze of hands, and she boarded. She waved through the window as the transport pulled away. “I love you too,” she said under her breath and watched Isaak shrink from view.

In the darkness of a tunnel, Vivian fidgeted with her sleeve. Solutions began to form. They crowded her thoughts, hungry as weeds, until one emerged with promise. The file cabinet in her father’s den was the seed of hope she needed.

But where might she find the key?

T
here were no clear answers, only a problem that continued to grow.

Audra sank into the padded stool, a stethoscope looping her neck. Alone in the lab of the clinic, she pulled out the card from that morning. She had only accepted it to be polite. How could she have refused with the man sitting right there?

The tagline sounded so simple. Three steps, three syllables. You could almost forget how many years and payments it would take to sustain hope of reaching the goal.

A mix of yips and whines drifted in from the kennel. But it was the melodic whimpers that reminded her of a cocker spaniel she’d once treated. A middle-school boy had abused the puppy for kicks—and this was after extensive counseling for tendencies of violence. Evidently the sessions were as helpful to the kid as Audra’s had been for her.

Weeks after Devon’s funeral, a friend of a friend suggested a grief counselor downtown. Audra had gone there for one reason only: to garner advice for helping Jack adjust. As it turned out, six appointments with a frizzy-haired shrink who assigned every feeling to a particular shape and color had been six appointments too many.

Maybe Audra had been too hasty. The ability now to decode the shapes and colors in Jack’s drawings might have been useful. Obviously, he would never hurt a puppy for kicks; at four, he had even begged her to save a bee from drowning in a puddle. Yet his current behavior seemed a blatant cry for help.

She rubbed the business card between her fingers. The phone wouldn’t dial itself. She grabbed the handset from the counter and began to press the numbers.

“You’re here!”

She swung toward the greeting.

Entering the room was Tess Graniello. In her signature style, she wore pink lip gloss against creamy white skin, a blond bob angled toward the front, a lab coat over tan Dockers, and a lavender scrub top patterned with tiny white kittens. Basically, if Barbie’s countless occupations included a clinic vet and manager, this would be her—but with a suave Italian husband whose local relatives could populate an entire village. In their family, every holiday was just an excuse for daylong eating and, oddly enough, karaoke singing. When Audra was hired here six years ago, Tess invited her to one of the extravaganzas. A plateful of cannoli and a duet, almost recognizable as “I Will Survive,” were all it took to forge a lasting friendship.

“I didn’t see you sneak in,” Tess said.

“Well, you know me and my ninja skills.” Audra pushed up a smile.

“Do you have a minute?”

“Yeah, sure.” She relinquished the phone, gladly, and tucked the card into her pocket. “What’s up?”

Tess leaned back against the counter. She folded her arms, her sass and smile missing. “We ran into a problem this morning with Mrs. Wilfred.”

Mrs. Wilfred ... the original “Crazy Cat Lady.”

“Don’t tell me she had an issue with me needing to reschedule,” Audra said. “That woman cancels on me all the time.”

“She showed up for the appointment. When you weren’t here, she went on a major rant. And when I say ‘major,’ I mean she could be heard from Pluto.”

Audra would never pass off blame, unless it didn’t belong to her. “Tess, I phoned the front desk. They said they’d call her.”

“She didn’t get the message in time. Apparently, with having to take her cats home, she had to miss breakfast with the Red Hat Society—which for her, as you well know, is earth-shattering. I would’ve handled the vaccines myself if my morning hadn’t already been packed.”

Audra groaned. After departing from the school later than planned, she’d hit a deadlock on 1-205 and had no option but to cancel. “I’m sorry for missing it, but seriously, the freeway was a parking lot.”

“Believe me, I understand. It wouldn’t have been a big deal except . . .”

Audra steeled herself before asking, “Except?”

“Hector was here.”

A vision of the full scene took shape: Hector Petra, the semiretired Greek vet who’d founded the clinic decades ago, dropped in only on occasion. He had a fairly hands-off style, so long as customer service was up to par.

“And, to make matters worse,” Tess went on, “a reporter from
The Oregonian
stopped by just then. He was snooping for info about you and Jack.”

Unbelievable. By now the journalistic buzzards should have had other targets to circle.

“What did you tell him?”

“That we had no comment, like you’d asked.”

Audra dropped her shoulders and sighed. “Thank you.”

Tess glanced toward the hall, a confirmation of privacy. She continued in a lowered voice. “When Hector asked, I told him you’d been flying out to see relatives. He bought it, but he’s still concerned about you being distracted. He said you’re welcome to take a few days off if that would help.”

If only a vacation were all Audra needed.

“It’s really not necessary. I appreciate it though.”

“But while you’re waiting for your interview—”

“The spot’s been filled,” Audra informed her, which fully solidified the outcome. “I got the call last night.”

Tess paused, taking this in. “I can’t say I’m entirely sad about that.”

A laugh slipped from Audra’s mouth. She was well aware of her friend’s hope that the plan to relocate was a temporary phase.

“On a serious note,” Tess said. “You doing okay?”

“Yeah. Fine. Just need to look for other options, is all.”

Tess tipped her head forward, peering at her. “Sweetie—and I say this with a whole lotta love—you look like doggy doo.” The girl was never one to sugarcoat. “For heaven’s sake, tell me what’s going on. Aside from the job.”

The invitation hung there like the crest of a wave. Audra felt the pull of its tide, anchored to the drawings tucked into her purse. A Nazi in an electric chair. Jack and Audra falling from the sky.

A twist of angst tightened her chest, along with the need to purge. “It’s Jack. He’s been struggling with pretty bad nightmares.”

Tess nodded, waiting for more.

“The school asked me to come in this morning. That’s part of why I was late. They’re worried about some pictures Jack’s been drawing in class. All of them about death.”

A gentle smile played on Tess’s lips. “Oh, yeah. I know that meeting. Been to a couple of them actually.”

“You have?”

Audra didn’t intend to sound so surprised. But the gal was a bionic supermom. PTA President of her daughter’s grade school. Fund-raising co-chair of her son’s lacrosse team. And when it came to baking, she threw off the curve. If she weren’t such a good person, a dozen other moms would have hired a hit on her by now.

“Grace had the same issues,” Tess explained, “back in kindergarten, when Russ was in chemo.”

“My gosh, of course.” Audra should have thought of that.

“She was fascinated by the idea of dying and where we go from here. It lasted quite a while, even after he went into remission. Cooper didn’t say much about it. I think as the older brother—he was in fourth grade at the time—and just from being a boy, he wanted to look like the strong one. But eventually I do remember him having some pretty rough dreams. I guess, sooner or later his brain had to deal with all those emotions.”

Now, three years later, Tess’s husband appeared so healthy, it was easy to forget the challenges the family had faced.

“You know what?” Tess said, a revelation. “That might be why Jack had a problem with flying. Not just from fear of crashing—which tons of
adults
are scared of, by the way—but having so little control over life.”

“True ... I suppose that could’ve been it.”

If the theory was right, Jack had already discovered a reality that had taken Audra more than thirty years to figure out.

“What about the nightmares, though? Were Cooper’s ever ... super vivid? Like with his eyes open?”

Tess waved her hand. “All perfectly normal. Just talk to Jack about it. I’m sure you’ll both feel a lot better.”

In many ways Audra already did. Everyone could be worrying over nothing.

What was it Devon used to say?
Nuttin’ but a scratch.
Blood would be pouring from a cut on Jack’s knee, or his elbow swelling from a fall off his skateboard, but hearing that assurance always calmed him right down. Even from the start, whenever Jack took a small tumble while learning to walk Devon would instantly clap and cheer; in response, their son would giggle rather than cry.

Bottom line, for a child the problem was only big if you told them as much.

“Speaking of kids.” Tess regarded her watch. “Cooper’s got practice today, so it’s my turn to drive Grace to equestrian. I’d better get some charts done. And hey, I almost forgot. Any time you and Jack want to ride my sister-in-law’s horse, just say the word. Tracy said you two are more than welcome.”

“But ... isn’t that how she shattered her pelvis before?”

“No, no. That happened from a snowmobile. Chestnut is the gentlest creature ever. You should get to know him yourself. Swing by the stable during the summer, or in the fall if it’s easier.”

Audra noted her friend’s insertion of an enticement to stick around. “I’ll keep it in mind,” she said with a smile.

Tess gave her a look, acknowledging the failed attempt. “All right, back to the salt mines.” She started for the hallway but dragged to a stop. Turning back, she spoke with all the enthusiasm of performing a full day of dental cleanings. “A friend of mine works at a pet clinic in Boston. He happened to mention they’re hunting for another vet. I could pass your info along if you want.”

Audra perked. She’d always thought of Boston as an intriguing city, rich in history and culture and academics. Great benefits for Jack in the years to come. “I’ll owe you one.”

“More like one million. But yes. You will.”

As Tess departed, Audra recalled her earlier mission. She dug into her pocket and retrieved the therapist’s card.

She scanned the text once more, and ripped the card in half.