A Woman's Place

by Lynn Austin

  Her friends from work. Why wasn’t she at work? Ginny looked around. She recognized this room. Every time she’d opened her eyes she had found herself in this strange room. It looked like a hospital. But the only reason she could think of to be in a hospital was to have a baby—and no one had brought a baby to her. Rosa was the one who’d had a baby.

  She tried to reach out to Harold and get his attention, but her arms wouldn’t move. She looked down at her body, lying prone beneath the white sheets. Both of her arms were encased in white plaster casts.

  “… I know I act stern and demanding sometimes,” Harold was saying. “I wish I could change. My father was the same way and I always hated the way he spoke to everybody—and now I’m doing the same thing. I think I come on strong to hide how weak I really feel. You told me once that the reason you fell in love with me was because I was so strong and decisive. Well … sometimes I don’t feel that way at all, and I worry that you’ll change your mind about me if you find out I’m a phony. Or if you discover that you’re strong enough to make it without me… .”

  Why was he talking this way, saying all these things? The man looked like Harold, spoke with Harold’s voice, but Harold didn’t talk this way in real life. She must be dreaming. Ginny closed her eyes again, but the Harold beside her bed kept on talking.

  “My love for you and my need for you scare me sometimes. I need your tenderness and I don’t know why I push you away. I guess I don’t want to admit my own weakness. I know that you think I’m cold. I … I’m not cold, Ginny—I’m scared! Scared that you’ll stop loving me. So I push you away, telling myself that I don’t need you. But I do. Please come back to me. I love you so much.”

  She opened her eyes again. Harold was looking right at her. “I’m here,” she wanted to say. “I love you, too.” But she couldn’t remember how to make the words travel from where they formed inside her head, out into the room. She must be ill. Something must have happened to her. Harold’s eyes filled with tears.

  “Say something, Ginny. Please be okay …”

  She closed her eyes again, hoping that when she opened them this dream would be over and she would be in her own bed, in her own room, with Harold asleep beside her. But when she opened them, the only thing that was different was Harold. He was no longer looking into her eyes but sat slumped in the chair again with his head bowed.

  “I loved you so much when we got married that I never wanted you to change. And I was afraid that this job would change you … that you would find out how strong and smart and capable you really are, and then you wouldn’t need me anymore. But you know what? I’ve grown to love the stronger, more confident Ginny. I love the woman you’ve become—a woman who can build ships and drive a car … and who still loves her family more than herself. We need you, Ginny. I need you… .”

  Poor Harold. He looked so lost and alone as he sat in the cold metal chair, pouring out his heart to her. She wanted to throw aside the covers and climb out of bed and gather him into her arms. She wanted to tell him that she loved him, too. Her mind and her heart begged her to do it, but her body simply wouldn’t obey.

  Move! she screamed inside her head. Move your arms! Your legs! Say something! Her vision blurred. Ginny felt tears of frustration roll down her face.

  Just then Harold lifted his head and looked at her again. “Ginny?” he whispered. “Can you hear me?”

  She blinked, and more tears rolled down her face. Harold scrambled to his feet and bent over her. He tenderly wiped her tears away. “Ginny… ?”

  “Hold me,” she whispered. And this time the words exploded from her head and out into the room.

  Harold brushed aside all the wires and tubes that surrounded her and lay down on the bed beside her. He was weeping as he gathered her gently into his arms.

  CHAPTER 39

  June 1944

  “D-day, the long-awaited Allied invasion of Europe,

  began just after midnight on June 6. Military experts claim

  it was the largest invasion force in history and included more

  than 175,000 troops, 10,000 airplanes and 4,000 ships.”

  * Helen *

  Helen rode her bicycle to Ginny Mitchell’s house right after work, still dressed in her coveralls. She wished she had a bell or a horn she could toot as she coasted to a stop in her driveway. She pulled the large manila envelope from her carrier basket and hurried up the sidewalk to ring the doorbell. Ginny answered the door herself.

  “Helen! Oh, it’s so good to see you!” The casts were off Ginny’s arms and she was able to give Helen a hug. It was so wonderful to hear Ginny’s voice again, even if her speech was still a little slow and labored.

  “I have something to show you.” Helen held up the envelope.

  “Well, come on in. Rosa is here with Joseph. Now, if only Jean were here, we’d all be together again.” As she followed her into the living room, Helen noticed that Ginny had a slight limp and still walked with a cane. But when Helen remembered the terrible fall Ginny had taken and the tenuous hours she had spent between life and death, Helen thanked God that she had recovered at all.

  “You look wonderful, Ginny.”

  “I’ll look even better when I get rid of this cane. It’s been frustrating at times, but I’m getting a little better every day.”

  Rosa jumped up to give Helen a hug, as well. Helen couldn’t get over how much the baby had grown since the last time she’d seen him. When Rosa put him on the floor, he was able to sit up all by himself.

  “I’m glad you’re here, Rosa. You’ll be interested in seeing these pictures, too.” Helen slid the glossy black-and-white photos out of the envelope and passed them to the women. “Earl Seaborn had them posted on his bulletin board, but I coaxed him into letting me borrow them to show you. What do you think?”

  “These are our ships!” Ginny said.

  “That’s right. The U.S. Army took these photos on D-day. Our landing craft were used in the invasion.”

  “Wow! I can’t believe it,” Rosa said. “Look at all our beautiful babies. Just think—we helped make them. We helped fight the war!”

  “We have every right to be proud,” Helen said.

  “I wish I could come back to work,” Ginny said. “I miss all of you so much. By the time I finish my therapy and get back to normal, the war will be over. But that’s a good thing, right?”

  “A very good thing,” Helen agreed. She noticed that Rosa had tears in her eyes as she gazed at the pictures. “How are you doing, Rosa?” she asked.

  “I’m okay. Joey keeps me pretty busy, as you can imagine. He has four teeth now.” The baby had managed to maneuver onto his tummy and was inching across the floor, away from his mother. Helen wondered if there was news of Dirk, but she hesitated to ask.

  “We still haven’t heard any more about Dirk,” Rosa said as she corralled the baby and sat him on the floor in front of her again. “It’s hard, waiting and not knowing…. It’s real hard. But Joey deserves to have a good mother, a happy mother, so I’m doing my best to be strong.”

  “How are Dirk’s parents?” Ginny asked.

  “They’re holding up. And I’m getting along with them now. They’ve been good to me, and I know they’ll take good care of Joey and me, even if … you know. I’m closer to Dirk’s mom than I ever was to my own.” Rosa scooped up the baby again as he crawled away, and he let out a howl. “The ladies at church help me, too. Almost everybody there has a loved one who is away in the service. We pray for each other.”

  “Rosa was just telling me that she works with the Ladies’ Missionary Society now,” Ginny said.

  “Yeah, but I don’t give them spiked punch anymore,” Rosa said with a smile. Helen and Ginny laughed. “One of our projects is to take Bibles and things out to the POW camp and help them with church services. I got Mrs. Voorhees to help me bake some stuff for them, too. I keep thinking that if Dirk was in a POW camp somewhere, he would appreciate it if someone took him a Bible and some cookies,
you know?”

  “Say hello to Mr. Kesler for me if you see him—” Ginny began, then stopped. “Wait. I keep forgetting that you never worked with him, Rosa. I seem to forget a lot of things these days. My memory isn’t quite the same, you know.” Ginny’s cheeks reddened, and Helen knew that she felt bad for mentioning Meinhard in front of her.

  “Actually, I’d like to see Mr. Kesler again, too,” Helen said. “Let me know the next time you’re going out to the camp, Rosa. I’ll give you a ride.”

  Helen didn’t want to stay too long and make Ginny tired. As she retrieved her bicycle and headed home, she started thinking about how everything had changed in a few short months, how they were all going their separate ways. Only Helen and Jean still worked at the shipyard. And Thelma, of course. But Rosa and Ginny had entered new phases in their lives, new beginnings. And that made Helen think about her own life.

  Production at the shipyard would be slowing down as the war neared an end. And when the soldiers returned home, they would come back to their old jobs. Perhaps it was time for Helen to make some changes, too.

  She turned abruptly at the next intersection and pedaled over to Lincoln Elementary School. She certainly wasn’t looking her best, wearing her work coveralls, and her hair disheveled from cycling, but she parked her bicycle in the rack and marched inside to see the principal.

  “I know I turned down a perfectly good job last year,” she told him without preamble. “And it’s probably too much to hope that there will be another opening this year. But if there is, I’d like to be considered.”

  A slow smile spread across his face. “Well, you may be in luck, Miss Kimball. I know of at least one teacher whose circumstances have changed, and she may not be coming back this fall. But in addition, the town of Stockton has grown so quickly in the past few years that we may need to add additional classes to accommodate all the new students.”

  Helen couldn’t help smiling, as well. “Please be sure to let me know,” she said. As she walked back through the familiar hallways, it felt right to be here this time. She had learned a great deal at the shipyard, accomplished so much. But this was where she truly belonged.

  She decided that she would tell Mr. Seaborn and Jean of her decision when she went to work the next day. But when Helen arrived, she realized there was one more loose end to tie up at the shipyard. Jean was still grieving. It would take a while to adjust to her brother’s loss, Helen knew. But Jean needed to move on with her life, the way everyone else was doing.

  “I saw Ginny and Rosa yesterday,” Helen said as she and Jean worked side-by-side.

  “How are they?”

  “Good. Then I rode over to my old elementary school and asked to be considered for a position next fall.”

  Jean stopped working and stared at Helen for a long moment. “It will be lonely here without you.”

  “We’re all moving on with our lives, Jean. And you need to move on, as well. The war is entering a new phase on all fronts. We’re winning. And I think it’s obvious that it won’t last too much longer—another year at the most. Then everything is going to change again, just as it did after Pearl Harbor.” Jean turned away to concentrate on her work again. But Helen knew by Jean’s expression that she’d heard her words.

  “I know this sounds harsh,” Helen continued, “but I’m going to say it anyway. Your brother’s life came to an end, but yours didn’t. Suppose it were the other way around. Would you want him to continue grieving for you and to stop living?”

  “No,” Jean said quietly.

  “When Jimmy wrote his last letter to me he said, ‘Get married. Live the life you deserve. Be happy.’ What do you suppose your brother’s advice to you would be?”

  “I know, I know,” Jean said, frowning.

  “And what do you suppose he would say to you about Earl Seaborn?” Helen waited for a reply, but Jean didn’t respond. “Earl is afraid to intrude on your grief, but he cares for you very much. I hope you’ll give him a chance.” An awkward silence fell between them. Helen sighed. “Listen to me, meddling in your life. And to think, we used to give Rosa a hard time about meddling! But I have just one more thing to say, Jean, before I’m finished. One of those colleges I told you about is only twenty miles away from here. I think you and I should visit there this Saturday. We can have a look around, get an application form, maybe some information about classes. I’ve been able to save up plenty of ration stamps since I’m riding my bicycle again, so I can come by for you around nine o’clock—or is that too early?” Jean shot her a quick glance. Helen saw that she was smiling.

  “Nine o’clock is okay.”

  Rosa telephoned Helen a few days later to say that she and the other church ladies were going out to the POW camp on Sunday afternoon to conduct a worship service. Helen hesitated, wondering if she was truly ready—not only to face Meinhard Kesler but to face God. But she had convinced Jean to move forward, and now Helen knew that she needed to follow her own advice.

  The beautiful wooded area around the lake stirred up so many memories of Jimmy that it brought tears to her eyes. But Helen could look at those memories now and not feel quite as much pain. She missed Jimmy Bernard. She probably would never stop missing him. But Jimmy had loved her. He had truly loved her.

  Helen sat beside Rosa in the mess hall, where she had once visited with the mayor, and listened to the Sunday service conducted in such a tangled mixture of English and German that it would have been humorous if it hadn’t been so poignant. When Helen bowed her head to pray, she was aware that God understood all of their prayers, regardless of language, and all of their needs, spoken and unspoken. Afterward, as Rosa served the cake that she and Mrs. Voorhees had baked, Helen sought out Meinhard Kesler.

  “I’m sorry for the way I treated you,” she said. “You asked for my forgiveness, but I’m the one who needs to ask for yours. I was wrong to judge you without knowing you. Wrong to assume that because you were a German that you were also a Nazi. It’s a terrible mistake to lump people into categories by nationality or race or gender, and I’m so very sorry, Mr. Kesler. The way I treated you was every bit as wrong as the racism that surfaced here in Stockton. Will you forgive me?”

  He reached for both of her hands and took them in his. “Of course, Miss Kimball. Of course.”

  She felt awkward now that she had said her piece. She groped for something to say as her hands slid free again and she folded her arms across her chest. “It looks as though the war will be over before too much longer. Before another year ends, Lord willing. I’m sure you’ll be glad to return home.”

  “I want to help my country heal,” Meinhard said, “to rebuild it without the hatred this time. I have learned that the only way to do that is to do what we have done—to ask each other for forgiveness and to rebuild our lives one person at a time.”

  As Helen walked back through the gates to the parking lot with Rosa, she felt more peaceful than she had felt in a long time. “Here—catch,” she said as she tossed the car keys to Rosa.

  “What’re these for?”

  “You need to learn to drive a car, Rosa. Get behind the wheel. I’ll teach you.”

  CHAPTER 40

  August 25, 1944

  “After four years of Nazi occupation,

  Allied forces liberated the city of Paris today.”

  * Jean *

  Jean knew that her last day at Stockton Shipyard had to come sooner or later, but when it finally arrived, it still felt bittersweet. Rosa had left the shipyard nine months ago, Ginny four months ago, and Helen two weeks ago to prepare for her new class of second-grade students. Now it was Jean’s turn. Helen had been right; she needed to move on. Jean had already registered for fall classes at the college and was looking forward to her first day, but she still felt sad as she stuck her time card into the slot and punched out for the last time.

  “I hope you’re going somewhere to celebrate.”

  Jean looked up and saw Earl Seaborn watching her, his shirtsleeve
s rolled up, his tie loosened, his withered hand safely stuffed into his pocket.

  “New beginnings should always be celebrated,” he said. “Helen told me that you’re starting college soon. Congratulations.”

  “Thank you.” Jean knew that Earl had deliberately remained in the background these past few months, giving her time and space in which to grieve. She appreciated his sensitivity—but she had missed him.

  “Actually, I don’t have any plans—to celebrate, that is.”

  “How about if we went dancing?”

  Jean hesitated as she wrestled with her heart. It felt disloyal to Johnny’s memory to have fun once again. But she remembered Helen’s advice, and before she had time to change her mind she said, “How about tomorrow night?”

  “I’ll pick you up at eight o’clock,” Earl said with a grin.

  They danced only to the slow songs. Jean still wasn’t ready to kick up her heels on the peppier ones. But the music soothed her and brightened her spirits. “I’m glad we came,” she told Earl. “Thank you.”

  “I’m just glad you decided to celebrate. It was an incredible thing that you and all the other women in America did—going to work in difficult, dangerous jobs. No one can ever say that women are the weaker sex or that a woman’s place is only in the home. You showed the world, Jean. You have a right to be proud.”

  “Have you heard some of the latest radio advertisements?” she asked. “When the war first started we heard a whole load of government propaganda telling women it was our patriotic duty to work in the war industries. Now they’re buttering us all up to return home. I heard one the other night that talked about all the great postwar jobs there were going to be for women as teachers and nurses and secretaries. It made me furious! They interviewed a woman who said she’d be glad to lay down her tools and live happily ever after as a housewife again. Another one said it was the right thing to do to give the men their jobs back.” She saw Earl cover his mouth to hide a smile and stopped. “What’s so funny?”