The Top Gun's Return

by Kathleen Creighton

  "Hang on just a minute, hon'," Jess was saying, "there's somebody here wants to talk to you." With an abrupt, almost angry thrust, she handed the phone to Tris.

  He took it calmly; his new crooked smile was fixed firmly to his lips as he put the receiver to his ear and said, "Hello…Sammi June?"

  "Daddy?" A high, breaking voice. A little girl's voice.

  Something burst, stinging, inside his head. He croaked, "Hey, baby girl…" Suddenly he was sitting on the edge of the bed with his elbows braced on his knees, head bowed, one hand shading his eyes. Dimly, thankfully, he heard Jess get up and go into the bathroom, as tears dropped from the end of his nose.

  Chapter 5

  Toddling along in the autobahn's slow lane at 100 kilometers per hour, Jessie flicked sideways glances alternately between the freshly plowed fields of the German landscape and Tris's silent profile. Reassured by the fact that he hadn't made any comments on her driving so far, she edged the Ford's speed up to 110 and settled back in the driver's seat.

  "There, now-it's not so awful, is it?" she said lightly, flexing tense fingers on the steering wheel. She said it in a teasing way, but the truth was, she'd been a little annoyed by all the fuss over her driving, with herself more than with Tristan. It was true her driving had always given him fits, but that had been a long time ago. She'd been more than competent behind the wheel of a car for a good many years now, and there wasn't any reason in the world why she should start having doubts about her driving skills just because Tris happened to be sitting beside her. Okay, she'd never driven in a foreign country before, but as Lieutenant Commander Rees said, it wasn't as though this was England where they drove on the wrong side of the road. Interstate or autobahn, they both looked the same, and the signs were pretty much universal, so what was the big deal?

  Why do I keep going back to where I was when I first met him? That was eighteen years ago. I'm not-I can't be that person now. It's not who I am.

  "You're doin' okay." Tristan glanced at her and a grin flickered. "Long as you don't get us run over."

  "I'm doin' 110!"

  "Kilometers, darlin'-that's sixty-six miles an hour. That'd get you a ticket for obstructing traffic in Atlanta."

  Jessie snorted. "Oh, well-Atlanta drivers are crazy, you can't go by them." She said it in a scoffing tone, but it was hard to hide a smile and a little shiver-of what, hopefulness? Encouragement? Optimism? It had been two days since the phone call to Sammi June, and although Tris still wouldn't stay the night with her, he seemed a little more like himself every day.

  But he still hasn't kissed me.

  Her heart gave a queer little bump at the thought. She glanced over at him, frowning, but he'd gone back to gazing out the window, silently watching the fields and billboards and the occasional town flash by.

  The weather was holding fine and cool, and the sky was a clear and lovely blue between billows of puffy white clouds. It felt good to be out on the open highway, going somewhere together, just the two of them…almost like old times. Freedom, she thought, after the days of being confined to the guest house and the adjoining towns. And her throat tightened as she wondered what it must be like for Tristan, whose days since being rescued from an Iraqi prison had so far been spent almost entirely within the confines of a military hospital, in an unrelenting schedule of tests, therapies and debriefings.

  She said softly, "It must seem so strange to you. After…"

  He jerked his gaze away from the window, giving her his familiar half smile. "I was thinking how normal it feels."

  "Normal! How is that possible?"

  He shrugged. "I don't know, there was a period right at first when I was sort of in shock, I guess, when it didn't seem real. It was like it was a dream, and any minute I was going to wake up and I'd be back there… I think I was afraid to believe it. But then…your brain makes some kind of adjustment or something, and where you are, no matter how crazy or terrible or impossible it is, that becomes your norm. Your brain adapts to whatever your reality is." He paused. "That's what people do, I guess. They adapt." His face darkened and he added, "Some better than others, obviously."

  She held her breath, waiting for more, but he'd lapsed once again into silence, watching the world flash by the car windows.

  You don't have to tell me about adapting, she thought as the lightness and optimism inside her suddenly congealed into a cold, gray lump of anger, and tears peppered her eyes. I know what it means to have the man you love, your husband and the father of your child, go away and then come back…go away and then come back. Go away and then not come back. I've had to go from being a dependent wife and stay-at-home mom to being a single parent and breadwinner. From a woman who deferred to my husband in every little thing to one who now, on a daily basis, holds the lives of the tiniest, sickest babies in my hands. Don't tell me what it is to adapt!

  "Hey, now you're cookin'," Tristan said.

  Blinking back the tears, Jessie glanced at the speedometer and saw that the needle was hovering around 140. Muttering a word her momma wouldn't have approved of, she eased up on the gas pedal while beside her Tris chuckled softly.

  They left the autobahn behind sooner than she'd expected and quickly wound down through woods and hillsides dotted with grazing sheep and into a deep river valley bordered on both sides by vineyards. Now the road followed the river's twisting, looping path, criss-crossing it on medieval-looking bridges, passing through towns of picture-book yellow and white half-timbered houses on narrow, brick-paved streets. The houses all had roofs of slate tiles laid like fish scales, and some were decorated with carved wood or patterns in contrasting brick and stone. Here and there, climbing up walls or creeping across arches, Jess saw the pale-green tendrils of new grapevines.

  She wished now that she didn't have to be the one driving. She wanted to be free to look and look and look. Instead, she had to content herself with glimpses snatched from bridge crossings and high points in the road, of the river and its traffic of stately white riverboats and great cargo barges. Vineyards covered both sides of the valley, from gently rolling plains to mountainsides so steep they seemed inaccessible except to mountain goats and eagles. And here and there, high on one of those mountains, above the slate rooftops of a town-and she would have missed them entirely if Tristan hadn't pointed them out for her-the ruins of medieval castles.

  In one of those towns, one even smaller than all the rest, huddled on a spit of land that barely missed being an island where the river looped back upon itself, he instructed her to stop. She pulled into a parking area next to what appeared to have been a train station but was now a grassy park that meandered along the riverbank among new-leafed trees.

  "Are you sure this is it?" Jessie asked, peering through the windows, searching signs attached to the quaint-looking hotels and restaurants that fronted on the river for the village's name. She'd been too busy reading warnings of rapidly decreasing speed limits to have noticed on the way into town.

  "Has to be," said Tristan. He didn't bother to consult the road map that was spread across his lap; they already knew the town they'd come to find wasn't on it. No surprise-it was so small, he'd told her, it didn't have a single store, much less a post office. "That was Traben-Trarbach back there, and Dad said Wolf was on a piece of land where the river makes a loop. This must be it. Come on-let's see if we can find somebody to ask."

  She turned off the engine and opened the car door. The coolness of the breeze surprised her-the bright April sunshine and intense blue sky were misleading-and she reached into the back seat for her coat. As she belted it around her-the same borrowed raincoat that had felt so inadequate in New York City-she watched Tristan maneuver himself and his cane out of the car, then shrug into his own jacket. He was wearing some of the clothes she'd bought for him-black cargo pants, a heather-toned turtleneck pullover bulky enough to camouflage his painful thinness. The jacket was sleek black leather. With the silver peppering his dark hair and a bit of a shadow on his jaws, he looked l
ean and dark and dangerous, and, Jessie thought, quite European. Sammi June would approve.

  For herself, looking at him gave her a queer little kick under her ribs, and her pulse quickened. He looks so different, she thought, for maybe the thousandth time. He'd always been so open, so carefree, the quintessential American flyboy, wholesome and uncomplicated as apples. Now he looked…mysterious. Forbidding…exciting. Damned attractive, but…so very different.

  She snagged her pocketbook from the back seat and hooked it over her shoulder and locked the car. She was pocketing the keys when she caught a glimpse of something that drove every disquieting thought from her mind-for a moment, anyway.

  "Tris," she cried, "look-is that-are those…"

  Tristan had already started toward the row of hotels and restaurants across the street. He turned to see what she was pointing at, then changed direction and came around the car to join her. "Those? What, you've never seen swans before?"

  Too awed to answer, Jessie was edging closer to the riverbank, where, in the shallows just offshore, two huge white birds were nibbling and nuzzling among the reeds. She could see others now, too, on the river, gliding in graceful formation.

  "Not like this, I haven't," she whispered as Tristan came up beside her. "I thought they were just in theme parks and zoos." She glanced at him and saw that he was grinning at her, amused at her naiveté, so mature himself, so superior-the old Tris. And the old Jessie might have felt embarrassed, young and a bit silly, but the Jessie she was now gave him a jab with her elbow and said, "And don't you try to tell me you have, either, mister. Aren't they the most beautiful thing you've ever seen?"

  It was a moment before he answered, in a strangely thickened voice, "Not the most beautiful, no…"

  She glanced at him and met his gaze for barely an instant before he turned. The naked hunger in his eyes shocked her.

  Shaken, now, and jangling inside, she followed him across the parking lot. At that hour-late morning-in the middle of the week, there were no other people about, and since it was obviously too early in the season for tourists, Jessie wondered whether any of the business establishments that catered to them would even be open. Tris, however, appeared to have no such doubts. He chose the closest one, a small Gasthaus of yellow and white stucco decorated with carved half timbers, and a sign in front that was artistically hand-painted with heavily laden grapevines and crossed wineglasses. He stomped confidently up the steps to the front door and turned the handle.

  The heavy wooden door opened onto dimness and silence. That is, until a voice, friendly but cracked and hoarse-a smoker's voice-called out to them in German.

  Jessie's heart sank, but once again Tris wasn't the least bit deterred. "Ah," he said, catching Jessie's hand as he veered toward the voice, "yes, hello."

  The owner of the voice, a middle-aged man with very little hair and great pouches under his eyes, came out from behind a high counter, stubbing out what appeared to be a hand-rolled cigarette on the way. Obviously accustomed to tourists of all nationalities, the man switched to slow and careful English.

  "Yes. Please. Come in. May I help you?"

  Jessie was surprised when Tris, instead of asking the directions they'd come for, took a stool at the counter and ordered them both glasses of wine.

  "It's a courtesy," he murmured in an aside to her while their host was busy opening a bottle and filling their glasses-unusual little glasses with etched leaves on the bowl and stubby, twisty green stems. "Besides, this is what the place is known for. According to Dad, it's all it's known for. Can't very well visit without sampling the local product, can we?"

  Jessie had never been that fond of wine, but she discovered she actually liked this one, a white wine somewhat on the sweet side. Since she was thirsty and it had been several hours since breakfast, she drained her glass rather quickly. Their host, who turned out to be a naturally gregarious fellow and obviously hungry for company, promptly refilled it before he went back to chatting amiably with Tris.

  He told them his name was Sigfrid, and when Tris returned the favor along with a brisk handshake, beamed and said, "Ah-Bauer. You must be German, then, yes?"

  When Tris explained that his father had grown up in that very town, and asked if Sigfrid might have known him, the Gasthaus keeper reluctantly shook his head and explained that he himself was from Traben-Trarbach, all of ten kilometers down the road, and had only taken over the Gasthaus from his wife's family twenty years or so ago. He readily gave them directions to the town's only cemetery, though, and urged them to visit the Kloster while they were there.

  "Kloster?" Jessie whispered when Sigfrid had slipped away with their Euros to make change. "Is that what I think it is?"

  Tristan nodded. "The cloister-Dad told me about it. That's the local ruin. It's on the hilltop above town-Sigfrid says you can see the whole loop of the river from up there. Apparently they have outdoor concerts during summer tourist season and at harvest festival time, so you can drive most of the way, and it's an easy hike after that. Why, would you like to see it?"

  Jessie twirled off her stool and was surprised to discover that she had quite a pleasant little buzz going from the wine. How many times, she wondered, had Sigfrid refilled her glass when she wasn't looking? "It's up to you," she said solemnly. Tris's only reply was a chuckle, which, along with the wine she'd drunk made something warm and shivery pool in her insides.

  They said their farewells to Sigfrid, who followed them out the door to the accompaniment of what was apparently the German version of the Southerner's "Y'all come back, now, y'hear?"

  Jessie was making her careful way down the steps ahead of Tristan when she noticed a series of wooden markers affixed to the stucco wall of the building. Each had the initials H.W. burned into it, followed by a four-digit number she thought must be a year. The topmost marker, several feet above her head, bore the number 1784. A foot or two below that was one marked 1993.

  "What does 'H.W.' stand for?" she asked Sigfrid.

  "Hochwasser," he answered unhelpfully, and it was Tristan who provided the translation.

  "That's 'high water'-the mark where the water came to in that particular flood year."

  Jessie stared at him. "You're kidding. You mean-" She looked at Sigfrid, who shrugged and muttered something, evidently the German equivalent of "C'est la vie."

  "The river floods," Tristan said with the same shrug. "It's a narrow valley, and when conditions are right…hey, it's not that big a deal here. They expect it, and cope with it. Like Canadians and snow." He pointed to a marker halfway up the row. "This one, 1954-that must be the one Dad remembers. They lived-" he paused, then gestured toward a pair of windows high in the gable of the Gasthaus, two floors above the door "-right there."

  Jessie gasped. "Right here? Your dad lived in this house?"

  He gave another shrug. "Might have. I don't know which one, exactly, but he told me after the war his mother worked as a cook in one of the Gasthauses fronting the river, and they lived in a room upstairs." His dark smile flickered. "So at least they never went hungry. In the wintertime he walked to school in Traben-Trarbach. Summers he worked in the vineyards-gave whatever money he made to his mother. He left for Canada the year after the flood. He was eighteen then."

  They waved a final goodbye to Sigfrid and went back to the car. There were others out enjoying the brisk sunshine now-a middle-aged woman walking a dog, a young mother with two small children bundled in sweaters and knit caps against the chilly wind. Jessie waved to them and got tentative-and surprised-little waves in return.

  At Al Sharpe's suggestion, Jessie had asked the guest house kitchen to pack a small cooler with sandwiches and fruit for Tristan, who was almost constantly hungry and tended, Al had confided to her with a grin, to get testy when forced to wait for his meals. Still feeling the effects of the wine she'd drunk, Jessie wasn't at all hungry and nibbled on a plum while Tris downed a chunk of thick German wurst wrapped in a stubby bun and slathered with hot German mustard. After
ward she tossed bits of the bun to the swans, while Tris leaned on his cane and watched her with unreadable eyes and a crooked smile.

  Back in the car, following Sigfrid's directions they turned uphill, passing through a tiny triangular town "square" where a statue of a wolf loomed menacingly from a bed of yellow daffodils. The narrow, brick-paved street wound past slender stone churches with tall slate steeples, and between yellow and white half-timbered houses with carved shutters. Here and there Jessie saw an elderly man or woman out in front of a house tending a postage-stamp-size garden. She waved at them all. In her mellow state she thought the town was enchanting-like a toy village. It reminded her of Disney movies-Pinocchio, maybe.

  They found the cemetery easily. It was a rectangular plot enclosed by a thick green hedge located just at the edge of the town, before the vineyards began. Within this secluded lot, separated by immaculate gravel pathways, each grave-site was framed by a low curbing of concrete or stone, and inside each frame was a tiny garden, lovingly tended, with a carved headstone at one end. Armed only with a date, Tristan and Jessie wandered the gravel pathways until they found the gravestone they were looking for. It bore a simple cross, the name Hannah Bauer, and the dates: 1906-1975.

  "There," Tris said. "That's my grandmother. Dad's mother."

  "She wasn't very old," Jessie murmured. She found the child-size gardens enchanting. Kneeling to touch the fat purple stalk of a hyacinth bloom, she looked up at Tristan, silhouetted against the sky. "Who tends them?"