by Kris Tualla
“Yes. Do that.”
Their food arrived and conversation halted while the plates were served. Then Kyle said, “We could wait and be married just before you ship out so we could still see each other every day…”
Tor shook his head definitively. “No. Absolutely not. Who knows what could happen? An accident, a blizzard, a sudden change in plans—I’m not taking any chances that my son won’t have my name.”
“Your son, is it?” Kyle laughed. “All right, then. A boy it shall be.”
“Tor Solberg Hansen.” Tor lifted his beer in toast. “To my American Norwegian son.”
Kyle lifted her glass of plain 7-Up, still laughing. “You do realize this baby is already a boy or a girl. What’s the feminine of Tor?”
“There are too many to list.” Tor waved a dismissive hand. “Make one up, if you want.”
He clinked his glass against hers and drained it. Then he leaned forward. “Kiss me.”
“Gladly.” And she did.
November 11, 1944
Scheduling the chaplain and getting time in the chapel wasn’t as easy as Tor thought it would be. Now that the Tenth Mountain Division was expecting their orders to come through any day, dozens of wartime couples were turning their romances into legal marriages while there was still time.
Tor had secured the four o’clock in the afternoon slot and he and Kyle had the chapel to themselves for half an hour before the last ceremony of the day would be performed.
He bought Kyle a wedding ring yesterday after they got the license—a gold band inlaid with three small diamonds—and he felt for it again, confirming it was still in his pocket.
He’d asked Torger to be his best man, but Kyle didn’t have anyone as maid of honor, claiming she really didn’t know any one at the camp who was special enough to her.
“It’s fine,” she insisted and smiled. “All that matters is that you are there.”
They also agreed to wear their dress uniforms and not spend money on new clothing that she would wear once, and he would abandon when he was deployed. Tor smiled at the thought.
My wife is a practical woman.
A typical Norwegian.
His mother was going to love her.
Tor and Kyle really hadn’t talked much about where they would live when the war was over. They agreed not to make any decisions about their future after the war until it ended and he came home.
Tor knew Kyle wanted to get as much as possible out of the Readjustment Act, especially since her permanent exit from Viking, Minnesota was being cast in concrete this very afternoon.
He could probably stand to live in America while she finished her education, as long as their eventual return to Norway was agreed on.
I want my son to understand where and who he comes from.
Tor and Torger entered the camp’s chapel and waited in the narthex for the three-thirty ceremony to finish and those guests to leave.
The door kept opening and members of Tor’s squad entered on blasts of winter air, accompanied by members of his previous training groups. Frank Collins was there, as well as Friedl Pfeifer.
A beaming Kossin walked up and slapped him on the shoulder. “Congratulations, sir.”
“Thank you, private.” Tor pointed. “How’s the leg?”
“Good as new. Maybe better. I’m skiing like a pro now.”
The door opened again and Kyle stepped inside. She wore her fitted drab-green four-button blazer with the calf-length flared skirt. Her blonde hair was rolled stylishly below her pipe-edge cap.
If Tor hadn’t known she was pregnant, he wouldn’t have noticed the slight bulge of her abdomen.
Now he wondered how he missed it.
He smiled at her. “My beautiful bride.”
She smiled back. “My handsome Norseman.”
*****
Tor wore his drab-green Norwegian Army captain’s uniform with its three-starred collars and King Haakon the Seventh’s crest on his arm. Sewn to his sleeve below it was the barrel-shaped blue and white Tenth insignia with its two red crossed swords, topped by the new Mountain tab.
Kyle still couldn’t believe that this six-and-a-half foot Nordic god—yes, she’d mentally succumbed to the annoying but accurate nickname—was about to become her husband. And that tonight she was going to be in his bed with every right to stay there.
They decided not to ask for an overnight pass for tonight, deferring their plans until she was discharged and only Tor needed to request leave. His three days had been approved and their reservation at the Brown Palace confirmed.
However, as soon as their ceremony was finished today they would drive into Leadville on a day pass and check into a cozy little inn where they’d have supper served in their room. Then they’d be all alone until they needed to drive back to Camp Hale and check in by midnight.
It wasn’t a perfect plan, but it was a satisfactory one.
The door from the chapel into the narthex burst open and a couple ran out, laughing and holding hands while being chased by a dozen cheering well-wishers. Tor lifted one eyebrow and looked askance at Kyle.
“We’ll be more dignified,” she assured him. “We’re Norwegian after all.”
Torger went inside to see what was going on and then popped back out. “He’s ready for us.”
Tor offered Kyle his arm. She took a firm hold on it and smiled up at him, happier than she could imagine. Together, they entered the little church.
*****
Tor repeated his vows with fervent sincerity while he held Kyle’s hands and looked into her eyes which were mostly green today, either because of her green uniform or her happiness.
Most likely both.
If Teigen could see him now, Tor figured his brother would have a heart attack. Happily marrying the woman he loved? About to become a father? This was the last thing Teigen would expect from him.
Teigen was engaged over five years ago and was supposed to be married in nineteen-forty. Sure, the war and his fiancée’s politics caused him to eventually break the engagement, but Teigen was much farther down the marriage path than Tor had ever thought of being.
I can’t wait to write him and tell him.
Tor would have smiled at the thought if he wasn’t already grinning like a fool.
“I, Kyle Solberg, take you, Tor Hansen, to be my lawfully wedded husband.”
Bliss.
*****
Some jokers had decorated the sedan that Kyle and Tor were taking into Leadville. The window paint declared they were Just Married and empty tin cans were tied to the bumper.
“So much for dignity,” Tor grumbled.
Kyle laughed. “This is the American part of the celebration.”
Torger stepped in front of them. “Before you two go, I have a little surprise for everybody. Come to the Officer’s Club.”
Tor looked at Kyle. She looked a little guilty, he thought.
“Did you know about this?”
“Maybe. Some of it.” She leaned closer and murmured, “Don’t worry. We won’t stay long.”
When they entered a private room at the Officer’s Club, Tor was dumbstruck. In the center of the table was a foot-and-a-half-tall Kransekake—a Norwegian wreath cake made from stacked flat almond cakes in decreasing sizes.
“Not only did your bride help me present you with a traditional Norwegian wedding cake…” Torger lifted a cloth napkin which was covering a bottle. “But I was able to get a very rare—in America—bottle of Linie Aquavit!”
Tor clapped his hands, thrilled to his core by Kyle and Torger’s efforts. “This day could not be better!”
Kyle and Tor posed for pictures by the wreath cake and fed pieces of it to each other for more photos, then toasted each other with the Linie.
“Tell me when you’re ready to go,” Kyle said. “Torger assures me he’ll save anything that’s left over for us.”
Tor pulled his wife into a hug and a solid kiss. “I am a blessed man this day.” He smiled at he
r. “Now let’s get out of here.”
*****
Kyle’s memory of making love with Tor in the forest was embarrassingly hazy but she remembered she liked it. The only thing making her nervous this afternoon was that, as intimate as they had often been, she was never completely unclothed in front of him.
When they arrived at the inn just after five-thirty, Tor asked that their dinner be served at seven.
“We have business to get to first,” he whispered as they climbed the staircase to the second floor. “And possibly again afterwards.”
A thrill of anticipation zinged through Kyle. She had no argument with his plans.
Now she stood in the bathroom wearing her only nightgown and nothing else. When her husband took it off her, she would be naked.
Would Tor be naked when she came out?
Only one way to know.
Kyle took a deep breath and opened the bathroom door.
Well look at that.
He is.
Tor turned around and faced her. He held out his arms.
Kyle walked across the small room and into his embrace. One passionate kiss later, her nightgown was on the floor and she no longer worried about it.
Whatever intimacy they had shared previously paled in comparison to the things Tor showed her today. He was tender, slow-paced, and paid attention to her entire body—until he finally groaned the end of his restraint and entered her.
Kyle was completely his, he made sure of it. When she peaked, she actually cried tears of joy. Nothing could have prepared her for the intensity of joining her body with a man she was deeply in love with, married to, and free to enjoy as often as she wanted.
She laid on the bed in his arms while he kissed away her tears. Nothing else that happened in her life would ever top this moment, she was sure of it.
“I love you, Tor,” she whispered.
He nuzzled her ear sending a wash of gooseflesh over her skin. “And I love you, Kyle.”
His hand slid over her tingling skin to her belly and rested there, warm and heavy. “I love both of you.”
Chapter
Thirty Six
November 20, 1944
Camp Hale, Colorado
Five days ago, the Tenth Mountain Division was told that they would ship out to Italy in stages. The Eighty-sixth Infantry—Tor’s division—was leaving first.
On December first.
“That’s eleven days after we get back from our honeymoon,” Kyle said when Tor told her. “It’s such a short time there’s no point in my trying to find a room to rent. I think I should just stay in the Leadville Inn until you go so we can spend as much time together as possible.”
Tor agreed. “Maybe you can leave your things there while we’re in Denver and only take what you need for those three days with you.”
That was exactly what she did.
Now she was alone in the inn at eleven-fifteen at night, looking at the neatly packed detritus of her last year-and-a-half, and wondering what her life would be like starting on December second.
Tor kissed her goodbye a dozen times before he headed to Camp Hale to check in. Kyle held her sorrow back until he was gone, and only then did she allow herself to cry.
Denver already felt like a dream.
Three days together with no one else around them demanding attention or placing rules on their behavior was heaven. She and Tor never stopped touching each other—holding hands, arms around waists, kisses both affectionate and passionate—as if they were both trying to save up a lifetime of vivid memories while they could.
Kyle had deliberately not allowed her thoughts to plan beyond December first. She would take her marriage one precious day at a time after that. That was how war was. There were no guarantees.
I am blessed today, Lord. Thank you for my husband and his child.
Tomorrow she would go to the camp and see if there was anything she could do there for the next ten days. And she would miss Tor every night that she slept here alone.
Tonight, not wanting to sleep yet and with no reason to rise early in the morning, she decided it was time to write to her parents. She dug out a pen and stationery from one of her boxes and settled on the floor, using the oval coffee table as a desk.
There was no point in delaying her news or beating around the bush.
Dearest Mamma and Pappa ~
I am writing with the most startling news and I hope you will forgive me and be happy for me, because I could not be happier for myself.
I am married.
On November 11th I married the Norwegian Army captain, Tor Hansen, whom I came to Colorado to translate for. We fell in love months ago, but until Erik broke our engagement I wasn’t free to accept Tor’s proposal.
Tor is shipping out on December 1st to fight in Italy with the Tenth Mountain Division and we wanted to be married before he left.
There is more news that I hope you will welcome: you are to be grandparents.
I confess that the baby and the marriage were out of order, and I ask your forgiveness for this. When Erik’s letter arrived in July, coldly releasing me from our promises and demanding that I be happy about his impending marriage, I found comfort with my dearest friend.
Once I discovered there was a baby on the way and I told him, Tor happily married me three days later. Your first grandchild ~ which Tor insists will be a boy ~ will be born in late April.
I have still more news.
Because of my delicate condition I have been honorably discharged from the army and will be coming home to spend the holidays with you. While I’m there I’ll claim my benefits under the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act, which I understand is generally being called the G.I. Bill, and decide where I want to live and what sort of education I want to pursue while I await my husband’s return.
I’ll call you on the phone when I know what time I’ll land in Fargo on December 1st.
I love you and can’t wait to see you both. I’m sorry there was no time for you to be at the wedding, but I do have pictures to show you. The army’s demands in wartime are never convenient.
Please be happy for me.
All my love,
Kyle Solberg Hansen
*****
Tor lay in his bed, in his room, in his barracks, and had never been more lonely in his entire life.
After almost thirty-two years as an intentional bachelor, it only took three days alone with his wife to transform him into a husband. And now he missed her soft warmth beside him so deeply that it hurt in his chest.
How will I survive leaving her?
The next ten days were going to require plenty of hard work and Tor expected that would distract him, at least during daylight. There was a lot to do to pack everything the division needed for the journey to war.
The first leg of that journey involved twenty buses carrying nine hundred Eighty-sixth Infantry men from Denver to Camp Patrick Henry in Virginia. They said it would take four or five days for the caravan to transport the soldiers the eighteen hundred miles.
There was nothing Tor liked better than folding his tall frame into bus benches for hours upon hours. It almost made him nauseated to think of it now.
From there the Eighty-sixth would board a ship to Italy. After that, he had no idea.
November 30, 1944
Camp Hale, Colorado
Tor and Kyle held on to each other as if their lives depended on never letting go.
Civilians were allowed into camp that night to say goodbye to their loved ones who were leaving in the twenty bus caravan before dawn the next morning and similar scenes were playing out all around them.
Kyle was determined not to cry. She didn’t want Tor’s last memory of her to be with a blotchy face and swollen red-rimmed eyes.
“I’ll write if I can,” he promised. “I don’t know where we’ll be or if there’ll be any post offices nearby, but I’ll try.”
“I understand. And I won’t worry if I don’t hear from you.” Kyle rubbed his
cheek, enjoying the rasp of his days-old beard. “Unless some army guys show up at my door, I’ll know you’re still safe.”
“Hopefully we can kick Hitler’s ass soundly and get out of there fast.” Tor’s lips curved. “Like the sign says, we have a date with the son-of-a-bitch.”
Kyle forced a smile. “That will be my daily prayer, I promise you.”
Tor kissed her again, a slow tender sort of kiss. Then he sighed and rested his forehead against hers.
“I can’t wait until our son is born and you can come with me to Arendal.”
“And I can’t wait to see Norway and meet your family,” she whispered, not trusting her voice.
“They’re going to love you.”
Kyle swallowed and forbade any tears to appear.
The camp siren sounded eleven o’clock, calling the visits to an end. Tor put his arm around her and he kissed the top of her head.
“Let’s walk slowly so you’re on the very last bus to town.”
They did.
When the line was nearly gone, Kyle threw her arms around Tor. “Thank you for giving me a part of you to live with. If I didn’t have your son, I don’t think I could say goodbye.”
“So you’re a believer now?”
Holding her close with one arm, Tor slid his other hand inside her coat. His broad palm and long fingers pressed against her growing womb.
“Take good care of him.” His voice cracked.
Kyle laid a hand over his, tears rolling defiantly down her chilled cheeks. “He’ll know you, Tor. No matter what. I promise you he’ll know everything about his amazing father.”
“I love you, Kyle.” Tor sniffed and his breath hitched. “You’re the only woman I’ve ever loved.”
“And you’re the only man.” She looked into his eyes. “Now I know what love really is.”
Tor kissed her one last time and then pushed her toward the bus. Kyle climbed the steps and took a seat near the back.
