The Wedding Tree

by Robin Wells

Becky had colic and cried round the clock. She had a raw, gnawing, shrieky cry that just wore on everyone’s last nerve. I remember being exhausted—just beyond exhausted. Charlie was irked and impatient. I had trouble fixing dinner or keeping things tidy or being able to sit and talk with him about his day. It was a tough time.

  I dedicated myself to being a good mother. I loved that baby more than life itself. I poured all the love I’d had for Joe into her. I think, on some level, Charlie sensed that, and that was the beginning of our really bad problems, although they didn’t manifest until later.

  I did my best to make a home for the baby and for Charlie. I wanted to give Rebecca everything she could possibly want or need.

  Once the colic subsided, things improved immensely. Fatherhood seemed to give Charlie confidence. He took on a larger role at the lumberyard, and talked his father into supplying other stores in other towns. His foot healed, but he walked with a limp, and he occasionally needed to use a cane.

  He grew less clingy and cloying with me, and our private married life improved. The three of us had a couple of good years. We socialized with our family and friends, and I resumed taking photographs. My favorite subject, of course, was Rebecca.

  During those early years, we were probably as happy as any other young married couple. Things were looking up, for us and for the country. We were thrilled when the war ended. The whole town poured into the streets and celebrated on V-E Day, then again at the surrender of Japan. We had a bonfire and a picnic and a spontaneous parade down Main Street. Oh, it was glorious!

  When Rebecca wasn’t quite three years old, I got pregnant again. Charlie was delighted—just thrilled to pieces. I was happy about it, too, certain that this would put to rest any lingering jealousies or insecurities in Charlie’s mind.

  And then one afternoon—I remember it was a warm day in November; Becky was down for her nap, and I was putting a Thanksgiving centerpiece on the table and wearing a sleeveless yellow cotton housedress—I heard a knock on the door. I thought it was my neighbor; Eunice was always popping over for a cup of sugar or something. I opened it, then literally fell to my knees.

  • • •

  “Why?” Hope asked.

  Hope’s voice pulled me back to the present. I stopped my rocker. “It wasn’t Eunice.”

  “Who was it?”

  “Joe.” I opened my eyes and looked at her. “It was Joe.”

  26

  adelaide

  Hope looked at me as if she wasn’t sure if I were in my right mind or not. “But I thought Joe was dead,” she said.

  “Yes, I thought so, too. My every decision had been based on that belief. I thought I was seeing a ghost.” I closed my eyes, and his face haunted me again.

  1946

  Joe was almost skeletally thin—his shoulder bones jutted through his shirt in sharp points—and his face seemed like skin stretched over a skull. Just like in the movies, I started to faint dead away. Joe caught me under the arms and half carried, half dragged me through the door to the sofa. He sat down beside me, and I touched his face, trying to determine whether he was real or whether I was dreaming.

  His skin was warm, and I could feel the trace of stubble on his gaunt, clean-shaven face. “You’re alive,” I said, staring at him, my hand moving to his close-cropped hair. “You’re alive!”

  He looked much older. His mouth had lines at the corners, his hair was thinner, and his eyes seemed more deep-set. He drew me into a hug, and I didn’t resist. When he started to kiss me, though, I drew back.

  “Are you okay?” he asked.

  I realized my hand was over my lips. I dropped it and scooted back on the sofa. “I—I still feel faint.”

  “I’ll get you a glass of water.” He strode into my kitchen, rummaged in my cabinets, and returned with a tall glass. He sat beside me on the sofa as I drank it.

  “Tell me everything,” I ordered.

  He said that the other planes in the squadron didn’t see any parachutes because he and the rest of his crew had bailed at the very last second, under cloud cover. The bombardier and gunner were shot before they hit the water; the navigator, the copilot, the engineer, and Joe were picked up by a Japanese PT boat and sent to a POW camp. Conditions were horrendous; out of all of his crew, he was the only one who survived.

  “You’re what kept me going,” he said. “I thought about you, and I knew I had to live.”

  His camp hadn’t been liberated until after the war had ended. He’d been so ill and malnourished that he’d spent eleven months in a military hospital. Due to a clerical error, his family wasn’t notified of his whereabouts until he was on the way home. It wasn’t until he arrived at his aunt’s home that he’d found my unopened letters—including the one saying I was pregnant.

  He’d immediately set out to track me down. He’d already been to my parents’ house. Apparently my grandmother had told him where I lived.

  My heart catapulted in my chest. “What—what did you tell her?”

  “Just that I was looking for you—that I’d known you in New Orleans, that I’d just been released from a POW camp. She gave me your address.”

  I tried to explain what had happened and why I’d married Charlie. He sat there, stoic as a statue, and said he didn’t blame me. His eyes misted, though, and he swallowed hard a bunch of times.

  “Our child?”

  Our. Oh, Lord, how can such a short word carry so much weight? “Rebecca. I named her for my great-grandmother. She’s napping. She—she doesn’t know. No one knows. Everyone thinks Charlie is the father. We can’t . . .”

  “Damn it, Addie. Don’t tell me what we can and can’t do.” His blue eyes were dark, his voice a low growl. “I spent years in a hellhole, and thinking of you was all that pulled me through. When I got out and read your letter, I nearly lost my mind. I vowed that if you’d given the child up for adoption, I’d get it back, one way or the other. And I swore that I’d marry you, and . . .”

  “You never wrote my father.”

  “I damn sure did. The night I got back from the base.”

  “He never . . .” Oh my God! Father had gotten the letter! That’s why he’d pulled me aside when Charlie and I came home married, and asked if I was all right. He must not have even told my mother, because my mother could never keep a secret like that.

  Oh, dear God, did my father suspect the baby’s paternity? Oh, heavens to Betsy! I couldn’t bear to think of it. It was a mercy he hadn’t told me or my mother about the letter, wasn’t it? So why did I feel so outraged and confused?

  There are pauses in the rhythm of life—space between heartbeats, time between inhales and exhales. Maybe those are little deaths. Or maybe that’s when life is lived most intensely. This felt like both.

  “Joe.” His name on my lips was like menthol on chapped skin, both sweet and stinging, a needling balm. “Joe . . . it’s too late.”

  My hand rested on my belly, an involuntary move. His eyes followed. The words were unnecessary, but I said them anyway. “I’m having Charlie’s baby.”

  The door opened and Becky came out, rubbing her eyes. “Mommy?”

  His eyes locked on her. I ran to her and scooped her up.

  “Who’s dat man, Mommy?”

  “He’s . . .” My throat froze, like the pipe under the house last winter—a pipe not properly insulated, because hard freezes were so rare in Louisiana that no one anticipates them. I drew a breath and started again. “He’s my friend.”

  Joe’s throat worked as he swallowed.

  I held her close, stroking her back. “Joe, this is Rebecca. Becky, this is Mr. Joe.”

  “How’d you do,” she said solemnly, extending her hand.

  Charlie had taught her how to do that. He’d wanted her to make a good impression when I brought her to the lumberyard, to be able to greet people respectfully.

 
; Joe took her hand and let her guide his in three up-and-down pumps. “Very nice to meet you,” he said, inclining his head in a slight bow.

  “Do you work at Daddy’s store?”

  My eyes filled with tears. I blinked them back. “No, honey. Mr. Joe is a pilot. He flies airplanes.”

  “Up in de sky?”

  “Yes.”

  “How do you get up dere?”

  “The plane goes really fast, and air presses under the wings, and it makes it go up in the air.”

  She thought about this a moment. “If I run really fas’ with my arms out, will I go up?”

  “No.”

  “Oh.” She looked at him thoughtfully. “Good.”

  He burst into laughter, and she smiled back at him. I found myself looking at the same rounded cheeks, the same inset dimple on both faces.

  “Can you take me and Mommy flying?”

  “I’ve already taken your mom.”

  “Daddy, too?”

  He looked at me. Fear, cold and clammy, raced through me. “Joe hasn’t met your daddy, honey,” I said quickly.

  “Oh.” She tilted her head as she looked at Joe. “Are you somebody’s daddy?”

  “Yes,” he said.

  “A boy or a girl?”

  “A girl.” I could tell he was having a hard time controlling his emotions. “Just about your age.”

  Tension vibrated like a crystal glass about to shatter. I couldn’t stand it any longer. “Let’s go get a snack, shall we?” I carried Becky to the kitchen, set her down in a chair, and turned to the sink. Joe followed me, standing in the doorway. I stared out the window, needing a few moments to compose myself. I washed an apple and cut it into slices, then set it in front of her, along with a glass of water.

  She looked at Joe. “Would you like something to dwink? Mommy fo’got her manners.”

  I had chastised her just yesterday for asking for something to drink without first offering a beverage to her visiting friend.

  He threw back his head and laughed. “Your mommy’s manners are just fine.”

  “I have a dwink, and you don’t.”

  “Can I—can I get you something?” I asked him.

  The look on his face told me exactly what I could get him. You. Our daughter. Our life.

  “Some coffee? Or iced tea?” I prompted.

  “I’ll take coffee, if it’s not too much trouble.”

  The percolator was still on, so I pulled out a mug. I remembered exactly how he took it. I heaped in three big teaspoonfuls of sugar without asking.

  He flashed a white smile, showing off the dimple that exactly matched Rebecca’s.

  “You remembered.”

  “I remember everything.” The way your lips feel on mine. The way the sunlight glistens on the hair on the back of your hand.

  “Tell me again—how do planes go up?” Becky asked.

  “Do you have a piece of paper?”

  When Charlie walked through the kitchen door twenty minutes later, he found Rebecca sitting on Joe’s lap, biting her lip in concentration as she folded a paper airplane.

  Charlie froze in the door. The color drained from his face, leaving his lips looking bluish.

  He’d never met Joe—never, to my knowledge, even seen a picture of him. Oh, I suppose he could have seen a photo from our weekend together if he ever went through my stuff—and later, I had reason to think that he might have, because I learned he was jealous like that—but at the time, I thought it was either something in the way I acted, or the crackling of chemistry in the air, or the similarity in the way Becky and Joe looked.

  “Hi, Daddy! Joe’s showin’ me how to fold planes.”

  “Joe?” His face grew paler still.

  “Charlie,” I said, stepping forward, wanting to get between them. “This is Joe.”

  Joe slowly set Rebecca on her feet and rose.

  Charlie leaned hard on his cane. “I—I thought . . .”

  “He was in a POW camp,” I rushed to explain.

  The two men stared at each other, two bulls protecting their herd, ready to charge.

  “My camp was the last to release prisoners,” he said. “They kept me at a hospital in Hawaii for nearly a year. I just got home, and when my aunt gave me the things the army had forwarded, I found Addie’s letters.”

  “Becky, you need to go see Poppy and Ammy,” Charlie said harshly.

  “No! I wanna make more paper airplanes with Mr. Joe.”

  Joe leaned over the table to look her in the eye. “I need to talk with your mom and Charlie.”

  I noticed he didn’t say “your father.”

  I think Charlie noticed, too, because a nerve twitched in his jaw. “Why don’t you take her over, Addie, while Joe and I get acquainted.”

  Every muscle in my body tensed. I’m not sure what I feared might happen. Maybe I thought they’d kill each other. I only know I was terrified of leaving them alone together.

  “Why don’t I call and see if Mother can come and get her.”

  “I really don’t want your parents involved. Do as I say, Addie.”

  I’d never heard his voice like that, although I would in the future. It was an order, dark and ominous, and something in his tone told me it would be deeply dangerous to resist. I might have resisted anyway, except for the fact that I didn’t want to create a scene in front of Rebecca.

  I nodded and wiped my hands on my apron, then tried to take it off. It took me a while to unknot it, because my fingers were trembling.

  “Come along, Becky,” I said.

  “It was nice meeting you.” She held out her little hand to Joe again.

  “Likewise.” He shook it solemnly, then gave her a hug.

  Charlie lifted his cane. “Run along now.”

  I took Becky’s hand. “I’ll be right back.”

  “I’ll be here,” Joe called.

  • • •

  My parents lived two blocks down. Mother immediately wanted to know about the gentleman caller who had stopped by her house. I mumbled some vague excuse about Joe being a friend of a friend, and asked her to watch Becky, saying she was bored with adult conversation.

  “Am not!” Becky protested. “Joe an’ I were makin’ paper airplanes!”

  I hurried back home, worried about what was going on in my absence. Joe and Charlie were still standing in the kitchen, facing off like a pair of prizefighters.

  The screen door squeaked behind me. Both men turned toward me. “Let’s move into the living room,” I suggested.

  “No need for that,” Charlie said curtly. “I’ve already explained things to Joe, and he’s just leaving.”

  “You explained . . . what?”

  “That we’re a family. That my name is on Becky’s birth certificate, and that makes her legally mine. That we don’t need a scandal. That you’re having my baby, and everyone will be better off if he goes away and never comes back.”

  “But . . .”

  My eyes met Charlie’s. What I saw there reminded me of the time I stopped to help a dog who’d just been hit by a car. His back end had been completely crushed, and the poor creature had gazed at me with these sinkhole eyes, so filled with pain and—this is what stayed with me the most—an odd bewilderment, as if to say, How can this be happening? How can God allow this level of pain to exist?

  My gaze shifted to Joe. He looked at me as if he’d just hiked twenty miles in the hottest desert, and I were an icy Coca-Cola. But Joe . . . well, Joe was made of tougher stuff. Joe could take it.

  And he did. “He’s right, Addie. I shouldn’t have come here. I just had to know. And I had to let you know. I didn’t want you to ever find out I was alive and think that . . . to think that I didn’t . . .”

  Love you. Want you. Need you. I heard all the unsaid words. From th
e quick flinch in Charlie’s jaw, I knew he’d heard them, too.

  “Well, I see that you have a happy life and a wonderful family. I’ll leave you alone.”

  “That would be for the best.” Charlie limped to the door and opened it, pointedly.

  Joe picked up his hat. He reached into his pocket and held out a card. “If you ever need anything, this is where you can reach me.”

  “She won’t,” Charlie said. “Keep your card.”

  I took it anyway.

  Joe’s throat worked. He nodded and put on his hat, then shook Charlie’s hand. He turned to me, as if to shake my hand, too, and I flung myself into his arms, hugging him fiercely.

  He hugged me back. I tried to memorize the imprint of his body against mine. I whispered, “Write me.” And then he set me away from him and walked out the door.

  The silence between Charlie and me was cold and thick as a marble tombstone.

  Charlie’s hands clenched and unclenched. “Of all the nerve,” he said. “Who does he think he is, coming here?”

  “Rebecca’s father.”

  Charlie raised his hand, and for an awful moment, I thought he was going to strike me. Instead, he smote his chest. “I am Rebecca’s father. I’m the only father she knows, and it’s going to stay that way. And don’t you ever say otherwise.”

  I was afraid of him just then. He had a wild light in his eye, as if something had snapped inside him.

  He glared at me. “What were you doing, throwing yourself at him like that?”

  “I—I wasn’t. I was saying good-bye.”

  That dying dog look was back in his eyes. “You said good-bye to him like you’ve never said hello to me. Not even when I came back from the war.”

  I was too raw, too torn up to deal with this. “I’m going to lie down.”

  I went into the bedroom, put my face in the pillow, and cried.

  • • •

  Charlie got drunk that night. It was the first of many times. And then he came into the bedroom, and he wanted to make love. I knew that I needed to, that he needed to, that it would be a good thing, a healing thing, but I just couldn’t pretend I wanted it. I didn’t say no, but I just lay there, crying. Afterward, he rolled onto his side, and the way his back heaved told me he was sobbing silently into the mattress.