Soldier Mom

by Alice Mead

  “No. Of course not. I’m not a combat soldier. I’m in a supply battalion,” Mom says. She comes over and leads me to the sofa so we can sit together. “The army needs lots and lots of supplies, and I have to keep track of that.”

  She hugs me, but I resist. Of course she’ll be in a war, I think bitterly. That’s what soldiers do. They fight in wars. Why is my mother going? If she loved me and Andrew enough, she wouldn’t go. War means she could be killed. And what if she had to kill someone else?

  I can’t stand it. I run to my room and slam the door. I pull my pillow to my face and sob into it. I hate her. I hate her.

  Then, sobbing leftover, bump-in-the-road sobs, I go to my desk and snatch a pencil and writing pad. I will leave home right now.

  Dear Mom,

  I would never do this to you, I mean leave you. I hope you believe me. I’m going to run away so you can’t do this to me again. I will come get Andrew as soon as possible. Don’t worry—we’ll be fine without you.

  Love, Jas.

  Age 11, nearly 12.

  12th birthday in one month.

  That’s good. Twelve seems old. I’m tall enough to pass for fourteen. I bet I’ll be able to get a job. I rip the paper off the notepad, accidentally tearing it down the middle. So I have to hunt for the Scotch tape. All patched together, the note doesn’t look quite as official. I stomp over to my door and fling it open. There’s Mom on the other side, looking startled. I guess she was about to come in.

  “Excuse me,” I mutter, trying to push past her.

  “What’s this?” she asks, reaching for the paper. I had thought I’d leave it on the kitchen table for tomorrow morning, so I could get a hefty head start tonight. I was going to hide at the stable and decide what to do from there.

  She pulls the note from my fingers and reads it more than once—maybe she’s memorizing it.

  “Here, sweetie. Come over here.” She leads me to my bed with her arm around me. “What’s this crazy stuff, huh?”

  I’m crying now, but I’m still determined to at least get to my closet and fling a few clothes together. My maroon Pre-season League jersey. I grab it.

  “Put the shirt down. Come on, now. How about a back rub?”

  Back rubs always calm me down. She knows that. Nobody else does. Slowly and gently Mom pushes all the stiffness from my shoulders and the back of my neck.

  Jake comes in and watches. “Maybe we should get married tonight,” Jake says. “That’s what a lot of reservists are doing. I heard it on the noon news. So whaddya say? You want to?”

  “What?” Mom stares at him.

  “I’m serious, Paula. Legally, it might be a good idea, in case . . .” He stops talking for a moment.

  “Oh, come on, Jake. That’s silly. I’m going to be fine. Anyway, we can’t get married tonight. This isn’t Hollywood or Las Vegas. I mean, I hardly know what I’m doing.”

  “I think we should,” Jake says. “I love you, Paula. For God’s sake.”

  “Jake, please don’t do this right now. I’m not like you. I’m not one person. I’m three people all in one. That’s what a mother is.”

  She shakes her head, her eyes full of tears. “That’s what I tried to tell the officers today.”

  It’s not going to work out, this Jake-staying-herewith-us thing. He can’t even handle dropping in now and then. He thinks he can sit around with a beer for the whole evening and not do the laundry. He has no idea how hard my mom works. Worse yet, he wanted to send me to Japan.

  Later I’m brushing my teeth. I hear them in Mom’s bedroom. Andrew’s sleeping. I tiptoe to the open door of the bathroom, right next to her room, and listen.

  “You don’t know, Paula. Listen to me. I work all day long with guys who’ve been in the army. You should hear them. They’re going to harass the daylights out of you over there. And where do you think you’re going to go to the bathroom in the desert? Even a little thing like that. You think the guys are going to put up a little curtain around you so you can have some privacy? You don’t know how guys think, Paula. I do. This isn’t going to be some picnic at the office. It’s going to be rough.”

  “Listen, Jake, I’ve been through years of training. Ten years. I know these guys, too. I know there’ll be a lot of gross comments to deal with. That’s not new. I’ll be okay. I’ll manage. Hey, I lift weights, you know. I’m strong.”

  She’s trying to joke him along.

  “Not as strong as a guy. Especially in a war zone. Man, guys freak out under that kind of pressure. There won’t be anybody there . . . there won’t be me there . . . to protect you, to help you.”

  I peek around the door. Jake’s got his arms around my mom, and he’s crying.

  “I love you, Paula. Don’t forget that. Please?”

  I run down the hall to my room and plug in my seashell night-light. We have to get up at five-thirty to take Mom to the bus. It’s the first time I’ve ever seen how much Jake cares about Mom. He’s so worried. Maybe more than I am. And that scares me worse than anything.

  I lie huddled under a thin cotton blanket. “Don’t go, Mommy. Please. I love you,” is running over and over in my head, and then suddenly those words switch to angry ones—“How can you leave us?”

  When my eyes are closed, I see the white, pencil-shaped, computer-guided missiles being loaded onto planes. Are those some of the supplies Mom is in charge of? Please, God, I hope not.

  8

  At five-thirty, Mom is up. She opens my door. “Come on, sweetheart.”

  I roll over and sit up. “But, Mom, why do you have to go? Why can’t they send someone else?”

  Mom sighs. “I’ve been in the army reserve for ten years, Jas. My unit’s been called.”

  I fling back the sheets.

  “Okay?” Mom asks.

  I shrug, not willing to answer. “Whatever,” I mumble. I pull on my shorts and tee shirt and pull my hair back into a ponytail. My sneakers are in the kitchen by the back door.

  I grab a bowl of Cheerios and half a banana and sit down to eat. Everyone is silent. Already Mom’s two backpacks are sitting near the door.

  “When did you pack?” I ask.

  “Last night.”

  “Did you say you were leaving from the Greyhound station?” Jake asks.

  “Yes. Now, this little notebook is Andrew’s immunization record. He has his one-year checkup in October. And Jas will need to go back-to-school shopping at the mall for new sneakers and notebooks and so on . . .”

  “Hold it,” Jake says. “It’s five forty-five in the morning. Slow down.”

  I shovel in the rest of my Cheerios and rinse my bowl. I start to put the bowl in the sink.

  “Dishwasher,” Jake says without looking at me.

  I turn around with a glare that could cut cold steel.

  “Jas, please,” says Mom. She’s really saying, Let’s not get in a fight here. Not now.

  “Okay, okay,” I grumble. I pull open the dishwasher and put my bowl inside. “I’m waiting at the car.”

  I push through the back door and head out to my sunflowers. The sun is just coming up over the ocean, a streak of rosy bright pink fading to a vivid pink-orange along the water. I stretch out my arms so the light can slide up them. Tears are just behind my eyes again. The only way I can stop them from coming is to be angry. Angry at everybody—except Andrew. And when I think of Andrew, I’m scared. Really scared. Because when you get right down to it, Jake doesn’t know how to take care of a baby, and everybody knows it.

  They’re coming out of the house. Andrew is wrapped up in his blanket, Binky. Jake has the two backpacks. Mom’s wearing dark glasses again. Trying to prove she’s tough? I throw myself in the back seat and slam the door.

  All the way to the bus station, twenty minutes, I don’t say a word.

  Mom keeps saying things like, “I’ll call you as soon as I land in Europe. Probably from Spain, when we refuel. And then I’ll try to call again from Saudi Arabia. You guys can write to me at an
APO address. I’ll give it to you when I get there. So you won’t need to buy air-mail stamps.”

  Like I’m going to write. She doesn’t want to hear what I have to say.

  “Well, you’re coming back when Stuart gets released, right?” I say finally. “So what’s the big deal? How hard can it be to get a little kid released?”

  Jake and Mom look at each other.

  “You’re right,” Mom says. “In a few weeks, this could all be over.”

  “You said by basketball season for sure, remember? Hey, by the way, I start practice on Monday.”

  Nobody says anything.

  “Yoo-hoo. Mom? I have basketball every afternoon next week. Three to five. I’m the team captain, remember? I have to be there.”

  “Okay, sweetie. You’ll get there. Don’t worry. Jake’ll come home and pick up Andrew. Don’t worry about a thing.”

  “Oh? Jake will, will he?” he says under his breath. “How am I going to manage that, Paula? Cut my work by more than five hours per week, so it fits in with Andrew’s day-care hours?”

  “Then Jas can get him,” Mom says. “That might work. Jas, honey, you can leave practice a little before five, can’t you?”

  “Well, if it’s practice, yeah. But what if it’s a Pre-season game? What if it’s an away game?”

  Jake interrupts us. “Listen, Jas, tell the coach you can play, but you can’t be captain this summer. There’s no way I can guarantee you’ll be there. There must be some other girl who can take over for you.”

  I can play, but not be captain? Of course, Coach would pick Bridget next. I feel a big chunk of my life break off like a piece of ice in a river and swirl away downstream.

  “No way!” I yell. “I can’t believe you said that.”

  “Please, let’s not argue. I’m sure there’s some way to figure this out,” Mom says.

  Right near the bus station, Jake makes a wrong turn. He swears and hits the steering wheel with his palm. He turns around and glares at me, as though I made him do it.

  I glare right back at him. “What?”

  Mom lays a hand on his arm.

  “It’s okay,” she says softly.

  He shakes his head and puts his hand on her leg. They sit that way, connected, for a minute. His eyes are full of tears. I sit way back in the seat and rest my head against the window. I push hard till my forehead hurts.

  Andrew doesn’t have a clue. He’s rocking in his seat, looking at the cars and trucks, singing a little chant with no words.

  Jake parks the car and we get out. The sun is up, but in coastal Maine there is still a morning chill in the air. The bus isn’t here yet. Already other families are waiting, standing in silent circles, separate little groups holding one another closely. I don’t see anyone else from Stroudwater, which isn’t surprising considering how small a town it is.

  Everyone tries to give everyone else privacy, but we’re right across the street from a Burger King and a doughnut shop, and a lot of people are driving to work at the hospital at the top of the hill, slowing down to stare. I turn my back to them.

  I stand rigid as a pencil. Mom’s hugging Andrew, and Jake’s got his arms around both of them. I could be the planet Pluto as far as they’re concerned.

  “Hey,” Mom says to me. “Come here.”

  She hands Andrew to Jake and wraps her arms around me, but I don’t soften up and hug back. How can I? She can’t be doing this to us. She can’t.

  The bus pulls up and lumbers into its parking lane, swaying from side to side like an old polar bear at the zoo, the kind with the chlorine-blue fur. The other soldiers start lining up, their families hurrying back to their cars because they’re crying so much. Jake takes Mom’s packs one at a time and tosses them into the luggage space under the bus.

  Mom bends down and pushes up her dark glasses so she can see me. “I love you, Jas. You have no idea how much.”

  Then she kisses Jake and Andrew fastest of all and hurries to take a place in line. Andrew starts to wail.

  “Hush, Andrew,” Jake says, jiggling him up and down. Mom turns and tries to smile at us from the top step, then disappears. Behind the tinted windows, she is lost from view.

  All the way home, the only thing I can think about is how mean I was to Mom. I didn’t tell her I loved her. I didn’t tell her not to worry. I didn’t help with Andrew. I stood still, still as a little toy soldier. Made of metal, arms at my sides. Metal, cold and hard. And heartless.

  What if Mom dies and never comes back? I didn’t say one nice thing today. I’m not even sure I said goodbye.

  Tears begin to run down my face. Andrew rocks in his car seat.

  “Mama?” he says to me. “Mama?”

  “No, not now,” I tell him. “She’s gone.”

  9

  “So,” says Jake brightly as we pull into the driveway. “This is it. Ta-dah! We’re home.”

  He lifts Andrew out and swings him up in the air. Andrew starts his great big laugh, and even I have to smile a little.

  Jake notices. “Life’s going to go on, Jas. It has to.”

  “I just don’t understand.” I flop against the side of the VW.

  “Jas, you have to let her go. She’s doing something she believes in. Serving her country. Helping people who need help. She believes in that. She’s trained for that for ten years, Jas.”

  “Well, nobody ever told me,” I mutter.

  “Nobody told you what?”

  “Nobody ever told me that going to her office job in Portland was the same thing as being ready to be part of a real live war in the middle of a stupid desert.”

  Jake looks at me. “Oh. I see what you mean. Yeah, I can understand that. I can see how you wouldn’t make the connection.”

  In the grass by the driveway, Jake finds a squishy pink ball that used to be mine. I always liked it a lot. He tosses it lightly to Andrew, who is sitting in the grass.

  “Here, Andrew. Catch! Whoa, buddy. You missed.”

  The ball rolls across the driveway. Andrew crawls after it at a hundred miles per hour. He wears the knees smooth on his overalls. They all have iron-on patches inside and out.

  “So, Jake, about basketball . . .”

  “Not now, Jas. I can’t deal with it right now.” He holds up both hands like a policeman saying “Stop.”

  But that’s not fair. I can’t not deal with it!

  I give a huge sigh. I have a colossal headache, and I feel groggy from getting up so early. I decide to go down to the cove.

  Directly across from me is a small island, Moorhead Island. The O’Neills paddle over there sometimes in their two-man kayak and circle it. I’ve been wanting to paddle there for years, but you have to cross the shipping channel, and the big tankers can’t see kayaks very well.

  Two long-necked cormorants, black-feathered and gawky, stand on the rocks, drying their wings. Witch birds.

  For some reason, right at that moment I turn around. Jake is standing at the top of the steps, watching me. He’s holding Andrew. Another family with little children is slowly descending the cement staircase for a Saturday morning at the beach. I can smell their SP45 sunblock from here.

  “What?” I shout.

  “Come on,” Jake says. “We’re going to McDonald’s for an early lunch. For a treat.”

  He has to be kidding. Maybe babies think McDonald’s is a treat, but seventh graders sure don’t.

  I squint up at him. “Nah. That’s okay. You go. I’ll get something at home.”

  “Jas! Come on!”

  The family stumbles past me with their bright yellow sand pails, clutching towels, tottering on the loose rocks.

  “What? I don’t want to go, that’s all. I’m not hungry.”

  He shifts Andrew to the other arm. Andrew lunges toward the water and kicks to be put down. I’ll go, I guess. I start walking toward the house. But I’m not eating a damn thing.

  If Jake gets sick of me, he can’t send me to Japan against my will, can he?

  Ja
ke’s in the kitchen, checking his wallet for money. “Can I talk to you?” he asks.

  I flop into a chair, stare at the ceiling. “Yeah.”

  “We’re going to get through this, Jas. I think you’re scared by the word ‘war.’ We both are. But you have to understand that it’s not a war at all. I bet it’ll be over in a few weeks. Maybe a month.”

  “A month? So you do think she’ll be back after that hostage kid, Stuart, gets released? You think so?”

  “Yup. As soon as the hostages are released, the reserve troops will probably be sent home.”

  “Not in time for my birthday?”

  But he’s not listening now. He’s looking for the keys. And muttering. “Money. Keys. Kid. Come on, Andrew.” Andrew is under the table, locating lost Cheerios one by one and eating them.

  “You made Mom call my dad in Japan, didn’t you? I bet you told her to do it when she went to her office, so I wouldn’t hear.”

  He nods.

  “Well, you should never have done that!” I yell. “I’m staying with Andrew. He needs me.”

  “Hey! Don’t yell, all right? Come on, Jas. Look. Can we just go for lunch?” He steps outside with Andrew. “Come on.”

  I don’t move an inch. “You don’t want me here, do you?”

  “Jas, stop it. You’re making it sound really bad, but the . . . uh . . . problem isn’t personal. It’s just that I don’t know how we’re going to manage. You and I, I mean,” he says. “I never had an eleven-year-old girl before, and I’m just learning about the baby. Maybe Mrs. Roberge can help out in the afternoon or something.”

  “Are you crazy? Mrs. Roberge? Have you spent an hour with Stevie lately?”

  “Jasmyn, look. I don’t care. Stay here. Forget McDonald’s. We’ll be home later. If you’re not going to come, you could at least write your mom a letter. We’ll get the APO when she calls.”

  He jogs down the steps, and a moment later heads up the street with Andrew in his VW. Jake has already moved Andrew’s car seat into the back of his VW. He hates Mom’s big bomb of an Oldsmobile.