Today We Go Home

by Kelli Estes

  “My guess would be it’s connected to Willie Smith, but I really have no idea.”

  “Oh.” For some reason, Larkin had hoped this one phone call would answer all her questions. Now she was eager to get back to the diary. “Look, I’d better get going. I’ll send those pictures to you ASAP.”

  “Thanks. Hey, Larkin?”

  “Yeah?”

  He was quiet, and she could hear a TV on in the background. “Do you think I could call you sometime? I missed my chance to know my sister and was hoping, maybe, you could tell me more about her.”

  Larkin squeezed her eyes shut as tight as she could. “Yeah, that would be okay.”

  “Thanks.” He hung up.

  Larkin dropped her phone on the bed and looked at Sarah’s urn. Larkin had been a coward. She should have told him she had Sarah’s ashes. She should have told him it was her fault Sarah was killed.

  “I just talked to your brother,” she said. “He’s not so bad. He misses you.” Maybe he even regretted the fact that he never made any effort to know Sarah when she was alive.

  Larkin looked at the pieces of the diary lying on her bed alongside the other items and felt deep shame for damaging Sarah’s book. “I’m so sorry, Sarah. I’ll fix it, I promise.”

  She inspected the broken pieces and saw with relief that the diary pages weren’t harmed, nor was the back cover. Only the front cover had broken.

  But when she looked closer, Larkin realized it hadn’t broken at all. The book had been crafted by someone with the skill to carve out a hollow compartment in the leather-wrapped wooden cover. They had then used another thin piece of wood, also wrapped in leather, to fit exactly on top in a manner so tight that the seam between the two pieces looked like a decoration rather than a separation. The other decorative lines on the leather cover helped with that illusion. As Larkin pushed the cover back into place, she realized Emily likely had needed to use a knife or other flat instrument to pry the cover off when she needed to open it. The tight fit was what assured the secrecy of the compartment.

  As she marveled at the diary’s construction, Zach’s words came back to her. There was something Larkin didn’t know. She couldn’t wait another second to find out what that was. Forgetting she’d offered to help with dinner, she lay down on her bed and continued reading.

  December 12, 1861: The three of us, Benjamin, Willie (with whom we’ve grown as close as brothers), and I, have become quite comfortable with camp life and almost forgot we were here to engage in war. The truth has made itself known today as we marched to Allegheny Mountain in preparation for battle tomorrow. At dawn we will attack the Confederate camp there. I am not too proud to admit I am scared, but I am greatly comforted knowing I will have my two dear friends by my side. We each will ensure that we all survive.

  Word has reached camp that the Confederacy has claimed both Missouri and Kentucky. It seems likely we will be ordered south to Kentucky in the near future. After today’s long march, I hope the order is delayed.

  As winter has settled over us, it has also brought illness. Daily fatigue duty involves burying those who have died from their disease. It is a gruesome task that reminds me how lucky David was to have died in a hospital with us at his side. We are doing our best to maintain our own health. Even Ben and Willie are avoiding the company sinks in favor of the woods behind our tents. Whenever possible, we collect our own water, taking care to be upriver from those exhibiting illness. I also make certain Ben eats the vegetables he is served, poor though they may be. Even desiccated (or desecrated, as the boys call them) vegetables are better for the body than none at all.

  No bugle is sounding tonight, due to our proximity to the Confederate camp. I find I miss hearing it as I lie down to sleep.

  Chapter Fourteen

  December 12, 1861: Near Allegheny Mountain, Virginia

  The night they encountered the possum while on picket duty marked the beginning of Emily’s friendship with Willie. He was smart, funny, and most of all, kind. Emily saw what had drawn Ben to their fellow soldier, and in the six weeks since, they’d become a close threesome. They ate meals together, lined up for roll call together, and whenever given the choice, volunteered for fatigue duty together. It was as though Emily had two brothers again.

  The only dimness in the light that was their friendship was Emily’s growing concern about the relationship between Ben and Willie. Quite simply, the two men shared a physical closeness that was unnatural.

  So far, Emily thought she was the only one who’d noticed their soft glances when they thought no one was looking, or their tender touch of a hand under cover of darkness, or the way their bodies would lean toward each other when sitting or walking together. If one of them had been a woman, Emily would have thought they were falling in love. But they were two men! This kind of thing wasn’t done and could even prove dangerous.

  At first, Emily had been jealous, for the bond they were building between them excluded her. She did not want anyone, even her dear friend, taking her brother away from her. Nor did she want her brother taking away her new friend.

  But then she truly looked at her brother and saw how happy Willie made him, and Emily knew nothing else mattered. And so she started to help them. Her presence had saved them many times already from being caught. Last evening, she had come upon them at their fire, sitting closer together than men normally do. Knowing other men were right behind her, Emily had insinuated herself right between the two, plopping herself on the log in a way that forced Ben to scoot aside. Willie’s ruddy cheeks told her she’d arrived just in time.

  This morning, as she was kicking dirt onto their campfire, Emily had glanced up and seen Ben and Willie walking back to camp through the forest where, she presumed, they had gone to fill their canteens from the river. They must have thought they were still out of sight because—and Emily had to admit it shocked her—they were holding hands. With a quick glance to ensure no one else had seen them, Emily did the only thing she could think of to break the two apart. She called to Ben, “Get a move on, Benjamin! You still need to pack your bedroll.”

  The two sprung apart so fast that it looked like they’d been stung by a bee. Emily knew she’d have to speak to Ben soon. They were growing careless.

  Tonight they were too exhausted after the long march to Allegheny Mountain to do anything more than lay out their bedrolls and heat their rations in the large fry pan Emily had purchased from a sutler on robber’s row with funds from her soldier’s pay. They’d brought their half tents with them, but all agreed the effort of setting them up for one night was wasted, even if the temperature dropped below freezing. They would sleep under the stars beside the fire. As Ben started supper, Emily took their coffee pots to the nearby stream to fill up. When she returned, she set them in the coals to heat.

  “I’m beat,” Quincy Rawlings said as he shuffled to their fire and eyed the chunks of salt pork Ben was frying. “If you cook my supper, I’ll share two apples my sister sent me, and some cinnamon, too.”

  Ben accepted the bargain, and Emily’s mouth watered as she thought of the sweet dessert that was to come. Cooking was one thing she had never enjoyed, not like Aunt Harriet and most other women she knew, and she was happy that Ben took over the duty tonight. She poked at the fire and watched as he added Quincy’s pork and potato ration to their pan.

  “Since you’re cooking our supper, I’ll cook dessert,” Willie offered, accepting the apples, spice, and fry pan from Quincy, who turned to lay out his bedroll in line with theirs.

  Emily poked at the fire and watched Quincy. He was a fine-looking man, she realized. He hailed from up near Muncie where his family had a dairy farm, and he looked every bit the farm boy, all lean and freckled with arms strong from lifting hay and carrying milk pails. He often sat with them in the evenings, telling stories or playing cards, and Willie said he was a courteous tentmate back at camp.

 
Maybe after this war was over, Emily mused, she could settle down with a man like Quincy. They would work their farm together and raise a family of their own.

  Emily poured coffee into the bubbling water and stirred it with a stick as she thought about becoming a wife. It was expected of her, of course, but she’d much rather be the one out with the animals and the crops, making decisions, instead of the person left at home over a hot stove, minding crying babies.

  Maybe she should continue to live as a man after the war. She’d already proven she could convince people she was one. She’d helped Pa on the farm enough to understand the work and knew she could do that job as well as she soldiered. What did she need a man in her life for, anyhow?

  Her gaze drifted to the other side of the campfire where Willie was holding out a tin plate for Ben to fill with pork and potatoes. Anyone else watching would not see the connection between them, but Emily did. There was an invisible tether between the two that was as real as any rope would be. Her heart twisted upon seeing them together for although she knew their feelings would bring them trouble, those feelings were deep and true.

  That was what she needed a man in her life for. Someone to look at her like she was his whole world. Someone who made her feel more important than anyone else in the room.

  Quincy finished unloading his gear and sat on the ground with a groan, stretching his fingers to the fire. “I don’t know about you boys, but I can’t wait to see my Minié balls slam into a Reb or two tomorrow. It’s been too long since we had a fight.”

  Emily exchanged a glance with both Ben and Willie. “This is going to be my and Ben’s first skirmish. Got any advice?” The sun dipped below the trees, and a cold wind pierced her overcoat. Emily reached for the tin plate that Willie held out for her, eager for the warmth it would bring her body. She shoveled in a square of pork and chewed slowly to savor the saltiness.

  Quincy accepted his plate. “Keep your head down, aim low, and reload as fast as possible.” He forked a huge bite of potato into his mouth, fanning his tongue as it burned.

  Emily smiled and hunched her shoulders forward, reveling in the heat rising from her plate. She could fire and reload four times a minute, which was fast, and she could certainly keep her head down. It was the part about shooting people that she wasn’t so sure about.

  “We’ll prevail tomorrow,” Willie said, handing Emily his empty cup for some coffee. “I feel it in my bones.”

  “I hope you’re right,” Ben said. He shot Emily a look that conveyed his concern. “I’ve already lost enough of my family. I don’t aim to lose more.”

  * * *

  They were roused before dawn, not with a bugle call, but by officers going quietly around camp, kicking men’s feet and grunting, “It’s time.”

  Breakfast was a hurried affair, eaten cold with stiff and trembling fingers. They were instructed to pack everything and to line up for roll call within ten minutes.

  Two men from their company had disappeared during the night. Emily did not know either of them, but she knew desertion was a serious crime. If caught, the men would likely face a firing squad made up of men from their own company. The knowledge cast a heavy pall over all gathered. Every man kept silent as final instructions were given and they began the short march up Allegheny Mountain under cover of darkness. Frost crunched underfoot. Their breath looked like smoke.

  Emily fell into step between Ben and Willie, with Quincy on the other side of Ben. No one spoke as they followed the Stars and Stripes up the mountain.

  When they neared the Confederate camp at the top, they were quietly ordered to fan out through the forest and be ready to fire into the clearing where the Rebs slept in their winter quarters. They would attack imminently.

  The sky lightened and Emily saw that much of the forest had been cut down, leaving stumps and brush to maneuver around. There would be little to hide behind when the Rebs started shooting.

  Before Emily was ready, the bugle sounded the order and the entire line of Federal soldiers started running. Emily, Ben, and Willie joined in, keeping their places in line, and soon they could see that the Rebs weren’t asleep after all.

  The sun was starting to come up over the mountains to the east. A shaft of light speared the clearing and illuminated a row of gray uniforms with weapons pointed straight at them. All at once, the bangs and pops of musket fire filled the mountain, followed soon after by the loud boom of artillery. Smoke drifted on the cold air, obscuring her sight. A stump near Emily shattered from a Rebel shot, and she flinched as splinters hit her face. She dropped to her knee and leveled her rifle, forcing herself not to think of the gray line as men, but as an evil force trying to kill her and her friends.

  She was able to fire and reload and fire again for what felt like hours, occasionally rushing to another location for better cover or back to the supply wagon for ammunition. Twice she dragged a fellow soldier who had been hit back to where those assigned to nursing duty could help him, but she always returned to her post.

  And always, always, she kept track of Ben and Willie’s locations. She only lost them one time, when she found herself at a bit of a distance from her comrades. As she was standing up to advance, a Johnny Reb surprised her by popping up from behind an earthwork that she’d thought abandoned. For one timeless moment, she stared into his wild eyes, unsure of what to do next. Even the sounds of the bugles and drums and the screams of the wounded faded away. All she knew was the youthful face of the man in front of her. He was too young to grow a beard, and his dirt-smudged cheeks still showed the pudginess of youth. When his countenance of surprise shifted to hatred, Emily knew she would be taking her last breath unless she fired first.

  She fired.

  The Reb’s mouth dropped open in shock, and she watched as he looked down at the blood spreading across his chest. He stared at her in surprise, as if asking why she had shot him. Then he pitched forward and landed on his face in the dirt.

  Nausea rolled through Emily as she reloaded. Her limbs felt heavy and slow, as if she were trying to run through mud, and she knew she would remember that boy’s face forever. But, right now, she needed to continue to fight and to stay alive.

  Hours later, the sun was high in the sky and Emily’s arms ached from the constant strain of loading and firing. Her canteen had run dry, and her mouth felt as if it were shriveling up like the garden in a drought from the powder that inevitably got into her mouth when she tore the paper cartridges open with her teeth.

  “Fix bayonets!”

  Emily’s breath hitched. The order had come from the opposing side. She had only seconds before she’d be facing steel blades. Shaking, she hurried to fix her bayonet.

  “Retreat! Retreat!” someone shouted, and Emily looked up to see a line of Rebs running straight at her with bayonets glinting in the winter sunlight. Fear slammed through her so swiftly that she almost couldn’t move. She dropped the shot she was trying to ram into her barrel and turned to run for safety.

  “Ben! Willie!” she called as she ran. “Fall back!” Up ahead, she could see the mounted officers galloping behind the lines, motioning the soldiers toward them as they took aim and fired over their heads on the Rebs coming up behind. “Retreat!” one of them hollered.

  Emily stopped running after she passed Colonel Milroy and his horse, turning back to make sure Ben and Willie were retreating. She fell into step with them as their forces ran down the mountain.

  Finally, at the base of the mountain where they’d camped the night before, they were ordered to halt. Emily thought the officers of her regiment must be concocting another attack plan and it would only be a matter of time before they were ordered to charge up the mountain again.

  As she waited, Emily sat on the cold ground, exhausted. A tremor swept through her body, and she realized she hadn’t eaten for several hours. If she was going to return to the fight, she needed fuel. With the call to m
arch coming at any moment, she didn’t have time to build a fire and cook, so she settled on a square of hardtack, which might be all her sour stomach could hold right now anyway. She’d discovered through trial and error that she could not bite through the rock-hard bread, so instead, she sucked on one corner until it softened enough to scrape off with her teeth.

  Willie dropped down next to her and sat with his hands hanging between his knees. Emily could smell him and knew she probably stank equally as bad. Willie’s face was streaked with black powder. “I don’t think I could lift my musket again to save my life. You’ll have to save me if the Rebs come after us.”

  Emily nodded, feeling much the same. “Don’t worry. I only have to throw this hardtack at our attacker’s head, and he’ll be gone from this world.”

  They fell into an easy silence, too exhausted for further conversation. Emily watched Ben carefully as he returned from filling their canteens, worried how the battle had affected him and wondering where his energy came from that he could perform even that simple chore. He did not seem harmed in any way from the day’s fighting. In fact, under all the soot and dirt covering him, his face was alight with joy. His teeth gleamed white when he smiled at her. “That was something, wasn’t it?”

  Emily thought of the man she’d killed and could not force an answering smile, no matter how hard she tried. She nodded.

  “It sure was,” Willie agreed, his face lighting up at the memory. “I didn’t expect so many of them up there.”

  “I know!” Ben handed Emily her canteen and plopped down next to Willie.

  The two of them continued discussing the battle, but Emily had lost interest. With the hardtack hanging out of her mouth, she dug her diary out of her knapsack. She found, however, that there were no words to adequately describe what had happened to her. Battle was something men talked about and wrote about all the time, but Emily now knew the reality was very different. So much more terrifying. And yet, exhilarating. Brutal, yet life-affirming. And sad.