No law required him to answer. He wasn’t a ten-year-old helping his mother read signs. He was twenty-nine, an American citizen same as her, with a Purple Heart and a personal letter from the president of the United States in his suitcase, so no one could make him out to be a migrant, not anymore.
“Would you...” The lady fumbled with her cart, letting her gray hair shield her face. “Would you like to share Thanksgiving dinner with me and my husband? If you haven’t made other plans, that is?”
Her invitation stunned him with its generosity. Result, he felt like a total jerk.
“This year it’s only the two of us. My daughter and her family live in California and my son...” She made eye contact for an instant, her eyes shiny in the fluorescent light, before swiftly shifting her gaze to the yams.
Grace met his questioning glance and nodded in agreement without speaking.
“Sorry. Didn’t mean to...” Her shoulders shook inside her quilted coat. “Didn’t mean to bother you.”
“Yes, please.” His voice was smooth and normal-sounding, although he supposed he should have said thank you instead of please.
“We’d love to join you,” Grace added and squeezed his arm while she took over details like address and time.
Someday people might stop surprising him, but it wouldn’t be this year.
* * *
Finding the Andersons’ address was easy where roads ran as straight north to south as a laser sight, so Cruz relaxed and anticipated turkey, football and pie while he watched the yellow lights of the house on the horizon grow.
A double line of trees stood sentry to the north. Underneath the snow cover, metal-prefab buildings huddled with a wooden barn and small concrete-block structures. Lights from the two-story house illuminated the plowed drive and scraped sidewalk, but they didn’t push the grim northern afternoon far. The scene should look like a postcard, but old snow skipped across the gravel, pushed by freezing wind, and made him shiver.
He’d decided to use his cane and wear khakis, a match for Grace’s black pants and silver pullover sweater. Like this, he could pass as a slow walker with a limp. The sidewalk was dry and easy for him, and at the end he lifted his eyes to count the porch steps.
The decoration beside the front door stopped his heart.
Why they’d been invited, and why, despite the lights and maintenance, the place whimpered of loneliness, suddenly became clear.
There was a gold star screwed to the siding.
He reached for Grace’s shoulder and jerked his head at the porch. “Star.”
Her inquiring smile meant she didn’t understand, so he pointed at it.
“Gold star. Mother.” He heard the quaver and fought for words to make her understand that these people weren’t run-of-the-mill lonely folks inviting strangers to their table. These parents had lost a son or daughter in war, probably somewhere he’d fought. A different day, a difference of inches, and this could have been his mother.
Grace was a civilian. She didn’t know what the gold star meant.
Mrs. Anderson opened the front door before he could connect with Grace, and inwardly he crumpled, although he made sure he stood as straight as a dress mess uniform crease. One hand for the rail, one for his cane, and he ascended the steps beside Grace. Each clunk on the wood sounded like the drum beat of a procession. If he wasn’t even able to warn her about their loss, there was nothing in the depths of his inarticulate misery to offer the Andersons.
Grace smiled and assured them they’d had no trouble finding the address, and agreed the weather was cold but dry was better than snow, as she shook hands with the stoop-shouldered man next to Mrs. Anderson, whose first name was Marlys.
“Your home smells wonderful,” Grace added as the older woman led her away.
Glen was the husband’s name. “They’ll be in that kitchen for the Lord’s own time, ya betcha,” he told Rey. “We can watch the game in here.”
Cruz froze in the doorway to the television room. On the mantel was a triangular frame filled with the folded flag, the boxed Purple Heart and a large portrait of a boy who could have been him ten years ago, when he’d barely needed to shave and still had a skinny Adam’s apple.
He used to be a man who called in airstrikes, took the shot, assaulted through the ambush, but he trembled before stepping into this room. Fear didn’t matter when he had to go read the boy’s name and unit and acknowledge this. Words weren’t at his command, but he could make these metal legs move with his cane and his will and take himself there.
Lance Corporal Matthew Anderson, United States Marine Corps, would never be more than twenty years old.
He propped his cane on his hip and looked at his shoes to be sure they were positioned correctly, not too far apart, before he rendered a salute.
Mr. Anderson stood by an indented easy chair, watching him. “Thank you.”
His throat was too clogged to speak, so he nodded and settled on the couch.
Glen started the television. “Radio says record cold this early. Ten below in the Black Hills.”
Not much seemed to be expected other than agreement. “Cold.”
“Yep.” The older man chewed his cheek, but after the next play he said, “You got some sort of injury, dontcha?”
He nodded. No shame in revealing himself, not to these people, so he bent and lifted his pants legs to show the metal protruding from his shoes.
“Both, eh? Some folks hereabouts lose one in a combine, but can’t say I’ve seen two. You walk mighty well.”
He nodded. “Run too.” He glanced at the game and shook his head. “No football.”
His host snorted. They didn’t talk for two possessions, and then Glen fired out of the hills. “Matt was our surprise. Marlys was forty-one when he came along.”
“Oh.” He started to feel hot in his chest again.
“His sister was right easy, but Matt changed our world.”
His heart veered closer to panic, but listening was his best newfound ability.
“Always asking me about things we don’t have here. Like that wi-fi.”
“Yep.” Now he sounded like the people in South Dakota.
“He wanted to come back and teach science and math. Get farm kids into technology, help more stay around here. I know farm equipment, but if it doesn’t have a power takeoff, I can’t do much about it.”
Their son had had big plans, empty now, like these people’s house. Rey’s struggle to decide what to do next wasn’t much in comparison to a boy who would never teach, never fulfill that dream to help his hometown.
“He sent that to Marlys and me.” Glen indicated a box on a lower shelf. “So she could see the grandkids. You know how to run it?”
Video chat equipment. Probably every soldier knew how to connect and use it.
“Com-com-com-puter?”
“In the other room.” It was halftime, so Glen stood. “Come on then.”
This he could do, in his sleep, and maybe then he’d be able to breathe again.
* * *
“Your kitchen is lovely. Spacious.” Grace had no idea what to say or do while Marlys bustled at the stove. “May I help?”
“Peel the carrots if you like, but mostly I want company while Glen watches the TV. It’s so quiet here now—” The energy left her, and she leaned against the counter.
As she grabbed for a topic to discuss with a sixty-year-old stranger, Grace wondered if their presence was tiring their hostess. “At the grocery store you must have heard us talking about leftovers.”
“That’s what made me think to ask.” Marlys straightened. “Your young man clearly wanted turkey, and Glen and I have too many leftovers by ourselves.”
“So nice of you to ask us.”
“Last year I decided...I decided I’d
take more chances. Meet new people.” She started chopping celery stalks. “It’s hard, on account of there aren’t many other people, and the young folks move away, but I couldn’t stay in my same life.” Thwack, thwack. “I don’t have that life anymore. So I up and asked you to dinner.”
“We appreciate it.” She was circling the same topics, but she doubted her hostess wanted to talk about fish or jogging.
“Saw your young man use a cane, so you must also know how fast life changes. It can all go away, just like that, can’t it?”
“That’s true.” The conversation had entered deep water, but Grace couldn’t see the way out. If she responded with another comment about food or weather, she’d sound like an idiot. “Very true.”
“Youngsters never listen to us old people.” The diced celery joined a tower of shiny red cranberry sauce in a bowl. “But if you love that young man, then don’t dither.” She covered her cheeks with her hands instead of tackling the apples. “I’m sorry, I’m being nosy. And silly. Glen would tell me to stop reading advice books.”
“It’s okay.” Grace thought she understood what Marlys was trying to say, but the homey kitchen didn’t erase the struggles she and Rey faced if they tried to build a future.
As the apples became slices, then chunks, Grace’s shoulders relaxed to the rhythm of the knife hitting the cutting board. The hypnotic flash of the stainless steel knife convinced her that Marlys wasn’t going to judge her, not the way her own family or Rey’s friends would.
She could share the fear that she hadn’t even recognized until after Rey’s friends had driven away. “I don’t know if I’m strong enough for Rey. Long term.”
“You are.” That sounded as confident as the other woman’s apple chopping.
“How do you know?” The question echoed in the kitchen like a plea.
“Set your alarm every morning, dontcha? Keep getting up. That’s the first step to strength.”
“Mar-lys! Come see this!” her husband yelled from another room.
“Hold on.” She wiped her hands on a striped towel. “What is that man fooling with?”
Following their hostess through the front hall to an office, she heard muffled laughter.
“Grandma!” Three blond children crowded and waved from a computer screen. Rey sat to the side of the desk, grinning, and Glen had a flush over his bald head as he gestured his wife to sit next to him. “Surprise!” the kids cheered.
“This young man fixed the video box with the computer thingie, don’t ya know.” His eyes glistened as he looked at Rey. “We can see our family today.”
* * *
Despite the lack of other cars, she drove slowly because she didn’t want to overshoot the headlights. And it was a form of control, at least over her exterior, that she didn’t feel over her emotions. “How could I not know?”
“It’s okay.”
“No, it’s not. They were the nicest people ever, and I didn’t know that they’d lost their son until... I feel like such a...” She’d whined to Marlys without understanding the other woman’s heartbreak until Rey had pulled her into the living room to see the boxed flag.
“It’s life.”
She didn’t say more while she parked directly in front of their room. Three lonely cars meant they could’ve had separate rooms, but after four nights, she’d forgotten to ask.
As if he’d also counted the customers, he reached for her hand. His fingers were longer and thicker and far stronger than hers, his skin a shade darker despite months inside Walter Reed. When her hand curled in his palm, he cupped it as gently as she would hold a shorebird’s egg. “Happy one room.”
“Me, too,” she agreed.
“Tonight?” He brought their joined hands to his lips, and she automatically unfurled her fingers to stroke his cheek where he’d shaved before dinner.
Don’t dither. Undoubtedly Marlys assumed two people their age were having sex, and she’d aimed her advice at marriage plans, but there was truth in her words. “Yes.”
The car was simultaneously steamy and freezing, and a warm room waited. The key was an old metal type hooked onto a steel slug and ball with the motel’s mailing address, and it took too long to operate. Finally he opened the door and motioned her to squeeze under his arm. She couldn’t make it without brushing his chest, which his lowered eyelids indicated he noticed.
The door clicked behind her and the chain snicked home, but she was uncertain whether to sit or stand, or even where to be, so she didn’t venture far into the room. Nothing in the utilitarian furnishings had changed from earlier when they’d dressed to go to the Andersons’ house, and yet the room felt as different as she did. The memorable items were the two double beds, not because of their patterned spreads or white pillowcases, but because of their side-by-side presence.
Rey solved her dilemma the way women fantasized a man would. From behind, he lifted her hair out of her coat collar and let it sift through his hands while he whispered her name. His lips brushed her temple and she tilted her head to let him kiss farther as he said, “Coat off.” It slid down her arms until the sleeves hung from her fingertips and she shrugged it to the floor.
With his hands holding her hips against his, he rotated their bodies until they both faced the mirrored vanity. The dim light from a single bedside lamp showed contrasts, but not details, of his white shirt and her silver sweater. They looked like an art photo.
“See.” He finger-brushed her hair to one shoulder. While she watched, he lowered his lips to her ear. His eyes never left her reflection. “Us.”
She was covered turtleneck to toes, but he found places to touch. The edge of her ear. The small bones of her wrist. The feather of tiny hair at her temple. He moved so slowly, always watching her eyes, that her knees wobbled with the tension and she couldn’t support herself without his body. She felt the bulge rub against her lower back, she wanted to press on him and squirm closer, but his touch was so precise it constrained her to stillness. She’d never known a man to be so focused on each moment with her, but nothing distracted him. This must be how he conducted missions.
Her head fell to his shoulder while they both watched him inch her sweater upward. His hands almost covered the pale band of skin revealed to the mirror.
“Smooth.” His voice was as rich and low as chocolate.
Now her chest rose and fell in the mirror and she looked like a runner needing air, but the elastic of her bra compressed her ribs and she couldn’t breathe. Again his hands moved as if he knew each thought when she had it, bra hooks released and the tight band was replaced by heat from his palms as the bottom hem of her turtleneck lifted higher.
She watched his hands trail across her stomach, the arch of her back stretching her to a tight instrument for him to play. Her skin was paler even than Seattle sunlight, and his hands looked dark and masterly as they spanned her abdomen, then traced her waistband. His little finger circled her navel.
No sudden moves from him, as if he feared spooking her, but she tilted deeper onto his shoulder and nothing could make her close her eyes, not while she had the sight of him manipulating the button and zipper on her pants.
“You like. Watching.”
He had that right. She liked to observe, whether marine life or her computer or people, but this was the first time the innocent habit made her burn. She wanted to do more than watch. She wanted to jump, to dive into him and roll with him and grapple and fuck, yes, fuck. But all he did was s-l-o-w-l-y loosen her pants enough for his hand to slide across her panties. Cotton, plain black, but eroticized by the image of his fingers covering the fabric.
He was making her wait. After all these months, the nights with their phones, the times their hands or arms had brushed on this trip, he was still making her wait.
In the waiting she noticed her breathing. And his. They had reached
tandem, both of their chests rising at the same moment, both letting out their breath when the other did, as if they had already become one.
“Off.” The command freed her.
She shimmied out of her slacks and kicked them far. He caught her frenzy and yanked her sweater until she twisted to remove her elbow from the sleeve. Not a graceful movie star helix-shaped strip-tease, but a rush with their eyes locked in the mirror, disconnected for the instant the knit pulled over her face, and then reconnected. His need fed hers, and her need soared to see the flushed cheeks and the shake in the hands that roamed her body. In the mirror the only dark spots left were her dangling bra and twisted panties, and her hair against his white shirt. Their silhouettes were tighter to each other, hers engulfed by his shoulders and arms as he curved around her and lifted his hands to cover her breasts.
Each sense doubled the other, racing from eye and skin to nerves and brain and multiplying until she couldn’t stand. But he could. He walked her close enough to the vanity that she braced her hands on its top. The bra disappeared, he whisked the panties to her knees and she kicked them away too. Then she was bare.
“Look,” he said.
The mirror was touching distance, like having two more people in the room. Her nipples were brown and pointed at their reflections. She watched his fingers pinch and roll them in a rhythm that tugged to her hips, felt each pluck as a need to undulate, to writhe and reach for more. Yes, she was naked, yes, he was man-handling her and driving her wild and yes, now his hand was between her legs. His fingers found her center, making her spine arch and her pelvis thrust at the same time, but no, it wasn’t enough.
He panted faster, and he bucked against her ass but he was still clothed. The rhythm of his hips and his fingers wasn’t completing her, wasn’t taking her there, the place she knew was there, so close.
If he wasn’t going to give it to her, she had to take it. She twisted to be face to face and gripped his zipper. His startled eyes were too near to focus while she assaulted his mouth. They moved together until the dresser edge dug into her butt, then he lifted her as she spread her legs and his fly. Their hands were on each other’s bodies. Everywhere was wet and wanting.
His Road Home Page 10
