“No, Father,” Catherine planted her feet firmly and shook his hands off her shoulders. “You will rue the day you lost your daughter.”
She was right; when it came to Catherine’s relationship with her father, that night was the harbinger of things to come.
*
Summer slipped slowly into fall. The leaves on Woodsville’s trees turned gold and crimson, rust and burnt orange as the air acquired a certain nip to it. At the Woodsville Drugstore, Catherine sold fewer and fewer root beer floats and Coca-Colas. Instead, most of her customers asked for hot chocolate with a dollop of fresh cream.
She saw Leo every night as they carried on their forbidden affair right under her parents’ upturned noses. Things were tense in the Woods household; Catherine and her father hardly spoke to each other, him noting her late arrivals and early departures with a cold, disapproving eye, but she hardly noticed.
Catherine and Leo took long walks through the colorful woods, bundled in coats and scarves, eventually found a blueberry grove still bearing fruit, far past season, and feasted on blueberries until they were sick. To avoid any run-ins with Josiah, they ventured out more frequently to surrounding towns to grab dinner and a movie. Afterward, they spent deliciously long, passionate hours in Leo’s Coupe, the warmth of their bodies pitted against the cool autumn night air made the car windows so thick with steam you could paint your picture in them.
“Run away with me,” Leo said one afternoon, as he held her in his arms. He hadn’t asked since that night in the woods—he had a feeling what the answer would be, but the thought of being without her was too horrible. Why couldn’t she defy what was expected of her just this once?
Catherine sighed. “You know I can’t,” she said. “What would my parents say?”
Leo shrugged. “I’d take care of you. They’d see that, eventually. They’d understand that we were good for each other… that I love their daughter just as much as they do.”
She snuggled deeper into his embrace. What she didn’t say was that it wasn’t just her parents’ approval she worried about. She feared what would ultimately become of them. What if they ended up hating each other the way her parents did? What if all the magic and passion of their forbidden romance fizzled once there was no longer a need for secrecy? What if Leo, her darling Leo, couldn’t be the stable partner so many adult women wanted?
That night, she made it home for dinner with her family, an event becoming increasingly rare. Her mother had made sirloin steak tips with green peas and mashed potatoes.
“How’s work going at the drugstore?” Elaine asked, attempting to be cordial.
“It’s fine,” Catherine replied. The tension was so thick, she wasn’t sure even her steak knife could slice it.
“If she even works there anymore,” Josiah added. “I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s all a cover.”
Catherine looked away from the table. The three younger children spooned peas into their mouths without making a sound.
“It’s not respectable work, anyway,” Josiah continued. “No daughter of mine should be working at a drugstore.”
“Sorry to embarrass you,” Catherine said, her temperature rising. Then, she played her trump card. “Maybe you’d rather I leave town with Leo Taylor. He suggested we elope today.”
Her attempt to anger her father worked as the judge exploded in rage, spewing peas everywhere.
“Ludicrous!” he spat. “What a ludicrous proposal. I hope you know that although you might enjoy disobeying me here in Woodsville, ‘having your kicks,’ as they say, if you pursue a life path with that boy, ultimately, only you will suffer. You will never have security. Without security, you will never have happiness. Never. Do you understand me?” He picked up a steak knife and ferociously sawed into his meat. “The next time I see that gutter rat, you can expect a confrontation, I’ll promise you that.”
Catherine stared into her mashed potatoes. Later that night, she couldn’t sleep. On a whim, she fastened a red flag to her bedroom window, hoping Leo might come by on a late-night stroll.
He did. As soon as he saw her signal, he went to the old tree and waited. But as she slipped out the door onto the front porch, she caught her father’s silhouette in the rocking chair a moment too late.
“Stop,” he hissed. “Don’t go another inch.”
She lingered, debating whether she should run.
“If you run,” he said, “there will be hell to pay.”
The judge motioned to an empty rocking chair beside him. “Sit,” he commanded. “If this boy loves you so much, he’ll come to you.”
So, Catherine waited in agonizing silence beside her father in the dark waiting; she didn’t have to wait for long. Leo, worried that the red flag meant Catherine was hurt or in serious trouble, bounded up to the front, caution be damned.
He saw the lamplight glinting off her hair as he approached. “Catherine?” he called in to the semidarkness. “Are you all right?”
“Don’t answer him,” Josiah interrupted, standing up from the rocking chair and looking down at Leo. “I understand you’ve been filling my daughter’s head with nonsense about elopement.”
Leo stood his ground. “It’s not nonsense,” he said. “I love your daughter, and want to marry her. If you won’t allow it, well… we’ll go elsewhere.”
Catherine could tell from the free manner of his speech and the slight slouch in his gait that he’d been drinking. “Leo,” she said gently. “Maybe it’s best if you…”
“Do you realize you’re robbing my daughter of her future?” Josiah roared, ignoring her interjection. “She’ll be the town disgrace. A girl with a bright future gets sucked into a life of poverty and shame.”
Leo glanced at Josiah. “Where I come from, life with someone who loves you and would do anything for you isn’t shameful. It’s called love.”
“Don’t tell me about things you know nothing about!”
Leo stepped onto the porch so he and the judge were on a level plane. Even in the murky light, Catherine could see that both their faces were red.
“Get off my property!” Josiah yelled.
“Not unless she comes with me!” Leo yelled back. “She has a right to choose.”
“Please…,” Catherine said. But it was too late. A light went on upstairs; they had awakened the other Woods children.
“You don’t know anything about your daughter!” Leo yelled, inches from the judge’s face. “If you did, you’d respect her wishes. But I don’t think you even care about her, all you care about is your pathetic social agenda!”
That was the final straw. Josiah pulled his fist back and punched Leo square in the nose. Leo staggered back in surprise, reached up, felt his nose, and saw bright blood on his hand.
“Father, no!” Catherine said, rushing to Leo’s side, but her admonishments were like pennies in the ocean—they sank without a sound.
Leo rushed toward the judge and slammed his fist into his jaw; the judge staggered back, dazed, as Leo headed toward him. Leo’s years of labor had made him strong, and he had no trouble knocking the judge down on his front porch.
“Stop it!” Catherine screamed. “Please, Leo, stop!” By now, her mother stood behind the screen door, crying.
“Stop it, or I’ll never speak to you again!” Catherine screamed.
Finally, her words penetrated the thick haze of alcohol and rage controlling Leo’s movements; he pulled back as Josiah struggled to right himself. Elaine rushed outside and held a dishtowel to his bleeding face as he pulled himself to a seated position. Through one swollen eye, he gave Leo a look of hatred.
“I could have you locked up for punching a judge,” he said. He spat on the porch, his saliva stained red with blood.
“You stand the most to lose,” Leo fired back. “You threw the first punch.”
Josiah was silent; Leo had a point. Catherine looked at both of them, shaking her head. “I think it’s time you go home now, Leo,” she said.
His e
yes flashed with anger, but he nodded; that was enough damage for one night.
As Leo retreated down the hill, Catherine brought her mother a clean, warm towel and watched as Elaine pressed it against Josiah’s cut lip. She tried to speak to her father, but he would have none of it.
“Just go to bed,” Elaine said woefully. “It’ll all be better in the morning.”
As Catherine climbed the stairs, she wasn’t so sure. The one person Josiah Woods disliked most in the world had shown him up. And as the moonlight shone off the fresh blood on the porch, he vowed to get revenge.
*
The fall of 1943 edged into the winter of 1944 and the news that came from across the Atlantic was getting darker. The world war that had seemed so far away suddenly drew close, the headlines saturated with grisly body counts and dire predictions.
Catherine read the paper each day at the Woodsville Drugstore. Often, she ripped an article before finishing it: she had a premonition of losing Leo and the war having something to do with it.
Catherine turned out to be right. World War II would change their relationship and their lives forever.
It started when Leo’s father lost his job. Acer Lumber was cutting its staff now that the money was in rubber, tanks, and gunmetal. Ellis heard jobs were available at a munitions factory in Ohio where one of his cousins worked. He felt it was his best option—perhaps his only option. So, he packed a bag and left, nearly overnight.
There were no tender farewells between father and son. Leo’s decision to stay in Woodsville with Catherine was easy. He wished his father well and wondered whether he’d ever see him again. Though both his parents were alive, Leo felt like an orphan.
He rented a room from two guys he’d met at the mill, dreaming about getting his own place, a little apartment just off the main stretch where he and Catherine could spend hours together. He hated the gossipy, small-town nature of Woodsville; once word got out about his fight with the judge, he found it best to lay low.
But it wasn’t Josiah Woods, but the draft board that ruined Leo’s plans: Leo Taylor was strong, able-bodied, and courageous. He was also eighteen and a half—the age of conscription. He was drafted into the military in weeks of renting his room. He received his letter on the first day of spring in 1944.
Leo had plans to meet Catherine at the Bath-Haverhill Bridge later that afternoon. Leo didn’t know how to break the news to her. Because it suited him just fine to play it by ear, he tucked the letter into his back pocket, then, he followed the Connecticut River to where the twain met.
Catherine could always read Leo like papers at the Woodsville Drugstore, his eyes telling her everything before he’d even opened his mouth.
“No,” she said, not wanting to believe it. “They want you in uniform. No. No.”
“You need to consider a career as a psychic,” he said, trying to diffuse the mood. Then, seeing that she wasn’t amused, he pulled out the letter.
Devastated, Catherine opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out. In her heart of hearts, she was certain he would be killed; the letter brought the news she’d been dreading, yet the news she knew would surely come.
Before she knew what she was doing, she was running—running back across the bridge and through the woods, back up the hill to her house, not looking back to see whether Leo was behind her. She ran straight inside and to her bedroom where she flung herself on the bed and wept.
When Leo came to the front door a few minutes later, out of breath, she refused to see him. Josiah was away at the courthouse, so there was no risk of another fight. Elaine was making almond pastries in the kitchen when Leo banged on the door.
“I need to see her,” Leo said. “Please.”
“I’m sorry,” Elaine said. “She doesn’t want to see you.”
For once, it wasn’t another case of the Woods family keeping the two apart: Catherine truly didn’t want to speak to him.
As he left the Woods house, dejected, he looked over his shoulder and saw Catherine watching him from her bedroom window, but when he saw her, she pulled the curtain closed.
Leo wanted to stay in Woodsville but he had no choice: she had to understand.
He waited at their meeting spot in the woods for hours, deep into the night. Realizing she wouldn’t come, he headed back to his shared room and snatched a few hours sleep. The next day, he was back at his post, desperately hoping that she would come to speak with him.
When she finally did, her face was pale, and her cheeks were tearstained. It had been a full day since she’d run away from him at the bridge.
“I’m sorry,” she began. “I’m sorry I left you. It’s just… I’ve been having these dreams.”
“I have dreams too,” Leo said. “Dreams of our future together.”
She shook her head. “Those aren’t the kinds of dreams I mean. I’ve been having dreams of your dying in the war.”
He sat on the soft bed of leaves and pine needles and beckoned to her. “Come here,” he said, opening his arms, and Catherine falling into them.
“Why did you hide from me?” he murmured, as she shook silently against his chest.
“It’s not because I don’t love you,” she said, her voice muffled against his shirt. “I just couldn’t bear to see you again, knowing I might lose you.”
“I don’t have to report to basic training for ten days,” he said. “We still have time to spend together.”
She shook her head fiercely. “It’s not enough.” She kissed him, first softly, then passionately, on his neck, his arms, and his lips. “It’s not enough,” she whispered. “It’s never enough.” Then, she climbed on top of him as he slipped his arms around her waist.
*
The next morning, Catherine begged her parents to allow Leo to stay with them. “Please,” she said, “just for a few days.”
Her father laughed in her face. “What in God’s name makes you think I’d allow that half-breed inside this house? If I as much as see him on my property, I’ve got half a mind to shoot him where he stands.”
“Oh, that’s nice,” Catherine retorted. “It wasn’t enough to hit him—now you want to blow him to bits?” She slammed her fist down on the kitchen table. “Is that how you treat the men fighting for this country you claim to love? He’s about to get shot at every damn day!”
“Watch your mouth, young lady.”
“I don’t care what you say.” She turned to Elaine and laid a hand on her arm. “Mother, please, just for a few days. He could help with the chores. He’s very handy. I just want to see him as much as I can before…”
Elaine’s eyes darted to her husband, then back to her daughter. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “That would be inappropriate. I can’t consider it.”
Upset, Catherine barely spoke to her parents for the next week and took all her meals with Leo or at the drugstore, even spending the night at Leo’s apartment, in flagrant defiance of her parents’ wishes. In a final effort to make them change their minds, she threatened to follow Leo wherever he was stationed.
“I’ll go to France,” she said. “How would you like that? Your precious daughter in a foreign country, alone?” They just shook their heads.
She cried to Leo about her hardhearted parents then apologized for not eloping with him when she had the chance.
“It’s all right,” Leo said. For once, he encouraged her not to make waves with her parents. “Just wait for me,” he said, stroking her hair in an attempt to soothe her. “Wait for me to come back. Because I promise you, Catherine, I will come back.”
*
On the day before he was scheduled to leave, Leo roamed the hills and river valleys of Woodsville until his arms were full of flowers. At home, he pulled a ball of twine from his pocket and set to work.
That night, they met at the Bath-Haverhill Bridge, the site of their first kiss, the starlight shining off Catherine’s long brown hair like a silver waterfall. For her part, she marveled at how tall and handsome he looked st
anding there, his arms behind his back. How much like a soldier, she thought with a pang.
“What do you have there?” she asked.
Then, Leo presented her with the biggest bouquet of wild lilies and black-eyed Susans she had ever seen. “Beautiful,” she said, burying her nose in the fragrant petals, then reached into the small coin purse she carried. “I have something for you too.” Carefully, she extracted a silver heart-shaped locket and placed it in Leo’s palm, him eyeing it with wonder. “It’s my great-grandmother’s,” she explained. “She gave it to me before she died. It’s very special to me.”
“You sure you want me to have it?” he asked.
She smiled. “You’re special to me.” She nudged him. “C’mon, open it.”
Leo popped open the locket so it was two perfect half-hearts; inside were two photographs, the first a current photograph of Catherine, the senior portrait her parents had insisted she take. She wore a demure black dress with a string of pearls around her creamy white neck, her skin pale and smooth, eyes full of fire, her lips curving into the faintest of smiles.
Leo kissed her on the cheek. “You’ve never looked lovelier,” he whispered.
The other picture was a portrait of Catherine from fourth grade, the year they’d met. By now, she knew that Leo had been in love with her since that first meeting.
“This way, you can preserve me the way you first knew me,” she said, “and the way you know me now.”
He closed the locket and held it tightly in his fist. “I’ll always keep it with me,” he said. “I swear to you. Whatever happens, this locket will never leave my side.”
She caressed his cheek and cupped his chin in her hand. “I wish I were the one going with you, not the locket,” she said. He held her while she cried.
*
Leo left for basic training in early April of 1944, buoyed on a stream of heartfelt promises after the two lovers swore they would be together again, that they would write to each other, daily. And they swore that, when Leo returned from war, they would be married, their promises far beyond the objections of Catherine’s parents now.
Four Seasons of Romance Page 4
