Garden of Angels

by Lurlene McDaniel

  March ’68: Dysentery and sores are driving me insane. Three more of my buddies are dead from enemy fire.

  June ’68: After a 77-day siege and hundreds of marines KIA (killed in action), the base at Khe Sanh was abandoned and blown up today by our own troops because Washington’s decided it’s no longer militarily strategic to remain there. So many died here, and now we’re told the place doesn’t matter anymore.

  I have survived when so many of my buddies have not. I don’t know why. Maybe to tell people that I have seen Hell and felt its fiery brimstone, and that it is a place where no one should ever have to go.

  I cried when I read Kyle’s journal. I saw the scenes he described, felt his anguish over losing his friends. I got mad at our President and Congress because they had allowed the fighting to go on for so long. With five months of school remaining, I kept tweaking and embellishing the chart with photos I cut from Life and Look and Time magazines. I knew the names of the military helicopters and fighter jets, the names of the battles, the locations of the crucial cities. Yes, I was becoming a real expert on the war in Vietnam.

  Then, in the last week of January, two things happened that put everything else out of my mind. Adel called to say that Barry and she were moving to Germany, courtesy of the U.S. Army. And my mother returned to the hospital for more chemotherapy.

  Seventeen

  February

  With Mama back in the hospital in Atlanta and Adel gone to Germany, I faced coming home to our empty house every day after school. I hated it. The house I’d grown up in seemed wintry and dark, a shell sucked clean of life. The gardens were barren, with leafless bushes and brown grass and birds not yet returning to build nests or sing their sweet songs. Papa didn’t come home until after six, sometimes later. “Tax season is on us,” he told me. “These next three months are the busiest of the year, so you’ll be on your own a lot, Darcy. Can you handle it?”

  Naturally I said yes. I made a stab at cooking and discovered that cooking and timing delivery to the table were much harder than I’d imagined. However, Mama’s prayer circle from church still brought over casseroles, so Papa and I ate regularly. I did my homework. I watched some television. I went to bed. My life became colorless and drab.

  On weekends, Papa and I went to visit Mama. She suffered terribly. She was worn down by chemo and ravaged by cancer; I could hardly bear to look at her. If I had thought her first chemo treatments were awful, these were downright horrific. Mama again lost her hair, including eyebrows and eyelashes. She said, “I look like a plucked chicken.” She had terrible sores inside her mouth, making it impossible for her to eat or drink. She was racked by nausea and lost so much weight that she became just skin and bones. Fear lived inside my heart like a worm in an apple. “She’s not getting better,” I told Papa after every visit.

  “She will,” he said. “Like last time, she’ll get better and come home to us.”

  I told Becky Sue, “The chemo is poisoning my mother.”

  Becky Sue let me rant and rail and patted my shoulder and told me to pray harder. I hesitated to tell her that I’d given up on prayer because God wasn’t listening. If he had been, then my mama would have been getting well and would have come home and stayed home. I swore off Sunday school and sat in the far back pews with Papa during church services. I attended youth group, but only for Becky’s sake. I just couldn’t feel anything but resentment toward God.

  It was Becky who signed us up at school for the Valentine dance’s decoration committee.

  “Why’d you do that?” I asked as she dragged me to the gym for the first meeting.

  “Because it’s the only dance of the year for the whole high school. Because dressy clothes are mandatory and therefore everybody looks their best. Because you need to think about something else for a change. Because it might actually be fun.” She ticked off the reasons on her fingers as she spoke.

  “Oh, sure. Cutting out paper hearts and making red-and-white paper chains is so much fun.”

  “Don’t be so crabby. I mean, what else have you got to do?”

  She was right about that. It wasn’t as if my life was full. I’d given up on Jason—a secret crush that would never amount to anything. He usually acknowledged me when I saw him in the halls, but he’d stopped coming to teen group at church, and no amount of begging him to return, according to Carole, persuaded him to do so. I considered Becky’s suggestion.

  “Oh, all right,” I said grudgingly. “I’ll be on the committee with you.”

  Our gym teacher, Mrs. Poston, supervised the plans for the dance, making sure we had the proper supplies and a scheme for decorating. Of course, I had no plans to attend the dance, because except for Jason, there wasn’t a boy in our school I’d go with, even if someone asked me—which no one would—but Becky held out hope that Russell would ask her. Three days before the big dance in the gym, Russell surprised us both by doing so. I’d heard that his first choice, Susan Wilson, had turned him down, but I saw no reason to puncture Becky Sue’s balloon with that kind of news.

  “You have to come,” she told me the day we were hanging decorations around the gym. The dance was to start at seven and we only had a few hours to get the work done, so the committee had excused absences for that Friday afternoon.

  “I don’t want to come,” I told Becky. “Why should I?”

  “To support me.”

  “You’ve got Russell to support you.”

  “But he’s a guy and you’re my best friend. Who’ll go to the bathroom with me?”

  I rolled my eyes. “I imagine you can pee by yourself.”

  “That’s not what I mean and you know it. I need you there. What if Russell and I don’t hit it off?”

  “You’ve been talking about Russell Danby all year. And now, at the eleventh hour, you’re afraid you might not get along with him?” I wanted to take my best friend by the shoulders and shake her. “I don’t want to go!” I exclaimed. “I’ll stand out like a sore thumb.”

  “Lots of others will be coming stag,” Becky insisted. “You won’t be alone.” She leaned closer to me. “I’ve heard that Donna won’t be going with J.T. Don’t you want to see who she comes with?”

  “They haven’t made up yet?”

  “Not even speaking,” Becky said smugly.

  I admitted that I was curious, but other things had occupied my mind in the past month. I told Becky Sue, “No way am I coming to the dance.”

  But in the end, she won out.

  When I arrived home from school on Friday and read a note from Papa saying that he’d be working late, and when I saw the long, lonely Friday night stretching out in front of me like an eternity, I knew I couldn’t stay there by myself. I hurried upstairs and called Mrs. Poston and told her that I’d be glad to man the punch bowl and take care of the table throughout the evening. She volunteered to pick me up early, for which I was grateful, because that meant I could arrive early with her and wouldn’t have to walk into the gym for all the world to see that I was utterly and totally alone.

  I pulled my bridesmaid dress from the closet and made a stab at dabbing on makeup leftovers from Adel, but could only brush my hair and let it hang to my shoulders in its usual style. “Who cares?” I told my reflection in the mirror. No one would be looking at me.

  The gym filled quickly with couples, and with the lights dimmed and a disco ball scattering sparkles every which way and the walls decorated with giant hearts, cupids and paper doilies, the place looked pretty good. Terri Hanson’s older brother set up a DJ corner and played stacks of records, one right after the other. I took my place behind the punch table and poured red punch into plastic cups for all who asked. And I saw that Becky Sue had been correct when she’d predicted that many kids would come stag. A whole line of chairs along the west wall was filled with girls and guys all dressed in their party best and trying hard to look bored and uninterested in each other.

  “You’re here!” Becky squealed the minute she saw me. She was dressed
in a long pink dress with pretty, puffy long sleeves and ribbons. She wore a wrist corsage.

  “I couldn’t let my best friend pee alone,” I said, handing her a cup of punch. “Of course, your kidneys will have to coordinate with my breaks.”

  She leaned closer. “Russell is wonderful. His eyes lit up like Christmas tree bulbs when I came down the stairs.”

  I was happy for Becky, but envious too. It might be nice to have some boy make a fuss over me. “Go dance,” I told her. “And don’t get lipstick on his collar.”

  She walked off in a flounce of taffeta, and Russell met her on the dance floor. I watched them snuggle amid all the other couples. I poured another cup of punch and looked up to see J.T. holding out his hand. “If I’d known you were going to be here unattached, I’d have dumped my plans, fallen at your feet and begged you to be my date,” he taunted.

  I scanned the room as if searching for someone. “So who did you pay to come with you?”

  He sneered at me. “I’m with JoAnn Moser. And she volunteered.”

  “What—no Donna?” I was pushing my luck but didn’t much care because he had made me mad with his teasing.

  His expression grew stony and I knew my barb had hit home. “She’s dog food. Who needs her?”

  “Jason,” I whispered, shocked. For there he was, just walking in the door, holding Donna’s hand.

  J.T. turned, and although I couldn’t see his face, I did see his back straighten and his big, beefy hand clench into a fist.

  Jason was dressed in jeans, but also a sport coat and white shirt. Donna wore soft yellow and her smile looked radiant. Suddenly, all became clear to me. It was Jason whom Donna had been seeing secretly. It was Jason who had broken J.T.’s hold on his longtime girlfriend. And by coming to the dance together, they were flaunting it to every teen in Conners. J.T., the mighty football god, had been snaked by an outsider, a nobody, a motorcycle-riding hood and a Yankee. I would have laughed out loud if my own heart hadn’t been broken.

  Principal Hagan and the coach materialized as if from thin air. Their presence meant there would be no problems at the dance. I picked up the cup of punch J.T. had set on the table. “Don’t you want your punch, J.T.?” I asked sweetly. “Have you lost your taste for it?”

  He shot me a withering look. “Stuff it, Quinlin.” He lumbered off, found JoAnn and half dragged her to the door. Everyone heard them arguing about leaving so early, but in the end J.T. got his way. As he usually did.

  Once they were gone, the floor filled up again with couples, and music filled the gym. I hardly heard anything. My hands were shaking so badly that I spilled punch on the table and had to find paper towels to sop up the mess. I didn’t care. All I wanted was to leave. I started making up a story in my head for Mrs. Poston to excuse myself when Becky Sue came up and said, “Time for a break.”

  I left my duties without a backward glance and followed her into the girls’ room, crammed with chattering females crowded around the mirror. “What’s up?” Becky asked once we’d carved out a space for ourselves. “You’re pale as a ghost.”

  “J.T. was hateful to me,” I said. The half-truth was my protective shield.

  “Well, he certainly got slapped down tonight,” Becky said with a note of satisfaction. “Donna really embarrassed him. I didn’t think the old girl had it in her, but I’m glad she did.”

  A senior and one of Donna’s girlfriends, overhearing our conversation, said, “Donna’s been sneaking around with Jason since Christmas. At first she was just using him to get back at J.T., ’cause he’s so mean to her. But the little mouse got caught in her own snare. Now she’s crazy about Jason.”

  I could have lived forever without hearing that, but I carefully hid my feelings behind a mask of indifference. Becky Sue hung on her every word. “J.T. won’t like being crossed,” she said. “Did Donna think about the consequences?”

  The girl shrugged. “Jason knows he’s playing with fire, but he doesn’t seem to care. It’s sort of romantic if you think about it, having two guys squabbling over you.”

  I didn’t want to think about it.

  Once we were back in the gym, Becky again asked me, “Are you sure you’re okay? You’re not acting like yourself.”

  “I told you I didn’t want to come to this dance,” I said. “I should have stayed home.”

  Becky Sue gave me a hug. “Tomorrow night we’ll have a sleepover.”

  “I’m going with Papa to visit Mama.”

  “Soon as you get home, you come over.”

  “What if Russell wants you to go out with him?”

  “Why, he can just wait. Goodness, I’ve waited long enough for him.”

  Knowing she was trying to cheer me up, I forced a smile. By then many of the couples were leaving and the dance was winding down. I was almost back to my post behind the punch table when Jason stepped in front of me. “Can we dance?” he asked.

  “Where’s your date? Chasing after J.T.?” I felt mean-spirited and humiliated too because he’d trampled on my tender feelings for him.

  “Donna’s sitting this one out.”

  I glanced around and saw her perched on a stag-line chair. She was giving both of us dagger looks.

  “What is she? A trained puppy? Waiting for you to snap your fingers?”

  “Ouch,” he said mildly. “Why so hostile?”

  “I’m busy,” I said, stepping around him.

  “But I want to dance with you.” He stepped into my path.

  “Well, did it occur to you that I might not want to dance with you?” My heart was hammering like a drum.

  He looked down at me, grinned and took me in his arms. “It never crossed my mind.”

  And at that moment, the DJ put on “I Honestly Love You.” My breath caught. I looked into Jason’s face and saw only softness. “Dance with me,” he whispered.

  If I had been butter, I would have melted.

  His embrace tightened, and with my body fitted to his, we moved as one to the music. I felt the heat of his skin on mine, the warmth of his breath on my cheek. His lips pressed against my hair. The words of the song wrapped around me like fine ribbons, binding me to Jason. He didn’t know— could never know—how much I wanted to be near him this way. “I love you; I honestly love you. . . .” The voice on the record and the one in my head flowed into one pure stream. I struggled not to cry. It’s a song, just a song, I told myself. It meant nothing and this dance meant nothing.

  When the music ended, Jason slowly untangled from our embrace. He stared down at me, his green eyes serious, his delicious mouth inches from mine. “You are beautiful, Darcy Quinlin.”

  I shook my head, not trusting my voice.

  “Then believe this—you’re worth two of girls like Donna.”

  But Donna was with him and I wasn’t.

  He raised my hand to his lips and, like a cavalier from an old storybook, kissed it. “Thank you for the dance,” he said, and walked away.

  Tears stung my eyes, but I didn’t look back to see him leave with Donna. For that was more pain than I could bear. I made it home before I broke down, and there alone on my bed in the moonlight, I told myself that I was being foolish and stupid to spill my tears over a love I should not feel for a boy I could not have.

  Eighteen

  March

  In the last week of February, I noticed that the daffodils were poking their heads through the soil. Just seeing their bright yellow faces gave me a thrill. Everywhere I looked in our backyard, spring was announcing its arrival. Lacy yellow fringe lined the branches of the forsythia bushes, and the azalea bushes were bursting into vibrant shades of orange, fuchsia, purple and lilac. I saw tiny tight buds on the dogwood trees and a mantle of purple phlox beginning to edge over the stone walls by the pond. Soon the iris beds would be in bloom. It made me happy, knowing that Mama would come home to find her gardens ablaze with color and new growth. I made a note on the calendar to pull up the pansies and remulch the beds. Once the irises were spent, I
would plant begonias, geraniums and verbena in the sunny beds, impatiens and petunias in the shady ones.

  Friday, March 1, was a teachers’ work day and we had no school. By noon, the air was warm enough to go without a sweater. Eager to hurry spring along, I headed off to the nursery, pulling the wagon Mama sometimes used to transport flowerpots and flats of annuals around the yard. The walk there was a long one, but I felt like making the trip on foot just so I could smell the air and feel the sunshine on my bare arms.

  I decided to cut across near the junkyard on the edge of town, run-down and overgrown with weeds and deserted except for a few crumbling buildings. I rounded the corner of one shuttered building and stopped stock-still. Less than twenty yards away, Jason was riding in lazy circles on his motorcycle. When he saw me, he gunned the engine, stood the machine upright on its back wheel and, once it bounced back to the ground, drove toward me. He slid to a stop, kicking up gravel. “Hello, Darcy. What are you doing out here?”

  “Walking,” I said. He looked good enough to make my insides turn into buttercream. We hadn’t had any contact since the dance.

  “Pretty lonely place to be walking by yourself.”

  “Are you thinking about my safety? This is Conners, not Chicago.”

  “You look like a little kid pulling your little wagon.”

  I was in no mood to be teased. “I’m buying flowers up at the nursery. Some of us have things to do.”

  He grinned. “Hey, I’m busy. I’m practicing tricks on my cycle. Not much else to do around this excuse for a town.”

  “Sorry you’re so bored.” I jerked the wagon to the left of him. He caught my arm as I passed.

  “Why are you mad at me?” he asked.

  There was no way I could tell him that my anger was rooted in frustration. That it was easier to dislike him than it was to long for him so much that it made me ache. “I’m not mad at you. I just have things to do.” I began walking, the wagon clattering behind me on the rough ground.