The GI Bride

by Simantel, Iris Jones

Wayne and I slept well into the next afternoon and only woke when Mum came upstairs with a cup of tea and said that everyone was anxious to see and talk to us.

  After more tea, ‘breakfast’ and everyone trying to talk at once about our nightmare journey, I wandered around the house, touching and looking at everything, as I had done on my last visit home. I grinned and cried alternately at the sheer joy of being at home, the simple pleasure of familiarity, hearing my family’s Cockney accents, gazing into their eyes and smelling the usual smells. The thought of having to leave it all behind again crept into my consciousness and I had to blot it out. I’d worry about that later.

  My time in England was all I’d hoped it would be. It was wonderful visiting my relatives, all of whom seemed eager to hear about my life in America. Wayne had his fourth birthday while we were there and the family made a big fuss of him. I also visited as many of my old friends as possible but mostly I spent time with my school pal Sheila McDonald, who was now married to Ray Jukes, a friend of my older brother Peter. They were still living, with their baby, Jane, on the Oxhey Estate with Ray’s parents.

  Besides having Sheila, Ray and baby Jane living with them, the Jukeses also had a lodger. He was a nice-looking man named Chuck and I developed a bit of a crush on him; my visits became even more frequent, always in the hope of seeing him. Finally, Sheila suggested he should ask me out, which he did. We had several dates, and he was kind to my son. Dad didn’t like him at all and I had a big falling-out with him when he called Chuck ‘a toe-rag’. The pot was calling the kettle black I hadn’t forgotten about Dad’s past.

  I continued to see Chuck, even though a cloud now hung over my stay at home. I probably spent too much time with him. He took me to nightclubs and occasionally we didn’t get home until the wee hours of the morning. We sometimes made love on the couch in the living room, only parting when we heard sounds upstairs. I knew that, in my parents’ eyes, what I was doing was wrong, that it was unfair to them, but I had missed so much by marrying so young. I suppose I was just trying to make up for it. I couldn’t expect them to approve: they saw only a fun-loving man who was still single at the age of thirty there had to be something wrong with him. They couldn’t understand that, in a way, Chuck had become my lifeline. He was giving me some of the fun I had missed as a teenager, some excitement and a break from the depression of the years spent trying to fit in with life in America and a family who couldn’t accept me for who I was. I knew he was no angel, but he had a well-paid job and no other obligations, he was known to be a one-woman man, and best of all, he seemed to care about my son. At the time, most importantly, he gave me back my confidence. He also gave me hope.

  Wayne and I had been in England for about two months when Bob, who had written to us several times, insisted that we return to America. He reminded me that it was illegal for me to keep his son away from him and that he might have to take legal action. My parents concurred: they thought I should return to the States and to my obligations. I later learned that it was not illegal for me to stay in England with our son as long as I made every effort to ensure that he saw his father.

  I will never forget going down on my knees, sobbing my heart out and begging, ‘Please don’t make me go back, please let me stay with you.’ Dad cried too, but Mum, stoic as ever, reminded me that I had made my bed and had to lie in it. All I could think was that she didn’t want me, that nothing had changed, that she still didn’t care about me. Were my parents worried that they might have to help support my child and me financially? I knew that my mother didn’t approve of my divorce or of me; she was ashamed, and I was sure she thought that everything had been my fault. At that time, in Britain, the only grounds for divorce were adultery, and abandonment or separation that had lasted at least seven years; the ‘other woman, or man’, referred to as ‘the co-respondent’, had to be named in the decree and the story usually appeared in the newspapers. Divorce was scandalous.

  Chuck had made it abundantly clear that he had no intention of marrying or settling down and said nothing to dissuade me from leaving. Sheila had warned me not to become too fond of him; he was an old friend of hers and she knew he was not interested in having a permanent relationship with anyone, even though he only ever dated one woman at a time. He had actually told me that he couldn’t understand how anyone could juggle more than one relationship. And so the time came for us to part. We said goodbye with tears in our eyes, promising to keep in touch. He had never said he loved me, but while we were together I knew he cared about me; I also knew I would miss him and hoped he might miss me too.

  Having postponed the inevitable for as long as possible, I booked our flight back to America and wondered what lay ahead for my little son and me. I knew Wayne’s father would always be good to him he was a good man but the rest was up to me. I just hoped I could do it on my own. Over the years, I often wondered how my parents could have allowed me, a sixteen-year-old girl, to get married and move to another country, but it was far more agonizing to recall that they made me go back to America and virtually nothing. I had nowhere to live, no job and no money, except the small amount I was supposed to receive in child support from Wayne’s father and how could we even be sure of that? The pain of the perceived rejection still lives in me, an ugly scar.

  It is impossible to describe the heartbreak I experienced at leaving my old home again. I remember only the all-consuming fear of facing life alone, and the ache in my heart as I said goodbye to my family, my true home and my beloved country. I didn’t know who I was any more. I was no longer a GI bride; I was divorced, a former GI bride. Did that make me a GI divorcee? I wondered how many other GI divorcees were out there. Had they faced the same fears that I now faced? Had any of them returned to their families in England, or had they been forced to live with the consequences of their mistakes and decisions? I didn’t seem to belong anywhere now, and I felt as I had when I was an evacuee during the war: desolate and in despair.

  As the plane rose into the air I watched the British coastline disappear beneath the clouds, and a new, greater fear gripped me: what if I could never afford to make another trip home? What if I had just said goodbye to my family for the last time?

  11: Single and Alone

  Back in Chicago, the Ballmaiers agreed to let me stay with them until I found a job and an affordable apartment. My furniture and other belongings were still stored at their house so Wayne and I moved back into our old bedroom the scene of a destroyed passport and almost-aborted holiday plans.

  I don’t know how I would have coped without the Ballmaiers. My brother Peter and his wife Brenda now lived in a distant suburb with their two children and they were expecting another, so I saw little of them. I wished they still lived next door: I missed having them nearby. I couldn’t sit around feeling sorry for myself, though. It was time to get some money coming in and I had to find employment.

  I’d always fancied working for a doctor so when I found the help-wanted advertisement for a receptionist in a surgery, I applied. The doctor hired me on the spot and I was soon working in downtown Chicago. Over the years, it always proved easy for me to secure such positions: Americans seemed to love having an English accent answering their telephones.

  I still had a little money saved from the divorce settlement and, after I’d received my first few pay cheques, I could afford the security deposit on a small apartment close to the Ballmaiers. Bob, my now ex-husband, was always faithful in sending us Wayne’s allowance; the amount was not huge but it made all the difference in that we could live in a decent neighbourhood and apartment. He always made sure Wayne didn’t have to go without, and his parents were good to their grandson too. Bob was also conscientious about his vis
iting rights; he always picked his son up punctually and brought him home at the agreed time; he did fun things with him, and often took him for the whole weekend so that I could have a little break. I couldn’t have asked or hoped for a more congenial arrangement and considered myself lucky that it was so.

  The apartment I rented was near the elevated train to downtown, and Wayne could once again attend the Gay Time Nursery School. Everything seemed to be falling into place, but it was still a struggle and I worried about our future. I had felt secure while staying with my family in England and, to a degree, while I lived with the Ballmaiers, but it was frightening to be alone, and I wondered if I’d be able to cope with the responsibility.

  The second-floor apartment I rented was the smallest of three in an old house. It consisted of a bathroom, then a large room divided into kitchen, dining area and living room. A small bedroom led off the living room so Wayne and I had to share the bed. My double bed took up the entire bedroom and there was little storage space; the only place for the rest of my bedroom furniture was in the dining area. Wayne’s bed, plus a few boxes of miscellaneous belongings, had to stay in storage until I had a bigger place. I had no idea when that might be.

  Luckily, a single girl in her thirties, Joan Witek, lived in the next-door apartment and we soon became friends. Joan worked as a secretary in downtown Chicago. She was also director of music for a large Catholic church and school in the city; she worked long hours but when she was at home she was good company. Sometimes I dog-sat for her, and occasionally she baby-sat for me.

  Joan was not particularly attractive. She fought a constant battle with her jet-black facial hair, and she was what you might call a big girl. She was madly in love with one of her bosses and thought he felt the same about her. I was sure that he was using her. There were many times when she prepared dinner for him and he didn’t show up, which was lucky for Wayne and me because she would invite us to eat the food. Joan was an excellent cook; the aromas of whatever she was cooking would drift into my apartment and make my mouth water.

  She tried to fix me up with one of her boss’s friends. ‘Maybe if Clare [Clarence!] comes over to see you, Jim will be less likely to stand me up,’ she said. I sensed there was method in her madness and agreed to meet the man. We double-dated a couple of times, and we even went to Lake Geneva for the weekend once while Wayne was away with his dad, but for me, there was too much drinking, which I found a giant bore. One dreadful thing happened while this liaison was going on. The four of us had been out for dinner and had come back to Joan’s apartment for a nightcap. Jim took the key from her and unlocked the door. We all piled in, expecting to hear her little dog yapping, but we were met with silence and a foul stench. When she turned on the lights, there was the dog, quivering and cowering under the kitchen table. All over the floor lay the torn-up remnants of several sanitary towels. He had been in the garbage can and, to top it all, had messed on the floor. No wonder he was shaking.

  I was mortified so I can only imagine how Joan felt. I immediately excused myself and went next door into my own apartment, leaving Joan with two shocked men and the most embarrassing situation imaginable. Soon I heard doors banging, and knew the men had left; the last thing I heard was one of them saying, ‘Jesus Christ, that was disgusting,’ as they went down the stairs. I went back into Joan’s apartment to see if I could help her, but she was inconsolable as she began cleaning up. I could only wonder how she’d ever be able to face her boss again, but she’d have to if she wanted to keep her job. For days after that, the only smell coming from Joan’s apartment was that of burning incense.

  Dr H., my boss, had his office on the mezzanine floor of a hotel on the near-north side of Chicago. It was close to Lake Shore Drive, which was where many of the city’s elite resided. Dr H. had numerous wealthy patients, including some members of Chicago’s illustrious high society. He was also physician to the Chez Paree Adorables, who performed at the city’s most famous nightclub, the Chez Paree. Many of the girls lived in the hotel and I often found them sunbathing nude on its rooftop terrace when I went up there to eat my lunch. On one occasion, I would have crawled over them to the rail, if I’d had to: the Queen and Prince Philip had arrived in Chicago on their tour of Canada and North America. They had sailed on the royal yacht, Britannia, down the St Lawrence Seaway to Lake Michigan, and had disembarked at Buckingham Fountain. I had read in the news that their motorcade would be passing the hotel and there was no way I was going to miss that, nude sunbathers or not. It was one of just two occasions in my life that I was privileged to see the top of Her Majesty’s head. (The second time was many years later at the Gare du Nord in Paris. She had travelled on the Eurostar, which takes you from London to Paris direct, passing under the English Channel.)

  After a while, Dr H. decided I could start helping his two nurses. His practice was close to the historic Navy Pier, and he had a contract to treat minor injuries incurred by the construction workers involved with renovation and restoration work there. Between the regular patients and treating injuries, the nurses were often swamped. They taught me to change wound dressings, remove sutures and deburr needles. Yes, in those days, they reused needles, which had to have any microscopic burrs filed off before they went into the sterilizer. I say microscopic but all we did was test the end of the needle with the tip of a finger. No wonder injections were so painful back then.

  One of the doctor’s friends, who came in regularly, began flirting with me. Byron H. was probably in his sixties, but I knew he was a wealthy widower. At that time, I had begun to think I should look for a rich man rather than elusive and often disappointing love so I flirted back. On one of his visits, he told me he was going to the hospital to have some tests.

  ‘How come?’ I asked.

  ‘How come you come, I come, baby come,’ he said, laughing like a banshee. What a jerk, I thought. How crude. I made up my mind right then that I wouldn’t go out with him if he was the last man on earth … but I did, just once. We went to a smart restaurant and shared pleasant conversation; he even told me about his wife and how she had died. He was so much nicer than I’d thought, and when he invited me back to his house to see his collection of old jukeboxes, I went. His home was sumptuous and the antique jukeboxes were impressive. I thought I had misjudged him. I was relaxed and comfortable until the mood changed drastically.

  ‘Well,’ he said, ‘I’ve been nice to you and now it’s your turn to be nice to me.’

  How could I have been so naive? That’s what I get for being so trusting, I thought. Now what do I do?

  ‘What do you mean?’ I said, acting as dumb as I now felt.

  ‘I’m taking you to bed. That’s how you’re going to be nice to me,’ he replied, and pushed me towards the stairs.

  I was petrified. ‘No, I can’t please. I have to get home. I promised the baby-sitter I’d be home by now.’

  ‘You should have thought about that before,’ he all but snarled at me.

  Roughly, he grabbed me. His fingers dug into my arms and his manicured nails were hurting me. Oh, my God, I thought, he’s going to rape me, but then I had an idea. ‘If you don’t take me home right now, I am going to tell your friend Dr H. and the girls in the office that you tried to rape me.’

  ‘You bitch,’ he spat out. ‘I believe you would, wouldn’t you?’

  He was right. I didn’t care who he was or what his connections were, I was not about to be bullied by a jerk like him. Yes, I was stupid to have put myself in such a situation and I had a lot to learn, but I was learning fast. I would never allow myself to get into such a fix again.

  One day at work I felt terrible I had been up all night with a sick Wayne and could h
ardly keep my eyes open. One of the nurses, a second-generation Lebanese girl with great almond eyes and jet-black hair that came down to her waist, told me she had something that would help me get through the day and handed me a capsule. She didn’t tell me what it was but assured me it was safe and that she often had to take one. I swallowed it and was soon wide awake and blabbering away like a chimpanzee to anyone and everyone. I was in love with the world and everyone in it. I thanked Faith, the nurse, for saving my life and for helping me to survive the day. It was nothing short of a miracle.

  When I got home that night, I crashed. I was so tired that Wayne and I went to bed at seven o’clock and slept straight through I hadn’t even undressed.

  ‘What the heck did you give me?’ I asked Faith the next day.

  ‘Just Dexedrine,’ she said. ‘It’s a stimulant. We keep loads of it here. Doc gives it to the Chez Paree Adorables. It gives them energy and keeps the weight off. Lots of his patients come just for that, but keep it under your hat,’ she added.

  Well, I certainly didn’t need to lose weight: I was still skinny as a rail.

  Faith was to surprise me again. One day, she asked me if I was interested in becoming an escort.

  ‘What’s an escort?’ I asked.

  ‘Well,’ she explained, ‘it’s someone who goes out for dinner or to a show with men who are in town and don’t want to go out alone.’

  ‘Are you kidding? Isn’t that prostitution?’

  ‘No, no, no,’ she said. ‘It’s nothing like that but you can have sex with them if you want to. They’re just lonely men, mostly travelling executives, who want to be seen with a pretty girl on their arm, and you get to have a good time and go to places you couldn’t afford to go otherwise.’ Hmm, I thought. Sounds fishy to me.

  ‘Here, look at this,’ she said, and pulled a fabulous piece of jewellery out of her pocket. ‘I got this from the guys I spent a little time with last night.’