Years

by LaVyrle Spencer

  Lastly, with a lump in her throat, she asked them all to pray for world peace, and told them Kristian would be leaving the following day for Jefferson Barracks, Missouri, for voluntary enlistment into the army.

  She thanked them one last time with tears in her eyes and turned the program back to Superintendent Dahl for the distribution of grade-achievement certificates and eighth-grade diplomas.

  Afterward, they had apple cider and cookies, and Linnea found herself hugged by nearly every parent present, and to a number, her students told her they wished she were coming back next year. By the time the benches were carried into the building and stacked up against the side walls, it was dusk.

  Kristian had gone off with Patricia, but Nissa and Theodore waited in the wagon.

  Standing in the cloakroom doorway and looking at the shadowed room with its desks pushed against the side walls, its flag furled tightly in brown paper, its blackboard washed, and its stovepipe freshly cleaned, Linnea felt as if she were leaving a small part of her heart behind. Ah, the smell of this room. She’d never forget it. A little dusty, a little musty — like sweating heads — and perhaps tinged with the undying after scent of cabbage from their Fridays’ soup.

  “Ready?” Theodore asked behind her.

  “I guess so.” But she didn’t turn. Her shoulders sagged slightly.

  He squeezed them, pulling her back against his chest. “You’ll miss it, huh?”

  She nodded sadly. “I grew up a lot here.”

  “So did I.”

  “Oh, Teddy... ” She found his hand and pulled it to her lips. The twilight settled upon their shoulders. Outside, the horses waited — Nelly and Fly now. Inside, memory’s voices drifted back from yesterday — the children’s, John’s, Kristian’s, the hired hands’, their own.

  “In six years one of ours will be coming here,” he mused. “And we can tell him the stories about when his mother was teacher.”

  She smiled up at him over her shoulder, then raised up on tiptoe and kissed him.

  He rested his hands on her waist. “I know how much you’d like to come back... and it’s okay. Cause I know you want the baby, too.”

  “Oh, I love you, Theodore Westgaard.” She linked her fingers behind his neck.

  “I love you, too, little missy.” He kissed the end of her nose. “And Ma’s waiting.”

  With one last look, they closed all four doors and walked arm in arm to the wagon.

  It was a breezeless night. The big dipper was pouring light into the northern sky and the moon in three-quarter phase lit the world like a blue flame. The first crickets had arrived and they sawed away dissonantly from the shadows, stopping momentarily at the sound of a horse passing, then tuning up again.

  Clippa plodded unhurriedly along the grassy verge between two wheat fields, head down, backside swaying lazily. On her warm, bare hide Kristian rode with the reins loose in his fingers and Patricia’s cheek pressed against his back, her hands hugging his belly. They’d been riding that way, aimlessly, for nearly an hour, loam to face the final good-bye.

  “I should get you home.”

  Her arms tightened. “No, not yet.”

  “It’s late.”

  “Not yet,” she whispered fiercely. Beneath her palm she felt his heart beat, strong and sure. Against her thighs she felt his legs rub with the rhythm of the hoofbeats on the grass.

  “We’re almost to the creek.”

  The branch of a black willow touched his face and he bent to avoid it, tilting her with him.

  “Stop a minute.”

  He reined in. Clippa obeyed instantly, her head drooping while the pair on her back sat still, listening. They could hear the purling water some distance off, and the pulsing duet of two bullfrogs. Kristian tipped his head back to look at the stars. It bumped hers and he felt her breath blowing warm through his shirt, heating his shoulder blade. He swallowed and closed his eyes, covering her arms with his own.

  “We shouldn’t’ve stopped.”

  She kissed his shoulder blade once more. “You could die, Kristian.”

  “I’m not gonna die.”

  “But you could! You could, and I’d never see you again.”

  “I don’t want to go either.”

  “Then why are you?”

  “I don’t know. It’s just something in me. But I aim to come back and marry you.”

  Behind him, he felt her straighten. “Marry me?”

  “I’ve thought about it. Haven’t you?”

  “Oh, Kristian, you really mean it?”

  “Course, I mean it.” Her arms snaked around his belt and her breasts warmed his skin through the white cotton shirt. “Does that mean you would?”

  “Of course I would. I’d marry you today if you’d let me.” Her palms moved to rub the tops of his thighs where his trousers stretched taut over firm, young muscle. Abruptly he swung a leg over Clippa’s head and slid off. Looking up, he reminded Patricia, “You aren’t done with school yet. Better get that done first, don’t you think?”

  “I’m fifteen. My grandmother was married a year already by the time she was fifteen.” In the moonlight her face was shadowed, but he understood the expression in her eyes even though he couldn’t make it out. “Come on, let’s walk.” He reached for her waist, and she for his shoulders, but when she dropped from the horse their bodies brushed and neither of them moved. The night thrummed around them. Their heartbeats matched its rhythm. Their breaths came quick and heavy.

  “Oh, Kristian, I’m going to miss you,” she breathed.

  “I’ll miss you, too.”

  “Kristian... ” She lifted to him, looping his neck with her arms, pressing close. When their lips met it was with the singular desperation only farewells can bring. Their bodies were tensile and straining, burgeoning with imminent maturity and the awesome need to lay claim to one. another before tomorrow’s separation. His arms bound her tightly and his tongue evoked an answer from hers. His hands began traversing her body, dreading the loss of it even before the gain.

  He found her breasts — firm, small, upthrust — her curved feminine length against his hard, honed body. He set a rhythm against her and she answered, until they could not have come closer together but tried nonetheless. He went down to his knees, hauling her with him, falling to the thick, dry grass that whispered beneath them as they added a new, pulsing rhythm to those of the summer night around them.

  When the rhythmic caress grew reckless, he hauled himself away. “It’s wrong.”

  She brought him back on top of her. “One time... just once, in case you never come back.”

  “It’s a sin.”

  “Against who?”

  “Oh God, I don’t want to leave you with a baby.”

  “You won’t. Oh, Kristian, Kristian, I love you. I promise I’ll wait for you, no matter how long it takes.”

  “Oh, Patricia... ” Her body formed a cradle upon which he rocked. Their bodies fit with mysterious conformity unlike any they’d imagined. He rolled aside, touched her here, there, discovering. She was the answer to the myriad questions of his universe. “I love you, too... you’re all soft... and so warm... ”

  She brushed her knuckles across his masculine secrets, discovering, too. “And you’re hard and warm... ”

  When they undressed each other it was only by half, and haltingly. When their bodies sought each other it was with the fumbling uncertainty of all first times. But when their flesh linked, so did their souls, bound together in both a promise and prayer for the future.

  “I love you, don’t forget it,” he said later, at her door. She was sobbing too hard to answer, able only to cling. “Tell me once more before I go,” he said, wondering why he’d ever been so anxious to grow up when growing up hurt this much, wondering why he’d ever wanted to leave this place when it was all the things he loved.

  “I l... love y... you, K... Kristian.”

  He forced her back, holding her head in both wide palms. “There, now you remember it. And
pray for me.”

  “I w... will... I p... promise.”

  He kissed her hard, quick, then spun and mounted Clippa before he could change his mind again, sending the mare galloping at breakneck speed through the summer moonlight.

  It was just past sunrise: Grandma waited at the door with six blood-sausage sandwiches wrapped in oilcloth.

  Kristian looked down as she thrust them into his hands.

  “Grandma, I don’t need all that.”

  “You just take ‘em,” she said sternly, trying to keep her chin from trembling. “Ain’t nobody in the army knows how to make blood sausage.”

  He took them, and the fresh batch of fattigman, too.

  “Now, git! And hurry and take care of them Jerries so you can git back home where you belong.”

  Her little gray pug was neatly in place, her glasses hooked behind her ears, her apron clean and starched. He didn’t ever remember seeing her any other way, not in all the years they’d lived in the same house. The morning sun lit the hairs on her chin to a soft, gilt fuzz, and reflected from the sparkle she couldn’t keep from forming behind her oval spectacles. He scooped her against him so hard her old bones barely stayed intact.

  “Good-bye, Grandma. I love you.” He’d never said it before, but it suddenly hit Kristian how true it was.

  “I love you, too, you durn fool boy. Now git going. Your pa’s waiting.”

  He rode into Alamo on the seat of the double-box wagon, flanked by Theodore and Linnea, holding the sandwiches and cookies on his lap. In town, he studied the buildings as if for the first time. Too quickly they reached the depot. Too quickly the ticket was purchased. Too quickly the train wailed into sight.

  It clanged in beside them and they stood in the white puffs of steam, all of them trying valiantly not to cry.

  Linnea needlessly adjusted Kristian’s collar. “There are more socks in your suitcase than any two soldiers could possibly need. And I put in some spare hankies, too.”

  “Thanks,” he said, then their eyes met and the next moment they were hugging hard, parting with a swift kiss. “We love you,” she whispered against his jaw. “Keep safe.”

  “I will. Got to come back and see my little sister or brother.”

  He turned from her tear-streaked face to Theodore’s.

  Jesus, Mary... Pa was crying.

  “Pa... ”

  His face wracked with sorrow, Theodore clutched Kristian to his wide, strong chest. His straw hat fell from his head but nobody noticed. The conductor called “All aboard,” and the father clutched his son’s hale body and prayed he’d return the same way. “Keep your head low, boy.”

  “I will. I’m c... comin’ back... you can c... ount on it.”

  “I love you, son.”

  “I love you, too.”

  When Kristian backed away they were both crying. They leaned toward each other one last time... straining... clasping each other’s necks. As adults, they had never kissed; both of them realized they might never get the chance again. It was Theodore who leaned forward, kissing Kristian flush on the lips before the boy spun for the train.

  It lumbered into motion, gathering speed, giving them a brief glimpse of Kristian waving from a window before whisking him away. The breath of its passing stirred the June air, lifting dust and Linnea’s skirts as the caboose swayed eastward along the track.

  She clutched Teddy’s arm against the side of her breast, trying to think of something to say.

  “We’d best get home. There’s wheat to be planted.”

  The wheat... the wheat... always the wheat. But now they had a real reason to keep loaves going to Europe.

  25

  OH, THAT SUMMER, that endless crawling summer while the war in Europe absorbed half a million doughboys and German submarines sank civilian barges and fishing schooners off America’s east coast. In the Westgaard living room the newest addition was a gleaming mahogany Truphonics radio around which the family gathered each evening to hear the news from the front, via the scratchy transmissions from Yankton, South Dakota.

  Linnea was shocked the day the age limits for the draft were extended to include men eighteen to forty-five. Why, most of the men she knew fell into that age bracket: Lars, Ulmer, Trigg... Theodore. Thankfully farmers were exempt, but it struck her that even her own father could be drafted! At church, where the service flag now held an additional blue star, she prayed more intensely, not only for Kristian and Bill, but that her father would not be called up. How would her mother survive if he went to war?

  Poor Judith, bless her heart, whose husband had always owned a store with fresh and tinned goods available, had planted a victory garden. But her letters were filled with complaints about it. She hated every moment spent on her knees amid the weeds and cutworms. The cabbages, Judith complained, attracted little white butterflies and resembled Swiss cheese. The green beans ripened so fast no mortal could keep up with them, and the tomatoes got blight.

  Linnea wrote back and advised her mother to leave the victory gardens to someone else and continue with the other war efforts at which she was so good. Meanwhile, she herself was learning the ins and outs of gardening from Nissa. Together they planted, weeded, picked, and canned. Linnea had never before realized how much work went into a single jar of perfect gold carrots gleaming like coins beneath their zinc lid. As the summer rolled on and Linnea’s girth increased, the work became more arduous. Bending grew difficult, and straightening made her dizzy. Being in the sun too long made black dots dance before her eyes. Standing too long made her ankles swell. And she lost both the inclination and agility to make love.

  Nighttimes, after listening to the radio and worrying about where and how Kristian was, she could not offer Theodore the consolation to be found in her body. She felt guilty because now, more than ever, he needed the temporary release. He worried about Kristian constantly, especially during his long hours alone, crisscrossing the fields behind the horses. They’d heard from Kristian — he’d completed his basic training and was assigned to the seventh division under Major General William M. Wright and had left for France on August eleventh after only eight weeks of training upon U.S. soil. Even with additional training in France, how could a farm boy who’d had to deal with nothing more belligerent than a shying horse be equipped for combat in so little time?

  Then, as the summer drew to a close, news of another threat, more insidious than flamethrowers and mustard gas, made its way across the ocean to worry not only Theodore and Linnea, but all the fathers, mothers, wives, and sweethearts of the men fighting in Europe. This was an enemy who took no sides. It struck American, German, Italian, and Frenchman alike. With absolute impartiality it smote down hero and coward, experienced commander and pea-green recruit, leaving them sneezing and shivering and dying of fever in the trenches on the Marne and at Flanders Field.

  The name of the threat was Spanish influenza.

  From the time the news of it reached American shores, Theodore’s restlessness and concern escalated. He became edgy and untalkative. And when the epidemic itself reached America and started spreading westward through its cities, the news affected everyone.

  Meanwhile, Linnea grew enormous and ungainly, and looked in the mirror each day to find herself so unappealing she couldn’t blame Teddy for paying her little attention lately. She loved going down to Clara’s and holding baby Maren, telling herself this was what her payoff would be, and it would be well worth it.

  One day, when Maren was asleep in her crib and Clara was rolling out crust for a sugarless apple pie, Linnea sat on a nearby chair like a beached whale. “I feel like a fat old ugly hippopotamus,” she wailed.

  Clara only laughed. “You’re not fat and ugly and you’re certainly not old. But if it’s any consolation, we all get to feeling like that toward the end.”

  “You did, too?” Even at full term, Clara had always looked radiantly beautiful to Linnea, and had never seemed to lose her gaiety.

  “Of course I did. Trigg just
teased me a little more and made me laugh to keep my spirits up.”

  Linnea’s spirits drooped further. “Not Teddy.”

  “He has been rather grouchy lately, hasn’t he?”

  “Grouchy — hmph! — there’s got to be a worse word for it than that.”

  “He’s got a lot on his mind, that’s all. Kristian, and the baby coming, and threshing about to start.”

  “It’s more than that. I mean, in bed at night he hardly even touches me. I know we can’t do anything with the baby only six weeks away, but he doesn’t even snuggle or... or kiss me or... well, he acts like he can’t st... stand me.” Linnea put her head down and started to cry, which she’d been doing with some regularity lately.

  Clara dropped the rolling pin and wiped her hands on her apron, coming immediately to comfort the younger woman. “It’s not you, Linnea. It’s just the way men are. If they can’t have it all, they don’t want any. And they all get ornery without it. Teddy’s acting like they all act, so you just get it out of your head that you’re fat and ugly.”

  “B... but I am. I w... waddle around like a Ch... Christmas goose and all I do is bawl all the time, and oh, Clara... I don’t think h... he likes m... me anymore!” she sobbed.

  Clara rubbed her friend’s shaking shoulders. “Now that’s silly and you know it. Of course he likes you. Wait till that baby is born and you’ll find out.”

  But before the baby was born someone else came along to lift Teddy’s spirits and make him forget his cares temporarily: Isabelle Lawler.

  Her cook wagon came rocking into the yard and Linnea’s intestines seemed to tighten into knots. Isabelle was the same as ever — large, loud, and lusty. Same pumpkin-colored hair. Same face that looked like a bowl of half-eaten pudding. Same bawdy mule-skinner’s voice. The transient cook was the farthest thing from a lady Linnea had ever seen. And even unpregnant, she outweighed Linnea by a good forty pounds. Why then the grin on Theodore’s face the moment he saw her? From the time she and the threshing crew arrived, his crankiness mellowed. He smiled more, laughed with the hired hands, and took his meals in the cook wagon, as he had last year. He said the men expected it of him, but Linnea thought he had other reasons.