Front Lines (Front Lines #1)(3)

The house is old, having passed down from her father’s great-grandfather, the Richlin who settled in Gedwell Falls after coming two thousand miles in an ox-drawn wagon. Rio has never doubted that she will spend the rest of her youth in this place, going to school, doing her chores, and spending time with her best friend, Jenou.

She’s also never doubted that she’ll marry, have children, and keep house. When they discuss these matters, as they often do, Jenou always emphasizes to Rio the importance of marrying someone prosperous. “Money and looks, Rio,” she always says. “Money and looks.”

“What about kindness, generosity of spirit, and a sense of humor?”

To which Jenou invariably responds with a despairing shake of her head and a slow repetition. “Money and looks. In that order.”

Rio assumes, has always assumed, that she will be like her mother, who is like her grandmother. For the most part Rio accepts that. But there is a small voice in her mind and heart that senses something off about it all. Not bad, just off. Like she’s trying on an outfit that will never fit, and isn’t her color.

This dissatisfaction is vague, unformed, but real. The problem is, being dissatisfied does not mean she has any better goal. Or any goal at all, really, except of course to get through her final year of high school with grades that don’t disgrace her and the family.

Rio sweeps her math work sheet into her brown leather book bag, slings it over her shoulder, kisses her mother on the cheek, and follows her father toward the front door.

Her father is stopped there, framed in the doorway against the early sunlight of the street beyond. He’s a tall man with a face carved to leanness by the hard years of the Great Depression, when he kept a roof over his family’s heads by taking on any work he could find, often going straight from his shop to mucking out cesspools or painting barns.

In the teasing voice that is their common currency, Rio says, “Come on, Dad, some of us have places to . . .”

Rio focuses past him and sees a uniformed telegram delivery boy.

Rio’s heart misses two beats. Her steps falter. She tries to swallow and can’t, tries to breathe but there’s a weight pressing down on her chest. She moves closer. Her father notices her and says, “It’s probably nothing.”

“Is this the Richlin residence?” the delivery boy asks. He mispronounces it with a soft “ch” instead of the correct “ck” sound.

He should be in school, that boy. He can’t be much older than twelve. Maybe this is an early delivery before heading off to school. Maybe . . .

Tam Richlin takes the envelope. It’s buff-colored, thin paper. He hesitates, turning the envelope as if he can’t find the right way around. He licks his lips, and Rio’s unease deepens.

“What is it?” Her voice wobbles.

“Thank you,” Mr. Richlin says. The delivery boy touches the brim of his cap and speeds back to his bicycle, relief showing in the quickness of his step.

“What is it?” Rio asks again.

He licks his lips again, takes a deep breath. Suddenly urgent, he tears the envelope open and draws out the sheet. He stares at it. Just that, just stares, and Rio knows.

After a terrible long silence in which the world stops turning and the birds stop singing and the breeze does not blow, she reaches for it and takes it from his nerveless fingers. The words are all in capital letters.





THE NAVY DEPARTMENT DEEPLY


REGRETS TO INFORM YOU THAT YOUR

DAUGHTER RACHEL RICHLIN . . .

Rio makes a small, whimpering sound. She looks at her father. He sags against the door jamb, head bowed. She sees him in profile only, a dark outline of a man looking at nothing.

. . . YOUR DAUGHTER RACHEL RICHLIN WAS KILLED IN ACTION IN THE PERFORMANCE

OF HER DUTY AND IN THE SERVICE OF

HER COUNTRY.

“Tam? Rio?”

Rio turns guilty eyes already glittering wet to her mother. Her mother sees the telegram and the expression on her husband’s face and the way he slumps there like every ounce of strength is gone from him. She falls to her knees, falls like she’s been shot, like the muscles in her legs have just quit all at once.

“No, it’s . . . ,” she says. “No, it’s, no. No. No. No, no, no, no. Not my baby, not my baby, not my baby, please no, please no.” It starts off denial, ends up pleading.

Rio runs to her mother, kneels beside her, puts her arms around her mother’s shoulders—though what she wants is for her mother to comfort her, tell her that it’s a joke or a mistake or a simple impossibility. Her mother is shaking. Saying No, no, not my baby, please, please, over and over again, as if saying it will make it true, as if it’s a magic spell to ward off the wave of pain coming her way.

Tam Richlin leans there with head bowed and says nothing. His fists clench then relax as if he simply lacks the strength to go on. But he says nothing. Nothing, no sound, as his wife howls in plain misery, howls into the hollow of her surviving daughter’s neck.

Tam Richlin says, “I best go open the shop.” And with that he is gone.

Rio moves her mother to the sofa, literally physically having to take her mother’s heaving shoulders and lift. Rio goes to the kitchen to make tea, because isn’t that what people do at moments like this? Don’t they make tea? As the water heats, she sets out the good silver tea service, focusing for as long as she can on the placement of the elements: the pot, the sugar bowl, the little, slightly mismatched cream pitcher, all of it clattering because her fingers are clumsy. It feels right, somehow, using the good silver, the silver that only comes out for Christmas, baptisms, rare occasions when some important person comes calling, and when sisters die. The person you used to gossip with, quarrel with, share clothing with, learn from. . . . The person you wanted to be like when you grew up. This day could not be marked with tea from a chipped old china teapot.