Home Front(37)

He hadn’t known shit. The cost of war was here, in this room. It was families being torn apart and babies born without their parent at home and children forgetting their mother’s face. It was soldiers—some of them his age and others young enough to be his sons—who would come home wounded … or not come home at all.

His wife was going off to war. War. How was it he had missed the most important part of that? She could die.

“Breathe,” Jolene said gently.

Michael stared at her, his eyes bright with tears he was trying to hold back. “How can you do this? Any of you…”

Lulu leaned out of his arms, toward Jolene, her arms outstretched. “Don’t leave me, Mommy. I’ll be good. I won’t be inbisible anymore.”

Jolene pulled her youngest into her arms and held her fiercely. “You are the best girl in the world, Lucy Lou…” She pinned a small golden set of wings on Lulu’s costume. “When you look at these wings, you’ll know I’m thinking of you, Lulu. Okay?”

Michael reached out, took Jolene’s hand. He should have done that before, told her he’d be here for her. She grasped his hand so tightly it hurt. He wanted to wrap his arms around both of them, but he didn’t dare. If he got close enough to kiss her, he might fall apart and be the only man in the room who cried. His kids didn’t need to see that.

Betsy stood back, her arms crossed, one hip flung out, her mouth pulled into a tight frown.

“I’ll send videos and e-mails. I’ll call as much as I can,” Jolene promised them all.

“We’ll be fine,” Mila said to Jolene, hugging her, taking Lulu into her arms. “Don’t you worry about us.”

Jolene moved toward Betsy, caressed her cheek, forced her to look up. “I have my watch set. Do you?”

“Seven o’clock,” Betsy said firmly, looking away.

Jolene bent down, looked Betsy in the eyes. “I love you to the moon and back.” She paused. Michael knew she was waiting. He thought: say it back to her, Bets, but the silence just hung there, until Jolene straightened, looking unbearably sad.

Behind them, a voice came through the speakers, telling the soldiers to gather at the buses. The crowd started to move like a wave, swelling toward the doors.

And then they were outside, this crowd of straight-backed soldiers with duffle bags, amid their weeping families and reaching children. A row of buses waited on the tarmac.

“I’ll be good,” Lulu said, crying hard.

Jolene kissed her daughters and held them tightly and then … let them go.

Michael watched her move toward him. For a split second it was just the two of them in his mind—no kids, no soldiers, no crying babies. Everything around them was a blur of sound and fury.

He didn’t know what to do or say. He couldn’t repair a broken marriage with a kiss or a touch, but he was ashamed of what he’d done to get them here, and it was too late to fix it.

“Michael,” she said and he felt the sting of tears. “Take care of yourself.”

It was so little, that good-bye; more evidence of the shoals they’d wrecked on.

“You take care of yourself. Come home to…”

“Them?”

“Just make sure you come home.” He took her in his arms at last, holding her tightly. It wasn’t until she walked away that he realized she hadn’t hugged him back.

With one last agonizing look, Jolene disappeared into the crowd of soldiers and boarded the bus.

Betsy cried out, “MOM!” and ran the length of the bus, following her mother’s progress. Her voice was lost in the din.

Michael picked up a sobbing Lulu and tried to soothe her, but she was hysterical.

In the back row of the bus, Jolene put down her window. She gazed down at her family; the smile she gave them faltered as the bus drove away.

And then she was gone.

“I didn’t say ‘I love you,’” Betsy said, bursting into tears.

*



In the months before his wife left, Michael had slept on “his side” of the bed. He’d seen the river of rumpled white cotton between them as a no-man’s-land where passion had gone to die. Now, on this morning when he woke up truly alone, he saw how false that had been. In all those nights, he’d had a wife beside him, a partner with whom he’d shared his life. Alone was different from separate, infinitely different. Often last night he’d reached out for her and found only emptiness.

His first thought when he woke: she’s gone.

He sat up in bed. Beside him on the nightstand was her “bible,” the huge three-ring binder that housed the endless list of his new responsibilities. In it, she’d put everything she thought he might need—appliance warranties, recipes, lists of mechanics and housecleaners and babysitters. He reached for it and opened it to the “Daily Planner” section.

Make breakfast. (Each morning came with its own carefully constructed meal plan.)

Get girls dressed. Make sure they brush their teeth.

Get Betsy on school bus. Arrival: 8:17.

Drop Lulu off at preschool. 8:30. She had provided him with an address, which pissed him off, both because she assumed he would need it and because, in fact, he did.

He threw back the covers and got out of bed, stumbling toward the bathroom. After a long, hot shower, he felt ready to start his day. Dressing in navy wool slacks and a crisp white Armani dress shirt, he left the room.