I Shall Be Near to You(20)

‘Are you saying they ain’t real friends to me? Is that it?’

‘This don’t have a thing to do with friendship! Your Papa—I don’t know what he was thinking, letting you get ideas—’

‘You keep my Papa out of this. I’m not even his farmhand any more. He’s got himself Isaac Lewis for that now. And I ain’t keeping house for just myself on your Pa’s farm, your Ma coming and making me feel like something less.’

‘That ain’t what she’s—She’s never called you something less! It’s the way you—’

‘Don’t! Don’t you defend her! You don’t know what it is, being there all lonesome and getting told I’ve got to do mending and stay inside and—You’ve never seen the way she looks at me! You never hear!’

‘Rosetta, it ain’t like that.’

‘It is! I can’t do it! I can’t be your wife if you ain’t there!’ My voice is too loud but I can’t stop it. I look around us quick, but no one’s close enough to hear me call myself wife.

‘You’re not safe here!’ Jeremiah says.

‘This don’t seem so dangerous,’ I say, throwing my arm out to the empty field. ‘You see any Rebels here?’

‘You don’t belong here! Can’t you see that? And I can’t be worrying about you all the time,’ Jeremiah says.

‘Is that what I am to you? A worry? You think you’re the only one that worries?’

Jeremiah looks down. There is hurt and something harsh about his air that I ain’t ever seen in him before.

‘This ain’t good.’ He is done arguing.

‘How? How ain’t it good? Me being with you?’

His voice is level. ‘You don’t make a lick of sense.’

‘You already knew that, and you married me anyway,’ I say.

‘You come with me,’ he says, and grabs my elbow. ‘We’ve got to fix things.’


JEREMIAH TAKES OFF across the field, but instead of going toward the tents, or for Captain Chalmers, we skirt the trees at the edge of camp until we are far enough that the sounds of men talking and laughing and the smell of campfires fade. Then Jeremiah veers into the woods. I have hardly stepped from the parade ground to the gritty snow in the shade when he turns, grabs my shoulders, and kisses me, his lips rough and chapped. It ain’t a nice kiss. It is something else, but I forget everything, just for a moment. Then I remember and shove him off.

‘That don’t fix anything,’ I tell him, looking all around. ‘It’s a good thing there ain’t a soul to see us.’

‘There ain’t a good fix for what you’ve done,’ Jeremiah says, and takes my hand, marching farther into the trees until he finds a log sheltered by a thicket of sticks and branches. He hauls me down next to him, but he don’t talk. Just sits there, staring off into space, his jaw tight, his thigh warm against mine.

Finally he takes my hat from my head and looks me over.

‘What did you do to your hair?’ he says, like that is the most important thing, and reaches to touch where it stops above my ears. I should pull back but I can’t. I’m too glad for this little touch.

‘You look—’

‘Don’t you be mean,’ I say, and cross my arms over my chest. ‘It can’t be helped now.’

‘I ain’t being mean,’ he says. ‘You look … it looks different, is all.’

‘I ain’t any different,’ I say. ‘And it’ll grow back.’

And then his fingers are in what’s left of my hair and he kisses me again, gently. ‘You ain’t got it right,’ he says. ‘Only ladies wear a part down the middle.’

His hands, all shaking, go from my hair to the strap holding my canteen across my chest. ‘And you can’t sling your canteen like that,’ he says.

‘You are plumb full of advice,’ I say, tugging at the leather while he stares at where it cuts across my chest. ‘Does this mean you’re letting me stay?’

‘Rosetta,’ he says, looking and swallowing hard.

‘Ross,’ I say.

‘Always Rosetta to me. I can’t not touch you.’

‘We’ll be secret,’ I tell him. ‘You call me Ross, and when we’re secret you can say Rosetta. But now we’ve got to practice.’

And then his eyes go hungry and he says, ‘Practice what?’ And then his hands, they shake still, but he takes the canteen over my head and then he kisses me while his fingers work at the buttons of my coat and then my shirt and I do the same to his. When he has got to the binding around my chest, he stops.

‘What—’

‘It’s to hide—’ I start, but then he unwinds it, unwrapping like he’s turning a wheel and I am the hub.

He sits back to look at me, catching my left hand, pressing it to his mouth and I know what at least one part of him is thinking.

I shiver in the cold and try to draw my hand away before Jeremiah can see the bruises and scratches marking my wrist. He holds tight and a fluttering feeling rises in my chest and all I want is for him to drop my hand.

‘Let go,’ I say. ‘That hurts.’

‘What’s wrong?’ he asks, his blue eyes darkening as they go to my wrist. ‘What’s this?’