The Memory Keeper: A Heartwarming, Feel-Good Romance(34)
February 14, 1943
I wish I could send something to Charles for Valentine’s Day. I count the days until I can marry him…
Originally, she’d thought Gran was talking about her dad, whose name was Charles, but then she’d written that she’d wanted to marry him. Marry him? The only man Gran had ever married was Pop-pop, and his name had been Warren Langley Townshend. She looked back at the date of the entry: 1943. That was the year Gran had told them all she’d met Pop-pop, right?
So Gran had been in love with someone else right before meeting Pop-pop? And she’d named her child after him? Gran’s comment from earlier tonight came back to Hannah. She’d said the journal was “a collection of all the memories that came before I was your gran.” It was hard to imagine Gran being anyone other than the woman married to Warren, mother of Hannah’s father. Who was she before that? Hannah read on.
Curry’s drug store has chocolates in sampler boxes from twenty cents. It’s more than I should be paying for chocolate right now, with Daddy out of work, but I would if Charles were here, just to show him how much I love him. And I’d also tell him that I stopped into Buxton Floral Co. when I saw their sign that said they would wire flowers. They even assured me of prompt and dependable delivery anywhere. But “anywhere” didn’t include Tunisia. And while it seems silly to send a soldier flowers in the middle of the war, it certainly would brighten up that dirty tent he told me he was sleeping in. But it might also distract him and make him miss home… So instead, I’m spending my twenty cents on a Valentine’s supper for one at the town hall. It’ll be good to get out of the house for a while. Mama and Daddy aren’t going, but they told me to have fun. Fun. That’s not a word I use very much these days.
Hannah set the journal down, rolled onto her back, and hugged one of Gran’s pillows to her chest. While she didn’t like the idea of her eighteen-year-old grandmother not having any fun, Hannah could hear her cheerful disposition even in such a turbulent time. It was a delight to read how innocent she was back then. Just thinking of how Gran wanted to put flowers in a military tent in the middle of World War II made Hannah smile.
She considered what Gran had been going through back then. Hannah could relate to having rough times. She couldn’t even remember the last time she’d done something that had made her laugh until she cried, like she had so many times when she was younger. She and Gran used to get to talking about something funny and end up doubled over, gasping for breath, the two of them giggling like schoolgirls. She promised herself right then that she’d do everything in her power to laugh with Gran like that again.
Liam still hadn’t come back from wherever he’d gone, and it was getting late in the evening. Hannah almost texted him, but she figured he was a grown man; he didn’t need her checking up on him. He had enough manners to come back at a decent hour, she was certain.
There was a knock on the doorframe. Hannah twisted around to greet her mother, who was standing in her bathrobe and slippers, holding her nightly glass of water that she’d always taken to bed.
“I was just checking on you,” Maura said. “You’ve been in here since dinner, and I wanted to make sure you were okay.” She came in and sat down on the bed. “I know how hard Gran’s situation must be for you. There’s no way to prepare for something like this.”
“It’s making me question everything.” Hannah pushed the journal to the side and sat up next to her mom. “I need to tell you about yesterday,” she said. She told her mother about what had happened with Miles.
“My goodness. That’s a lot to handle,” her mother said. “How are you holding up?”
“As good as I can be. I need to be strong for Gran,” Hannah told her.
Her mother sat, thoughtful, her hands wrapped around her glass of water. “I never got to meet Miles,” Maura said. She huffed out an expression of resentment.
Hannah ran her fingers through her hair. “I’m so sorry I didn’t bring him home.”
Maura frowned. “Doesn’t matter now.”
“It does matter that I never brought him to meet you. I’m sorry I stayed away so long. I should’ve been better.”
Maura smiled affectionately at her daughter. “We spend our lives trying to be better people than the ones we are now. That’s all we can do.”
“I missed you,” Hannah told her, basking in the wisdom only a mother could offer.
“Aw, honey, I missed you too.” Maura leaned over and kissed the top of her head like she had when Hannah was young. “I wish I could shield you from all the pain that life can bring,” her mother said, “and I know I can’t. But your dad and I are here whenever you need us.” She patted Hannah’s hand. “How are you really? Are you doing okay?”
“I feel like I spent so long and wasted so much precious time trying to make things work between Miles and me, and it was all for nothing,” she admitted. Tears welled up in her eyes unexpectedly.
Maura scooted closer to her. “It wasn’t for nothing,” she said gently. “All this is supposed to teach you something. Every step in life is a teaching moment—we just have to figure out what we were meant to learn from it.”