Twenty-Seven

Ava

Sunlight sparkled over the Tagus with a brilliance that left Ava shielding her face with the flat of her hand. The noxious odor of smoke from the massive ship obliterated any freshness the water might have cast off. All around her, people rushed this way and that, their bulging suitcases clutched at their sides, children herded close to their parents.

Ava scanned the sea of people, seeking out Sarah and Noah.

They had been lucky to obtain tickets on the SS Drottningholm. Ava had been correct about the lines at the office being even longer after the Allied attack.

Fortunately, the invasion appeared to have been successful with securing Allied soldiers into the occupied territory and putting Nazis on the run. But the victory had come at a steep cost with thousands dead. Thousands she could not allow herself to think of.

"Miss Ava." A squeal of excitement pulled her attention to the right as Noah barreled toward her with Sarah following closely behind.

Ava caught him and swung him up into a big hug, cherishing the moment, for it would be the last—at least in Lisbon. He grinned at her and pointed to the towering SS Drottningholm. "Is that ours?"

"It is," Ava confirmed. "Are you ready?"

"Yes," he shouted, practicing the American word. He had quickly learned several phrases and was eager to learn more.

Ava laughed and set him down. He immediately dug out his toy ship and held it up, comparing it to the original. "Ship," he said slowly in English, and she nodded in approval.

"I cannot thank you enough for all you have done." Sarah swept forward to embrace her.

Ava waved off her gratitude, especially when the effort had been that of so many people, namely Elaine Rousseau. And James.

An ache filled Ava's chest, and she shoved the thought of him aside.

"It was a combined effort," Ava replied. "It is so good to know you will be reunited with Lewis soon."

"You will visit when you return to America?" Sarah gazed imploringly at her.

"I absolutely will."

The horn on the ship blared, and the crowd collectively pushed toward the open gangplanks.

"It appears the time of our departure has come." Sarah took a large breath and let it whoosh out.

"He is still going to love you," Ava said reassuringly and hugged her friend.

"Merci."Sarah beamed at her and took Noah's hand. The little boy turned and waved until the crowd swallowed them up. Though Ava knew him well enough by then to realize he was likely still waving long after.

Ava didn't leave until the large vessel glided from the dock amid a puff of thick, dark smoke. People stood at the railings above, calling out their farewells. Though Ava couldn't discern any one person there from the other, she still waved and shouted her well wishes.

And then, as soon as they had come into her life, Sarah and Noah were gone. Finally on their way to America. To safety. To be reunited as a family.

A week letter, a V Mail appeared on Ava's desk. She opened it with trembling fingers and sobbed an exhale of relief as she read the five simple words.

I'm safe. I love you.

-D

Short and sweeter than any mail she'd ever received. Daniel was safe.

After so many tense years of uncertainty and loss in her life, finally things seemed to be going right.

The foreign newspapers dwindled over the next four months as the Allied advantage became undeniable and Germany was squeezed in on all sides. It was then the notification came from Washington that the IDC's efforts of information gathering in Lisbon were no longer needed. Mike was to be transferred to Switzerland. Ava had been offered the same but declined.

While she loved gathering information and meeting people she would always remember, she wanted to settle down in DC, preparing for Daniel's inevitable return when the war ended. Something she hoped would happen sooner than later.

They had already spent far too long apart. She missed his brotherly advice that teetered on the edge of a lecture, meeting up for game night on Fridays and laughing until her face hurt, like they used to do before the war. Those days that had once been so common now felt a lifetime ago.

And, if truth be told, she was still licking her wounds over James.

She hadn't seen him since the day of his confession in her apartment. At first, she had been glad for his absence, but as the days churned into weeks she regretted the sharpness of her words.

"You have mail." Peggy slid a V Mail envelope onto Ava's desk.

Ava beamed and picked it up.

"Did you hear about Sims's boy?" Peggy asked in a hushed whisper.

Ava's own excitement dimmed at the solemn tone, and she shook her head.

The corner of Peggy's mouth turned downward. "He's gone."

Ava sucked in a shocked breath.

"So maybe keep your letter under wraps." Peggy lifted a shoulder. "Just to be kind."

"Of course." Ava slid the letter with the unmistakable V in red off her desk and glanced toward the closed office door where Mr. Sims's voice boomed behind it.

He was staying later at the office and scarcely took a lunch the last week. She had assumed his redoubled efforts were to wrap up loose ends before their departure. Now, she saw the assiduous efforts for the deflection they were.

She read her letter quietly, unable to help her gratitude that Daniel had remained safe. But it was Mr. Sims she thought of as she sifted through the paperwork on her desk to determine what was needed and what should be destroyed.

The last convivial lunch at the office was with Mike and the ASLIB boys to bid a final farewell. Any hopes James would be in attendance were immediately dashed at the four-person table without another chair waiting for an unassumingly debonair Englishman with the slightest hint of a limp.

She suppressed her disappointment and together with Theo and Alfie, she and Mike feasted on an assortment of Lisbon's best foods: greasy, spiced sausage and grilled fish and briny sardines on hard bits of bread. But before a round of Super Bock could be ordered, Ava took up her purse and excused herself to return to the office.

"You're going back there?" Mike asked, incredulous. "I'm done with that place."

Ava shook her head with a laugh. "I have one last drawer to clean out."

"Suit yourself." He held open an arm toward her. "Bring it here, kid."

She stepped into the hug. "You do know I'm around the same age as you."

"Yeah." He grinned. "I know."

"Viel Glück,"she said, wishing him luck in Swiss. She had spent a week studying it as she vacillated over her decision before finally turning the offer down.

Mike's brow crinkled. "Huh?"

"It's Swiss," she laughed.

"Yeah, I knew that." He offered a reassuring nod and clapped her on the shoulder. "Let me know if you ever want to come join me. It'd be great to work with you again."

"I'll keep that in mind." She embraced Alfie and Theo before taking her departure, refusing to think of James as she did so.

Back at the office, she didn't last long before the heavy meal in her stomach left her eyelids feeling leaden. She pushed up from her seat and made her way to the back room where a pot of restorative coffee was always at the ready.

Her heels clicked over the glossy floor as she turned the corner and stopped short. Mr. Sims stood near the coffeepot, his large hand braced on the vanilla speckled Formica countertop, his head bowed.

This was clearly a moment of a man needing his privacy and yet Ava could not bring herself to leave.

"Mr. Sims," she said softly.

He straightened and cleared his throat, opening his mouth to speak before closing it again only to shake his head. His gaze slid away. And then his chin trembled.

Ava said nothing but strode over to him and opened her arms. He sagged against her, his breath warm where he sniffled against her shoulder and the bulk of his large body trembled with the power of his grief. He stayed there for a long moment, clinging to her the way Noah did when he would wake from a nap after a nightmare.

There was something so humbling about witnessing such a proud man forced to bend under the weight of loss. She knew the burden well and wouldn't wish it upon anyone.

"I'm so sorry," she said gently.

"He always wanted to make me proud," Mr. Sims said raggedly.

"You've never been anything less," Ava offered in reassurance. "He knew that."

The older man straightened, his eyes bloodshot and his nose red. He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and gave her a grateful nod. "Don't you have a desk to finish cleaning out, Harper?" His question lacked its usual sharpness. "You know you won't get paid extra."

"Yes, sir, I do." She turned, leaving him to recover in peace.

It didn't take long to sift through one final stack of papers. When she was done, she handed the box to be destroyed to Peggy.

"I'll be joining you in DC sooner than later," the secretary said. "I expect you to show me around all the good dance halls and jazz clubs."

Ava chuckled. "I'm not sure how adept I'll be at that, but I can give you a personal tour of the Library of Congress."

"I'll take it." Peggy beamed and gave her one final hug. "Have a safe flight."

Once upon a time, Ava would have shuddered at the mention of flying. Though she still didn't relish the idea, it didn't terrify her anymore. In the last year and a half, she had been trailed by the PVDE, stalked by a Nazi, and duped by a spy. Daniel had jumped out of planes on a beach in Normandy and fought for his life. Even more powerful was what she had witnessed of others in her time in Portugal.

She had seen people subjected to endless waits for visas they were never granted, suffer from delayed ships that started the abysmal process over again, and even people who were cheated out of their life savings in a desperate bid to book passage from Lisbon. Only the extremely wealthy could afford seats on the plane she would be boarding the next morning. The letters she had salvaged spoke of the Nazis' unimaginable brutality, as had the stories she'd heard. Yet so many had endured, resilient and brave as they left their lives behind to save their families. And, as she so often did, she thought of Otto whose barred entry from her homeland had been so great, he could not bring himself to continue on even one more day.

Plato said courage was knowing what not to fear. In looking back on her time in Lisbon, Ava realized now that wisdom was also knowing what to fear. In the face of what so many others had endured, flying was such a pale, petty thing.

The morning of her flight came upon her quickly. She was ready with her small apartment neatly packed into two suitcases and the copy of Little Women carefully tucked among her folded dresses.

She pushed out the door of her building and nearly ran headlong into a man. With a gasp she drew herself upright, having come face-to-face with James for the first time since his confession.

"Ava." His blue-green eyes locked on hers, and her heart squeezed with more feeling than she wished.

His lean frame had filled out in the months since they'd seen one another. Beneath a gray fedora, his hair was freshly trimmed, and his skin glowed with good health. He put his hand out to stop her from leaving. "Please let me speak."

Once before she'd told him to go away and had spent the time since regretting the decision. She would not make the same mistake again.

"Have you been waiting out here for me?" she asked in surprise.

He gave a sheepish smile. "I couldn't miss a final opportunity to talk."

No matter had fully she thought she quashed all sense of hope, it now flared to life, foolish and eager, revived by his mere presence. For all she knew, he was there to apologize one last time.

She tensed, bracing herself for what he intended to say.

"I have something for you." He reached into his pocket, the contents of which gave a slight rattle.

She held out her hand and was surprised to find a set of aged, yellowing dice fall into her palm, their dyed black grooves chipped in several places. They were still warm from the heat of his body.

"For luck," he said. "My father was a fighter pilot in the Great War and gave them to me to keep me safe. I know you're flying out today and I thought..."

"You thought it would give me confidence on the plane," she said with a smile at the generosity of his gift.

He nodded.

"I'm not as afraid of flying as I once was." She extended her hand to give the dice back.

"All the same, I'd like to know you're safe." He did not reach for the dice. He wasn't even looking at her hand, but at her, studying her face as if he expected to never see her again. "The thing of it is, Ava, I care greatly for you. I cared for you before, but in the absence of your company, I cannot seem to put you from my thoughts. And I do not even begrudge the space you occupy in my mind. Rather, I find it comforting in a familiar, pleasant manner. I..." He exhaled a laugh. "I'm making a bloody fool of myself."

All the willpower in the world would not quell the heat blossoming in Ava's chest. "I thought you were doing very well."

He gave a lopsided grin and put his hands in his pockets. "I'll be returning to London soon, with a proper address. Perhaps we might write, or even see one another. Alfie said the London Museum has heaps of material in French and German to sift through. Journals and letters, like the ones you were collecting. Maybe someday you might come for a week or so. Or I might—"

Ava stepped toward him, cupped his face in her hands, and kissed him. His lips were warm, his chin smooth against hers. He drew his arms around her, holding her to him as his pleasant, clean soap scent enveloped her.

A car pulled up alongside them and they drew apart abruptly, each with a shared, private grin. Ava touched her mouth where her lips still tingled from the brush of his.

Her ride to the airport was ready to whisk her away. The driver busied himself in the car a moment, clearly giving them time.

"I'd love to write to you," she said.

James withdrew a scrap of paper with an address in London printed on it in familiar messy, bold letters, then remained with her in the short time it took for her driver to fetch her things. When she rode away, James gave her one last lopsided smile that sealed itself in her mind and left not a modicum of space to even worry about the plane ride.

Life in DC was not the welcome embrace she had assumed it would be. After the easy, languid existence in Lisbon, the American capital seemed to sweep by too quickly and left Ava feeling as though she were standing still amid a torrent of activity.

Her position at the Rare Book Room had been filled, of course. Such an important job could not remain open for long. Instead, she was placed among the polyglots who categorized the countless boxes of microfilm sent by herself and the other members of the IDC. It was quite often she came across a box labeled carefully in her own looping writing and even the jagged script of Mike's quick hand.

The ration was still in place in America and took some adjusting to, especially as she'd grown to taking her coffee sweet. More than anything, though, was the great wanderlust that had been awoken in her and now would not be quieted, leaving her humming with restless energy. This was further fueled by the letters from James as he returned to London and shared pieces of his life with her.

It was through their correspondence that she learned he had spoken the truth of himself when he was with her, that his stories and his family were not simply fictional details of a spy on the job. His brother had also thankfully survived the war and they celebrated with grateful, joyous letters to one another that both their siblings had emerged from such dangers unscathed.

Eventually, 1944 gave way to 1945 when the horror of the concentration camps was discovered in April. In those shocking images of skeletal men, women and even children plastered on the front of every newspaper, she saw the fear the Lisbon refugees realized. However bad anyone thought the situation was for the Jews, the truth was far, far worse.

It had been a devastating blow to know the many hopes she heard whispered among the refugees for their families would be crushed by such a heavy reality. And it made her burn with rage for the many who had brushed aside the truth for so long, casting it benignly into the category of simple war rumors.

Hitler put a cyanide capsule in his mouth and a gun to his temple not long after. Many saw his suicide as a coward's way out. For Ava, there was some justice in knowing that Hitler had died with the same scrabbling fear as so many of his victims.

When at last the war ended on September 2, 1945, with the formal surrender of Japan, DC kicked off its war-rationed shoes and celebrated with great jubilance. Ava had not joined in the ebullient throngs crowding the streets. There was no win without loss, and the tolls exacted through those bitter years of war had been enumerable.

Instead, she took the day to honor the memories of those she had personally known as well as those she was acquainted with through what she read. Those letters and journals, written in a frantic script, stained after being shoved from view in clandestine hiding places, were all that remained of so many.

Several months later, Ava found herself on the platform at Union Station with a crowd of others, all dressed in their finest clothes. Women scraped the hollowed-out tubes for the vestiges of their lipstick, pressed their least worn dresses, and tucked ribbons and flowers in freshly curled hair.

Their men were coming home.

The doors to the train swept open and the crowd surged forward, Ava with it, drawing the lot of them toward the uniformed men with freshly shaved, eager faces. And that's when she saw Daniel for the first time in five years.

His stare found hers and gave her that familiar easy grin he'd always had.

Ava's eyes went hot with tears, but she didn't waste time wiping them away as she ran forward and threw her arms around him. He smelled foreign, like wool and burned starch with a slight undertone of mechanical oil.

"My kid sister." He drew back and took her in with such pride, it made her heart ache.

The five years of war had aged him, carving lines at the corners of his eyes and across his brow. But his gaze still held that jovial sparkle she'd always known, and his smile didn't bear the wobble of some returned men.

He was home, safe and sound.

The stretch of time between them dissolved as it always did with close siblings, fading amid ready conversation and jaunts down memory lane. The evening found them at the dining room table of the apartment Ava had secured, the jumbled letters of the Criss Cross Words board game laid out before them.

Ava shuffled the letters in front of her, navigating the Q, U, and X around a C until the answer came to her. In a flash, she transferred the tiles onto the board.

"‘Quixotic,'" Daniel read. "Are you serious? Is that a word?"

She put her hands on her hips where she sat. "Of course it is." It took her a moment to dredge up its meaning from her memory. "It's something unrealistic or impractical."

"You always were good at this game, sis." Daniel leaned back in his chair and took a pull from his beer bottle. "That's why you needed to go to college."

Ava's triumphant play was short-lived at the mention of college. He had always shrugged off not achieving his dream of getting a degree and having sent her to pursue hers instead.

"If I'd known you weren't going to college because I was, I never would have gone." She stared at him, still smarting from the decision he made.

He chuckled. "And that's why I didn't tell you."

"You can go back now that the war is over."

Silence fell between them.

"A lot of men will be going to school again," Ava said.

"It's not that." Daniel set his beer down. "I don't want to get out of the Army. I'm a Screaming Eagle through and through, sis."

Ava stared at the board, no longer seeing the letters, but instead the blank months that dragged by as she waited for him to return to DC. "But that means you'll be relocated again."

"I know," he said gently.

She looked up, hating the lump forming in her throat.

"I didn't know how to tell you, but I'm not a studious kind of guy, not like you or Dad." Daniel lifted a single shoulder in a half-hearted shrug. "I only wanted college because I thought it was what he would want for me. Until I saw you and how much you enjoyed all that studying." He put his large hands on the table. Pale nicks and scars flecked his calloused fingers. "The Army suits me, Ava." He leaned over the table, his gaze concerned as he studied her. "You're not too upset, are you?"

Ava chewed her lip and forced herself to examine the uncomfortable emotion knotting her stomach. It wasn't Daniel she was upset with, it was herself.

She shook her head slowly. "I think I'm relieved, actually."

Daniel's brows shot up. "I'll try not to take offense to that one." The flash of his familiar grin told her he really wasn't hurt by her statement. In fact, he looked relieved too.

"I have been trying to find my normalcy here," Ava said aloud as she puzzled out the details herself. "But it's not fitting because I'm not the same person I was before."

"Sounds pretty quixotic." He winked at her.

She laughed. "Yeah, it is."

"So, where are you going to go?"

Ava didn't even have to think. "To England, to see about a position at the London Library."

"I've always wanted to see London." Daniel nodded in approval. "I'll have to plan a visit."

Ava beamed at him. "I'd love that."

Daniel studied the letters in front of him and turned them toward her. "All right, Ava, what can you do with this jumble of madness?"

She studied the small blocks, then referred to the board for other words she could play off. Using the first I of QUIXOTIC and an E from SEEN, she spelled out the word FULFILLED.

An appropriate and perfect word to describe what they had both realized and where they were both going to be.