CHAPTER 15

1942

“J acob’s going in. I can’t let him go alone,” John David told her.

“Jacob lost his brother at Pearl. You didn’t.”

“I can’t lose the man I love in the war, Debbie,” John David argued.

“You can get out of going, JD. You own the farm now, and you’re needed here.”

“I don’t want to get out of it. I want to do my duty.”

He stood up and refilled his coffee.

“You know you can’t be with Jacob over there, wherever the Army sends you. They won’t let you two have a moment alone. You’ll be fighting or training to fight.”

“I know that. But I can’t let him go to war alone. I love him, Debbie. What would you do if it was Harriet?”

Deb sat at the table, a cup of coffee in her hands, and she almost broke the cup from squeezing it so hard.

“She’s a woman, so she doesn’t get to go, but men do,” John David continued. “While I might be able to file some paperwork or something, I don’t want to. If he’s going over there, I’m going with him. Besides, it’s the right thing to do. He lost a brother at Pearl, yes, but they attacked our country, Debbie. We’re at war. I gotta do my duty.”

“You have a son. You have a wife.”

“You’re not really my wife, and you and I both know that. I’m Jacob’s husband, and you’re Harriet’s wife. You need to look at it this way. You can have Harriet here now to help you out. She’s still not married, and you’ll need help around the house and the farm with Paul. She can move in, and you two can be together. I’ll be with Jacob. No Delilah around to make him spend more time with her than me. I know it’s not ideal, but– ”

“Not ideal, JD? You could die.”

“If I did, it would be in service of my country, wouldn’t it?”

“What about the farm? Paul is only four years old.”

“I’ve already got my will done up, Debbie. I’ll give it to the Army. You’d get ten thousand dollars if something happened to me, and you’d own the farm until he’s old enough to take it over for you. I’ve got you farmhands, and we’ve been turning a decent crop this year. Plus, the cattle is good, and you’ve got the chickens and pigs. I’ve seen to it that you and Paul are taken care of. Your mama is gone now, like your papa, and both of my parents are gone, too. There’s no one around to question what I want and what I put in my will.”

Deb took a slow sip of her coffee.

“JD, I may not love you how I love Harriet or how you love Jacob, but I do still love you. You’re my best friend. You’re the best husband I ever could have asked for, and you’re the father of my son. I don’t want anything to happen to you. I don’t want more time with Harriet because it means you’re gone. Do you understand that?”

“I know. I love you, too. I love my boy. I’m proud of him. You tell him that when I go; that I love him and that I’m proud of him. You tell him that I want him to take care of his mama, too. I’ll write you letters and some for him that you can read to him. I want him to know those things, Deb.”

“He will because you’ll tell him when you get home.”

“Maybe. But just in case, you promise me that you’ll tell him? I want him to be a good man when he grows up; take care of his wife and children, provide for them, and take care of you if you need it. Well, you and Harriet.”

“You’re not going to promise me that you’re going to come home, are you?” she asked.

“I can’t. You know I don’t like to break my promises to you. I promised you that I’d only touch you to have a baby because we had to and that it would be over before we both knew it, and I kept that promise. Then, I promised that if we had a boy, I wouldn’t want another, and I’ve kept that promise, too. Now, I can’t promise you that I’ll come home because I don’t know. I do know that they’ll need to train me up, and they keep sayin’ it’ll be a quick war, so maybe it’ll all be over before I ship out, and I’ll come home sooner than you know it.”

“I’ll pray for that,” she replied.

The day they were saying goodbye at the train station, Deb and John David left Paul with one of Harriet’s sisters-in-law. The woman had been kind enough to take him in for the afternoon, given the circumstances. Her own husband hadn’t been drafted yet, nor had he volunteered, so he would be sticking around to take care of their own farm for as long as he could. JD had said goodbye to his son, telling him that he’d see him later, and they’d taken a family friend’s car to the train station and had all gotten out, with Harriet at her side and Jacob’s wife at his. Deb hugged John David close and told him to come home. Then, she gave Jacob a hug and a kiss on the cheek and said the same.

“Come home, Jake,” she said. “And watch out for each other, you hear me?”

“I hear you. We will,” Jacob replied.

She watched JD turn away when Delilah kissed Jacob on the lips and cried. Her own children were at home with her mother, thankfully, because they had four little ones now. Deb wanted to take Harriet’s hand, but she didn’t. Instead, she watched Harriet hug both men. Then, they got on the train, along with other men from all the nearby towns, and she watched JD walk back to a seat. He waved to her through the open window.

“Go on home! I’ll be fine,” he yelled to her.

She saw Jacob sit down next to him, waving out the window at Delilah.

“Tell the kids I love them! I’ll be home before you know it,” Jacob yelled out.

“I love you,” Delilah replied.

Jacob nodded, and maybe for the first time, Deb felt bad for Delilah. She had always thought Delilah liked Jacob enough, but her parents had chosen him for her in the same way that Deb’s parents had chosen John David for her, so she’d never even considered that Delilah had fallen in love with him. Now, though, as she watched her standing there, crying, holding one of Jacob’s handkerchiefs to her nose, she felt bad for the woman because Jacob could never love her back in the same way. Deb looked at Harriet then, who was waving at Jacob and John David.

“I am so lucky,” she said to her, causing Harriet to turn toward her.

“Weird thing to say right about now, don’t you think?”

“I have you.” Deb smiled a little. “At least, I have you.” She nodded to Delilah, who was waving at Jacob.

Harriet smiled at her as well and said, “We should talk more about what John David said he wanted us to do, Deb.”

“I know. We will. Let’s just get our boys off to war first.” She turned back to the train as it started to rumble and roll.

She waved at John David and Jacob, who continued waving back until the train started to pull away.

◆◆◆

“He asleep?” Deb asked hours later as she stood at the stove, making them something for a late supper since neither of them had felt like eating earlier.

“He is. He called me Mama again, though. I told him not to, but I think it just slips out.”

Deb smiled as she looked down into the pot on the stove.

“Well, with JD gone and you and I being best friends to everyone else, I think they would understand a little boy making a mistake like that.”

“Maybe. But do we want to risk that?” Harriet asked.

“We can keep telling him not to call you that, if it bothers you.”

“It’s not about that. I love that little boy more than life. I wish I really was his other mama. But if people hear that, they might get the wrong idea, which is really the right idea because I love his mama more than life, too.” Harriet walked up behind Deb, wrapped her arms around her middle, and rested her chin on her shoulder. “What’s for supper?”

“I’m reheating the stew from yesterday. Have a seat. It’s done.”

“No, I like it here more.” Harriet kissed her cheek.

“Harriet Louise, you sit down at the table right now.” Deb laughed. “We haven’t eaten all day.”

“All right. All right.” Harriet pulled away and took her usual chair at the table.

Deb spooned their meal into two bowls and placed one of them in front of Harriet and the other in front of her own seat.

“I just realized this is the first time since the wedding that JD won’t be sleeping here,” she shared as she sat down next to Harriet. “Even when he would run out with Jacob, he always had to come back and sleep here because Delilah was at Jacob’s house.”

“How are you doing with it, him being gone?”

“It’s only been a few hours.”

“I know.”

Harriet dipped her spoon into her bowl.

“I’m sad about him leaving. I’ll miss him. He’s a good man to me and a good father to Paul.”

“He is.”

“But… I’m also happy. I think that means I’m going to hell.”

“Well, Deb, according to everyone else, you and I are already going to hell, so that’s nothing new.”

Deb smiled softly and stirred her own stew.

“I guess not. But it’s just you and me now, Harriet – you, me, and Paul – and I can’t help but be happy that we have the house to ourselves. I want him to come home, of course, and I know things would go back to how they were when he does, but… I don’t know. I just feel like this is our chance to live the life we want the best way we can.”

“You want me to move in? ”

“You know I do. And I know you have your reasons for worrying. I understand. But your brothers don’t care. They’ve given up on you getting married by now. In fact, I think they’d rather you move in here because they wouldn’t have to worry about you anymore.”

“Probably true. What happens when JD comes home, though? I just move back out? None of my brothers would have space for me by then. You know they all plan to have big families, and they’re well on their way.”

“No, you’d stay here. We’ve got the room. And we’re not having another baby, so it’s just Paul for us. We’ve got that room upstairs, next to Paul’s, that you can sleep in whenever you’re not sleeping in my room. Right now, Paul’s young, and we can put him down before going to bed, but when he gets older, you might have to wake up early and go to that room so that he doesn’t find out. JD and I don’t want him to know about us. We want him to be safe. And, honestly, neither of us wants him to have to lie for his parents.”

“So, you’re saying JD would be all right with me living here permanently? He’s not going to come home and make me leave when I might have no place else to go?”

“No, we talked about it again last night. And he knows that Jacob can’t move in here, but if he could, we’d, all four of us, live in the house together and be happy. He wants me to be as happy as I can be, at least. I know I’ll be happy if you don’t have to use that ladder or pretend to be dropping things off in the morning so it doesn’t look like you slept here. You were getting questions from your brothers about why you were coming and going at all hours. We’re only lucky they don’t seem to care to put together why.”

“Well, none of them were particularly blessed with much in the smarts department, so that’s why.”

Deb laughed a little and said, “Will you move in with us, Harriet? Me and Paul?”

“That won’t confuse him even more?”

Deb leaned over and reached for Harriet’s hand then, joining them on the table .

“My love, you are that boy’s mama in the same way that I am. I might have brought him into the world, but you’ve been there every minute of his life. Besides my mama and the nurse, you were the first person he met, even before his daddy. I love that he calls you ‘Mama’ because it’s the truth.”

“Don’t make me cry, Deb,” Harriet said with tears in her eyes.

“Will you please move in? Be with me here? Fall asleep and wake up next to me every day, not just when you can get away?”

“I’m not really hungry.” Harriet pushed the bowl away.

“You haven’t eaten all day. We were both so worried about JD and Jacob. Do you want something else?”

“Yes, but not food.”

“Harriet…” She flushed immediately.

“Sweetheart, we have never been able to touch each other in this house unless it was upstairs in your room. Paul is asleep, and you know once he goes down, he’s down till morning.” Harriet stood up.

“You want to do that down here?”

“Yes. I want to touch you in every room in our house except for Paul’s and JD and Jacob’s rooms, obviously, because that would be wrong.”

Deb smiled up at her and said, “You said our house.”

“I did, yes,” Harriet replied and held out her hands. “Let me make love to you everywhere and all night because we can in our own home.”

“We’ll need to close the windows first. We’re far away from town, but you know people sometimes walk through fields to get places. I don’t want anyone to see me without my clothes on.”

“Neither do I. You’re only mine to look at that way.” Harriet winked at her.