Home Front

“We might have to be … innovative,” she said.

“I love innovative,” he whispered, letting his hand move across her jutting hip bone and along her thigh. His touch electrified her. She pulled off her blouse and undressed him and lay against him, every part of her needing to be touched by him. She ran her bare hand along his chest, feeling him, remembering. Their kiss turned desperate. Her fingers slipped beneath the waistband of his boxers.

Had she ever felt this sharp, aching need before? She couldn’t remember, but it was in her now, fueling her, straining to be released.

He knew her body as well as he knew his own, knew when to touch her and where, knew how to bring her to this edge that was both pleasure and pain. It didn’t matter at all that they had to do things a little differently than before, that she sometimes needed to position herself with pillows. Lying on her side, she clung to him, her breath coming fast and hard, feeling him inside her again, filling her; she arched up, kissed him, and their cheeks were wet with each other’s tears. Her release was so powerful she cried out; it felt as if her entire body were being lifted up, carried on some dark wind, and then floated back to the softness of the bed she’d shared with this man for so much of her life. In the aftermath, she curled against him, her body sweaty, spent, and as he stroked her arm, she lay there, her cheek against his chest, remembering the feel of his tears on her face, the salty taste of his kiss.

“Can I ask you a question?” he said afterward, as they lay together, still breathing heavily.

“Of course.”

“How come you never answered my letter?”

“What letter?”

“The one I sent you in Iraq, a few days before your crash.”

She frowned. “I never got a letter from you over there. We were crazy that last week, missions constantly, and the Internet was always going down. I opened my e-mail once after I got home; there were hundreds of condolence messages about my leg. I couldn’t stand reading them. I haven’t gone to the computer in forever. What did it say?”

“That I wanted another chance.”

She tried to imagine what that would have meant to her then, when she was so far from home. Would she have believed him? “How did it happen, you falling in love with me while I was away?” she asked, her body tucked up against his, her chin resting on his shoulder.

He slid his arm beneath her, pulled her closer. “After Dad’s death, I was depressed, and you were always so damn cheerful. You gave me the kind of advice I couldn’t follow—like think ‘good thoughts, remember his smile.’ Honestly, I hated that shit.” He looked at her. “I was unhappy, and it was easy to blame you.”

“I thought you could will grief away. That’s what I did with my parents. At least that’s what I thought I did. The truth is, I knew loss. I didn’t know grief. Now, I do.” She tilted her chin to look up at him. “I let you down.”

He kissed her forehead slowly, lovingly. “And I let you down.”

“We need to talk more this time,” Jolene said. “Really talk.”

He nodded. “I want to know about Iraq. Can you do that?”

Her instinct was to say no, you don’t want to know and protect him. “I’ll tell you what I can do. You can read my journal,” she said. “And I need to talk to that doctor of yours, too. I need help with this, I think.”

“You’ll make it through, Jo. You’re the strongest person I’ve ever met.”

“What about Betsy? How will I convince her to forgive me?”

He smiled. “You flew helicopters in combat. You can handle one angry twelve-year-old girl.”

“I’ll take combat anytime.”

They were laughing when someone knocked on their door. Pounded, actually.

Michael got out of bed, snagged his pants and stepped into them. He was buttoning the fly as he opened the door. “Ma,” he said, grinning.

“It’s Betsy,” Mila said. She was holding Lulu, whose head rested on her shoulder. “She’s gone. We can’t find her anywhere.”

“What do you mean?” Michael said, picking a tee shirt up from the floor, pulling it over his head. “I’m sure she’s in the backyard or somewhere close.”

“Gone?” Jolene sat up, clutching the sheet to her bare breasts. She didn’t know how Michael could sound so calm.

Mila glanced sympathetically at Jolene. “After the … incident at Tami’s, there was a lot of talk. People are worried about you, Jo. Anyway, I was soothing Lulu, who kept wanting to know why you’d thrown yourself to the ground, and when I got her settled, I looked for Betsy. It took a long time to work the room. The point is, she and Seth are gone. We’ve looked everywhere. Carl is frantic.”

“I’ll check the house,” Michael said.

He rushed out of the room. Jolene got out of bed and went to her dresser. Finding jeans and a white sweater, she dressed as quickly as she could. Michael returned with her prosthesis, and they went down the stairs. Hold-limp-step. Hold-limp-step. Never had the unwieldiness of her fake leg bothered her more.

Carl was waiting for them in the family room, looking harried. Mila was beside him, holding Lulu in her arms.

“They ran away,” Carl said to Jo. “I heard them talking, and I thought, ‘Good, they’re friends again,’ and I went for another beer. I don’t know how long it was before I went looking for him again. It wasn’t until people started to leave that we noticed. I should have noticed.”

“The Harrisons’ tree,” Michael said. “Remember the last time Betsy ran away? Seth found her at the tree by the Harrisons’ dock.”

Jolene stared at her husband. “The last time she ran away?”

Michael barely responded. Carl nodded and the two men set off. Jolene followed them as far as the porch.

Out there, it was cold and black. No stars shone through. She stood at the railing, trying to will herself to see through the darkness. Mila came up beside her, carrying Lulu. “We’ll find her, Jolene,” she said. “Teenagers do this sort of thing.”

This sort of thing; running away in the dark, where God only knew what waited. If Jolene had been a better mother in the past weeks, they wouldn’t be here, staring out at the cold night, praying. She heard Lulu’s small sob, and she turned.

“She ranned away again,” Lulu wailed.

Opening her arms, Jolene whispered, “Come to me, baby. Let Mommy hold you.”

Lulu’s teary eyes widened. “Really, Mommy?”

Jolene’s voice cracked. “Really.”

Lulu hurled herself forward so hard Mila stumbled sideways. Jolene caught Lulu in her arms and held on tightly, breathing in the familiar little-girl smell of Johnson’s Baby Shampoo and Ivory soap.

She felt Lulu’s sobs, and all she could do to help was hold on tightly, to tell Lulu over and over again that she was safe in Mommy’s arms. Finally, Lulu drew back. Her dark eyes were swimming in tears, and her cheeks were glassy-looking with moisture. “You scared us, Mommy.”

Jolene smoothed the damp hair from Lulu’s face. “I know, Kitten. The war made your mommy a little crazy. I’m going to get better, though.”

“You promise?”

The trust in Lulu’s eyes was a balm to Jolene’s battered spirit. She wanted to say I promise. That was what she would have done in the old days; deflect and pretend. But promises were fragile things, and the future even more so. “I promise I’m going to do everything I can to be the mommy I used to be. But I might need your help. Sometimes if I’m … you know, crazy, you’ll have to just raise your hands and shrug your shoulders and go, ‘That’s my mom.’ Do you think you could do that?”

Lulu raised her small pink palms and shrugged and said, “That’s my mom.”

“Perfect,” Jolene said, her smile unsteady.

Then Carl and Michael emerged from the darkness across the street and appeared in the driveway, walking slowly toward them. Betsy and Seth weren’t with them.

“Where is she?” Lulu said.

Jolene’s fear kicked up a notch, edged toward panic. She kissed Lulu and handed her back to Mila, “Will you put her to bed, Mila? Please?”

Mila nodded. Taking Lulu, she carried the little girl back into the house. The screen door banged shut behind her.

Jolene met the men at the end of the porch.

“They weren’t there,” Carl said. “There was no sign that they’d been there, either.” He looked down at his watch. “It’s ten o’clock. Should we call the police?”

Jolene felt a chill go through her. Betsy was out there, somewhere, in the night, running away from a family that made no sense to her anymore, from a mother who could no longer be trusted. She went to the railing, stared down toward the road. Come back, Betsy. I will explain it all to you, please …

Michael came up beside her, put an arm around her shoulders. She couldn’t help thinking that before all of this, she would have shrugged his comfort away, would have been pacing now, trying to control a situation that wasn’t hers to control. Now, she leaned against him.

How long did they stand there? Long enough for Michael and Carl to call everyone they knew, long enough for Mila to put Lulu to bed and come out to the porch, wrapped in a purple and pink afghan. Long enough to see their friends and family walk over from Carl’s house and stand clustered along the fence line. Long enough to see the red and yellow flash of police lights coming their way.

Jolene saw the bursting bits of color, and she tightened her hold on the railing, freezing cold now, shivering. She was reminded of another night like this, long ago. She’d stood on another porch, all alone, watching her parents drive away. She’d never seen either one of them again.

Tami, bring her back to me.

The police cruiser pulled into the driveway and stopped. The colorful lights snapped off, leaving darkness behind.

Two uniformed officers got out of the car.

Michael tightened his hold on Jolene’s waist. Was he thinking about the night he’d been told about her accident? Hadn’t Ben Lomand come up at night with the news?

The older of the two officers opened a pad of paper. “We’re here about the missing children?”

Missing children.

Jolene gripped the railing so tightly her hands went numb. Think, Jolene. You know Betsy. Where would she be?

She heard the questions being asked and answered beside her; descriptions, names, favorite places, reasons they might have run away. She heard the pause after that question, and then Carl’s halting answer.

“We were having a memorial for Seth’s mom tonight. She was killed in Iraq. Jolene had an … um … flashback and threw herself to the floor. It caused some … I don’t know … upset to the kids, I think. Later, I heard Seth say to Betsy, ‘That picture doesn’t even look like my mom.’ That’s the last time I remember seeing them. It was, maybe, eight thirty or nine. I can’t be sure. There was so much going on.”