Message from Nam (18 page)

“Hi … I … this is a surprise … how are you?” She kissed his cheek and as she did, she saw the dampness in his eyes, and took a quick step back with a look of terror, as though if she didn’t stand too close to him, whatever had brought him here wouldn’t touch her. “Is something wrong?” She stood there, looking young and beautiful, and very, very frightened, and he could only look at her and shake his head as he fought back tears. But he had wanted to come here to tell her himself. He knew that that was what Peter would have wanted.

“They called us last night.…” Marjorie was still in bed, sedated by their doctor, when he left the house to see Paxton. “Paxxie … there’s no easy way to say this.” He took a long stride closer to her, to where she had fled, and pulled her close to him, and held her, and for the briefest instant, she wanted to pretend to herself that it was not him, but Peter. “He died in Da Nang.” He said the words so softly, she almost didn’t hear them. “They sent him up north as soon as he arrived, and he was out on a patrol at night. As green as he was, they made him a point man.” She didn’t know what that was and she didn’t care. She wanted to put her hands over her ears so she didn’t have to hear it. “He was the one out ahead …” Ed Wilson began to cry. “… He didn’t take a hill … or get shot … or level a village … he didn’t even step on a mine … he was killed by what they call ‘friendly fire,’ one of our own boys panicked and thought they heard a VC in the brush, and they shot Peter instead.… It was a mistake, they explained … a mistake, Pax …” He couldn’t stop crying, even though he had come here to help her. “… But he’s dead … our little boy is dead … his body will be home on Friday.” As he said the words he felt a great rock pull through his chest, and she felt as though she were going to die in his arms. But she wanted to hit him first. She wanted to force him to un-say it. She began to flail at his chest, her hands and hair flying wildly around her.

“No!… no! It didn’t happen like that!… It didn’t! It’s not!… I don’t want to hear it!”

“Neither did I … but you have a right to know.…” He looked at her miserably, the man who had believed in bombing the hell out of Viet Nam, had lost his son to it. “He died for nothing.” And all he could remember now was how he had looked as a little boy, not how he had looked as a man when he left only a week before, on April Fools’ Day. He had lived one week in Viet Nam, less than that, because he had only gotten there on Wednesday their time, and he had died on Sunday. Five days. Five days it had taken for him to be killed. For nothing. Killed by “friendly fire.” How friendly was that if it had killed the man she loved, the man who’d been his baby?

“The service will be a week from today … but Marjorie thought you might like to come home with me … I … I think it might be good for her.…” Without saying a word, Paxton nodded. She wanted to be with them, too, they were the only family she had right now, and she wanted to be close to them. Maybe if she stayed with them, he’d come back and tell them the call from Nam had been a joke, the guy had only been shooting blanks, and he was fine, and still planning to meet her in Hawaii.

Paxton walked into the bedroom they’d shared, feeling numb and strange, and she put her jeans on and slipped her feet into loafers. She put one of Peter’s sweaters on, and it still smelled like him, and she threw everything she could think of into a bag, and walked out to the car with Mr. Wilson. He reminded her to lock the house, and carried the bag for her, and she sat in the car, alone with him, feeling wooden.

“It’s my fault, isn’t it?” she asked as they drove across the bridge, staring straight ahead, at the city still shrouded in fog. The city looked sad today and she was glad. Too many people had died recently. Dr. King, Peter … it seemed as though everyone was dying.

“Don’t say a thing like that, Paxton. It’s no one’s fault, except the boy who pulled the trigger. It was an accident. The hand of fate. You have to know that.”

“If I’d married him, he’d have had his deferment.”

“Maybe not. Maybe something else would have come up. He could have gone to Canada, run away, done a lot of things. I think basically he felt he had to go because they called him. I could have forced him to go to Toronto, too, but I didn’t. I could blame myself too. We can’t … if we do that, it’ll drive us crazy.”

She looked straight at him as he drove, wanting to know the truth from him. “Do you hate me because I didn’t marry him?”

“I don’t hate anyone.” His eyes filled with tears again, and he patted her hand and looked away. “I just wish he were still with us.”

She nodded, unable to say more, and grateful for the absolution. And she sat very still and straight, wishing the tears would come to wash away her pain, but after the initial anger, all she felt now were hatred and resentment.

When they arrived at the house on Broadway, Gabby was there, and Marjorie had just gotten up, still looking very groggy. But they were both crying, and little Marjie was staggering around aimlessly, eating cookies. Mr. Wilson said he had some things to arrange, and he went into the library, and he left Paxton with the other women. And it was here that she was able to vent her grief, with them, the other women who had loved him. They cried for what he had been to them, what he had said and meant and done, and they seemed to spend the whole day telling stories about Peter, as a child, as a man, as a son, as a brother, as a lover. Sometimes they laughed, sometimes they cried, and sometimes they just sat in silence, thinking. It was hard to believe he was no longer alive somewhere, that he wasn’t going to call and tell them he was fine, and he was really sorry for the scare, but when the official telegram came twelve hours after the call, it only reconfirmed it. And they all started to cry again. And that night when Gabby and the baby went home with Matt, Paxton went to the guest room feeling absolutely exhausted.

She spent the rest of the week with them, helping Mrs. Wilson to sort through some things, and letting her talk when she needed to, and it gave her someone to talk to too. She thought of calling home more than once, but the truth was, she didn’t want to. She didn’t even want to tell Queenie. Telling them would make it real, and she didn’t want it to be real yet, or ever. But it was much too much so, when the Presidio called them on Saturday morning, and informed them that they could pick up his “remains.” Mr. Wilson came into the library with a somber look, and an hour later, Paxton and the Wilsons went to the Survivors’ Assistance Office, and stood there with two other sets of parents. The two other families were black, and their sons had both been eighteen years old and cousins. Their grief was also strong, their hearts ached too, and the boys they had loved were gone forever.

Peter was in a simple pine coffin draped with the flag, and Mr. Wilson had arranged for a hearse from Halsted’s to join them. It was already waiting there when they arrived, and the Wilsons were ushered into a small room alone with Paxton. And there it was … the proof … the boy he had been and no longer was … in the coffin. In spite of herself, Paxton began to sob, and Mrs. Wilson sank quietly to her knees beside it, as her husband stood beside her, trying to support her.

“Take it easy, babe …” Paxxie could hear Peter say to her. “It’s okay … baby, I love you.…” The memories were so clear, the voice still so strong, it was impossible that he was gone. Impossible, and unbearable. But he was gone. Forever.

They stayed that way for a long time, and finally Peter’s father helped his wife to her feet, and taking Paxton’s arm, they walked slowly back into the April sunshine. Life seemed to have less meaning now. It seemed to matter less what one did, where one went, what one wore, who one saw, what one said. Without him, nothing mattered.

They drove slowly back to the house, and the hearse took Peter to Halsted’s, and that night when his body had been moved to another coffin, in a quiet room, Paxton went to see him. She couldn’t believe it was really him in the mahogany box, but she didn’t want to look to see, just to prove it. Instead, she knelt there beside it, and touched the wood, and the brass handles, with the tips of her fingers.

“Hi …” she whispered alone in the room, “,… it’s me …”

“I know …” she could almost hear him say, the voice so familiar, the eyes so blue, the hair so like her own … the lips the same ones that had kissed her only a week before. That same face was in the box, that boy was the one she loved, and always would, and yet now they wanted her to believe that he had left her. “You okay?” her heart told her he was asking, and she could only shake her head as her eyes filled with tears again. She wasn’t okay, and she never would be. Just as she hadn’t been when her father died. How could you be okay again when you lost someone you loved that much? What did you believe in after that, except loss and pain and sorrow. A part of you felt vulnerable for the rest of your life, and in a secret part of you, you always knew that at every moment.

She knelt there for a long time, feeling him close to her, and wanting to feel at peace, but she couldn’t. All she felt was pain and loss, and anger at the boy who had accidentally pulled the trigger. Even the terminology was wrong. “Friendly fire,” as though that made it all right, because he had been killed by an American and not the North Vietnamese Army. What difference did it make, if he was dead now?

The service on Monday was heart-wrenching and brief. The news of Peter’s death had appeared on the front page of the
Sun
, and several other papers. And everyone he had ever gone to school with came, along with teachers and friends and relatives and colleagues. And the Wilsons introduced Paxton to everyone. In the end, it was almost as if she and Peter had been married. And she envied Gabby now. If she had had Peter’s baby, she would always have had a part of him with her. She was twenty-two by then … twenty-two, having loved Peter since she was eighteen, and lived with him for three years. And she knew that who and what he was, was lodged in her heart forever.

She stayed with the Wilsons for another day, and then, feeling strange, she went back to Berkeley. She had fallen so far behind that it seemed almost pointless to go back there, but she knew she had to. It no longer seemed possible that she would graduate in June, but she didn’t really care.

And in May, she had just gotten an extension to complete all her classes over the summer, when her brother called her. She hadn’t heard his voice in so long that at first she didn’t realize who he was, but the accent gave him away quickly.

“Hi,” and then sudden realization. “Is something wrong?” It was the only thing she could think of now. Ever since Peter had died the month before, she seemed to expect nothing but bad news, and it was almost a relief when no one called her.

“No … I …” He didn’t want to lie to her, but he didn’t know what to say either. They had never been close and he knew this wasn’t going to be easy for her. “Mama thought I should call.”

“Is she sick?” Or was it Allison, or the baby? Paxton couldn’t figure it out as she waited.

“No, she’s fine,” he drawled on, and then, there was no way out. He had to say it. “Paxton … it’s Queenie.” Her heart stopped at the words, and she wanted, ever so gently, to set the phone down before he could tell her. Instead, she said not a word, and clutched the phone as she waited. “She died in her sleep last night, Pax. She had no pain. Her heart just gave out … that’s all … Mother just thought you should know and she asked me to call you.” She could have called and extended her condolences herself, but she didn’t.

“I … yes … I …” She couldn’t form the words. She felt as though the last person who had loved her had disappeared, and there was no one left now. “Thank you, George.” Her voice was an anguished croak, and he felt sorry for her. “Do you know when the service is?”

“One of her daughters picked her up today, and I think she said the service is tomorrow. Mother said she’d send flowers from all of us, but I don’t think you should go, if that’s what you’re thinking.” The funeral would be in the black district, and most people wouldn’t have understood the love the two had shared. And there was no doubt that she would have been the only white person at the service.

“Yeah, I guess so.” She sounded vague. “Thanks for calling.” Paxton hung up then, and wandered around the house, and that afternoon she drove into the city. She went out to the beach, and walked along the waves, and she thought of them, the people she had loved so much and who were gone … Queenie … and Peter … and eleven years ago now, her father. It was as though she had friends waiting “out there” for her somewhere, people she loved and whom she knew really loved her. But it seemed cruel to her that she had to live alone now. She had to go on, with no one there, no one she cared about, and she couldn’t imagine caring about anyone again. A few boys had asked her out since Peter’s death, but she was horrified. She couldn’t imagine going out with anyone. Even Gabby had tried to fix her up with a friend of Matt’s, but Paxton told her bluntly that she had no interest.

She stopped at the Wilsons that afternoon on the way home, but they were out, and she found herself wondering how they could go on living without him, knowing that he was dead and gone, that he had died for nothing, and in a sense had been murdered. It was a tough one to swallow, and there were times when Paxton wanted to die too, she just wanted to go to sleep and never wake up, so she wouldn’t have to be without him.

They called her the next day, when they heard she’d come by, and she noticed that his mother sounded a lot better. She was excited about the baby now. And she talked about Peter, but she didn’t sound as unable to control her emotions.

Paxton’s own mother also called her that afternoon, to say she was sorry about Queenie and wanting to know the details about graduation. It was only a month away, and she and Allison and George were planning to come to San Francisco. Paxton had been meaning to call them for weeks, but she hadn’t.

“There’s been a change in plans,” she announced, and her mother sounded startled.

“What’s that?”

“I won’t be graduating until September. I won’t be graduating with my class. I’m just going to finish my work, and they’re going to mail me the diploma.” And then I’m just going to spend the rest of my life trying to figure out why Peter and I didn’t get married. “It’s no big deal, Mom. I’m sorry you’re going to miss the graduation.” But she didn’t really care. She didn’t care about anything anymore. Absolutely nothing mattered.