Seasons of Her Life (35 page)

Ruby spent the third day writing notes to her friends. The letter she wanted to write to Andrew would have to wait till she got home so she could give him firsthand news. He would want to know every little detail, and she needed the privacy of her bedroom to write about all that she'd gone through and about the miracle of their daughter.

On the fourth day, Ruby's release was signed by Arlene Frankel. Her driver carried all the gifts and flowers to the car and took them to her apartment first, then came back for Ruby and the baby.

Arlene stayed just long enough to see that the baby and Ruby were comfortable. “Ruby, I took the liberty of sending over two cases of canned milk and some syrup for you. I see a dozen bottles on your kitchen table and the bottle pot for sterilizing. I can do that if you want, but I'll understand if you want to do it yourself.”

“I do, Mrs. Frankel. I want to do everything. I want to learn to take care of this baby. She's mine, I ... I feel like God did something special for me. I can't explain it. Thank you, thank you for everything.”

The moment the door closed behind the general's wife, Ruby raced to the crib and picked up her sleeping baby. She kissed the downy head over and over. An hour later she placed her daughter in the crib, and with a speed she didn't know she possessed, she washed and boiled the bottles and made enough formula for two days. The minute the bottles were set in the cooling rack, she ran back to the baby and picked her up. She rocked her contentedly until she squirmed and let out a high-pitched wail for food.

“You're mine, all mine,” Ruby whispered softly. “I'll never leave you. I'll take care of you until the day I die. I'm going to be so good to you. I love you so, little Martha. And I know you will never leave me. I'm going to be the best mother in the whole world. I want you to love me the way I love you. No one in this whole world will ever love you the way I love you, even if you marry, I'll always love you more.”

The baby finished her bottle and burped, a healthy sound that made Ruby laugh. She nestled her back into the crook of her arm, rocking contentedly.

Ruby was happier than she'd ever been in her life.

 

Andrew Blue slogged his way through the mud, the torrential rain sloughing off his back like a waterfall. He hated this goddamn, godforsaken place. He was hot and he itched everywhere. He also suspected he had a good case of the crabs. That meant turpentine treatments. Right now he hated everything and anything that fell in his line of vision. He probably even hated Soong Lee. He should kill her, but he couldn't prove she'd given him the crabs. All he'd done for the past four months was fuck his brains out. Jesus, he itched.

He slammed the door of his quarters, stiff-arming Soong Lee, who was ripping at her clothing. Disgust showed on his face for a moment, and then he felt the beginning of an erection. That, coupled with the itch, sent him to the bed, where he pulled Soong Lee down on top of him. “Make it go away,” he moaned.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw the pink slip on the stand next to his bed. He reached for it, bringing it closer to his face. “Hot damn!” he muttered as he ejaculated into Soong Lee's mouth.

Four weeks before Martha's first birthday, Andrew was sched
uled to return to the States along with General Frankel. A leave in Hawaii, both officers' new billet.

He'd return to Hawaii like a prodigal son, and Ruby would greet him with the kid, and they'd be one happy family. His face furrowed into deep lines when he pulled the stack of letters from his footlocker. There had to be at least two hundred of them. Ruby had been as good as her word, writing two, sometimes three letters a week, each of them as long as four or five pages. All were full of boring events: the weather, the kid's sniffles and bottle consumption. If he lived to be a hundred, he'd never forget the blow-by-blow account of Martha's arrival, and what she'd gone through. He'd skimmed through much of the long missive, and when he got to the part about how hard it was to push the afterbirth out, he'd crumpled the letter. She didn't have to tell him all that shit. Like he really wanted to know about the bloody towels, lumps of blood that looked like slabs of liver, and tree limbs in the kitchen window.

Andrew looked at the blank paper in front of him. So what's new, Blue? Ruby complained that he never told her anything in his letters, and that they were too short. Their daughter, she said, was going to think her father didn't care about her. Andrew grimaced. He could just see Ruby reading his one-page letters to the kid and clucking her tongue. Shit!

An hour later he was finished with his letter. As usual, it said nothing of any importance. He missed her, was eager to see Martha and to hold her. He told her how hot it was and how he would bring her and Martha gifts from Korea. He was saving his leave so they could spend every hour, every second of the day together when he returned. He said he couldn't wait to put his arms around her. He signed it, as always, “Love, Andrew.”

Andrew tossed the letter into the outgoing mail tray and promptly forgot about it.

His thoughts turned to the dry month he'd had since Soong Lee took off on him in the middle of the night when he said there was no way he was taking responsibility for the kid she was carrying. He'd cuffed her good on the side of the head and told her what she could do with her pimp brother. He hadn't seen her or her brother since.

Andrew whistled all the way to the motor pool and the jeep that was his for the asking. He liked driving the general's jeep with the single-star flag at attention. In another year there would be two stars on the general's flag and there would be maple leaves on his collar. All he had to do to get those leaves was continue to be indispensable to his general and somehow erase the doubt he'd been reading in his eyes. Pearl Harbor would do it. Once he returned to his little family, he'd be a model husband. Until then . . .

 

The week before Martha's birthday, Ruby received a letter from her husband saying his tour was being extended for another few months. He was being assigned to the Korean Military Group (KMG) as an adviser to the Korean Marines. He had volunteered, he said, because he knew it was what the general expected. There's going to be a screwup in orders, so just ride with it. You'll love our new billet, he'd added along with a line of exclamation marks to prove his point.

 

Ruby read the letter aloud to her eleven-month-old daughter, whose attention was riveted on a stack of brightly colored blocks. The moment they toppled, she crawled to her mother to rebuild them. Ruby smiled indulgently and rebuilt them carefully, reciting each color and shape. Martha clapped her hands and knocked them over a second time.

Later, when Martha was tired of blocks and wind-up toys, Ruby put her down for a nap, a full bottle clutched in her chubby fists, the handmade quilt tucked close to her face. Ruby smiled, her eyes full of love.

She was reading Andrew's letter a second time when a knock sounded on her front door. Thinking it was one of her friends, Ruby called out, “Come in.”

“Corporal Wagoner,” the young man said removing his cap. “Are you Mrs. Ruby Blue?” Ruby nodded. “I have a message for you from headquarters, ma'am.”

“Thank you, Corporal.”

A message for her. Her hand started to shake as she read it. It was from Andrew, but had been copied out by someone in the communications office. It was cut and dried. Ruby blinked, first in surprise and then in anger.

“It isn't fair,” she muttered. “First the baby and now this.”

This meant Andrew's tour had been extended for an extra six months, not the three or four he'd mentioned in his letter. She, however, was to go ahead and move to their new location. In exactly one week, on Martha's birthday. “And just how am I supposed to do that, Andrew?” she said sourly. He'd said there would be a foulup. She didn't even know where the new location was. She knew a moment later when she flipped the page. “Hawaii! What about my car! Where am I supposed to get the money for all this?” she demanded.

Arlene Frankel hadn't said a word about her husband's tour being extended. Right now she was in Hawaii, meeting her husband, who was on leave. Was the general going back to Korea, or was Andrew left behind to clear things up?

Five days! It's impossible. Besides, she'd planned a birthday party for Martha. The Querys were coming. “Damn you, Andrew. I can't believe this all happened at the last minute, because if that was the case, I'm sure Mrs. Frankel would have told me,” she muttered.

Ruby panicked then, much the way she had the day of Martha's birth when the awful storm hit. When she arrived in Hawaii, where would she live? Nothing was said about military housing, so that meant they would have to live off the base and pay out more money for expenses. Hawaii might be a transfer dream, but reality was something else. If there was a foulup in orders, she could end up living on the street. She'd heard horror stories about military screwups.

Ruby picked up the phone. In a brisk, professional voice she hadn't used since working for Admiral Query, she explained her circumstances and at the same time expressed her displeasure at having only seven days' notice to move lock, stock, and barrel with a year-old baby in what was obviously an error. “And what about my car, sir? What am I supposed to do with it?” She listened, not liking anything she heard. She was tempted to tell the captain what she thought of his explanations and then tell him to go to hell. She bit down on her tongue when he said, “Mrs. Blue, you are a military wife and as such you are expected to fall in and do as ordered.”

Right then, that very second, Ruby knew she could pack up and walk out and return to Washington, D.C. She'd had just about enough of the Marine Corps and its gung-ho officers with their rules and regulations.

In the same brisk voice Ruby said, “Give me the bottom line, Captain.” She listened, her eyes widening with shock as the captain's voice droned to an end.

“Well, that's all fine, well, and good, Captain, but I find it totally unacceptable. What that means is, it isn't good enough. There's been a mistake and my husband's tour has been extended. You'll have to do better than that, or I'm not going. I can be out of here in seven days, that's no problem. I'll be driving to Washington, D.C., where I know I can find a place to live. I'll leave it up to you to explain the circumstances to my husband and General Frankel. Thank you for your time, Captain.” Ruby slammed the phone down so hard, Andrew's favorite ashtray crashed to the floor and shattered.

 

Colonel Oliver Peters expelled his breath in a loud swoosh and swore loud and long. Eyebrows shot up, grins stretched from ear to ear, and guffaws rang out.

“She's the one who delivered her own baby. Yeah, she's Frankel's pet. Has her own car. You bet your ass she'll drive to D.C. Totally unacceptable, eh? Not good enough. Screwup in orders. She was probably right. The goddamn marines never did anything right. The lady has guts. What are you going to do, Captain? Her old man is Frankel's aide, better not forget it. She sure isn't.”

“I don't make the rules, gentlemen, I obey them just the way you do.”

“Pass the buck,” a brash major chortled.

“For Christ's sake, Ollie, pull some strings. It's done all the time. She's right, it's goddamn unfair, and she's probably right, it is a mistake in orders,” another marine colonel said quietly.

“Look, I'll do my best, but I'm not making any promises. Orders are orders.”

“I wouldn't drag my ass on this,” the colonel said lightly. “All she has to do is pack her duds, put the baby in the car, and do exactly what she said she's going to do. She could be doing it as we speak.”

Peters slapped his fist down on his desk. “If she does, she doesn't belong in the fucking military. How's that grab you?”

“Obviously, she's already arrived at that conclusion,” the shy second lieutenant muttered.

“I gotta check this out. And don't even think about leaving this room. You're so goddamn eager to help, you can do it all if I get approval upstairs. This is a fucking first, I can tell you that. Who the hell is this Ruby Blue anyway?” the captain snarled.

“I do believe, sir, she's the one who . . . ah, entertained the two flags a year or so ago and then her old man got his promotion. Just like that!” the colonel said, snapping his fingers.

“Oh, shit!” Peters said, stomping from the room.

 

At seven minutes past seven, on his way to his quarters, Colonel Peters rapped on Ruby's screen door. He blinked when she opened the door, a sleepy golden-haired child in her arms. She looked ordinary enough. The kid was cute, too. “Yes,” she said in a puzzled voice.

“I believe we spoke earlier, Mrs. Blue. I'm Colonel Peters. I believe we can accommodate you, Mrs. Blue. If new orders come through later, you'll be ahead of the game. One of my men will bring over your airline tickets tomorrow. Someone will meet you in Oahu and take you to Pearl. We'll have housing for you on base. Your car will be shipped, but you'll arrive before it does. You're not to pack anything except yours and the child's personal belongings. Professional movers will crate everything. If any of your property is damaged in transit, you'll file a claim and will be compensated. You've got top priority, Mrs. Blue. General Frankel's furnishings and yours will be shipped at the same time. We don't anticipate you . . . ah, roughing it for more than twenty-four hours. Is this acceptable, Mrs. Blue?”

“Why . . . yes . . . but I don't . . . yes, sir, it is acceptable. Thank you.”

“My pleasure, Mrs. Blue.”

“Pussies, my ass,” he muttered as he slid into his brand-new car that he'd spent three full months wheeling and dealing over.