Message from Nam (8 page)

P
axton and Gabby both did exactly what they’d set out to do when they’d come to Berkeley. Gabby signed up for the easiest classes she could, and managed to go out almost every night. She was having the time of her life, although she had not yet found a husband. And Paxton, on the other hand, had signed up for the toughest classes open to her, particularly those involved with journalism or writing. She was also taking a political economics class that was so hard it terrified her, physics, math, and Spanish. Her adviser had fought her on everything except Spanish and math, but she seemed to be doing well in every class except physics, and that was a required class anyway, and she was taking it on a pass/fail basis. But she was exhilarated by everything she learned and did, and still managed to go out with Gabby and her friends sometimes, and she almost always enjoyed them. They were a fun-loving crowd, and they seemed to be involved in everything. Two of them were involved in CORE, several were trying to raise money for SNCC, which were causes that appealed to Paxxie, too, as they benefited southern blacks, and one evening she met Mario Savio, the leader of the Free Speech Movement. Gabby seemed to know everyone, and although she knew the cause people, she also knew the more social ones, too, and most of her friends were pretty tame, which was comfortable for Paxton.

By the second month of school, Paxton had had several run-ins with Yvonne Gilbert. The black girl seemed determined not to give Paxton a chance about anything, and she constantly assumed that if something was wrong, it was Paxton’s fault, and it was beginning to seriously annoy Paxxie. It was prejudice in reverse, and it was getting to be a challenge to hold her temper.

Not surprisingly, given her extraordinary looks, Yvonne had found a boyfriend by the second week of school. He was the star running back on the football team, a huge, handsome black boy from Texas, and by association and because of her own personality, she was becoming quite a star on campus. All the boys were running after her, but she seemed to be serious about Deke, and she’d already made it clear to several of her admirers that she had no interest in white boys.

She was in Paxton’s physics class, but she never talked to her, and they hardly ever spoke except when they ran into each other in their living room and really had to. But the exchanges were never really friendly.

And Dawn seemed to live her own life too. She still slept most of the time, and more than once Paxton had wondered if she ever even went to classes. “She’s never going to make it, if she keeps it up like this,” she’d said to Gabby several times, who seemed to feel it was not her problem. She had her own life to lead. And she was having a good time going out with two of her brother’s friends from the law school. And her own prediction had proven true. She was seeing more of her brother than she had in years, and although she complained about it constantly, she really enjoyed it. He had started turning up every few days just to make sure she was “alright,” or to bring her things, like a six-pack or a pizza or some pastry he’d just happened to pick up, or a bottle of cheap wine, but Gabby knew he wasn’t worried about her, he was interested in Paxton. The two would sit for hours sometimes, on the battered couch, or on the floor, talking long into the night, drinking coffee or beer, or just Coke, and talking about the things they believed in. They seemed to share the same opinions about everything, and it was rare that they disagreed, and it almost frightened Paxton sometimes to realize how much alike they were and how compatible on a broad range of subjects. It was as though they had been destined to meet and become friends. But it worried Paxton at first, because unlike Gabby, the one thing she didn’t want was to find a husband. She had come to Berkeley to learn and to make something of herself, and one day she was going to be a great journalist, or at least a hardworking one, and go out and write about the world. She wanted to go to Europe, Africa, the Orient. Sometimes she even thought about spending a year in the Peace Corps. The last thing she wanted was to fall in love, settle down, get married, move to the suburbs and have babies. And she’d told Peter that and he’d laughed. Even his blond good looks were a lot like hers. People told them they looked alike, and he and Paxton looked more like brother and sister, than he and Gabby.

“Are you telling me I look like the type who’s going to get married and move to the suburbs? Christ, how insulting.” But he was laughing and sitting on her living room floor at two a.m. when he said it. Gabby had just come in from a date, Dawn had been asleep for hours, and most of the time now Yvonne was sleeping at Deke’s apartment off campus.

“Did I hear someone say marriage?” Gabby cupped her ears jokingly with one hand, and stopped on her way to the bedroom.

“No, you did
not
!” Paxton was quick to correct her. She was wearing jeans and a T-shirt, and lying on the floor near Peter. She loved being close to him, loved what he thought, and who he was and what he stood for. But she didn’t want to love him more than that, didn’t want to really let herself fall in love with him, at least not yet. She just couldn’t.

“Your friend just insulted me,” he informed his younger sister, but as he said it, he stroked Paxxie’s golden hair, and smiled down into the green eyes he was falling in love with. “I think she just called me a square, or worse.”

“I did
not!
” Paxton sat up, laughing then. “I just said I didn’t want to get married, move to the suburbs, and have kids. I want to see the world first.”

“And you think I don’t?” He still looked mildly insulted.

“He wants to see the world,” Gabby assured her, “Monte Carlo, Cap d’Antibes, Paris, London, Acapulco, St. Moritz. You know, the hardship spots.” The three of them laughed.

“What do you think I am?” he demanded of them both. “Lazy?”

His sister knew him better than that as she replied, shaking her head, “No, just spoiled. Like me.” She smiled benignly and he threw an empty Coke can at her.

“Well, it’s true. Can you see either of us wanting to join the Peace Corps, like Pax? Just thinking about it gives me hives, and I can’t see you digging trenches or building latrines either, can you?” she asked him honestly, and he shook his head.

“Why do you think I’m in law school?” he teased, but there was truth to it too. He was going to graduate from law school at twenty-five, and with luck he could avoid the draft till he was twenty-six and it was no longer an issue. He liked the deferral status that law school gave him. He had no desire to join the police action in Viet Nam. Only two months before, after the Gulf of Tonkin incident, American aircraft had bombed Viet Nam for the first time, after years of being there as advisers. “To tell you the truth, I can’t see myself in Viet Nam, or anyplace else even remotely like it. What makes you want to join the Peace Corps, Pax?”

“I’m not sure I do. I just want to make a difference somewhere,” she said seriously, as Gabby left them alone again. “I’ve spent my whole life watching people indulge themselves and not give a damn about anyone else. I don’t want to do that. My father cared about people a whole lot. I think he would have done something like that if he’d had the chance and hadn’t gotten married.”

“He must have been a nice man,” Peter said quietly, as he watched her face grow soft thinking about him.

“He was.” There was a lump in her throat as she spoke. “I loved him a lot … my life was … very different … after he died.”

“Why?” His voice was gentle in the night, there was so much about her he already loved, but it scared him, too, sometimes, just as it did Paxton.

“My Mom and I are … well, pretty different.…” She didn’t want to say more, not yet, and there was no point. And it sounded too awful to say she had always thought her mother didn’t love her.

“Is that what the Peace Corps is all about? To get away from her?”

“No.” Paxton smiled. “But Berkeley was.” She was very honest with him, they both were. They were just that kind of people.

“I’m glad,” he said to her, as his lips brushed hers and they lay close to each other on the floor, propped up on their elbows.

“So am I,” she whispered back, and then he took her in his arms and they lay there and kissed for a long time, until suddenly Gabby opened the bedroom door and looked down at them with considerable interest.

“You guys going to bed separately or together tonight, or are you just gonna lie here and neck? It’s all the same to me, I just wonder if I should wait up for Pax, or go to sleep now.” Peter groaned and Paxton laughed as she rolled away from him, her hair tangled, her cheeks pink from their kissing.

“Has anyone told you lately what a rude pain in the ass you are, Gabrielle?” He knew how desperately she hated the name and he loved to use it to annoy her. “Christ, it’s just my luck to fall for my sister’s roommate.” He stood up then, and held out a hand to Paxton. “I guess you’d better get some sleep, babe. If the mouthpiece here will let you. I don’t know how you stand it.”

“I just fall asleep when I’m tired.”

“And she probably keeps talking.” All three of them laughed because it was true and he kissed Paxton goodnight and left. And when he was gone, Gabby pressed her.

“Is it serious, Pax?”

“Don’t be silly. We’ve only known each other for six weeks, and we’ve got our whole lives ahead of us. He’s got three years of law school, I’ve got four years of undergraduate work to do. What could be serious?” But in her heart, she knew it was, and didn’t want to admit it yet to herself or Gabby.

“You don’t know my brother. I’ve never seen him look like this. He really cares about you. I think he’s in love with you.” And then with an earnest, investigative stare, “Has he told you he loves you?”

“For heaven’s sake … of course not.…” But he didn’t have to. Paxton knew it. Gabby was right. And Paxton had never felt like this either. It was just rotten luck that it had happened so fast, and so early. For the moment, finding the man of her dreams was the last thing Paxton wanted.

“Shit. Isn’t this just my luck,” Gabby complained as they got into bed. “I want to find a husband and you don’t, and what happens, you’ve got Peter drooling over you and looking like he wants to get engaged, and who have I got? No one. Some jerk with frizzy hair to his waist who wants to go to Tibet with me next summer as long as I’ll pay for his airfare. Some people have all the luck.”

“Karma.” Paxton grinned as she lay in the dark, listening to Gabby.

“Who’s he? Isn’t he that guy at the free-speech table on Bancroft?”

“No, it’s that thing Dawn is always talking about. Karma. Fate. Kismet.”

“They must be sleeping pills. Christ, did you hear her getting sick yesterday? I think she’s dying.”

“Maybe she’s pregnant,” Paxton whispered hesitantly.

“When does she have time to get pregnant? She’s always sleeping.” And with that, they both laughed and turned over and went to sleep. For once, Gabby had nothing left to say and she had to go to her contemporary music class in the morning. And she had a lot to do after that. It was the day before Halloween, and she wanted to work on her costume. She was going to be a gold lame pumpkin.

It was also the day the Viet Cong attacked the Bien Hoa airbase, fifteen miles north of Saigon, the first major U.S. military installation to be hit.

Five American men were killed, and seventy-six were wounded. And Johnson did not order an attack in retaliation. He was trying to sit tight, especially before the election four days later. Goldwater was promising to bomb the hell out of everyone, and end our involvement in Viet Nam by crippling the North, and Johnson was promising not to get us in any deeper, which was what everyone wanted to hear. And Johnson won by a landslide on November third. The threat of Goldwater involving the country further in Viet Nam had been answered.

And the following week, Peter asked Paxton what she was doing for Thanksgiving.

“Nothing much. It’s too far to go home just for a few days.” Too far and too expensive, although Thanksgiving without Queenie’s turkey wouldn’t be Thanksgiving. Paxton was trying not to think of it, and she was planning to spend the day studying for a physics test, and having a turkey sandwich at the cafeteria if she even remembered.

“I was wondering if you’d like to come home with us. I mentioned it to my mother last week, and she’d love it if you used the guest room. It might even give you a rest from listening to Gabby talk to you all night.”

“I might miss it,” Paxton said shyly. “Are you sure it wouldn’t be an imposition?”

“Not at all. That’s what Thanksgiving’s all about. People overeating together and watching football. In fact, Dad and I are going to the game on Saturday and I’d love it if you came. And I thought maybe we could drive over to Stinson Beach on Friday.”

“I’d like that.” She smiled. Gabby had said something vague about it a few days before, but then she had forgotten to pursue the subject further. But Paxton couldn’t think of anything she’d like better than spending Thanksgiving with them. She hadn’t met their parents yet, but suspected from everything she’d heard that she would like them. And going there was a little frightening, too, it would bring her that much closer to Peter. But there seemed to be no way to avoid it. Most of the time they went out with friends, and she had only been out with him alone a few times, but even in a crowd of people, their attraction to each other was so strong that it was impossible to fight it.

He told Gabby that afternoon, and she exploded into their living room while Paxton was studying and surprised her.

“I hear you’re coming home with us for Thanksgiving, Pax, that’s terrific!” She smiled warmly. She had talked to her mother only that afternoon, and Marjorie Wilson wanted to know more about her roommate and if she was a serious interest with Peter. She had found it strange that he, and not Gabby, had called to ask if Paxton could come home with them. “You’re going to love my Mom.”

“I’m sure I will.” She already did from all of Gabby’s stories. The two were amazingly close, and it was obvious from everything Gabby said that she was crazy about her mother. It sounded as if Marjorie Wilson was involved in causes and auxiliaries and bridge clubs, like her own mother, but unlike Beatrice Andrews, she seemed genuinely to love her children. Paxton wasn’t sure what their father did, but she assumed somehow that he was in business.