Mrs. Lieutenant: A Sharon Gold Novel (33 page)

"Try to talk to her – see how you can help,”
Fred says. “Next time she might not be as lucky."

Yes, Fred is right Sharon thinks. Next time
Kim might use the gun.

**

Thirty minutes later Sharon lets Donna into
Kim's apartment. "Thanks for coming," she tells Donna.

"I called Wendy – she'll be here soon." Donna
sits down on the couch. "Now tell me what's going on with Kim."

"I walked over to Kim's because it was so hot
in my apartment. Then I climbed in the bathroom window when Kim
didn't answer the door."

"You what?" Donna bends forward, as if she is
about to spring up and inspect the bathroom window, check if Sharon
can fit through the space.

"I climbed through the window ... and found
Kim lying unconscious in her bedroom."

Donna's mouth sags around her disbelief.

Sharon paces away from Donna, then turns back
to her. "I knew she was alive because I found a pulse. I tried to
revive her, but couldn't."

Donna jumps up. "She's okay now, isn't she?
You didn't call me over to figure out what to do about a ..."

"She's resting in the bedroom. I need your
help to talk to her about what happened and figure out what to say
to Jim."

Donna sits down and motions for Sharon to sit
back down too. As Sharon moves towards the couch the doorbell rings
again. Sharon opens the door to Wendy.

"What's going on?" Wendy says. "What's
wrong?"

"Sit down," Donna says.

Sharon repeats what she has told Donna. "I
can't believe it, I can't believe it!" Wendy says.

How much help are these two going to be?
Sharon thinks, then says that Kim’s stomach was pumped. "She took
... she took almost a whole bottle of pills."

"Why?" Wendy asks.

"I haven't asked and she hasn't said."

Donna takes Sharon's hands. "We're here."

Sharon gulps back a sob. "Help me fix it,
especially the part about not calling an ambulance.”

“You didn’t call an ambulance? How did you
get Kim’s stomach pumped?” Wendy asks.

Now Sharon tells the rest of the story. The
mad dash to the Weinsteins’ house. Afterwards the talk with
Fred.

“Did I do the right thing?” Sharon says. “Kim
could have died! It would have been my fault!"
Again
.

Donna says, "You have to believe that nothing
here is your fault. Another person makes a decision – to enlist, to
leave his family, to whatever. And if something happens after that,
if you react to the consequences of that action a certain way, it's
not your fault. You did your best at that particular moment."

Sharon looks at Donna. She's talking about
herself as much as Kim, about herself and her first husband.

"What should we do now?" Sharon asks.

"Let's talk to Kim together," Wendy says.
"Show her she has friends."

“
... as a military wife, never insist that a
friend tell you about her husband.”
Mrs.
Lieutenant
booklet

Kim lies on the bed staring at the
ceiling.

On the drive home Kim had been aware of what
was going on, but she said nothing to Sharon. Kim’s clothes stuck
to the back of the car seat as the heat pressed against her. She
thought of the World War II movie she'd once seen. The one – was it
"The Bridge on the River Kwai"? – where the British officer is
imprisoned in a solid metal cage as punishment by the Japanese.
Afterwards Kim had been haunted by the image of the officer crammed
in the small dark cage, the blazing furnace of heat pressing
against him.

She imagined herself trapped like that. No
air to breathe. No way out.

Kim knew Sharon wanted to ask "Why?" Did
Sharon say nothing because she was being polite or did she dread
hearing the answer?

Kim couldn’t even answer herself. Did she
mean to take all those pills? She could remember an intense
headache, a headache that sent pain flashing through her entire
body. She walked into the kitchen for a glass of water, then into
the bathroom. She sat on the closed toilet seat, opening the cap,
then what?

When they reached Kim’s apartment Sharon
stopped the car. "We're home," Sharon said.

The nausea flashed through Kim’s body, more
powerful than the headache pain. Home! They weren't home, they
weren't even close to home.

Her head throbbed as Sharon opened the
passenger car door for her. She accepted Sharon's offer of an arm
to lean on.

"I'd like to lie down," Kim said as they
stepped into an apartment almost as broiling as the car.

Sharon guided her onto the bed, then stooped
to take off Kim’s shoes and swing her legs up. Sharon closed the
bedroom door behind her.

Kim heard the doorbell ring in the living
room. Her stomach twisted. It was too early for Jim to come home,
wasn't it?

A few minutes later Kim heard the doorbell
ring again.

Now Kim waits for whatever will happen next.
She can’t think about who might be here and what Sharon may be
doing. Kim has to save all her energy and worry for when Jim gets
home. He'll never be able to understand, to forgive her weakness.
Maybe he will finish what she started.

The door to the bedroom squeaks open and
Sharon comes in, followed by Donna and Wendy. So Sharon called for
reinforcements. An entire army can't overrun Jim's anger.

"Mind if we sit on the bed?" Sharon asks. Kim
shakes her head.

Sharon glances at her watch, then says, "We
have a few hours before the men get home. We can work this all out
among ourselves and the men need never know."

Not tell Jim? He'll know. He'll see it in her
face.

"Can you tell us about it?" Donna says. "Tell
us why you took all those pills?"

Why she took all those pills? Kim looks at
the picture of her parents, the frame without the glass. The photo
as unprotected as she has been all her life. Yet that's going too
far back.

"Jim's volunteering for Vietnam."

All three women gasp. "Vietnam!" Sharon
says.

"I want to go home," Kim says. "I just want
to go home."

Wendy picks up one of Kim's hands. Kim thinks
to pull back her own hand – a black touching her in such a familiar
way. Then she stops herself. Wendy is her friend. Friends touch
each other.

"I know how you feel," Wendy says. "I miss
home all the time." She turns to the others. "Living in the South
is different. It's more ... something. I feel protected there.
Safe."

Protected. Kim nods that Wendy understands.
At home Kim is accepted for who she is. Even if she comes from
white trash, at least she knows who she is and what's expected of
her.

"Has Jim officially volunteered or has he
just made up his mind?" Sharon asks.

Kim says, "I think he's just decided."

There is silence. Then Kim understands. "You
think I did this to get him to change his mind?" She shakes her
head. "I really don't know why I did this. I certainly didn't think
it would change his mind. Nothing will."

Tears form. She shakes her head again. She
will not cry now. It can't help.

"What about postponing his decision?" Donna
asks. "Why not just go on to your first permanent assignment? Let
Jim see the real army before he volunteers to go to Vietnam?"

Kim hesitates. "He's punishing me. He thinks
I'm looking at other men."

The three faces can't have been more shocked.
Maybe Sharon's is less shocked, because she knows about the ...
jealousy.

Wendy says, “That doesn’t make sense. If he’s
in Vietnam you’ll have ample opportunity to be with other men.”

Kim says, “He only sees that he’s punishing
me with the one thing I dread the most.”

Sharon says, “Maybe we can convince him that
you only have eyes for him."

Kim shakes her head. Sharon doesn’t know
Jim.

“
An afternoon tea is one of women’s greatest
pleasures and should be well planned with details given great
thought.”
Mrs. Lieutenant
booklet

"Bonnie's pregnant," Sharon says that evening
after Robert has changed out of his uniform. "My mother said Mrs.
Morgen called all excited. Bonnie's due in January – around the
same time as Donna."

Sharon thinks about Bonnie’s wedding last
summer, a year after she became engaged. That means Bonnie would be
married a year and a half when the baby was born.

"Very nice," Robert says. He doesn't look up
from the “New Yorker” magazine he’s picked up off the
imitation-wood coffee table.

"Robert, when I talk to you, I want you to
look at me," Sharon says.

Robert comes over to her. "What's wrong? You
seem jumpy tonight."

"Jumpy? Why would I be jumpy?"

"Is it your time of the month?"

"You mean my period. No, it is not."

"Then what's wrong?"

"Nothing besides you're an officer in the
U.S. Army and there's a bloody war going on halfway around the
world in some country most people can't even locate on a map!"

Robert hugs her. "I've told you everything is
going to be all right."

"What makes you so sure?"

"It's Bonnie's pregnancy, isn't it? You're
jealous, right?"

Sharon pulls away. "I AM NOT JEALOUS. It's
just ... it's just that I want the option of having a baby now.
Instead my life is dictated by the army!"

Robert shrugs. "Donna's having a baby and her
life is dictated by the army too. The army doesn't stop you from
having a baby."

"The war does! Donna knows that Jerry can get
out of going to Vietnam. You don't have an exemption!"

She runs into the bedroom and throws herself
on the hideous brown cotton bedspread. Robert lies down beside her
and recites:

Let me not to the marriage of true minds

Admit impediments. Love is not love

Which alters when it alteration finds,

Or bends with the remover to remove:

"You're quoting Shakespeare again."

“
Sonnet 116.”

O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark

That looks on tempests and is never shaken;

It is the star to every wandering bark,

Whose worth's unknown, although his height be
taken.

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and
cheeks

Within his bending sickle's compass come;

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,

But bears it out even to the edge of doom.

If this be error, and upon me proved,

I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

Robert reaches for her undies.

Minutes later, his chest rosy, Robert traces
the outline of her breasts.

“We talked about our decisions today,” Robert
says. “You know, what we’re going to officially respond on
Monday.”

“And what did everyone say?”

Robert laughs. “Remember loud-mouth Geist.”
He pauses, waits for her nod. “Always shooting off his mouth about
how Southern officers are the best soldiers, the most patriotic,
the stars.” His fingers brush around her nipples.

“Today he announces he’s going to go vol
indef. Says he wants the chance to see Paris before serving in
Vietnam. Truth is, he’s no more eager to get his butt shot off than
the rest of us. He’s all talk.”

“What did Nelson, Jerry .... and Jim
say?”

“Jerry’s taking vol indef. He wants to go to
Europe.”

“Maybe they’ll be stationed with us,” Sharon
says. “You did tell him you were going vol indef, didn’t you?”

“Of course.”

“Nelson?”

“He wants to apply Regular Army so I’m not
sure how that works with vol indef.”

Sharon’s fingers twist the sheets. “And
Jim?”

“Not going vol indef. Says he has no interest
in living in Europe with all those foreigners. Wants to do his two
years and return to his hometown.”

Sharon waits for Robert to say Jim plans to
volunteer for Vietnam. When Robert says nothing, Sharon climbs out
of bed. Perhaps Jim hasn’t said anything.

“I have to get ready,” Sharon says. “Kim and
Jim will be here after dinner.”

An hour later, Sharon stacks the playing
cards on the table. The evening has been carefully orchestrated,
and Robert will be as unwitting an actor as Jim.
“All the
world’s a stage and ...”

The doorbell rings. Butterflies circle
insider her stomach as if on opening night of a Broadway play.

Jim says hello and Kim nods. "I'm glad Sharon
asked you over tonight," Robert says. "Now let's play bridge."

Robert shuffles the cards and Kim cuts to
him, her face pale. Did she manage to get through supper without
letting Jim see how upset she is?

Sharon, Donna, and Wendy talked and talked to
calm Kim down. Then they formed a plan. It has a chance of working,
with a little finesse.

Sharon waits until the second hand, the first
being won by her on a bid of three spades. "I'm getting excited
about living in Europe," she says, laying down a three of clubs.
"Robert says we'll probably be sent to Germany. He knows some
German, so that should be good."

Jim turns to Robert. "You've definitely
decided to go vol indef?"

Robert lays down his five of clubs. "It makes
the most sense at this time."

Neither Jim nor Kim says anything.

After another time around the table Sharon
asks, "What have you guys decided?" She doesn’t look at Robert. Is
he wondering why she’s asking Jim if Robert has already told her
Jim’s decision?

Kim studies the dummy's cards. Jim tosses a
card down and says, "I'm going to volunteer for Vietnam."