“I like that. Makes me think of my grandpa.” He leaned across his desk. “My grandpa was the one who was always there. He was never too busy for me.” Todd’s voice trailed off. “We made a birdhouse that I still have. I often think of his advice: ‘Make yourself the most valued person in a company, even if you’re just mopping floors.’”
Like a statue coming to life, her typically distant boss softened before her eyes.
“He sounds like a great man.” Ava glanced at her watch and realized it was nearly time for their weekly production meeting to start.
Todd straightened and then nodded. “So sum it up for me. What’s the story that’s worth letting you head off to Europe during a very busy network season?”
She didn’t answer right away but played with the black stapler on his desk, trying to wipe off the fingerprints with the sleeve of her sweater, as she tried to find her words. “When I think of World War II, I think of black-and-white photos from
Life
magazine, of soldiers in foxholes. Those images don’t mesh with my sweet old grandpa who spends his days watching
Gilligan’s Island
and
Bonanza
. Let’s reconcile the two. He’ll show me the places I’ve heard about my whole life. He did something that really mattered and…the world is different because of him.” She tucked her hair behind her ear. “It wouldn’t just be his story either. It would be mine too. Ours.”
“I think that’ll work.” There was tenderness in his tone. “You should do it. We could follow you…the show I mean.” Papers fluttered to the ground, brushed off by his arm as he rose. “You can debrief in the evenings and send back video.” Todd stood, walked around his desk, and then leaned back on it, crossing his arms. “Eat cheap. Don’t buy too many souvenirs.” He winked. “We can pawn off your duties during the meeting.” He looked at his watch, which had likely cost more than Ava’s car, glanced at her with those sexy, dark eyes, and rapped her chin with his knuckle. “You’ve never let me down, Ava. Don’t mess this up.”
* * * * *
Ava sank into the faded red velveteen chair in the small coffee shop a few blocks from the television studio and set her cell phone next to her laptop. She ran her fingers over the tiled table, brushing away the crumbs. Even though the Mean Bean was a block farther than the chain coffeehouse, it was worth the walk. She enjoyed the quaint atmosphere—the mismatched tables, comfy plush chairs, and old photos of Seattle squatter settlements of the thirties.
She usually went there in the afternoon to get a little caffeine pick-me-up and to work away from the office. Today, she had come to research where she’d be going and to research stories she’d most likely hear. On the walk over, she’d called her grandfather to get more details.
Grandpa Jack hadn’t answered, and he didn’t have an answering machine. He wasn’t the least bit interested in a cell phone. In fact, he still used a gold rotary phone that had hung in his small kitchen for as long as she could remember. Her mom had told her to keep trying to reach him, but Ava wondered if not talking to him until she got there would be better. Maybe a face-to-face apology would be a good start to their trip.
She opened her laptop and connected to the free wireless, also making eye contact with the barista, Jed, behind the counter. The fresh-faced college student tipped his chin at her, which was their signal he’d get started on her order. She ordered the same thing every day—no need to stand in line.
Today the coffeehouse was especially busy—a mix of white-collar workers like her, moms with babies in designer strollers, and artsy people nestled in the corners with books and magazines. The chatter of voices swirled around her, mixing with the scents of coffee, vanilla, and cinnamon.
She opened the search engine and typed “Eleventh Armored Division reunion.”
The first link took her to information about their Louisville reunion and news about the previous reunion in Chicago. Her grandfather had attended these gatherings since before she was born, and he always roomed with his friend Paul. While Paul was a wealthy business owner who traveled often, her grandfather had worked in a door factory his whole life. Paul was a city boy and Grandpa Jack, a country bumpkin. The two would have never met without the war. Yet, because of their time together in the trenches, they’d been best friends ever since.
After adding in a few more search words, she found a site with all the information about the European trip. The tour was traveling from Paris to Belgium, and then through Germany into Austria, where it would end with the annual commemoration ceremonies of KZ Mauthausen and Gusen.
Ava didn’t understand what KZ meant, so she searched that term next.
Konzentrationslager
, or KZ, was the German term for concentration camp. Numerous websites popped up with information about Nazi concentration camps, including those in Upper Austria, where their tour was headed. She clicked on some of the pages, and her stomach turned at the photos of bodies stacked on horse carts, of underground weapon production plants, and of American tanks rolling through tall gates with skeletal men cheering healthy-looking GIs.
She clicked to enlarge one photo of the liberation of Mauthausen concentration camp. Her eyes scanned the men in striped prisoner uniforms, thin right arms lifted in cheers. Then she looked at the men on the tank and truck behind it. Her heart swelled as she viewed smiles that hinted of both joy and sorrow. And then her eyes focused on one man. She knew that face. Her stomach flipped as if being tossed like a pancake, and her heart swelled with pride.
“It’s him.”
Jed approached with a steaming latte, and she nearly knocked it from his hand as she reached for his arm. “Look, it’s my grandfather.”
Jed tossed his blond hair from his eyes and peered down.
“Cool.” Jed nodded and then handed her the mug. “Sweet old photo,” he called over his shoulder as he scurried back behind the counter to attend to the line.
Ava sank back into her seat. In the photo, her grandfather looked happy, relieved, overwhelmed. To actually see him entering the gates of the concentration camp made her grandpa’s stories seem so much more real. Jay would have been excited too, but she couldn’t call him. Wouldn’t call him.
Instead, she opened her purse and pulled out a photocopied page that had been folded and tucked into a Christmas card. Two years ago her mom had tried to come up with a Christmas gift for her grandfather, who always claimed he didn’t need anything. Her mother’s idea started when she’d been reading some of the letters written by her father during World War II. Ava hadn’t even known about her grandpa’s letters until her mother sent one to family members with a special request. Since Grandpa had asked for cookies in his letter sixty-seven years ago, her mother had asked everyone to send him a tin of homemade cookies, along with their own personal Christmas letter—in honor of the one he had sent to his parents during the war. The cookies and letters had arrived throughout December, and Grandpa had loved it. Likewise, Ava had loved getting a glimpse into her grandfather’s life during the war.
March 8, 1945
Mother dear,
I keep dreaming about your cookies and hope some will come in the mail. I haven’t been getting any packages lately. I know it isn’t your fault. It must be the mail service.
It’s good to get out of Belgium—to make it out alive—but we have a lot of Germany stretching before us. The Germans held out against our bombing better than I thought. These towns have a lot of caves in the hills, which they run into. There’s plenty of food. When we go into a town, the people are always huddled in the basement. They have their beds down there, their food, and most of their valuables. Of course we only bomb towns when they refuse to surrender.
The houses here in Germany have slogans written on the walls to bolster the people’s fighting spirit. One of the prominent ones is “Sieg oder Siberien,” Victory or Siberia. I guess they worry that if they don’t win, they’ll end up as slaves up in Russia.
We traveled through some beautiful country coming here. It was wonderful, broad, fertile farming country. It reminded me of back home.
The farmhouses and barns are very neat and kept up well. The industrial cities and the houses are very modern. Everything here is much better than anything I have seen in France or England. The Hitler regime has made many improvements here.
I am enclosing a German army insignia which I took from a uniform I found in a basement today. There were a lot of German soldiers that got away from us. Some of them threw away their uniforms and put on civilian clothes. I wonder if we’ll find them. I wonder if I want to. I wonder if they ever wrote letters home to their mothers to ask for cookies.
Love,
Jack
Ava paused. She folded up the letter and held it tight between her fingers. If she’d gotten her dates right, by this time her grandfather would have faced many battles, including the Battle of the Bulge. Yet his letter skimmed over the bombings and fighting and focused more on the scenery.
Had he ever discussed the battles he fought in his letters? Or the friends he’d lost? Had he ever written about his fear? Ava wondered if her mother had access to the other letters. She scribbled a reminder in her notepad to ask about them.
Goose bumps traveled up her arms as she imagined driving down the same streets he’d gone down all those years ago. What had it been like to be fighting? Or to be on enemy soil? Or what had it been like to compare the improvements in Germany with the destruction found within the walls of the concentration camps?
“He had no idea of what was to come
,”
Ava jotted in her notepad. Maybe her grandfather had a hard time writing about the battles, which was understandable, but he had no idea what awaited them. As Ava sipped her coffee, she mapped the trip. They would start in France, traveling by bus through Belgium, and then through Germany into Austria. Instead of stopping at obvious tourist spots, like Berlin, they’d spend their time at small villages where her grandfather’s major battles took place.
The tour operator’s specialty was World War II, and he had traveled with similar reunion groups from all over the world. Ava had recognized town names like Bastogne and Bayreuth from shows she’d watched on the History Channel, and even though she’d started reading through the history of her grandfather’s division, it was still hard for her to keep track of all the battles, the dates, the places. Being there would help put the pieces together, she hoped.
Her cell phone buzzed, and she saw Jill had sent a text message. Reading the three simple words made it even more real: “Seriously, Paris? OMG!”
She smiled as she read the words, but the joy of the moment was disrupted by the text message right above it that she hadn’t deleted—the one from Jay.
Does Jay really think he made a mistake?
Maybe she should call him. Then again, how could he do this? How could he say he loved her after all he’d done?
Mostly, she hated herself for even considering responding.
Where’s your backbone, Ava?
She’d always considered herself strong and independent, but that was before Jay.
I’m not sure I know who I am anymore. Or what I want.
Somehow on the path to a rewarding job and marrying a man who also wanted to start a family, she’d lost herself.
She closed her laptop and stood. She didn’t know how to respond, or if she should at all. She needed time to decide what she thought about Jay, and if she could risk her heart once more.
But even as she deleted Jill’s text, she couldn’t make herself delete the one from Jay. She tucked the phone in her pocket, but his words replayed in her mind:
I have a feeling I made a horrible mistake
.
Was she the one making a mistake now by not giving him a second chance?
Chapter Four
After driving most of the day, Ava pulled into Cal-Ore trailer park just in time to see the sunset cast a pink glow on Mount Shasta. She could have flown down from Seattle to Northern California, but she told herself she needed the drive—to think, to plan, to process. She’d done a little of each, mostly the processing part, trying to come to terms with the fact life wasn’t turning out as she’d always dreamed. She wasn’t succeeding at her job. Didn’t have someone to share life with. Most of her other friends were married; some had kids.
As the miles had clicked by on the odometer, Ava had tried to focus on the many ways this trip was a gift. Not only would she and Grandpa embark on this journey together, she’d also get to see Tana.
And this was a chance to fulfill at least one of her long-held dreams—to see Europe—since the dream of living happily ever after with Prince Charming wasn’t going to happen any time soon. Mentally, she kicked herself for hanging on to that dream. Before leaving the house, she had caved and sent a quick e-mail to Jay: “Got your message. Will be out of the country for a week. Would like to talk when I get back.”
All those thoughts flittered away like dandelion seeds on the wind as soon as she pulled into the trailer park. Her grandparents had moved there before she was born, and Grandpa had chosen to stay in the doublewide after Grandma’s death, even though his two kids lived four hours north in Bend, Oregon.
A smile curled Ava’s lips as she scanned the trailers—the same ones she remembered from when she was five. She looked to the hill near the cow pasture and remembered rolling down it with Michelle from down the street. Ava chuckled, seeing that it wasn’t much of a hill. Five feet high at the most.
It’s amazing how everything changes, or rather how changing makes everything look different.
She parked in front of the mobile home, and as soon as she turned off the engine, a strange peace washed over her. Tucking her cell phone into her purse, she got out and locked the car, immediately chiding herself for doing so. She wasn’t in Seattle anymore.