Shattered Dreams (3 page)

“
Well, if any of you ask me,
James has his own look and it’s a very handsome look, at that.” I
walk over and pick up James from my mother’s lap. “It’s time for
him to lie in his own bed. You all will have him so spoiled, he’ll
never want to sleep alone again.” 

I walk the short distance to
the bassinet and lay him on his back
in
it.  

My mother stands up and laughs, “Who wants a
spice cake for dessert?” 

“
From scratch?” my father
asks with a knowing look on his face. My mother always bakes from
scratch.  

“
Of course, Gene. When have
you known me to open a box to bake from?” 

“
Never, but since we aren’t
home, I wasn’t sure.” 

“
Well, if they don’t have
what I need, we’ll go to the commissary to get
it.” 

My dad stands with my mom and they walk hand
in hand towards the kitchen. 

“
Gene, don’t get too caught
up with that spice cake. We have a train set to put together.” Max
looks at the large box leaning against the
wall.  

“
Let’s make sure Millie has
the ingredients for the spice cake and then we’ll put the train set
together.” 

“
Ok, I can appreciate that,”
Max says. 

Max

Gene and I sit in the center
of the living room floor looking at the picture of the train set on
the very large box it came in. We have a tool box out with
miscellaneous tools lying around us. The house is smelling of spice
cake and the sound of baby noises fills the otherwise quiet space.
I look around and see Millie and Emma cooing at James.
This is my life and I couldn’t be
happier
. I look over at Gene, who is
looking frustrated.  

“
I think you should be
reading the instructions and not looking at the picture,” Millie
says.  

“
Millie, how many of these
have
you
put
together?” Gene asks, looking up from the train
set.  

“
None, but I have seen you
put several together and you always look at the picture first, then
after several hours you decide to read the instructions. I just
thought I would offer you some advice that will eventually save you
some time.” 

“
Thank you, but this is how
real guys do it, huh, Max?”
Gene says,
smiling. 

“
I’m afraid so, Millie. This
is how my dad did it and this is how my granddad did it. It must be
the right way.” 

The timer on the oven goes off and Millie
stands up to remove the cake from the oven. “Ok, have it your way,
but don’t say I didn’t tell you.” 

“
Don’t worry,” Gene says,
laughing.  

Millie walks out of the room towards the
kitchen.  

“
Dad, you know she’s right.
You always look at the picture first, then you have to read the
instructions to complete the project.” 

“
I know, honey, but I’m not
ready to admit defeat. Max, you read the instructions and don’t let
Millie see you.” We all laugh and Millie walks back into the
room.  

“
What’s so
funny?” 

“
Nothing. How’s the cake
look?” Gene asks.  

“
It looks as good as it
smells,” Millie boasts. 

“
Em, I need you to get that
recipe from your mom before she leaves.” 

“
I already have it, but mine
never comes out like hers.” 

“
I need you to get it right
before she leaves, then.” 

Later that night we have dinner and dessert.
While Millie and Emma bathe James, Gene and I read the instructions
to the train set behind their backs. Slowly we get the right pieces
into the right places. It would go a lot faster if we didn’t hide
our reading the instructions from Millie, but Gene is determined to
not admit defeat to Millie. I don’t understand what the big deal
is, but Gene tells me one day I’ll understand.  

During the rest of the week, Gene and I get
the train set together. The plan is that Gene and I will get it put
together, and my dad and I will put it where it needs to be. Millie
and Gene spend as much time as they can bonding with James and
visiting with Emma. We are stationed in New York, and our parents
live in Florida. We all know it will be awhile before they see us
again. Once they leave on Sunday, my parents will be here the
following week. I am scheduled to return to work on Monday. These
two weeks that I have been off have flown by. 

I return home from taking Emma’s parents to
the airport to find James and Emma sound asleep in our bed. I
shower and climb into bed with them. Emma is very firm about us not
sleeping with James or holding him for too long. She doesn’t want
him to be dependent on sleeping with us or being held. I, on the
other hand, want to sleep with him and hold him during all my free
time.  

Once I am in bed, I just stare at the both of
them. He reminds me so much of her. They even sleep in the same
position; on their side with their arm draped over their eyes. I
smile and just watch them. I can never get enough of him or her for
that matter. She is the love of my life. I get the camera and snap
several pictures of them. When I get deployed, I plan on taking a
photo album with me.  

I remember the first time I
saw Emma; she was sitting on a park bench reading. She was wearing
a floral sundress and white sandals. Her long blond hair was pulled
up into a high ponytail. It was a Saturday afternoon nearing the
end of summer. I was there playing basketball and just finishing up
a game when I noticed some punk harassing her.
I walked over to her and I could see fear in her eyes. I heard
him saying how sexy she looked in her dress and what he wanted to
do to her sexually. He added how good he can make her feel. I
wanted to beat him to a pulp, but instead I walked up to them and
smiled my all-American smile at her and told her I didn’t know the
game was going to last that long and that I was sorry for keeping
her waiting. She smiled shyly and stood up from the bench with her
book in hand. I stood tall, squared my shoulders, rolled my neck
side to side then balled my hands into a fist. I stood in front of
the scared girl and looked at the punk and asked him did he want
something. He shook his head and walked away. I walked the nameless
girl to her car and watched her drive off. We didn’t exchange names
or phone numbers. I wanted to, but after her encounter with the
creeper, I didn’t want to appear to be a creeper
myself.  

The following week at school, I was surprised
to see the nameless blond in one of my classes. She saw me in the
back of the room and smiled immediately. I knew when I first saw
her that she was someone special. She never wore makeup and she
didn’t need to; she was just naturally beautiful. She came up to me
and thanked me for helping her that day in the park. We started
having lunch together and I would walk her to most of her classes.
The more time I spent with her, the more I liked her. And the more
time I spent with her, the more I realized that she was incredibly
beautiful and that her beauty was the least interesting thing about
her. 

Emma has the same first name
as Emma Peel, the character Diana Rigg played for two years on the
British cult TV show
The
Avengers
. The producers wanted a sexy woman
to replace the sexy actress Honor Blackman, who left
The Avengers
to play the
character Pussy Galore in the Bond movie
Goldfinger
. In fact, the producers
put a lot of thought into Diana Rigg’s character’s name: Emma Peel
= M Appeal = Man Appeal. I think that Emma, my wife, has a lot of
man appeal. 

A few months later, I was running late to
meet her for lunch. I was running down the sidewalk towards the
restaurant as she was coming out. She dropped her shopping bag and
bent over to pick it up. I was close enough to her to hear some
creeper say, “Hey baby, mind bending over again? I wasn’t quite
ready.” The creeper is holding up his cell phone to take a picture.
“Hey, jerkoff, take a picture of this!” Emma told him, holding up
her middle finger.  

I yell for her so she knows I am here.
“Someone picking on you, Em?” I ask. 

The creeper leaves. Quickly. 

“
Not anymore,” she says,
smiling.  

James stirs and Emma wakes immediately. I am
lying on my side, beside them, and just watch. She attends to James
before she even notices I am watching her.  

“
Hi.” 

I bend down to kiss her. “Hi,
yourself.”  

“
What are you doing?” she
asks, picking James up and positioning him for his
feeding. 

“
Watching my two favorite
people sleep.” 

“
Nothing better to do with
your time?”  

“
No, there is nothing better
to do than to watch you and our son.” 

“
Would you mind getting me a
diaper and wipes? 

I’ll be right back.” I get up from the bed
and walk out of the room. 

“
And get a burp cloth, too,
please.” 

“
Anything else while I’m
up?” I ask, poking my head back into the bedroom. 

“
I could use some water, if
you don’t mind.” 

“
Water, wipes, diapers, and
a burp cloth, got it. Be right back.” 

Later in the week, my mom and dad come to
visit for a week and they automatically fall in love with James.
Dad and I put James’ train set up in his bedroom. When I was a
little boy, I had a train set that ran around the perimeter of my
bedroom just below the ceiling on the wall. It took some time but
we got the train track shelf mounted to the wall and the train runs
perfectly and continuously around James’ room. James is too young
to appreciate this train set, but when he gets older, he will love
it. Emma let me decorate his nursery in trains. She wanted some
little fuzzy bears, but she eventually and reluctantly agreed to
the train theme.  

“
Son, it looks wonderful,”
my dad says as his eyes travel around the room. 

“
Wow, Max, I can’t believe
it, but it looks great,” Emma says, walking further into the
nursery.  

“
This is just like the one
Max had as a little boy.” My mom smiles in
appreciation.  

Mom is holding James and we are looking
around the room at the moving train. 

I look around the room and
think,
This is a great-looking
nursery.
  

“
James, do you like your
bedroom?” Emma asks as she turns him around to see everything. He
is still too small to know what’s going on, but he looks up towards
the ceiling at the lights.  

We all sit down at dinner and have mom’s
homemade potato soup with bacon and cheese topping.  

“
I forgot how good this soup
is, Cheryl,” Emma says, spooning more soup into her
mouth.  

“
Thank you,
Emma.” 

“
Mom, you outdid yourself,”
I say, scraping the bottom of my bowl. 

“
Max?” my dad asks
seriously. 

“
Sir?” My dad is a retired
Army Command Sergeant Major. I always answer him with
respect.  

“
Did you find out what the
meeting is about tomorrow?” 

I look around the table. Emma looks up at me
and stops eating. My mom also looks at me with concern. “No, I
haven’t heard anything. I guess I’ll find out tomorrow.” I smile at
my mom and then at Emma. I don’t want either one of them to
worry.  

“
Max, what do you think it’s
about?” Emma asks, and I can hear the crack in her
voice. 

I look into her big, clear, blue eyes. “Em,
it’s probably about stepping up security on base or something like
that. I don’t want you to worry about it.” 

Emma looks away, breaking eye contact with
me. That is a clear sign that she is going to worry. We have troops
doing a tour of duty in the Middle East, and there is talk of
sending more over to help them out.  

“
Em?”  

She slowly looks up and doesn’t say anything.
I can see the sadness and worry in her eyes.  

I say, “Don’t worry, we don’t know what the
meeting is about. There’s no need to worry.” 

She nods. “If you’ll please excuse me,” she
says, before standing and taking her bowl into the
kitchen. 

“
I’m sorry, son. I didn’t
realize she was that worried.” 

“
Danny, of course, she’s
worried. It’s hard being an Army wife. All she does is worry about
him,” mom says.  

“
Mom, dad, please excuse
me.” I stand and walk into the kitchen where Emma is standing at
the window looking outside at the two deer in the backyard. I walk
up behind her and wrap my arms around her. She leans back into me
and rests her head on my chest.  

“
I’m sorry, he didn’t mean
to upset you.” 

“
He didn’t, I worry anyway.”
Emma turns around and looks up at me. She is only 5’3” and is
significantly shorter than me. I look down at her and smile. “Max,
when your four years are up, I want you to get out of the service,
move back to Florida, and raise James around our
family.”  

“
Emma?” 

“
Max, no, you listen to me.
When we got married, you said you would enlist for four years. You
have two years left. I don’t want to be here and have to worry
about you and what kind of training you are doing today or
tomorrow, or the next day. I don’t want to know what kind of
weapons of mass destructions are in the world. I don’t want to have
to worry if you’ll be home tonight or if you won’t be home at
all.”