I have to park a block and a half away from your building, then climb the narrow flight of stairs to the second floor. I’m a little light-headed by the time I reach the top. I half expect to find you hovering in the open doorway, but you’re not. I’m even more surprised when I try the knob and find it locked. I dig out my key and let myself in, nearly tripping over my suitcase sitting just inside the door.
I wander through the rooms, casually at first, then more frantically. Looking for you. Looking for your suitcase. In the bedroom, the bureau is bare, the bed still made. The bathroom, too, has been emptied of your things. But that’s normal, I tell myself, pushing down a mounting sense of unease. We’re going away and you’ve packed it all. That’s why everything feels so empty, so unsettlingly quiet.
I hunt for a note, but there isn’t one. There isn’t anything—except an empty gin bottle in the sink. Every trace of you is gone. The room wobbles and sways. I close my eyes, waiting for it to stop. When I open them again, I spot the envelope on the floor near the couch, blue, with your name on the front. The flap is open, its contents gone.
I’m still staring at the envelope when a man in a rumpled shirt and a stained cardigan appears in the open doorway. “You can’t be in here.”
“I’m looking for the man who lives here.”
“No one lives here,” he says with a trace of annoyance. “Tenant flew the coop last night.”
I blink at him as the words sink in. “Flew the coop?”
“Yes, ma’am. Knocked on my door around suppertime to tell me he was clearing out. Said he’d wrapped up his work here and was off to cover the war. I didn’t know you could still get over there, but maybe he’s got connections. His type usually does.”
Suddenly there isn’t enough air in the room and I feel as if I’m about to slide to the floor. I grab for the arm of the sofa, dimly aware of the landlord’s alarmed expression.
“Hey, are you sick?” His eyes narrow, looking me up and down. “I remember you now. Coming around at odd hours. Never staying long.”
The change in his expression makes my cheeks go hot. I consider denying it, assuring him he’s mistaken, but it hardly matters now. I straighten and run a hand over my hair. “Did he leave a forwarding address for his mail?”
“No. Nothing like that.” He presses his lips together then, as if he’s just grasped the situation. “Left you flat, did he?”
I look away. “It would seem so, yes.”
“Tough break. But maybe you’re better off. Any man who’d leave you to go play in a war needs his head examined.”
I stare at him, my throat too tight to reply.
“Well, if you’re in need of an apartment, doll, this one’s available. I can make you a good deal, too, since your fella paid the month out.”
The idea that I would want to live in this apartment is ridiculous, but it suddenly dawns on me that I have no backup plan. It never occurred to me that you wouldn’t be here or that I could have miscalculated so completely. Now, the thought of having to return to my father’s house, to my sister’s gloating smile, is more than I can bear.
“Hey, you okay? You don’t look so good.”
I shake my head and move toward the door.
He takes a step toward me, as if to block my way, then points to the suitcase parked haphazardly inside the door. “That yours?”
I glance at the suitcase, remembering the weeks I’ve spent carefully filling it. My trousseau, you teasingly called it. “Yes, it’s mine.”
“Aren’t you going to take it with you?”
“No.”
I manage to make it down the stairs and all the way back to the car before falling apart. I lean my head against the icy steering wheel, the thrum of traffic muffled beyond the car windows, and finally, I break. How could you, Hemi? After everything—how could you do it? When you knew I was coming.
I barely remember the drive back to my father’s or dropping the car off at the garage. Cee-Cee is in the foyer when I walk in, arranging a bowl of flowers. She peers at me over the blooms as I shrug off my coat, lingering on my face. My eyes feel swollen and gritty, as if I’ve spent the afternoon in a smoke-filled room.
I expect her to demand to know where I’ve been, who I’ve seen. Instead, she inspects me briefly and returns to her gladiolas. I’m so relieved, I could cry. I don’t think I could bear another scene with her at this moment. I head for the staircase and manage to make it to the top. I’m so terribly tired all of a sudden, so utterly and completely empty.
Finally, I reach my room and lock myself in. After washing my face and swallowing one of the sleeping powders Dickey brought from the druggist, I fall onto the bed, craving only oblivion. Tomorrow, I’ll think about what to do. Tomorrow, I’ll make plans.
I have no idea what time it is or how long I’ve been asleep when I hear Cee-Cee outside my door, cursing and banging, rattling the knob.
“Open the door, for heaven’s sake! Something’s happened!”
I’m still muzzy from sleep, but eventually her words penetrate. Something’s happened. Scenarios tumble through my head as I scramble to sit up. You’ve changed your mind and come back. My father’s gotten wind of our plans and cut his business trip short in order to deal with me. Or perhaps he’s already dealt with you. The thought sends a chill through me. I bolt from the bed and hurry to unlock the door.
Cee-Cee pushes in, grim-faced and out of breath. “The Japanese have bombed the naval base at Pearl Harbor. They just broke in on the radio with a reporter who’s there. You could hear the bombs going off in the background, things exploding. It sounds bad.”
It takes a moment for my brain to shift gears. Not you. Not my father. The Japanese. “How could it happen?”
“A sneak attack, they say. Planes downed. Ships on fire. God knows how many killed. They think Manila’s been hit too. Roosevelt will get his war now. They’re probably popping the champagne corks as we speak.”
I stare at her, horrified. That’s what she’s thinking at this moment. No outrage over men dying, no anguish for widowed wives and orphaned children. Just resentment that my father’s precious cause—the gift to Hitler of a neutral United States—is almost certainly lost.
“Has the president spoken?”
“No. But he will. This is exactly what he’s been praying for.”
“You think the president of the United States has been praying that we’d be attacked and hundreds of people would be killed?”
“You still don’t understand, do you, who’s pulling the strings and why? This wasn’t a random attack. It was orchestrated to drag us into their war. The Jews and the communists want us to use our money and our resources to fight their war for them. Why should we? Let them raise their own army and fend for themselves.”
Cee-Cee’s words stun me. “The people you’re talking about . . . our mother was one of them. Her blood—Jewish blood—runs through your veins the same as mine. They . . . are us.”
“Never say that again. Not in this house. Not anywhere.”