He shrugged. “Haven’t you ever just known, Ann?”
I looked at him sideways when he called me Ann. It seemed sort of intimate for someone I barely knew. But, then again, Rob didn’t seem like the kind to feel uncomfortable. And, of course, I “just knew” all the time. I instantly thought about Ben. “So do you ever get done with a task and think, ‘Well that was pointless’?”
“Oh, sure, all the time.” Rob pulled into a parking space outside of Patterson Farm. “But I never, ever think that about that first-thought-of-the-day task.”
Rob and I each got a Patterson Farm cardboard basket with its open top and wooden handle that fit right over your arm for picking. It made me think of Lovey and how she would take me strawberry picking when I was little. I would keep those empty picking containers, wrap my dolls in blankets and slide them into the baskets, pretending they were my own precious babies. It was the first time I had thought about my empty uterus since breakfast.
About halfway down the first row, I said, “Doesn’t it feel sad just leaving some of these behind, or picking them, realizing they’re bad, and then throwing them back.”
Rob nodded and was quiet for the first time that morning.
Since I tend to ramble in uncomfortable silences—at least when they’re uncomfortable on my end—I continued. “I mean, they all start from the same perfect seeds, but then when they grow, some never even get to reach their full potential of being spread over pound cake with homemade whipped cream.”
My boss laughed. “Thanks, new Girl Friday.”
“For what?”
“You just wrote my sermon.”
And that’s when I realized that, though I might have stopped inspiring my husband, that didn’t mean I wasn’t still a muse.
Lovey
The Nicest Boy
May 1949
My momma always said that you didn’t stop dating until there was a ring on your finger. So, I didn’t want to, but, to appease her, I went on the occasional date when I was at WC. Well, more to the point, I went on hundreds of dates with Dan and a few with other boys. I’ll admit that it got harder and harder to see the other girls come home with rings on their fingers, leave school early to get married. There were even a few that left school and got married because they were pregnant—but we didn’t talk about that out loud. Just behind our hands in hushed tones after she was gone.
Dan and I dreamed of our wedding day. When he went home for Christmas break, he negotiated with his parents that he would work for one year after college, get his feet on the ground, and we would get married. It was longer than either of us wanted to wait,but it was better than the five years that his father’s parents had demanded of him.
Dan was coming to pick me up that night, and I couldn’t wait to see him, to go dance, to feel his strong arms around me, our lips on each other’s. With only a couple of weeks until graduation, we could see the light at the end of the tunnel. And I had found a teaching job in New Bern, where he would be working as a banker, and a group of girlfriends to live with. At least we would be in the same town now and could see each other all the time.
Dan handed me the telegram before I realized that there were tears in his eyes. Before I could even finish reading it, I was sobbing. “If they had just let us get married. Why didn’t they let us get married?”
“How could this happen again?” Dan asked. “Don’t they think I’ve served my time?” He punched the hood of the car, and I didn’t blame him. I wanted to too.
Dan hugged me close to him. “Will you wait for me, Lynn? Please, please promise that you’ll wait for me. We are getting engaged the minute I get home, my parents be damned. They can have their house and their money and their rules.” He kissed my head and lowered his voice, looking down on me. “All I want is you.”
We cried a lot that night, but Dan told me not to be scared. “I won’t be fighting this time, Lynn, so you don’t have to worry.”
“They aren’t fighting now,” I cried. “But what about later? What if the war heats up? Oh, I can’t bear the thoughts of knowing that you’re in danger.”
He had kissed me passionately and said, “I promise that I will come home to you. And when I do, we’ll get married. And I’ll spend the rest of my life taking care of you and making it up to you.”
I was supportive. My parents were not. Since Dan wasn’t goingto New Bern, it seemed silly for me to. So, instead, I went back home. I was twenty-three already, and most of my friends were married, having babies, starting their lives. And I was so jealous I could scarcely breathe.
That first night back home I realized I had made a huge mistake. I should have gone to New Bern with my other single girlfriends.
I was sitting on the living room sofa, crying my eyes out because my Dan was gone. The love of my life was on the other side of the world. War had brought us together and war had torn us apart again. It didn’t seem fair.
“Look,” my daddy said. “I know you’re brokenhearted, Lynn, but we think it might be time to move on.”
“Move on?” I spat through my tears. “I will not move on. Dan is the love of my life.”
“Of course he is, darling,” my mother soothed. “But, in the meantime, the nicest boy wants to take you out.”
I glared at her. “Momma, have you not been listening? I’m inlove, for pity’s sake. I am marrying Dan the moment he gets home. I’m waiting for him. I’m not dating a bunch of people I’m not interested in. I did that in college because you made me. I’m done now. In my mind, I’m married to Dan already.”
