“At least you’d be alive.”
Jolene looked at her daughter. There it was, the fear that lay beneath the adolescent fury. “It’s my job as a mom to keep you safe and be with you and help you grow up.”
“That’s what I’m saying.”
“But it’s also my job to show you what kind of person to be, to teach you by example. What lesson would I teach you if I ran from a commitment I made? If I was cowardly or dishonorable? When you make a promise in this life, you keep it, even if it scares you or hurts you or makes you sad. I made a promise a long time ago, and now it’s time to keep that promise, even if it breaks my heart to leave you and Lulu, and it does … break my heart.”
Jolene willed her tears away. Nothing in her life had ever hurt like this, not even hearing Michael say he didn’t love her anymore. But she had to keep going, had to make her daughter understand. “You’ve grown up safe and loved, so you can’t know how it feels to be truly alone in the world. When I joined the army, I had nothing. Nothing. No one. I was all alone in the world. And now my friends need me—Tami, Smitty, Jamie. The rest of the Raptors. I have to be there for them. And the country needs me. I know you’re young for all this, but I believe in keeping America safe. I really do. I have to keep my promise. Can you understand that?”
Tears sprang into Betsy’s eyes. Her lower lip trembled mutinously. “I need you,” she said in a quiet voice.
“I know,” Jolene said, “and I need you, baby. So much…” Her voice caught again; she had to clear her throat to keep going. “But we’ll talk on the phone and e-mail, and maybe we’ll even write good old-fashioned letters. I’ll be home before you know it.”
Lulu tugged on her sleeve. “You’ll be home before I start kindergarten, right?”
Jolene closed her eyes. How was she going to do this, really?
“Mommy?” Lulu said, her voice shaking.
“No,” Jolene said finally. “Not for kindergarten, Lulu, but your daddy will be home for that…”
Lulu started to cry.
*
Michael sat on the couch, alone now, and looked up at his mother. He could see the concern in her eyes, the unasked question. She wondered why he was out here while Jolene was handling this alone.
She stared at him for a long, assessing moment. Then she walked out of the living room and came back a few minutes later, carrying a cup of coffee in one hand and a plate full of baklava in the other. Of course. Food. Her answer to everything.
She put the cup and plate on the table beside him and then sat down on the sofa next to him. She placed her hand on his knee. “When I was young … during the war … it was a terrible time in Greece. My father and uncles and cousins were all gone. Many of them did not come back. The family stayed strong, though, and faith kept us together.”
He nodded. He’d heard her stories all his life. World War II had seemed distant to him, barely understandable; now he thought of the relatives he’d lost to enemy fire. They’d been just names in a book before. Without thinking, he reached over for a baklava and began eating it. God, he wished his father were here now.
“I will move into the house and take care of the girls.”
“No, Ma. There’s no bedroom for you, and you’ve got the Thumb. I’ll hire someone.”
“You most certainly will not. No stranger will take care of my grandbabies. I will hire another part-time employee for the store.”
“The store can’t afford that.”
“No, but I can. I will be at your house after school each weekday. I’ll pick Lulu up from preschool and meet Betsy’s bus. We will be just fine. You can count on me, and the girls will count on you.”
“Every day, Ma? That’s a big job.”
She smiled at him. “I am a big woman, as you may have noticed. I need to help you, Michael. Let me.”
He didn’t know how to respond: he still couldn’t wrap his mind around how completely his world had changed.
“These are details, though, and not the thing that matters most.” She looked at him. “You should be with her now, telling your children they will be fine.”
“Will they … be fine?”
“It’s not your children you should be worrying about right now, Michael. Their time will come.”
“And Jo?” he said. “Will she be fine?”
“She is a lioness, our Jolene.”
Michael could only nod.
“Already you are letting her down. Your father was like this, God rest his soul. He was selfish. This is a time for you to see beyond yourself.” She touched his cheek, resting her knuckles against his skin as she’d done so often in his youth. “You be proud of her, Michael.”