and resumed her mechanical and relentless assault on a bottle of cheap gin.
Katelyn found herself on the floor naked and covered with sweat. Not understanding how she had gotten there, she scrambled to her feet—and found that she was afraid to look in the mirror—terribly, agonizingly afraid. She stood, her head bowed, holding onto the sink and crying bitter, bitter tears.
Her mind could not seem to make sense of what had just happened.Why was she naked? What was she doing on the floor? Who was that boy, and why did she remember a boy at all?
She returned to her room, found her nightgown, and put it on. She went to her window seat and sat down, and watched the moon ride low over the lake, and smelled honeysuckle on the air.
Then she was sick, and ran into the bathroom and threw up. She washed her face, brushed her teeth, and finally saw in the mirror her own haggard face. As if she was seeing a miracle, she touched the glass. Tears beaded in her eyes and rolled down her cheeks. She went to her bed, then, and lay down, and slept the dismal and uneasy sleep of a captured soul.
TWO
ON A SOUR OCTOBER FORENOON in 2003, Lieutenant Lauren Glass watched her father’s coffin being lowered. She was now alone, given that her mother had abandoned them when she was twelve, returned to Scotland, and no longer communicated.
Also at the graveside were four men, none of whom she knew. They were, she assumed, members of whatever unit he was involved in. She did not know its name, what it did, or anything about it at all.
The wind worried the flowers she had brought, the chaplain completed his prayers, and she threw a clod of earth and said inside herself,
You will not, you will not
and then she cried.
He had died on duty, somehow. She had not been told how, she had not been allowed to see his body. The coffin was sealed with federal seals warning that it was a crime to open it. Lead solder filled the crack beneath its lid. She had wanted to at least be alone with it for a short while, but not even that had been allowed. There had been no obituary, nothing to mark all he had done in this world, what she believed must have been a heroic life.
She had been given a five-thousand-dollar death benefit, and he had been listed as killed in action.
Killed how? In what action? He’d left home as usual that morning, then driven to his work, she assumed. They lived on Wright-Pat in Dayton, but he commuted to Indianapolis on the days he worked, which were sporadic.
As the ceremony concluded, to her amazement a missing-man formation flew overhead, wheeling majestically away toward the gray horizon. Then, down at the end of the field, an honor guard she had no idea would be there fired twenty-one times. The highest salute. Taps were sounded.
He was being buried with the highest of honors, and she felt bitter because she did not know why.
The four men were walking away from the grave when she caught up with them. “Can you tell me anything?”
Nobody answered.
“Please, I’m his daughter. Tell me, at least, did he suffer?”
One of the men, tall, so blond that he might have been albino, dropped back. “Should I say no?”
“You know how he died?”
“I know, Lauren.”
He knew her name. But who was this man in his superbly tailored civilian suit, as gray as the autumn clouds, with his dusting of white hair and his eyes so pale that they were almost white as well?
“Who are you? Can you tell me what my dad did?”
“I want you to come to an office. Can you do that?”
“Now? Is this an order?”
“I’m so sorry. Are you up to it?”
This walk across this graveyard was the saddest thing she had ever done. She did not understand grief, it was a new landscape for her. Could you go to an office in grief? Talk there in grief? In grief, could you learn secrets? “I want to be at home,” she said.
He gave her an address on base. “You think about it, and I want you to bear in mind that we wouldn’t be asking this
Katelyn found herself on the floor naked and covered with sweat. Not understanding how she had gotten there, she scrambled to her feet—and found that she was afraid to look in the mirror—terribly, agonizingly afraid. She stood, her head bowed, holding onto the sink and crying bitter, bitter tears.
Her mind could not seem to make sense of what had just happened.Why was she naked? What was she doing on the floor? Who was that boy, and why did she remember a boy at all?
She returned to her room, found her nightgown, and put it on. She went to her window seat and sat down, and watched the moon ride low over the lake, and smelled honeysuckle on the air.
Then she was sick, and ran into the bathroom and threw up. She washed her face, brushed her teeth, and finally saw in the mirror her own haggard face. As if she was seeing a miracle, she touched the glass. Tears beaded in her eyes and rolled down her cheeks. She went to her bed, then, and lay down, and slept the dismal and uneasy sleep of a captured soul.
TWO
ON A SOUR OCTOBER FORENOON in 2003, Lieutenant Lauren Glass watched her father’s coffin being lowered. She was now alone, given that her mother had abandoned them when she was twelve, returned to Scotland, and no longer communicated.
Also at the graveside were four men, none of whom she knew. They were, she assumed, members of whatever unit he was involved in. She did not know its name, what it did, or anything about it at all.
The wind worried the flowers she had brought, the chaplain completed his prayers, and she threw a clod of earth and said inside herself,
You will not, you will not
and then she cried.
He had died on duty, somehow. She had not been told how, she had not been allowed to see his body. The coffin was sealed with federal seals warning that it was a crime to open it. Lead solder filled the crack beneath its lid. She had wanted to at least be alone with it for a short while, but not even that had been allowed. There had been no obituary, nothing to mark all he had done in this world, what she believed must have been a heroic life.
She had been given a five-thousand-dollar death benefit, and he had been listed as killed in action.
Killed how? In what action? He’d left home as usual that morning, then driven to his work, she assumed. They lived on Wright-Pat in Dayton, but he commuted to Indianapolis on the days he worked, which were sporadic.
As the ceremony concluded, to her amazement a missing-man formation flew overhead, wheeling majestically away toward the gray horizon. Then, down at the end of the field, an honor guard she had no idea would be there fired twenty-one times. The highest salute. Taps were sounded.
He was being buried with the highest of honors, and she felt bitter because she did not know why.
The four men were walking away from the grave when she caught up with them. “Can you tell me anything?”
Nobody answered.
“Please, I’m his daughter. Tell me, at least, did he suffer?”
One of the men, tall, so blond that he might have been albino, dropped back. “Should I say no?”
“You know how he died?”
“I know, Lauren.”
He knew her name. But who was this man in his superbly tailored civilian suit, as gray as the autumn clouds, with his dusting of white hair and his eyes so pale that they were almost white as well?
“Who are you? Can you tell me what my dad did?”
“I want you to come to an office. Can you do that?”
“Now? Is this an order?”
“I’m so sorry. Are you up to it?”
This walk across this graveyard was the saddest thing she had ever done. She did not understand grief, it was a new landscape for her. Could you go to an office in grief? Talk there in grief? In grief, could you learn secrets? “I want to be at home,” she said.
He gave her an address on base. “You think about it, and I want you to bear in mind that we wouldn’t be asking this
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