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Water found its way into the smallest cracks and undermined the sturdiest foundations.
Trees fell over, crashed into power lines; electricity was lost.
Credit: Deborah Feingold
Rivers flooded their banks, washed across yards, ruined homes.
People who loved each other snapped and fights erupted as the water rose and the rain continued.
Leni felt edgy, too.
St. Martin’s Press
.and her fathers angryleave me the hell alone.
They were at it again.
Soon there would be crying.
Weather like this brought out the darkness in her father.
Leni glanced at the clock by her bed.
Not once had she found a way to truly fit in, but she remained stubbornly hopeful.
She took a deep breath, unfolded, and slid off the twin bed.
Moving cautiously through her bare room, she went down the hall, paused at the kitchen doorway.
Damn it, Cora, Dad said.
You know how hard it is on me.
Mama took a step toward him, reached out.
You need help, baby.
Its not your fault.
The nightmares
Leni cleared her throat to get their attention.
Hey, she said.
Dad saw her and took a step back from Mama.
Leni saw how tired he looked, how defeated.
II have to go to school, Leni said.
Mama reached into the breast pocket of her pink waitress uniform and pulled out her cigarettes.
She looked tired; shed worked the late shift last night and had the lunch shift today.
You go on, Leni.
You dont want to be late.
Her voice was calm and soft, as delicate as she was.
Leni was afraid to stay and afraid to leave.
Mama was engaged in a continual quest to find herself.
In the past few years, shed tried EST and the human potential movement, spiritual training, Unitarianism.
Shed cycled through them all, cherry-picked pieces and bits.
Mostly, Leni thought, Mama had come away with T-shirts and sayings.
Things like,Whatis, is, and what isnt, isnt.None of it seemed to amount to much.
Go, Dad said.
Leni grabbed her backpack from the chair by the kitchen table and headed for the front door.
As it slammed shut behind her, she heard them start up again.
Damn it, Cora
c’mon, Ernt, just listen
It hadnt always been this way.
At least thats what Mama said.
(Mama dancing was really all Leni remembered about those years.)
Then Dad got drafted and went off to Vietnam and got shot down and captured.
Without him, Mama fell apart; that was when Leni first understood her mothers fragility.
There, they tended beehives and made lavender sachets to sell at the farmers market and protested the war.
Mama changed her personality just enough to fit in.
When Dad had finally come home, Leni barely recognized him.
The handsome, laughing man of her memory had become moody, quick to anger, and distant.
He hated everything about the commune, it seemed, and so they moved.
Then they moved again.
Nothing ever worked out the way he wanted.
He couldnt sleep and couldnt keep a job, even though Mama swore he was the best mechanic ever.
That was what he and Mama were fighting about this morning: Dad getting fired again.
Leni flipped up her hood.
That was something everyone was angry about these daysgas prices.
As far as Leni could tell, adults were edgy in general, and no wonder.
The war in Vietnam had divided the country.
The massacre at the Munich Olympics had stunned the whole world, as had the Watergate scandal.
And recently, college girls in Washington State had begun to disappear without a trace.
It was a dangerous world.
She would give anything for a real friend right now.
It was all she really wanted: Someone to talk to.
On the other hand, it didnt help to talk about her worries.
What was the point of confession?
But sometimes, especially on days like today, Leni was afraid.
*
After school, Leni walked home in the rain, alone.
Weeds grew in clumps from the decaying gray roof shingles.
An empty flagpole pointed accusingly upward, a statement about her fathers hatred of where this country was headed.
For a man whom Mama called a patriot, he sure hated his government.
Cardboard boxes lined the interior walls, full of stuff they hadnt yet unpacked from the last move.
He was dressedas usualin his frayed military jacket and torn Levis.
He sat slouched forward, his elbows resting on his thighs.
His long black hair was a tangled mess and his mustache needed trimming.
His dirty feet were bare.
Even slumped over and tired-looking, he was movie-star handsome.
He cocked his head, peered at her through his hair.
Love most of all.
Lenora, he said in that scratchy, cigarette-smoker voice of his.
I was waiting for you.
I lost my temper.
You must be disappointed as hell in me.
She knew how sorry he was.
She could see it on his face.
You get stronger so they can lean on you.
Leni sat down beside him.
He put an arm around her, pulled her in close.
The world is being run by lunatics.
Its not my America anymore.
He didnt finish, and Leni didnt say anything.
She was used to her dads sadness, his frustration.
Leni knew about that reticence and understood it; lots of times it was better to stay silent.
He reached into his pocket, pulled out a mostly crushed pack of cigarettes.
He lit one up and she drew in the acrid, familiar scent.
She knew how much pain he was in.
He shook his head, exhaled a stream of blue-gray smoke.
more, I guess.
I want to walk down the street and not have to worry about being called a baby killer.
Itll all be okay.
Youll get another job, Dad, she said.
Sure I will, Red.
Tomorrow will be better.
That was what her parents always said.
She adjusted the rabbit ears to get a decent picture.
When it popped into focus, Barbara Walters was saying .
Eyewitnesses report that the nineteen-year-old heiress, who was kidnapped by the Symbionese Liberation Army in February .
She still couldnt believe that anarmycould march in and take a teenager from her apartment.
How could anyone be safe any- where in a world like that?
And how did a rich teenager become a revolutionary named Tania?
Come on, Leni, Mama said from the kitchen.
Get ready for school.
The front door banged open.
Dad came into the house, smiling in a way that made it impossible not to smile back.
Water dripped from his hair.
Mama stood at the stove, frying bacon for breakfast.
Dad swept into the kitchen and cranked up the transistor radio that sat on the Formica counter.
A scratchy rock n roll song came through.
Dad laughed and pulled Mama into his arms.
Leni heard his whispered Im sorry.
Always, Mama said, holding him as if she were afraid hed push her away.
Dad kept his arm around Mamas waist and pulled her over to the kitchen table.
He pulled out a chair, said, Leni, come in here!
Leni loved it when they included her.
She left her spot on the sofa and took a seat beside her mother.
Dad smiled down at Leni and handed her a paperback book.TheCallof the Wild.
Youll love this, Red.
He sat down across from Mama, scooted in close to the table.
He was wearing what Leni thought of as his Big Idea smile.
Shed seen it before, whenever he had a plan to change their lives.
Raising mink (what a horrorthathad been).
Selling American Seed packets in Central California.
You remember my friend Bo Harlan?
Mama took a moment to answer.
To Leni, he said, Bo Harlan was the crew chief and I was the door gunner.
We looked out for each other.
We were together when our bird went down and we got captured.
We went through hell together.
Leni noticed how he was shaking.
Leni didnt know what had caused his scarshe never said and she never askedbut his captors had done it.
She had figured out that much.
The scars covered his back, too, pulled the skin into swirls and puckers.
They made me watch him die, he said.
Leni looked worriedly at Mama.
Dad had never said this before.
To hear the words now unsettled them.
He tapped his foot on the floor, played a beat on the table with fast-moving fingers.
He unfolded the letter, smoothed it out, and turned it so they could read the words.
Sergeant Allbright
You are a hard man to find.
I am Earl Harlan.
My son, Bo, wrote many letters home about his friendship with you.
I thank you for that.
Itisntmuch.Fortyacres with a cabin that needs fixing.
I dont have nophone, but it’s possible for you to write me c/o the Homer Post Office.
Ill get the letter sooner or later.
Thanks again,
Earl
Mama looked up.
She cocked her head, gave a little birdlike tilt as she studied Dad.
Bo, has given us a house?
Think of it, Dad said, lifted out of his seat by enthusiasm.
Weve dreamed of it for years, Cora.
Living a simpler life away from all the bullshit down here.
We could be free.
Wait, Leni said.
Even for Dad, this was big.
You want to move again?
We just moved here.
theres nothing up there, is there?
Just bears and Eskimos?
He pulled Mama to her feet with an eagerness that made her stumble, fall into him.
Leni saw the desperate edge of his enthusiasm.
I need this, Cora.
I need a place where I can breathe again.
Sometimes I feel like Im going to crawl out of my skin.
Up there, the flashbacks and shit will stop.
I know it.Weneed this.
We can go back to the way things were before Nam screwed me up.
Mama lifted her face to Dads, her pallor a sharp contrast to his dark hair and tanned skin.
Come on, baby, Dad said.
Leni saw Mama softening, reshaping her needs to match his, imagining this new personality: Alaskan.
Maybe she thought it was like EST or yoga or Buddhism.
Where or when or what didnt matter to Mama.
All she cared about washim.
Our own house, she said.
you could apply for that military disability
Not that discussion again, he said with a sigh.
Im not doing that.
A change is all I need.
And Ill be more careful with money from now on, Cora.
I still have a little of the bread I inherited from the old man.
And Ill cut back on drinking.
Ill go to that veterans support group thing you want me to.
Leni had seen all of this before.
Ultimately, it didnt matter what she or Mama wanted.
Dad wanted a new beginning.
And Mama needed him to be happy.
So they would hit it one more time in a new place, hoping geography would be the answer.
They would go to Alaska in search of this new dream.
Leni would do as she was asked and do it with a good attitude.
She would be the new girl in schoolagain.Because that was what love was.
