Spencerville

Maybe. He poured a little more Scotch and thought back.

He'd gone to Fort Dix, New Jersey, for his basic and advanced training, then to Officer Candidate School at Fort Benning, Georgia, and within a year was commissioned a second lieutenant. Not bad for a farm kid. They wrote, often at first, then less frequently, of course, and the letters were not good. She found her monogamy hard to defend or justify and let him know she was seeing other men. He understood. He didn't understand. He spent his pre-embarkation leave in Spencerville, not Columbus. They spoke on the phone. She was very busy with difficult classes. He was very anxious about going into a combat zone and really didn't care about her classes. He asked her if she was seeing anyone at the moment. She was, but it was not serious. After about ten minutes of this, he looked forward to combat. He said to her, "You've changed." She replied, "We've all changed, Keith. Look around you."

He said, "Well, I've got to go. Good luck in school."

"Thanks. Take care, Keith. Home safe."

"Yup."

"Bye."

"Bye."

But they couldn't hang up, and she said, "You understand, I'm making this easy for both of us."

"I understand. Thanks." He hung up.

They continued to write, neither of them able to comprehend that it was over.

Keith pushed the Scotch aside. The alcohol wasn't working, his hands were trembling, and his mind was not getting pleasantly numb. He read, "Well, welcome home, Keith, and good luck."

"Thank you, Annie."

He'd served as an infantry platoon leader, saw too many dead people lying on the ground, fresh blood running, or bloating in the hot sun. He had no frame of reference for this, except the stockyards in Maumee. Very nice villages and farms were blown to hell, and sandbags and barbed wire were all over the place, and he'd wept for the farmers and their families. He'd completed his tour and returned to Spencerville on leave.

Keith wiped the sweat off his lip and focused on the letter, read it from the beginning, then read, "I'm leaving tomorrow to drive Wendy to school. She's starting as a freshman at our old alma mater. Can't wait to see it again. Be gone a week or so." He nodded and took a deep breath.

He'd spent his thirty-day post-combat leave in Spencerville, and did mostly nothing but eat, drink, and take long rides. His mother suggested he drive to Columbus. Instead, he'd called. She was working on her doctorate by then. It was a very strained conversation, he recalled. He hadn't asked her about other men, because he'd come to accept that. He'd had other women. It didn't matter. But she'd changed in a more profound way in the last year. She'd become more politically active, and she had ambivalent feelings about a man in uniform and had given him a lecture on the war.

He was angry, she was cool; he'd barely controlled his anger, and she kept her tone frigid. He was about to hang up on her when she said, "I have to go," and he realized she was crying, or close to it. He offered to come see her, she said that would be all right. But he did not go to Columbus, and she did not come to Spencerville, nor did they meet halfway.

Keith read the final lines of her letter. "My Aunt Louise still lives out by you, and next time I'm that way, I'll stop and say hello. Take care. Annie."

He put the letter in his pocket, stood, and went out the back door. The hot wind had died down, and it was cooler now. There was some sun left on the western horizon, but in the east he could see stars.

Keith went out to where the corn began and walked between the tall rows, a few hundred yards to a small hill that was thought to be an Indian burial mound. The rise was gentle and tillable, but no one in his family had ever planted there, and the Mullers were asked to do the same. Rye grass grew tall on the hill, and a single birch had been planted or had taken root on its own near the top of the hill.

Keith stood beside the birch and looked out over the corn. He'd played here as a boy and come here to think as a young man.

Nor did they meet halfway. It was his pride, his ego, or whatever. He simply could not accept the fact that she'd been sexually involved with other men when they were supposed to be going together. But then again, he hadn't proposed marriage, perhaps because he didn't want to make her a young widow. It was the classic dilemma of wartime: to marry or not to marry? He couldn't recall exactly what had transpired between them regarding this subject, but he was certain she'd remember.

He sat at the base of the birch tree and looked out at the stars. In Washington, he could barely see the stars, but here in the country, the night sky was breathtaking, mind-boggling. He stared up at the universe, picking out the constellations he knew, and remembered doing this with her.