about moving. I guess. If that makes sense. Because... I need to find a way to feel something again. I need a new place to have dinner. And a new face to have it across from. Not so I can forget, not to replace anyone. But just... I’m here. I wake up in the morning. I work at the end. And I love it. I love being here. I love you and Mom.”
“Sometimes there aren’t words,” Anna said slowly. “Sometimes it’s just your heart groaning. And it takes a good long while for groans to become actual words. For you to be able to understand them. And sometimes you shove them away for a long time, Rachel. Because it’s terrifying to try and understand them, because then you’ll feel compelled to act on them. But sometimes when there’s a deep sadness in your heart, your heart cries out for something. It’s not right or wrong—it just is. Your heart needs something. Give it what it’s asking for.”
“I don’t want to fall in love. And I don’t think I could fall in love with him. Which, honestly, is why it’s such an ideal date.”
“Maybe you just want to feel like a woman again. Beautiful. There’s nothing wrong with that. It kills you inside, losing sight of that.”
“Jacob made me feel beautiful.”
“I know. I loved Jacob,” Anna said. “I love him. He’s the closest thing I’ve ever had to a brother. And I know—I believe—that he’s always going to matter to you. And I don’t see this as you letting go of him. Set grief to the side for a moment. Timelines. What other people might think. What do you need?”
“I guess I just want to see what life looks like now. And this feels like...a way to do that. A new view. Like I said. I—I can go out on dates now. There’s a new reality that I’m living in, and if I don’t do something to explore that, I’m going to end up... Sometimes I walk by our bedroom and I think he’s still there. And the more I sink into isolation here, the more that’s true.”
“It’s okay, Rachel. All of it is okay. There are about a hundred guidebooks for things like this, but the people who wrote them still never went through what you did. Because they didn’t have your marriage. Your husband. And they don’t have your life or your heart. We know what’s right. We have a generic set of rules for how were supposed to handle everything... But when you’re in the weeds, looking for solutions to your problems, sometimes things that never made sense before look a whole lot different.”
Rachel tried to smile, her heart twisting. “You sound like the older sister now.”
“Well, that’s the thing. I’m not a kid anymore. We’ve both... Lived some life. We can learn from each other. We can be there for each other. You don’t have to just take care of me, Rachel.” She slid her hand across the space and covered Rachel’s with her own. “Let me take care of you, too.”
Rachel looked down into her teacup and took a sip, the whiskey burning a trail down her throat. She coughed, and then started to laugh. “I like the way you take care of me,” she wheezed, pounding on her chest.
Anna took a sip, too, and blinked. “That’s strong.”
“I’m so tired,” Rachel said. “And I don’t want to go to sleep.”
“Bunk with me tonight,” Anna said, raising her dainty teacup. “We’ll get hammered and watch HGTV.”
That was a new view. A new thing.
And as she settled onto the couch with her sister, pulling a wool blanket over her knees, clutching her spiked tea, she thought that for now this was a pretty great view, after all.
18
Patrol does give a man time to think. It reminds him of what’s important. I think often of you.
—FROM A LETTER WRITTEN BY STAFF SERGEANT RICHARD JOHNSON, JULY 25, 1944
ANNA
She had done a lot of thinking about her life over pie.
Either making it, or eating it, Anna felt that pie was an extremely good source of clarity. This had always been true. Whether her problems had been with friends in high school, or concerns over a child in the church who was sick and in the hospital.
It was true now, while she went over her own problems.
She had been baking continually at the Lighthouse Inn over the last week, turning over the altercation with Hannah in her mind, and the conversation she’d