Letters from War (5 page)

But two years of moving and wandering was a long
time. Beth knew that her energy and her sanity were almost depleted.

She kept waiting for relief to come. And relief could come only in the form of an answer. Any answer.

Lord, keep me strong. Keep me going. Keep me in Your arms as long as possible.

Those were the only kinds of words that kept her going.

“I tried, Beth. God knows I'm trying. But it's not like riding a bike. It takes a little more work than that.”

“You're not being graded. That's the beautiful thing about it. Everybody comes with his own faults and failures. That's the blessed thing about grace.”

Beth changes the phone from one ear to the other. She's been on the phone with Marion DiGiulio for half an hour. The Friday-afternoon phone call came without fail. For the last six months, it's been a constant, just like the letters. Normally Marion calls saying she has unlimited minutes to use on her cell phone.

Even though they've only met once, Beth considers the woman on the other end of the phone one of her closest friends.

So few understand what we're going through.

“My father was good about teaching us about sin. The grace thing I don't know much about.”

Beth knows that these phone conversations have evolved. From the start, it was simply about keeping in touch with the mother of the soldier who went missing with James. Sergeant Francisco DiGiulio from Chicago, whom most everybody called Frankie, was with James's convoy when the ambush happened. At first the two women would simply compare notes. Now they compare lives.

“My father lived by example,” Beth replies. “He was a good man who went to the same church most of his life. He went to be with the Lord a few years ago. I could not believe how many people came up to me to tell me how he touched their lives. I couldn't believe it because my father was a quiet man, understated in so many ways. I guess that's where I got my assurance from. I saw it lived out in my parents' lives.”

“Faith is harder to find after losing it.”

“I can believe that.”

These Friday conversations that used to be about what the army knew, what they had been told, and how they were both coping had recently morphed into the subject of faith. Many times Marion commented in her more emotional moments on how well Beth seemed to be managing everything. Beth didn't always agree, citing the fact that she struggled daily just like any mother would. But that led to the discussion of how Beth was relying on God through this.

I'm a lot like Dad. He was never one to talk about it unless someone brought it up.

“I had an awful thought the other night,” Marion said. “I thought that maybe this thing with Frankie and James was something God brought to bring me to Him. And right after I thought that, I got up and said, ‘Uh-uh, no way.' I told God that if
that's
the way He was trying to get my attention, I didn't want any part of it.”

“That's the scariest part for me.”

“What?” Marion asks.

“Not knowing why. Not understanding why certain things happen.”

“It's because this world is ugly and there are people who only want to destroy.”

“Not everything is ugly,” Beth says. “I saw that picture you sent us, the card with your family picture on it. That's beautiful.”

“I have pretty children, don't I?”

“You do.”

“Frankie should've been in that shot. We took it at his little sister's wedding. He should've been there.”

“I have to believe there was a reason this happened,” Beth says. “Or, at the very least, that God is in control.”

“I'm used to being in control.”

She laughs. “I think all mothers are. But this world shows us that ultimately we're not in control.”

“Having children grow up tells me that,” Marion
says with a bit more of a midwestern accent in her voice. “They grow up and do stupid things.”

“Some grow up to be heroes.”

There is a long pause.

“Sometimes I don't know which is worse,” Marion says.

“What?”

“Having a son that's a delinquent, or having a son who's a hero.”

“I just want to know the truth.”

The craziest image comes to mind as she closes her eyes. She thinks of Jack Nicholson in military dress barking “You can't handle the truth!” at her.
A Few Good Men
was on TBS the other night, and she watched it for the tenth time. Something about watching people in that world gives her comfort, even if the world depicted was more Hollywood than military.

The voice on the other end of the phone is no Jack Nicholson, nor does he bark.

“Mrs. Thompson, there's nothing more I can tell you.”

She's heard this, she
knows
this, yet she still waits for a response.

This is something she does on a regular basis, talking to different people in different departments hoping to
find the Holy Grail of information. Hoping someone will whisper on the line that they know something they shouldn't tell her, that the army knows where James is and is about to rescue him.

That's Hollywood I'm hoping to talk to,
she realizes.

This is just a small something she can do on a biweekly basis. It remains a part of her to-do list, just like cleaning the house and taking out the garbage and paying bills and getting her lawn maintained.

And yes, checking to see if the army has any more information on my one and only son who's been lost for two years.

Two years can pass by in a blink when you're a newlywed or a new parent or a new employee. But when it comes to grief, two years can seem like an eternity. Two years can feel like a Groundhog Day of gloom. The seasons might pass outside, but the season inside of you never changes; it only grows colder and darker with each passing sunset.

Beth thanks the man on the other end who is just doing his job and is doing it with compassion. The world is full of so many uncompassionate clubs, she knows, but the army is not one of them. They know how to take care of their own, even when the answers their own are looking for aren't there.

For a minute Beth thinks about her recent conversation with Marion, then thinks back to her
women's group at church the other day, full of mothers complaining about their children. One complained that her sons never came around anymore. Another mother said she didn't get along with her son-in-law and therefore never saw her daughter. Beth shared a little about her own relationship with her daughter, but in the back of her mind she couldn't believe the insensitivity of these women. Maybe they assumed she had moved on. Maybe they had forgotten about it.

Everybody is selfish when it comes time to talk about their prayer needs. Everybody wages their own daily war.

The most comforting words and support had come from others who had been there, even a few who were in the same boat she was. She got an e-mail out of the blue forwarded by an army captain. It came from the father of a marine who had been missing in action for over three years until they discovered him dead. He had never given up hope, and the father told her to do the same.

Just because they discovered Riley dead doesn't mean I regret hoping and believing that he was alive those three years. Those years made me a better man and drew me closer to the Lord. I don't have all the answers, but I do know that God has given me peace.

The words from Riley's father continue to haunt her.

They also conflict with Josie's urging her to let go.

Beth stares at the window looking out to her backyard, but she's in a place far away from there. A place she doesn't even know or recognize but simply feels.

She shakes her head and then turns and strides upstairs, knowing that the moment she slows down is the one where she'll be crippled and unable to keep moving.

Step by step.

Day by day.

“Mom?”

“Yes?”

Emily walks into the bedroom as Beth finishes washing her face. Her daughter sits on the edge of the bed.

“I thought you were asleep,” Emily says.

“I was. For a while. There's nothing on television. How was work?”

“Slow. They let me go home early. Made a whopping thirty bucks in tips.”

“It's a weeknight.”

“Tell me about it. So I wanted to tell you what happened.”

Beth folds up some clothes and places them in an armchair in the corner of her bedroom, then sits next to Emily.

“What's wrong?”

“Nothing. It's not about work. It's just—well, I don't know if it's wrong. Maybe it is. That's what I want you to tell me.”

Beth has learned to control her thoughts. By now Richard would have been asking for the name and address of the boy. Then grabbing his gun.

“What do you need to know?” Beth asks.

“I lost Daddy's letter.”

There is no question which letter this is. She simply asks, “When?”

“I don't know exactly. I thought it was here at home, but I've searched my entire room twice and I can't find it. Part of me thinks—wonders—maybe I took it off to school. I think it might have been in a bag. But that's gone. I don't know.”

“It's okay.”

“If I lost it?”

“Things happen.”

“Yeah, but—what if Dad's looking down on me and sees how dumb I was to lose something like that?”

Beth puts her arm around Emily. “I'm sure he wouldn't think you were dumb to lose it. Maybe he'll manage to put it across your path.”

“I can't believe I lost it.”

“Do you remember what it says?”

Emily rolls her eyes.

“I'm just asking,” Beth says.

“Of course I do.”

“Then that's all that counts.”

“Yeah, but one day, when I'm old and senile, I might start to forget.”

“Then write down the words you remember.”

“Is that why you write to James?”

She thinks for a minute, rubbing her dry hands together. “He was the one who started writing to me. I asked him to and he obliged. But he always said that he wanted to be like his father in that regard. He even wrote to you a few times too, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Maybe it's a way to carry on a tradition.”

“I bet he did a better job keeping track of his letters than I do.”

“That's because he wasn't as busy as someone like you.”

“Are you putting me on?”

She smiles at her daughter. “Just a little.”

“I actually started to cry today thinking I'd lost that letter. Thinking how disappointed Dad might be. Thinking how stupid I was.”

“The important thing is that you remember what it says, that you keep the message it contains.”

“You didn't read it?”

“Your letter?” Beth asks. “No. That was between your father and you.”

“He said in the letter that when I turned twenty-one, you're supposed to start giving me a weekly allowance of two hundred dollars.”