Losing Julia Read Online Free PDF Page A

placed her glass down gently on a paper napkin, then ran her fingers along the rounded edge of the table. She had a habit of moving her hands a lot, not out of nervousness but as though curious about the texture and feel of things. Several times during the evening she placed her hand on my forearm or shoulder while making a point and I wondered if she knew how powerful that was. I liked people who spoke with their hands, so long as it looked natural. I looked down at my hands, which lay immobile on the table, and commanded them to join the conversation. Soon I was enjoying myself, telling funny stories just so that I could flail my arms in a certain way. When I knocked over my brandy glass, she burst out laughing.
    “I’m not sure brandy is your drink,” she said, as she dabbed the brandy off my shirt with her napkin.
    “It’s the Prohibition. I’m out of practice.”
    She went up to the bar to buy me another drink. I watched her squeeze in between a row of men and then laugh with the bartender. No wonder she loved to travel; she seemed at home anywhere. “On me,” she said, returning. I took the glass from her and thanked her.
    “Were you shipped home quickly?” she asked, sitting close to me. I glanced down at her forearms, which were lightly sprinkled with freckles.
    “Five months after the Armistice. Five god-awful boring months.”
    “You must have been glad to be home.”
    I shrugged.
    “No?”
    “You’d think so, but it just didn’t feel the way I had hoped. We got our sixty-dollar bonus and a uniform, coat and shoes—they let us keep our gas masks and helmets for souvenirs if we’d been overseas—and that was it. After the parades and speeches it was like it never happened. There was no grieving, not like in other countries. Everybody just went back to work.”
    “It’s not something people want to dwell on,” she said.
    “Maybe they should dwell on it,” I said, feeling my anger return. I leaned back in my chair. “One minute you’re picking up after a shell has landed in a crowded trench, and the next you’re at a dinner party listening to people belittle someone for their taste in china. Hell of a transition, if you ask me.”
    She nodded very slowly, as if she truly understood.
    I took a long sip of my drink, enjoying the warmth of the brandy in my throat. “It felt like such a betrayal.”
    “Of those who died?”
    “And their loved ones and the wounded and everyone else whose lives were absolutely wrecked.” I squeezed my fists together, then let out a deep breath. “Anyway, I’m sorry… ”
    “Don’t be.” She leaned toward me and placed her hand on mine. I looked down at it, at the smooth white skin and thin fingers and the small creases at the knuckles. Beneath her hand my own looked exceptionally large and worn.
    I felt suddenly overwhelmed with the desire not only to touch and kiss her but also to tell her things I’d never told anyone since the war, things I’d seen and done and endured. Is that what Daniel meant, that you could say anything to her? And is that what the poets write about; about two souls who find each other and can live apart from the rest of the miserable, lonely world? Who wouldn’t give everything for such closeness?
    “I hated Daniel for enlisting,” she said, sitting back in her chair with both hands wrapped around her glass. “He was so damn stubborn about it.” Her eyes reddened. “He was just doing it for his parents, to make them proud and win them back.” Then she tried to smile and said, “He didn’t like guns. I couldn’t even get him to shoot the wooden ducks at a carnival.”
    I remembered my excitement the first time I shot an Enfield in training; the smooth feel of the stock and the tension of the trigger and the sudden crack of rifle fire.
    “I knew he wouldn’t come back,” she said, wiping her eyes. “After we said good-bye I couldn’t eat for days. It was only when I found out I was pregnant that I understood that I