The GI Bride Read Online Free PDF Page B

Bob woke me. ‘Come on, sleepyhead,
everyone’s waiting to talk to you,’ he said.
    ‘Everyone?’ I groaned.
‘Who’s everyone?’ I felt as though I was about to be put on display,
and I suppose, in a way, I was.
    ‘Just Mom and Dad so far, but
I’m sure my sister and her family will be here soon.’ I scrambled to prepare
for the inquisition, my stomach clenched. I was nervous to the point of nausea
again.
    Bob showed me to the bathroom. He gently
pushed me inside and followed me, closing the door behind us. He took me in his arms and
held me close, whispering in my ear, ‘Remember, you’re my beautiful girl and
I’m proud of you. Don’t be nervous about meeting the family, I’ll be
holding your hand all the way. Try to remember that they’re probably nervous too.
They’ve never had a daughter-in-law before.’ He chuckled, the way he always
did, and, as always, it made me feel just that little bit better.
    I felt safe wrapped in his strong comforting
arms, and at that moment, I almost cried tears of happiness. His caring and closeness
reminded me of the love that had brought me to this strange land of contrasts. His
people were different from my own. I had to get used to that, and I hoped that my
disappointment in them and their world would relax into familiarity, that I would soon
feel at home with them.
    ‘Thank you for loving me, Bob. I just
hope I’m not a disappointment to you or your family,’ I whispered into his
neck, as I breathed in the familiar warm smell of his body. The scent of his Old Spice
aftershave suddenly reminded me of my mother and I smiled on the inside;she had liked the smell so much she had started using Bob’s
bottle as perfume and he had surprised her by buying her one of her own. We had all
laughed about that, and about her blush when she realized she had been found out.
    ‘You’ll never be a
disappointment to me, honey. I just hope you’re not disappointed with us.’
He gave me a reassuring hug. ‘Come out when you’re ready. I’ll be
waiting for you.’ He smiled the smile that had drawn me to him in my other life,
the life I had left behind for him. Now I was ready for anything.
    ‘Would you like something to eat,
honey?’ asked my mother-in-law, when I came into the kitchen. ‘Waffles,
eggs, bacon?’ I didn’t know what waffles were, and I certainly didn’t
have the stomach for eggs and bacon at that time.
    ‘No thanks, Mrs Irvine, I’m not
hungry, but could I have a cup of tea, please?’ I was desperate for a cup of tea.
I
needed
a cup of tea.
    ‘Oh, my dear [it sounded like
‘deeyurr’], I’ve just made you a whole pot of coffee,’ she said.
‘I’ll have to see if I have any tea bags oh, and you can call me
“Mom”, if you like.’ Tea bags, I thought. Ugh.
    And so began my introduction to a completely
new world of food and drink. It wasn’t something I had expected to cause problems,
but it did and for a long time too.
    My mother-in-law did eventually produce some
ancient tea bags but I would have killed for a ‘real’ cup of tea. She seemed
quite distressed when I put two into my cup instead of the customary one, but it was the
only way toget any flavour into the tea, and even then it left a lot
to be desired. ‘When I have tea, usually if I’m ill, I use the same tea bag
all day,’ she mumbled.
    Later that first day, Bob’s sister,
Roberta, came over with her husband, Mike, who was Ukrainian, and their baby, Clarice.
They sat around us while we opened our presents. Their generosity was overwhelming and I
didn’t know what to say. Between them, they had bought us everything and I do mean
everything we needed to start our home. It felt a little odd to be opening Christmas
presents in March, with the sound of carols playing in the background. I must have
sounded like a broken record, saying, ‘Thank you,’ over and over again.
    When Roberta and family left, we piled all
of our presents around the edge of our small bedroom, then crawled