The Truth He Buried With Her Chapter 12

The Truth He Buried With Her Chapter 12

That night, I didn’t go back to the dormitory.

I took Leo to the Kensington house.

When Mom saw me, she paused. Then she noticed the folded court document sticking out of my bag.

She stood by the stove, the spatula still dripping oil, staring at it for a long time.

The edge of the divorce decree-just a corner of that stamped, sealed page-peeked out from my cloth bag, catching the dim kitchen light.

She didn’t ask. She put the spatula back in the pan, turned to the cupboard, took out two plates, and started dishing out food.

One plate in front of me, one in front of Leo.

She piled them high, with an extra piece of meatloaf on mine, just like she always used to when I came home

for dinner.

Dad sat at the other end of the table, eating with his head down. His fork pushed the food around. He put a spoonful of greens into Leo’s bowl, then lowered his head and ate again.

Halfway through the meal, he set his bowl down, stood, and went into the inner room.

The door wasn’t fully closed. I saw him sitting on the edge of the bed with his back to the door, shoulders

shaking.

In his hand, he clutched the red scarf he had bought me when I was in elementary school. His knuckles were

white.

Leo looked up at the inner room, then at me. His small hand tugged my sleeve.

“Mommy, what’s wrong with Grandpa?”

I touched his head.

“Grandpa got something in his eye.”

That night, after I put Leo to sleep, I sat alone on the doorstep of the courtyard, watching the moon.

The jujube tree in the yard was still there. The rope marks from my childhood swing were still in the

branches.

Moonlight fell on the flagstones of the courtyard, white and hazy, like a thin frost.

The neighbor’s radio was playing soft country music through the open window, drifting in and out-some old

song I couldn’t name.

I sat there not thinking about Griffin, not thinking about the housing block.

I was thinking that tomorrow morning I’d go to the market and buy two pounds of ribs to make Leo some

soup.

He’d been living on cafeteria food with me at the textile mill dormitory for two weeks, and his face had

gotten thinner.

I didn’t know when Griffin left.

By the time I found out, it was already in the newspapers.

Something had happened on the southwestern border, and reinforcements were moving out on short notice.

Major Sinclair called the factory office three times. Margaret Hartley passed the message to me.

After work, I called Battalion HQ. Colonel Harrington answered.

He said Griffin had volunteered.

The unit had initially denied his transfer request and sat on it for two weeks. The border defense unit on the

southwestern line happened to be short a commander, and Griffin had asked to go.

The deployment orders had come down three days earlier. He hadn’t said goodbye to anyone. He’d only left

his savings and a letter for me and Leo.

The letter was forwarded by Colonel Harrington to the factory.

I opened it.

It wasn’t long-a fw lines.

[Sloane, You were right. What I owed you wasn’t an apology. It was that I never made you my own family.]

[I’m a clumsy man, even clumsier with words. All these years, you’ve carried more than your share.

In six years of marriage, you never once made me worry about things at home.]

[The day I left, you stood at the gate and said come home safe. I carried that all the way. I remember what you told me to remember. I won’t make that mistake again. I’m still keeping this home. Whenever you want to come back, the door is unlocked.]

I folded the letter back into the envelope and tucked it into the last page of the photo album, next to the

photo of the three of us before he shipped out.

Blair came to see me once, bringing her son Owen.

Owen had grown a lot-rounder, with bright round eyes. He lay in the swaddling cloth, not crying or fussing.

Blair laid him on my bed. I looked at him.

He smiled at me.

Blair set a can of formula on the table and pushed it toward me, saying quietly, “Ms. Kensington, this was bought with Mitchell’s money.”

I said keep it.

She stood there, then suddenly looked up at me, eyes red.

I poured her a glass of water and slid it over.

“You were Mitchell’s fiancée. That baby is his. None of this is your fault. If you need someone to blame,

blame the war. It took him from you. But Griffin and me-that was never about you.”

Blair lowered her head. Tears fell onto Owen’s blanket, leaving a small dark circle.

“Will you ever come back to the housing block?”

“No.”

I sat down across from her.

“I have a good life now.”

I smiled, and I meant it.

“Even without all this, we probably weren’t right for each other.”

Leo was running around in the distance. I turned to look at Blair and the baby in her arms.

Everything was peaceful, with none of the noise of the housing block.

Tomorrow was still a rest day, and I was going home for dinner.

Those people, that place-none of it was mine anymore.

I had work to do and a life to build.

Leo and I would build it together.

That was enough.