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He shook his head. “Nah, kid. My cub reporter’s been called up so I need someone to help me cover the meeting. You were the best one for the job.”
“The best one? I’m a typist. I can’t possibly cover a story.”
“Just take one of the chairs against the wall and take notes. And don’t say anything,” he instructed, then disappeared into a group of uniformed men clustered in the corner.
I took off my overcoat and folded it in the lap of my navy blue skirt, noticing as I sat down a run in my nylons. Then I tried to smooth the wrinkles from my pleated-front blouse. I was the only woman in the room, except for the one setting out coffee cups. The war might have brought women to work, Rosie the Riveter and all that, but in high-level Washington meetings like this, the seats at the table were still reserved for the men.
The door opened and a man I recognized from the papers as Undersecretary of State Edward Stettinius came in. “Be seated,” he said, as the others came to the table. “I’ve only got a few minutes so I’ll be brief. I’ve called you here to ask for your help in talking to the American people about the war.” He launched into a discussion of a new initiative by the Office of War Information to work with the press on the way it would communicate information about the fighting.
I scribbled furiously. Though I frequently typed the shorthand notes of others, I had seldom taken dictation and I feared I would not be able to keep up with Secretary Stettinius’s rapid English. But as I listened, I became absorbed by what he was saying. The relationship between newspapers and government had always seemed adversarial, one seeking information and the other holding it back. But he was speaking now of ways they could work together. “I’m happy to take your questions,” he concluded a few minutes later.
A correspondent from the Washington Star whom I did not recognize raised his hand, then spoke without waiting. “It sounds good on the surface—but isn’t it something of a conflict of interest?” I had been wondering the same thing: Could the newspapers still maintain their independence and integrity while working with the government?
Secretary Stettinius offered a vague explanation of how it would all work without compromising the independence of the press.
“Surely you aren’t suggesting we show you our stories before they go to press?” another reporter pressed. “That would be censorship.”
“No, of course not,” Secretary Stettinius replied, looking tugging at his collar. “We simply want to be a resource.” Across the room, Mr. Steeves folded his arms, unconvinced. “My deputy will be in touch with each of you individually to discuss specifics,” Secretary Stettinius promised, cutting the questions short. He rose, signaling that the meeting was over.
As the newsmen stood and chatted among themselves, I tried to catch Mr. Steeves’s eye, but he was engrossed in conversation with a foreign correspondent. I made my way toward the door of the too-stuffy room, uncertain whether to wait for him or return to the bureau.
As I neared the massive foyer, a door across the hallway opened, letting loose a low din of chatter from another meeting. I started past. “Then we are agreed,” a voice broke through the others, unexpectedly familiar. I stopped mid-step. “We’ll meet again when we have the plans drawn up.”
Charlie! My head swiveled in the direction from which the voice had come. It couldn’t be. I craned my neck, trying once more to hear the voice. I had imagined him so many times since coming here, seen him in every uniformed soldier on the street corners. But I’d never heard his voice.
I stepped toward the door of the other room, not caring that I had no business being there as I scanned the crowd. “Oh!” I cried so loudly that a man in front of me turned to stare. I brought my hand to my mouth as Charlie’s broad shoulders appeared above the others. Joy surged through me, making my head light. It really was him. But how? There was no reason on earth for him to be in Washington. He was meant to be off training somewhere or deployed, not standing in front of me, tall and glorious. Had he come for me? No, there was simply no way he could have known I was here—which was exactly how I had wanted it.
Anxiety rose, eclipsing my happiness, and the walls of the immense room seemed to grow close. I started to duck away, the idea of facing Charlie unfathomable. But even as I took a step toward the door, I turned back, drawn to him. He looked different to be sure, aged by all that had happened, with lines in places I hadn’t remembered and a permanent sadness about the eyes. His brown hair was cut short and it was thinner, too, without the thick, rich curls he had once had. He was still beautiful, though. My breath caught. That did not, could not, change what had happened. I had to leave. Now.
I stepped back toward the corridor, my ankle turning inward and causing me to stumble. As I struggled not to fall, I dropped my notebook, which clattered against the marble. Heads turned in my direction, seeming more annoyed than concerned. As the others resumed their conversations, Charlie stepped from the group and moved toward me in the hall, his face breaking. “Addie?” His tone was disbelieving. I froze, unable to move or speak as he drew close. He reached out, as if to touch me, but his hand foundered midair before falling to his side again. He leaned in to kiss my cheek and his familiar scent made the room wobble. I struggled not to turn and meet his lips with my own. “Addie.” There it was in that single word, that voice which cut right through and connected with my insides as it had since the first time I heard it. “What are you doing here?” He didn’t know any of it—that I had left Philadelphia, or how I had come to be here. Because he had gone first.
“I’m working for the Post.” I watched his face for any sign of disbelief. But Charlie had never doubted me. “I never expected you to be in Washington,” I added.
His face flinched slightly as though he had been slapped. “You aren’t pleased to see me.”
“Of course I am. It’s just that I thought you were training.” My words came out too quickly, piling on top of one another.
He fumbled with the hat, neatly folded in his hands. “I was, for almost a year. But now I’m here for some extra briefings.” There was a strange undercurrent to his voice. A year had slipped through our fingers. How was that possible? Once it had seemed unthinkable to keep breathing without Charlie, but somehow the clock had kept ticking. I tried to imagine his days in between, all of the things he had done and seen since we’d last laid eyes on one another. But my mind was blank.
“Your hair,” he blurted. I raised my hand to my temple, wincing at how tousled I was from the rain. “It’s short.” It was the bob, so different than last time he had seen me. “I mean, I like it.” I couldn’t tell if he was just being kind.
“How’s your family?”
“Holding up as well as can be expected.” He shrugged, helpless but not indifferent. “My folks are in Florida. Mom has thrown herself into the women’s auxiliary.” It sounded so much like Mrs. Connally that I had to smile. “Dad’s Dad.” Guilt at having left them flickered across his face. “It tore them apart, you know.” Yes, I knew only too well. The Connallys lived in a place where their grief would always be as raw as the day it all happened, no matter how much time passed or how far away they moved. “They’re together, but in a separate kind of a way. They know now,” he added, and I wanted to ask if he meant about the army, or what had been between us, or both.
The question stuck in my throat. “And the boys?” I asked instead.
“Jack, well, he works at a plant in Port Richmond. He’s taking night classes at Temple, though.” Jack had been the real brain of the boys—he might have gone to an Ivy League school and practiced medicine as he once dreamed, but for money and circumstance. “He hasn’t been called up yet, thank God. Mom couldn’t bear to lose another son.”
I swallowed. “And Liam?”
Charlie stared hard at the floor. “I’m not sure.” But surely his parents knew about Liam’s whereabouts, and whether or not he was okay. Or had they cut ties with him as well? My stomach tugged. I still hated Liam for what he had done, yet I could not help but worry.
Charlie and I watched one another, not speaking. We had talked about everyone, of course, except the one name we could not say. “How long will you be in town?” I asked, not sure what answer I was hoping to hear.
Before Charlie could reply, voices came from the conference room behind him. He looked over his shoulder. “There’s another meeting. I’m going to have to go.” A knife ripped through me at the idea that he might leave again just as quickly as he had appeared. “Addie, I want to talk to you. Meet me tonight?” he said suddenly. “The Old Ebbitt Grill at seven.” So he did not want our chance reunion to end either.
I peered at him, trying to read the meaning behind his words. Were we merely two old friends, trying to catch up? No, it was still there, that hungry, yearning look in his eyes I had first seen the night on the dock. He wanted to pick up once more and return to that moment when we had stood on the edge of the world, gazing down at everything that lay before us. He wanted to make things whole again.
Something licked at my insides then, familiar like a forgotten dream: hope. Even after everything that had happened, Charlie still reached a place in me that made me believe things could be good again.
But something held me back. “I don’t know.” I was suddenly angry. Did he really think we could put all of those broken pieces back together and not see the cracks? Doubt thundered beneath my feet like a freight train and the ground began to sway. I had managed to make my way back from the place that nearly killed me and stand despite it all. I could not afford to let him in and risk going there again.
“Please, Addie. I’ll wait for you.” There was a desperation about him I had only seen once before in my life. Before I could answer, the men spilled forth from the conference room, enveloping Charlie, and we were separated by a sea of suits and uniforms giving off the odor of cologne and cigarette smoke. I had not had the chance to answer.
Our eyes met and locked, his making a silent plea before he slipped from sight.
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Philadelphia June 1941 Two years earlier
I struggled to stand in the crush of unwashed bodies that surged forward from the ship on all sides. Then I squeezed my way to the side of the dock, pressing back against a rotted wood railing that I hoped would hold. I lifted myself to the tips of my toes in Mamma’s too-large shoes, struggling to see above the ocean of heads around me. Shoulders pushed close, blocking my view. I hoisted myself onto the rail, grasping it tightly so as not to fall, and scanned the sea of travelers. I wished that I might see the familiar face of one of the girls from steerage (not that they had been so friendly). But I recognized no one from the massive ocean liner, even after traveling on it for seven wretched, seasick days.
The travelers moved in small clumps, couples and families of three or four. Across the wharf, a woman flew into the arms of a man waiting for her, reunited. Everyone was carrying things, boxes and bags and children. But I was alone, my hands empty. Worry mixed with the hunger that had been gnawing at my stomach, growing to a burn. In her haste, Mamma had not given me so much as an address for my aunt and uncle who were supposed to take me in. What would I do if no one came for me?
Think. I inhaled, then took in the scene again, framing it and trying to find the right angle to make sense of the situation. Back home I might have snapped a photo with the old camera Papa had given me. But here I was overwhelmed by the chaos, great swirls of strangers moving in all directions, colliding with one another. A dog trotted along the edge of the dock, sniffing at garbage. Even a stray seemed to somehow know where it was going.
Looking around the smelly, crowded harbor, my spirits sank. Lucky, I’d heard a woman remark days earlier as the Italian coastline had faded from view. Heads around her had bobbed in agreement: we were fortunate to be away from the violence that had worsened ominously against the Jews in recent months. But as the ship pulled from the Stazione Maritima, I did not feel lucky, but alone. My parents were still there—and I wanted to go back.
“You!” a male voice barked, and I turned with a flicker of hope. Perhaps my uncle had found me after all. But it was one of the burly stevedores who had herded us from the boat. “Down!” I scrambled from the railing, trying to fade into the crowd. The travelers had moved forward, though, dwindling and leaving me exposed like a broken shell on the beach at low tide. “Keep moving.” It had been like this the whole of the trip, deckhands shouting orders to the lower-class passengers, not bothering to maintain a pretense of courtesy. “Someone here to get you?” the man pressed.
I processed his English slowly. Good question. What if the message had not gotten through and no one was coming for me? Perhaps they would let me go back, I thought with fleeting joy. But after all of the struggle to get me out of Italy, Mamma would think that a failure.
It was only a week ago that I had been reading in our two-story apartment just off the Via del Monte, snug in the bedroom that I had shared with Nonna before she passed two years earlier, when Mamma came running in, breathless. “We have to go.” Downstairs, Papa was throwing papers into the fire that never burned in summer, with an energy I thought he no longer possessed. “Come!” Mamma ordered, urging me down to the street, and lifted me onto the handles of her bike.
“Where are we going?”
My mother did not answer, but pedaled fiercely through the darkened streets. It was after curfew and I feared the police might stop us. We neared the harbor, drawing close to the docks where too many people were crowding onto a rickety ship. Mamma stopped, climbed off and pulled me from the bike, breathing heavily. Perspiration glistened on her forehead and cheeks. “You have to go first.”
I stared at her in disbelief. “Where?”
“America.” She handed me a satchel heavy with coins, and a ticket and papers, though real or forged I could not say.
She could not possibly be serious. I reached for her, panicking. “I can’t go alone!” The sight of the dark water behind the ship filled me with terror.
“There’s no other way. You’ll be fine. You’re strong.” Mamma had never coddled me, forcing me to find my own way from our apartment through the city to market from a young age and do almost everything for myself. It was as if she had known and somehow been planning for this.
“Why now?”
“These documents.” She gestured. “That ship. You’ll have to transfer in Gibralter, but there’s no telling when we might get another chance.” But her voice was evasive, and remembering Papa burning the papers, I knew it was something more. I would be leaving them behind in danger.
“Papa and I will follow.” I knew it was a lie. Papa was too weak to travel. She urged me forward onto the rotten-smelling dock, finding gaps in the crowd that I could not see and making her own with shoulders and elbows where none existed. Her hair fanned out around her, a lioness with her cub.
We neared the front of the crowd and Mamma pushed toward a uniformed man and handed him a fistful of bills, saying a few words I could not hear. She turned back. “Come.” We reached the edge where the dock met the ship and my toe caught in the gap. Mamma grabbed my arm hard to keep me from stumbling. “Stay out of sight as much as you can.” Her fingers bit into my skin. “Talk to no one. I will send word to Papa’s brother.” She took her mizpah necklace, with its half-heart pendant made of gold that she had always worn, from around her neck, and fastened it on mine. My father had given it to her years earlier, keeping his half in his breast pocket, close to his own heart. She did not kiss me, but pressed me tightly to her once, firm and hard. Then she released me and, before I could follow, disappeared into the crowd.
“Hey!” The stevedore’s voice came again. My vision cleared. Impatient now, he gestured with his thick hand in the direction of the large building ahead. “You gotta go in there. Police come for the kids who’ve got no one to claim them.” There was a quiet thud in my chest, as I carefully pieced together his words. What did the police do with those kids?
I ran my tongue over the chipped spot on my front tooth as I glanced back over my shoulder at the ship. Once dirty and confining, now it seemed a refuge. But I did not have money for a meal, much less a return ticket. “You can’t go back, only forward.” The man stood with arms folded, blocking the way behind me, and I had no choice but to move in the direction of the building.
Inside the high-ceilinged arrivals hall, bodies pressed together, making the air warm and thick. Conversations in different languages, German, Yiddish, Italian, rose and clashed around me. I hung back from the queue that shuffled forward, trying to figure out what to do. In an alcove to the right, a few of the other kids from the ship sat forlornly on a wood bench. A policeman lorded over them in the doorway. Nothing good was going to happen to that lot and I didn’t want to join them. But I was not about to go up to immigration and announce that I was alone.
I saw a sign for the ladies’ room at the far side of the terminal and made my way toward it. Pressing inside through the wall of stench, I grimaced at my reflection in the cracked mirror. On the boat I had tried to cow my thick dark hair back into braids, as Nonna had done each morning. But pieces stuck out in all directions. The scratch on my cheek had just begun to heal. I pushed my way to the basin where women jostled at the sink like pigs at a trough. Reaching my hands into the fray, I managed to get a few drops of water. I desperately wanted to drink it, but didn’t dare. Instead, I used it to smooth my hair and wipe a smudge from my forehead.
Back in the main hall, the crowds from the ship had thinned. I walked to a newspaper stand in the corner, pretending to be interested in the headlines. Ten minutes passed. “You buying?” the man behind the kiosk asked. I moved away, feeling exposed in the vast, emptying arrivals hall. If I stood here any longer, the policeman who took the kids was going to notice. In the short queue which remained ahead, a family with several children was nearing the immigration desk. I moved close to them, hoping to slip through with them.
But as the family stepped past the desk, a hand caught my shoulder, stopping me.
“Papers?” I drew myself up to my full four feet eight inches, then handed my passport to the man in a dark blue cap and jacket whose eyes darted back and forth as he scanned the paper in front of him. An open pack of Lucky Strikes peeked out of his breast pocket. I held my breath, praying that the papers were good, and that the money my mother had given the ship’s purser was enough to have my name added to the manifest. The waiting room on the far side of the immigration desk, where cleared arrivals met their hosts, stood just feet but oceans away.
The man looked up beneath bushy brows. “Who’s sponsoring you?” I shook my head at the unfamiliar word. “You have family here?” he asked more slowly.
“My aunt and uncle. They’re expecting me.” My accent sounded thicker than when I had practiced speaking English with Mamma back home.
“Where are they?” I faltered. “Children have to be collected.” He made me sound like luggage. I bristled at the notion of still being called a child at almost seventeen, then decided not to complain. He gestured toward the guarded side room with the kids. “Otherwise you’ll have to go to the Home until your relatives can collect you.”
“Home?” I repeated, picking out the word I recognized.
“It’s a place for kids who have no one.”
My stomach tightened. “My uncle, he is...sick,” I said, spinning the lie as it came out. “They couldn’t came.”
“Come,” he corrected. “You have a letter?”
“It blew away.” I gestured with my hand, then fought not to blink as he stared at me. “On the boat.”
He took off his cap and scratched his head. “I’d like to help you. But we can’t just let kids go loose in the city.” Now he sounded like a zookeeper. My heart sank as he raised his hand to wave over the policeman who was guarding the children.
Over the edge of the immigration desk, I spotted a grainy family photograph. “You have children?”
The man hesitated, unaccustomed to others asking the questions. Then he lowered his hand. “Four. A girl and three boys.”
“Your daughter is beautiful. How old?”
His face softened a bit. “Mary’s six.”
The officer rubbed his right temple with thick fingers. Behind him, the clock struck five. “Joe, we’re headed to O’Shea’s,” another man called from behind him.
“My aunt and uncle lived close to here,” I said, not stopping to correct my grammar as I sensed a crack in his resolve. “I will bring my aunt back tomorrow to sign for me? Please.”
The man hesitated. “What’s their address?”
“2256 South Fifth,” I replied, making up the numbers and hoping they sounded right.
“I could lose my job for this.”
“You won’t. I’ll come back.” The man stamped my passport. I took it and hurried past him. I scanned the waiting room, but did not see anyone who might have been my aunt and uncle. Not daring to linger in case the immigration officer changed his mind, I scurried through the station and stepped out into the light.
On the far side of the door, I stopped again and scratched at the back of my head, hoping I had not picked up nits. The street in front of the Port of Philadelphia was packed thick with buses and taxis and black sedans, choking the already thick summer air with exhaust. An enormous American flag flapped in the breeze above. At the corner, a hot-dog cart gave off a savory smell. My mouth watered. Food had run out in steerage almost two days before we docked. I had not eaten, except for the scrap of bread an upper deck passenger had carelessly tossed below in waste. I moved closer to the cart, eyeing the soft pretzels stacked high on the edge. I could take one without anyone noticing.
No, I was not going to start my life here by stealing. Better hungry than a thief. I turned from the cart, focusing on the street in front of me. I had made it through immigration, but I still had no idea where I was going.
“Adelia?” a voice called behind me. I froze. They were going to stop me from leaving after all. But this time the voice was female and it had spoken—not barked—my name. I turned. A sturdy woman in a flowered dress and thick brown shoes was walking toward me, a thin, stooped man at her side. My shoulders slumped with relief. So Mamma had been able to send word after all.
A look of something—disapproval perhaps—passed over the woman’s face as she neared. She leaned in to kiss my cheek, flinching at the travel smell I could not help. “I’m your aunt Bess. This is your uncle,” she added, gesturing toward the gray-haired man in horn-rimmed glasses who stood behind her. I tried to stand straighter. I wanted them to like me, to be glad they had taken me in.
“Meyer,” he offered, switching his cigar to his other hand so he could shake mine. I strained to hear his voice, one step above a whisper. There was something familiar around his dark, almond-shaped eyes that made him an older, less handsome version of Papa. Homesickness washed over me.
“I’m so sorry we were late. There was construction on the road and then we had the wrong dock,” Aunt Bess said, sounding harried. I struggled to keep up with her rapid-fire English, catching only a fraction of what she said. “I suppose we have to clear you through customs.” She pointed to the building.
“I already did.” As if on cue, I saw the immigration officer who had let me go walking from the terminal, jacket thrown over his shoulder. He turned, a wave of recognition crossing his face as I gestured toward my aunt and uncle. I had been telling the truth after all. He raised his hand, wishing me good luck with a kind of salute before rounding the corner.
“But how did you manage that? Oh, never mind,” Aunt Bess added before I could share my tale. She took me by the arm. “Oy, you’re all bones.” The comment stung. Before I’d left Trieste I’d been developing, with new curves that made my clothes fit differently. But all that seemed to melt away during the days of hunger on the ship and now my elbows and knees stuck out like a scarecrow’s.
“You must be hungry,” Uncle Meyer offered more kindly.
“A little,” I lied, nearly swooning at the mention of food. My eyes traveled once more toward the stack of pretzels on the hot-dog cart.
But Aunt Bess opened her purse and fished out a bagel wrapped in tissue. She dusted off a bit of lint that had stuck to the corner and handed it to me. “Thank you,” I managed, trying to mask my disappointment as I bit into the stale, crusty bread. I gulped the first mouthful, then forced myself to slow down as my stomach roiled.
“You don’t have bags?” I shook my head. “We’ll have to get you some things,” Aunt Bess said, as though it had only just occurred to her. I followed them to a black car at the corner. “We’re headed to the shore. That is, the beach. Atlantic City. We take a place there in the summer. It’s nothing fancy, just a few rooms in a boardinghouse. But we thought the sea air might do you good.” Aunt Bess spoke quickly, using too many English words that I did not know. “Do you understand?”
She must have noticed my confusion. I tended to wear my emotions on my face—a habit I’d been trying to break. “Si. I mean yes.”
“You’ll like that, nu?” Uncle Meyer asked, his whisper kind. I did not answer. How could I explain that, even though I’d been raised in coastal Trieste, the ocean was in fact the one thing I hated most?
A tear escaped from my right eye then and trickled down my cheek. “Oh, dear,” Aunt Bess said, mistaking my sadness for gratitude and hugging me awkwardly. I let myself be folded into her stiff, unfamiliar arms and took a step into the life that was waiting for me.
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Hearing the screen door slam behind me, I shielded my eyes and peered up at the slope-roofed beach duplex where we occupied the second floor. Aunt Bess labored down the rickety wood steps, straw purse tucked under her arm. Though it was not yet midmorning, the sticky July heat had already caused damp spots to form at the armpits of her dress. “I’m headed to Margie’s.” Aunt Bess’s routine was always the same, the only question if it was canasta at Margie’s or mah-jongg at Flo’s. “Do you want to come?”
I considered saying yes, just to see her reaction. “No, thank you.” Aunt Bess’s shoulders dropped slightly with relief. She hesitated in that way she always did, not quite sure what to do with a teenage girl whom she’d only just inherited less than a month earlier. Things were especially awkward during the week. Uncle Meyer traveled in the Buick, selling pots and pans and other household items to the housewives of Elkins Park and Cheltenham and other neighborhoods northeast of Center City. Until he returned Friday afternoons, it was just Aunt Bess and me. “There are some leftover prakas—I mean cabbage rolls—in the icebox for lunch.” Aunt Bess’s family had come from Pinsk some thirty years earlier, fleeing the pogroms. She regarded herself as American, but little bits of the old country seeped through, like a white slip peeking out beneath the hem of her dress. Sometimes I felt as if I were an embarrassment to her, the immigrant niece a reminder of the world from which she’d tried so hard to distance herself. “There’s cheese for sandwiches and some potato salad,” she continued, as if rattling off a grocery list. She was forever trying to feed me. “I’ll be back this afternoon.”
I watched as Aunt Bess padded, dingy white sandals scraping, down to the corner of Monmouth Avenue. She was not an unkind woman; she simply did not know how to do this, like a muscle stiff from lack of use. I did not dare to ask if she ever wanted kids of her own.
I was supposed to be grateful, I knew, from the looks and not-too-low whispers of Aunt Bess’s friends. Grateful to her and Uncle Meyer for the clothes that were new, but not quite the right size, and for the secondhand books that were a few years too young for me. Grateful that they had taken me in, even though they really hadn’t had a choice. And I was grateful, but I wished they might just once ask me what I wanted, or even let me choose for myself.
When Aunt Bess had disappeared from sight, I climbed the steps of the duplex and went inside for some calamine lotion. We had two rooms, if you counted the screened sundeck with the daybed that made me an easy target for the mosquitos as I slept, plus kitchen privileges down below. I rubbed the lotion into my legs, avoiding the scrape on my left knee. Then I straightened, licking the salt from my lips and peering out across the horizon where greenish bay water met overcast gray sky.
