July 22, 1940 (Burbank, CA)
A short story
Rollie Prader awoke with a feeling of not only falling but also dislocation. He didn’t know where he was and he was dropping fast through superheated air. He cried out twice and felt stupid.
A gentle shushing came from out of the dark. “Where am I?” Prader asked.
“You’re in Burbank,” said the shusher. “You’re at home.” Two gentle hands pushed him back onto the bed. He was in his bedroom, and the blinds were drawn. The vaguely Teutonic voice belonged to Camilla. Rollie stopped resisting and allowed her to ease him down. The sheets were damp and smelled sour. “How long have I been here?” he asked.
“Four days. You don’t remember getting off the train? Or meeting us at the station?”
“There was a train?”
“A train, yes.”
“What’s the matter with me?” Rollie asked as Camilla smoothed the top sheet over his chest and squeezed his shoulder.
“You’ve been very ill, Rollie. And when you got off the train, you were as drunk as I’ve ever seen any man.”
He did his best to match her words to his recollections, but his memories were gauzy and without pattern. “There was something else,” he murmured. “Something happened.”
Camilla sighed quietly, and Rollie realized her breath was bad. “Let’s talk about that later. For now, I’m encouraged. This is the most coherent you’ve been since we brought you home.”
“What time is it?”
“Four seventeen a.m.”
“Is tomorrow Thursday? Am I supposed to go back to work?”
“Yes, but please don’t concern yourself. William Scanlon’s been by, and he knows the situation. Nathan and Joseph came too.” She laid a damp cloth across Rollie's forehead. “You have good friends, Rolland.”
He coughed and the muscles over his rib cage tightened and stung. When he was done he said, “Funny, Right now I can’t remember what they look like.”
“You’ll remember when you see them. Are you hungry?”
He had to think. There were no strong drives in him since his body was divorced from his consciousness. Finally, he said, “Ummm…”
“Let me help you, Rolland: The right answer is ‘yes’. Even if it’s ‘no’.”
“That makes it easy then. Yes.”
“Good boy.” She stood up from the chair she’d placed by Rollie's bedside and walked past her own bedroom and Molly’s toward the kitchen. He tracked her hazy silhouette through the glow of an always-burning nightlight in the hall.
Ten minutes later, she returned, bearing a metal tray. “I’m going to turn on the light,” she said. “Get ready.”
He closed his eyes halfway and through his slitted lids, he saw Camilla’s shape as it fumbled for the switch by the door. When the light came on, he laughed without meaning to.
Camilla unfolded the tray’s legs and laid it across Rollie's lap as he sat up. “What’s funny?” she asked.
He looked down at his buttered toast and hot tea. “You look like hell,” he said.
She plopped down in her chair and glared at him from under a furrowed brow. “It’s lovely to see you too.”
Though not wise in the ways of women, even Rollie knew that spin control was called for. He hadn’t made himself clear. “I never expected to see you looking like hell. Not in a million years.”
She raised her chin. Fatigue was draped over her like a shroud. Her tangled blond hair looked like a nest of starfish. “So, this is a compliment?”
He smiled. “No. But, for the first time, you look mortal.”
She yawned deeply, not bothering to cover her mouth. “You’re speaking in riddles, Rollie Prader. The trace of Berlin in her voice made her sound sophisticated even through her exhaustion.
Rollie picked up a triangle of toast and took an experimental bite. She’d sprinkled cinnamon over the butter. “You can look just as wiped out as the rest of us. Wonders never cease.”
“You can be quiet now,” she said.
“Thanks. I think I will.”
She cocked her head to the right. “Can I get in there with you?”
Rollie's defensive synapses fired, but just for a moment. He nodded subtly, careful not to appear too in favor of her need for intimacy.
For the first time, Camilla crawled into Rollie's bed, working her way gingerly around him until they were side by side.
“I think I’ve had about all I can handle right now,” he said, meaning mostly the food.
She was on her side with her eyes closed and her legs drawn up. “Put the tray on the floor. I’ll get it in the morning.”
He did as he was told and then laid back down. “The light’s still on,” he said.
“I don’t care.”
Rollie rolled onto his side so that he could face his wife, something he might not have done if her eyes had been open. She still intimidated him on a deep level. He inhaled her, and she smelled of sweat and, strangely, of apricots. He raised an experimental hand and smoothed her matted hair. He looked at her with awe as though she were a wonderful toy.
The corners of her mouth turned up, and she smiled. “That feels nice,” she said.
But then Rollie raised his hand for another stroke, and he realized he could not remove his fingers. They were deeply enmeshed in a tangle of blond. “I’m sorry. I’m stuck.”
She reached up with both hands and tried to extricate him from her hair. “My God. What’re you doing up there?”
“I didn’t realize it was so tangled.”
“I haven’t bathed or brushed in three days.”
They were both laughing by then. “I know. I could tell.”
“You don’t exactly smell like a field of lilacs yourself.” Finally, she yanked Rollie's hand out of the maelstrom of hair and, holding it in front of her, she smiled. “You’re wearing your ring,” she said.
“Yes, I am,” he said, holding her gaze.
She put their hands down on the bed between them, keeping her fingers intertwined with his. “We should sleep now,” she said.
So, sleep they did.
In the morning, Camilla padded into the kitchen looking lost and disoriented. It took her several blinks to process what she saw at the breakfast table. Molly was eating a stack of maple-soaked pancakes, and Rollie sat across from her, sipping tentatively at a glass of water. Molly held her fork in a tight fist, and when she saw her mother, she laughed. “You look terrible, Mommy.”
“Thank you, dear child.” Camilla pulled out one of the remaining chairs and sat down heavily. She turned to her husband and asked, “Did you call out for pancakes?”
Molly answered for him. “Rollie made these! And they’re better than yours!”
“Are they indeed? Well, you go right on enjoying them then.” Again, she turned to Rollie. “What is the secret to these miracle pancakes?”
“Nutmeg,” he replied wearily. “I’ll show you.”
She smiled, turning to her voracious daughter. “You didn’t have to do this,” she said.
“No one said that I did. But no good deed goes unpunished. I feel like stretched-out taffy.”
She looked around the kitchen, seeing not only the debris from the pancake-making but his dishes from the night before. “My kitchen got caught in your taffy puller.”
Rollie winced, knowing that she was an everything-in-its-place kind of girl. “Sorry. The pancakes alone nearly did me in.”
“Oh, I couldn’t care less,” she said, clearly meaning it. “I’m just glad to see you up and my daughter eating like an angry badger. Everything is back to normal.”
“Rollie says that he knows how to cook other things, too,” Molly said.
“It’s true,” he confirmed.
“You should make dinner tonight instead of Mommy!” The girl’s cheeks were bulging with half-eaten pancake, and her chin was sticky.
“Did you not feed her at all while I was gone?”
Camilla sighed, placing her head upon her folded arms. “Don’t act like you’ve never seen this before. Molly’s a whirlpool sucking down ships made of baloney and hamburgers and peanut butter. She will have no money for college because she will have eaten it all.”
“Can I stay home today?” Molly asked, ignoring the unflattering portrait her mother was painting.
“Don’t be absurd. Of course, you can’t stay home.”
“You and Rollie are staying home.”
“We’re both very ill. Soon, we may go to live with the angels. Do you want to stay at home and be sick with us?”
Molly sighed and put her fork down on her plate. “You’re a shrewd negotiator, Mommy.”
“She’s right about that,” Rollie said, marveling at the girl’s sophisticated manner.
“Brains run in the family,” Camilla muttered into her elbow.
“And looks, and poise, and charm. You guys’re like characters out of Greek mythology.”
Molly giggled. “Mommy looks like Medusa.”
I whistled. “She’s the best-read six-year-old I know.”
Camilla stood, wiping Molly’s face, tucking a paper lunch sack into the girl’s hand, and pushing her toward the door. “Don’t be too impressed. She owns the Heroes of Greek Mythology Coloring Book.”
“Still. At her age, I wasn’t even housebroken.”
“So little has changed,” Camilla said, forcing Molly through the back door just as the school bus arrived. She followed the little girl outside, and Rollie heard her say, “Oh, hello, Nathan. He’s just inside.”
Nathan Tweed entered the kitchen, ducking to get in through the back door. As Camilla came in behind him, he laughed and said, “You look like something Skitch ate and then barfed back up.” Skitch was Nate’s Golden Retriever.
Camilla began gathering up Molly’s dishes and said, “I’d offer you breakfast, Nathan, but instead why don’t you kiss my ass.”
Tweed pulled out the chair Molly had vacated and laughed. “I think she might be a keeper, Rol.”
Rollie smiled at him, but he was still unsteady from exhaustion. “What brings you here, Nate?”
“Just figured I’d stop by and see if you were going in today. From the looks of you, I’m guessing not.”
Prader shook his head. “You’re lying, Tweed. Just go ahead and say it… You’re lonely, aren’t you?” Before Rollie's sudden marriage, he had shared an apartment with Nathan, and they’d ridden into work every day. He’d gotten Skitch to fill the void.
Camilla looked over at the two men from her place at the sink. “Why do I suddenly feel like The Other Woman?”
Tweed flushed, grinning. “Maybe I am a little lonely. But I’m also jealous. I need me a woman. Who’d have thought Rollie Prader’d land himself a lady before me? I mean of all people…”
“Careful now,” Camilla said with just a hint of menace. “That’s my husband you’re talking about.”
“Sure, but Rollie’s no ladykiller. I used to drag him out looking for girls, and he’d hem and haw. I thought he was going to wet himself.”
Camilla shot Rollie an amused glance and said (without enormous conviction), “He was saving himself for the right lady.”
Rollie wasn’t fazed. “The Good Lord taught me to draw. He didn’t give me much else.”
“Amen to that,” Nathan said. “You got a sister, Mrs. Prader?”
“No, sir. Not unless my old papa was less well-behaved than he let on.”
“That’s a darn shame.”
Rollie looked over at Camilla with twinkling eyes. “Nate’s being sociable now, but the truth is he and the fellas have been giving me hell for a while now.”
Camilla dried her hands and resumed her former seat. “About what?”
Tweed grinned, looking back and forth between the two of them. “About you, Mrs. Prader. We funned him about his recent nuptials. Did he not tell you he had reservations of his own?”
Camilla turned to Prader, one eyebrow raised. “Reservations, Rolland?”
Again, Rollie was unfazed. He even smiled. “Of course. Any situation as… impromptu as ours is bound to be reexamined when a cooler head returns.”
Camilla looked back at Nate. “He raises a fair point. Although I can’t imagine why you’d want to give him difficulty. Let’s look at the situation from a high vantage… A young man marries an older woman he barely knows because she’s got some trouble. Said older woman has a child. The circumstances surrounding the blessed union are mysterious at best and, at worst, possibly sinister.” She poured herself a cup of coffee and drank it with a dissatisfied pucker. (Cooking Rollie could do; coffee was not his strong suit.) “I can’t see what there is to gossip about.” She turned to Rollie. “Can you?”
“I can’t,” he said. “I truly can’t.”
They both turned to Nathan, and Nathan said, “Land sakes, look at the time.” There was no clock within the field of his vision, and he was not wearing a watch. “See you when you get better, Rollie. Good morning, Mrs. Prader.” He mimed tipping a hat and then exited through the back door.
Husband and wife sat in silence for a moment until Camilla turned to Rollie and said, “I suppose this is a stupid question, but we wouldn’t be married right now if it hadn’t been for the schnapps.”
“That’s not a question.”
“Answer it anyway.”
“Schnapps can be a very persuasive beverage.”
“We sleep in separate beds. We’ve never consummated.” Her eyes were genuinely sad.
“All of that is true.”
She looked him dead in the eye and made a perturbed little shrug.
“Since I woke up this morning at four seventeen, I’ve had a recurring thought.”
“What’s that?”
“I should go where the schnapps takes me more often.”
Her smile was quizzical. She still wasn’t sure of him. “Meaning what?”
“Meaning I want to go consummate.”
She giggled and it was the sound of long-held tension being released. “Right now? With both of us like this?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“What if I vomit on you?”
“Then one of my adolescent fantasies will have been realized.”
She laughed a deep, earthy laugh and entwined her fingers with his.
Lying in bed with the blinds drawn, Rollie said, “I wasn’t ready.”
“No one is ever ready, Rolland. When my nana left us, I was only six, and I was so angry. I thought she went on purpose.”
“When I saw him, he was fine. Later, they told me he was gone, and I couldn’t believe it. If I’d known, I would have stayed with him.”
“Okay, but when the two of you spoke, did you tell him you loved him?”
Rollie nodded. He’d almost forgotten about that. “You know what? I did.”
Tucked into the crook of his arm, Camilla shrugged. “Then what else is there?”
He sighed and looked down at her. “Are all krauts this smart?”
“Oh, Lord, no,” she replied. “Most of us are as thick-headed as the day is long.” This made him laugh, and she clung to his chest tighter. Then she said, “Rollie, something else happened in Ohio to put you in such a state…”
He didn’t answer for a while. Finally, he said, “One disaster at time, dear.”
This short story is part of an interconnected series forming one “meta story”. Eventually, all of those stories will be here on Substack. If you'd like to cut to the chase, please check out the book.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0F8PC5SVD
