Calling the Stork

***

Friday, September 14, 1917

Private Bankston asked if he could call me Mary today, and if I would call him Henry. I chastised him out loud for being so presumptuous. The look on the poor man's face melted my heart, so I gave him the tiniest smile and whispered my agreement, adding it would be okay when we were alone together, as long as Miss Pinnock doesn't find out.

His look changed, from one of defeat to immense happiness before he whispered, "So that means we'll get to be alone together! Thank you, Saint Peter!"

I think I may need to ask him about his Saint Peter infatuation.

***

Saturday, September 15, 1917

Henry was sitting on the side of the bed this morning when I entered his ward.

"You're not supposed to be up," I told him, but he shook his head at me.

"Man isn't supposed to waste away in bed like that, even when recovering. I have to build up my strength."

"No, you have to get back in bed." I gave him a gentle push and over he went, back down on the bed. "When you're strong enough to keep from falling over when I push you like that, that will mean you're strong enough to stand up on your own."

He nodded at me, seeing my point.

I think. Maybe he was just responding to my challenge.

***

Sunday, September 16th

Henry keeps popping up in my thoughts even when I'm trying to keep him out.

Off duty for a while this morning to go to our service, I gave in and went by to see him before mass anyway. He was standing beside his bed when I entered and I almost flew to his side, sure he would fall over and injure himself.

"Mary," he growled at me with a smile, "I succeeded in getting up and walking for a few steps, but climbing back into bed seems to be beyond me at present."

I helped him turn around and put his arms around me to the delight of a few of the other men who were awake, which woke up even more of them. There was a little cheer as I eased him down and then back into his bed, but I wasn't really hearing it for his arm around me and mine around him caused my blood to race and my heart to pound.

When he was reclined once more, I scolded him. "You're not to get out of that bed unless someone is here to help you, Henry Bankston! I don't want you getting hurt any worse than you already are."

"You're someone," he said. "Can you help me?"

"Only if you're good," I growled back at him, leading him to smile and more claps from everyone awake who heard our exchange.

I don't know if anyone else heard, but he responded with, "Yes, my angel."

His pale blue eyes were looking at me unlike anything I've ever seen. I couldn't look into them for more than a second or two; they felt as if they were boring into my soul, so I glanced away before he saw my consternation and concern below the bluster I was trying to portray. I'm not sure if I succeeded.

***

Friday, September 21st

I've picked up this book to write several times this week but one day becomes the next, with each much like the one before and the one to come. Still, I look forward to each new day now, with the difference being Henry, always complimenting me, teasing me, and making me smile.

He grows stronger from his walks in the ward, and he's now able to get back into bed on his own as long as there is someone standing in front of him to keep him from falling. Arriving today and peeking in from just outside the door, I saw him do it without holding on to the person in front of him, leading me to smile as I think of his insistence on holding me as I help ease him down. I thrill at his gentle touch each time, so I will pretend I don't know of his little trickery and hope that Miss Pinnock doesn't know either.

Of course, several of the other men are now copying Henry's actions, and their improvement continues, too. The difference I note in them and Henry is that holding them as I ease them down is work and duty, while helping Henry is a pleasure and hope.

***

Saturday, September 22, 1917

I received a letter from home today! It's the first that has made it here since my arrival, though the date on it is just days after my departure for England. Some of the other women in our group got letters, too, leading us to think, with all of the postmarks and forwards from places in England and France, that the Army has been trying to figure out where we'd been sent.

Hopefully this bodes well for upcoming correspondences with home since I've been sending a letter to my parents and Clara every few days. I don't know if they've received any of them yet, but considering how efficient the United States Post Office Department is, I'm sure if they haven't it would have to be the Army's fault.

Henry asked me to walk with him for a little while today, with the two of us whispering (or maybe me whispering and Henry growling at me?). We made several rounds of his ward, and then I did the same with some of the other men since I can't play favorites. Miss Pinnock saw me escorting one of the men, Private Mertoni, I think, and she only noted his arm locked in mine and the space between us before she nodded and went on her way.

***

Monday, September 24th

Three more letters arrived from home today! They were sent about a week apart, so I spent my off time answering them tonight instead of writing much in here. I didn't mention Henry since I don't want the censors to know about him, but I think Ma might pick up on something from the hints I dropped.

I walked with Henry today. I'm looking forward to tomorrow.

***

Thursday, September 27, 1917

As his lungs have slowly improved, Henry's voice has begun to sound a little better, now only a little like a bear rather than a lot like one. He told me that he didn't get a full dose of the gas before he could get his mask on.

"We've practiced many times, putting them on and taking them off, but this time, the strap hung on something and I couldn't get the mask tight, to stay on right. I've fought and been exposed to the gas before, but it was a surprise this time, and I struggled with it, panicking, I guess. My eyes, face, and lungs were burning and I've never been so scared in my life, Mary. I wanted so badly to rip that mask off, to gulp even a single breath of fresh air, but somehow I still knew there was none to be had despite being blinded, that if I tore it off like I wanted, I really would die rather than just feeling like it."

He said he kept his eyes squeezed shut and was gulping the air in his mask, even with the gas that got in, until the filter started working, and then he had a hard time breathing because the damage was already done. He was temporarily blinded and his skin was blistered, but it's healed now, with only some redness remaining. He really is a good looking young man, even with what looks like a bad sunburn. In fact, now that I think of it, it looks sort of like the burn Clara got from refusing to wear her bonnet when Ma and Pa took us to Cape May a few summers ago.

When Henry finished telling me the story as I took him back to his bed, he added that he was most glad his eyesight had returned.

"I'm sure. It's hard to do things if you're blind after seeing all your life," I replied, remembering some of my nursing training. "When that happens, the newly blind seemingly have so much more to learn in a relatively short time since those blind from birth never learn to depend on their sight."

He shook his head at me and smiled. "No, if I was permanently blind, I'd have never seen you and how lovely you are."

I had to run out of the room to keep everyone from seeing my tears.

***

Friday, September 28, 1917

The end of the month nears but the war seems to be no closer to an end. We hear that more and more American boys are arriving in France to help swell the ranks, but it seems they're really only training now before eventually filling the lists of the soldiers at the front and, unfortunately, of the dead and wounded. Considering our facility is full and we can only bring in new patients when someone leaves, I don't know that we'll see too many of our boys here when they eventually join the fighting.

The event of the day is that Henry spoke to Doctor McClardy, asking if he can be given permission to walk outside in the gardens. The doctor told him no, but that he would reevaluate in another week, when Henry's lungs are, hopefully, a bit better and his burn has healed a bit more. So very badly do I want him better, but I look forward to walking hand-in-hand in the garden with him, too.

***

Saturday, September 29

Why? Why? Why?

Oh, I am so angry it reminds me of Clara stomping around in her little black shoes when she was six or seven and Ma told her she couldn't go to a party for one of my friends with me. I wish I could stomp and curse in anger like my little sis did, but I actually know the answer despite not being at risk of the spanking Ma gave her or the threat of soap in her mouth if she ever said another such word.

No, in this case, Miss Pinnock must have been watching, for she switched my ward with Vivian's, and now I'll never see Henry and she'll never see Ewan, the young Scotsman that she's been speaking with.

Vivian just came over and whispered with me as I was finishing writing the previous paragraph. We spoke for a while and agreed to swap messages between Ewan and her and Henry and me. We giggled as we discussed it, feeling like two female spies pulling one over on Miss Pinnock and our other unromantic supervisors. We laughed at that, for no one would ever suspect a lady of being a spy. At least that's what we thought until Collette, one of the British nurses, pointed out that a Dutch actress named Harry or something like that had been convicted as a spy for Germany just a couple of months ago.

"Them Frenchies'll probably just keep her in prison until the war's over, but you never know with them. They could pull out one of those gilly-things (I'm pretty sure she meant guillotine, but with her accent, it could have been that or most anything) or could just shoot her, too."

Someone said Collette has what the Brits call a cocky accent (whatever that is) so she's a bit hard to understand at times, but we understood her well enough that she made Viv and me blanch at the thought and just decide to just swap messages and leave the spying to any actual spies.

Just a minute before lights out, I wonder how I could have gone from being one never interested in romance to one now so obsessed with it in such a short period.

Perhaps love, like God, really does work in mysterious ways.

***

Sunday, September 30, 1917

I miss seeing Henry, so I slipped into his ward for a few moments today to tell him hello. He was walking the aisle as I arrived, doing laps like a horse at the races, so I joined him for a few rounds before it became necessary to slip away to avoid being caught.

"I miss you terribly, my Mary," he whispered to me before leaning in and giving me a tiny kiss on the cheek. The other patients who were awake must have realized how important it was, for none made any noise to give us away. Instead, they just smiled at us, hoping, I think, for the best for us.

***

Friday, October 5, 1917

The doctor gave Henry permission to walk in the garden today, but my Englishman showed his feistiness by asking Dr. McClardy if it wasn't the doctor's opinion that he should be escorted by a nurse when making these rounds.

"Have a nurse in particular in mind?" asked the doctor.

"The little red-headed one with the beautiful blue eyes," Henry told him.

"I've seen that one. She's a little short for you. Perhaps Nurse Farnsworth? She's a good 5'-10 and probably 15 or maybe 16 stone...."

Henry said he shook his head so fast the doctor laughed and agreed to allow me to be his escort. "She's small enough that she'll make you do the work you should be doing to get better." The doc wrote it up and Miss Pinnock transferred us back to our old wards starting tomorrow, but she warned me about hanky panky, reminding me once again of Mr. Cruickshank back home.

We'll have to be careful.

***

Sunday, October 14, 1917

Between work, walking with Henry in the evenings, and writing letters home, I've had no time to write in these pages recently. Perhaps the book has done its job anyway, helping me take my mind off home and putting my focus on Henry when I'm not focused on the men under my care.

Henry gets stronger as we walk in the garden each evening after dark. It's begun to get cooler, which gives us an excuse to snuggle close as we walk arm-in-arm. He recites poetry to me sometimes, making my heart tremble, with Byron being his favorite, though I'm not sure if that is true or if it's a matter of convenience. That's because I noted today that the book from our missing landlord's library that Henry has been reading is actually a collection of Byron's works. I may borrow it tomorrow if I can find another for him to read in Bryon's absence.

***

Wednesday, October 17, 1917

Maybe Byron really is Henry's favorite. He recited "She Walks in Beauty" to me tonight as we walked and I could hear both Byron's and my Henry's love in the words as Henry repeated them.

There was a difference though; I'm not sure if Byron's love was true, whereas Henry's shines more brightly each day, just as mine does for him.

***

Friday, October 19, 1917

The change in Henry's attitude since he's been exercising is phenomenal, and more of the men are doing the same now, though not as much as Henry. He ran a few steps today and was only slightly winded when he stopped.

Of course, fifty feet isn't much, but considering where he started, it feels like he's running miles. Henry laughed when I told him that, praising him for his success, before telling me it hurt like he'd run miles, too.

***

Thursday, October 25, 1917

Henry turned 21 today! With the help of one of the cooks, I went to the kitchen tonight and made him a small cake. While the cooks were able to give me some sugar for the cake itself, there was none to spare for icing--so many things are in short supply here--but I took it to him after it cooled and we enjoyed it together after giving a bite to each of the other men in his ward.

We held hands and looked at each other until it was time for me to go.

**

Sunday, November 4, 1917

With the days getting cooler, Henry is going out in the garden during the day, often by himself, and walking and sometimes running some distance. I saw him from a distance a few days ago and am amazed at his progress. We walk together in the evening; between that and my letters home, I haven't had time to write in here.

It's raining tonight, though, so I write, wondering where we are going and if Henry and I might have a future together.

He is a good man, so nice and kind, and we've begun to talk of that possible future, after the war. He wants to become a foreman at his father's factory in Leeds, to get married, and to have children. Being Catholic like me and one of six, he's said that six to eight kids would be a good number, though I told him he may be thinking more of the stork calling aspect of it than the number of diapers that would have to be changed and washed and the number of mouths that would have to be fed.

"Perhaps," he said, grinning at me. "Mary, as long as it's with you...."

He didn't finish but I could see the meaning in his eyes, just as I felt it in my heart. I'm now more certain each day that, when this is over, I want to be with him, too.

***

Sunday, November 11, 1917

Henry left the garden today while on his walk and went all the way to the village and back. He said he ran short distances, but that worries me, making me realize he is serious about returning to his unit to continue fighting rather than to go home to Leeds or find something to help with here in England.

I asked him this evening. "You really are serious about going back to France?"

"I have to, Mary, my fellows are counting on me."

"No, Henry, you've done your part. Go home or find something here and I can join you when this is over, if you want me to."

He stared into my eyes with that look only he can give me. "Mary, of course I want you to, but it's not safe until we make it so by beating them. We have to make them want to quit, for if we retreat, they'll follow, and if guys like me walk away, who'll step up to beat them back?"

"Don't you understand, Henry? I want you to be safe!"

His head shook, slow and measured, as he looked at me. "Mary, don't you see? I'll be going back when the time comes to make sure you'll be safe and so we can marry and have all those little ones someday."

That set me off, crying, but he pulled me close, holding me in his arms, tight against his chest. He patted my back, giving me comfort, before looking down at me. My eyes closed and I lifted my lips toward him to share our first kiss and I felt his breath on my lips when a throat cleared and I turned to see Miss Pinnock staring at us.

"Enough! You know the rules; separate, now."

Henry held me for a second or two more and his lips touched my forehead before he turned to stare back at her with an inner strength I'd only suspected to that time. "Sorry, Ma'am, but we love each other and are going to get married someday. Please? Just a few seconds more?"

She huffed and stomped off, madder than I'd ever seen her, and Henry hugged me close once more for those few seconds before escorting me inside. It was with a heavy heart that I left him in his bed and came here to write these words.

As much hope as I have for our future and as much as I hate to say it, I fear what tomorrow will bring.

***

Tuesday, November 13, 1917

Monday brought great change as I feared.

Miss Pinnock moved me to another ward where I wouldn't see Henry, and early that afternoon, she told me it was even worse, she was switching me to the night shift. I'll never see Henry now.

Last night was the longest of my life, coming off a full shift and then staying on for another. I slept long and hard today and now I only have minutes to write before having to report for my second night shift.

Perhaps Henry, who is increasingly mobile, will come to visit me?

***

Wednesday, November 14, 1917

Henry didn't come on Tuesday evening after I wrote before my shift, but he surprised me this morning as I was getting off work. He walked me to breakfast where we sat and talked over a plate of their biscuit-like things they call scones.

"Mary, to be perfectly clear, what I was trying to say the other night when the head nurse lady caught us is, well, straight to the point, I say, I love you with all my heart and all my soul, and I want us to be together after the war ends. Will you be my wife, my love?"

I felt like I was floating, my heart racing at his statement and his question. "Yes, Henry, yes! I love you, too, and I'll gladly be your wife! But we don't need to wait until after the war. It can be over for you now, remember?" I pleaded. "With your lungs, you can go home. We can get married, and I can work in a hospital there in your Leeds."

He shook his head at me. "No, Mary, my place is with my fellows on the front. I signed the paperwork yesterday to return to them in two weeks, when the doctor said he'd release me. I'll be leaving then, Dear, but will be home to you as soon as possible when we've thrashed the Germans enough that they cry 'Uncle!' and scamper back home with their tails tucked between their legs."

"Henry, no!" I pleaded but he took my hand and held it against his cheek, telling me not to worry, that it would be alright. Tears ran down my cheeks as he promised to write to me often and I promised that I'd wait for him. Then, to my surprise, he slid a ring on my finger.