Page 9 of Long Way Home

When I’d returned home after talking with Jimmy that day, I’d remembered that Mama used to have a wooden crucifix hanging in her bedroom. Pop must have put it away after she died because it wasn’t there anymore. I searched through all of her drawers until I found it. That cross was still hanging on my bedroom wall to remind me to talk to God every day and tell Him the things that were bothering me. I’d learned more about prayer in the years that had followed, but Jimmy’s words came back to me during the war when Mrs. Barnett and I prayed so hard together for it to end and for Jimmy to come home safely. And now I was praying for God to show me how to help Jimmy be whole again. If He doesn’t answer our prayers exactly the way we want, He has a good reason.

I was shaken from my thoughts by the roar of a motorcycle coming up the road. The sound grew louder and louder until it finally halted in front of the veterinary clinic. Mr. Barnett had gone out on a call, so I hurried over to see who it was before he bothered Mrs. Barnett. A man dressed in black had climbed off the cycle and set the kickstand. He was removing his helmet. “Can I help you with something?” I asked.

“Oh, hey! Yeah, I came to see Corporal Barnett. Jim and I were in the Army together. Is this his place?”

I was normally wary of strangers, but I had the crazy thought that maybe God had sent this stranger to help us figure out what had happened to Jimmy. “Yes! Yes, it is. But he isn’t here. He’s... um... at the VA hospital.”

The man grinned and ran his fingers through his curly black hair, matted and sweaty from his helmet. “Well, hey. I’m not at all surprised that they gave him a job there. Best darn medic in the whole Army.” I simply stared at him, unable to form any words. “That’s why I came here all the way from Ohio. To thank him for saving me. Not just physically, you know? But up here.” He tapped his forehead. “What time does he get home from work?” He must have seen the tears that filled my eyes because he said, “Hey, hey... what’s wrong? Jim isn’t sick, is he?”

I nodded. “He tried to kill himself.”

“No! I don’t believe that for a minute! Not Jim! He’s the one who always cheered everyone up when we were down. He was always telling us that God had some sort of grand plan for the world.” He started to put his helmet on again. “I gotta go see him.”

“Wait! They won’t let you in. They’re not letting any visitors in to see him for the next two weeks.”

“Well, what are they doing to him in that hospital?” His thick black eyebrows drew together in a frown above his olive-dark eyes. He was a good-looking man—or would be once he bathed and shaved off the shadow of stubble on his face.

“They want to put him into a coma using insulin,” I said. I knew I shouldn’t be telling a stranger such personal things, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that he’d been sent here in answer to my prayers. Maybe he knew who Gisela was.

“You gotta get him out of that place right away! Believe me, I know what they’ll do to him in there!”

“We do want to get him out, but he has to get better first.”

“Whatever you do, don’t let them give him the water treatment. It’s torture! They fire a high-pressure hose at you—first hot water, then cold, then hot. I thought I was going to die!”

“Why did they do that?”

“They called it ‘therapy’ to help me get over my shell shock or battle fatigue or whatever crazy name they’ve decided to call it nowadays. I convinced them that the water had worked. I told them hey, no more nightmares, no more shakes. Then I got out of there as fast as I could. Listen, I could use a cold beer. Is there a bar around here?”

“The Crow Bar is a few blocks back that way,” I said, waving in the direction of town. “But it isn’t open yet. My pop has some beer in our refrigerator, though. I live right over there, across the street. Come on.” This stranger who knew Jimmy had also suffered from battle fatigue, and I wanted to hear more about how he had gotten well enough to leave the hospital. And I wanted to show him Gisela’s picture.

“Okay, thanks. I’ve been riding all day to get here. Slept in a park in Pennsylvania last night.” He raised the kickstand on his motorcycle and wheeled it across the road as I led the way.

“I’m Peggy Serrano by the way,” I said as we walked.

“Hey, Italian, like me. We got the same hair. I’m Joe Fiore.”

“I’m only half-Italian. My mother’s family was Irish.”

“So are you his girlfriend? You in love with Jim or something?”

“No, nothing like that.” In truth, I was in love with Jimmy and with his whole family. But I wasn’t his girlfriend and I never would be. How could I explain what Jimmy and his parents meant to me? All my life, I had stood on the outside looking in at their warm, loving home—something I never really had. Even before Mama died, ours wasn’t a close family like theirs. The Barnetts were an ideal to me, something I wanted for myself someday. If I could have wished for anything, it would be to live in a house like theirs with a husband like Jimmy who would be a good father to our children. A husband who would pray before meals like Mr.B. did and sit beside me in church. And I would wish that I could work with animals all day, the way Jimmy had planned to do. Pop accused me of living my life through the Barnetts instead of getting on with my own, and he was probably right. I used to imagine that Jimmy would fall in love with me and marry me, but it was just a girlish fantasy. Jimmy cared about me, but in a pitying sort of way. He always had lots of friends and girlfriends hanging around him.

Buster came from our backyard as we approached, barking at Joe. He was very protective of me, and he didn’t seem to like Joe’s motorcycle. I grabbed Buster’s collar, saying, “Shh, it’s all right. Joe is a friend.”

“Hey!” Joe suddenly shouted. “That’s the famous three-legged dog!” He quickly parked his motorcycle and held out his hand to Buster. “Jim told us all about you, fella!”

“He did? What did he say?”

“Well, it’s kind of funny. Some of us had lost an arm or a leg, you know? And that was a pretty big thing. Hard to get used to, right? Felt like our life was over and done with. Jim said there was this dog back home that had gotten run over by a car, and his dad, who was a veterinarian, didn’t think it would live. But he did the surgery anyway, and now that dog was leading a happy life just like any other dog, except with only three legs.” I was very surprised when Buster finally sniffed Joe’s hand, then let him scratch behind his ears. “Jim said the pretty, young gal who owned that dog loved him just the same as before, when he had four legs. The story gave us all hope, you know?”

His words startled me. Had Jimmy really called me pretty?

“We laughed and made a lot of jokes about it. Someone said the dog’s name should be ‘Tripod,’ so we all started calling him that. Jim would tell stories about all the crazy things that dog could do—save damsels in distress, catch bank robbers, save drowning kids—like he was Lassie. Jim even had the three-legged dog saving the world from Hitler. Made us laugh, hey? And now I get to meet the real Tripod in person.”

I watched in amazement as Buster cozied up to this stranger as if he were an old friend. “You should be honored, Joe. Buster usually doesn’t make friends with strangers so quickly.”

“We understand each other, don’t we, boy? See? My leg is gone, too.” Joe lifted his pant leg and let Buster sniff his prosthetic leg. I’d seen prosthetic limbs on soldiers before, but the sight of one on this young, gregarious man shocked me.

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