Sugar

PROLOGUE

Winter settled in around them early the year that Lt. Howard Milburn returned from England. Cold winds rolled up the hills and spilled down across barren Kansas fields. Heavy drifts blocked County Road 42, cutting them off from town for days at a time. A howling wind at night brought the war back to Howard, awakening a longing that made him restless.

Just before Christmas, he rented a post office box in a nearby town, sent an Aerogram, and waited, praying for a reply.

When Howard told Anne that he wanted a divorce she was furious and told him that if he left her he would never see his daughter again. He knew it was not an empty threat. Anne could easily be tough and venomous. Heartless, he thought. Vacuous. He knew that he could never fill her, never get close enough to salve her pain and insecurity. He knew that, if ever, it would be a long time before he would see his daughter again.

No one knew where he went, only that he packed a few things and disappeared leaving her with an old house out on the prairie. It was rumored that he returned to England, perhaps to a woman he had met during the war.

For years, Anne hated the approach of winter. Each fall, on the final warm afternoon that signaled a change in the weather, she and her young daughter would gather blossoms from the flower garden beside the barn.

CHAPTER ONE

Street lamps glistened and taillights smeared ahead of the wipers’ sweep, leaving Jean Rosinski squinting into the stream of oncoming traffic while she groped to adjust the radio volume.

Wide-ranging power outages and icy road conditions have isolated thousands across the Great Plains today…

Drive-time news never holds promise, she thought. I’d better give Mother a call when I get home.

After the news, a public radio documentary detailed the dilemma of people who never knew one or the other parent and she strained to hear the radio over shrieking stammers of a worn-out wiper and the drumming rhythm of rain pelting the roof.

I… I never knew my father… a woman told listeners, fighting back tears Jean could feel.

Absorbed in their stories, Jean pulled off the highway into a strip mall, parked, and shut off the wipers. A chilling October rain blurred the outside world as men and women declared how they felt—half-orphans—pursuing the unknown. Their accounts saddened her, closed in and squeezed her breath to shallow pulses as the windows became opaque.

Listening to their stories awakened the frustration she had fought all her life.

I was never allowed to ask about my father—much less find him.

Jean tried to envision him in the flickering lights behind the gray windshield. Where would I even begin to look? Rolling her window down a crack, she took a deep breath.

When the program was over, Jean wiped the fogged glass with her gloves. When I get home I’m going to call Mother! she said gruffly. I don’t care if she does get angry; I’ve got to make her tell me where he went. She knows. I’m sure she does.

Jean arrived home to find the light on the answering machine blinking—three messages.

Who called, Mitzy? she asked, setting a grocery bag down next to the sink.

Graciously ignoring the question, her cat, Mittens, jumped onto the counter and nosed into the bag while Jean activated the recorder.

Good. I want to talk with you, too, she said, hearing her mother ask her to call. Listening to the second message, Jean stopped unbuttoning her coat.

Hello, Ms. Rosinski, this is Ruth Scott at the Logan County Emergency Resource Center. Will you please give me a call?

The last message was a hesitant, mumbled bit of information from a friend of her mother.

… I'm very sorry, dear, she had said finally, and then, with some bumping of the receiver, hung up.

Shocked, and with disbelief, Jean listened again to the voice of her mother. Stunned, she repeated the message, listening a second time, and a third.

Oh, dear God, Jean murmured, her hands trembling as she pressed the auto-dial number for her daughter Tammy in Wichita.

… and call your father, Honey, she said at the end of their long conversation. He and Mother always got along well.

Flight reservations made, Jean called Sally, her best friend and confidant, who lived across the street.

Hi, Sally. I really need to talk with someone…

She shared her grief and made an arrangement to feed Mittens. Not until all those matters were complete did she allow herself tears. Gently stroking the mostly white cat curled contentedly on her lap, Jean sat on the sofa, staring at the phone, weeping and slowly unraveling her long, unhappy relationship with her mother.

***

The storm had moved across the Midwest, leaving the rural landscape in Kansas, where her mother lived, cloaked in a crisp, pristine, sugar-icing white. Above the distant Kansas horizon, pink and gray lens-shaped clouds hovered in the western sky while whispering zephyrs wandered aimlessly over the stark, frozen prairie.

Twilight faded, leaving only red, amber and blue emergency lights winking into darkening shadows, a kaleidoscopic fusion sweeping the snowscape, their stabbing flashes disquieting an eerie silence.

***

Standing in the rent-a-car line at the Kansas City airport, Jean tried to think about her mother, but her spirit drifted away, remembering the weak, hesitating voice speaking to her answering machine, a voice delivering unexpected and disturbing news. The realization of her mother’s accident was devastating.

Mother wanted to tell me something. I can’t imagine what it might have been.

Rubbing the itching, jagged scar stretching across the knuckle of her right thumb, Jean waited, nervous and agitated, her consciousness blurred with emotion. Love, anger and bitter resentment roiled inside her. Slowly, with deliberate effort, she subdued them, and drawing a breath, forced a friendly smile as the man ahead moved away from the counter.

Good morning! Jean handed a credit card and Illinois driver’s license to the agent. I believe the reservation is listed under ‘Dr.’ Rosinski.

The woman pulled a folder from the reservations file and began typing.

And a dark color, please. I’m on my way to a funeral.

The five-hour drive westward started out gray and snowy on Interstate 70, streaked with brackish, salt-laden snow and grime. Near Hays, gusty winds blew a fine glimmer across the highway and it became noticeably colder. By mid-afternoon she followed U.S. Route 40 where it split away from the Interstate.

The county sheriff’s office was located behind the Town Hall. Jean parked on the street and went in to get a copy of the report of her mother’s accident. Pulling back onto Main Street, she noted the Logan County Senior Center where her mother had lived—if only briefly. Next door stood a new medical clinic and across the wide parking lot was the mortuary. The irony had never occurred to her until she turned in and parked in front of Gardner Funeral Home.

Momentarily transfixed, Jean sat, a stranger in a familiar place, a raw chill permeating the stillness. She had no tears, only a soul-wrenching sorrow, and for a long moment she couldn’t help wondering if her father might still be alive somewhere.

Using the mirror, she applied fresh lipstick and drew a comb through her chestnut hair. Wish I could get a cut here, somewhere. She glanced down the street before dismissing the thought. Thank God I don’t have to get it colored yet. She turned and tipped her head to check whether the silver strand she’d notice a few days before showed, and before readjusting the mirror, looked herself in the eyes.

The funeral director showed Jean to the viewing salon and turned on dim spotlights. When he closed the door, she found herself alone with her mother for one last time.

Three small floral bouquets, in addition to the arrangement of roses that she had ordered, sat on white plastic pedestals near the softly illuminated glossy casket. At each end, simulated candles flickered inside ruby-red plastic holders.

Moving closer, Jean gazed at the pale, weathered face of a woman she thought appeared much too old, and much too tiny, to have been her mother. Placing her fingertips on the casket, she felt its chill grip her through the quilted satin. Standing rigid and motionless beside the kneeler, she closed her eyes. Breathing in the sweet fragrance of the blooms, she was a child again, standing in the flower garden beside the barn, holding a shallow wicker basket, watching her mother select and snip blossoms. They worked well together in the garden—it was Jean’s prime source of praise. Vivid color images invoking childhood memories flicked through Jean’s mind until, with a jolt, she remembered the rickety wooden bridge that terrified her when she was a child. Through eyes damp with emotion, she gazed longingly at the powdered, motionless, unsmiling face, before reaching out and caressing her mother’s cheek.

I wish it had been better for us, Mama, she whispered, aware of the tremor in her voice, the love and anger in her heart, the pain of conflict beating inside her chest. I have so many questions, Mama. You would never answer my questions.

In the cold silence she shivered.

No answers. Ever.

Turning away, Jean walked to the door, paused to look back, and reached for the switch.

Driving north on County Road 42, Jean sensed her growing apprehension. These old feelings were irrational and she knew it. When she was a young girl, confronting the wooden bridge over Little Camus Creek was a dreadful experience.

Some of her fear of the dilapidated structure had waned over the years, but she still disliked having to cross over. Smiling to herself, she recalled her childhood ritual: clenching her hands in her lap, closing her eyes and praying while the span’s wood planks thumped and clattered beneath her mother’s rusted, rattling Studebaker pickup.

We’ll crash through these rotten old boards, she had thought as a little girl. We’ll smash against the rocks down there and die! And, whenever deep swift water rampaged in the otherwise shallow creek swollen from a deluge, she imagined that she would drown slowly, thrashing and gasping for air, pinned inside the cab of the sinking truck. Once, after reading about billy goats and a troll, Jean became so hysterical that her mother had to stop and check for the mischievous dwarf before her daughter would cross.

The road had an airy openness that was beautiful, especially during spring and autumn. Now, the thin crust of snow blanketing the harvested terrain glistened, a sparkling mantle reflecting the pale glow and purple shadows of a late afternoon sun. Near the center of a field, clumps of barren trees clustered among a hummock of rock. Resident crows wheeled and soared noisily in the waning light like autumn leaves blowing before an ominous, bone-chilling wind. For Jean Milburn Rosinski, Ph.D., there was an uneasy feeling about coming home. Deep inside, the scars still ached. In a moment of bitterness, Jean recalled those early years with her mother as they drove along this same undulating road, a lonely, rolling ribbon of white.

A glare of sunlight poked under tattered clouds in the western sky. Bright rays pierced the familiar, ragged windrows of Osage orange, buffalo berry and elder. Filtering through the now hopeless remaining leaves, intermittent flashes cast a dappled golden sheen across the white Ford, dull and gritty with road salt. Rapid bursts of light flickered like a strobe, giving Jean a thrilling, mind-tingling sensation of vertigo, as though the car was skidding, and she gripped the wheel tighter. At the curve ahead, just beyond a shallow rise at the creek bank, loomed the bridge. On either side of the entrance stood a gaggle of chevron-striped barricades, their amber lights randomly winking a warning.

Those bastards! Jean banged the heel of her hand against the steering wheel. After all these years…

The wide concrete bridge was new—years too late.

Given the generous amount of self-analysis during her first courses in psychology, Jean knew that the bridge was merely the object onto which she had projected her anger about her mother. Now both were gone.

She stopped near the entrance to the bridge and got out. Although sanded, the new asphalt was treacherous. With arms crossed, fingers gripping her sides, she walked to the center of the span.

Mother, I am so sorry, she whispered, tears blurring the way.

Fighting off a strong sense of suffocation, she stared into the icy creek for a long while, and then turned and walked back toward the car. Shards of glass jutted angularly from the rippled snow around a post and under the guardrail. Stooping, she touched streaks of paint on the rough, galvanized metal, then took off her glove and rubbed a bare hand across the abutment’s chipped and gouged concrete.

I only wanted you to be safe and well cared for.

From the bridge, Jean could see the old farmhouse silhouetted against the horizon, and hanging above it, suspended in the graying sky, a ragged, dark swirl of smoke.

Tammy and her husband, Ray, had arrived not long before, and a smoky fire stumbled in the fireplace. Pulling up the driveway behind Ray’s pickup, Jean turned out the lights and honked.

Tammy had watched her mother stop at the bridge and she burst from the door, followed by Ray. Throwing her arms around Jean, she gave her mother a kiss, rocking her lovingly in a long embrace. You okay, Mom?

Yeah. I’m fine. Jean took Ray’s outstretched hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. Will you bring my bag from the trunk, Ray? Jean asked, handing him the keys.

Have a good flight? he asked, cradling her bag in his arms.

Actually, it was pretty smooth. See? She spun a wheel on her suitcase. I bought myself one of these ‘Toter’ roll-along things.

The three crunched across the crisp snow while their shadows raced ahead and climbed the steps to the veranda.

Mmm, something smells good! Jean exclaimed, stepping into the moist kitchen.

I was planning to keep it warm, Tammy said, turning off the oven. But you’re just in time, because we’re ready to sit down. Motioning for Ray to get wineglasses, she said, Ray brought four bottles of wine. He thought we might need it to get us through this.

But there’s beer out in the truck! Ray said with a laugh.

How very thoughtful, Ray, Jean said, with a haughty tone.

Dinner conversation started awkwardly, as though no one wanted to acknowledge why they’d gathered.

Did you talk with Reverend Swenson? Jean asked abruptly, scratching the scar at the base of her right thumb.

He’ll meet us at the cemetery at nine o’clock, Tammy said, seeming relieved. I asked Lotte Metzger to call Grandma’s friends and tell them that after the burial service we’ll meet at Johnny’s Cafe for brunch. Lotte told me there aren’t many left.

That’s probably true, Jean said, fumbling in her purse for the cigarettes and lighter she had bought at a truck stop. Lotte must be almost ninety. She sounded so weak when she called and left the message.

Jean blew a stream of smoke toward the ceiling. I stopped at the mortuary on my way. Mother looked so… so frail, she said, pausing, deep in thought, but as peaceful as I’ve ever seen her.

Tammy, a scolding look on her face, got up and found a souvenir ashtray by the sink. I see you’ve given up not smoking again, Mother, she said, shoving the ashtray across the table.

Only one now and then, Honey… it calms me.

It’s a bad habit, Mom! It’s not healthy. You know it’s only a cliché.

So, my darling, Jean affected a coy smile, I’ve got a bad cliché.

The custodian at the Senior Center said he’d clean her apartment for 40 bucks, Ray said, and since Grandma didn’t have any of her own furniture there, that’s all taken care of. We do have her bible though—do you mind?

Jean shook her head.

You sure you don’t want anything? Tammy asked. We can keep it at our place until we drive up at Christmas. It’s not a problem. I hate it that so much of Grandma’s furniture is going to the thrift shop up in Colby, she said with a sigh. Isn’t there anything you want to keep?

Not really. Jean glanced around the spacious living and dining rooms. She gave me the things I wanted long ago. Lowering her eyes, she let out a smoky breath. I’ll go up in a minute and see what’s in the attic. For a long moment she gazed at Tammy. I just adore her. I wonder if my mother ever felt this way about me. Probably not.

I doubt there’s anything up there that I want.

She took a drag on the cigarette, breathing the smoke out slowly as she reflected on her life in this house, her mother’s house. It was only after she had graduated from college, got married and had Tammy, that Jean and her mother developed a mildly comfortable, non-confrontational relationship. Until then, they had rarely been on agreeable terms.

When Jean was a young girl, her mother would accuse her, whenever Jean had done something deemed bad, of inheriting that particular trait from her father. At least that’s how Jean took it.

You didn’t get that from me! her mother would say with disgust.

Who, then, could it possibly be but her father?

Anne Milburn rarely spoke about her husband. I don’t know where he is, or what he’s doing, she once told her daughter. And I don’t much care! It hurt Jean to hear that.

Ray banked the fire and adjusted the screen, and then he and Tammy bid Jean goodnight.

Lighting another cigarette, she remained at the table. Absently following a rising fine thread of smoke, she gathered what she knew about her father, watching the gyre curl wildly before diffusing into a gray void.

I’m going to the attic now, Jean called, disappearing up the stairs.

In the middle of the upstairs hallway she pulled open the trap door, straightened the folding ladder, and poked her head into the dusty, dark attic. Standing on the middle tread, she turned on the ancient light and peered into the narrow space under a bare wood roof.

Climbing gingerly through the hole and stepping onto the attic floor, she looked around, shivering from the chill.

At the far end of the space, a pile of carpet remnants nearly obscured a flat wooden trunk. When she pulled away the remnants, Jean was surprised to find a military footlocker stenciled with her father’s name—1st Lt. Howard Milburn O-1805059. A yellowed U.S. Army Air Force shipping certificate was pasted on the corner of the lid. Brushing away the dust, she read the APO number—AAF Station 117—stamped across the bottom.

A brass lock secured the hasp. Jean thought she would need a hammer and screwdriver to break in, but when she twisted and pulled, the short screws tore easily from rotted wood. With some difficulty she raised the lid, its rusted hinges shrieking as they yielded to her pressure.

Full of curiosity, Jean peered in. The trunk gave off a sour, musty smell. Probing carefully, she half suspected that some dead creature might be in inside. Instead she found military clothing and a hat that once belonged to her father. One by one, she removed the contents, cautiously examining each piece. In the drab green box lay a dark olive jacket with badly tarnished silver pilot wings pinned above a row of ribbons. On each shoulder was a blackened silver bar. She tried the hat. It fit perfectly. Next she removed a pair of aviator’s sheepskin overalls covered with gray spots of mold, and then two pairs of well-worn, pinkish tan pants. Underneath the clothes was a collection of items—war trophies, she imagined—a six-inch dagger with an eagle’s head and a swastika on the hilt, a pair of soft, gray leather gloves with a stamped eagle and markings in German.

Across the bottom, at one end, was a Hathaway shirt box containing a manila envelope and what looked like a manuscript, a tied bundle of yellowing, brown-edged paper held between pieces of thin pressboard.

Curious, she lifted out the papers and untied the ribbon. The cover sheet, written in bold pencil, read:

We Called Her Sugar

***

The discovery of a manuscript fascinated Jean. Between two pages was an out-of-focus snapshot of an airplane and a group of soldiers. Examining the photo, she was quite sure that one of the young men standing in the two rows was her father.

Jean held the manuscript pages to her breast, wondering why she felt so secretive. There was a time when the mere mention of her father would bring scorn from her mother—the subject was strictly taboo. At this moment, she felt as though she held him in her arms.

Could I finally be allowed to know about this man? she wondered with a sigh. Can I ever know who I am without knowing anything about him?

Jean brought the shirt box with the manuscript to her bedroom.

I’m too tired to read all this now, but I’d love to know what he wrote. I wonder when it was written.

When she was ready for bed she picked up the folder, flipped through a few pages, then gazed at it for a moment.

A novel would only confuse the issue. Besides, it looks way too technical for a novel. If I can glimpse just enough of him, I might be able to piece together a picture of this guy Mother always accused me of being just like.

More than a little curious, maybe even nervous, she laughed out loud. Oh, God, I hope I don’t see too much of myself!

Propped up with two large pillows, Jean prepared to read the musty-smelling manuscript.

The first chapters were missing.

Hmm, that’s strange. What happened to the first part of this?

She leafed through the remaining pages, looking for a beginning. Finding none, she began reading.

CHAPTER TWO

Our 22nd mission was far from the milk run that’d been briefed.

Approaching the target release point, bombers in the Wing’s lead formation bounced wildly in a patch of milky sky dotted with brown-tinged, smoke-grey burrs, exploding pockets of hot steel splinters. An un-welcome mat laid out by Mr. Hitler! Planes in the second group sailed through the area unscathed. Maybe the Krauts were reloading. Then all hell broke loose.

Our squadron was caught by a flak barrage that blew a hole in our right wingtip and knocked out one engine of our Flying Fortress. Dutch Muller, our pilot, wrestled to keep the B-17 under control, buffeted as we were by exploding flak. Hot slivers of Krupp steel pelted the airplane, sounding like fistfuls of gravel and an occasional rock hurled against the fuselage. Sparkling flashes from the barrage made us flinch.

Bastards have us bore sighted! Dutch shouted, hunching over the control column. All this while the flight engineer, Sergeant Wolfeson, was transferring fuel out of the leaking tank.

Soon after we had released our bombs and turned toward home, a bold pair of sleek Luftwaffe fighters made a head-on attack, diving and rolling through our formation. Our Fort shuddered from the chattering fire of our guns, involuntary shivers reminding us we were cold and scared. For those few seconds, the air over my head was shattered by bursts from the twin 50-caliber guns in the top turret just behind the pilot’s compartment.

I heard Sergeant Wolfeson, who was also our top-turret gunner, shout, you fucking Krauts! and a blue streak of curses when the canvas bag attached to the gun’s spent case ejector tore loose and empty shell brass cascaded onto the deck behind the pilot’s seats. Even above the roar of the three engines, we all heard him because when he grabbed for the bag he hit his interphone selector switch to mic and we had to listen to his running commentary of spicy invectives!

The Nazi hunters grew till they filled my windscreen. For a split second it seemed like we’d collide.

Mesmerized, I watched sparkles from the machine guns in the wing roots and the rhythmic flick, flick, flick of the 20mm cannons as the leader squeezed off a burst. Somewhere behind me, I felt his shells hit home. With two quick roars, like a big dog’s double bark, grey blurs flashed past.

Our crippled Fort’s number four engine had already been silenced, its propeller still, three black blades knifing into the slipstream. Now the plane gave a shudder and began a slow turn to the right. Dutch cranked in full left rudder trim but still needed the rudder pedal to hold the airplane straight. He eased back on the power of the left outboard engine and nosed the bird down into a slow descent. Ugly, bright orange flames burst from the cowling not more than five feet from my legs, and tickled the wing behind the number three engine.

Shut it down, Milburn, commanded Dutch.

I reached across the instrument panel, pushed the propeller feathering button, and the burning engine rumbled to a stop. Then I closed the cowl flaps and moved the Nr. 3 fuel switch to Off. Rotating the