GI Brides: The Wartime Girls Who Crossed the Atlantic for Love (40 page)

Since the incident on the escalator in San Francisco, Lyn's pangs of homesickness had grown into a burning need to return to England. Although she and Ben could scarcely afford the plane ticket, he agreed to borrow some money for her and John to go, aware of how important it was to her. Soon they were booked on a Trans World flight from San Francisco to London.

Ben dropped them off at the airport and kissed them both goodbye. ‘Are you sure you'll be all right?' he asked, looking anxiously at the braces on Lyn's legs.

‘I'll manage,' she said, but inside she was terrified. She had never been in an aeroplane before, and she couldn't help thinking about the hundreds of miles of ocean that they would be flying over. The old Lyn would have seen it as a big adventure, but she was more anxious now.

The flight was long, with stopovers in Newfoundland and Ireland, but when she finally stepped onto English soil again, Lyn felt overwhelmed with relief. ‘We're home!' she told little John, who looked at her confused. This wasn't home to him – just a place he didn't recognise.

Mr and Mrs Rowe were waiting at Arrivals. As soon as they saw her, Lyn's mother cried, ‘There's my Gwen!'

People stared at the overwrought woman with tears running down her face, but she didn't care. She rushed over and threw her arms around her daughter.

Lyn had remembered her family as being reserved, but after so many years apart their natural restraint went out of the window.

‘Now, don't you use that “Lyn” word in front of me!' joked her mother, wiping away her tears. Lyn was worried about how she would respond to the sight of her in leg braces, after the comment in her letter about how ugly they were, but to her relief she didn't mention them.

‘John, say hi to Grandma and Grandpa Rowe,' Lyn told him.

‘Hi,' said John shyly. His grandfather put him on his shoulders, and the family headed back to Southampton.

Over the months that she had been planning the trip, Lyn had imagined the house in Padwell Road time and time again – her childhood bedroom with its fireplace, lit every night, the grand front room that no one was ever allowed to use, and the big kitchen table that they all sat around, chatting.

‘Here we are, Gwen – home again!' said her mother, as she ushered Lyn through the door. But Lyn was speechless. The house seemed to have shrunk significantly. The hallway was narrow and the little staircase pokey and strange, and now that she was allowed to sit in it, the front room looked cramped and sparsely furnished.

That night, Lyn slept in her childhood bedroom, but instead of feeling she was truly home, she felt like Goldilocks in someone else's bed.

The next day, Mr Rowe took John so Lyn could have a wander around Southampton. The city had healed from the wounds of the Blitz, but so many new buildings had sprung up that the character of the town was very different. Lyn found it difficult to remember her way around now that so many old landmarks had gone, but she found her way to the Polygon Hotel, where Ben had been billeted in the war.

On a wall of the hotel a plaque had been erected to commemorate the Americans' arrival in Britain. The sight of it brought tears to Lyn's eyes. She thought of Eugene sitting in his jeep outside her front door, and the other brave young men she had chatted to on D-Day before they went off to risk their lives on the far shore. The GIs had passed into history, she realised. Did anyone really remember them now, when the only sign that they had ever been here was a plaque on a wall?

Standing outside the Polygon brought memories flooding back – of Ben and Lyn's early courtship, of the elegant dances in the ballroom, when Lyn had felt so beautiful twirling around the room. She wouldn't be able to dance like that now, she thought, looking down at the braces on her legs.

For months Lyn had felt desperate to return home to England, but now she realised that the thing she had been looking for no longer existed. It was her younger self – that confident, carefree girl who hadn't had any knocks in life, who could stand on her own two feet without braces to support her.

On her way back to her parents' house, Lyn sat on the bench where Ben had proposed all those years ago. She remembered the absolute trust she had felt in him then, a trust which had never faltered. As much as she loved seeing her parents, Lyn realised that Ben and John were her family now, and her home was in California with them. Whatever life in America had to throw at her, she would have to face it.

When the day came to leave, saying goodbye to her parents was even harder than when she had gone the first time. On the plane home, Lyn cried non-stop.

Back in the States, it wasn't long before Lyn was finally able to get rid of the clunky braces and walk unaided once again. Her family and friends congratulated her on her achievement: she had finally beaten polio, and could return to a completely normal life.

One afternoon, Lyn was driving home from a friend's house, with her son John asleep on the back seat. It was a peaceful early summer's day with little traffic on the road, and she drove slowly, taking in the sight of flowers in bloom and the perfect blue of the California sky.

Suddenly, she was gripped by the overwhelming conviction that she was about to die. The thought hit her like a punch in the gut and she struggled to breathe, her fingers tightening around the steering wheel.

Terrified, Lyn checked the rear-view mirror to see if John had noticed. But the boy was still sleeping soundly, unaware of the crisis his mother was enduring. Outside the car, the lazy midday traffic cruised by and the birds were singing. But inside Lyn felt pure fear flooding every inch of her body. All she knew was that she had to get home, to the one place she felt safe. She put her foot down on the accelerator and sped back to the apartment.

Once she was inside with the door shut, Lyn's breathing gradually returned to normal and the feeling of blind terror started to dissipate. She told John to play with his toys, and went to lie down.

She wondered what on earth had just happened. Where had that certainty of impending death come from? And why now, when she was finally over the polio?

That evening, Lyn did her best to forget about the horrible episode. It made no sense to her, so there was no point in dwelling on it. Perhaps she had just spent too much time in the sun.

But a few days later, Lyn was out shopping in the supermarket when once again she was suddenly gripped by fear. She leaned her hand against a wall to steady herself, her breathing becoming tighter and her heart racing. As women pushed their shopping trolleys past her, oblivious to her suffering, Lyn tried her best to regain control of herself. Once again, there was one thought paramount in her mind: she had to get home. She couldn't cope out here on her own for one moment longer.

Back at the house, the feeling quickly subsided. But this time Lyn knew that it would come back again.

Over the following weeks and months Lyn began to dread leaving the house. She never knew when the panic attacks would strike, and there was no way of protecting herself from them. Even the most familiar places provided no guarantee of safety.

Inevitably, she began to find excuses to stay at home. When she and Ben were invited out by friends and family, she would plead a sore throat or headache. Ben did his best to support her, and if there were tasks to be done outside the house, he offered to take them off her plate. Having stood by unable to help as she went through polio, he was anxious to protect her now. ‘You don't have to do anything you don't want to,' he told her, and as time went on, Lyn became increasingly withdrawn.

To begin with Lyn's excuses seemed plausible, but it didn't take long for the Patrinos to suspect something was wrong. Soon Ben's mother was demanding to know why Lyn was no longer attending family dinners, and Ben was having to brush off her questions.

One day, Ben's older brother Leo called and asked to speak to Lyn. She took the phone cautiously, afraid of receiving an earful for deserting the family. Leo had never shown her much kindness.

‘Lyn, I need to talk to you,' he said.

‘Yes?' she replied, bracing herself.

‘Are you feeling afraid right now?'

Lyn was taken aback. ‘No.'

‘I think you are, and I want to tell you something. I've been there – I know exactly what it's like.'

Leo told her that the reason he had never been drafted during the war was that he had suffered from panic attacks. ‘It was a kind of nervous breakdown,' he explained.

Lyn was shocked that he would admit such a thing to her, and for a moment she didn't know what to say. ‘How did you get over it?' she asked eventually.

‘I went to a shrink,' Leo told her, ‘and he helped me out of it. I think maybe you should do the same. I promise I won't tell the family.'

‘Thanks,' Lyn replied. Part of her felt relieved that there was someone who understood what she was going through, but another part felt exposed, knowing he had seen through her excuses.

Back in England, the idea of seeing a psychotherapist would have been unthinkable, but here it was different. And Lyn knew Leo was right – she couldn't go on the way she was. She needed help.

The following week, she found herself sitting on a psychotherapist's couch. ‘I can't understand why all of a sudden this has happened,' she told him. ‘I used to be so independent and strong.'

She thought back to the old Lyn, who was never afraid to go anywhere or do anything. The Lyn who had crossed the Atlantic to start a life in a new country.

‘You've become like a house that's all shut up,' the psychiatrist explained. ‘The door's been locked and the shutters have been closed.'

‘Why did the house close?' asked Lyn.

‘That's what we're going to find out.'

Lyn's visits to the psychotherapist soon became the focal point of her week, while the rest of the time she hardly left the house. Her life was becoming more and more constrained.

In the meantime, her mother-in-law was becoming increasingly suspicious. One day, when Ben was out, she turned up at the door, and Lyn had no choice but to let her in.

‘Why don't you come round for dinner any more?' she demanded. ‘Why do we never see you?'

Lyn felt weary of excuses and decided to come clean with Mrs Patrino, even though she didn't expect her to understand. ‘I didn't want to tell you this,' she sighed, ‘but I'm seeing a therapist. I've been having panic attacks.'

The look of exasperated annoyance fell from Mrs Patrino's face, and to Lyn's surprise it was replaced by one of concern. She reached out and took her daughter-in-law's hand. ‘Let me help you,' she said.

Lyn was caught off-guard. She had expected Mrs Patrino to tell her to stop being lazy and get on with things, but she took the issue very seriously. She had been through it all before with her own son. ‘I know this is real,' she said. ‘It is not weak. It is not phoney. Don't let anybody tell you that.'

Lyn didn't know what to say, but it meant a lot to her to know that she had her mother-in-law's support.

A few days later, Mrs Patrino returned. She had seen from her last visit that Lyn was struggling to keep on top of the housework.

‘Do you want me to do a few things for you?' she asked gently. ‘I can change the sheets if you like.'

In the past, Lyn would have responded with indignation to any comment her mother-in-law made about her housekeeping, but there was something very different in the way that she broached the subject now. There was no tone of authority, no implied criticism. And instead of insisting, she had actually asked for permission.

‘Yes,' Lyn replied. ‘That would be helpful.'

Soon there were fresh sheets on the bed and new towels laid out in the bathroom. The laundry basket had been emptied, the mess had been tidied away and the cabinet tops had been cleaned. ‘Thank you,' Lyn said to Mrs Patrino, who gave her a smile and left.

Mrs Patrino began to visit Lyn every few days. Sometimes she swept the floors or dusted the shelves, other times she looked after John so that Lyn could rest, or got the dinner ready before Ben came home. Lyn thought back to how wretched she had felt when she had been stuck in the hospital with polio and Ben and John had gone back to live with his parents. Then she had been desperate for the three of them to be in their own home again, independent once more from Ben's family. But now, for the first time in her life, she was beginning to appreciate having an extra person she could lean on. This must be the flip side of the overbearing Italian family, Lyn thought.

When Mother's Day came round, Mrs Patrino made a comment that touched Lyn's heart. ‘It's the worst day of the year for me,' she admitted. ‘Leo calls up and has some kind of excuse for not coming round, and Armand shows up asking for a piece of cake. Ben's not too bad. But they see it as an obligation.'

Lyn looked at her own son and imagined how hurt she would be if he felt that way about her when he grew up. She couldn't help remembering her first Mother's Day in America, when Ben had brought her flowers but not given Mrs Patrino anything. The more she thought back to her actions in those early days, the more she realised that Ben's mother had not been entirely to blame for souring things between them. Perhaps Lyn had been more homesick than she had liked to admit, and it had made her overly defensive. ‘Maybe I had a chip on my shoulder,' she told Mrs Patrino.

‘Maybe we didn't take into account that you were only twenty, and you'd just been through a war,' Mrs Patrino replied.

But while Lyn was finding Ben's family surprisingly supportive, she was beginning to grow frustrated with the professional help she was receiving. The therapist had laid down strict rules about what could and couldn't be discussed in their sessions, and Lyn found them ridiculous. Whenever she tried to talk about her wartime experiences, leaving for America or suffering from polio, he would tell her, ‘You're looking in the wrong place.'