The Promise of Home
Read The Promise of Home Online
Authors: Darcie Chan
The Promise of Home
is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
2015 Ballantine Books eBook Edition
Copyright © 2015 by Darcie Chan
Reading group guide copyright © 2015 by Penguin Random House LLC
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Ballantine Books, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.
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Chan, Darcie.
The promise of home : a Mill River novel / Darcie Chan.
pages ; cm.
ISBN 978-0-345-53824-6
eBook ISBN 978-0-345-54157-4
1. Interpersonal relationsâFiction. 2. City and town lifeâVermontâFiction. I. Title.
PS3603.H35558P76 2015
813'.6âdc23
2015022668
eBook ISBNâ9780345541574
Cover design: Marietta Anastassatos
Cover illustration: Richard Tuschman, including images © Alex Kotlov/iStockphoto (landscape), © Horst Gerlach/iStockphoto (branches), © Betty Copeland/Dreamstime (mansion), ©
Monkeybusinessimages/Dreamstime
(couple)
v4.1_r2
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PrologueCourage is a kind of salvation.
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P
LATO
January 2, 2013
W
ith a last wave at the window where she stood looking down at him, Nick was gone.
In the terminal at Southern Vermont Regional Airport, Karen Cooper wrapped her arms around her son, Benjamin, and pressed her cheek against his head. She squinted through bloodshot eyes as her husband ducked into the turboprop for his flight to Boston. There, he would leave the small plane and board a transatlantic jet that would take him to Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris and then on to Riyadh. The Middle East againâthe land of 120-degree temperatures, sandstorms, danger, and uncertainty. The place Nick had already spent so many years, wishing every minute that he could be home with her and Ben. The place he hated to be almost as much as she hated his being there.
Almost.
For nearly a decade, Nick had served in the Air Force, stationed on the other side of the world most of that time. She'd held down the fort at the bases where they'd been stationed, caring for Ben, their only child, and working part-time as a teacher's assistant. While Nick was deployed, most of their interactions had been measured in minutes chatting on the phone and later, on Skype or Facebook. There were a few precious weeks between deployments and during the holidays when he had been able to come home for a visit.
The rest of the time, she had lived with constant worry. There were the darker feelings, too, which she struggled to keep from pulling her under while her husband was away.
Finally, a little over two years ago, Nick left the military. They moved from Lackland in San Antonio to the little town of Mill River, in southern Vermont, where she had grown up. An aircraft systems engineer, Nick found a job at GE Aviation in Rutland. She was hired at the elementary school, and Ben adjusted beautifully to the move. They'd finally purchased a home of their own. After years of rentals and military housing, living in their own cute three-bedroom Cape Cod and knowing they wouldn't have to pack up and move for another deployment had felt like a dream.
She should have realized that, like all dreams, it wouldn't last long.
Nick was among the first to be laid off when the economy sputtered. The newest employees had the least seniority. Her salary alone wasn't enough to cover the bills, and their savings were significantly depleted after making the down payment on the house. But Nick had promised her that they would return to her native Vermont after his military career was over. They had scrimped and saved for years to qualify for a mortgage. And now they were settled in their new house.They were thrilled by how Ben was thriving in his new school. Finally, they were living in the cozy, loving community she considered her one true home. They were not about to surrender their dream without a fight.
“I could easily do maintenance, but none of the airlines are hiring. There's always contracting work, though,” Nick had said as they sat at the kitchen table late one night. His voice had been quiet, hesitant, as if he hated to even bring up the possibility.
“You would have to go back.”
“Yes. For a while. But the money would be great, a lot better than a military salary. Do you think you could make it through one more stretch apart? It might not be for long. The economy's finally on the way up. In six months or a year, I might get reinstated at GE.”
Six months or a year.
Karen felt as if they were moving backward. She squeezed Nick's hand as she let his words sink in. It was all she could do to hold it together. But Nick's brown eyes were fixed on her as he waited for her reply.
“I thought we were past being apart for months at a time.”
“I know, so did I. But short of moving again, I don't know what other options we have. Besides, this is your home.
Our
home. I don't want us to lose it or have to leave Mill River any more than you do.”
Karen felt the darknessâwhich was how she thought of the clinical depression that had plagued her for yearsâtrying to force its way through her defenses. She had been stable for quite a while, thanks to a new antidepressant and careful monitoring by her doctor. Still, Nick's long absences didn't help her condition, and she knew what she would be risking by going along with his proposal. She knew, too, that by asking her next question she would be giving in, and she waited a few moments to compose herself. Finally, she whispered, “Where would you go?”
“Nowhere near any hostilities. Not Iraq or Afghanistan, although we're about pulled out of them completely. Maybe the UAE or Qatar. Somewhere stable, with a U.S. presence and more tolerant locals.”
“You make it sound like it's already a done deal.”
“I've made some calls,” Nick admitted. “Just to see if it was even a possibility. And it definitely is. Lots of guys I've worked with are already well established with the big contractors. I just need to give them the go-ahead, and they'll hook me up.”
“What happens if nothing's changed with the economy by the time your contract's up?”
“We just have to have faith that it will be okay.”
“I can't stand the thought of us living apart again. And Benâ¦it's meant so much to him to have you home.”
She looked into Nick's eyes and saw inevitability. Her pain was reflected there, too, interspersed with his own hurt and disappointment. But in his gaze, Karen also recognized her husband's incredible fortitude. His strength and resolve were two of the things she loved most about him.
“I know. But we've all done it before. Can't we make it another year, honey? Can you stay strong for me one more time? I don't know what else I can do, and at least I'd be earning enough to give us a savings cushion. I can keep an eye out for openings while I'm gone. I may be able to line up something for after the contract is up, and if not, we'd have a little time to decide what we should do.”
She squeezed Nick's hand in silent acquiescence. He reached over and cupped her face, wiping one of his big thumbs gently beneath her eye. “One more year. But this will be our last separation,” he said. “You have my word. After this, whatever happens, we stay together.”
The ground crew detached the portable rolling stairway from the turboprop as the aircraft door swung closed. Karen pulled Ben closer as the plane began to back away from the terminal. She didn't want her son to see her cry, but when she tried unsuccessfully to stifle a sob, he turned around. There was no avoiding it.
“It'll be okay, Mom,” he said, stepping back into her arms. “He'll get to visit in the summer, and before you know it, it'll be Christmas and he'll be back for good. Maybe I'll even be taller than you by then.”
“At the rate you're growing, I wouldn't be surprised,” she said with her cheek pressed against Ben's temple. “I wouldn't be surprised at all.”
Once the small jet had taxied out to the runway where Karen and Ben could no longer see it, they walked back through the terminal and out to the parking lot. They didn't speak much on the short drive home, which was just as well, because Karen was lost in her thoughts.
She worried that their time together as a family in Mill River might make this separation harder for her son. At last Ben had experienced what it was like to have Nick home at the end of each day, like most other fathers. For once, he'd had both parents attending his basketball games and other school events. Ben and Nick had begun to spend more time alone together on the weekends, doing “guy things” in which she had no interest. At least they'd had a little time together, and Nick had been there to see Ben transform from a little kid to an almost-teenager.
Still, it made her heart ache, how her son seemed to accept Nick going away again so easily. She told herself it was because Ben was a little older now and more emotionally mature. It was easier than admitting that, for her son, having his father live half a world away was simply the norm.
Karen exited the highway. With snow-covered rooftops and strings of holiday lights still illuminating the streets, the little town of Mill River rose up in the distance. She took a deep breath, slowing the car to turn into her driveway before they entered the quaint business district along Main Street. Here she had friends, a job, and their own lovely little home. For so many years, she had longed to bring her family back to the place where she'd had such a happy childhood. Closing her eyes and picturing her husband and son together in Mill River almost gave her a sense of peace. Besides, it would be better this time.
She
was better, and she could survive in this place.
“Well, Mom,” Ben said as he turned to her, “I guess it's just you and me again.”
“Yeah,” Karen replied with a forced smile. She felt the dark wisps of emotion teasing, seeking a handhold on her soul, and she shuddered. “But only for one more year. We can make it for one more year.”
She silently repeated the reassurance she had just offered her son.
I can make it one more year.
For her family's sake, she would try. She had no other choice.