The Pieces We Keep(28)

“You don’t understand.”

“Yes, yes,” she replied tiredly. “Mothers never do.” When she turned to leave, Vivian’s frustration sharpened, an arrow of unsaid words. She could hold them in no longer.

“Aren’t you worried at all about Father staying here? Or are you secretly hoping something will happen to him?”

Her mother froze, facing the doorway.

Vivian girded herself for a glare, a reprimand. Perhaps even a slap, partly aware she deserved it. Instead, a sheet of silence erected, so brittle it could shatter from a single tap.

When the woman eventually spoke, she did so over her shoulder in a tone cool as steel.

“I was once your age, Vivian. Believed I knew everything about life and love, how the world worked.” After a pause, a wrenching mournfulness entered her voice: “Enjoy it while you can.”





Vivian did her best to shake off the remark. She realized how greatly she had failed while ascending from the Underground, having little recollection of the trip.

On the sidewalk, someone bumped her from behind and shot forward to pass her. No apology. Such rudeness was more typical of a kid in knickers than a gentleman in a suit. Her gaze trailed him to a barbershop, where a group had assembled outside. The presence of women made it clear that something other than a free cut and shave had beckoned the crowd.

Vivian warily approached. The people held in place, still as stone, listening. The stout barber in a white apron adjusted the radio on the counter. The speaker’s voice belonged to Prime Minister Chamberlain. Through the crackling static came the formal announcement: Britain had declared war.

War ...

It was now official. Inevitable, really. The ultimatum had been made; the treaty had been breached. Nevertheless, the surrounding expressions confirmed Vivian was not alone in her shock.

As if that weren’t enough, France, Australia, and New Zealand had also joined the cause. Another world war was upon them, all thanks to Hitler and his Nazi regime, dragging with them the populace of Germany.

Isaak. She had to reach him.

She glanced at her watch-eleven seventeen-and made her way toward the Thames. Storekeepers mounted sandbags and crisscrossed windows with fresh tape. Strangers toted boxes stuffed with gas masks on the ready. Optimists would no longer view these as overly cautious measures.

From Vivian’s childhood, a nursery rhyme echoed in her memory. “London Bridge Is Falling Down.” She dreaded to think the same fate could befall the city. The whole country.

She increased her pace, bordering on a run. When she reached the designated lamppost-no longer her special spot, but theirs—she checked her watch again.

Eleven twenty-six.

Four minutes to wait, at the most. Isaak was never late. Punctual as a German train, he’d once boasted. Though she hadn’t considered how telling the phrase was until this moment.

A growing rumble caught her ear. She turned toward the water, where boats had become rather scarce. The image of a German bomber flashed in her mind. She scanned the overcast sky. Patches of clouds were stitched into a quilt, a convenient disguise for the Luftwaffe.

But then she traced the sound. The muffler of an old Ford grumbled down the street.

“Just a car,” she sighed. She almost laughed from relief, when a siren wailed. An actual warning. Not a practice drill. A passing mother yelled at her child to keep up. Couples set off in a sprint, retreating to shelters.

Where was Isaak? Vivian searched for his face. Panic coursed through her veins. The siren pierced all thought. She cupped her ears, muting the nightmare, and prayed that any second she would wake.





13


I’ll find him, I’ll find him ...

Audra looped the declaration, a flimsy weapon against the images emerging from her memory. They were alerts of missing children—posters and billboards and five o’clock news leads—a collection she had unknowingly accrued since the day of Jack’s birth.

“I repeat, we’ve got a Code Adam,” the security guard said into his walkie-talkie. He released the button, and a voice confirmed receipt of the message. He addressed Audra again, his tone and appearance straight from any crime-fighting show. “Do you remember what your son was wearing?”

Jack’s entire wardrobe tumbled around in her mind, as if viewed through the window of a clothes dryer. She glanced around the food area, at the outfits of strangers, to jog her recollection.

“He’s got jeans on. And sneakers. He has a cast on one arm, but it’s covered by his blue raincoat—no, green. It’s dark green.”

Audra waited as the man relayed the description to the control center. Why hadn’t she dressed Jack in something more distinct? For public places, Devon used to put him in bright colors, fluorescent orange and yellow. She just didn’t think it would be necessary at his age.