It hadn’t been that long since I’d eaten a grape, my aunt always keeping fresh fruit on hand, but here it was a delicacy and I savored the cold, bright flavor on my tongue before eating the other one and moving back to the counter to pour some coffee.
“Fresh load of fruits and vegetables came in last night,” she said. “I happened to be standing by when they unloaded these. I may have snagged this bunch without asking.”
“Well, I won’t tell,” I said, taking one more. “Thanks.”
“You headed out or staying in?”
“Thought I’d take a ride, check out a bit of the countryside.”
She glanced out the window, the sky a dusty blue, the sun about to make its debut.
“Good day for it,” she said. “Take a raincoat just in case though. The weather here is not to be trusted.”
Twenty minutes later, coffee mug emptied, washed, and put back in the cupboard, a slightly bruised apple in hand, I left the house, placed the apple in the basket on the front of my borrowed bicycle, and was off.
I bumped down the long driveway, the cool morning air whipping my hair around my shoulders, the quiet disrupted by the crunch of the tires over dirt and rocks. At the end of the drive, I turned right, heading in the opposite direction of base, smiling at green hills dotted with sheep, the scent of grass and flowers in the air. From here, one could almost forget a war was going on.
At the top of a small hill I stopped, leaned the bicycle against a short stone wall, grabbed my apple and rested my arms on the cool, damp stones. Before me the land sank and sloped for miles, soft and green, mist hanging in the glen, the sky turning from a dark, dusty periwinkle to a crisp blue.
As the sun finally made its appearance, I heard the faint sound of reveille and stood, turning toward the sound. When it finished, I ate my apple, tossed the core in the field, climbed back on my bicycle, and pedaled to base to see how William was doing.
15
“You’re sitting up!”I said when I saw William.
I’d seen him spot me as soon as I’d entered and he watched me walk from the door to his bed, making me feel a bit self-conscious as I went.
“Not quite,” he said. “But I’m getting there.”
He was propped up on two pillows, instead of just the one, and his color looked better than it had when he’d arrived, and certainly better than the greenish color he’d been when I’d sewn him up on the plane.
“How do you feel?” I asked.
“Like the luckiest man alive.” His eyes swept over me. “You look like a ray of sunshine.”
I glanced down at my yellow sweater and fidgeted with the cuff.
“It’s my day off,” I said.
“And what will you do with your coveted day?”
I shrugged. I didn’t want to rub in the fact that I could get out and about while he was stuck inside. It seemed cruel. But he somehow saw the internal struggle I was having.
“Come on,” he said. “Don’t feel sorry for me. I’ll get out there soon enough. Tell me what you have planned.”
I sighed and sat in the chair beside his bed, wondering if it had been left from the day before, or if he’d maybe requested it be put there in case I came to see him.
“Well,” I said. “I already went for a bike ride to watch the sunrise.”
“That sounds magnificent.”
“It was. The countryside here is gorgeous. The land is so gentle. Not like Manhattan with all its cement and hard structures. And then the trees and sheep... It reminds me of—” I stopped, shocked at what I’d nearly said.
“It reminds you of what?”
I searched my mind for something to say, twisting one of the buttons on my cardigan.
“When I was a kid,” I said, my voice taking on a sudden nonchalance. “My family would go out to the countryside every summer. We had a house there.”
