The Secrets of Tree Taylor Page 21

  Randy frowned as he took the pages from me. But his grin peeked out as he read. “Fancy that,” he muttered. “Hmm.” He squinted over the paper at Mrs. Kinney. “Let me think about this. Could you come by the office on Monday, Mrs. Kinney? Maybe we can work something out.”

  Only then did I dare look over at Mrs. Kinney. Her eyes were watery, but she was smiling. “I reckon I can do that.”

  43

  S.W.A.K.

  The sun was setting by the time Jack and I took Mrs. Kinney home. Fireworks sounded from all over town. I held it together until Jack and I were on our way back down the porch steps, where the shadow of my dad and Mrs. Kinney would always be, the rifle between them.

  For no reason I could put my finger on, tears exploded from me like sparks from a Roman candle. I could hardly see where to walk. Jack held on to me until we made it back to the car. Jack. I had never been so glad to have anybody beside me. He put his arm around me, and I rewarded him with a full-fledged, shoulder-shaking, snot-dripping cry.

  When I stopped bawling, more or less, he started driving. I didn’t know where he was headed, and I didn’t care. I stared out the window as my mind dredged up every secret I’d stepped into so far that summer.

  Jack turned into the reservoir and parked Fred at the water’s edge, just beyond the spillway, where couples went to watch submarine races. The whole reservoir wrinkled under a half moon, leaving a silvery carpet on the surface of the water. The sky filled with colors and light from fireworks all over Hamilton.

  He shut off the engine and waited.

  I gulped down saltwater tears that flooded my throat faster than water over the spillway. “I know Mrs. Kinney’s secrets, Jack. And Dad’s. And Penny’s. And Eileen’s. And maybe, one day, the whole stupid world’s!” I looked up at him. “Only what do I do with all of them?”

  He sighed. “I don’t know, Tree.”

  “This whole summer has been nothing but secrets, and I’m afraid my whole life will be like this. It’s like life is a spiderweb of secrets, holding everything together by these tiny threads that hide the truth. And I keep stumbling into webs I can’t get out of.”

  When I looked over at Jack, he was staring at me. I had never seen him look at me like he was now, as if he felt everything inside of me, times ten.

  “Tree, this may be the worst timing in the history of spiderwebs. But I have to add another secret to your web.” He gazed out at the ripples of water, and the moonlight caught his profile, his strong nose and chin, long eyelashes I’d never noticed before. “I shouldn’t be telling you this. You shouldn’t have to hear it, not with all you’ve been going through. But I can’t tell anyone else. You’re it.”

  I swallowed hard, and when he turned back to me, I didn’t look away.

  “I’m going to Vietnam.”

  “You’re what?” I stared into his eyes, hoping they’d get that twinkle, the mischievous squint that would let me know he was kidding.

  But there was no twinkle. Only an agony so deep I fell into it with him.

  “I’m not going to college, Tree. Not now, anyway. I need to do this. I believe in what we’re fighting for over there. We have to stop Communism now. If Vietnam goes, so will Cambodia. And Laos. And then the world. Communism could take over the whole world. I want to keep us safe.”

  “You can’t go, Jack!” I pleaded.

  “I can’t go until I’m eighteen. So I’ll head for Maryville, like I’m planning on getting that business major. But I’m not. And I’m not telling my parents until I’ve signed up. Especially not Donna. Only you. I couldn’t lie to you, Tree.”

  “Jack …”

  It was all I could say. I didn’t want him to leave. I didn’t want him to go where people were killing each other. I did not want to lose him.

  “Will you write me when I’m over there?” He asked this like his life depended on it. “Even when you’re officially reporting for the Blue and Gold, will you still write me?”

  I nodded. Tears were flowing again, silent but harder than ever. Deeper.

  In the background, from somewhere above us, music drifted down. Cars must have been circling.

  Jack touched my chin. Lifted it. Then he kissed me on the forehead. A soft kiss. Long and sweet and real.

  I didn’t care if it was the music or the moonlight, the mystery of submarines, the threat of Vietnam, or the secrets of summer—I knew that kiss was the fulfillment of Goal Number Two. Not what I’d expected. But true.

  Jack and I joined five cars in a jagged circle of headlights. With no more talking, we raced to that circle of light, and we danced. I danced so hard I couldn’t breathe or see or think. With everything in me, I rock-’n’-rolled, prairie girl with Jesse James, through the thin lines of the spiderweb, trusting Jack and I would hold each other up, at least for tonight.

  A slow song came on, “Soldier Boy” by the Shirelles. Jack and I usually skipped the slow dances, but we didn’t skip this one. I was figuring out that when I turned twenty-four, Jack would only be twenty-eight. No difference at all.

  Halfway through the song, Jack whispered, “What are you thinking, Tree?”

  “I’m thinking that people are like music. The better you know them, the more there is to know. Like you think a person is one way—smart or funny or mean. But nobody is just one note. God created people like music. We’re all symphonies and rock-’n’-roll.”

  He nodded, laughed a little. “Who said that?”

  “Me.”

  Then he pulled me in a little tighter and rested his chin on top of my head. “You know, Tree. You should be a writer.”

  “Right on.”

  Not the End

  So many things have happened to America and me this past year that to do it right, I’d have to write a whole entire book about it. And I don’t want to spend that kind of time reliving that year. The last quote in my writer’s notebook was anonymous:

  All good writing is swimming underwater and holding your breath.

  That’s what I’ll have to do to sum up the year.

  On August 2, 1963, Sarah moved to Iola, Kansas, and it’s rumored she only wore black and gold, Mizzou colors, the entire year. We’ve kept in touch through letters, and Mom lets me phone her long-distance on holidays, including her birthday. But I never got used to her not being in classes with me. In some ways, I missed her more and more as the school year progressed without her.

  On August 9, 1963, Mrs. Kinney’s first piece came out in the Hamiltonian, kicking off her weekly column, Mind Travel. In her third column, she urged everyone in town to send travel postcards to Gary Lynch wherever they went.

  On August 23, 1963, I was awarded the freshman position on the Blue and Gold staff. I won it fair and square. I never gave Mrs. Woolsey anything I’d written about the Kinneys. Only Jack got to read that. But I turned in a feature on Officer Duper and an op-ed piece on the power of rock-’n’-roll. Plus “Ode to a Lifeguard.”

  On August 26, 1963, Wanda Hopkins dropped out of school and married a Cameron basketball player. Seven months later they had a baby girl. Ray told me Wanda’s secret right after she dropped out, but it wasn’t a truth I wanted to write about. I gave her three Dr. Seuss books at her baby shower.

  On August 28, 1963, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., gave his “I Have a Dream” speech. The following week, Penny gave a report on it. She got an A+. And when I told her I thought it was the best report we’d ever had in school, she said, “Thanks, Tree.” After that, we started eating school lunch together.

  On September 28, 1963, Jack Adams took a bus to a recruiting station in downtown Maryville and joined the United States Army. I knew what he was planning to do. I couldn’t eat the whole day, and I snapped Eileen’s head off for no good reason. I couldn’t tell anybody why I was acting like I was.

  Jack called me from a pay phone outside the recruiting office. He sounded so excited that I felt guilty for crying through the whole conversation. After we hung up, Jack called his parents. Donna was cr
ying when she called Mom with the news. After that, Donna phoned every person in Hamilton.

  On November 1, 1963, the South Vietnamese military, backed by the United States, overthrew the South Vietnamese government. President Diem and his brother Nhu were killed the next day. That night Dad sat next to me on the couch and read the whole newspaper article out loud. I stopped him every time I had a question, and he answered it. We talked about what might happen next in Vietnam. Neither of us mentioned Jack, but he was in every word of that article and in the middle of every question I asked.

  That week Dad wrote another letter to our senators, urging them to get out of Vietnam and bring our soldiers back home.

  On November 22, 1963, I was in English class taking a quiz, when the loudspeaker crackled and squawked in our classroom. Penny and I giggled. The whole class stopped writing and stared at the speaker high on the wall above the blackboard as our principal gave us the news that President John F. Kennedy had been shot, assassinated, in Dallas, Texas.

  Later, Mom, Dad, Eileen, and I sat on the couch, closer together than we had to, and watched Walter Cronkite on the CBS Evening News.

  By Christmas, I had written three letters to President Lyndon B. Johnson, urging him to bring home our soldiers. On December 29, I got my first letter in return. It stated simply that my letter was now on file with the F.B.I., along with other suspicious and threatening letters. Mom and Dad both agreed there was nothing suspicious or threatening in any of my letters.

  On January 7, 1964, Private John “Jack” Adams joined a ground force of thousands sent to Vietnam. Jack wrote me about every soldier in his platoon—guys with names like Mojo, and Loon, and Shooter Bill.

  I began writing Jack every day, instead of once a week.

  April 30, 1964, was the worst day of my life, although I didn’t know it until May 5. According to official army records, “On April 30, 1964, Private John K. Adams, in an act of bravery to protect three wounded men under Viet Cong fire, ran headlong into an ambush. He was wounded and is officially missing in action.”

  I don’t remember what I did on that Thursday. Went to school, of course. Laughed? Worried about tests? Flirted with Ray? I didn’t know that my whole world had changed.

  I have pictured that ambush so often that it feels like I was there to see it. The heat and mosquitoes cling to Jack’s skin while he waits with his platoon for help to arrive. The men are pinned down. No reinforcements in sight. No helicopters. Nothing, except the enemy. The Viet Cong keep firing as if they have so much ammunition they need to get rid of it. Bullets hit their targets. Three men fall wounded as the platoon dashes for cover. The fallen men lie in an open field, while Jack and the rest watch from behind thick vegetation. Surely a helicopter will come and rescue the men. Surely the army has reinforcements on the way.

  But no help comes. Jack knows somebody has to do something. Their lieutenant is one of the men down. Everyone now looks to Jack for leadership. The others beg him not to go himself. Someone else should go instead. Not their best shooter. Not their leader. Not Jack.

  But they don’t know Jack like I do.

  He runs out of the bushes, crying out to the wounded that help is on the way. I see him running and screaming, much like I’ve seen him a thousand times in our games of Capture the Flag. Dodging bullets, he races toward the injured soldier, his buddy. “It’s okay. I’ve got you,” he says, tugging the soldier to safety. A bullet grazes his leg—a shallow wound, like Mr. Kinney’s. Somehow, Jack reaches the second soldier and drags him to the nearest cover. He is headed toward the third soldier when scores of Viet Cong appear out of nowhere and grab him.

  Did he have time to salute his fellow soldiers? Did he have time to hear music? To think of me?

  On May 5, 1964, Donna called Mom. She had just received a telegram telling her that her only child was MIA, missing in action. A telegram. Black words on a piece of flimsy tan paper. Words that changed everything.

  Mom called Dad at the office. He drove directly to school and pulled me out of class. I didn’t return for a week. Only Penny called. And Sarah. Penny had called her.

  On May 14, 1964, I received a letter from Jack, posted three weeks earlier. It read:

  Dear Tree—Miss you. I have a secret. But no sweat—it’s the good kind of secret. I’m coming home the first of the month! Let’s dance our kicks off! Love, Jack

  It’s the last Jack letter any of us has received.

  I imagine Jack hiding in the jungle. I picture him in a jungle prison. He’s still Jack. I see him dancing, working out new steps to the songs in his head. He’s swinging and jiving so hard, his Viet Cong guards step back and watch, in awe.

  He’ll be back.

  Last night I attended the Hamilton High spring dance with Ray Miller. Afterward, I taught a new generation of Hamiltonians to dance in a headlight circle at the reservoir—but only and always beginning each dance session by shouting “To Jack!”

  Acknowledgments

  I feel as if I should thank the entire town of Hamilton, Missouri, where I grew up dreaming of becoming a writer. This book is a work of fiction, but I hope it reflects my gratitude for the spirit of the people there. It was an amazing time and place to come of age.

  Thanks, especially, to my sister, who embodies all of Eileen’s good traits and none of her bad.

  I will always be thankful for the memory of Jack House. To Jack!

  I’m grateful to my agent, Elizabeth Harding, at Curtis Brown, Ltd., for doing all the things I don’t like to do so that I can do what I love—write.

  It just doesn’t get any better than being part of the Knopf family, where each comma is carefully discussed with heartfelt emotion. I am the luckiest writer in the world to have Allison Wortche as my editor. Thank you so much for your perceptive eye all the way through this project. I’ve watched my simple story transform into something much deeper because of you.

  And I can’t miss another opportunity to thank my wonderful family for pitching in when I’m too locked into writing to do anything else. Thanks to my hubby, whose writing challenges me, and whose love keeps me going.

  About the Author

  Dandi Daley Mackall is the award-winning author of many books for children and adults. She visits countless schools, conducts writing assemblies and workshops across the United States, and presents keynote addresses at conferences and young author events. She is also a frequent guest on radio talk shows and has made dozens of appearances on TV. Her young adult mystery published by Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers, The Silence of Murder, won the Edgar Award.

  Dandi writes from rural Ohio, where she lives with her husband and family, including their horses, dogs, and cats. Visit her at DandiBooks.com and SilenceofMurder.com.