Unremarried Widow by Artis Henderson Page B

shakers, the green ceramic mugs. Miles carted armloads into the spare bedroom: his extra uniforms, a second set of desert boots, the Gore-Tex jacket in green camo. In that way we set up house—again.
    There was a sweetness to the time Miles and I spent in the trailer next to the cornfield, even as the deployment loomed. The unit was scheduled to ship out in three months, in late July, but we pretended not to notice. The air was soft and clear as if all the turbulence of the previous season had blown over. Miles and I slept in the back bedroom in a white-framed double bed. We held hands in the night. One morning I woke with my nose pressed against his neck, my face tucked into the space beneath his chin, and blinked in the feathered light of early day.
    â€œYou’re sweaty,” I said.
    â€œ You’re sweaty.”
    I pulled away from his pillow and rolled onto my back, and he rolled onto his and reached across the bed for my sweaty hand.
    Once a storm blew through in the night and I woke with an inexplicable fear inside me. Rain roared against the walls of the trailer and wind shook the oaks in the front yard. Their branches dragged across the roof like the tines of a rake, and I lay beside Miles filled with a nameless dread. In the morning we walked the rutted dirt road that ran beside the trailer. Stalks of corn shot into the sky, hopped up on rain and fertilizer. The gravel that pocked the road crunched under Miles’s boots as we debated the question that hung over everything: what to do with me while he was gone.
    â€œYou could go to my folks’ place in Texas,” Miles said. He walked with his hands shoved down in the front pockets of his jeans.
    â€œWhy would I do that?”
    â€œI don’t know. To be close to family.”
    â€œMy mom is my family.”
    â€œMaybe you should go home to live with your mom, then.”
    We continued in silence for a bit, both of us turning over the idea.
    â€œI could go back overseas,” I said unconvincingly. “Teach English somewhere.”
    I had already given up on the idea of that life, but it felt wrong not to say it, to pretend like it wasn’t even an option. But Miles shook his head.
    â€œYou don’t want to be that far away. Not while I’m gone. Not in case something happens.”
    â€œNothing’s going to happen,” I said. “But if I lived with my mom, we could save some money. You’ll be earning hazard pay and I’ll get a job. We could put a lot of money in the bank and maybe when you get back we could buy a house.”
    â€œIt would be nice to have a place of our own,” Miles said.
    â€œPlus my friends are in Florida. It might be okay to be back there.”
    â€œIt might.” He smiled slyly. “You could always stay here.”
    I gave him a push with my elbow. “What would I do here?”
    â€œHang out with the other wives. Get tangled up in the FRG drama.”
    â€œThat’s my worst nightmare,” I said. I shook my head as I imagined the infighting, the backstabbing, the rampant gossip. It never occurred to me that those women might be a source of support while Miles was gone, that they might comfort me if the worst happened.
    â€œNo, send me home,” I said. “Get me away from the military. Let me live with my mom. That way, when you get back, we can buy our own place.”
    â€œAnd if something happens—”
    â€œNothing’s going to happen.”
    â€œBut if something happens,” he said, “you’ll have everybody there.”
    On the first day of July, three weeks before Miles deployed, we held our wedding at my mother’s beach house in Florida. My best friends were there, Heather and Annabelle and Stacy, young women I had known all my life. They joined me in my bedroom as I nervously dressed and fixed my makeup. My mother stepped into the bathroom, tugging at her hair. She still wore it long and parted down the