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“Well, Tom, you did it. How does it feel to be a married man?” Boyd Webster grinned broadly at his friend,
as Tom looked around him with unconcealled pleasure. Marrying into the Wyatt family had been a step up in the world for Tom Parker. He was looking forward to living on the ranch and sharing in its comfortable profits, if not directly, at least in life-style. Tad had been grooming him for months, explaining to him about the corn and the cattle and the vineyards. The walnuts were the least profitable venture on the ranch, but even that was no small operation. And in walnut season, everyone on the ranch lent a hand, until their fingers were stained from picking and shelling the walnuts. For the first few months, though, Tom was going to be helping his father-in-law with the vineyards.

“Yeah, I’ll bet you will,” one of Tom’s friends teased him over plates heaped with ham and turkey, “wine-tasting, isn’t that what they call it, Tom?” The groom laughed happily, his eyes a little too bright, as Becky giggled in the center of a group of the girls she had grown up with. Most of them were married now too. With the war finally over, and the boys coming home just as the girls finished high school, there had been dozens of weddings in the valley in the past year, and some of them had already had babies. And they were already teasing Becky now about getting pregnant. “It won’t be long, Becky Wyatt … just you wait … another month or two, and you’ll be expecting!” The girls giggled as cars and pickup trucks continued to drive up, and their neighbors arrived, dressed in their Sunday best, reprimanding their children, admonishing them to behave, and not tear their clothes running wild with their friends around the tables. Within an hour, there were two hundred well-wishers crowded along the long tables of food, and half as many children, small ones standing close to their mothers’ legs, afraid to stray too far, babes in arms, a few little boys carried about on their fathers’ shoulders, and a slight
distance away from the carefully laid tables, a huge crowd of children running and playing tag, with their parents’ words of caution instantly forgotten. The boys were chasing each other around the trees, as several of the more adventurous ones climbed them, and the girls stood in large groups giggling and talking and laughing, some of them taking turns on the swings Tad had built years before for his own children. They joined their elders briefly from time to time, but on the whole each group was content to ignore the other, the parents assumed that the children were safe nearby, and the children were content that their parents were having too much fun to concern themselves about what their offspring were up to.

And as always, Crystal stood on the fringe of the younger groups, almost forgotten except for an occasional glance of envy or admiration. The girls always eyed her cautiously, and the boys, in recent years, had been fascinated by her, although they expressed it oddly at times, pushing and shoving, and even tugging at the long blond hair, or pretending to spar with her, or push her too hard, or doing anything they could physically to catch her attention, without actually talking to her. And the girls tried not to talk to her at all. Her looks made her much too threatening. She was set apart from them without understanding why. It was the price she paid for her beauty. She accepted the way they treated her as something that was, without yet understanding why. Sometimes, when the boys pushed her, and she was feeling brave, she shoved them right back, or hit them, or even tripped them when they annoyed her. It was her only communication with them. And the rest of the time they ignored her. She had known them all since they were born, and yet in recent years, it was as though she had become a stranger. The children were as aware as their elders were of how striking she was, how breathtakingly
lovely. But no one knew how to deal with it. They were simple folk and it was as though in the past year or two, she had become someone different. It had particularly struck the boys coming home from the war, after four years away, they were shocked to see what had happened to Crystal. Always pretty as a little girl, there had been nothing about her at ten to suggest the full force of her beauty as she became a woman. But part of her appeal was that she was as yet unaware of her effect on the men around her, and she was still as patient and good-natured as she had been as a little girl. If anything, she was shyer now, because she knew her effect on those around her had altered subtly, but she didn’t know why. Only her brother treated her as he always had, with rude affection. But her lack of awareness about her looks made her innocence all the more sensual, a fact of which her father was well aware, and for two years now he had told her to stop hanging around the ranch hands. He knew exactly what they were thinking and why, and he didn’t want Crystal unwittingly doing something to provoke them. Her gentleness and silent way of moving among them was far more arousing than walking past them stark naked.

But Tad wasn’t worried about her now, as he talked politics and sports and local gossip and grape prices with his friends. It was a happy day for all of them as their friends ate and talked and laughed, and the children played nearby, while Crystal watched them.

Hiroko stood slightly apart from all of them too, beneath the shade of a tree, silent and alone, her eyes never leaving her husband. Boyd was talking to Tom in a circle of friends, reminiscing about the war. It was hard to believe it had ended less than a year before. It seemed lifetimes behind them now, with its terrors and its excitement, the friends they had made, and those they had lost. Only Hiroko stood there now, as a living reminder of
where they had been, and what they still remembered. She was eyed with open hostility, and none of the women approached her. Even her sister-in-law, Ginny Webster, was careful to shun her. Ginny was wearing a tight pink dress, low cut over her full bosom, with a matching jacket with little white polka dots, and a peplum which accentuated her shapely bottom. She was laughing even louder than the rest, and flirting with all of Boyd’s friends, just as she had years before when Boyd brought them home after school and she tried to captivate her brother’s buddies. But her effect and her style were far different from Crystal’s. She was overtly sexual with her bright red hair and her tight dress and her obvious makeup. She had been talked about for years, and the men loved to slip an arm around her shoulders and get a good look down her dress to her ample bosom. It brought back memories for many of them. Since she’d turned thirteen, Ginny had always been generous with her favors.

“What you got there, Ginny?” The groom sidled up to her, smelling of something stronger than the wine Tad was serving. A few of the men had been drinking whiskey in the barn, and Tom had, as always, been quick to join them. He eyed her now with obvious interest as he squeezed her close to him, and let his hand slip under her jacket. She was holding Becky’s bouquet, but he wasn’t referring to the flowers. He was looking straight into her cleavage. “Did you catch the bouquet? Guess you’re next.” He laughed raucously, displaying good teeth and the smile that had won Becky’s heart years before. But Ginny knew more of him than that, which to some, was no secret.

“I told you I’d be getting married pretty soon, Tom Parker.” She giggled at him, and he pulled her even closer, as Boyd blushed and looked away from his sister
and his friend, catching sight of his tiny ivory bride, watching them from the distance. Boyd felt a pang as he looked at Hiroko then. It was rare that he left her side, but today, as Tom’s best man, it was hard to be as attentive to her as he would have liked. But as Ginny and Tom teased and laughed, Boyd quietly slipped away, and went to find Hiroko. She smiled as he approached, and he felt his heart tug as it always did when he looked into her gentle eyes. She had brought him comfort a long way from home, and she had been devoted to him every moment since she’d arrived in the valley. It broke his heart to see how unkind people were to her. Despite his friends’ warnings in Japan, he hadn’t been prepared for the viciousness of their words, or the doors that had slammed in their faces. More than once, he had thought of moving away, but this was his home, and he wasn’t going to run away, no matter what they said or did to him. It was only Hiroko he worried about. The women were so unkind to her, and the men were worse. They called her a gook and a Jap, even the children wouldn’t talk to her, having been told not to by their parents. It was a far cry from her gentle loving family in Japan.

“You okay?” He smiled down at her, and she bent her head and nodded and then looked up at him shyly in the way that always made his heart melt.

“I’m fine, Boyd-san. It is very handsome party.” He laughed at her choice of words and she looked embarrassed and then giggled. “No?”

“Yes.” He leaned over and kissed her gently, not giving a damn who was watching. He loved her and she was his wife, and to hell with them if they couldn’t understand it. His red hair and freckles stood out in sharp contrast to her ivory skin and jet-black hair which she wore in a neat bun at the nape of her neck. Everything about her was simple and neat and nicely put together. And her family
had been just as shocked as his own when they had told them they were getting married. Her father had forbidden her to see Boyd again, but in the end, in the face of Boyd’s kindness and gentle ways and obvious love for the girl, in spite of themselves and her mother’s tears, they had relented. Hiroko had told them nothing in her letters of the brutal reception she had met in the Alexander Valley, she told them only about the little shack where they lived, the beautiful countryside, and her love for Boyd, making it all sound simple and easy. When she first arrived she had known nothing of the internment camps for the Japanese during the war, or the fury and scorn she would meet in California.

“Did you eat?” He felt guilty, realizing how long he had left her alone, and he suddenly suspected, correctly, that she hadn’t eaten. She had been too shy to approach any of the long tables surrounded by their neighbors. “I am not very hungry,
Boyd-san.
It is warm.”

“I’ll get you something right now.” She was slowly growing accustomed to Western food, although most of what she cooked for them was the Japanese style he had come to love in Japan and that her mother had taught her. “I’ll be right back.” He kissed her again and hurried toward the tables, still laden with the food Olivia and her mother had prepared, and then as he started back toward her with a plate, he stopped, unable to believe his eyes. Still carrying Hiroko’s long-delayed lunch, Boyd hurried toward the tall, dark-haired man shaking hands with Tom Parker. He stood out from the rest of the guests in a dark blue blazer and white slacks, with a bright red tie, and an aura about him that bespoke a world of ease far, far from the valley. He was only five years older than Boyd, and he looked different now, but they had been close friends in the Pacific. Spencer Hill had been his commanding officer and Tom’s, he had even come to
Boyd and Hiroko’s wedding in Kyoto. And as Boyd approached him with a broad grin, Spencer was shaking Tom’s hand and congratulating him, looking suntanned and at ease, and as comfortable there as he had been in Japan in his uniform. He was a man who seemed at ease anywhere, his deep blue eyes seemed to take in the whole scene at a glance and a moment later he was laughing at Boyd Webster.

“Well, I’ll be damned … you again! The freckle-faced kid! How’s Hiroko?” Boyd was touched that he remembered her name, and he smiled as he waved toward the trees where she was standing.

“She’s fine. Christ, it’s been a long time, Captain….” Their eyes met in instant memory, of the pain they had shared, and the fears, but there had been more than that, there had been a closeness that would never come again. A closeness born of sorrow and excitement and terror, and victory too. But the victory had seemed a small moment compared to the rest, and it was the years before that they all remembered. “Come and say hello to her.” Spencer excused himself from the group and left Tom to his cohorts, in high spirits by then, and anxious to get back to the barn for more whiskey.

“How’ve you been? I wondered if you’d be here. Or if the two of you would have moved to the city by now.” He had often thought that it would be easier for them to live in a place like San Francisco or Honolulu, but Boyd had been determined to go home to the valley he had so often talked of.

Hiroko’s eyes filled with surprise and she bowed when she saw him. As Spencer smiled down at her, she looked as tiny and delicate as she had a year before at her own wedding. But there was something more in her eyes now, a wisdom and sadness that hadn’t been there before, and
Spencer easily suspected that the past year had been neither kind nor easy.

“You look beautiful, Hiroko. It’s good to see you both again.” He gently took her hand in his own, as she blushed, not daring to look up at him, as her husband watched them. The Captain had been so decent to both of them, he had done everything he could to discourage them from getting married, but in the end, he had stood by Boyd as he had all his men, in battle and out. He was the kind of man his men knew they could always turn to. He was strong and intelligent and kind, and relentless when they let him down, which they seldom did. There had been few men in his command who didn’t want to live up to the example he set them. He worked hard, fought alongside them, and was seemingly tireless as they struggled to win the war, and now it was so strange … it was over, and here they were, halfway around the world, safe again, yet none of it was forgotten. “It’s been a long time, hasn’t it?” Spencer’s eyes met Boyd’s, and he saw something older and wiser there, they had both seen pain together in the war. Yet, out of uniform the handsome captain seemed much younger than he had the last time they’d met, when Boyd left Japan for San Francisco.

“I didn’t know you’d be here today,” Boyd said quietly, happier to see him than Spencer knew. He was the first person who had spoken kindly to Hiroko since she’d arrived in California in September. “Tom didn’t tell me.”

“He was probably too busy thinking about his bride.” Spencer smiled a wide easy smile at them both. “I wrote and told him I’d try to come, but I wasn’t sure myself until a few days ago. I was supposed to be back in New York by now. But I never seem to want to leave California.” He glanced around and Boyd handed Hiroko the plate and urged her to try it, but she was more interested
in their friend than the food, and she set the plate down carefully on a tree stump just behind her.