This Light Between Us: A Novel of World War II

Like all of Paris.

My feet took me to Sorbonne. The one place that has always lifted my moods. Whenever I am there, I always imagine myself as a student walking across its beautiful campus with arms full of English literature books. I can see this in my mind so clearly, I can feel it in my heart. I want it so bad it hurts.

Last night in the moonlit courtyard of the Sorbonne, I sat on a cold stone bench. There was a stack of papers left forgotten under it. I picked them up. Handwritten poems. Some candles were left on the ground—a puddle of wax pooled around each. I imagine the group of students gathered here earlier, perhaps a campus poetry club meeting for a nighttime reading.

I stared at the candles, the discarded poems. I stared at the empty campus. Life was passing me by, had moved on without me. And I felt suddenly stripped of substance. Like I no longer mattered. Like I was invisible, a ghost.

I picked up the candles, the sheets of poems, slid them in my bag. I walked. For hours. I did not come upon a single soul. Eventually I found myself on the banks of the Seine. The silhouette of Notre Dame cathedral stood across the river.

Do you remember you once sent me instructions on how to build a Japanese floating lantern? I took a discarded piece of wood from a closed bookstall, and removed from my bag the papers and candles. Ten minutes later, I finished making a crude floating lantern. I walked down a small staircase to the river. I lighted the candle and set the boat down on the Seine. Amazingly, it floated; I half expected it to sink quickly. It was a single lonely flickering light that became smaller and smaller as it drifted down the Seine. When it blinked out and disappeared, I imagined that it hadn’t sunk but instead was floating around the bend, that it was passing the Notre Dame cathedral, the Musée de Sèvres, past, I imagined, the Palais Bourbon, the Mantes-la-Jolie, and all the way through the graceful loops to the Manche, through the Celtic Sea.

And even now, as I close my eyes, I think of it floating across the Atlantic Ocean, on the big black seas, a tiny dot of light. Defying wind and sea, defying the world. And somehow finding its way to the shores of America, to, dear Alex, you.

Charlie

29

DECEMBER 2, 1942

Alex finishes reading both letters. Holds them to his side, the pages shaking. It’s only then that he realizes he’s kneeling on the floor, bent over his cot like a penitent in a pew. He’d somehow fallen while reading the letters. He tries to stand but lacks the strength. His legs gutted, his heart gutted.

He touches the paper. He imagines he can feel against his fingertips the dips of her handwriting, and in the most tenuous of ways, it feels like he is reaching out and touching her.

Then the Maeda family start to bicker. Their voices float over the bedsheet that is hung up as a divider for privacy, and they shatter the illusion.

There is one thing Alex must do, and do immediately. He must let Charlie know he has heard her, and that he hurts for her. Never mind it’ll be weeks before she reads it; he still feels the urgency. He glances at the clock: 3:45 P.M. If he hurries, he can dash off a quick letter, and run to the post office before it closes. He will write again tomorrow, and the day after; he will send her a letter every day even if the postage bleeds him dry.

He arrives at the post office panting hard with only two minutes to spare. There’s only one other patron inside, a well-groomed, well-coiffed man going through some packages. The head clerk at the counter, Miss Geraldine Wool, sees Alex approach the counter with his letter. Her face instantly falls.

“What is it?” Alex asks.

She puckers her lips. “You’re not going to like this, Alex.” She reaches below the counter and brings up a stack of envelopes.

At first Alex’s heart leaps. The top envelope is postmarked and covered in stamps. An international letter! But then he sees. It is his handwriting, not Charlie’s.

“I’m sorry,” the clerk says. “But your letters got returned.”

“No way.” He’s already counting the stamps on the envelope. There’s more than enough to cover the postage. “Did they raise the rate again? You should’ve told me—”

“No—”

“What then?”

“I don’t really know. It just says ‘return to sender.’” She looks impatiently at the wall clock. “I’m sorry. But we’re closing…”

He slides his just-sealed letter over the counter.

“It’s just going to get returned, Alex.”

“I don’t care.”

“You really want to waste your stamps—”

“Just do your job and take it!”

“Fine.” Her lips pinched as she tosses it into a basket.

He’s surprised by his sudden hatred for her. Her chubby cheeks. Her sweaty fingers, how they always stain his mail. Her lilted hellos and good mornings and sorry, nothing for you again, Alex. Her niceness that’s as fake as her painted eyebrows. Her white skin that burns so easily in the summer months, making her look like she’s always blushing.

He walks out. He’s halfway down the block when he feels a tap on his shoulder. A man’s voice. “Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you.”

It’s the well-dressed man who was in the post office. Closer up, he appears younger. Behind his wiry spectacles, intelligent eyes peer at Alex. He’s wearing a plaid wool jacket, and this alone sets him apart from everyone else’s generic redistributed army peacoats.

“I don’t mean to meddle,” the man says in well-articulated English, “but I couldn’t help but overhear your conversation back there in the postal office.”

“Yeah?” Alex says, still angry.

“You’re expecting a letter from France?”

/> Alex nods.

“Well, look, this is none of my business, but there’s been a recent development in France.”

Alex tilts his head toward the man. “What kind of development?”

The man’s face softens with sympathy. “Earlier this month, German forces invaded the unoccupied Vichy zone.” He pauses, seems to consider his words. “And unfortunately, all mail to France, including the Vichy zone now, has ceased. So that probably explains why your letter was returned. I’m sorry.”

“But I just received a letter from there. Today.”

The man touches the rim of his glasses. “It was probably already in transit.”

Alex’s heart sinks. “How do you know all this?”

“The Manzanar Free Press,” the man says with pride.

Alex knows it. The newspaper circulated around Manzanar internment camp, four pages of mimeographed reporting on mostly camp affairs: sports results, weddings, births, deaths, important events, a reminder of rules.

“My name’s Ray Takeda. I’m the editor in chief. We’re not allowed to report on international news. But we hear stuff on the radio. Sometimes the staff hands us newspapers and magazines.” He glances at his watch. “Well, look, I need to run.”

“Hold on,” Alex says. “When can I … you must know of some way I can send my letters to France.”

He pulls his hat lower. “I’m sorry. Not until the war’s over. And that won’t be for a few years yet.” And with that he doffs his cap and walks away, head tucked against the wind.

Standing alone, Alex feels a sharp twinge inside. His lungs collapsing into tight knots, his supply line of oxygen suddenly cut off.

30

DECEMBER 4, 1942

On Friday when the lunch shift ends and most of the staff have already left, Alex is finishing up in the kitchen. The only other people in the kitchen—two senior staffers—are shooting the breeze at the prep table. This is the one-hour dead time before the dinner crew arrives.