The intimacies of marriage both fascinated and frightened Tom. Not the most obvious aspect of it. That part was no longer a mystery to him, thanks to a brief encounter years ago with a college girl from William & Mary. She was doing some historical research at a plantation near his family’s orchard over one weekend and made a very persuasive case to then-eighteen-year-old Tom to spend some time with her in the barn. He’d thought he was in love after that, this creature who swept into his life and seemed so unlike the few girls he knew in the surrounding area. But when he’d borrowed his father’s truck and driven to Williamsburg to visit her, she’d laughed at the wild daffodils he’d picked for her and told him that she preferred the company of academics to farmers.

He didn’t bother to tell her that he’d just been accepted to the University of Virginia. If she could laugh at his past, why should he offer her his future?

After that, he was reluctant to take up with a girl, even though some of the co-eds in Charlottesville presented more than enough opportunities. He knew his mission—join the military after graduation. Or after his master’s degree, if his mother’s influence prevailed. Love and family would come much further down the line, and he didn’t care to playact them casually in the meantime.

But John and Dottie—though he knew her only through John’s descriptions—seemed ideally suited, and Tom’s faith in love was restored through the ardor with which his friend talked about her. It resembled the flame that Tom wanted to feel in his heart for a girl.

Next time, though, he would be more discerning. Love was not instant. He would take his time to really get to know her. Cherish her for what she said and not what else came with a romance.

Whomever and wherever she was.

“You can’t sleep, either, with the freight train in that bed over there?” Tom asked. The room was lit with a streak of moonlight and Tom could see William as he sat up in his cot.

William didn’t sleep well most nights, and Tom had been in on John’s idea to have his sister write letters to him. It seemed to have worked—Margaret Beck had written William a letter, just as John had asked. And though it was no substitute for the ones he’d hoped to receive from his family, it had bolstered him a bit.

He had yet to write her back, but Tom planned to encourage him to remedy that.

“It’s not that. Well, in part, it is. I guess my thoughts keep me up,” William admitted. “That and this damn hand.”