FF: Day of Infamy
Disclaimer: The characters from the Ghost and Mrs. Muir do not belong to me. They are the property of 20th Century Fox and David Gerber Productions. George Feeney belongs to Buena Vista Television or he will when he grows up.
Summary: Carolyn shares her memories of Pearl Harbor with her daughter.
Warning: This story contains the word Jap. It is necessary to maintain the feel of the story. It was a common usage during the time this story is set. To not use it would not keep the integrity of the time. No offense is meant.
I got this idea when Debbie said her birthday was December 7. I hope you all enjoy it. Thanks to Mary for the great edit.
December 7, 1941. Candy had stared at the date so long, it had burned it's image in her retinas. If she re-traced it one more time she would go through the paper. Letting out a huge sigh, she wrote it again, hoping it would help. It didn't. It was now on there twice, and she still didn't have any ideas.
"That has got to be one of the saddest faces, I've ever seen." her mother came walked into the kitchen, her ever-present coffee cup in her hands. Candy watched as the woman walked over to the stove, poured herself yet another cup, and took a sip. "Anything I can help you with?"
"I don't know." Candy shook her head, smiling up at her mother. "I have to write a paper on the impact of Pearl Harbor, for the 30th anniversary, but, gee, Mom, it's so hard to do, because I don't really understand it. I mean I know the Japanese attacked and then the President declared war, but it's really just a bunch of words in a history book."
She watched the color drain from her mother's face, as she sat down at the chair beside her. "Can I read what the book says?" Carolyn asked her, reaching for the copy of Our American Heritage that Candy had laying out beside her paper.
"Sure." Candy handed her the book, watching as her mother silently read the page dedicated to the event. To Candy it was just a boring mention in what was becoming an increasingly boring subject. But as her mother read the words, she could see the light going out of her eyes and the tightness of her lips. To her mother, it was something very different.
"Well, they have the facts right." Carolyn said, pushing the book away. "But they don't really capture the essence of it."
"It happened so long ago." Candy sighed. "I mean, thirty years is a long time."
"And yet in many ways." Carolyn sighed, fingering the pages. "It seems just like yesterday. I still remember how scared I was."
NNNNNN
It was a Sunday like any other Sunday. Carolyn had gotten up and eaten her usual Sunday breakfast of bacon, eggs and cinnamon rolls, washing it down with a glass of milk. She half-listened as her parents discussed their plans for the day, first, church, of course, then Mama was going to have Mrs. Feeney and Ellen Muir over for tea. She knew that Mr. and Mrs. Muir had just recently moved in next door with their five children and that Ben was very handsome and funny, Lizzie had given her a cookie and Rich was annoying and called her names. She had heard her mother tell her father that she wanted the family to feel welcome, which was fine with Carolyn if that didn't have to include Richard.
She didn't quite catch where her Daddy was going, but it was where ever Daddy's went on their days off, she was sure.
Asking to be excused, she went up the stairs to her room, wishing she could stay home just this once. Her grandmother had sent her a new doll , just yesterday, and she was itching to play with it. She was so pretty, with long brown curls and a bright smile and had three outfits.
"Lynnie, are you getting dressed?" her father paused outside her bedroom door. "We don't
want to be late today, I have to give the invocation."
"Yes," she sighed.
"All right, sweetie. Ten minutes, all right?"
Carolyn glanced at her clock, a present from her father for learning to tell time. She loved the clock — it had a pendulum and played a pretty tune on the half-hour. Daddy told her he didn't know any other five-year-old that could tell time as good as she could. Which made her wonder how many five-year-olds her father knew?
Putting on her new green plaid dress, her other grandfather Williams had given her for her birthday just a few days before, she came down the stairs with her hairbrush and ribbon in hand. "I'm ready Mommy." She turned around to allow her mother to take the curlers out of her hair and try to keep them in long enough to tie them back in the ribbon.
"There, don't you look pretty?" Emily Williams kissed the top of her head. "All right, get your coat. We mustn't be late."
Carolyn loved the opening of the service — the organ sounded like what she imagined the ocean must be like when it pounded the land, the rustling sound the choir made as every member rose up like one person, the song of welcome they sang to the congregation. She loved to sit with her eyes closed and listen as the chosen deacon of the week, said his prayer. Today was even more of a thrill, because it was her father. As she sat quietly, eyes closed, she thought about how important her Daddy must be to get to stand behind the pulpit and say a prayer aloud to God.
She enjoyed the hymns afterwards as well. Singing was fun, but so was watching other people sing. She enjoyed looking at the faces of those around her — the piano player who could sing and play with her eyes closed, the organist who played as though his life depended on it, the preacher who spent the entire song looking in the book, and the many members of the choir who she was sure were only moving their lips.
Looking over across the aisle she saw her friend Susannah, and gave a little wave. It was something
they did every Sunday, made that much dangerous by the fact that if Mr. Munroe caught his daughter he would give her the 'stare.' Carolyn knew that the Fraser's would be sitting behind them and she turned slightly to see Doug, also five, trying to take his tie off, while his mother shook her head severely.
But after the hymns and the offering was taken, church lost all interest for her. Doing her five-year-old best, she would sit quietly, trying not to swing her legs, or yawn too big. Sometimes Mama would lean over and give her a peppermint or a butterscotch and even though she was a very big girl now, Daddy would still take her on his lap and let her dry pictures on pieces of paper he kept inside his Bible.
The closing hymn was always her favorite because it meant they could go home. After the benediction, she was allowed to go over to find her friends and go play with them until her parents came to collect her.
Today she was playing chase with Susannah and Doug and Ellie Muir when she saw Richard out of the corner of her eye. He was such a messy little boy, she thought, with his tangled hair and freckled face. Even dressed in his church suit, he looked dirty. Today, he had his cousin Robert with him and she stopped for a minute to look over at the older boy. Robert was tall and so handsome she thought, and she liked the way he smiled, she couldn't help but smile back. She knew that Robert's family didn't go to First Presbyterian, but rather were members of the Our Lady's Episcopal on Arch Street. She had gone there with her other best friend Janie Updyke one time and had seen Robert Muir there.
She knew from listening when she probably shouldn't have been, that Ralph Muir, Robert's father, didn't often speak to his brother Charles who now lived beside her and her family, very often. She didn't know why, but family not talking to one another seemed rather mean to her. Maybe it was one of those things she would understand when she grew up.
"Carolyn, time to go," she heard her mother's voice call out to her.
"Coming, Mama," she called back, tagging Doug because she could and then hurrying away. She saw Richard smirk at her out of the corner of her eye and she shook her head. "Hey Puddin Head." he teased her, but she ignored it. She was so much more grown up than that.
NNNNN
Sunday dinner was always a very formal occasion, even if it was just the three of them, which today it was. She sat quietly and listened to her parents talk about everything from the fact that Carolyn needed a new winter coat to the situation in Europe. She knew that the word she had trouble wrapping around her tongue, really meant war, but like everything else, she knew if you stayed quiet, you would learn more that way.
"The Situation," as everyone seemed to call it, was talked about much more often now then it used to be. She could catch words ever so often like "Germany" and "Hitler" and "bombs" and "Britain," but none of them really made any sense. The fact that these words were often said very quietly, made her afraid of them. And Friday she had met a girl who was living with the Kingston's who had come from England, because her family no longer had a home and she had no safe place to live.
"Lynnie, do you feel all right?" Her father looked over at her, a smile on his face that made her feel better right away.
"I'm very good," she nodded.
"You are very well," her mother corrected.
"Yes, ma'am," she nodded again. "I am very good and well."
Her father got up from his chair, headed for the back door and stopped to give her a kiss. "I'll be back to tuck you in for your nap in a minute."
She hated nap-time more than anything in the world. She wasn't tired, and she didn't want to lie in bed and pretend to be. Why did she have to take a nap every Sunday? She would rather watch Mama and whatever company she might have that day , or go out and play with George Feeney from next door or at least take Fletcher for a walk. When she suggested one time that she would like to take him around the block, her father and mother laughed so hard, tears came to their eyes, her mother finally getting up to hug her.
"Honey, Fletcher is a big old dog, he would end up taking you for a walk."
Why was being little so hard sometimes?
Going up to her room with slow steps, she went inside, closing the door. Taking as much time as possible, she took off her dress, slip and tights, laying them carefully in the chair like she knew she should, then pulled on a blouse and a pair of coveralls. No one said you had to wear night clothes to take a nap, and if she dressed now, she might have time to go and play with George when she woke up. Then she remembered. George wasn't home right now. His father had taken the boy and his sister to New York to visit their grandparents.
Flopping down on the bed, she wished she could think of a word to say when you got angry that wouldn't make grownups frown, or say 'where in the world did you hear that?' Or even worse, get a spanking.
Tossing and turning on her bed, she stared at the ceiling, then turned over to look at the floor, back to the ceiling, then staring at the wall. She must have drifted off to sleep, because the next thing she knew the clock was making it's chime and she could see it was two o'clock. So, it wasn't a very long sleep, but still she could say yes she had had a nap. Slipping out of bed, she did play with her doll for a few minutes, but she felt restless. She wanted someone to play with.
She wondered if Ellie and Ally Muir had to take naps. If not, maybe she could play with them. Her mother was always telling she needed to spend more time with girls and not so much time with George. "She's going to be a wild heathen," she had heard Emily Williams exclaim on more than one occasion, "playing with boys, the way she does." Both her father and Grandmother Cabot had told her mother not to worry so much, that Carolyn was every inch a girl. Well of course she was a girl everywhere! What did her mother expect?
But until the Muirs had moved in next door, three months ago, there had been no girls to play with. Not unless she was allowed to go three blocks to Janie's house or Janie could come play with her. And she liked George, he had a great imagination — for a boy.
Slipping down the stairs, she sat on the landing, watching her mother the other two women as they sat sipping their tea and talking. Carolyn watched all three of them carefully, coming to the conclusion that her mother was the prettiest. Not that Ellen Muir wasn't nice looking with her brown hair and red dress or Ava Feeney, in her green print certainly wasn't ugly, they just weren't as pretty as Mama. She didn't know how many times she wished for dark hair and eyes like her mother had, instead of plain old yellow hair.
As the women chatted they listened to Sammy Kaye's Sunday Serenade, or silly serenade as she knew her father called it. She really didn't think that Sammy Kaye was all that great of a singer, but she knew her mother adored him. As the musician gave his familiar sign off, Mrs. Muir sighed about how unfair it was that he only had his show on Sunday's.
"We interrupt this program to bring you a special news bulletin. The Japanese have attacked Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, by air, President Roosevelt has just announced. The attack also is made on all naval and military activities on the principal island of Oahu."
"What did he say?" Emily Williams jumped up from her chair, the look on her face, making Carolyn jump up as well.
"Did he say the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor?" Mrs. Feeney stood up quickly, only to sit down just as quickly.
"Maybe some other station will have something." Emily ran to the radio, turning the dial with shaking hands. "Didn't one of the Munroe boys just get sent to Pearl Harbor?"
Carolyn felt like her heart was going to fall out on the ground and her hands felt sweaty. Her stomach hurt and she couldn't breath right. The Japanese had attacked. She didn't know what Pearl Harbor was, but the word attacked stood out like a sore thumb. Attacked from the air. An airplane flew over the house just then, and she shivered.
She heard as another voice came out from the radio saying more or less the same thing as before. The naval base at Pearl Harbor had been attacked this morning at 2:33 am Hawaii time in a surprise invasion by the Japanese Air force. More news would be broadcast later as developments were learned.
"I wish Brad was here," she heard her mother whimper, the way the woman said the words, filling Carolyn with even more terror than before. Jumping up, the five-year-old ran up the stairs and then down the back stairs that led to the kitchen. Without realizing it, she pulled her play coat off the hook and ran out the back door. The day was cold but sunny and she had to blink several times until her eyes adjusted.
Everything looked the same as it had that morning. The house was still standing in its place, the fence freshly painted, still surrounded it. The maple tree was standing tall and bare in the middle of the yard, looking as friendly as it always did. Fletcher's doghouse, still stood under it, as did the bunny hutch. Mr. Nose had died last year, but they had never bothered to take his home away. It looked so lonely now. A bird on a limb of the dogwood that sat between the property lines, started to sing and Carolyn covered her ears. Somehow it didn't seem right that the bird should be so happy. But maybe the bird didn't know about the attack, she reasoned.
She sat down on a chair, plunging her hands deep into her pockets. She wished her father were here. He would be able to tell her not to be afraid, that everything would be all right. She wanted to cry, but she couldn't. She didn't know where Pearl Harbor was or even for sure what the Japanese might be, but she had seen the looks on the women's' faces and she knew it was something very bad. It was bad in that same way grownups whispered the words "Hitler" and the "Blitz" and "prisoner of war." It was the same look when she heard Mrs. Updyke tell Mrs. Fraser that is she had a son, she would rather kill him then let him "over there."
It was the kind of bad that you really couldn't do anything about.
She heard a plane coming closer overhead and she wanted to scream, but nothing came out. What if it were one of those Japanese people coming to attack them? Fear mounted up inside of her, as tears started to roll down her cheeks. She knew she should run, but she couldn't. Then suddenly she stopped crying. Getting up from her chair, she ran to the middle of the yard, staring up into the sky. If it were going to get her, she wasn't going to hide.
"What are you doing?" She heard a voice on the other side of the fence. She knew who it was, it was him, that boy Richard.
"I want to see if it's ours or theirs," she said, with more conviction than she felt. "If it's going to get me, it should be able to see me."
"It's one of ours, you dope." He shook his head scornfully. But she could tell that he was just as afraid as she was. He jumped over the fence, coming to stand beside her, both of them watching as the plane flew by.
"My brother says that Hawaii is clean on the other side of the map," Rich was almost bragging. "He says that the Japs can't get us. We are too far away. And we are smarter."
Carolyn was about to say something, when two more airplanes went overhead, one of the much lower than the other. "Rich," she said in trembly voice, looking up at the sky. "Are they us too?"
He scrunched his eyes up as he looked into the sun, searching for the sign that Ben told him would show what kind of plane it was, when suddenly a siren started off in the distance, getting louder and soon seeming to eat them up where they standing.
"Japs!" Richard cried, grabbing Carolyn's hand, the two five-year -olds running as fast as they could to the woods behind the Williams house. They ran until they couldn't any more, both of them sitting on the ground, trying to get the air back into their lungs.
"What should we do?" He looked at her, forgetting for the moment as the "man" he should always have a plan.
"We can hide in the fort that George and I are building," she told him, getting up to her feet. She brushed the leaves off the back of her coat, not noticing that one of her mittens fell out of her pocket as she did so. "It will be a good place to stay."
The Muir boy nodded, following her at a steady pace. Carolyn knew exactly where she was, and they soon came upon the "fort," a hastily constructed wooden structure, that had pine trees for a roof. Going in the front, she led him over to a small wooden box, pulling out a blanket, which she spread on the ground. "George and I use this for our table," she explained.
Sitting down on the blanket, they stared at each other, both afraid to say anything. The fear of the "Japs" coming to get them was great and they tried not to think about it. But that many planes going over at one time, along with a siren — what else could it be?
"How do you suppose they got here?" Carolyn finally whispered.
"I guess maybe they snuck," was all Rich could think of.
"Do you think they will blow up everything?" Her bottom lip started to tremble. "I've heard Daddy say that Philadelphia is a very important city."
"It's the City of Brotherly Love," the little boy nodded. "And it's historic."
"It's almost as important as New York." Carolyn looked over at him. She had always thought Richard was a messy, dorky boy, but now, he was being so nice.
"I hope everyone's all right," he said, a few minutes later.
Carolyn only nodded, thinking about the look in her mother's eyes when she heard the radio announcement.
"Rich, are you scared?" She looked him straight in the eye.
"No," he shook his head vehemently. "Not one bit."
"Okay." She nodded again, feeling bad as soon as she said it. Mama kept telling her it wasn't a civilized word. Would she ever see Mama again? "All right," she added quickly.
The cacophony of sirens could still be heard in the wood fortress, but it wasn't as loud. Carolyn looked over at two squirrels playing in a tall pine tree, smiling at them, then bursting into tears thinking of Daddy and were he was and whether the Japanese had gotten him.
"Rich?" She wiped her face, with her hands. "What is a Japanese? She was trying not to snuffle, she didn't want Rich to think she was a baby.
"Mr. Yomamoto is a Japanese," he said importantly. "Ben told me so."
"The baker?" Her eyes grew wide. Mr. Yomamoto made the best cookies in the world and he was always very nice. Every time she and Mama went into the good-smelling shop he'd give her a treat and tell her she'd gotten prettier than the last time she had come in. "But he's so nice!"
"My dad says everyone is different." the boy picked at a piece of grass. "Maybe there are good Japs and bad ones?"
"I think that maybe, there are good and bad of everyone." Carolyn hugged her knees.
"I think so, too."
Both were quiet for several minutes, neither one wanting to admit how afraid they were. It was getting colder and they both started to shiver.
"Maybe if we sit together, we could stay warm," Rich suggested and she nodded. Cuddling together, he pulled part of the blanket over her, making sure she was warm.
NNNNNNNN
When Carolyn opened her eyes, it was dark and extremely quiet. Rich was still asleep beside her, his hand clutching hers. She rubbed her eyes with her other hand and wondered where her mitten was. She thought she heard her father calling for her and shook her head to clear it. She wasn't sure if that really worked, but she knew that grownups did that all the time. There it was again. "Daddy?"
"Lynnie! The next thing she knew her father and Rich's father were there, reaching for them, picking them up and holding them tight.
"Lynnie, we were so worried." Her father was kissing her face. "Mama is sick not knowing where you are."
"It was so scary, Daddy." She crushed her head against his chest. "The radio guy was saying the Japanese attacked and then there were sirens and airplanes, and I was so afraid they had gotten you!"
"No, sweet-pea." He hugged her closer. "We are fine. Mr. Muir and I were at the ball game and they told us the news when it was over. We hurried home to find Mama and Ellen and Ava scared and wondering what was happening. We were just glad you were still taking your nap, but then we found out you weren't. I was never so afraid when I went up to your room and you weren't there."
"I'm sorry, Daddy. But I didn't know what to do and Mama looked so scared and then I heard the sirens and I thought they were coming to get us."
"It was a fire." Charles Muir smiled over at her, Richard being held tightly in his arms. "It was only a fire."
She couldn't help but laugh at that. Fires were very bad, but not as bad as they had thought.
Slowly, Carolyn and Richard's father walked back to their homes in the darkness, the sound of crickets, a welcome one.
"I'll see you tomorrow," she heard Mr. Muir tell her father. "Hopefully we will know more of what's going on then."
NNNNNNN
"So what happened then?" Candy was transfixed in her place, like she was watching a movie.
"I never will forget the speech President Roosevelt gave that next night," her mother said, her voice still shaking.
"Nor will I." Martha nodded. Neither one of the Muir's had seen the housekeeper come in.
"What was it like for you, Martha?" Candy turned around to ask.
"Well, I was in San Francisco at the time, living with my brother Marty. He had taken off for the day to go with a friend of his on a picnic, and I had decided to take my free day and do a little window shopping. I was in McGreevy's when I heard the news. I wasn't sure what to think, it seemed so ludicrous to think that on that beautiful sunny Sunday afternoon that such a thing could be happening. I saw my girlfriend, Myra, and we went to a coffee shop, that had the radio on. It soon became full of people waiting for more news. I don't remember what time it was, but a reporter from Hawaii had climbed to the top of a building in Honolulu and with his microphone in one hand and a telephone in the other, he phoned in his report. You could hear the noise all around him and it actually seemed to bring him right there to us. And then in the middle of his report, the operator interrupted him for an emergency call!"
"What could have been more of an emergency than that?" Candy looked up, outraged.
"Exactly what we thought. "But to this day, I will never forget what he said. "This is a real attack. The killing is real, the bombs are real. Everything about this is real."
"Wow!" Candy sat at her seat, not sure how to take it all in. "So it's not just a date in the book. It really did happen. And you both remember it. Thanks, Mom, Martha, that makes is so much easier. I was actually scared there for a minute." She shook her head in the wonderment of what she had just heard and once more picked up her pencil.
"I'm glad we could help." Carolyn got up from her seat and kissed the top of her daughter's head. "It is one thing I will never forget. It was indeed all too real. And you know with everything that happened after that, including my father going to war in the Pacific for a year-and-a-half, none of it was has impressed itself on my mind more than that day."
Candy started writing, pausing after several sentences. "Mom, do you think anything like that could happen again? Could someone sneak in and attack us like that, today?"
"I hope and pray not." Carolyn Muir, folded her hands as though in petition. "I pray for the country, it never happens again."
Yesterday, December 7, 1941 — a date which will live in infamy — the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by the naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan."