Wilbur hadn't experienced the war firsthand, but the war had left its mark on him just the same, the same as it did to any soul living in Britain in the decades following. He had grown up haunted by the specter of the war. It hung like a miasma, sometimes a mere dust cloud, sometimes dense and threatening. Sometimes it coalesced into a sinister form, a pounding fist. It's finger print was everywhere and on everyone.
There were times, though he never told his elders, that he wished he had been alive during the war; maybe he would better understand why people spoke in hushed tones, with faraway eyes, a catch in their throat, and a bitter but brave sense of nostalgia.
There was a peculiar pride his elders wore– for having survived the horror, for having done their part to aid the victory– and a brusk dismissal for those, like him, who had come after. His generation would never know (hopefully) and could never understand the fear, sense of comradeship, and collective hate that bound together the generations that lived, fought, and lost loved ones in the years of battle.
The war was imprinted on them, in worry lines and in a frugality of spirit that they rationed as carefully as they had petrol, sugar, and butter. Sometimes mid laugh, a person would catch themselves, and with a gulp, swallow their excess mirth, ashamed at having let it break forth.
So much had been lost, and so much more sacrificed, in the effort to maintain freedom, and maintain a manner of life, which somehow had been lost just the same. The stiff upper lip that Brits were known for wasn't the result of that one war; it had been bred into them over centuries of making do, toiling with bent backs and weary optimism. They knew how to rebuild with the tumbled bricks and rubble of wars, disease, famines, and cultural unrest, they'd been doing it since forever.
Wilbur had inherited the stiff upper lip, but his tended to curl into a smile if he wasn't careful. He bore survivor's guilt even though he hadn't been born when the war was raging. He always felt a step behind, as if he needed to apologize for not having been through the great shared experience that shaped them all.
It was a case of the haves and have-nots, akin to the way that people with old money sneered at people with new money. Being born in the shadow of war wasn't the same as having lived through it. The new generation might be bent under the burden of the country recovering, struggling to get upright, but this new generation hadn't been broken and healed over. The new generation wouldn't ache with pain when the clouds of memories gathered, or the thunder of conflict echoed in the distance.
Wilbur feared war, though he didn't fully comprehend it. He knew that mass death, destruction, and cruelty were things to be avoided but there was something bleak and desperate that was beyond his understanding.
He, and those of his generation, bore the guilt and shame of freedom not earned, not sacrificed for. He'd inherited a gift he knew not the price of, yet he understood that it was of such great value that if he scraped and labored every day of his life, he could never repay his debt.
His generation searched for ways to address that burden. Some swallowed the seed of their parent's pain and let it grow and fester inside until it burst out angry and violent. They fought their own personal wars on every front they could find. They blamed those before them for the damage and destruction they felt was their duty to bear and repair.
Others leaped the fence between then and now, before and after, and took a more optimistic protest. We'll not repeat the past, we'll take the rubble and rebuild better, fresh, and free! Spit on the old, welcome in the new! As long as it was different it was better.
Some sought to rebuild the past– the way things had been before the wars– golden days they'd heard of but never experienced. Days when people knew their class and place, before the newfangled nonsense that had led to war. People not knowing their place, that was the problem, if people would just stay where they belonged…
The common thread was anger, and the needle ticked back and forth between pessimism and the vow of 'never again', not quite optimism, but its second cousin…once removed.
Growing up the children hadn't understood that they were still fighting their parents' wars. They didn't know that many of their rhymes and games had been conceived in the dark miseries of the past. They only knew that if they laughed too loud the grown-ups shushed them, pursed their lips and shook their heads. Happiness was sought after, yet frowned upon if you actually stumbled into it. It was suspect. You were meant to be content, accepting your lot, but not actually happy. You hadn't earned the right to be happy. The ones who had earned the right,seemed to have forgotten how to be happy, and weren't comfortable with being reminded.
It was a different world now, but not different enough. The best one could do was have lots of babies to replace those that had been lost, work hard, live frugally and respect their elders.
When spats broke out on the playground, and they often did, words were shouted that stung to the core. "What do you know? Your dad didn't fight, he's a scrimshank. My father said he was always a bit of a dodger."
"Do you even know who your father is? My mother told me what your mother was like during the war."
Children who had been friends one minute, were bitter enemies the next, hurling insults they didn't understand but had heard spoken at home. By the time they were teens they had gathered into factions, gangs, and forms, depending on their social standing. Oh how the English loved their classes and more so the division between the classes.
Everything in its place, everyone in their place, neaten up the queue, straighten your collar, you there! Where do you think you're going? Don't use that tone with me!
Wilbur's father had been to war, on the front lines. Never worked harder in his life, hoped never to work that hard again. Yet he seemed to bear it better than most. He smoked, and his face wore the deep lines of weary deprivation, but he didn't have that fractured look about him.
His father spoke of the war with the same bitterness as the other grownups. He talked about the hard times, building back after. How the deprivations continued long after the arms had been laid down. But he also spoke with frustration about how tenaciously people clung to the war, afraid to let it go, let it be the past.
People were very divided on that. Some were so relieved it was over, they wanted to leave it behind and move on. They wanted everything different and colorful and expansive. They shrugged off the old ways, wore the new styles, and listened to the new music.
His father sided with them, even though he himself didn't personally embrace all things bright and new. He still wore the same dark suits, the same old-fashioned hats, and sometimes sang the old songs, not because he thought they were better, but because they were familiar.
He wanted Wilbur to have new things, to embrace life. When he shared stories of the dark times he didn't do it to burden his son, but to inform him. It was their shared history, and Wil needed to understand it, but his father never wanted him to relive it, or bear the weight of it. Wil's father was a bit of an odd duck, but he kept up with the times.
Wilbur recalled seeing his father laughing and dancing the new steps to the new music with his mother. Well, not the NEW music, but the music that was new for old people. Wil's generation's music the older people swore, was just a mixture of noise and insolence.
They weren't wrong exactly, it was full of insolence and disrespect, but it wasn't all noise. Enfolded deep within the sound and lyrics was hope, beneath the tense brittle energy and throb of sexual desire, there was hope, that things could be different. And that the youth would seek it through trial and error until they found a way.
Wilbur's father wanted better for him. Wil wasn't certain it was for his own sake, or out of respect for his mother. His parents weren't together. They weren't enemies they were just very different from one another. After the war victory made as many strange bedfellows as the war itself had. People reached for any good thing near at hand, wanting to feel something different than what they had felt for years.
When Wil was 25 he went on tour with his mother. For two entire, blissful, astounding years he had traveled with her around the world once and again. And what he had experienced, what he had absorbed into his very being was hope, far away from the sights and sounds of reconstruction, away from the grey skies of England. They had visited many war-torn, and war-devastated lands, but they had also been to many places untouched by war. Places that didn't have the stink of death, bombs and tears, but smelled like earth and Sunshine and new life.
What he learned while traveling with his mother is that the earth always renews itself. Nothing is ever beyond the reach of hope and growth, never. From the most terrible places of destruction and death, plants sprang forth and deer came to nibble them. Be it war, volcanoes, earthquakes or floods, life sprang anew.
Rain washed away the soot, and where airplanes had been shot down, trees now grew in the wreckage, and foxes denned in the cockpits. On the plains of Africa elephants and zebras grazed. Birds in their billions seemed to follow him and his mother everywhere they went.
And Wil, though his mother called him Mulberry, learned to laugh without self-consciousness. He stopped looking over his shoulder and tensing for a reprimand. He felt free to enjoy whatever life had to offer, for as long as it lasted. He learned too, of course, that nothing lasted long, but that it wasn't meant to. Change was the way of things, and it was holding on, holding back, and refusing change that brought destruction.
He learned to follow the call of life, and in his own way to call life forward. It seemed to him, that life responded to one's willingness to engage with it. The more one was open to life, the more life flowed to them and through them. The more one participated, the more they were included in the dance.
His father refused to call him Mulberry. He said it was silly, a child's name, but Mulberry's mother loved it. She said that people often outgrew their given names, and were gifted new ones by those who loved them. Those were the best sort of names, bestowed by those that know us best. His new name was the gift of a childhood friend, a legacy left to him on her deathbed.
His mother said 'Mulberry' suited him, fresh, juicy, bursting with flavor and color. Mulberry trees provided pleasant shade to sit or play beneath. Mulberry leaves were consumed by caterpillars who spun it into silk worn by Queens and Emperors and used in ball gowns and monk's robes. It was a wonderful name, and coming from his mother's lips it sounded like music, laughter and destiny all wrapped in one.
He was heartsick when his time with his mother came to an end. He'd see her again in a year, but it wouldn't be the same. The glorious sense of freedom they had shared he feared he would never feel again. He told her as much, asking if they couldn't do another go round the planet; there were still places he had not yet seen.
"Freedom is something we carry in our hearts Mulberry," she had told him, but he'd been in no mood for philosophies or platitudes.
"I don't want to return to Dad, I prefer your line of work."
"What we do isn't all that different."
He could hardly believe his ears, how could she say such a thing? What they did couldn't be any more different. They were opposites, as far apart as the stars and the depths of the sea..
She read his face. She actually flinched, the way he looked at her was so accusatory, she had never, ever lied to him, he couldn't believe she would do it now.
"Listen." She took his face in her hands before he could turn away in disgust. "Your father and I both work in service; what we do is necessary. I know it seems that what I do is…better, kinder, but think about it. THINK about it," she implored him.
He backed away. "But…" But there is nothing in the Universe that is all good or all bad. Sometimes Springtime brought floods or blew in hot and dry. Some years a late frost shriveled the hopeful crops just as they had begun to grow. He knew that sometimes death was a blessing, the end of suffering, going home to meet their loved ones who had gone before. It made room and made way for the next generation.
His mother was wearing a sad smile, but she held her hands out to him. "You know…"
He nodded and took her hands. Nothing was as simple as he would like it to be, or maybe it was too simple…and he was trying to complicate it.
"You are a miracle, the best of both of us. You have such gifts–" she said drawing him close. "It would be selfish to keep you with me, when so many have need of what you have to offer."
"What? Bring life with one hand, kill with the other? What if I mix them up one day and…" He drew a finger across his neck.
"You know it's not like that. You know the power of intention."
He squeezed her hand in acknowledgment, but shoved the other one down into his pocket. Still not ready to concede.
"You understand that life is short, just a season, and how important it is to make the most of it."
He nodded. "So many people exist but barely live." He'd seen so much in his short time on Earth.
"But it doesn't have to be that way. Sometimes people want to love and laugh, to live, but they don't know how. Or they are waiting for permission."
Mulberry nodded again. Certainly Britain, and a large part of the rest of the world had been in exactly that quagmire following the war. They wanted to, maybe they even remembered how, but they were holding back, waiting…fearing…uncertain.
"You know that my work is mostly waking things up, you have that gift too," she reminded him.
"You love what you do."
His mother nodded and smiled.
"And my father–" His throat was dry and he found it hard to force the words out. "He loves his work…mostly."
"He understands how important it is, and that…it's a privilege Mulberry, what we do is a privilege, to serve. Not many could do what your father does without having it turn them cruel or power-hungry."
Mulberry sighed. "He seems…indifferent…sometimes anyway."
"He's not indifferent, but he understands priorities."
Mulberry let out a sarcastic snort. "Priorities. That's his word. He's always reminding me about priorities."
"They matter. Life is more than trying to feel good all the time. More than trying to avoid pain."
He understood that. Seeking pleasure and frantically trying to avoid pain brought on more misery than almost anything. Relentlessly chasing pleasure was a long, slow, sad death.
"The golden light…that smells of peaches." He smiled in spite of himself. "I'd like to share a bit of that with people, while they still have time…to live a little."
"And you can. That's your gift. You've seen both sides."
He frowned with frustration. He thought he understood, but he wasn't sure how to go about it. Having a foot in both worlds might seem like a wonderful thing, but he felt like he hadn't quite mastered either one.
"You'll learn." His mother must have read his mind.
He took his hand from his pocket and embraced her.
"Son." A voice came from behind.
The voice made him stiffen, and his heart sped up. "Dad." He spoke without turning around. He spoke with his face buried in his mother's hair.
"I don't have to ask if you've had a good time. I don't think anyone could spend time with your mother and not enjoy it." His father's voice was just one notch below charming. It was comforting, calming, believable. But it wouldn't take much to make the leap to smarmy, Wil thought.
"You are very much like him," she whispered in his ear.
He swallowed down his protest. Seemed that she'd read his mind again. He didn't like that she was right. Like his father, Mulberry had a way with people. He had to keep it in check, the temptation to take things just a little too far. Charisma was a dangerous gift in the wrong hands.
Wil turned. "Hello, Dad." He smiled, then went and embraced the man. "I had a wonderful time. It's good to see you." The last part came out more hopeful than honest.
His father gave him a genuine smile. He loved his son, there was no doubt in Wil's mind that his father loved him. He wasn't an indulgent man, but he was reliable and intelligent, and had quite a sense of humor, if you were bright enough to catch it.
Wil's mother sighed. "I hate to give him up, but…" She shrugged. "It's time he goes out on his own. Time for us to share him with the world."
Wil watched his parents share a smile. In spite of the crow's feet around both their eyes, he could see in a flash how they must have been when young, when they'd fallen in love, when they'd found solace and hope in one another.
He felt he understood how they must have craved each other, but at the same time know that they couldn't stay together. They each had their calling, and that trumped desire, in the end. They understood their duty, to the world, and to their son.
"I'll see you…" His mother tapped her chin. "In about 9 months." She gave a firm nod.
"Yes!" He didn't bother to blink away the tear from the corner of his eye.
"And you'll have a lot to tell me." It was more of an order than anything.
"I will," he promised.
"Goodbye Mulberry!" She turned away.
"Mulberry!" His father rolled his eyes. "I guess it doesn't surprise me that she took to it."
"You know Dad, how it is when someone you love has a name for you?"
His father gave a cryptic smile and nodded. "I guess I do. It's a bit like music to your ears."
"The friend who named me Mulberry…she saw something in me. She…made me see something in myself." Wil had never tried to explain it to his father. "That's what I want to do. I want to help people see something in themselves."
His father seemed to consider it and looked at his son with a smidgen of astonishment and more than a little pride. "Alright. But it takes more than going about giving people silly names."
"It takes a lot to turn a ship." Wil quoted, though he didn't know where he'd heard it.
He just wanted his father to know that he understood.
"Well, I've been meaning to talk to you. Your Aunt–"
"Aunt Pesty." Will surmised.
His father nodded. "She and I have worked together for quite a while but…I've been thinking of taking a different tack. A new field…for me."
Wil was puzzled. Death was death, wasn't it?
"There's been an opening in work with the elderly. I know you often think I'm…heartless. I admit, the war, then all those children…but someone had to do it, and I did it properly. With respect, and in spite of what you might think…"
"It's ok Dad, I understand…sort of."
"It's time for someone with more energy and less…well, it's time for someone new to take that on. There are a lot of people who need our help, and I thought maybe…well, you could go in before me. People sometimes have last wishes…regrets they need to take care of, you know the sort of thing."
"The sorts of things that people killed in war and epidemics don't get the chance to do," Wil summed up.
"That's right." His father smiled. "You can go in, and help them sort things out…or whatever needs to be taken care of. People who've lived good long lives, they deserve the chance to put things in order. You'll need to be discreet of course." His tone changed.
"You've taught me well," Wil said truthfully. He didn't particularly like 'discreet' but he could do it when he needed to. He preferred his mother's more effusive approach, but that didn't suit for all purposes."
"It's good to have you, home son." His Dad clapped him on the shoulder.
Home? He guessed his father was right. This was home. England. In many ways, he was a citizen of the world, but if he had to call one place home, this was it.
"Yeah Dad, it's good to be home." He looked around, there was evidence of his mother everywhere. Good smells, bursting buds, potential. He carried that within himself, it was his gift, potential.
XXX