Dishonoring Jack

Chapter One

 Jack Harrison leaned over the wooden crate filled with letters, a strand of dirty blonde hair escaping from the chignon at the base of her straw sailor's hat. The heat of the summer of 1918 swept through the small brick post office and Jack ached to leave it behind and ride off on her bicycle into the Virginian countryside. A few more minutes, she promised herself. I'll ready the mail for the milkman and go home.

Harold Blackaby, the milkman, also served as the town of Irvington's postman, delivering the mail that Jack received and sorted every day. With the genesis of the Great War and the departure of most of the able-bodied men, women like Jack volunteered to take over jobs previously only available to men. Jack rather liked the blurring of the line between men's and women's duties; she herself had never fit into the categories society provided, and she much preferred to contribute to the war effort through building bombs and sorting mail than embroidering handkerchiefs or writing love letters.

As Jack sorted through the mail, her fingers caught on a missive addressed to a familiar name: Frances Hunt. Curiosity piqued, she pulled the letter from the stack and searched for the sending address. When she found what she sought, Jack's breath caught in her throat and her face blanched. Roy. Of course, she'd heard from the gossips in town that Roy had joined the Army, and like thousands of other young men, he had been sent to France, but she'd thought nothing of it. Jack had not spoken to Roy in many years, avoiding him when she could and looking the other way when they were so unfortunate as to cross paths in town. He had not been part of her life for so many years that she now barely spared him a second thought--until today, that is.

Jack didn't need to open the letter from Washington to know what it said. She had distributed too many of these letters on days previous. It is my painful duty to inform you that a report has been received from the War Office notifying the death of Roy Hunt. The words soaked into Jack's heart long untouched by Roy Hunt with the power of cold winter rain. An image of the man in his youth appeared before Jack, Roy with his misty green eyes and blonde curls and ready laugh. Though Jack had long learned to forget Roy, this letter brought him back to her in stunning clarity.

For a moment, she tried to imagine how he died. Torn apart by a mortar shell? Shot through the heart? Worn down by weeks of dysentery or pneumonia? Killed by the new strand of the Spanish flu sweeping Europe and the world at large? Jack shivered at the gory images that appeared before her. The Great War had killed thousands of other men, and Roy was no different. Still more mothers' sons and women's husbands would perish before the great bloodshed concluded. She should be grateful that the letter wasn't addressed to her niece, Christina, whose beau also fought in France. Still, Roy was dead.

Jack straightened her broad shoulders, clenching the letter in her hand. She would have to ride to the home of Frances Hunt, Roy's mother, and hand-deliver the letter as she did with all letters of this type. The people of Irvington had learned to pray against Jack Harrison riding her bicycle to their front door. She was the grim reaper of Irvington, always bearing bad news. Jack fetched her messenger bag, slipping the letter inside, and slung it over her shoulders, slamming the door of the post office behind her and emerging into the sunny outdoors.

The Virginia summer sun temporarily blinded her as it cast its honeyed hues across the open fields and cobblestone streets of Irvington. If it weren't for the oppressive cloud hanging over her, the warmth of the sunshine and the chirps of the songbirds in the nearby elms would have brought a smile to Jack's face, but not today. With the arrival of that letter, the decade that stood between Jack and her memories of Roy had evaporated and she felt like she was still a young, naive girl in love with a boy known for trouble.

Jack lifted her chin and stared at the sun through squinted eyes. Despite the war, despite the death and the loss, Jack had lived long enough to know that the sun would still continue to shine.