Chapter 15 - WHAT MERCER REMEMBERED
Later, I found Thomas Mercer alone on the terrace.
The city lights shimmered beyond the hotel garden.
He had removed the Navy Cross pin and was turning it between his fingers.
“Why did you bring that?” I asked.
“I almost did not.”
He handed it to me.
“Your mother gave me the news that you were gone three days before the action that earned it.”
I knew the citation.
His ship had taken fire while protecting a medical evacuation.
Mercer had crossed an exposed deck twice to pull wounded sailors to safety.
“I was not brave,” he said.
“I was furious.”
“At Mom?”
“At the world.”
He looked toward the ballroom.
“For years, I wondered whether grief had made me reckless.”
“Then I saw you at Annapolis.”
“You stood exactly as my mother had stood when she was angry.”
I smiled despite myself.
“That is a strange basis for paternity.”
“The test helped.”
We were quiet for a while.
“Did you have another family?” I asked.
“I married.”
“Her name was Anne.”
“She knew about you and encouraged the letters.”
“We could not have children.”
“She died nine years ago.”
The answer left me with a grief I had no right to claim and could not dismiss.
“I am sorry.”
“She would have liked you.”
“You do not know me.”
“No.”
He accepted the correction.
“But I would like to.”
That humility affected me more than any demand could have.
He did not ask me to call him Dad.
He did not reach for an embrace he had not earned.
He simply stood beside me and waited.
“Why tonight?” I asked.
“Because Mason said Robert was still trying to make you ashamed of the uniform.”
Mercer took back the medal.
“I realized my silence was helping him.”
I watched my reflection in the terrace glass.
White uniform.
Silver stars.
My mother’s face and Mercer’s eyes.
“Monday is my retirement ceremony,” I said.
He held his breath.
“It is at ten.”
“Would you like me there?”
“I do not know.”
May you like
He nodded.
“Then I will wait until you do.”
