Angel of Okinawa; Chapter 14

 

Angel of Okinawa; Chapter 14

© 2024 by Amber Wright

By April 13^th things were looking grim for us Okinawans.

Already had our invaders taken over the island of Tsugen Shima, and the towns of Taira, Tako, Aha and Hedo which was the northernmost tip of our island.

I thought soon the war would stop here in Okinawa, but little did I know just how much more bloody days and heavy casualties there would be.

And not only the soldiers would die but the innocent civilians like poor little Phanny.

I wiped my eyes thinking about the war around me and how great a price it cost for liberty. Although I wanted the U. S. army to leave and quit the fight to save the blood, I knew freedom was never free.

In a little island like here we could do more or less what we wanted. But in Japan and other places like that freedom was on its edge and dictators were rising. It would be a matter of time when we would have had to quit being Christians or suffer the consequences.

I was sitting cross-legged in the attic, trying to sort out my thoughts, when I happened to pull out a thin box that held my parents pictures.

Wrigley was getting better and more friendly by the day, but still I liked Derek better. I hoped Wrigley would want to stay friends, even if I didn't like him romantically.

As I casually leafed through some pictures, I caught sight of a picture that looked familiar. I stared at it with two intense blue eyes, and gasped. It was a picture of my parents on their wedding day.

My mother’s light hair set her smiling face, and my father’s dark hair was parted just so. I smiled. They were in every way what I would call completely beautiful.

I never had remembered seeing this picture before, but as I looked over it I saw the other faces of my parents’ family.

There was my mother’s parents on her side.

My father’s parents on his side.

A couple of others and…a blond haired guy who looked exactly like Wrigley!

I read the names on the backside of the picture and matched positions. Third one, left, first row, Gideon Wrigley. I stared in shock as I read on, Brother of Groom.

I was utterly shocked as I sat there gasping, trying to take it all in. What was my last name anyhow? I never knew. I never thought to ask. Whenever I had ordered my English and American books I had only written: Angel, my address; nothing else. This island was so small that everyone knew that “Angel” was me.

Wrigley, so my last name’s Wrigley! But how did that match that guy out there on the back porch? He was called Wrigley and so that must mean that was his name, his first name and not his last name. I’d have to go ask him.

But meanwhile, I would study this Gideon Wrigley a little longer…just to make sure sort of thing.

I plucked up my courage later on as I handed Wrigley his rice pudding and orange punch with a bright smile. If he’s my cousin, I told myself happily, I have nothing to worry about. But if not, uh-oh…

“Thanks,” Wrigley smiled up at me as he took his rice pudding and orange punch after his military canned food supper.

“You’re welcome.” I stopped for I had purposely left him last so we could talk. “Hey, what’s your last name?”

“Wrigley.” Wrigley smiled with a slight nod. “My first name’s Gideon but I don’t go much by that since I’ve been in the Marines.”

My mouth fell open and I quickly sat down on the empty chair beside him. “So, your uncle was Amos Wrigley?”

Gideon blinked and stared at me. “How did you know? Yeah…I had an uncle Amos before he and his wife left for the East to help Christian natives on some island here in the Pacific. Never heard from them since.”

“You didn't know, Gideon?” I stopped and took a deep breath to steady myself, wiping my clammy hands on my lap.

“Know what?” Gideon looked puzzled.

“That your uncle Amos died from a snake bite,” I told him briefly and without looking at him, “and his wife had died seven days before when she had their only child.”

“Was this the island?” he asked in surprise.

I nodded affirmatively.

Gideon knitted his eyebrows. “Did my cousin live?”

“Yes.” I could barely hold the excitement in my voice.

“Where is he or she then?” he wanted to know.

“Sitting right here before your eyes!” I told him, throwing my palms out excitedly.

Gideon looked shocked and he set down his pudding and punch to give me a hug, “I’m really glad to meet you, Cousin!”

“You’re my first blood relation I’ve seen in my entire life!” I admitted and tapped my feet with happiness. “So, where do you all live?”

“Here, there and everywhere.” Gideon grinned, and picked up his pudding and punch again. I let him say a silent prayer over it before I pounced on him again.

“But where do you and your family live?”

“Nashville, Tennessee.” Gideon took a drink of punch. “But I don’t suppose you know where that’s at. It’s a big town in the central of the U. S. Our great uncle started up a big chewing gum factory in Lexington, Indiana, and some of us live in Wrigley, TN, a town I suppose one of us founded.”

I grinned. I really wanted to go to America now! I knew family there…and friends, or friend.

^{· · ·}

By bedtime the whole house knew about my newfound cousin, Gideon Wrigley. Meema seemed both troubled and relieved all at once. I didn’t understand why then but would later. Right then, I was only happy to meet a blood relation.

“Goodnight,” I smiled at Gideon who was taking a pallet on the living room floor where a few half dead men lay.

I was relieved. Gideon would be there in case any of them turned for the worse that night or happened to die, a thing I really dreaded but couldn’t help.

I felt haunted…well, not entirely, but… How many ghosts will there be once this war is over? were my anxious thoughts. Four of Meema’s husbands, plus the soldiers who were dropping off like flies these past few weeks.

I took a deep breath and tried not to panic.