Choices

By Caire Lane

What's a girl to do?

 

It's 1941. Pearl Harbor has been attacked, sending America into the war and dashing the innocent plans of so many—one of them Dottie Mahoney, mother goose to her seven younger Irish-American siblings. She's graduated high school in Home Economics, has a job that is just that—a job—and has been expecting Henry Quentin to propose at any moment.

 

But Henry enlists, and Dottie's three younger brothers will soon be joining him, she knows, leaving her and so many other young women to hold down the home front. She becomes a hostess at the USO, passes out home-baked cookies, smiles, dances till her feet hurt, and writes letters to lonely servicemen overseas—hundreds of them. One, Ed Lane, returns from the war and proposes to her. She is torn, and not sure why.

 

Caught up in WWII and the "Cold War" that follows, Dottie cannot escape turbulent times. Along with daily war-time duties like rationing, she faces family problems, race riots, antisemitism at home and news of genocide abroad; and soon, when one war ends and another kind of war begins, she and everyone she knows will face "The Atomic Age." Even the "Fabulous Fifties," she will discover, are volatile in their own way...

 

Caire Lane is a true story teller. In CHOICES, she gives us Dottie, a 19-year-old girl and the eldest in a large, close-knit family that suffers great losses during WWll, and follows Dottie's life through several periods of history in beautiful, poetic language. I couldn't put it down.

—Barbara Cairns, author of Rachel's Next Chapter and Nettie's Dream

 

Caire Lane's debut novella, Choices, shows a deft hand at storytelling—at giving us characters we can care about against an epic backdrop—and delivers a heroine it's hard not to fall in love with (in all the right ways). Dottie Mahoney isn't just a young woman coming of age and surviving the challenges of a 20th Century world that seems unable to escape turmoil. She is also the embodiment of the human spirit William Faulkner talks about in his Nobel Prize acceptance speech, and we feel that spirit to the very last page. Can't wait to see what Lane gives us next.

—Bruce McAllister, author of Dream Baby and The Village Sang to the Sea

• Language: English
• Publisher: PAEAN PRESS
• Release date: Nov 1, 2023
• ISBN: 9798988897828

Caire Lane

CAIRE LANE was born in the town that inspired her heroine's Grossse Pathé. Caire saw the tanks and troops roll by and later witnessed the jubilant celebration in the streets on V-Day from the window of her parents' apartment. Over the years she came to appreciate, as teacher and social worker, the struggles young people have coming into their own.

Book preview

CHOICES

CAIRE LANE

Paean Press

Crystal River, FL

Copyright © 2023 by Carol Renée Abrams

All rights reserved.

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Published by Paean Press

Contact information: [e-mail]

eBook ISBN: 979-8-9888978-2-8

Cover photo (detail) by Ralph Crane; Courtesy of rarehistoricalphotos.com

Cover design by Brandi Doane McCann;  ebook-coverdesigns.com

An excerpt from the forthcoming book The Price by Caire Lane is included. This excerpt has been set for this preview only and may not reflect the final content of the forthcoming edition.

Dedicated to

The Greatest Generation,

who lived it,

and to my family,

who benefits from all they did

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Acknowledgements

Preview: The Price

About the Author

Life shrinks or expands

in proportion to one’s courage.

—Anais Nïn

Chapter 1

AS WWII RAMPED UP AND everyone in Grosse Pathé sought ways to do their part, Dorothy Rose Mahoney (Dottie to family and friends) came to a realization: she wasn’t one to spend her time rolling bandages in the basement of Saint Andrew’s Church with the old ladies of the parish, no matter how sweetly, or how often, they asked.

She was young—much too young to sit still in a chair, gossiping—and she was full of life. She had hopes. She had dreams. After twelve years in Catholic school, she was ready to start living them. Shouldn’t she have a chance to do something... anything... before she, too, got old and took a seat among the biddies in the basement? Even if she made mistakes and turned into the butt of the gossip, they would be her mistakes. It wasn’t as if she wanted to run off and join the circus, or become a chorus girl, nothing like that. She only wanted what every girl she knew wanted...a husband, as many kids as God gave her, and a house in a nice neighborhood big enough to hold them happily ever after.

The Young Catholics met in the same church basement. Dottie had been a member of the group since she’d turned sixteen. She found she liked being part of the group. While she was with them, she didn’t need to be a responsible adult, Mother Goose to her younger siblings. She was just another teenager. Free. Light of heart and light of step... And what she wanted to do was dance. Here, she had a chance to meet other young people from the neighborhood, especially the boys of St. Andrews, and get to know them—under the watchful eye of Father Dan, of course, but he was young, too...in his twenties, more modern and a lot less strict than his superior, Father Fitzpatrick. He allowed them to bring in a phonograph. Only fox trot records. No jitterbug, no jive. That suited Dottie just fine.

When she danced, her body buzzed. She could feel the electricity running through the whole of her when a boy took her hand, or put his warm palm on her back to guide her. She wanted to nestle right in, but she remembered the rule: at least six inches between you and your partner—or else! Or else meant banishment from the dance floor. As rarely as she was asked, she wanted to enjoy every precious second, not miss out, so she held herself in check.

But she couldn’t keep from feeling the rhythm of the music. Her body wrapped itself inside the pulsing drums, the beat of the bass, the screaming trumpets, the soothing sax; it moved in synch to them without her thinking about it; she was alive in every cell and she knew it.

Boys told her she was a good dancer, light on her feet. She wondered why they didn’t ask her to dance more often, if that was the case, but then, again, the answer was as plain as the nose on her face. She only had to look in the mirror to know why.

Dottie spent Thursday afternoons doing the one thing she liked more than dancing. She baked. Not for herself. Never for herself. She couldn’t risk running to fat. She baked for the people she cared about. As she mixed ingredients, rolled buttery dough under a dusting of flour, or dropped cookies onto baking sheets, she filled the house with irresistible aromas. Alone, she imagined the joy on the faces of the recipients when they bit into cookies that melted in their mouths, melted their hearts. She got more pleasure from imagining their reactions than if she had tasted the cookies herself, and, so, she was satisfied.

These cookies were meant for Friday night’s event. Gingersnaps, hermits, oatmeal raisin, chocolate ice box and sugar cookies with her own secret touch—almond extract instead of vanilla. Five dozen, to be precise. Ten, if you counted the double batches, she baked to stave off the ravenous, drooling siblings who stampeded at the first spicy whiff, overran her kitchen, watched her work, or hung on her apron strings begging for bits of dough to be eaten raw while they waited for the finished product.  She divvied out their share with great fanfare. Then, she hid the rest.

On Friday evening, Dottie dressed in her best dress. She knew from her reflection in the mirror she wasn’t much in the looks department. Her Uncle Sean had teased, ‘Built like a brick shithouse, she is.’ At first, it hurt her feelings to be compared to an outdoor toilet. Then, she realized the operative word was brick. Dottie took it to mean Uncle Sean thought she was solid, sturdy. Well, she couldn’t fault him for the truth. Uncle Sean was right. She had shoulders that didn’t need shoulder pads to square them up. The rest of her dropped straight down from there. Nothing much in front, either. But the dress helped. It had a full skirt and a belted waist that gave the illusion that she had one. She sighed.

Not a girl to wear heavy makeup, she applied Vaseline to her naturally bushy, carefully tweezed brows to tame them and to her lashes to bring out the gleam in her eyes. She was black Irish, her hair so dark she didn’t need mascara, or eyebrow pencil. That she’d inherited the fair complexion and blue eyes of her maternal line should have guaranteed her stunning looks. Instead, she was doughy. Her face was too square...broad forehead, a snubbed Irish nose, not a hollow to be seen beneath her non-existent cheek bones, and a perfectly square jaw. She sighed again, as she filled in her lips with pink Tangee lipstick. Her eyes, when she didn’t have her glasses on, and her warm smile were her best features, she knew. She hoped they would be enough to offset her lack in the oomph department.

In the kitchen, she snuck two dabs from the vanilla extract bottle, one for the hollow of each elbow, to use as perfume. Almost all of her earnings went to support the household...none left for luxuries like perfume.

She put the pans of cookies into shopping bags and left behind the chaos—seven siblings, her parents and the family drunk, Uncle Sean. Fridays were for her. They were her best chance to find a sweetheart, a nice Catholic boy, get married, and have a home of her own.

The girls arrived early by arrangement. All of them, except she and Gloria, worked in the kitchen preparing ham salad sandwiches and setting them out on trays. She was exempted because she baked the goodies. Dottie put the cookies out herself. She didn’t want them broken before they were seen and appreciated by the boys.

Gloria had boobs out to there, a father in the clothing business, and knew she could have any man she wanted; working in the scullery was beneath her, so she ignored it and, if asked, refused with the scowl of the high and mighty. No one challenged her.

When Father Dan opened the doors, Dottie slipped her spectacles, utilitarian appliances she thought made her look like an elderly maiden aunt, into her purse. She was ready. She made sure she greeted everyone she knew by name, and introduced herself to anyone she didn’t know.

It took months of careful cultivation—friendly conversation, flattery, flirty hair-tossing and batting eyelashes while tilting her head so she looked up at him adoringly—to get Henry to ask her to dance. A year to coax him into asking her out. They went to the Grande Theatre on date night, saw Rebecca and an old gangster movie. He shook her hand when he left her at her front door. She’d expected a kiss—her first—daydreamed about it for weeks. Let down, she headed for the kitchen, ferreted out three oatmeal cookies and scarfed them up. Eventually, Henry began calling her ‘just to talk,’ he said, so she saved up anecdotes to tell him and asked his opinion about everything to make him feel important.

By the time they graduated, it was clearly understood by all the girls in the Young Catholics—if not by Henry—that they were going steady. Sooner, or later, in the normal course of events, it would dawn on him and they would become engaged.

As they prepared for the Christmas Eve party, a girl asked Gloria to give her a hand decorating the tree.

Why should I? Gloria asked, queen to servant.

Dottie had had enough of her. The girl was acting like a spoiled brat. Because it’s the right thing to do, Dottie said.

What’s in it for me? Gloria transformed into the sly vixen ready to pounce.

A kick in the pants, if you don’t, Dottie said in the same voice she used with her younger siblings when they misbehaved.

A collective gasp went up. Dottie had only done what all of them had wanted to do at one time, or another; she had called Gloria out for her rotten attitude. But they knew Gloria well enough to know she could be vicious. Whether the slight was real, or imagined, no one wanted to be in her sights when she pursued a vendetta.

Gloria’s eyes narrowed. She took deadly aim, shot a look filled with hatred at Dottie. Quietly, she got off her duff and offered the girl the most minimal assistance she thought could get away with. She directed the other girl to hang each ornament where, in her elevated opinion, it shown to best advantage. She never touched one of them, but she seemed very busy.

All of the girls, except Dottie, saw that murderous look. Even the youngest and the dimmest knew mayhem was being hatched in Gloria’s mind. They waited for the drama to play out.

Dottie never gave her another thought. She was busy doling out Christmas candy into tiny paper sacks, wrapping them with red ribbon and curling the ends of the paper ribbon against the blade of her scissors to add a final bit of panache. She couldn’t help but admire her handiwork, adjusting each as she laid them around the miniature Christmas tree centerpiece.

The evening went swimmingly. Henry had eyes only for her. They ate their refreshments sitting together, his leg pressed hot against hers. When she danced with him, he held her tight, ignoring all the rules, and stared into her eyes till she was dizzy with delight and seeing stars. She knew it was just a matter of time until he proposed...

Ooh, Hennn...ry, Gloria drawled. She dripped seduction, the alpha female of the pack commanding the attention of her mate... demanding service.

Huh? The dumb cluck dropped Dottie and answered Gloria’s siren call, leaving Dottie alone in the middle of the dance floor.

She saw them put their heads together, laughing at some private joke. Humiliated, she watched them dance away the rest of the night as if she didn’t exist. After the caroling, she looked for Henry to walk her home, but he was gone.

Just like that. With two words, Gloria had stolen her man. The phone calls stopped. The dates disappeared. Dottie could only wonder what enticements Gloria had offered. What she couldn’t do was call Henry. She had her pride.

At the next Young Catholic meeting, Gloria arrived draped against Henry’s arm. She paraded him about; he followed after like a tamed pup. She extracted vengeance, scorched earth, leaving Dottie no doubt how things stood.

Dottie was mortified. She wanted to slide into the ground. When the dancing started, from her position as wallflower, she watched Henry hold Gloria the way he used to hold her. She was nothing to the man she had planned to spend her life with. Invisible. Gloria had destroyed her future, along with her dreams. She didn’t know which hurt the most. She hid in the kitchen, pretending to make herself useful.

When the meeting was over, she ran for home. In the bathroom, she turned on the water in the tub to mask the sound while she cried her heart out. Afterward, she prayed for grace to handle the situation, because, whatever happened, it must be God’s will. In her mind, she heard Mam whisper, No use to worry, Dorothy Rose. Whatever will be, will be. Reconciled to the uncertainty of the outcome, she drifted off to sleep, but she slept badly. In her dreams, everywhere she went, she ran straight into Gloria and Henry. Gloria leered and made insulting comments, while Henry laughed at her. She couldn’t escape them, no matter where she turned, or how fast she ran.

Dottie needn’t have worried. She was never again confronted with Gloria and Henry socially. They stopped coming to Young Catholic meetings. All spring, she wondered if they were getting closer, getting married. She scoured the newspaper for engagement announcements, hoping against hope there would be nothing there.

But there was. A huge picture of Gloria smiling. A half page of text with it.

Dottie froze. Then, she shook. No. Please don’t let