by Jane Slate
Grace’s face whitened. She wore her inner turmoil as clear as day.
The years had rolled by like they were nothing. There he stood, in all his handsome glory. A shadow of the boy she had loved in her youth.
“Landon,” she breathed, daring herself to look up at him.
He raised his eyebrows and took a step forward, biting down on his bottom lip as he tried to process what was happening.
It was clear that he was just as surprised to see her as she was him. Her humidity touched hair, tiny body, and prominent cheekbones were all eerily similar to that of the girl he had spent almost eight years trying to forget.
He never expected to see her again. Especially not like this.
Grace took in his appearance.
His hair was much shorter than it had been when she knew him, but it suited him. He had a small dent near the tip of his nose and a tan scar ran only his temple, ending near his right eye. Dark stubble covered his hollow cheeks.
He was much taller than she had remembered him.
He had hardened. His brown eyes were haunted and intense and the freckles that covered the bridge of his nose had faded from one too many hours in the desert sun. His full lips were upturned and agape.
She felt a familiar feeling settle over her. Her head spun. In an instant, she felt as though she had been transported back to the tender age of sixteen. But reality intruded as it often did, and she managed to snap out of it.
“How are you?” Grace spoke up, extending a hand to Landon. She tried to smile but her cheek muscles tightened and made it difficult for her to remain cavalier.
Miller frowned and grabbed her by the waist, looking speculatively from his wife to Landon.
“How do you two know each other?” he questioned.
Shit.
Grace swallowed hard, feeling sweat surface on her hands. She looked from Landon to her husband, unsure of what to say. It wasn’t every day that you ran into your first love at an airport while seeing your husband back from war.
Luckily, Landon spoke up for her.
“We went to school together,” he replied simply, hiking his duffle bag up over his shoulder. His intense brown eyes lingered on Grace’s for just a second too long.
It wasn’t a total lie, but it wasn’t the entire truth either.
Miller could sense that something wasn’t right, but he didn’t comment on it. He shrugged and introduced Landon to the children before stepping away to converse with a few other men from another infantry. The children followed, leaving Grace alone with Landon. She hesitated, picking at a piece of lint on her dress.
Landon gazed at Grace as a slight half-smirk crawled across his face. Her heart felt heavy in her chest. She looked over at Miller, but he was too immersed in a conversation to notice the situation unfolding with his wife.
“So...Miller huh?” Landon finally spoke up, clearing his throat.
“He told me he was married but I guess I didn’t put two and two together.”
Grace nodded and crossed her arms over her chest. Landon eyed the flowing dress she wore, his eyes lingering on her cleavage. Her auburn hair had lightened some. She wore it in a bun with a few loose strands framing her face.
“You look good,” Landon commented nonchalantly.
Grace could feel her cheeks flushing of color. She blushed, swallowing back a sudden bout of nausea.
“Thanks,” she responded in a tight voice, looking away from him.
“So how have you been Gracie?”
Gracie.
Grace cringed. No one ever called her that but him.
“Don’t call me that,” she said, keeping her voice low. She felt her throat tighten. The nickname struck a nerve inside of her.
Landon held his hands up in front of himself in his defense.
“Sorry,” he said, raising an eyebrow.
“I’m just...It’s good to see you again. That’s all.”
He scratched at his beard and shrugged.
“I don’t think I ever expected to.”
Grace shifted on her feet, feeling suddenly awkward. What was there to say? They were each other’s past. Her present was waiting for her a few feet away.
“I really should get going,” she said, nodding over at her family.
Landon nodded and took a step backwards.
“Right, of course.”
Grace smiled at him softly. When she was sure Miller wasn’t looking, she reached for Landon’s hand and gave it a squeeze.
“I’m glad you made it back safe,” she whispered to him.
She turned her back and walked away.
Landon sighed and stepped out of the airport, hailing a taxi. One stopped for him in front of the terminal and he heaved his bags into the backseat before climbing in. He thought about his exchange with Grace and smiled for the first time in years.
“I’m heading to the Medlin Cemetery,” Landon told the driver.
He continued out into traffic and to Landon’s dismay, he began asking questions.
It was the uniform.
It was always the uniform.
His clothing was that of a high ranking U.S Marine. Faded from the desert sun, offset by ripped gloves that had been ruined a long time ago. Battered kneepads hung from his overstuffed camouflage backpack. On his feet were a pair of steel-toed boots with worn down soles. Before Landon had left for his second tour, he stood tall in them. Now, they were shrunken and useless from years of pounding against foreign soil.
His armor had seen better days as well. It was covered in torn pouches and pockets of various different sizes and shapes. Inside them, Landon had carried things that saved his life and the lives of others. He also carried deadly weapons.
But the highlight of it all was the insignia which declared his rank. The chevrons were a lucid reminder of his responsibility and his sacrifice for his country.
“So,” the driver asked, speaking in a hushed tone. “Where were you stationed?”
Landon remained silent and only answered when the man looked at him in his rearview mirror.
“Just north of the Khyber Pass,” he replied flatly.
He answered the rest of the man’s questions with even less enthusiasm and was grateful when they finally arrived at the cemetery, if that was even an emotion one was capable of feeling in such a depressing environment.
Landon climbed out of the taxi and pulled his duffle bags out after himself, handing the man a rumpled twenty dollar bill to cover his fare. A large metal fence greeted him as the car pulled away. He stepped forward through the gate and pulled out a piece of paper from his jacket pocket.
Written on it were the coordinates to his parent’s graves. He walked the vaguely familiar path, examining every stone for their names as the sun shined against his face.
He turned around every few seconds only to ensure that he wasn’t being followed by anyone.
The Marines had trained him well.
Finally, Landon found the graves and sucked in a deep breath. He crouched down and pulled two bouquets of flowers from his backpack, placing them in front of each headstone.
“Hey ma,” Landon whispered as his eyes began to water. “Hey dad.”
He sat on the dehydrated ground and traced his calloused fingers along his parent’s names on the stones.
“I’m home.”
The sound of a car door being slammed shut tore Landon from his thoughts. A breeze hit his face. He stood up and brushed off his jeans, squaring his shoulders and smiling as Kade Steven’s came stomping towards him. They were brothers, if not by blood then by honor. Kade had tried to join the Marines at the same time Landon did but he wasn’t accepted because of his asthma.
Not that it ever slowed him down.
“Kade!” he called out, pulling the stocky man into a hug.
He slapped him on the shoulder.
“Man,” Kade said, pulling back. “I just talked to Nash! He said I would probably find you here.”
“Damn,” he said, ashin
g his smoke. “It’s good to fuckin’ see you brother!”
Kade’s breath smelled heavily of whiskey. He exploded into a fit of coughs.
“Sorry about your ma and pop,” he said to Landon somberly, collecting himself and waving a hand over each headstone.
Landon smiled tightly and shrugged.
“Thanks man.”
“Look at you!” he exclaimed, changing the subject. “Just when I thought you couldn’t get any bigger!”
Kade flexed and laughed a hearty laugh that shook his chest.
“Yeah, I’ve been hitting the gym,” he answered flippantly.
“Nothin’ else to do when all my brothers are overseas.”
Landon nodded.
“I still think its bullshit that they denied you.”
Kade stood up straighter and cracked his knuckles. He ran a hand through his greasy hair and shrugged.
“They don’t know what their missing,” he said jokingly.
Landon smiled. He always did admire Kade’s attitude.
He was a brutal son of a bitch who wasn’t known to back down from a fight. The boys called him Blow; a nickname inspired by his uncanny ability of knocking his opponents out cold in the first hit.
But he had a soft side too.
“Damn right,” Landon replied sardonically.
He caught the pack of smokes tossed to him by Kade and lit one, inhaling sharply. Kade’s eyes narrowed as his nostrils flared. Suddenly, he was all business.
“What was it like over there?” he questioned.
Landon was silent.
“I don’t know,” he finally answered, flicking ash.
“Well,” Kade continued, shifting on his feet. “Everyone round here is saying you’re a hero.”
Landon’s mouth tightened into a grimace.
There was nothing he resented more than being called a hero. The title just didn’t sit right with him. He had only ever done what was expected of him.
“Maybe,” he answered anyway.
Kade seemed to read his mind
“Give yourself a little credit brother,” he said with a nudge.
“Nash told me that he wouldn’t have walked off that plane if it wasn’t for you.”
Landon remained quiet and took another long drag of his smoke.
“When was the last time you showered,” Kade questioned, changing the subject.
Landon shrugged his shoulders and followed Kade up the hill to where his truck was parked, climbing in.
“It’s been awhile.”
Shortly after Landon arrived back on American soil, he and the other men were given medals.
An honorary assembly took place.
They even shook hands with the Attorney General.
But it didn’t Matter.
No battle was won. Nothing had been gained but everything had been lost. The war continued on. They had given it their all, but it wasn’t enough.
It was a pitiful thing; thousands of men dying for a cause they didn’t understand. But it was what they had signed up for.
Landon grew bitter.
He felt lied to. By the government and its tactics. By the army and its double standards. By Hollywood and its movies for putting forth the idea of glory and heroism in the wake of a bloody war with too many causalities.
By the gun totting, “ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country,” American culture as a whole.
And most of all by his father.
His raged simmered and grew stronger as time went by and his flesh healed over the bullet permanently lodged in his chest.
He even resented the president.
He could picture in his mind’s eye a man with a fulfilled smile; proud and imbecilic at the notion that thousands of men had entered the depths of hell to protect their countries finest politicians.
Land of the free and home of the brave.
It wasn’t a prose Landon still believed in.
Chapter Five
“I don’t want you talking to him again, Grace.” Miller said sternly once the family had boarded the truck and were on the road towards home. He turned to look at his wife.
“Landon I mean. Not unless I’m with you. That clear?”
Grace nodded but didn’t say anything. Miller’s jealously was nothing new. She pressed her face against the window and closed her eyes.
Later, when they gathered around their dining room table for supper, the shock settled in. Followed by disbelief and pride.
He had come home to her. He had lived through it.
Yes, he had scars. Some that wouldn’t just heal overnight.
But he was still alive.
Three weeks later, on Fourth of July, Miller stayed home while Grace and the children took off to the lake to watch the fireworks with the rest of the residents of Falls Creek.
A welcome home celebration was held for the men who had returned home and those who weren’t so lucky. Everyone asked Grace where Miller was but she didn’t have a good answer for them.
He said the sound of the fireworks bothered him.
In retrospect, it was the first red flag.
After sending the children off to play with their friends, Grace retired behind the outhouse beside the lake to smoke a cigarette. It was a habit she had abandoned as a teenager but picked up again shortly after Miller had left.
Nicotine seemed to be the only thing capable of clouding the haze that had become her life.
Grace shook a cigarette from the pack and lit it with a pink lighter, inhaling a deep breath. The sky was a collage of red and blue as fireworks cascaded above her. Each one would shoot into the sky with a loud boom only to evaporate into the darkness a few moments later.
Grace pulled her jacket around herself and sighed, taking another drag of her smoke as she buttoned it.
Silence.
It set in like a plague shortly after the last round of fireworks went off. Grace welcomed the interruption and basked in the quietness. Grasshoppers chirped around her. The smell of barbequed food filled the air. She watched as a swarm of lighting bugs streamed out about from amongst the trees, their yellow tails blinking as though to say hello.
There was beauty in the night sky.
Grace shifted on her feet to get a better look at the stars, careful that her heels didn’t wedge into the grass. She leaned against the wall of the outhouse, making sure that she was out of sight from the rest of the guests.
Solitude.
It was something she was all too familiar with.
Miller had been home nearly a month and he had yet to touch her with the intent of initiating any sort of intimacy. There was none of the teeth bumping, tongue lashing, clothes-tearing passion that existed in their relationship early on.
Wasn’t that the first thing most men wanted to do after being away from their wives for so long?
Grace lived in a constant state of disappointment. There had been one too many sleepless nights. One too many arguments.
It was too much for her to process.
Instead, she tried to desensitize herself to the obvious changes in her husband. She focused on the soft sound of insects chirping and people laughing over the sound of music and beers clanking. She was too young to feel this sad.
This undesirable.
To make herself feel better, Grace managed to convince herself that the changes in her marriage were normal. That all military couples went through what she and Miller were going through.
But what bothered her the most wasn’t the slow death of her marriage. It was Miller’s failure to care enough about it, about her, to revive it. He had built an invisible barrier around himself and his wife, and though he never addressed it aloud, Grace knew it was there.
In the beginning, Miller was always so polite and approachable. The last gentleman in a town full of outlaws. He treated Grace with respect, the way a lady should be treated. He had always been good at keeping up with the joneses. At doing and saying the things he felt he h
ad to. Normality was his calling card, but he was a different person behind closed doors.
Someone else entirely.
He had changed with the war.
Now he was cold and callous. A shadow of his former self. And Grace was tired. Tired of putting on a face. Tired of holding tight to the seams of a life she didn’t enjoy living.
Sometimes late at night, she would lie beside Miller in bed and stare up at the ceiling as she tried to fight off the feeling of dread and loneliness that settled over her. He was back, physically, but all the best parts of him were still in Pakistan. She tried to focus on his snoring to distract herself from her feelings but it only ever made things worse.
After hours of tossing and turning, she would abandon the idea of sleep altogether to stand on her balcony, where she would determinedly count each and every star that filled the sky until her eyes were too tired to keep open.
And that worked for a while.
The days that followed were enjoyable. They fell back into their lives together in a harmonious fashion, but Grace couldn’t help but pick up on the undertones of darkness that had surfaced in their relationship.
Miller had problems stemming from what he had seen and done.
When the sun went down, his mood changed.
He began to drink again, an ugly habit he had abandoned with the war. And so slowly but surely, he settled into his new identity.
The sound of footsteps crunching against grass and pebbles caught Grace off guard.
“Well look who it is.”
Grace turned around and squinted into the night.
“Who’s there?” she called out, feeling her heart thump against her chest.
The soft glow of a cigarette was her only indication to the stranger’s identity. She trained her eyes, focusing them in on the figure that loomed in front of her. A deep, raspy laugh followed by a cough filled her ears.
Landon stepped forward, holding up his arms to show he meant no harm.
Relax,” he said with a smile, pressing his back against the building. “It’s just me.”
Grace tensed, remembering Millers warning.
That’s the problem, she thought.
“You alright?” Landon questioned, furrowing his brows.