by Suzy Parish
“I used to be good with a lot of things before the mortar attack.” I tried to reassure her. “I used to be good with going to the gym to work out and leaving my rifle in my room. I used to be content with walking down the gravel drive to the showers early each morning, feeling exposed even though I was dressed. It’ll be OK, though. You know what I always say, ‘Welcome to Camp Paradise.’”
We both let out a short laugh.
“I’m calling you back on my laptop. Maybe it’ll behave this time.”
“OK. I’ll be looking for you.”
I clicked off my phone and hurried to pull up a live video. It worked, thankfully.
“Sophie, I love you. Please forgive me.”
Sophie looked as if she was struggling with an answer. She shook her head. “Just like that? I’m not some video game that you can just turn on and off when you feel like it, Mac.”
“I know what I told you came as a shock, but it’s the past, Soph. I don’t know how to say it any other way. I don’t know what you want. Please, tell me how to make things right.”
Blush spread up her neck and across her cheeks. “I can tell you about a dinner I went to this week. I saw some things I wanted to talk to you about.”
“Sure, anything, Soph. I just want us to be OK again.” Whatever that was. I wasn’t even sure I’d recognize it in our relationship anymore.
“It was nothing big, just a gathering of a few couples for potluck. I was by myself, of course, and I guess because of that I noticed things. One couple barely looked at each other the whole night. They each told stories about their week, but they weren’t even in each other’s narratives.”
Phoenix jumped up on the bed beside Sophie. She absent-mindedly scratched him behind his ears as she spoke. “They looked so weary and sad. Like field hands who had been at the plow so long they never even glanced up at the beautiful sky anymore. Just kept looking down at the dirt, unfurling from the plow.”
Phoenix relaxed down into the bed and rolled over on his back. Sophie rubbed his belly.
“On they plodded, and the scenery never changed.” Sophie paused, took a sip of water from a glass she kept beside the bed.
Funny how I noticed the details of our life together so clearly once I was away. She always kept that glass by our bed.
“I remember you and me being like that,” she said softly. She stopped rubbing Phoenix’s belly, and we were both silent. The sound of his relaxed breaths filled my tent. Soon, he was snoring. “I remember you working three jobs just to get us through. I was home with Little Mac,” Sophie said.
His name seared me.
“We just hoped to get through one day, and the next and the next, didn’t we?”
I nodded. I remembered those dark days. I’d rather have forgotten. “I’d come home tired from work and dealing with people’s problems. I just wanted to be left alone. It seemed all day that everywhere I turned people had their hands held out, needing help. The calls I went on were traffic accidents, murders, and horrific things no man wanted to discuss with his wife. I’m sorry, Soph. You got the leftovers.” A deep sigh worked its way up from my core. It seemed I had been holding that particular breath for years. It was release. Not defeat, not surrender. It was a different kind of sigh. It was a coming home sigh, and Sophie was my home. “Computer games were my escape. You were right, Sophie, only I didn’t want to see it. I couldn’t see it. It was too easy to come home, sit in that chair, and block everything out. Besides, you were so self-sufficient. You made it easy for me. I’d come home to a hot meal and a clean house. And you did extra things for me, too, little things, like that bread you knew I loved, with the cheese stuffed in the middle. I never thanked you out loud for that. I just thought you knew how much I appreciated you.” My voice cracked.
Sophie rubbed Phoenix’s belly. He stretched and snored.
Could we return to the time in our marriage where we were as content?
“There was another couple, Mac. They chilled me even more. They used sniping, cruel remarks toward one another. Sharp weapons forged in bitterness.” Sophie stopped and adjusted the laptop. “I remember a movie you and I watched. It was the couple’s second marriage for each one. The wife asked the husband to promise she would never be back in the dating world again.”
I shifted in my computer chair. I could feel it coming. I knew Sophie well enough. She wanted something from me, but the old fear returned. I didn’t know if I could give it. Practical things like bill paying, fixing things around the house, those made me comfortable. When we hit emotions, they tangled me up. “Yeah, I remember that scene.”
“Promise me.” Her eyes were soft, her voice warm, like maple syrup.
“OK. Promise what?” I’d give her anything.
“Promise me when you come home, we will never take each other for granted again. Promise we won’t become those couples.”
I sighed deeply, and it came out like a rumble, a low primitive growl. I’d do anything for Sophie. “I promise.”
I signed off and carefully placed my vest, helmet, and M-4 within reach of my bed. I started to change into my shorts and T-shirt but thought better of it. I left my cargo pants and polo shirt on. Shorts wouldn’t provide much protection from flying debris. I took one last swig of my power drink and turned off the light. The hum of the generator down the hall lulled me to sleep. The last thing I pictured was Sophie.
The next morning, I pulled up my e-mail before I even rolled out of bed. I lay on my cot, laptop balanced on my chest.
Mac,
I forgive you. I truly do. It doesn’t mean that I’m not hurt, which I am. Deeply. I’ve been thinking about our conversation, and I see where we have wounded each other time and again. I don’t want to hurt each other anymore. I want to heal and go on.
When we last talked, you seemed so much like the old Mac, the guy I fell in love with.
I remembered our first kiss. Your breath reeked of onions, and you were so clumsy but so sweet. I remember the stubble on your cheeks and the way you cupped my face in your hands. I had a crush on you for so long.
The day you took me riding in your new truck was like a fairy tale, but when you told me you were leaving to join the Army, I almost called the whole thing off.
I was afraid I wouldn’t be strong enough to live with the constant good-byes that go with being an Army wife.
Because I knew I was already falling in love with you.
I remember snuggling down into your old worn leather jacket. You pulled me up against you like you never wanted to let me go. I still remember the smell of your cologne. I could feel your whiskers, all scratchy on my cheek.
You traced on my back.
I asked you, “What did you write?” and you said, “It’s a secret.”
I just now realized what it was you were writing.
I—love—you.
Is that it? You were the first one to send a secret love note, not me!
I’m tracing with my finger right now on the screen. Can you see it? Can you feel it?
I love you.
I guess this is my way of saying I want to try again.
Sophie
P.S. I’m starting a game called Tag. This is how it goes. I tell you a memory, and then you are “it,” and you have to send me one.
Tag, you’re it!
I closed her e-mail. She’d figured it out, after all those years. A smile filtered across my face. Her description of that day took me back to that red truck, the day I fell in love with my girl. I never knew that was the day she fell for me. It was my turn to tag her back. I pulled up a new e-mail but it was hard to concentrate with all the constant noise.
On the other side of the thin plywood partition, Glenn was talking loudly on the phone to someone from the States. He was placing an order for who knew what. That guy shipped more packages than a delivery service.
Farther down the hallway Travis’s snores shook the tent. He’d been sleeping in a lot, avoiding us. His phone rarely rang anymore.<
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In between, was Stockton’s room. He wasn’t there, which was a relief. When he was there, it was mainly late at night, and he stayed up until all hours making a racket with his music. I had to knock on his door on more than one occasion to tell him to turn it down.
The cursor blinked at me from a blank page. What should I write? I wasn’t used to sharing feelings with Sophie, and I knew that’s what she wanted. It threw me off balance.
I’d rather talk about my day, training the guys. How the food was good, and I was thankful for that. How I respected the soldiers, who came in from the field. I always nodded a hello when I passed them on the gravel road on the way to the DFAC. Some answered me, and some didn’t. There was a long history of strained relations between contractors and the military. I would have been lying to pretend it didn’t exist. Some of the military resented us. They felt we got in the way of them doing their job. Others saw what we did and appreciated it. It all depended on the man.
Separating myself from the soldiers was impossible. I felt a kinship with guys like Sergeant Thorstad that was difficult to explain to Sophie. My goal had been to be one of them, and for a while, I had been. But ties stronger than the brotherhood of soldiers pulled at me. Sophie captured my heart.
Sophie,
I guess one of my strongest memories of you was the day I left for Basic Training. You stood there with me at the bus terminal until it was time to board.
I’d told you to stay home, let me say good-bye the night before, but you wouldn’t listen. You were always stubborn like that. The truth is, I was glad you came to see me off.
We didn’t talk very much. There wasn’t much to say, and I was afraid I’d make you cry because you looked so sad already. They announced we could board the bus, and I remember you grabbed me like you wouldn’t let go. I was going to ask you to marry me before I left.
Did you know that?
But I didn’t because I wanted to save up my first few paychecks and get you a ring.
I remember when the bus pulled away I looked down at you and tears were running down your face. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done, leaving you like that. But I did it for you and me. I wanted to start a life for us.
Soph, I came to Afghanistan for the same reason. When I get home, we will start fresh, and things will be better. I promise.
I’m going to close this now. Writing this has made me feel things I haven’t felt in a long while.
I love you, Soph. I always have, even when I messed things up. I never stopped loving you.
(I’m tracing the screen back to you)
Mac
P.S. Tag, you’re it.
22
“Hi, Mac? Can you get on live video? I hate to stay on here because they charge just to connect to you on the phone.”
“Are you all right?” I asked.
“Yes, fine. Turn on your laptop, OK?”
I hung up my phone and hurriedly clicked on the icon on my desktop. It seemed to be running slow. When we were off work, everyone tried to get online to talk to family, and my guess was it overloaded the system. Finally, it pinged, and her live video showed up.
She held a piece of paper in her hands. She could barely stand still, she was so excited.
“What’s that?” I said.
“A contract to supply one of the local restaurants downtown with my bread and rolls.” She danced around the kitchen.
“I’m so happy for you, Soph!”
She positioned the paper on the kitchen table and smoothed it out.
“I can’t believe it. So far, I have six varieties of bread, and they’re all selling well. I just signed a rental agreement to use an industrial kitchen near the restaurant. That way I can bake it and transport it quickly. Besides, I’ve outgrown our kitchen.”
“I miss your baking. Camp feeds us well, but I miss coming home from work and getting a whiff of homemade bread,” I said.
“You’ll smell it a lot more. I’ll probably never get the aroma off me. I can’t wait for you to come home. You’ll get to see my table at the market. I have a banner and everything. You know my vintage bicycle? I have baskets on the front and back, and I deliver bread that way.”
“Really?”
“When the weather’s nice, I use my bike. You know I practically live on that thing. Otherwise, I take the car.”
All that talk of bread and Sophie on a bicycle was carving a knot of yearning inside me.
Sophie studied my face. I must have been frowning.
“What are you thinking? Aren’t you happy for me?”
“I’m happy, Soph. All this talk is making me a little homesick.”
“Well, maybe it’s time,” Sophie said.
Not the reaction I anticipated. “What does that mean?” I asked.
Sophie pulled a kitchen chair from under the table and slid onto the seat. She rested her elbows on the table and cupped her chin in her hands. “I’m glad for once you’re missing me. Just think, in a few weeks you come home on leave.”
“Where do you want to go for vacation when I’m home?”
She tipped her head sideways and looked at me quizzically. “There’s only one place.”
“The beach,” I said.
“How’d you ever guess?”
“What about somewhere different for a change? Maybe the mountains?”
“The beach is us. I’ll never forget our honeymoon there, and every time we go back, I get the same feelings. I fall in love with you all over again.”
“I’d be a crazy man to turn that down,” I said.
“Yes, yes you would.”
“All right, then. The beach it is. I’ll leave the planning to you. Did you get the e-mail with my travel dates?”
“Yes. I keep counting and recounting the days, and I’m finding it hard to believe you’ll be here. I know time goes fast for you, but it seems like we’ve been apart a lifetime,” Sophie said.
“Teaching pretty much fills my days. And I think being in a different place makes the time go quickly. You’re still in familiar surroundings,” I said.
“I know, and I look for you every morning out of habit when I wake up. But I feel like a different person, and I like that,” Sophie said. “This contract with the restaurant has shown me I’m capable of running my own business. Even our relationship is getting stronger.”
I spun the wedding band on my finger. “I’m trying.”
“I know you are and really, Mac, that is worth more to me than any present you could give me, or any trip you could take me on. It’s what I’ve wanted for so long.”
I didn’t know what to say. Glenn was right? Sophie only wanted me, not extravagant gifts.
Sophie moved closer to the screen and gave me an air kiss. “I feel as if I’m about to go on a date with a most handsome man from overseas.” I was about to send her a kiss back when Travis rapped on my door.
“Everything all right in there? We’re going out to the bench to smoke.”
“Yeah. I’ll be there in a minute,” I said.
“What was that all about?” Sophie asked.
“That was Travis. They have a cigar club on Thursdays.”
“Cigars?” Sophie’s nose crinkled.
“Yeah. It’s kind of cool,” I said.
“I suppose you’ll want to cancel your order for suckers and have me send you cigars instead.”
“Don’t worry. That’s not about to happen. Speaking of pops, I’m in desperate need of three bags of them.”
“Oh?”
“Two to give away and one for me.”
“All right, they’ll be in the mail tomorrow.”
“Super.” I stayed online. Just stared at her. I ached for her.
She sent me another air kiss, said good night, and signed off.
I closed my laptop.
The sounds of war crowded in, as if to suffocate me. But in my mind, I was back home in a kitchen that smelled of hot bread fresh out of the oven, and I had my arms around my lover.
23
Flight 1811 was headed for Atlanta, Georgia. I followed the plane avatar on the screen in front of me. Not much longer, and we’d be landing. After fifteen hours in the air, I’d be happy to land in a cornfield. A roar from under the right wing, immediately followed by a violent vibration stopped my thoughts. The plane shuddered.
“What do you think that was?” I asked the man to my right.
He was seated next to the window. He leaned as far forward as he could and studied the wing. “I don’t know. Feel that vibration? Something’s not right,” he said.
The Fasten Seat Belt sign flashed on.
“Please secure your trays in the upright position. Stow any bags or purses beneath the seat in front of you,” the flight attendant announced, her voice tense.
I scrambled to dig my seat belt out from beside me, clicked the buckle shut and tightened the belt across my lap. I survived a mortar attack in Afghanistan. Would I die in a plane crash before I saw Sophie?
There were no more announcements. The flight attendants rolled their cart down the aisle and offered sodas, water, and alcoholic beverages. I nudged the guy to my right.
“Still nothing?” I asked.
“Can’t see any damage,” he shook his head.
A bell tone rang, and the passengers were silent.
“The captain wants you to know that we’ve apparently blown a tire. We will be arriving in Atlanta on time but will wait on the air strip until maintenance crews can change the tire and make sure there are no other issues. We apologize for any inconvenience. Please remain seated with your seatbelt fastened.”
“A blown tire didn’t sound nearly as bad as what I had pictured in my head,” the guy next to me said.
“I hear that,” I said.
My ears felt like they were popping as the cabin pressure adjusted. We were headed for the landing. I closed my eyes and pictured those in my life who were so important to me. Sophie and Little Mac. What was it King David said? ‘I can go to him, but he can’t come to me.’ If I didn’t make it, would I be with Little Mac?
My thoughts were interrupted by a terrifying blast, and the plane shuddered. Metal groaned. A young girl a row ahead of me cried. We were on the ground, moving along like a crippled bird, but we were on the air strip. We were alive.