Rescuing Broken

by Gina Azzi

  "Jax?" She's staring at me, her eyes wide. Her fingers twist around her napkin. It’s a nervous habit that irritates me because she never used to do it. It serves as a reminder of all the time I let pass between us.

  "Sorry. I spaced out." I shake my head. "Sometimes, it's strange being back."

  "I bet. What was it like, over there?" She angles her head, curiosity burning in her eyes.

  I hesitate. It's a question I've been asked so many times before by so many people. But it's different with Evie. It's not like I'm the only soldier she knows who's been deployed. She's surrounded by them at work. Her brother serves. Her mom is a general for God's sake. She knows what it's like in Afghanistan. And Iraq. And posts across the world in both friendly and hostile environments. She knows. But she's asking about me.

  Is it too much to hope that she's asking because she cares?

  So instead of feeding her the bullshit I feed everyone else about it being hot and sandy, I tell her the truth. "It's a place I never want to see again."

  "You did three tours."

  "Yeah."

  "Why'd you keep signing up if you didn't want to go back?"

  "My guys. My team. I couldn't let them be one short, you know? A lot of us," I say, blowing out a breath, both wanting and not wanting to talk about this, "we were all in together. It seemed like if one of us didn't re-up, we'd mess with what we had going on."

  She nods in understanding. Something almost everyone does but when she does it, it's like she really understands. Probably because she gets me. She always did.

  "You lost someone you care about." She squints at me, studying my face. It's a statement when it should have been a question, but like I said, she gets me.

  Biting my bottom lip to steady the emotion swelling in my chest and threatening to choke me, I sigh. "Yeah. My best friend."

  Expecting her to look away—a new habit she's picked up when she's uncomfortable—she surprises me and keeps her eyes locked on mine. Like the old Evie. The one who didn’t shy away from messy, complicated emotions. "I'm really sorry, Jax." Her voice is soft, her words soaked in sincerity.

  I clear my throat, a tight smile pinching my cheeks. "Me, too."

  She wrinkles her nose, looking so adorable I wish I could reach over and pull her into me. "You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to. Obviously." She shakes her head, her cheeks growing pink. "I didn't mean to pry."

  "You didn't. Usually, I hate talking about it. But it's different with you."

  She does look away this time, a sign that I need to be careful not push her too hard.

  "His name was Ethan," I add, as if it's an afterthought. But really, I want her to know. I want to share him with her since he was my best friend, and she was my girl. Once. They should have known each other. "And I couldn't save him."

  Her body jerks back slightly. "What happened?"

  My fingers meet to form a steeple in front of my nose as I weigh my words. "It was an IED at first. Followed by shooting. So much shooting I could feel every bullet that grazed by me. The air even stung. Dust and sand everywhere, I couldn't see shit. I knew he was next to me. The guys had been razzing him just moments earlier about Amy's due date. That's his wife. She was eight months pregnant." I smile just thinking about Annabelle, his baby girl. Tiny fingers but the hardest grip I've ever felt from someone so little. "I met Annabelle as soon as I got back. Went straight to Amy's, even before coming here," I explain.

  "I'm sure she's perfect."

  "She is."

  "So Ethan..."

  "Killed in action. So fucking stupid, the entire thing. It shouldn't have been him. We were standing as close as you and I are right now. It could have been me; it should have been me. I'm single, no baby girl on the way, nothing to come home to."

  She winces at the hard edge barbing my words but I don't care. It's the truth. It should have fucking been me.

  "One minute he was there, the next, he was lying on the ground. I was with him at the end." I close my eyes, dropping my hands back to the table. "Worst fucking moment of my life." I blow out a breath, my fingers connecting with the scars on my shoulder. “I got shot up when we fell back. I was so focused on Ethan that I wasn’t really paying attention. I actually don’t remember much of it.”

  I feel her fingers tuck into my hand in the space between my thumb and index finger. She squeezes twice, just like she used to when she wanted to get my attention at a party or one of Carter’s baseball games or somewhere public.

  I open my eyes and look at her, surprised to see moisture gathering in the corners of her eyes and coating her long lashes.

  "I'm sorry that happened to Ethan. I really am. But there's nothing you could have done differently. That's the reality of war, Jax. You know that. And even if it's a shitty thing to say out loud, I'm really happy you came home. I'm really relieved it wasn't you."

  I breathe out a shaky breath from my nose, letting her fingers rest against my hand. Dropping my head, I nod that I've heard her, scared to voice my thoughts because of how fucked up they are. The truth is that sometimes, I'm really relieved it wasn't me either.

  Evie squeezes twice more, and I look up again, the corners of my mouth ticking up at her smile. She remembers, too. "I didn't mean to be such a Debbie downer."

  I close my hand tighter around hers, squeezing back. "Nah, I think I can claim that title tonight."

  She removes her hand from mine to pick her spoon back up. She plunges it into the bowl, even though the scoop is mostly melted. "I like that we can still talk about things. Real things. I don't really have anyone I can do that with."

  "Jenny and Miranda?"

  She shrugs, chewing her lower lip in thought. "We're close. Good friends. We have fun together, but it's not like we were inseparable from way back when. Jenny and Miranda have always been tight, and they've sort of adopted me into their group, but I wouldn't say I over share with them."

  "Graham? Your mom? Your family was always super close."

  A spark of sadness touches her eyes before she blinks it away. "It's different between us now."

  "Why?"

  "Just is. Things change; time passes. Distance makes things harder."

  "Yeah," I agree, thinking of how my relationship with my brothers and Daisy has shifted while I've been gone. "That's how it is with my brothers and Daisy and I, too."

  "How is Daisy? It’s spring break, right?"

  "Yeah. She’s all grown up."

  "Crazy to think that we're somehow adults now, isn't it?"

  "Scary as all hell." I agree, taking a spoon full of mint chocolate chip ice cream. "Evie, I couldn't even believe it was her when she walked toward me at the airport. I saw her in New York two years ago and I didn’t think that two years could make such a big difference. It’s ridiculous. I can't take her anywhere without guys stopping to stare at her, or worse, approaching her. And some of them used to be my friends!"

  Evie bites her bottom lip, and I can tell she's trying to hold her laughter in. "Daisy's always been beautiful."

  "Stop. She's my sister. She should be in a nunnery."

  "A nunnery?"

  I nod, wishing I could somehow convince Daisy to join one.

  "You do know that nunnery is also slang for brothel, right?"

  My spoon clatters to the ice cream sundae, spraying some chocolate syrup on the table.

  "Why do you even know these things?"

  Evie shrugs, licking the tip of her spoon. I stare, enthralled, suddenly wishing I could be ice cream instead. My jeans seem to tighten as she smacks her lips together, lowering the spoon.

  "I like to read. Unlike some people..." she raises her eyebrows at me, a sweet smile that teases as much as it soothes on her lips.

  "I read," I say defensively.

  "Really? Like how you were always prepared for British Lit in high school?"

  I throw a balled-up napkin at her, tapping her square on the nose. "You can't act like the only reading in the world is Dickens and Aus
ten."

  "Dickens and Austen? I'm impressed, Kane. The way I remember it, you didn't even have a pen, never mind the book."

  I pick my spoon back up and shovel a scoop of ice cream into my mouth.

  I know exactly how she remembers it: my asking to borrow a pen and paper from her in homeroom, us getting paired up for a term-long assignment in class, the boring readings, and the lame lectures. But the time I spent with Evie was captivating. Knowing her changed my life. Falling for her changed everything.

  It was the absolute best.

  Just like watching her cheeks redden now.

  Just like tonight.

  14

  Evie

  I can't help but blush as I reminisce about the past right in front of Jax. But it feels good too, talking about it, laughing together. I remember everything about the first few times I interacted with him. I remember because knowing him altered everything I thought I knew about love. Losing him solidified all my previous beliefs. Him returning just confuses the hell out of me. Partly because I want so badly to be the girl I was when I first fell for him and partly because I’m not sure I can ever trust another man, even him, again.

  "Do you make a habit of being early?" Jax asks innocently as he sits down beside me in homeroom.

  "Do you struggle to do so?" I quirk an eyebrow at him, taking in his disheveled appearance.

  He smirks, lifting a baseball cap off his head and running a hand through his tousled—correction, tangled—bedhead.

  "Sometimes," he admits. "But," he pauses dramatically, "I'm prepared today." Jax holds up a purple notebook. It's thin, and there is a crease in the cover, as if he folded the notebook in half and tucked it into his back pocket. It looks like one of the ninety-nine-cent ones you can get at the checkout aisle in a grocery store or at a gas station. And what guy would buy a purple one?

  "Where'd you scrounge that up?"

  He laughs, a deep chuckle that has several other students turning around to look in our direction.

  I feel my cheeks flame at the attention, but I can't seem to look away from Jax, the carefree blaze of his moss green eyes, the fact that he is laughing at an insult.

  "Found it in a kitchen drawer."

  "The junk drawer?" I guess.

  He considers this, his expression thoughtful. "Appears that way."

  "Did you do the reading for Lit?" Suddenly, I'm desperate to keep this conversation going, to keep Jax's eyes trained on me. Especially now that Silvia has arrived, her eyes glued to Jax, and studying the way he leans over the side of his desk toward me.

  "I did. You?"

  “Yes.”

  "Hey, Jax," Silvia practically purrs, grazing her fingertips along Jax's forearm and up his shoulder as she sits in the empty desk on his other side, effectively pulling his attention from me to her.

  "Hey," he answers before turning back to grin at me. "‘A wonderful fact to reflect upon, that every human creature is constituted to be that profound secret and mystery to every other.’" He quotes Dickens from our reading of A Tale of Two Cities before winking at me.

  Jax Kane winked at me, after quoting Dickens.

  My mouth falls open as I stare back at him, confused as to whether he is openly flirting with me or somehow mocking me.

  Before I can determine the intent of his wink, he's talking to Silvia, and I'm staring at the back of his hat, my fingers playing with the edge of my notebook.

  That same day we were paired together for an assignment. It forced us to spend a lot of time together outside of school, researching, planning, and brainstorming. At first, we focused on the assignment, but slowly our time together lengthened, and we found ourselves joking around, talking about other things. Music, movies, friends. And later we had quiet conversations about life, love, and relationships. By the time we handed in our final project, I was completely head over heels for Jaxon Kane and wearing his football jersey to every Friday night home game.

  I felt in sync with him in a way I never experienced before. I felt whole. He made up a huge part of my world, and the thought of going to New York without him the following fall was enough to send me into a full-on panic attack. So we devised a plan to be together. To take the first steps into our futures as adults together.

  Before I knew Jax, my entire high school focus was on being accepted at West Point. Everything I participated in – the track team, volunteering at Veteran’s Affairs, my course selections – were for the sake of increasing my odds of acceptance. I didn’t have time for boys or dating. Despite my Mom and brother’s urgings to be more social and make more friends, I was only interested in pursuing my future goals.

  Meeting Jax was like being thrown a curveball. I fell for him hard, fast, and completely. Sometimes, it scared me how much my dreams and goals shifted in relation to his. When he bailed and left, he shattered my heart. And everything that came next, shattered the rest.

  Sitting across from him now, seeing flashes of the boy I once loved mixed with the man I don’t want to want, but can’t help being drawn to, leaves me feeling overwhelmed.

  "Evie?" Jax's voice breaks into my trip down memory lane and I look up, my blush deepening.

  "Sorry."

  "You okay?"

  "Yeah, just, remembering."

  Jax tugs his lower lip in between his teeth as he regards me. "Sometimes that’s painful."

  My smile is tight; I’m glad he somehow understands. But then again, he's Jax. He always understands.

  "Most of the time."

  Jax's hand covers mine, and he flips my hand over so his fingers tickle my palm. "I'm glad you came with me tonight.”

  “Me too.” I reply truthfully. I’m having a good time with Jax, enjoying the easy conversation between us. It’s been a long time since I’ve been out with a guy and let my guard down and the fact that I did so easily with Jax is both comforting and alarming.

  “Evie, I know I already said this but I really want you to understand how sorry I am." He looks me straight in the eyes. His gaze is full of sincerity and a mixture of pain and regret; I know he's being honest with me. "The way I handled things between us," he blows out a deep breath between puffed out cheeks. "Fuck. I'm really fucking sorry for hurting you. I never meant to do that. I just didn't want to hold you back. And, if I'm being completely honest with myself, I didn't want to be in your shadow, either."

  My eyebrows nock up at this. "My shadow? What are you talking about?"

  He hesitates, uncertain how to continue. Raking his teeth across his lower lip, he considers me, the corners of his mouth lifting but never forming into a full smile. "Evie Maywood, you were larger than life. I couldn't believe I was even in your orbit, never mind on your planet. You were bigger than the sun and brighter than every single star combined. Back then, I was scared of being an anchor to your dreams; I was intimidated by your confidence. You knew exactly who you were and what you wanted. Don’t get me wrong, I was proud as all hell of you. Amazed by you. But I also needed to go off and do something that could make you be proud of me. Make me bigger than the sun for you."

  "You already were."

  "No, I wasn't. I may have been that to you, but I wanted to be that for you. There's a difference." His fingertips graze mine as he slowly pulls his hand back to his side of the table.

  "You broke my heart. Your leaving destroyed me."

  "I know. And for that, I am so unbelievably sorry. It was naïve of me to think things would just work out between us but I really thought they would. That’s why I kept emailing and trying to keep in touch. I thought we would work things out and end up together. After you told me to let you go, I knew I was being selfish with your feelings so I stopped calling. I wanted to respect your wishes. But fuck," he pinches the bridge of his nose, “it was really fucking hard. I wrote you so many emails that I never sent. Waited for my brothers to drop crumbs of information that would let me know how you were doing. But they never did and I figured they lost touch with you too once you headed to West Point. I nev
er thought our paths would cross again when I came home. I think that’s part of the reason I stayed away so long. I knew it would be disappointing as hell to come back and find you gone.”

  I close my eyes, a sting of tears pricking behind my eyelids. I want to be so angry with him for enlisting, for leaving. But what he's saying, on some level, makes sense. We were only seventeen when we started dating. Eighteen when we graduated. My future was so clearly planned out, and yet it did sort of seem like Jax was just following me because I wanted him to. Because I needed him to. Because at some point, I began defining myself in relation to him and could no longer fathom a future that didn't include him.

  "I get what you're saying," I admit. “And it’s not all your fault. I pushed you away too. After you left, the sound of your voice reminded me of all I lost, of losing you. By the end of that summer,” I bite my bottom lip hard to keep my tears from falling, “I just wanted simplicity. Uncomplicated. And you were way too complicated for my heart to handle at that point. Still,” I level him with my fiercest look, “I did want to punch you in the face or kick you in the balls for leaving the way you did.”

  Jax laughs, an unexpected burst of energy wrapping us back up in our own world. "There she is." He smiles at me warmly.

  I raise my eyebrows.

  "My Maywood. She definitely would have punched me in the face or kicked me in the balls if I pissed her off. Glad to see she's still lurking in their somewhere." His eyes soften as if to take the sting out of his words.

  I smile back. Because as infuriating as he is, he speaks the truth.

  I'm glad that I’ve still got some of my old sass and attitude too.

  We pass the rest of the evening in easy conversation, a comfortable familiarity unfolding between us as we reminisce about high school and trade bits of information about mutual friends and what they’re up to now. I confide in Jax about the PT programs I’m applying to, with Baylor-Army at the top of my list. He shares Army stories with me, most of them about the stupid pranks he and the guys in his squad would pull. The banter is simple and uncomplicated and I find myself wanting the night to continue just so we can keep talking.