by Naomi Niles
An older man with a long, narrow face and a grey beard was leading them in a chant: “If war is the answer, we’re asking the wrong question!” They said it again and again, their voices growing louder with each iteration.
“What are they all so mad about?” Carson asked, looking bewildered.
“The war, probably,” I said, not feeling particularly interested. “What, you don’t think they followed us here, do you?”
“No, I’m not that paranoid. I bet they’ve been planning this protest for a while.”
One of the protesters, a woman, shouted, “We’re not against the soldiers! We’re against the war!” and the chant was picked up by the rest of the group. The pedestrians who were having to walk out into the street to get around them didn’t look too happy about it.
“Lordy, I haven’t seen anything like this since before the Iraq War started,” said Carson. “What do you suppose has gotten them so riled up?”
“I mean, from what I’ve heard, a lot of people are scared right now,” I said, keeping my eyes on the road in search of a taxi. They’re afraid we’re going to end up back in the Middle East, fighting another war that we can’t win. Even though no one really wants to be over there, and every problem we solve just creates another, even bigger problem that we then have to solve. And really, if we do end up in another war, it’s guys like you and me who will suffer for it.”
“I guess that makes sense,” said Carson. “I don’t know about you, I just have a visceral reaction to protesters. I don’t know what it is, I just hate them.”
“I don’t mind them,” I replied. “I think they’re just doing what they think is in the best interests of the country, same as we do. We just have different ideas about how to defend it and where our blood and money should be spent.”
“Yeah, no kidding,” said Carson, adding in a lower voice, “and ‘Who Would Jesus Bomb?’ What does that even mean?!”
I shrugged. “Your guess is as good as mine.”
“God, sometimes I don’t understand the people of this country. We’re sweating away for a year in the jungle to protect them, and this is the kind of welcome we come home to. If those bastards had even an ounce of respect…”
“I don’t get it, either,” I said sadly. “I just have to keep telling myself they’re doing what they think is best.”
Chapter Eighteen
Kelli
The next morning, I was awoken by Renee standing over me holding a plain vanilla latte. I glared at it suspiciously as I took it from her hand, as if expecting her to have secretly poisoned it while I slept.
“What’s in this?” I asked, peering down into it as though looking for bugs. “What did you put in it?”
“I didn’t put anything in it,” said Renee. She didn’t even sound like her usual chipper self; she sounded almost, well, normal. “I just thought you might like to enjoy a normal, unhealthy drink for once.”
Now I knew there was something up. “Is this your way of trying to say you’re sorry?”
The miserable look on Renee’s face confirmed my suspicions instantly. “I’m not sorry for what I said,” she explained as she pulled up a chair and sat down beside me. “But I realize that sometimes I can come across as—”
“Abrasive and controlling?”
“Yeah, I was getting to that. And I realized I can’t force you to do things you don’t want to do or to hear things you don’t want to hear. This has been a problem between us ever since we were little, even though you were the older one and should have been looking after me instead of the other way around. It’s because I don’t ever want to see you get hurt like that again.”
That made sense, though it was weird to hear her bring it up—weird even to see her being halfway serious. She had a habit of pretending like terrible things weren’t happening, even when they plainly were. “I didn’t know you still thought about that,” I said quietly.
“Always,” said Renee with a look of profound sadness. “Anyway, finish your drink. Are you coming with me to yoga?”
I took a sip of my vanilla latte and enjoyed it so much I took several more. “Not on a Saturday,” I replied. “It’s my day off, I’ve been going all week, and I need a break. I’ll go on Monday.”
“Sad,” said Renee, throwing on a tight-fitting pink shirt. I had a strange feeling she had brought me the latte in part because she was hoping it might motivate me to follow her to class. “You sure you don’t want to come?”
“Yeah, I think I’m gonna stay here and make some breakfast. It’s been so long since I’ve watched anything, I’ve been so busy.”
“You ought to check out Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries. It’s about an Australian woman in the ‘20s who solves crimes and wears the most glamorous clothes. She’s in love with a dashing police inspector who glowers and has cheekbones.”
“You had me at cheekbones,” I replied.
Renee left. I climbed out of bed and pulled what was left of the bacon, the tube of sausage, and the package of hash brown patties out of the fridge. Then, as the skillet was warming, I booted up my computer and put on James Blunt’s first album, the one with “You’re Beautiful” on it, the one everyone went crazy for, for about a year, before we all collectively decided we hated that song.
I let that play for a few minutes while I logged into Netflix and searched for the show Renee had been telling me about. It looked ridiculous in the best way: there was a woman with an angular face, an upturned nose, and an elegant dark bob wearing the sort of clothes I had dreamed about running away to Paris and getting married in. The episode descriptions sounded fairly lurid: jewel thefts, murder at a carnival, murder on a train, murder in a Turkish bath. I couldn’t help but shake my head and smile as I clicked “play” on the first episode. Leave it to my sister to find the perfect show for me.
I was midway through the opening credits (which were fantastic) when my phone buzzed. Swearing under my breath, I ran over to the table and picked it up. Someone was calling from a number I didn’t recognize.
I felt a brief moment of panic as I stared at the screen. Despite my attempts to be even-handed in my portrayal of the SEALs, I had been getting a steady stream of death threats ever since the article went to press. Some enterprising young fool had found my personal number and put it on Twitter, and the Bugle had been inundated with hate mail. Few of the senders were SEALs or veterans; they were just old people who watched a lot of Fox News and thought I was part of the liberal “resistance” destroying the country.
With a quick prayer for protection, I pressed the answer button. “Hello?”
“Hello? Hey, is this Kelli?” To my immense relief, it was Zack.
“Zack! Hey.” I sank down into a chair, feeling my whole body loosen. “How did you get my number? Where are you calling from?”
“Somebody posted it on Twitter,” said Zack. “And I’m calling from Manhattan. I actually just flew back in yesterday.”
“Oh, yeah? Is your deployment over?”
“Finally over, although those last ten months or so were hell. I think they make it that way on purpose.”
It’s fair to say this wasn’t how I had expected the morning to go. I had almost given up hope that we were ever going to talk again, and now here he was on the other end of the phone crashing my Netflix party. I wanted to tell him how good it was to hear his voice, but I didn’t want him to think I was a sap. Get hold of yourself, I told myself; he’s only calling you because he knows you’re in town. Never mind that he had called me almost as soon as he landed…
“Anyway,” he said, “I was just calling to see if you wanted to get dinner tomorrow night while I’m still in town. I have a feeling my parents are going to want to see me before too long, so I figured we’d better do it soon—that is, if you want to.”
“What? Yes, I would actually love that. Where would you like to go?”
I could almost hear him tousling his hair on the other end of the line; after being separated from me by an ocea
n for ten months, we were that close. “I’ll let you pick,” he said. “You know this area better than I do, and honestly pretty much anywhere we go is going to taste amazing after the meals I’ve been eating for the last year. That sound good?”
“Yeah!” I knew I sounded too eager, but at the moment I couldn’t bring myself to care. “That sounds great. Text me when you’re on your way? I’ll text you my address.”
Knowing I wouldn’t be able to concentrate on my murder show, I closed Netflix and put the unused food back into a set of containers in the refrigerator. After the invitation I had just gotten, it somehow didn’t seem right to sit here alone eating the same foods I ate every morning. I wanted to celebrate. Throwing on a blue sequined shirt with delicate lacing and a pair of skinny jeans made of dark denim, I grabbed my computer and left the apartment.
I ate a breakfast of bagels and lox at a locally owned shop near Hell’s Kitchen, then sat in the window for about half an hour watching the pedestrians passing in the late-morning sunlight. I ran through our conversation in my head so many times that by the time I paid my bill and left, I had practically memorized it. I wondered if Zack noticed how awkward I had sounded, if he paid as much attention to the peculiarities of my speech as I did, or if he even cared.
When Renee finally got out of class, I was waiting for her in the coffee shop. I managed to flag her down before she could reach the front counter and Max.
“Hey, how’d your class go?” I asked her. I felt unusually effervescent, and I was sure it showed on my face.
“It actually went mostly well,” said Renee. “Maureen O’Connor only threw up once at the very end of class, so it wasn’t as big of a disruption as—you don’t really care, do you?”
I shook my head, my eyes twinkling. “What have you got going on this afternoon? Whatever your plans are, cancel them. We’re going out for lunch, and then we’re going to go get our hair done.”
***
As we sat in a circular booth at Bareburger on 85th Street an hour later, I told Renee about my surprise phone call from Zack and his invitation to eat out before he headed home to Texas. At first she looked thrilled, but the more we talked about it, the more she reverted to her usual stance of being protective and cautious.
“This sounds great and all,” she said, taking a sip of strawberry lemonade, “and I couldn’t be happier for you.”
I could sense there was a “but” coming. “Go on,” I said, my brow furrowed in suspicion.
“But I hope you won’t assume this is going to lead to anything long-term. It sounds like maybe he was just in the area and wanted to hook up for the night. He might not be in the Navy anymore, but he’s still a Navy man at heart.”
“Yes, but did you hear the part where he called me first thing when he flew in?” I asked. “I feel like you’re overlooking a very important part of all this.”
“Maybe,” she said. “And anyway, it’s cool that he invited you out and it’s exciting and you should be excited. But I don’t want you to be disappointed if you don’t hear from him again after tomorrow night.”
“You’re doing it again,” I said, half-amused and half-exasperated. “The thing, the thing that you do!”
“What thing?” asked Renee.
“The thing that you apologized for doing this morning, where you want to protect me from the world instead of letting me live my life and make mistakes like a grown woman.”
Renee shrugged in defeat. She knew better than to argue with her own words, especially when they had been spoken not three hours before.
“Anyway,” she said, “I hope you’ll go out and have a good time tomorrow. You’ve earned it.”
Chapter Nineteen
Zack
It was late Sunday afternoon, and I would be meeting up with Kelli in a few hours. I dug through my bag until I found a light-blue silk button down that wasn’t too wrinkly and a pair of dark denim jeans.
As I buttoned my shirt in front of the mirror I could feel my hands starting to shake. The last time I had felt this nervous about going out with a girl was in high school, when I had invited my crush to go bowling and we had kissed in the back of the bowling alley. I thought I would have gotten over that after high school, and for the most part I had. This girl was different, though. She put the fear of God into me. There were so many different ways I could screw this up, and if I did, we’d probably never see each other again.
“Tread carefully, Zack,” I told my reflection. “You’ve only got one chance to get this right. You’d better not mess it up.”
I doused myself in a cloud of cologne and dabbed my body with scented lotion. I wasn’t going to be taking any chances this evening; I had to look and smell perfect. I was still gelling and combing my hair when the phone on my desk buzzed. At first, I worried it might be Kelli calling to cancel, but it was just my mom.
“Hey, Mama,” I said with a feeling of relief. “What’s up?”
“Hey, sorry I missed your call yesterday,” she said. “Are you back in the states yet?”
“Just got in the day before yesterday. I had to check on my apartment and get my car out of storage.” I loved how easily I reverted back to my natural Texan accent when talking to my parents. Most of the time I was able to hide it; Carson was the only one of my buddies who knew I was secretly an old country boy at heart. “How are things over there?”
“Well, we really miss you,” said Mama. “Things here are good. Your dad finally got those hogs under control. Him and Curtis spent a whole weekend out here nailing the fence down. Took ‘em forever, but the hogs aren’t getting out anymore.”
“How’s Curtis and his girlfriend? They still together?”
“Still together,” she said. “I imagine they’ll be engaged before too long. They’ve been dating for about a year now.”
“She still livin’ out in the back yard?” My parents owned a tiny house, and they had been renting it out to her.
“Yeah, although she’s been talking about getting her own place in the city. Anyway, and your dad’s doing well. He wants to know when you’re coming home.”
I could hear Dad hollering something in the background, although I couldn’t make out what he was saying. “Tell him I’ll be coming home in a few days,” I replied.
“Well, you ought to,” said Mama. “Remember his birthday’s next month. He’ll be turning sixty-five, if you can believe it. I asked him what he wanted; he said a new waffle iron, but I think what he really wants is for all you boys to be together in the same room again. You know his heart hasn’t been acting well, and we don’t know how much longer he has.”
In the background, I heard Dad yelling something that sounded a lot like, “My heart is just fine!”
“I’ll be flying home, probably next weekend,” I assured her. “Matter of fact, I had better get going; I’m going on a date.”
“A date? Oooo, how exciting. Well, you take care of yourself. Stay out of trouble.”
“I will, Mama.”
“Love you.”
“You too.” She hung up.
Talking with Mama had allowed me to forget my worries for a few minutes, but as I drove through Manhattan to Kelli’s apartment I couldn’t stop thinking of all the things that could go wrong. Maybe she wanted to let me know that she had gotten married in the year I’d been away; maybe she would bring her husband to dinner. More likely we just wouldn’t click in the way we had done a year ago; there’s a reason long-distance couples are encouraged to talk every day if they hope to make their relationships last. I had a horrible image of myself entering her apartment and taking off my clothes, only to find her looking on with a horrified expression and showing me to the door.
But I shouldn’t have worried so much. When I came up to her room and knocked on the door, she came bounding out with a loud cry of surprise and excitement, throwing her thin arms around me. She smelled of elderflower and aromatic cedar and for a moment, I was content just to stand there and breathe in her scent.
>
“It’s so good to see you again,” she said, holding onto me and not letting go. She was wearing a blue button-down and a pair of blue jeans that showed off her slender figure to good effect.
I let out a sigh of relief and patted her gently on the arms. “Been a while, ain’t it?”
“‘Ain’t it?’” said Kelli, pulling back and grinning wickedly. “You been stationed in Louisiana for the last ten months?”
I’d have been humiliated if she wasn’t laughing so hard. I was reminded instantly of why I had fallen for her in the first place. “I just got off the phone with my mom; I forgot to transition back on my way over.”
“I don’t mind,” said Kelli, taking me by the arm and leading me down the hallway. “I think it sounds kinda sexy. You ought to be standing in a field wearing a cowboy hat and chewing on a long piece of grass.”
“If that’s what you go for, then you’d love my brother.”
“Oh, yeah? Does he have a sexy cowboy voice like Garth Brooks?”
“He is way, way sexier than Garth Brooks,” I replied.
We went out to dinner at a fancy crab shack on Long Island. I ordered she-crab soup and a bell pepper stuffed with shredded cheese, ground beef and cilantro while Kelli ordered sweet snow crab, potato crisps, and a garden salad. The meal came with unlimited breadsticks, and I was already nearly full by the time our plates arrived.
“So, feels like forever since I’ve seen you,” said Kelli. “How was Libya?”
“Hotter than hell on the fourth of July,” I replied. “They had to warn us not to go walking around in our bare feet or we could literally die—not that we needed any warning. And of course, the whole country is in chaos since the fall of Qaddafi, different gangs trying to seize control of the country. I feel like a lot of people don’t understand how vital our military is to keeping peace over there.”
Kelli frowned and poked at her salad unhappily.
“That wasn’t a jab at you—” I said.
“No, it’s fine. I realize my portrayal of the Navy might not have been entirely positive, but it’s something I’ve come to accept. How did the guys like it?”