Like There's No Tomorrow

by Linnea Valle

  “When he finally did start talking to me, things were never quite the same as they had been before. You know, Eddie was never one to hold a grudge, but it sure felt like he was holding one against me. Worst fucking feeling ever, at least up to that point in my life.”

  Emma sat quietly, soaking in everything I was telling her. Her eyes widening at Eddie’s uncharacteristic behavior, but she didn’t make a sound.

  “Finally, I couldn’t take it anymore. I mean Jesus, Emma, he was my best friend and I felt like things were so wrong between us. So, I made him talk to me.”

  “I thought you didn’t know about the pregnancy?” Emma looked alarmed. She was much more open tonight than I had seen her so far, dealings with the kids excluded.

  I shook my head at her as I spoke. “No. He never let on at all. I couldn’t have faked my reaction to seeing the kids. Plus, if I would have known, I would have been here for you from the moment I found out. You need to believe that, Em. You know me better than that. I had no idea.”

  “Eddie called somewhat of a truce between us, although I didn’t feel as close to him as I had before. He made me promise if anything happened to him, I would take care of you.” I looked down in shame. I hadn’t fulfilled Eddie’s one, simple request. “I’m so ashamed of myself for letting both of you down. But I’m here, I want to make this right. And now I have even more incentive than when I came here yesterday to talk.”

  “What happened on, you know, that day?” Her inquiry was hesitant and I wondered if she truly wanted to know or not. Because this was where the shit got raw for me, so I knew it could be her undoing.

  This was it, it was what I was dreading. I didn’t want her to know the details of how badly I let her and Eddie down. Dr. Mooney and I talked about it at great length and he had been encouraging me to come here. To let it out and tell Emma. I wasn’t sure how I would handle it, but I was certain Emma wasn’t going to deal with it well at all. I didn’t want to sully her memories and I didn’t want to let mine come out to play. Dr. Mooney said it was the only way for either of us to allow ourselves to move on and begin the process of healing.

  “You sure you’re ready to hear this?” I asked. “Cause, I’m not sure if I can get it out or not, but I’ll try if you want to hear it. I’ll warn you Emma, what comes out of my mouth is not going to be nice. I don’t have a filter for this and when it starts, I can’t tell you how long it’s going to take. I won’t be able to stop. So, if you’re not ready for this, tell me now.” Sitting stone faced, I almost hoped she would stop me. Save me from living through the agony, yet again.

  “I don’t want to hear it Zach,” she hesitated and my heart skipped a beat. “But I need to hear it, and I need to hear it from you.” She finished and my chest caved in, sucking the oxygen out of my lungs, just like after I’d been hit by the shrapnel. I tried my best to stave off a panic attack.

  “Okay, Em. But hold on, it’s going to be a rough ride.” I told her honestly. I hoped I could get through this without that looming panic attack.

  I started my story, telling Emma the details as I slipped from the present into the past as surely as if it were happening all over in that very moment.

  “We were on patrol. It had been a typical day. Boredom and bullshit. It was dry, hot, and the air tasted dirty. No different than any other day. All the days blended one into the next.

  We started out a little before dusk on patrol within our area of operations. We were about an hour in and our Humvee was lead vehicle on a deserted road. We were coming up on a few abandoned cars which looked like they’d been burned out. It put me on high alert. Eddie and I were switching out the gunner position. Something felt wrong about all of it, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. The patrol continued moving while I climbed down from the sling chair and Eddie climbed up.”

  I stopped to take a drink of water. My throat burning and parched just like I was still out in that dry desert. I took a couple of deep breaths to tried and calm my racing heart. The last thing Emma needed was for me to have a full-blown panic attack and completely check out. I resolved to continue and I slipped back into the past.

  “As Eddie and I exchanged seats, we also exchanged a greeting and I mentioned something about the cars up ahead. Eddie nodded an acknowledgement. Eddie took his position as gunner and I turned around, preparing to take my seat. Then it happened. The sound was deafening. My brain registered confusion at being thrown around like a ragdoll. I had a feeling of tumbling. It felt very much like when you’re in a dream and you feel like you’re falling and can’t catch yourself.

  One of the abandoned cars, which we were now directly beside, had exploded. The percussion of the blast threw us. The driver tried to swerve and between that and the blast, our Humvee was on its side. All I could hear was ringing in my ears. Fuck, we took a direct hit. I looked around and from what I could see through the dust and smoke was total chaos inside my vehicle. I couldn’t tell you if I lost consciousness or not. If I did, it was only momentary.

  I could see people outside running toward us from the other vehicles in our patrol. I saw that orders were being yelled and men from my team were pointing rifles, sweeping in all directions. As the dust began to settle a little, I pulled myself up and looked around to see Eddie, laying a couple of feet away on his back on the ground. He’d been thrown from his perch. I didn’t know if it was from the blast itself or the roll of the vehicle. He wasn’t moving. Jesus Fucking Christ, Eddie!!!! I had already surmised from my quick survey of the vehicle, no one else in our Humvee had survived.

  I was having a hard time moving. My limbs wouldn’t respond to what my brain was telling them to do. I had to get to Eddie. He was my sole thought right then.

  By sheer will, I drug myself out and over to Eddie forcing myself to stay low. I grabbed Eddie and pulled his head to rest in the crook of my arm as we lie in the dirt cloud surrounding us. He was still alive and mouthing something to me. Thank fuck he was alive. I still couldn’t hear anything from the sound of the explosion. I quickly looked up and down Eddie’s body and I saw his fatigues were soaked in blood, Eddie’s blood. Shards of shrapnel from the car itself as well as nails and other metal objects were scattered across his whole body. He looked as though someone had made a pincushion from a tomato.

  Panic rose in me at the sight of so much of Eddie’s blood soaking his fatigues. The thought running through my mind was ‘Jesus, this can’t be happening. We’ve only got a few more weeks before we’re supposed to head home. Eddie was going to have his happy little family. He was going to have a life with Sarah, a white picket fence. The whole thing!’ This had to be a bad dream. I needed to wake up from it. I quickly realized this nightmare was real.

  I looked back toward the other vehicles in our patrol and screamed for a medic. I think I was yelling at the top of my lungs, though I couldn’t hear myself and the rushing sound in my ears was overwhelming. What was taking them so fucking long?

  I leaned down and by some miracle, I was able to hear Eddie. He repeated the same words over and over. He said, “Take care of Emma. Tell Sarah I love her and I’m sorry.” Those words were on repeat as his voice got softer and softer.

  A medic arrived and as he began to crouch down, I saw it, movement from behind the other vehicle. I could see the muzzle flashes and someone taking pot shots at us. I grabbed Eddie’s gun, because I must have left mine behind. Eddie’s weapon was still wrapped around his body.

  I tried to take a deep, steadying breath to get my shot off, but the pain of trying to take a breath wracked my body and I almost fainted. I felt like I was suffocating. Like a fish out of water, gulping and gasping, trying to put some oxygen into my bloodstream before I passed out. But still no luck and it hurt like a son of a bitch.

  Eddie and I were both excellent marksmen; that’s why we were the gunners. I took the shot and a male figure slumped forward, his gun falling to the ground, not moving. Slowly, I felt myself losing my fight with consciousness. No matter how hard I tried
to yell or tell Eddie we were going to get out of this, my vocal cords had stopped working along with my ability to breath. We had to get out of this. Fuck Eddie, I thought, ‘Just hang on. Just. Fucking. Hang. On’.

  I looked down at Eddie and he gave me a wan smile, coughed, and winced a couple of times and then his eyelids started to flutter. His mouth still repeating the same phrase as earlier. Eddie’s only concern was for Sarah and Emma.

  I watched the life drain out of his eyes and I knew he was gone, right then. I wanted to scream but my lungs wouldn’t let me, my ears were still ringing. Probably a good thing, because if I could have gotten a breath in for my voice to work, I would have been wailing like a baby.

  Eddie. Eddie was fucking dead. His head cradled on my arm, pulled up to my chest. The life spilled from his body by all the blood from the shrapnel wounds. If a person could pinpoint a moment in time when they lost their mind that was it for me. Eddie was my friend, my confidant, hell, Eddie was my fucking brother! He couldn’t leave me now. God, no!

  I looked up at the medic, who was tugging on the arm of my fatigue jacket. He began pointing and my first inclination was to pull away, and then I realize he wanted me to look down. I saw my own jacket, soaked in blood, Eddie’s blood and then I saw what he was actually pointing at. The blood wasn’t all his.

  I saw a shard of metal, it was large and I didn’t know if it was from the car that blew, other shrapnel which had been placed inside the car for maximum casualties, or if it was a part of the Humvee. My only thought was, ‘well, I’m fucked.’ Because right then, I realized that piece of shrapnel went straight through my back and was sticking out my chest. In a dream like state, I recalled Eddie’s rifle falling from my hands and everything started to go dark as I took what I assumed would be my last attempt at a breath.

  I figured I was joining Eddie on the other side. Probably fitting since I knew it should have been me to die and not him. If we’d only put off the gunner tradeoff for another thirty seconds, maybe he would still be alive. It was my fault. All my fault.

  The next thing I knew I was waking from surgery at a hospital in Germany. I was told I’d already had two previous surgeries. They were trying to stabilize me enough to ship me to Walter Reed.”

  I stopped abruptly, out of words to describe the horrors I had seen and felt, only raw emotion remained. I looked down at my hands. They were shaking and I was pouring sweat. My breathing was fast and erratic. I was about to have a full-blown panic attack when I looked over at Emma. I had been so wrapped up in my internal memories of losing Eddie, I’d forgot why I’d been telling the story in the first place.

  Emma was huddled into a little ball in the corner of the couch with her knees drawn up to her chin and her arms wrapped so tightly around herself, not only had her face been drained of color, so had her hands from clenching herself so hard. She had silent tears streaming down her face and a small trail of drainage from her nose was drawing precariously close to her lips which were quivering. She gulped her breaths so fast I was afraid she was going to hyperventilate. Emma sat staring wide-eyed at me. She was in shock.

  The sight of her snapped me out of my impending panic attack and I immediately went to her side. I tried to pull her arms from around her legs, but they weren’t moving. I picked up the whole bundle that was Emma, slid underneath her and placed her on my lap. I held her tight, murmured what I hoped were comforting words in her hair and rocked her back and forth like a child.

  After a few minutes, her body began to relax a little and she turned, still on my lap and wrapped her arms around me. She buried her head into the crook of my neck and shoulder and started to sob in earnest. I held her, I’d hold her for as long as it took. At least until she came to her senses and pushed out of my arms demanding that I leave. I was sure she must hate me now.

  Emma

  I sat and listened to all the details of Eddie’s death, absorbed everything that poured out of Zach. He was lost in it. He was back there. I’d made him go back and experience the worst day of his life. The thought slayed me. How could I have been so cruel? Except, I needed to hear it. I felt somewhat like I experienced it myself through the telling.

  I didn’t know shit about any of what they had been through, but I could tell from how agitated Zach was, it was awful. No words would ever be able to convey what he had to go through. The memories were ones only he would see, feel, and try to deal with. No wonder he wouldn’t talk to me afterwards.

  I almost understood the need he had to hold on to the nurse who was his caregiver. Maybe she kept the nightmares away. The understanding didn’t take away my jealousy or the pain I felt knowing he’d turned to someone else during his time of need. The agony of seeing me, looking so much like Eddie, and remembering our childhood would have been unbearable. I knew why he started drinking to try and numb the pain.

  As strong as Zach was, I couldn’t blame him for thinking about ending his life. The guilt and misery he had been carrying around must have been an immense burden. He thought I was going to hate him for being the survivor, for not saving Eddie. I would never hate him for living. I hated the war. I hated the fight and the enemy, but Zach was a hero. As much as I’d wanted to all this time, I was unable to hate the man I loved, no matter how many reasons he had given me to.

  The Army told me Zach saved many more lives by killing the sniper. His medals proved he acted with bravery and valor. I was proud of him. Did any of it take away the pain I felt for Eddie’s death? Hell no, the pain would never go away. Eddie and I were too close for it to ever go away completely. I didn’t know he’d given Zach a hard time about me. I didn’t know his last words were concern for Sarah and me. But I did know there was nothing anyone could have done to save Eddie.

  Sarah and I were given a basic rundown of the same story Zach told me. My Casualty Assistance Officer also told me it was less than two minutes from the time the vehicle was hit by the explosion until the medic arrived on scene. What must have felt like an eternity to Zach was only a couple minutes or so. Two minutes. Eddie didn’t suffer, his injuries were extensive enough, they said he wouldn’t have been very lucid and certainly wouldn’t have felt the pain. His body was likely in shock.

  I was grateful, even in that state, his thoughts were of us. As upset as I was about Eddie being gone, I would never think to blame Zach. He’d been through enough already. I wasn’t even sure why he kept saying it was his fault or he should have been the one. If it would have been Zach, our children would be fatherless. Eddie would have tried to take care of me. But he also would have built his life with Sarah, so no matter who was killed, there was no right or wrong person to have survived.

  What it boiled down to was Zach felt unworthy to have lived. As painful as it was to hear the horror of what they both went through and how Eddie died. My real pain was for Zach. What he struggled with daily was beyond my imagination. Carol had mentioned she knew he had nightmares and panic attacks but his psychologist was a great help along with AA. I had pretended not to have heard her all those times when she had made comments here and there. I never called her out on them, because, honestly, I savored every bit of information I got.

  After Zach’s retelling, my tears were a mixture for Eddie and for Zach as well as for Sarah. Sarah. It hit me we needed to talk to her. She deserved some peace in her life as well. I thought I’d found mine. I believed I could finally move on. The grieving process would continue. I was sure it would be present for years, but I had the twins to help me stay focused. I also had two more years before I graduated. And, maybe, just maybe, Zach and I would get a second chance.

  For the moment though, it was time to shed the tears. I’d shed them every night for my brother and, if I was honest, for the loss of Zach as well. Now the tears were for Zach. For what he had gone through. I lost my best friend and brother, but so had Zach. He watched it happen, impotent. Unable to stop the inevitable course. He was a bystander who had to deal with it first-hand.

  After the shock wore of
f, I held him. I cried tears for him. He was here, alive, and had come to the realization he loved me. Well, it was about fucking time. I thought he’d never understand. What we had was special, once in a life time kind of special.

  He was trying to comfort me, but I was trying to comfort him as well. From what I saw, he wanted to be a dad to his children and I wanted nothing more than to have him a part of their lives. Their dad, the totally infuriating, totally fucked up, and God help me, the totally hot Army hero who had always been my best friend along with my brother, Eddie.

  After a time of grieving, I gathered my thoughts and feelings before I pulled away from Zach. I wiped my nose, quite indelicately, on the hem of my tee shirt. I was sure I looked a wreck, but when I looked up into Zach’s eyes, all I saw was adoration, and the love he’d proclaimed. I had settled down now, and he stopped rocking and whispering in my ear. He looked relieved I was coming out of it.

  “Thank you, Zach. I can only imagine how hard it was for you to expose yourself and tell me everything.” I tried to smile, but I felt like it came out as more of a grimace than a smile.

  “Emma, you deserved me to tell you everything months ago. Don’t thank me. I’ve been a complete, selfish bastard by not doing it sooner.” He looked stricken with guilt. “Now is where I plead with you to let me continue to be in the twins’ lives and in your life if you can stand me.” The worry lines furrowed his whole brow and his brown eyes misted over with his own unshed tears.

  “Why would you need to plead with me, Zach?” I asked as I lifted his chin to look into my eyes. Something I had noticed he avoided whenever possible. “You’re their father. If you promise to never pull away from them, leaving them fatherless, I want you to be a part of their lives. They deserve to know their dad, and you deserve to watch them grow up and be a part of their lives. I’ll protect my children any way I need to, so don’t screw this up for all of us or you’ll never see any of us again. Are we clear?”