Chapter 30
Jeff showed up just before I left Kathy's and insisted on talking to me to let me know he was going on a mission for his church and hoped I would be willing to help support him while he was gone.
“Jeff I can't believe you're asking me to help support you in this. You know how I feel about that damned church, and you're going to ask me to help support someone trying to spread its lies? If you want to help people join the military, at least they'll teach you usable job skills,” I said.
“So you won't help me?” he asked.
“If it means the lies of that religion are spread, no, I won't help you,” I said.
“Fine I guess I should have known you wouldn't, but I hoped maybe since you're my brother...” he started.
“Are you going to ask Kathy? I'd be surprised if she says yes. What bout Sarah? Let me guess they have families to take care of so you won't ask,” I said.
“You're the only one who has any money to help,” he said.
“Why don't you go to your precious church and get them to help? After all it is their beliefs you'll be spreading. As long as you'll be spreading that religion I can't help you. If you want to really help people, there is little I wouldn't do to help,” I said.
Mom was standing there and heard everything. She gave me a disgusted look, but didn't say anything. Kathy came up to me and asked if I needed anything else before leaving.
“I don't need anything unless you can convince Jeff not to throw away the next couple years of his life,” I said.
Jeff seemed hurt that I refused to help him do something he knew I was against. I couldn't believe he had even toyed with the idea that I would give him money to do something that to me was as offensive as trying to spread the lies of religion. The thing he didn't seem to understand was it wasn't just this particular religion I was so against, I hated all religions equally.
Everything started to fall into a routine, in the morning the girls would get up with me and have breakfast, after I would get back from my morning run just before leaving for work, I would make them something for lunch. I met some of the neighbors and found out the church my mother was so fond of was in this part of the town as well, but not as in your face with it as they were in mom and dads, or Sarah's areas.
The time I spent with Kathy diminished to the point we never talked unless there was something happening she knew mom wouldn't tell me, but felt I should know about. Mostly about Jeff and what he was doing.
After the first year of living with Irene and taking care of the girls I needed some time out as well, so she agreed to see if her mother would take the girls and she would take me out to all the haunts she went to regularly. The first place we went to was the same bar we met in and there she introduced me to Chris.
“Irene said your in special forces,” I said.
“Did she? She hasn't told me anything about you other than your name, so I'm kind of surprised she told you that much, to be honest,” Chris responded.
He gave me a look I didn't understand one that said something wasn't right.
“Is something wrong, Chris?” I asked.
“Wrong?” Whatever it was that was bothering him vanished. “No, Sam there's nothing wrong, Just a memory that... a memory I just can't seem to get a grasp on, is all,” he said.
There was something so familiar about him, but if we had met, I had no memory of it. The way he looked at me seemed to say he too knew something was wrong, that something happened that changed memories so something was out of sync. There was always the nagging feeling that not only had we met before we had been more than just friends.
Over the next couple months I met most of Irene's friends and while I got along with them, Chris was the only one I trusted, but even him I didn't trust enough to tell my secret, a secret I didn't dare share with anyone any longer.
I would still get calls from General Wright wanting my help with some of the training on base. And it seemed Chris was gone quite a bit with his work whatever it was. I assumed he was done with the military since the war was over, but for some reason knew whatever it was that took him away had something to do with his special forces training.
Of all the people I met after meeting Irene, Chris was the only one I couldn't read well enough to know whether or not I could beat them if push came to shove. He was capable of so much more than any of the others. He had a grace, speed and agility that belied his size, I knew there wasn't another person in the group that could match him in either aspect.
A few months after meeting him I found I was tired again, like I had been when I woke after the last two missions I had been involved in before being sent back home. I hadn't suffered the blackouts, but the weakness and tired feeling was back. I wanted nothing more than to share with this man everything. To tell him who I really am, but the fear of him laughing at me was more than enough to keep me from saying anything.
“Are you alright Sam? You seem a little out of it,” Chris said.
“I feel like I haven't slept in days. It's a feeling I haven't had since before I got out of the Air Force,” I said.
“It wouldn't be the kids would it?” he asked.
“That's a different kind of tired, this tired is just like the tired I felt after the last two missions I did,” I said.
“I'm not sure I understand,” he said.
“I'm not sure how to explain. Everyone I talked to after those missions said I was a key player in the missions, but I don't remember much of anything about either of them. I only remember waking up in my quarters and being told I'd been asleep for three days,” I said.
“I see, I have a couple mission I was involved in like that, I don't remember much about how they ended only that they ended with the enemy pulling back as though they faced something they knew they could never defeat. In one of them they had us out numbered more than one hundred to one. Then all of a sudden they gave up and pulled back,” he said.
“Explain something to me if you would. Everyone of the people here are like an open book to me. It's like I know their weaknesses and their strengths, all, that is except you. With you it's like you have a speed and grace that defy your size and build. A strength that can't be measured in terms most could begin to understand,” I said.
“I don't have an explanation. I'm surprised you can read some of the others here if you can't read me,” he said.
“I've noticed several of them are faster than it seems possible, even that they seem to be able to move with a grace that makes them seem to disappear and then reappear at will, but only you seem to be able to disappear and reappear to me. I guess you could almost call it magical, if you were to believe in such nonsense,” I said.
“You don't believe in magic?” he asked.
“I believe in magic the same way I believe in god. For the weak minded they can both exist, but for me everything can be explained logically through science,” I said.
“I see so the fact I seem to be able to disappear and reappear at will can be explained through the use of logic and science. For the record Sam, I don't believe in god either, I'm not so sure about magic though,” he said.
“Chris if you want to believe in magic that's your choice, it doesn't bother me one way or the other. I don't even care if someone wants to believe in a god, as long as they don't expect me to believe as well, or try forcing me to believe simply because they can't understand why I don't,” I said.
“I would never try forcing you to believe in something simply because I believe in it. That would be like me trying to say you have to be The White Rose just because I think you are,” he said.
“I'm not The White Rose. The White Rose is a children's story character,” I said.
“So you've heard the stories of The White Rose?” he asked.
“My best friend told them to me after we were stationed on the front lines,” I said.
“Your best friend?” he asked.
“Yes my best friend, Sargent Mac Denvers. He said his mom use to te
ll the stories to him when he was a kid,” I said.
“That wouldn't be Mac Denvers of White Rose would it?” he asked.
“He was my second in command. We went through special forces training together,” I said.
“If you'll excuse me Sam I need to go talk to some of the other guys,” Chris said.
For some reason it seemed he avoided me as soon as he found out I was White Rose commander even though I sensed he was someone I considered to be a member of White Rose.
No, that wasn't right, not a member of White Rose, but something special to White Rose.
“He's your husband Sam,” the voice I knew but didn't know said.
I looked around to see who said that, and wondered if maybe I was as crazy as some people seemed to think. The voice had been nothing but a whisper, yet there wasn't anyone near close enough to have said it.
I was really hating not being able to share who I was with anyone, but was terrified of being laughed at again. How many people could accept that the woman I was inside was the real me.
I stayed in the corner where it seemed I always sat when at this bar and noticed few if any of those there wanted anything to do with me. I thought several times of leaving and just going back home, but didn't want to be alone there either.
“He really cares about you, he just isn't ready yet,” again the voice I knew yet didn't know.
I looked around again with the same results. No one even close, yet the voice was so close and familiar.
I closed my eyes and leaned back against the wall and was lost into a world where no one could hurt me.
The Hidden Rose Page 79