August—Then
I climb off the bus and hoist my gear over my shoulder. I didn’t think I was going to be able to get off this weekend, much less be able to come home, but I pulled in every kind of favor I could from my team and got a weekend pass to see my girl.
I purchase flowers from Mrs. Matchet on Main Street and walk the three miles home. Mamma would skin me alive if she knew I was coming home without seeing her first, but some things are worth the risk. I had to be here for Savannah's birthday, I just had to. I walk up the street to our house and frown at the car in the drive. I didn’t know Jude was home from school yet. He’d said he was staying on in Atlanta for extra credit and working through the holiday. Sav’s birthday isn’t the only reason I’m happy to be home Thanksgiving weekend. I’m looking forward to a home-cooked meal with my folks.
I use my key to open the door. I can’t wait to see her face when she realizes I’m home, but when I step over the threshold and walk into the entryway, I’m met with a sound that rips the rug right out from under me.
As if on autopilot, I walk down the hall and push open our bedroom door. My best friend is buried balls’ deep inside my fiancée, and her legs are up over his shoulders as he pumps inside her. I stand in the doorway, watching them. It’s as if I’m dreaming, it isn’t real, it isn’t . . .
“Fuck, Sav.” He groans, interrupting my thoughts, piercing my heart like a blade, white-hot and searing. “Christ, I love this tight pussy.”
How can she do this? How can either of them do this to me, to us?
The ringing clap of his flesh slamming against hers echoes off every wall in the room, and as her mouth drops open in an O, her eyes closed and her moans splitting the air, my stomach bottoms out, my blood boils, and everything turns red. I charge at the two of them, grab him around the back of the neck, and pull him off her as I slam my fist into his gut, and Sav, my Sav, my fiancée, screams for me to stop.
She hurls herself at me. I shrug her off onto the bed. Jude comes up swinging, but I duck, and jab my fist into his nose. Blood sprays my face and shirt. One clean crack to the jaw while he’s still reeling is all it takes, and it’s lights out for this asshole. His body crumples in a heap on the floor.
I stare down at him, knowing he deserves this and so much more, but I don’t feel any better for knocking him out. Sav launches herself at me, screaming, but I can’t make out her words. I let her slap my face, my chest. I let her hit me until the blood spattering my shirt stains her hands and she falls against me. I can’t help but put my arms around her, because even though she just ruined me, ruined us, by fucking my best friend, even though the two of them have betrayed me in a way I never thought possible, I love her. It’s muscle memory. Loving her is muscle memory, and losing her is worse than the thought of dying in Afghanistan.
“I hate you.” She shoves away from me and slaps my face, hard. “I hate you. You left me here.”
“For you. I did it for us.”
“No, you didn’t. You did it for you, because the idea of being a hero gets you hard. You did it because you wanted to feel like a big man and run around the desert playing with guns. You didn’t sign up because it meant we’d be taken care of financially, or because you wanted to fight for our country. You’ve talked about joining the Marines since you were twelve years old. You’d always planned on leaving me.”
“Then why did you agree to marry me?” I shout.
“I don’t know!”
I inhale through my nose to keep from putting my fist through the wall beside her head. “You don’t know. So what? You’re in love with Jude, now? Is that it?”
“I don’t know,” she whimpers.
“How long?” I shout. “How long have you been fucking my best friend, Sav?”
She flinches as if I’m about to hit her. I laugh, because I’d never dream of hurting her. Not in a million years. Not like she’s destroyed me. “You two deserve each other.”
“August, wait. I didn’t mean for it to happen. I’m sorry, baby. I love you.” She grabs hold of my arm but I shrug her off, and she goes tumbling to the floor, staring up at me with an accusatory glare. I pause, wanting to go to her despite my anger, but instead I turn my back and stare at the prone body of my best friend naked and bloody, laid out on my bedroom carpet. Jude’s face is a mess, but it’s nothing the doctors won’t be able to fix if he throws enough money at them. Jude du Pont never met a problem he couldn’t fix with money. “You best call him an ambulance.”
“August,” Sav whimpers, but I walk away, and I don’t look back.