“What?” She shakes her head slowly, “he killed her? I never read anything about that…” she squints off into the distance, like she’s trying to read the details in an invisible file she’s probably poured over a hundred times.

“No, not directly,” I grind my teeth together as the pain of her loss stabs my heart. I look down at the dust clinging to my boots, trying to stop the tears pricking my eyes. I take a deep breath, sucking air deep into my lungs like a diver about to plunge into the ocean. That’s how I feel about my memories of her, like they could drown me with sadness.

“What does that mean?” She asks softly, and I look back up at her. She’s searching my face for answers that I’ve still never spoken out loud about.

“Trent Turner raped my sister,” I answer flatly. “She was seventeen and she decided to sneak into a frat party on campus. You know, sometimes I’ve thought about that, about how she snuck in and was drinking underage, and I’ve gotten so angry. Like, if she just would’ve stayed home and acted her age instead of sneaking into a party full of booze and college kids… why did she have to go out that night at all?” My voice cracks, and the tears I’ve been trying to keep inside fill my eyes. I wipe them away with the back of my hand, “but I’m not angry at her. How could I be? It’s not her fault that Mr. Fucking Prep School decided to roofie her. It’s not her fault he took her back to his place slobbering and almost unconscious. It’s not her fault he recorded himself fucking her while she was passed out like he was some kind of hunter taking pictures of his prized gazelle,” I swallow hard but my throat is raw.

Abbie jumps as I make my way to the side of the bed. “I’m just grabbing this,” I point to the water bottle beside the bed.

“Oh, okay,” she watches me intently as I lean over and pick it up. My throat is parched and I take a huge swig of the cool, refreshing water.

“Listen, I wish you’d just relax. I’ve already told you I’m not going to hurt you. Don’t you think if I was some kind of crazed serial killer I would’ve shown you that by now? Don’t you think I would’ve made my move?”

“You’re right,” She nods and her long hair swings around her face. “I’m just nervous, like, only twenty-four hours ago I had a much different picture of who you were in my mind,” she explains.

“Yeah, well, you were wrong. I wasn’t even going to kill Trent until he destroyed my sister’s life. I found out about the rape when I was on deployment, and I always knew I was going to come back and teach him a lesson, but with these,” I hold up my fists, “not a gun.”

I remember how angry I was when I first found out about the assault. I went back to my barracks and ripped my room apart. I flipped the bed, tore the hangers out of my locker, kicked the door and dented the metal with my steel-toe boot. Did I want to kill him then? Absolutely. But I knew that I wouldn’t.

I run my hand over my grizzly jaw and snap back to the present. Abbie is looking up at me and I hold out the water bottle to her, “Here, have some,” I offer.

“Thanks,” she takes a sip, never moving her eyes from my face.

She still doesn’t trust me.

“I didn’t find out until I came back that he had recorded her. I guess that fucker spread the video around to his buddies and it leaked to the kids in her school. From what I’ve found out, she couldn’t get away from it. She’d go to school and kids would play it on their phones in the cafeteria, laughing at her. She stopped eating at the school. Then she just stopped eating, period. Her friend told me she would hide in the bathroom between classes and cry. Before that happened, she had the same dreams most high school seniors have, to have an epic graduating year. He took that from her too.”

I lean down on my haunches so I’m not towering over Abbie on the bed. I realize I’m probably intimidating her.

Her eyes are soft and her full lips twitch downward and she grabs my hand, “I’m so sorry. My heart hurts for her,” she blinks quickly.

“I am too. The thing was, when I was in the desert, I didn’t know all that shit. I didn’t find out until I came home for her funeral. I got word from my commanding officer that I was being sent home because she died,” my voice breaks and I can’t stop the tears from falling this time. The pain is still fresh. The loss still doesn’t feel real. It hurts too much to wrap my mind around. “I couldn’t believe it,” I choke out the words and force myself to keep talking because I know if I don’t I’ll end up losing it. “They didn’t want to tell me it was suicide, but I pushed him. I mean, she was just a kid. A healthy kid with her whole life in front of her. Anyway, he told me she took her own life and I felt like he gutted me. I couldn’t breathe. My ears stopped working. I was numb as I walked back to pack up my bunk.” I squeeze Abbie’s hand as I remember the helplessness I felt. How it hurt to breathe.

Abbie doesn’t interrupt, but tears are forming in her eyes. She gives me time to get some control without pushing me to continue. “I don’t know if you’d call it fate or shitty luck, but when I got to my bunk I missed mail call and someone left a letter that was sent to me on my bed.” Tears slide over my cheeks. “It was from my sister. She still didn’t tell me about the video or the kids in her school, but she told me life was feeling out of control. She said she was finding it harder and harder to stay optimistic that she didn’t know if she could ever get her life back to normal. That she didn’t even know what normal was supposed to feel like anymore. But,” my voice cracks and a tremble runs through me as I remember her words written on the page I’ve read a hundred times, “she ended it by saying she had one thing that still gave her hope.” I breathe in a shaky lung full of air, “That she still looked forward to when I was coming home. She said she couldn’t wait to see me,” hot tears splash down my face and I pull away from Abbie’s hand to wipe them away.

“Trent Turner took that away from me. He might not have put a bullet in her, but he still killed her. What he did was much worse, because he killed her soul long before he ever took her life.” My chin trembles and I try to get my emotions under control.

Abbie moves forward to the edge of the bed and throws her arms around me, “I’m sorry Cole,” I look up at her and she’s crying too. I wrap my arms around her and let my tears fall as I hold her against my chest.

“Me too,” I agree. “Me too.”