Chapter Seventeen

Jase and I talked late into the night and laughed over memories we never noticed we shared differently. We even had text wars with Izzy and Joe, taking selfies and captioning them. I was confident she was having a blast even if it wasn't completely with me. The last thing she sent read:

It's good to see you so happy

I hadn't realized I was missing anything before but she was right. In that moment, I really was just that—happy. It was almost three in the morning before I convinced him we needed sleep.

"But if we sleep, that means when we wake I have to let you go again."

He had snuggled up to me, spooning me from behind. The room was dark and I had finally reached exhaustion. 

"You’re acting like a girl."

"Red, don't start with that."

"Okay, I take it back. Now, let me sleep."

"Goodnight, baby."

He kissed the back of my head and then readjusted himself to lie on his back. I missed him immediately and rolled onto my stomach, resting my head on his chest. Truth be told, I loved that he wanted me. It felt amazing to be cherished and he knew exactly how to accomplish that. Giving him trouble was just an old habit I never learned to kick.

I was thrown to the floor hearing screams louder than I could register before I even understood where I was. Once realization set in, I was on my feet and standing over a waking nightmare. Jase was thrashing from side to side, his arms flailing as he continued to scream over and over, "Stay down. Just go, I've got them." 

"Listen to me. Go. Get out of here."

I climbed onto his bed and tried to shake him awake but never got the chance. He was moving around too fast.

"Jase. Jase.”

He began to sob in his struggle and I simply lost it. Sliding down the wall, I curled into the fetal position, forced to listen as he relived a time in his life I couldn't protect him from. The pain he was dealing with, was forced to live with, it wasn’t fair. After more minutes than I cared to keep track of, I decided it was enough. He wasn't alone, and there was no reason for him to endure the pain any longer. I didn't care if he put me through a wall, I was going to wake him up if it killed me.

He was covered in sweat, still thrashing around when I went to the bathroom for some water. At first, I intended to have it ready for when he woke, but knowing how dangerous it was to go near him I threw it right over his face. He came off the bed swinging and I flew back against the wall scared to death for the impact I was certain was coming. Instead, everything went quiet. I hadn't realized my eyes were closed until I had to consciously decide to open them.  He stood before me frozen with fear. I wasn't sure if touching him was a good idea. If he was still technically asleep, it could trigger another episode. 

"Jase?"

It was as if the sound of my voice clarified his reality. He buckled to the floor and reached out for my feet while he shook uncontrollably. I lowered myself until we were at eye level.

"It's going to be okay." He refused to look at me. "Jase, I need your eyes right now. If ever there were a time, now is it."

He still refused, burying his face in-between my legs. My hands reached out to comfort him but couldn't stop the tremors myself. Slowly, I rested them on his shoulders and begged, "I'm really scared, and I need you to talk to me."

I felt him shift, and then he lifted his head, meeting me with his eyes. 

"Did I hurt you?"

I took his face in my hands.

"No. No, you didn't hurt me. Was that just a bad dream? Are you okay?"

The sorrow in his eyes made my heart hurt, but when he said, "I'm so sorry," my heart broke. He said each word slowly making every one count. 

"You didn't know what you were doing."

"I could have hurt you."

I was completely astounded that he would be more concerned with me being okay. 

"Look at me. I'm fine."

He pushed forward and kissed me with a fervor I didn't expect. Still high from adrenaline and fear, I wasn't really in the mood to make out, but that wasn't his intention, either. He clearly just needed reassurance everything was going to be okay. I, on the other hand, needed something else.

I waited until he was the one to stop and then asked the question I knew he would do anything to avoid. 

"I need you to tell me what happened over there."

His eyes went back and forth over mine, searching for a way to escape.

"You don't want to know, believe me."

"I may not like what I hear but that—" I pointed to the bed that was now in shambles "—is clearly something I need to understand. Shutting me out isn't going to work this time."

He pushed himself off of me and rolled to the left, resting against the wall beside me.

"I don't want to do this."

He physically looked scared.

"Then don't, but know I can't stick around to watch you fall apart. I may not be able to help you, but if I'm going to go through that again, I need to understand."

He looked away from me, and I knew I had lost any chance at being close to him. And then, without warning, he opened up to me. As he started speaking, the sound of his voice changed as if he was living through it all over again. Tears ran down my face, and I was grateful he never once looked at me to see them.

"We had been over there for months moving through the same areas day after day. The routine was ingrained in us. Search the houses, secure the area, and sweep for enemies. It was around 14:00 hours when we were on the last stretch."

He readjusted himself against the wall and then surprised me by picking up my hand.

"I'm going to try to explain all this in a way you will understand, but don't hate me if I have to stop for a second, okay? It's been a long time since I have told anyone what really happened."

I squeezed his hand and followed it up with, "I don't want you to hate me for this. I only want to understand why what just happened did. That was more than a bad dream, Jase. You were living inside a nightmare."

"You have no idea, Red. I live that nightmare whether I'm asleep or not. It just had faded a little before the other night is all. I really believed I was going to be okay."

"You are okay. You're here and able to talk to me about it. For me, that makes you better than just okay."

He brought my hand to his mouth and tenderly kissed the back of it before he blew out a deep breath and continued.

"So, like I was saying, the area had been swept, meaning the streets were clear. My men had just combed two houses and were about to search the next two. I was on over watch, which means my job was to have eyes on all of my men to provide protection and look out for anything out of the ordinary. It was a normal day, like any other, and then something that had never happened before took everything I knew and blew it to shit. I mean we had this job down to a science, but somehow, a boy, no older than six, came running toward me. I saw him out of the corner of my eye and hated that my reflex had me drawing my weapon on a child, but over there you trust no one but your unit and I had never seen this kid before in my life. He wasn't local. Dirt flew up around him as he skidded to a stop, but he never made a noise. All he did was look past me over my left shoulder, and I knew something was wrong. I didn't have time, Red. I tried. I swear I tried, but as soon as I followed his line of sight, I watched Duffy, my youngest soldier, enter a door I hadn't given the order to search yet. One look back at the kid and he was smiling. It all happened so fast. I screamed at the top of my lungs, causing every one of my men to take notice. As I ran toward the door, I screamed for Duffy to get out over and over again. He was right there, Red. I could see him through the window as I passed by. Right fucking there, walking back toward me. When the bomb went off, I will never forget the confused look on his face before I was shot back at least twenty feet from the blast. I couldn't breathe. Stars were in my eyes and making out anything was impossible. The air had literally been sucked out of me. Honestly, I was scared to death, but when I heard the first shot fired everything came rushing back. I had thirty other men in my platoon besides the one I had just lost, and Lord help me, I would die before another one of them would. 

“I screamed for them to take cover while I dragged myself back against the closest wall I could find. That's when I saw the shooter. I took him out with one pull of my trigger. I could see Dalton, my staff sergeant, across the street. I signaled for him to pull the men back and saw his head shaking back and forth. He knew me well, and I know it had to be so hard to allow me to do what I was planning. I knew what I was doing was crazy, but in that moment, if it meant securing the fate of the rest of the soldiers, it was my duty as their Sergeant.  He didn't move so I gave the command again and then trusted him to follow through as I pushed off the wall I had been resting on and advanced past the houses on the corner to the next street alone. From there, it was a witch hunt, Red. I killed every asshole with a gun in his hand until one finally took me out. I remember being prepared to die that day. I truly thought I had, until I woke up in the Medic area hours later. Dalton had ignored my orders and followed me. Thank God for that or he wouldn't have dragged me out. The part that gets me is every time I play it over in my head I can clearly see the detonator in that boy’s hand, but at the time, I missed it."

I said nothing. For a good five minutes, the two of us sat in his bedroom processing the past he endured, never letting go of each other’s hand.

"Did the rest of the guys make it out?"

"Every one of them, other than Duffy."

"So that's who Mr. Jenkins was talking about? He really thinks he can blame you for that? After you saved your entire unit, he wants to blame you for something you had no control of?"

"I was supposed to have control the whole time. Duffy should have never entered that house. I should have shot that kid."

I moved away from the wall to scoot in front of him. 

"Did you signal the house was clear?"

"No. I was too worried about the kid—"

"Did you see the detonator?"

"Not at the time."

"What did the Army say?"

"I wasn't charged with any misconduct, but that doesn't take away the fact I lost one of my men that day."

I reached for his shoulders and pulled him to me, but it wasn’t until his arms came around my back and clung to me that I knew I was where I needed to be. He needed someone to be there for him. I couldn't imagine coming home from all of that to no one, facing it all alone.

When I pulled back, I knew that he feared I would run away. That what he told me would be too much for me to handle. I knew he wasn't sure where we would go from that moment, but my uncertainty disappeared. When he opened up to me, every wall he had had crumbled, and all that was left was him raw and exposed, with nowhere to go but forward. 

Bringing my lips to meet his was the scariest thing I had ever done. Why? Because I knew there was no turning back. We shared a kiss that would be told to my grandchildren. You never mistake the moments that change you. And in that one, he became so much more to me than anything I had ever known before.