Didi
I take a deep breath before entering the lion’s den. I’m just grateful that José didn’t introduce me as a psychology intern, because I think Walker might be the kind of patient who rips up psychology interns with his bare hands and eats them for breakfast. Coated in strawberry yoghurt.
He looks about as willing to spend this half an hour with me as I would be to take a stroll naked through the canteen downstairs.
I tug down my too-tight scrub shirt, self-conscious after overhearing Sanchez’s comment about my boobs, but then remember that Walker can’t see what I look like.
‘Hi,’ I say in an overly bright voice. ‘I’m Didi.’ I hold out my hand then snatch it quickly back when I realize how dumb that is. I glance at his free hand, the one not in a sling. It’s resting on the bed. I could take it and shake it, but intuition tells me that wouldn’t be a good idea. He might be injured, but I have no doubt that his instincts are still razor sharp. I’ve had a quick look over his notes. José was right. He was the youngest ever marine to make lieutenant, and even prior to his injury he had been cited twice for bravery.
‘We met earlier, actually,’ I say, taking a step closer to the bed. ‘I came to see if you needed any help.’
He doesn’t say anything in reply, and even though I can’t see his eyes I can tell he’s glowering. Oh man, this is going to be hard work.
It’s hard to tell what he looks like because the bandage obscures a lot of his face, but there’s no mistaking he’s a good-looking guy – in a gruff, stubbly kind of way. He has thick dark hair, pale olive-coloured skin and a slight cleft in a solidly square jaw, which at the moment is covered in at least four or five days’ worth of beard.
He’s wearing a white T-shirt that stretches across his shoulders and emphasizes an impressive build. If this is how he looks after who knows how many weeks lying in a hospital bed, I’d like to see what he looked like before he was injured.
‘What should I call you?’ I ask. ‘Lieutenant?’ I know how important it is to maintain respect for wounded soldiers’ ranks, especially at a time when it might feel like they’ve lost everything else.
‘Walker’s fine,’ he answers in a flat voice.
‘I’m interning here for the summer,’ I say. ‘I’m just meeting people today. Getting to know the lay of the land—’
‘Which department?’ he interrupts.
‘Sorry?’
‘Which department?’
‘Um, clinical psychology. I’m studying for my doctorate.’
‘You’re a head doctor.’ Not a question.
‘No,’ I say.
‘I don’t need one of those.’
‘OK,’ I say. ‘That’s good. Because I’m not one.’
He turns his head away from me as though not interested in what I have to say.
‘How long have you been here?’ I ask after a moment.
‘Six weeks,’ he answers with a barely disguised sigh.
‘And how would you say it’s going?’
He turns slowly back to face me. There’s a slight smile twitching on his lips. ‘And you say you’re not a head doctor?’ he says. ‘That’s a classic therapist question.’
I press my lips together. He’s right. My dad uses it all the time on me.
‘OK, on a scale of one to ten, how much does this place suck?’ I ask him, deciding to switch gears.
He smiles now, but ruefully. ‘Eleven.’
‘You know they spent twenty-seven million dollars on this place trying to make it as non-sucky as possible?’
‘Yeah? Well, they failed. At the very least they could have put locks on the doors.’
‘I see your point. If there were locks on the doors you wouldn’t have people wandering in offering to help you and getting covered in yoghurt for their pains.’
His brow creases with a frown.
‘And you could lock yourself away and ignore everyone who tries to talk to you and just suffer in silence instead. Oh wait,’ I say, ‘you don’t need a lock for that. You’re doing pretty well without one.’
His cheeks start to flush. His free hand balls into a fist. Crap. I think I might have overstepped the mark. I didn’t mean to needle him, I just wanted to gauge his reaction, find out where on the grief scale he is. José told me he’s been depressed since they brought him in.
I’ve had my own brush with grief via Jessa, so I have some idea of the different stages involved. First comes denial, then anger, then bargaining, before depression hits and finally, sometimes days after, sometimes years, comes acceptance. It’s obvious that though he’s depressed he’s also still really angry.
Walker doesn’t speak for a few moments. I think we’re a long way off acceptance here.
‘You should leave,’ he says quietly, almost under his breath.
I flinch a little, my cheeks flaring. ‘I—’
‘You know nothing about what I need or what I’ve been through,’ he says in a voice that shakes with anger. ‘No one does.’
‘What about Sanchez?’ I ask. I know Sanchez was the only other survivor besides Walker. And it seems to me that Sanchez has lost just as much as Walker.
Walker’s jaw knots, unknots. His fist stays clenched, the knuckles blanching white.
‘Sanchez wasn’t responsible for them,’ he says, and I notice the way his voice is straining, almost cracking. ‘It was my team. They’re dead because of me.’
I take a step towards him, my stomach cinching tight and a wave of empathy rising up inside me at the grief etched on his face. ‘That’s not true,’ I start to say, but he turns abruptly away, his expression hardening to stone.
‘Just go,’ he barks.
I open my mouth to argue but find I have nothing to say. The rage and the pain bouncing off him are palpable, as powerful as a shock wave. It spins me around and sends me straight to the door, which I close quietly behind me as though I’m scared of setting off a bomb.
I stand in the corridor, breathing hard and cursing myself silently. I was just meant to be getting to know him, not trying out what I learned in Psychology 101. I’m such an idiot. My first day and I’m already messing up.
‘Your negativity is your only hurdle.’
‘They really like their motivational posters, don’t they?’ I whisper to the person sitting beside me.
He looks up and I notice his eye and his mouth are sagging on one side. He glances at the poster opposite of clouds scattered across a neon-blue sky with a Photoshopped rainbow bursting out of them.
He smirks. ‘Yeah,’ he says with a strong Southern drawl. ‘They spend millions of dollars of tax payers’ money turning you into a lethal killing machine, you get some sergeant major yelling in your face every day for months, calling you every name under the sun, son of a bitch being the least of them, and then, the minute you’re injured, they surround you with pictures of rainbows and clouds and smiling babies. All I need is a fucking unicorn.’
I laugh under my breath.
‘It’s like the Care Bears designed this place.’ He sighs.
Seeing me smile, he offers his hand. I take it.
‘Callum Dodds,’ he says.
‘Didi Monroe.’
His handshake is solid, his grip firm. Before I can stop myself, I glance down at his legs. Or rather at the space where his legs used to be.
‘Fallujah,’ he says, noticing me looking. ‘Roadside bomb.’
‘I’m sorry,’ I say, looking up, flushing.
He smiles grimly and taps his head. ‘I got a metal plate in my head too. Walk me through airport security and the X-ray machine’ll light up like a fourth of July firework.’
I notice now that he has a deep scar running down the left side of his face. The muscle is slack underneath it, and that’s what’s causing the downturn to his mouth and eye. He’s barely twenty-five years old but he looks twice that.
We’re sitting in the physiotherapy centre – a large room with lots of ropes, pulleys and machines. Three guys in T-shirts and sweatpants are being put through their paces and I’m observing to see how it works. One guy is being taught to walk on a prosthetic leg, another is bench-pressing weights, grunting with determination as sweat rolls down his arms.
Sanchez is over in one corner being fitted with a prosthetic arm. He’s grinning and making the physio laugh. I wonder at the difference in how people deal with their injuries and what it is that makes Sanchez so upbeat in the face of everything that lies ahead of him. I wonder how I would cope in his situation.
‘So, you some kind of doctor?’ Callum asks me, nodding at my scrubs.
‘No,’ I say, turning back to him. ‘I just had an accident this morning.’
He raises his eyebrows.
‘No! Not that kind of accident! A run-in with an exploding yoghurt pot.’
He nods. I wince. Bad choice of word. ‘Where are you from?’ I ask quickly, trying to cover it up.
‘Alabama originally.’
‘Do you have family here? On the base?’ I ask.
He shakes his head. ‘No. No family. I grew up in care. Never met my mom. Don’t know who my father is.’
‘I’m sorry,’ I say again. God, that word seems so painfully inadequate in this place.
He shrugs. ‘The marines is my family. It’s my whole life. Was my whole life.’ He takes a deep breath. ‘Don’t know what the hell I’m supposed to do now.’
One of the physios comes over just then and drops a hand on Callum’s shoulder. ‘Get back on your feet, Corporal, that’s what you’re supposed to do now.’
I glance sideways at the physio, frowning. Is he trying to be funny? Dodds raises his eyebrows and smiles at me. But it’s not a real smile. It wouldn’t fool a child.
‘You ready for your session?’ the physio asks.
‘As I’ll ever be, I guess,’ Dodds says.
The physio stands aside and lets Dodds wheel himself over to the far corner of the room. I watch for a few minutes before standing up and heading to the door, appreciating my body in a whole new way and vowing never again to complain about having short legs.