It wasn’t something he normally did, fraternizing with the recruits. Especially with hopeless long shots like Davey. But he knew what would happen if he hadn’t, how it would probably turn into one of those things that would eat away at him and keep him up at night. He had too many of those lately.

What was an hour, anyway? Maybe even less. He could put some closure to it, and then walk away feeling good. Or at least not guilty.

“I’ll take a Coke,” Jasper told the bartender as he sidled up to the bar.

“And you?”

Fresh-faced Davey glanced hesitantly at Jasper, and then back to the bartender, saying in a meek voice, “A Coke please.”

“You can get a beer if you want,” said Jasper. “It’s okay.”

“No, I’m fine. Coke’s fine.”

There was no way he was going to pass recruitment. He might as well order a beer, or a whole row of shots. Might as well get sloppy drunk and make a big scene in front of Jasper and everyone else at the base bar. Maybe tell everyone where to shove it.

But he was fine with a Coke.

Good ol’ Davey. Didn’t want to make a bad impression among his superiors. He took off his cap and placed it in his lap like an old veteran. He cleared his throat nervously. “So, uh . . .” he trailed off, sounding a little unsure of how to begin whatever the hell he was trying to say.

The bartender returned, sliding toward them two plastic cups of carbonated sugar water. The cups left wet streaks along the wood-grain bar top.

“So,” said Jasper, trying to jump start the recruit’s idling conversation. “Was it like how you expected?”

“The exercise?”

“The whole thing,” Jasper specified, bringing the cold plastic cup to his lips. “The classes. The scenarios . . .”

“It was . . . harder . . . than I expected.” He sounded as defeated as his efforts to pass the testing. No surprise he found it harder.

“What were you expecting?” asked Jasper, sincerely curious.

He thought for a while, and then, said, “I don’t know.”

It made sense. He really had no idea. It was apparent to Jasper out in the training ground how little of an idea he had, how little he knew. How young he was.

Jasper looked down the bar and spotted some old friends. He nodded in their direction, and then turned back to his dejected little friend. “It’s one of the most challenging positions, Davey. Just getting here is an honor. You should be proud.”

“Yeah,” he said with a quiet nod. It wasn’t clear if he was really proud or not.

“I mean it.”

“Yeah,” he said again, still avoiding eye contact. His reluctance to make eye contact was another red flag for Jasper and the recruiters.

Jasper kept waiting to look at this kid in the eyes, staring at him for a while and then saying, “I bet your parents are proud of you.”

Davey shrugged.

“Well,” said Jasper, giving up on the possibility of eye contact. “It isn’t supposed to be easy.”

“I know.”

He didn’t know shit.

“Because you really have to be a master of both fields. You’ve got to be a top-of-the-line soldier and medic. And then you have to put it all together when it means the most. In the thick of it.”

“Yeah, it’s like street smarts.”

“Huh?”

“Like, you know,” Davey said, playing around with his drink. “There’s book smarts and then there’s street smarts.”

“Yeah?”

“And you need both,” he said clearing his throat again.

“Sure,” said Jasper. “You need both. Exactly. You can be good in the classroom setting, with the medical side of things, and you can run a six-minute mile and bench 300, but if you can’t put it all together . . .” He wanted to say more, like, if you can’t use your brain under pressure, or if you can’t even follow the most basic commands . . .

“I didn’t do so good, did I?”

“No, Davey. You didn’t.”

Davey was just looking at his drink now. He hadn’t taken a sip. “I appreciate you taking the time, you know, to come out here with me. I know I’m a fuckup.”

“Nah, you’re a good guy. You’re a good soldier, Davey. You’re just... You just didn’t do very well in testing.”

Davey reached for his drink and said, “I’m always terrible with tests.”

It made Jasper wonder what Davey thought the real-life version would be, if not a test. But he didn’t say anything about that. He’ll figure it out on his own. Or not. “I just don’t want you to get too discouraged. And, um . . .” Jasper tried to think of the right words. “And I just want to save you some time.”

“You’re cutting me early?” asked Davey.

Jasper didn’t want to look at him, to see the hurt in his eyes.

“I mean, I guess I knew I probably wasn’t going to make it after today. But . . .”

“I’m trying to help you,” said Jasper. “This way you’ll still have time to transfer out into something else. Something you’re more suited for.”

Davey held on to his cup, his hand shaking slightly, the ice cubes moving softly against each other in the dark, fizzy liquid. He eventually placed it on top of the bar, and then started reaching into his pocket, first trying one, and then the other. “I’m sorry,” he said, pulling out a few single bills. “I should probably go.”

Jasper stayed quiet.

Davey slapped the money down and thanked his superior for his honesty. He stood up. And then Jasper stood to face him.

“You’ll do alright,” said Jasper. And he believed it, too. A little adversity is what every man needed. A little kick in the ass.

“Thanks,” said Davey, showing more courage and resolve than he ever had on the mock battlefield.

“I mean it,” said Jasper. “Keep your head up, Soldier.”

“I will,” he said, nodding firmly. “Thanks for being honest.”

Jasper was glad he got the message, that he understood the privilege he’d just received. Sometimes, even saying no, if done the right way, can be a huge boost.

Davey’s face turned to stone as he saluted his superior. And it remained that way as he turned and walked away.

He was a good kid.

* * *

A warm summer breeze met Jasper on his way out of the bar. It was good to be outside again. It was good to be alone and to have that little unpleasant business with Davey over and done with. He’d actually expected it to go worse, for the poor kid to be wounded beyond all words. And maybe he was, alone and away from Jasper. He was probably off somewhere, maybe back in his dorm, locked in the bathroom and breaking down into tears.

And that would be perfectly fine. It was okay to cry. The kid was allowed that. He’d held it together when it counted. Jasper was proud of him for not making a scene in the historic, hallowed ground of the base bar, where men throughout history had far better reasons to cry.

The kid was still young. Barely in his twenties. He’d find his own way.

The more he thought about his situation, his youth, his life’s potential, the more Jasper’s sympathy turned to envy.

Lucky friggin’ kid. What Jasper wouldn’t give to be a kid again, especially a kid failed out of medic training. Could it be so bad? To be in the prime if your life again?

By now, walking across the dimly lit parking lot, Jasper had stopped thinking of Davey, but of himself, of the possibilities his life would have had outside of the military. Maybe his childhood dream would have worked out, his aspirations in playing the Grand Ole Opry as country star. Maybe if he hadn’t traded a guitar for a gun . . . And maybe if he hadn’t spent all that time dulling his musical ear, and his emotions.

But the military made him into a man. And without it, he’d probably still be a boy. A boy with nothing to write about.

His pocket suddenly vibrated just as he reached his car. When he answered, he was mystified at the voice that spoke back to him. A voice he hadn’t heard in years. A Midwest accent. It was a scratchy, smoky voice, though still youthful somehow. And still very familiar.

“Jas,” the voice said. “It’s me.”

That “me” was Kyle, his older brother from the oilfields of North Dakota.

“Kyle? Where are you calling from?” Jasper didn’t recognize the number.

“Home,” Kyle answered. “This is my home number.”

How long had it been that he’d had the wrong number for his brother stored in his phone contacts, and how long it had been outdated? He knew their parents wouldn’t be too happy about that. And it was a little sad, but at least they were talking now.

“You’re not busy, are you?” Kyle asked. “I know you’re always busy.”

It was a convenient excuse they’d both accepted and shared, Jasper always on some mission across the world. It was a nice reason for not ever talking. Helpful in their case.

“You sure you’re not off behind enemy lines somewhere?” asked Kyle, laughing a little bit.

“Hiding in the bushes somewhere in Abu Dhabi? I wouldn’t want to interrupt.”

“No, no, I’m back home. I’m safe,” said Jasper, well accustomed to the joke, their routine. “Well, Fort Bragg, actually.”

“Fort Bragg, huh? Last time I was out there was when they kicked me out of the army.”

Kyle, being older, was the first to try his luck with the army. Not special forces, just a basic grunt. A piece of meat with a gun.

He didn’t do so well. Jasper tried to imagine it, how much worse a recruit could be than Davey. But it was possible. It was his brother. And he didn’t exactly set the bar for the family name.

“How are you?” Jasper asked. “How’s the family?” He tried picturing his Irish-looking sister-in-law and his two nephews. He imagined them starving out in some North Dakota plain, like something straight out of The Depression photography. Their dirty hollow cheeks. Sad, hungry eyes.

“You know how it is,” said Kyle with a hint of melancholy to his voice. “You know how the oil industry is around here.”

Jasper knew, but didn’t want to admit how well he knew.

His brother’s family, and two cousins, moved to Williston for the oil work in the early 2000s. When everything was booming.

They were barely surviving today. Jasper helped financially where he could, but it had been years since he and his brother had had a proper conversation.

Due to the amount of refining it required, Bakken shale oil was astronomically expensive to produce. It needed a high price of oil to stay profitable. Back then, a steady increase in oil prices was as sure a bet as the sun rising the next day. But this was before the Saudis flooded the oil market. The price plunged overnight, and now Williston was in its death throes.

“The news keeps blaming the Saudis for the price drop,” Kyle said, his voice growing thick. “It’s like they’re trying to squeeze us out. Put us out of business. And then once all the competition bows out and closes production, they’ll scale back and watch the price go way up again. It’s bullshit, man. It’ll take years for us to recover.”

A recovery at all would be hopeful thinking. But Jasper kept that to himself.

“But I dunno, Man, I didn’t just call to bum you out about this. My sob story. You know.”

So why did he call? But again, Jasper kept it to himself.

“I uh . . .” He trailed. “I, you know, I heard about you and Susan and all that.”

Jasper and Susan, what was left of them, happened almost a year ago. But to Kyle it was probably fresh news.

“I just wanted to say, you know, that I’m sorry to hear about that and everything.”

“Thanks, Kyle,” said Jasper, feeling his mind getting unnecessarily dragged back through time, back through the mud and all the emotional torrential rain.

“You okay, Man?”

“Yeah,” Jasper said. “It happened a while ago, but yeah.” It happened long enough ago that it hardly felt like anything. The major feeling, when it was happening, was relief. After a few weeks, it got worse, him moving on for a few months to a quiet and lonely mobile home. Some place he could get for cheap and hide out. Recover. A place he could walk away from. A place to leave his old shit. Maybe burn it down if he’d wanted . . .

“I just heard about it, so . . .” The sound of Kyle sniffing came through the phone again. Was he crying? Why was he crying? “And I just figured I’d call anyways. It’s been a long time.”

“Yeah, it has.”

“So what happened? I mean, if you can talk about it. Or if you want to talk about it or whatever. Like, you just divorced?”

“Yeah,” said Jasper. “Irreconcilable differences.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means that we’re too different.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“And neither of us wanted to change.”

“Yeah,” Kyle said sadly. He sounded almost sick.

“But again, it happened a long time ago.” And it felt like it. A long, long time. Thank God.

“Yeah,” Kyle said again.

“Are you okay, Kyle?”

“Yeah.”

He didn’t sound okay. He got this way when he’d been up for too many days in a row, when he’d gotten manic about something. Or when he was jobless and speeding, popping pills, living in the most destructive manner—which, in an oil town, could be rather dramatic. He could do all these things from a lack of job stability, or emotional stability, or from something going wrong at home. There were interventions. There were worries. Plans. Promises broken.

He kept sniffing on the phone. He was definitely sick.

“Are you sick?”

“Nah, Man. No, I’m good.”

“Are you feeling good? Healthy?”

“What do you mean?” He started to sound a little agitated. “I just wanted to call, you know, about, you know . . .”

“Kyle . . .”

“What?”

“Are you sick?” This time Jasper said it more seriously, and with intentions. He’d put a certain stress on the word “sick.”

Sick.

They both knew what he meant.

“Dude . . .” And now that Kyle had caught on, and he clearly wasn’t happy about it. “Dude,” he said again, agitated now. “I fucking call you up . . .”

“I’m just worried about you, Bro.” Jasper could feel it happening, the start of their slide down that all-too-familiar slope, the steepening slope that usually ended in a big pit of lava.

“Well, so?” said Kyle. “I’m fuckin’ worried about you too. Bro.”

“I know you are,” said Jasper, trying to soften up his delivery. “And thanks. I’m glad you called.”

“Yeah.”

“Seriously, Kyle.” Jasper heard his brother take a deep breath. He wanted to say something more, something . . .

Kyle started muttering again. “Uh, yeah, alright. I uh . . . I gotta go.”

And that was it. The call ended with just as much mystery as it began.