Chapter 15

I’ve reached an age where my mind says, “I can do that.” But my body says, “Try it and die, fat girl.”

-Fact of life

Naomi

“Why don’t you like your name?” I asked the old man, two weeks after I’d visited my family in Kilgore.

He looked over at me where I was walking at his side and grinned.

I could tell, at one point, the man had been beautiful. Very handsome.

“I like my name,” he said. “But I liked it more when my wife said it.”

Sadness welled inside of me.

“Tell me how y’all met.”

His smile was radiant.

“The Korean War.”

I blinked.

“You met while fighting the Korean War?” I asked.

He smiled down at me.

“I met my Molly when I was twenty, and four days away from deployment,” his words were whimsical, and I tried hard not to stare at him.

He was making my heart hurt with all his happiness on his face at remembering his wife, and how they met.

“I was going to a bar to meet my friends,” he started. “One last hoorah before we all left.”

I stepped over a dog who was a bit too overzealous with his excitement and waved at the frazzled looking girl trying to corral him. Butterfinger growled low in her throat but didn’t make a move towards the other dog. I had started holding the dog’s leash during our walks, so he could concentrate on walking.

She waved back, and I returned my eyes to Brady.

“I walked in that tavern that night, sixty some years ago, my eyes jumped to the bar area and I froze in the doorway.”

“Why?” I smiled. “Was she sitting at the bar?”

He shook his head.

“No, she was dancing around it.” His smile was so soft and sweet that my eyes smarted. “She had on this black dress. I’ll never forget it. The skirt was big and it just spun around her knees and made her waist look so tiny. It was open at the neck and it seemed to wrap around her shoulders like it was hugging her. She looked so beautiful, I couldn’t take my eyes off of her.

He swallowed. “And these bright red high heels.”

I grinned.

“The high heels got you, didn’t they?” I asked.

He laughed, his voice shaky.

“Yeah, they got me.” He turned his eyes up to the sky, studying a giant buzzard that was circling over the path on long, languid sweeps of his wings. “And that smile. God, it made my chest tight to see that smile aimed in my direction.”

We finally rounded the last path, and I saw my man. The one who I only recently discovered was mine.

And his back was stiff, his hands clenched at his sides.

Brady kept talking, unaware of what we were walking into.

“I spent every waking minute with my Molly for the next three days, and on the day that I deployed, she waved at me until the bus disappeared.” He cleared his throat. “I came home a different man, but she helped put my broken mind back together again. We married two years after we met and had five kids together. Four of whom are now gone. One is in a nursing home not far from mine.”

I looked away from Sean. “Kind of young to be in a nursing home.”

He nodded, eyes solemn.

“Heart disease runs in our family. On my Molly’s side,” he murmured regretfully. “All of my children suffered heart attacks. Donnie, my youngest, is the only one to survive his.”

Brady’s life kept getting sadder and sadder.

Jesus, I felt like shit for even bringing up how he’d met his wife.

“I…what in the world?”

I looked where he was staring, and I felt my heart get tight.

Someone was burning a flag!

And oh, God! Sean was standing there, about to lose it.

“Oh shit,” I said, hurrying forward.

Brady shuffled as fast as his cane and bad leg would allow him behind me, but I didn’t wait.

Instead, I ran up to Sean’s side, latching onto his straining arm.

It was clear to me that he was only seconds away from blowing up, and this needed to de-escalate quickly or someone—likely Sean—would cause chaos to ensue.

“Sean,” I whispered frantically. “Come with me.”

He didn’t budge when I tried to pull him, and I had a sinking sensation fill the pit of my belly. I knew he was closer to that line than I realized.

“Sean,” I repeated.

His eyes, however, were focused on the group of what appeared to be college students and church protestors burning up a flag.

They held signs that read, ‘Too late to pray’ and ‘You deserve those tears.’

And I realized then that this was a ‘peaceful protest’ of a veteran’s funeral, possibly even the zealot group from Westboro Baptist Church.

There were about fifty of them, all surrounding the path of the walking trail, and trickling out into traffic.

I wasn’t sure if the protest had started at the mouth of the trail so they could walk down it, or if they’d just ended up at the start of the trail because they were stopping traffic on one of the busiest streets in Mooresville.

Regardless of what they’d intended, they were now not only disrupting the traffic on the road, but also causing a whole lot of ruckus in the area and offending every single citizen, not just the Veterans, in the general vicinity.

“The funeral procession is supposed to take this route in about five minutes,” I heard one of the protesters say. “Get your flags ready.”

A kid stood up, and reached for another flag that he had left carelessly laying on the ground.

The minute it was in his hand, he reached for the lighter that another boy was holding out to him and struck the ignitor with his thumb to spark the lighter when Brady, cane in one hand and holding onto a park bench with the other, brought the cane down onto the boy whose intention was to burn the flag.

Right over the back of the other kid’s head.

The boy was stunned, falling to his knees, and dropping the lighter before it could so much as flame.

Sean jerked as he seemed to get his wits about him and finally moved.

Butterfinger, who was still in my hold at my side, lurched forward, trying to get to her master, and would’ve taken me down to my knees had Sean not waded in.

Grabbing Butterfinger before she could even make it a step, he pulled her over to the dog park and locked her behind the fence before turning back to the crowd that was now circling Brady.

Brady, who looked not one single bit concerned about the angry mob that was surrounding him, started yelling at the kids.

“This is my flag!” he bellowed. “I fought for this flag! I bled for this flag! I lost friends and family for this flag. All so you all could do dumb shit like this instead of using the brains that God gave you!”

Oh. Shit.

The crowd moved in even closer, surrounding Brady.

But then Sean was there, parting the crowd with his bare hands and a whole lot of strength.

“Move!”

Sean’s bellow made everyone in the vicinity freeze, and slowly part until Brady was able to extricate himself from the sea of protesters.

“You will not burn another flag,” Sean’s words were horrific in their power and anger. “Or I will make sure your hands don’t work to light another fucking lighter.”

Those simple, short, bold words were said out of lips that I adored.

“You can try to make us.”

Sean’s eyes turned to a smartass girl standing on the edge of the crowd. He was so calm, that I wondered if the other shoe was going to drop.

“Let me see. Delaney, right?”

The girl looked startled.

“Isn’t your brother in the Marines?”

Delaney looked startled that Sean would know that.

“N-no.”

Sean smiled; it wasn’t a pretty smile, either.

In fact, it was quite intimidating.

Which was felt by some of the other protesters because they all took a few steps back and looked around nervously. There had to be at least fifty of them, and every single one of them was watching Sean like he was a freakin’ army instead of a single man.

“I was there when he came home from his last deployment. Part of his welcome home party, actually. I know who your brother is, and I know who you are.” He frowned at the girl. “Though, I thought your parents raised you better than this.”

Sean’s head turned. “And you.”

He pointed at the boy who had passed her the lighter.

“Isn’t your mother retired from the Army?”

And so it went.

I was so surprised by the number of people Sean knew that I wasn’t paying attention to the kid on the ground who Brady had struck until he was up on his knees. He was swinging a stick that he’d found right at my man who didn’t notice until it was too late.

The stick hit Sean in the back of the thigh, missing his knee by only a few scant inches.

The stick broke over the back of Sean’s leg, and the reaction it drew from Sean was that he staggered forward slightly, trying to avoid stepping further into the crowd of protesters any more than he already was.

The crowd went silent, and I started toward Sean to make sure that he was all right, but Brady grabbed my arm before I could even make it a step.

“Sean!” I cried out.

Sean looked down at the kid, then reached forward and picked him up by the collar of his shirt.

And by up, I mean the kid was dangling above the ground, the tips of his sneaker covered toes just barely grazing it.

“I served my country for years,” he announced to the stupid kid. “I watched two of my best friends in the whole world die by rifle fire during an attack on our unit. Held their hands while blood pumped out of their chests, as they cried and asked me to tell their wives and kids that they loved them. To tell their mothers that they were sorry. Tell their fathers that they would miss throwing the ball around on Christmas.”

My throat constricted.

“I watched a female soldier being cut down from a tree where she tried to hang herself because she couldn’t live with the aftermath of killing women and children who were committing acts of war against us. When she tried again, and succeeded, I watched the medics clean up pieces of her head from where she used a gun to commit suicide because she couldn’t deal with the ghosts in her head or the way she always felt fucking dirty,” he continued to growl. “My father fought for that flag. My grandfather, too. And his father before him. So, let me tell you something, you little entitled son of a bitch, this country doesn’t owe you a goddamn thing except fucking jail time. It should be a felony to burn this flag, but I fought for your fucking rights, so of course, you’ll never see it. But that doesn’t mean that you don’t deserve it.”

With that, Sean threw the kid to the ground, and the crowd sucked in a swift inhalation of breath as Sean turned, pointed at them all in turn, and gave them his back as he walked toward us.

Brady had a smile on his face the size of which I’d never seen before, and pride was practically bursting from my chest at seeing my man’s show of strength and pride in his country.

“You’re so hot,” I told him.

Sean’s face cracked into a small smile. One that was gone almost before it was even there. One that didn’t reach his eyes.

But it was a start and that was all that mattered.

“Good man,” Brady said to Sean.

Sean’s answering reply was harsh, but nonetheless true.

“I’m fucking sick of this. This country is raising a bunch of pussies, and it keeps getting worse and worse.”

I agreed, but the only thing I could change was how I raised my own kids to deal with whatever was happening with this country.

“You’ll have to start with your own kids,” I told him honestly. “Because you can’t start with any that aren’t yours. They’ve already been ruined by their parents’ beliefs and bad upbringings.”

I gestured to the kids that were still holding their signs, and he sighed.

“My kids ever acted like that, I’d beat the shit out of them,” he murmured. “I’d pull them away by their ears, run over all their electronics with a lawn mower like I saw some guy do to his kid on YouTube, and then force them to watch me burn it. Then I’d put the fire out by pissing on it.”

I snorted.

“Duly noted.”

“I was going to try to watch the funeral procession from here, but I can’t see a damn thing,” Brady grumbled. “Do you think they’ll move and allow me to leave? If I can get out, I can park at the top of my street and watch from there.”

Sean grunted. “I’ll make sure of it.”

And he did.

Five minutes later, he was pushing the crowd back with only a glare, and Brady waved. “See you tomorrow, Naomi.”

I waved and watched until his taillights disappeared around a bend in the road, and then turned toward Sean.

“Ready to go?”

His eyes went to the protesters and then to the remains of the burned flag.

Taking two long steps toward it, he snatched up the flag from the ground where it lay like a piece of trash instead of this nation’s symbol, and then gestured to the bike.

“Get on. Let’s go.”

I got on, and we went.

I was putting my helmet on as he pulled past them, and not one of the protesters made eye contact with either of us.

And the whole time I hugged Sean tight.

I was proud of him.

He could’ve allowed that situation to get out of hand instead of using his head.

But he didn’t.

“Why are they being so calm now?” I yelled over the motor. “That easily could have gone the other way.”

He stopped at the stop light just past the protesters and turned his head so I could hear him.

Sean shrugged. “Most protesters are generally non-confrontational. Likely, there was only one loser who wanted to burn that flag, and he did. The others didn’t participate in it, but they either condoned it by not stopping him or were too stunned by him doing it to do anything about it.”

That made sense. I, on the other hand, would like to think that the country I was currently living in wasn’t made up of a bunch of spineless people who wouldn’t take a stand against something that they knew was wrong.

Sean’s hand clamped onto my wrist, and then the light turned green.

His hand lifted, and he waved at a biker who looked vaguely familiar across traffic, yet I couldn’t quite place him.

Though, he did that to every motorcycle that passed, so it wasn’t an indication that he actually knew the other man.

I swiveled my head so I could watch as the biker turned behind us.

He was wearing a leather jacket, black jeans, and black boots. His shirt, however, was blue. Though, it appeared black in some places due to what I assumed were grease stains.

I’d seen the man before. Actually, I’d seen him a lot.

That long silver hair of his was pretty distinctive.

I squeezed Sean tighter, and his large hand covered mine for a half an instant before he returned it to the handlebars.

I lifted my head to rest on his shoulder, allowing my helmet to lean against his head, and stared ahead of us.

The biker passed us, but I kept my head forward, staring straight ahead, and didn’t allow myself to turn and study the man.

I didn’t want to see him staring, because that would only give me an even greater sense of foreboding than I already had.

Almost as fast as he’d passed us, he started slowing down.

I saw Brady, out of his car, eyes on the road behind him rather than on us, but I waved at his back anyway.

The biker that Sean waved to turned down the road that Brady was parked on, and my brows furrowed in contemplation.

Maybe that was why I saw him so much, because he lived on Brady’s street.

As we rode further away, I realized that I’d been making a bigger deal of it than I should have. If the man lived on Brady’s street, then I’d have seen him a lot. Brady and I had gotten thick as thieves since we’d met.

Something in my gut loosened at the knowledge that I wasn’t being followed by some random scary, greasy biker dude. And I started to enjoy my ride.

Though, even when my mind was racing about some fake stalker that I’d made up, I’d been pasted up against a sexy man’s back, so it hadn’t been that bad.

Sean took the long way home, looping around the entire town on back roads, allowing me the time to breathe easy.

Rides on the back of Sean’s bike were the best.

Rides where Sean wasn’t wearing his cut—which allowed me to feel his spectacular muscles and nothing else but a sweaty t-shirt in between us—were even better.

Not that I had a problem with Sean wearing his club colors.

In fact, any other time I adored when he wore it. I loved the way it looked on him, and how he acted when he was wearing it—like something was different about him. More confidence. More pride. More carefree.

Whatever it was, the man looked sexy in his Dixie Wardens cut.

It was only when I had my face pressed against it that I didn’t adore it as much, but I was slowly getting used to it.

Sean took a turn, and I looked around, trying to figure out where we were.

“What is this?” I asked ten minutes later as he brought the bike to a stop under a tall pine tree that was bigger around than I was.

“This,” he put forth, kicking the bike stand down and standing up. “Is mine.”

My head tilted.

“Yours?”

He nodded.

“My land.”

Understanding dawned. “When did you get this?”

He offered me his hand and I took it, dismounting the bike and falling into his side all in one jerk of his hand.

“I got this last year, but I haven’t had much time to stop and see it. Barely have time to pay for it.”

That, I understood too well.

The man worked a lot. Had started working even before the vacation that he was able to finagle out of our employer was up.

Even now that we were both back at work, he still worked a lot.

I worked a lot, too, but that was only because if I didn’t then I’d never see him.

I’d asked him why he did it, but I didn’t know that he had to do it to pay for land that I didn’t even know he had.

“Why don’t you park your trailer here?” I asked, looking up at him. “Then you’d get to see it a lot.”

His mouth firmed.

“I bought it to build a house on with Ellen.”

My belly rolled, and I started to pull away.

He stopped me by clamping his hand around my hip, refusing to allow me to move.

“At the time, our relationship was already deteriorating. I knew she had a thing for Jessie. Saw it with every breath I took. I bought this place—which was twice my budget—in the hopes that she’d love it. But she didn’t.”

Why that made me irrationally happy, I didn’t know. But it did. I wanted to jump up and clap that she was too stupid to see that she had such a good thing and had let it go.

Had she not done that, I wouldn’t be standing here, in Sean’s arms, on some land meant for her.

“That was the day that she told me that she didn’t do ‘country’ living. She didn’t like bugs. She liked paved streets and being close to the city so she could go shopping.” He dropped his mouth to my head, and my tense body tensed even further. “I realized something while you were gone.”

I froze.

“I’d already started planning our life out here. Thinking about what you would like and not like when it came to a house. Wondered if I could convince you to move in with me when we’d only known each other for a few months.”

I turned my head up so I could see if he was sincere.

His eyes were on the gate that was blocking our access to the rest of the land.

Then he tugged me forward and we were walking.

Up a long winding red clay driveway that likely would be a bitch if it rained. Through it was lined with trees that were high and beautiful beyond belief. Then that long driveway turned into a sprawling meadow, and I knew that this was where the house would go.

“Right here,” I told him.

He stopped, and we looked at the land before us.

“I want to put a house there, on the top of the hill.”

He echoed my thoughts exactly.

“I want to leave as many of the trees as we can and to disrupt the look of the land as little as possible,” he explained. “I want a shop where I can work on my bikes and cars. I want a…”

“Pond would look good right here,” I pointed to a really low lying spot where the land dipped sharply into what looked like a creek at the very bottom.

“There’s a year-round creek right there,” he informed me, confirming my suspicions. “And I’ve thought about damming it up right there and doing the same.”

I grinned and pulled away from him, walking down the steep hill to the creek beyond.