by Odette Stone
He watched me as I approached. I sat on the couch beside him. I had no idea what to say. I knew grief. Other people talking didn’t help. Talking only helped when the grieving person did the talking. So I put my knees up to my chest and just waited with him. He occasionally took a long drink from the bottle, but he didn’t say anything. He made no move to touch me, and I was pretty sure if I attempted to touch him or comfort him, he would push me off.
His voice jarred me awake. “I went through BUDs with Chris. It was Stubbs, Bixley, Chris, and I. We were all in the same graduating class.”
Stubbs and Bixley were the two men that had been killed on Jackson’s bad tour. Now Chris had died. These men were his family. These men were not just co-workers. He loved these men as much as I had loved my parents or my granny.
He continued. “I was his best man at his wedding. And today, I had to sit with his wife while she cried and cried. All because some dumb fuck was too drunk to call a cab.”
My eyes filled with tears. I couldn’t imagine her level of pain. I couldn’t.
“It’s one thing to die in the line of duty, but now his death has no meaning. Now his little daughter is going to grow up without her daddy. And tonight his wife is alone.”
That is what death is like. That first night is the worst. The pain, the disbelief. It’s almost too much to bear. I knew exactly what Chris’ wife was going through tonight. My heart ached for her.
“Chris loved her so fucking much,” Jackson looked at me. “I remember the first night they met. We were at a bar. We had a weekend off BUDs, and he saw her sitting at a table with her girlfriends. He looked over at me and told me that she was the woman he was going to marry. He knew from the moment he saw her that she was different.”
Tears burned my eyes. I nodded.
“What Chris and Dena had between them was real. It wasn't make belief. They were the real deal. Before them, I never really understood what love was. But they knew.”
Tears streaked down my face, which I hastily wiped off.
He finally looked at me. “I think you should leave me alone.”
This is the man who had pushed Harper away after Bixley and Stubbs had died. Grief was a powerful emotion. It made you feel crazy. When you're grief-stricken, you don’t want to be around anyone, yet you don’t want to be alone. It was also one level above anger and fear. Today he got a pass on everything. Whatever he thought he wanted, he would get from me.
“Okay.” I stood up.
He watched me. “Just like that?”
“Just like what?”
“You’re going to leave me alone?”
I stood there in front of him, unsure what to say. “Isn’t that what you said you wanted?”
He gave a dark laugh. “You’re not going to fight me on that? You’re not going to tell me that I shouldn’t be alone?”
“I think you know what you need right now,” I said quietly. “I love you, and I just want to give you what you need.”
He glowered at me. “You just think you love me.”
“No, Jackson. I do love you.”
“You don’t know me. You don’t know who I am. So how the fuck can you say you love me?”
Jesus. This was a dark side of him that I had never seen before. “Then tell me who you are.”
“That would be a bad idea.”
“You could tell me anything, Jackson, and I'd still love you.”
Our eyes met. He grabbed my hand and tugged me, so I was standing in front of him. He looked up at me. The man was drunk but coherent.
“Why did you trust me today?”
It took me a moment. “When we jumped out of the plane?”
“Yeah.”
“Because you asked me to.”
He frowned. “But you were so scared. I could feel your entire body shaking.”
“You asked me to jump out of a plane with you. I knew it would be fun for you. And you asked me to trust you, so I knew we'd be safe.”
“You thought we would die. Yet you still flung yourself out of a plane because I asked you to?”
It felt like a trick question, but that is precisely how it happened. “Yes.”
“Why do you trust me?”
“I believe in you. When you tell me that you'll keep me safe, I believe you.”
He stared up at me, his eyes searching mine. And then he reached up and tugged at the belt of my robe. It fell open. My stomach fluttered as he tugged me so that I straddled him.
His hands went up to my breasts, and I arched my back as his mouth sucked on my nipple. He pushed open his pants and then he was pulling me onto him. I cried out as I felt him push inside of me. I put my hands on his face. His red eyes stared up at me. So serious. So intense.
With his hands on my hips, he slowly began to move me up and down on him. It felt wrong yet so right. After such a tragedy, it was a moment where we both needed to remember that we were still alive. We needed to connect. Our eyes locked as I slowly moved up and down on him. I was becoming distinctly out of breath.
His big hands moved to my hips, helping me lift up and down. My hands pushed into his hair. My mouth on his. Kissing. He tasted like bourbon and Jackson. I couldn’t get enough.
“Oh God,” he groaned, as he pulled me down harder on his thick length. “Why do you love me?”
Green eyes looked up at my face.
“What?” I was almost delirious with desire. I couldn’t think.
“Tell me why.”
I wrapped my arms around his neck and put my forehead against his. I was trying to think of a coherent answer. “I love how kind and protective you are. You make me feel safe.”
I continued to move on him, moaning at the sensations that coursed through my body.
He watched my face, and his pupils were so wide his eyes look almost black.
I put his face in between my hands. “You’re the most amazing person I know. I trust you.”
“But why do you love me?”
“Jackson,” I was breathless. “I don’t understand.”
“Why me?”
“I don’t know, I just do.”
One strong hand came behind my neck, pulling me down to his face. His lips were on mine. “Tell me why.”
I felt my whole body tightening. My climax roared towards me. I fought it as he moved beneath me. I opened my eyes and looked into his. I could barely speak. Thinking of that little kid who was repeatedly told that he wasn’t worthy of love.
“No one deserves to be loved more than you.”
“If you knew who I was, you wouldn’t love me.”
I teetered on the edge, as he pumped up without mercy into me. “I want to know you. I want to know everything about you.”
I held his face in my hands, and we looked into each other’s eyes as he drove me off the edge. I cried out hard, shutting my eyes as waves so intense washed over me, I couldn’t even think.
“Look at me,” he begged. “Look at me.”
I peeled open my eyes and focused on his face. There he was.
“Jackson,” my voice sounded strangled.
“Oh God, Emily,” he winced, his green eyes were wide on my face as he found his release. We stared at each other. And then, as if he couldn’t take the intensity between us, he wrapped his strong arms around me and buried his face against my neck. “Emily.”
My arms wrapped around his head. We stayed like that for a long time. Holding each other. Without meeting my eyes, he lifted me off him, back onto shaking legs.
Without looking at me, he said, “Now you should leave me alone.”
I nodded, my cheeks wet with tears. “Okay. I’ll be upstairs in bed if you need me.”
Chapter 37
Three days passed. Jackson was gone long before I woke up and he came home long after I went to bed. I heard him come in at night, but he never came upstairs. The man was mourning, and he wanted nothing to do with me.
Lauren was my seeing eye dog through all of this. She told me about the f
uneral, what to wear and how there was going to be a massive get together at the community hall after the military funeral service.
She explained that pretty much the entire community would pay their respects to Chris and his family. Instead of making the widow foot the bill for such a huge gathering, it'd be a giant potluck with a cash bar. All proceeds from the bar would go towards his wife. Everyone would pitch in to help serve and clean up. The men would set up and tear down the tables. Together, everyone would work together as a team to say goodbye to Chris.
The morning of the funeral, I brought my food to the hall. Lauren had coordinated the food, and I was responsible for bringing a pan of brownies, potato salad, and a fruit tray. I dropped the food off at the community hall, where men were already setting up the tables.
I got dressed for the funeral and waited. Jackson came home. Without saying a word, he shaved and put on his dark military uniform. We drove in silence to the cemetery.
The service was devastating. Jackson, Alphie, Guinness, Forbes, and Typhoon were pallbearers. Chris was given a full military service that included soldiers firing their weapons. Chris’ wife was flanked by her two parents and Chris’ parents. The ceremony was short and hard to watch.
There must have been two hundred people at the hall. Chris’ widow and the parents sat at the front table. Everyone took their turn, filing past them to give their condolences.
I was an interloper. I had only met Chris once, and I had never met his wife. Jackson stood with his unit. None of them talked. They just stood there together, silently drinking. Brothers banded together. They didn’t talk to anyone else, and no one approached them. Not even their wives.
I walked into the kitchen and looked at Lauren.
“Put me to work.”
Her eyes were red from crying. “Okay. We need a dishwasher.”
She showed me how to use the industrial dishwasher. And then I spent the next three hours spraying dishes and running them through the machine. Another woman came and took away the clean dishes for me.
Finally, the onslaught of dishes slowed down to a trickle. Lauren came back and looked at me.
“Are you still doing dishes?”
“Of course.”
She put her arm around my waist. “Come. Let’s find you some food.”
I ate with the woman who had helped me with dishes. We didn’t speak. I picked at my plate of food. I was hungry, but I didn’t feel like eating.
Finally, I pushed my plate away and stood up. I needed to go to the washroom.
I washed my hands and looked up when the door opened. Harper stood with her back against the door. She looked stunning with her blonde hair pulled into a chignon and a slash of blood-red lipstick that contrasted with her black dress. Leave it to Harper to look sexy at a funeral.
I ignored her while I studied my reflection in the mirror.
“I don’t know why you are even here,” she said. “You’re not part of this group. You don’t belong here.”
I began to dig through my purse for my lipstick, hoping that she could not see my hands shake.
“Jackson hates being tied down to you. He resents everything about you. Your neediness. Your lack of friends. This baby. You represent everything that he never wanted.”
Without my permission, my head swiveled so I was looking at her but words failed me.
She gave a knowing smile. “That night in San Lucas. Did he ever tell you what he did? He dragged me onto the beach. He couldn’t get enough of me. He was an absolute animal. Savage, insatiable. That was the night he told me that as soon as you gave birth, he was going to leave you.”
Dark fear clawed at my throat. I took a deep breath. “You need to remember that we're at a funeral. Have some respect.”
“You don’t belong here. You don’t understand this world and you never will.”
I had so many things I wanted to say to her, but the words were stuck inside of me. Without looking at her, I walked out on shaking legs.
Jackson drove us home. He didn’t say a word. We walked into the house. We went upstairs to change. I let Chloe outside and stood on the deck when I heard a tremendous crash from inside.
I opened the back door and watched in shock. Jackson had thrown one of our dining room chairs across the room. One of the lamps smashed. I held my breath as he stalked across the room and picked up that chair. And then he began to smash the chair against the dining room table repeatedly.
Chunks of wood flew everywhere. He continued to hammer the table with the chair until the chair smashed into three pieces. He turned and fired part of the chair against the wall. A photo on the wall dangled and swung before crashing to the floor. Jackson picked up another piece of the chair and threw that across the room. It bounced off the living room window. I was surprised that the glass didn’t shatter.
I stood transfixed as Jackson flipped the dining room table. The flower vase, papers, books, and candlesticks all went flying with a messy, loud crash. I watched in mute horror as he started to repeatedly kick at one of the upturned legs of the table until it splintered off. Then he picked up the table leg and heaved it against the giant mirror in the front hallway. Glass shattered with a deafening crash.
He turned and looked at me, and his face was a mask of anguish. I stood in shock. Then he stomped out the front door, slamming it hard behind him. I heard the roar of his truck, and then he was gone. I looked in disbelief at our living room. It looked like a tornado had hit it. My husband, who never showed his emotions, had no idea how to process his pain.
Keeping Chloe outside, I put on my shoes and vacuumed up the glass. I cleaned everything up to the best of my ability. I was exhausted. Emotionally defeated. I climbed into bed with Chloe and fell into a dreamless sleep.
I woke up when a warm body pulled me against him.
“I’m sorry,” his warm breath was against my neck.
I didn’t say anything. I just lay there and stared into the dark.
I felt his big hand stroke my hair. “Did I scare you?”
I thought about that. The entire time I watched him go ballistic, not once did it cross my mind that he would hurt me.
“No.”
A long pause wavered between us. “I'd never hurt you.”
“I know.”
“I’m sorry if I scared you.”
I twisted around so that I could face him. “You didn’t scare me.”
“What I did was unacceptable.”
I lifted my hand up to his face. Here was a man who had spent his entire life not showing his emotions to anyone. It came as no surprise that he had no framework in which to deal with his anger and his pain. “Jackson.”
“That'll never happen again. Okay?”
“I know.”
We lay there in silence for a long time.
“Chris was 24, and I was 21 when we met in BUDs. He was older than all of us. We were all just a bunch of dumb kids, but he was wiser than the rest of us. He showed us how to be men.”
I stroked his arm, listening.
“I had a lot of issues. More than you could imagine but he was never afraid of me. He was always there for me.”
“Jackson.” My heart was breaking for him.
“I can’t imagine my life without him.” His voice was so full of anguish tears started to fall down my cheeks. I wrapped my arms around him and held him. He buried his face into my neck and I cried for him.
His voice filled with anguish. “I’m so fucked up.”
“No, you’re not.”
“Chris knew me. You don’t know me. If you did, you would hate me.”
I had no words. The only comfort I could offer was to hold him tight.
When I woke up, he was gone.
Chapter 38
Jackson mourned. He didn’t talk. He didn’t smile or laugh. He dutifully took Chloe for walks or helped me around the house, but the man I knew was missing. He had withdrawn into himself.
I didn’t understand him, but I did understand
grief. So I did my best to be there for him. I made dinner for him. I was home when he came home. We were two silent strangers living together. It broke my heart, but I knew enough not to push him on anything. This pain was something he needed to work through on his own.
He never asked me about my life, but even worse, he completely stopped talking about Alien. He seemed to have lost all interest in both of us.
Two more weeks passed. Jackson might as well have been deployed. He completely withdrew and didn’t even notice when my cast was removed. We coexisted together. Two roommates who never talked.
At dinner, I watched him eat, and then I decided to press my luck.
“I have an ultrasound scheduled tomorrow for 5 PM.”
Green eyes looked at me.
“Did you want to come?”
“Sure. Text me a reminder.”
“Okay.”
The next day, I waited outside the clinic until 4:59 PM. There was no sign of Jackson.
Me: At our appointment. Are you running late?
No response.
With a sore heart, I went to the appointment by myself.
The technician asked me if I wanted to know the sex of the baby. My eyes filled with tears. This was a decision that we were supposed to make together.
“No thanks.”
She gave me a sad smile.
I cried on the way home. I had no idea how to deal with this situation. Did I give Jackson more time? Did I confront him? What was I supposed to do? I thought losing him to Harper would be the worst thing in the world. But this, this was much worse. He didn’t want to be comforted. He didn’t want my love. He pushed me away, and there was nothing I could do about it. How long would this last? How long until the delicate relationship that we had started to cultivate was utterly shredded.
