Ask Me Again

by E. J. Noyes

  Transport Blue, do you copy? Looks like you have hajji en route… My hands had shaken as I’d read the greeting. Hey Doc.

  We’d been in regular email and video-call contact ever since, bonded in the way of two people who have shared something horrific. I hadn’t known him before that day—Gavin was just a guy enlisted to give me a ride in a Humvee to and from somewhere I technically shouldn’t have been. But after The Incident, he became one of my closest friends. One of the few people I could be completely honest with, and he with me.

  I settled on the couch and pulled the laptop onto my knees. “Hey!”

  His gray eyes were bright, and he looked cheerful and healthy as usual. “Doc! How’re you doing?” Despite my telling him to call me Sabine, he still referred to me as Doc, or in his rawer moments Captain. Just like he had that day. Aside from that, there was no ma’am or proper protocol here. Here, over the Internet, we were just two people talking about a shared experience. Gavin leaned forward. “And unless Rebecca made a trip back to the desert to visit, I’ll assume you’re home.”

  “Sure am. Touched down stateside last Wednesday. Finished up our processing yesterday and now we’ve got two weeks leave.”

  “All right!” He pushed his fist to the webcam and I did the same for a virtual fist bump. Gavin was fourteen years younger than me, and his exuberance made me feel like a teenager again, helping to balance the inevitable somberness of our interactions. He’d been barely legal drinking age when it’d happened and had looked so much like a young boy I could hardly believe he was serving. Now he was twenty-three and still a boy, but with that awful look I saw in so many eyes. Including my own at times.

  Haunted, wary, changed.

  “So, any news?” I asked. We always started with the general life stuff before moving on to our inevitable informal therapy sessions. In addition to mandatory therapy while stateside and combat stress appointments while deployed, I’d tried PTSD support groups. But they were claustrophobic and anxiety-inducing rather than helpful. Supplementing Army shrink sessions with Gavin worked well. Or as well as any therapy could for me.

  He rubbed his chin, slowly and with mock thoughtfulness. “Well, nothin’ much unless you count getting engaged!”

  “What! Congratulations! Oh my God, I’m so happy for you.” I made a gimme motion with both hands. “Come on, don’t leave me hanging. Tell me about it. You proposed? Or did Hannah get in first?”

  “All me, Doc.” His grin was so wide I couldn’t help but match it. Gavin leaned close to the webcam. “Okay, so I got the ring, this real pretty diamond I knew she wanted. Made a dinner reservation at the fanciest place, new haircut, closest shave, best suit, parade-shined my shoes, the works. And right before we left, I was just checkin’ my hair in the mirror when I notice this almighty, disgusting zit on my temple, like I dunno…stress of the proposal or something. Hannah comes out, dressed up real nice and she smells so good and looked so damned beautiful. And she sees this thing on my face, grabs my head in one hand to stop me moving, grabs a couple of tissues from her handbag with the other, then pops it without askin’ me, you know, the way women do.”

  “Mhmm.” I put my hand over my mouth to stop laughing. He was so gleeful in his runaway retelling that it wouldn’t have mattered if I’d burst into a fit of giggles, but I wanted to hear the rest of his story.

  “I just thought that this is so comfortable, you know? Like her squeezing this gross thing on my face before we go out, this is how we’re going to grow old. This is our life and we’ve had it all already, the good and the bad and the frightening and the disgusting, and isn’t that what love is?” He shrugged, still smiling. “So I pulled the ring out of my jacket pocket right there, in the entryway, with her holding these gross zit tissues. Got down on one knee, and I just asked.”

  I couldn’t help clapping. “I think that’s the best proposal story I’ve ever heard. Nobody is ever going to top that. Ever.”

  “Yep, it’s up there.” His expression grew earnest. “You and Rebecca will come to the wedding, right? It won’t be for another year or two ’til we can save up enough money to have a real nice one, and I know Alaska isn’t super convenient and that’s even assumin’ the Army doesn’t move me again, but it would mean a whole lot to us if you were there.”

  I didn’t even have to think before answering, “Gavin, we wouldn’t miss it for anything. I’d be honored to be there when you two get married and I know Bec will feel the same.”

  The corners of his eyes crinkled. “Awesome.” Gavin propped his elbows on the desk and rested his chin on clenched fists. “So, how you been, Doc?” The banter was over. Shit.

  I’d learned that if I hesitated, I would either clam up completely or be evasive, and that was almost as bad as not talking about it at all. Before I could let myself think, I answered, “Up and down. I was having compulsions again this week like I did on deployment. It’s that damned control thing.” I cleared my throat, still not fully able to push aside the default reticence I had toward talking about such things. “It’s back to feeling like I have to do it or something bad will happen.”

  I sighed, recalling my meltdowns in Afghanistan. The position of my boots in my locker, the number of paces between the prep room and the theater, and the times I’d uncharacteristically snapped at a nurse for setting one of my clamps slightly out of line or having the tray at an odd angle relative to my body.

  Gavin nodded once, the movement short and sharp. “Keeping it all squared away. I get it, and hell I got the same. Holy shit, and the constant vigilance still, like I’m paralyzed because I’m so terrified someone’s coming for me and Hannah. Some nights I can’t even sleep, just have to stay awake and make sure everything’s okay.” He drew in a long, unsteady breath, shaking his head as though shaking the thought out. “You told someone? About the compulsions things?”

  “Mhmm, I mentioned it to the shrink this week.” In a roundabout, not-fully-elaborated kinda way. “Are you and Hannah still communicating?”

  “Yeah, and she’s so good at bringing me down from it now. Usually just by being there, you know?” He scratched his jaw. “How’re the dreams?”

  “Down to twice a week or so.”

  “What am I doing in them?” It was a bit of a joke from our partners that we dreamt about another person more than them. Hannah even called me Gavin’s Other Woman.

  “Same as always. The radio call, then you ask if I’ve got my gear on and my rifle ready, and I think that’s what trips me up and paralyzes me in the dream, because you didn’t ask that.”

  “No,” Gavin agreed quietly. “I didn’t.”

  It was Richards, his platoon mate and friend who’d asked me “Are you dressed, Captain?” just moments before he was killed. He was checking up on me, making sure I was okay and prepared for what might happen because I’m not a field soldier. I’m a surgeon and I shouldn’t have been there.

  I would never be able to shake the embarrassment of a soldier who ranked underneath me having to make sure I remembered what to do in a combat situation. Nor could I get rid of the ugly bitterness inside, survivor’s guilt they all called it, which was about right. There was nowhere to direct the feeling except back at myself because I’d pushed my commanding officer, Bec, to let me go even when I knew I shouldn’t have even asked.

  But I did ask. Because everything with me and Bec had been so confusing, with no workable solutions in sight, and I needed some time away from the FOB. From her. So I’d asked her to let me go away for a day to perform a routine medical procedure on a bunch of soldiers at a neighboring Army installation just so I could think and breathe. And it’d worked as I’d thought it would. Until The Incident.

  I pinched my thigh hard, the pain resetting my thoughts as I’d hoped. “Then I see the light, and I know what’s coming and I just know there’s fuck all I can do about it.” Either I’d wake in a gasping, sweaty panic or the dream would bleed into another and I’d spend the night fighting unwinnable battles in my sle
ep.

  “Yeah…” He closed his eyes, his lips moving as he silently counted to ten. Then he opened them again. “Stupid thing is we know I never saw it. Never saw them. But I see them in the dreams.” A flash of panic clouded his eyes. It’d taken almost eight months into our conversations before he’d stopped constantly apologizing for all he thought he didn’t do, or that he thought he could have done better or differently. But he still had moments of intense self-doubt and loathing. As did I.

  “I know you didn’t, hon. Neither did I.”

  Both his hands came up helplessly. “You know, just a little faster, or a swerve or somethin’…”

  I kept silent. There was nothing I could say, these were simply thoughts that needed to be worked through out loud.

  “…but then it could have been me or you and not Richards.” Gavin let out a choked exhalation, and quickly dashed his palms under his eyes. “How do you make a choice like that?”

  My throat felt so tight, I didn’t think I could answer. But I had to. For him and for me. I had to remind him of something we’d said so many times already. “You don’t. Someone else made it for you. For us.”

  “I know,” he agreed quietly, his voice still edged with tears. “I think sometimes the what-ifs are the hardest.”

  I nodded. What if I hadn’t selfishly wanted to get away and pushed Bec to let me go do a job that a nurse usually did…what if I’d been sitting a couple of feet to my right…what if we’d left a minute later or earlier? What if I’d never joined the Army in the first place?

  Gavin and I sat separated by thousands of miles, but staring at him on my laptop screen, it felt as though he was with me. His head was slightly bowed but he still felt present, and the comfort of it was immeasurable. This quiet reflection was another of our themes and after all our time together, we’d become adept at knowing when to break the silence.

  “How’s the physical stuff?” I asked when I sensed the small change come over him. “Any pain?”

  Gavin huffed an exaggerated sigh, a smile breaking through his somberness. “Just like you Med Corp, always pushin’ us to tell you where it hurts.”

  I gave him an answering smile. “Bite me.”

  He laughed. “Hip aches a bit in the rain but other than that it’s fine. How about you?”

  “Okay. Been getting a few nerve twinges in my thigh where the shrapnel was.” I couldn’t help but look around, even though I knew Bec was outside gardening and wouldn’t be able to hear my quiet admission. “And this weird…well, it’s fake pain. Psychosomatic. Under my armpit where I was shot.”

  His expression grew serious as again, he asked one of his favorite questions, “Telling the shrink? And your doctor?”

  “Mmmmmmm.” My evasive answer ran up and down through about three octaves.

  “Doc,” Gavin sighed. “Come on. If I gotta talk about all my nitty gritty stuff then you do too.”

  “Yeah I know. I will, I promise.” At some stage, when I didn’t feel like I’d choke on the words. I made an expert deflection, not entirely selfish because it was pertinent to our friend-therapy. “Have you got your deployment orders yet? Wasn’t there a rumor they were coming soon?”

  “Word is within three months.” It would be the first time his platoon would deploy since he’d been wounded two years earlier, and he’d be out running patrols in the thick of things, not like me who worked behind walls. Afraid. Hiding. Safe. Or, safer.

  “How’re you feeling about it?”

  “Same as always but with this little voice in my head now.” He peered at me, eyes a little brighter. “And yeah, I actually told the shrink.”

  “Smartass,” I said, but I was smiling.

  “Yeah yeah.” He paused, a long sigh escaping. “Once is bad luck, right? Twice is near impossible. Or that’s what I keep telling myself.”

  “That’s what they say.” It sounded like a platitude, and I hated myself for it. But what could I say? Yeah the odds are in your favor, but it could still happen, again, because nothing is guaranteed over there.

  He glanced off to the side, nodding once before turning back to me. “Okay. Sorry, Doc, I gotta go. Hannah’s waving at me to stop talking and have breakfast. I’ll see you in a few weeks, same time, same place?”

  “You know it. Take care of yourself, hon.”

  “You too, Doc.”

  “Give Hannah my congratulations. Or my regrets,” I added playfully.

  He laughed and the video went black.

  I thumbed dust from the plastic ridge edging the screen and stared at the background picture of Bec and me at Universal Studios, taken a few months after I finished my medical leave. Something that somehow snuck by all our getting to know you was her love of adrenaline rides—the scarier and more vomit-inducing, the better she loved it. My concession was joining her on the less thrilling ones, the kiddie-coasters as she so teasingly called them.

  Bec still had all these little bits of herself that she kept giving me and each one was another piece in the jigsaw puzzle of our new, shared life. I’d never had this sort of connection with anyone before, never felt so balanced by another person. It wasn’t that I felt incomplete by myself, but more that with Bec I was somehow made whole. Like she filled all those holes that’d opened up inside me with pieces of herself to keep me together. It was her love that pushed the darkness aside.

  Gavin was right. Love was the easy and the hard, all the scary and disgusting things and the sweet and gentle and kind. Bec and I had had all of that good and bad stuff, and we were still together. Still in love. I needed that if I was ever going to move past this crud in my head. Needed her. I closed the laptop and ran up the stairs two at a time, rushing along the hallway to our bedroom.

  I unlocked the safe, shoving everything out of the way until I found the box I wanted. I cracked it open and stared for what felt like the hundredth time since I’d bought it. I could see it on her finger. Imagine her response, hopefully the one I wanted. But I couldn’t quite picture myself asking her. That disparaging voice came back again to tell me I wasn’t good enough for her. I wasn’t worthy of her when I was as ruined as I was, like a rotten piece of fruit.

  Rotten apple actually summed it up pretty well. Looked all right, so long as you didn’t touch it or take a look inside. Be quiet, Sabine. You’re never going to give her this ring if you don’t suck it up and get your shit together. It’s easy. Just say…Bec, I love you so much I can’t even think of what to say. Nice one, that’s totally romantic and memorable. Bec, I want us to spend the rest of our lives together? I love you. Marry me? Great, very convincing.

  I hid the box again and locked it away. My footsteps were light as I made my way back downstairs and through the kitchen. I quietly opened the screen door and leaned against the doorframe, staring into our backyard. Bec kneeled on the grass beside the vegetable garden, stretching over to reach a weed. Her broad-brimmed sunhat, those dorky gardening gloves and slip-on shoes all made a picture of perfection.

  I relished these mundane domestic moments. I loved knowing that before me, before us, she would have done the same thing—on a smaller scale in the planter boxes on the tiny balcony of her studio apartment. Gradually, the gardens here had been transformed under her green thumb. Less than a month after she moved in, the hedge I despised along the side fences had been pulled out and replaced by flower beds. Her rosebushes filled our front gardens and while they were blooming I’d often sneak out and smell the blooms. I’d never cared much for the garden before but I loved everything she’d done. Because it was hers and she’d made it ours.

  When my shadow fell over the tomato plants she was attending, Bec twisted around, her greeting a soft, “Hello, darling.” As well as making herself scarce, Bec never asked about my contact with Gavin. I think for her it sat in that strange area of a call between friends, and therapeutic.

  “Hey.” I knelt beside her and rubbed a smear of dirt from the side of her jaw, kissing the spot when I was done. “Gavin and Hannah are en
gaged.”

  Bec straightened, the smile of delight bringing out her dimples. “Really? That’s fantastic news! I’ll pick up a card to send them. When’s the wedding?”

  “A year or two. We’re invited.”

  “Sounds lovely. Did you get any more packing done?”

  “No, but I just need to toss a few more things in and I’m set.” Toss…carefully place in exactly the right spot in the suitcase. Same thing.

  Bec arched her back, groaning faintly. “I suppose I should pack too. In a bit. Are you hungry?”

  “Not yet. Soon though.” I ran my fingers through the inch-high grass beside my knee, relishing the softness of it. “I think I’ll mow the lawn.”

  “Why don’t I start some lunch then and it’ll be done when you are?” She pulled off her gloves and stood, offering me her hand.

  I took it to pull myself to my feet. “Sounds great. Thanks.”

  Bec studied my face, her expression relaxed and thoughtful. Slowly, and with what seemed like unnecessary caution, she brought her hand up to caress my cheek. A moment later, her lips touched my mouth, then without saying anything else, Bec gathered up her gardening things and walked away.

  I watched her making her way across the yard and into the house. Checked her out was more like it. Though she was still fit, with her flag football and jogging a few times a week, she’d lost some of the hard muscle from her military days. Bec had always been so female, with full breasts and curves that made my stomach flutter and my mouth go dry. Now she’d softened, just a little, and become even more delicious. And I loved it. Loved the contrast to my lean greyhound body.

  Heat built in my belly when I recalled the night before when I’d reacquainted myself with every delicious inch of her. I let the desire take over, until the other thing rose up, the thing I recognized as self-admonishment. Beautiful, sexy, sensuous girlfriend and I’d been too scared to make love to her. Made her wait even longer. Only done it once. Hadn’t really let her touch me. Shut upppp, Sabine.