Ask Me Again

by E. J. Noyes

  I crouched down in front of the vet, upset to realize the blanket was damp and he was shivering. “Hey,” I said softly. “How’re you doing?”

  He straightened as best he could. “Not too bad thank you, ma’am.” His gaze went to the patches signifying my rank and identifying me as Med Corps, and finally settled on the objects in my hands. I saw a flash of hope in his eyes before he schooled his expression to nonchalance. Shit, he was so young, probably only thirty if that. Younger than me and already used up and spat out on the side of the road.

  With the cardboard coffee tray, I gestured to his sign. “When did you get out?”

  “Twenty-oh-eight, Captain. Did three tours before my body and brain wouldn’t let me do no more.” Carefully, he pulled the blanket up and I saw the painfully familiar empty space where a lower limb should be.

  By now, the reaction was automatic—a moment of anger and despair, then it was gone again, set aside so I could focus. “It’s not my place to tell you what to do but VA can help out, if you need it. Or you have other options aside from that.”

  “I tried, but I can’t bear going in there, ma’am. All those broken people, it just makes me feel useless all over again.”

  “I understand,” I murmured. It wasn’t a platitude, I knew exactly how he felt, and that sentiment was part of the reason I stopped group therapy. Not wanting to dwell and perhaps trigger something for him—or me—I cleared my throat and forced my tone into brightness. “You’re not a vegetarian, are you?”

  He smiled. “Oh no, nothing like that, ma’am.”

  “Good.” I offered the coffee tray and bags to him. “There’s something for now and a few things for later in there. Creamer and sugar too if that’s your thing.”

  The vet took the tray and bags cautiously, as though he expected me to snatch them back and yell Psych! at him. His voice was soft, incredulous when he said, “Thank you very much, Captain. I really appreciate your kindness.”

  “No worries.” On a whim, I fished in my pocket and handed him all the cash I had in there. “Take care of yourself, okay?”

  “I will, ma’am. Thank you very much.” His fingers closed around the cash and he looked at me searchingly. His face contorted before he managed to regain control of his expression again. “You be sure to take care of yourself too, Doc.”

  I swallowed the hard lump in my throat, nodded and left him to his meal. Jana glanced up as I jogged over to her. She offered me shelter under the umbrella along with an unwanted piece of advice. “If you keep giving them handouts, Sabs, they’re never going to get on their feet.”

  I almost choked on what had just come out of my sweet, generous, kind sister’s mouth. Jana and I rarely fought and I couldn’t believe that she’d say something so insensitive and narrow-minded. “Jannie, I love you but that’s probably the stupidest fucking thing you’ve ever said.”

  She opened her mouth to protest but I cut her off. “That guy could have been me, you know. If it wasn’t for you, Mom and Dad. Bec…” I shrugged, clenching my teeth hard to stop myself crying, but the words still came out cracked and broken. “It would have been so easy to just keep slipping until I was so far under I couldn’t get back up again.”

  Jana pulled me to a stop a few feet from the curb. “Wait. Stop.” She launched herself at me, the hug awkward around the umbrella, but still fierce. The rain fell on us as Jana held me, and I could feel the faint tremble in her body. “I’m so sorry, Sabbie. I didn’t know.” My sister sounded genuinely remorseful and more than a little upset. “I mean I knew, but I didn’t know.”

  “I know.”

  “Why didn’t you say anything?”

  “You know why. Because I’m a fucking idiot when I have to talk about my feelings.”

  We parted, and I lifted the umbrella again to protect her good suit from the rain. She was crying, and her expression tore through me. “Are you okay?” Jana asked. “Like really okay?”

  “Mostly, yeah.” I made myself smile for my younger sister and carefully used my thumb to wipe under her eyes. “It’s not as easy as just saying ‘get over it’. You know how much I hate therapy and if I didn’t think that working through my issues was the right thing to do for you guys then I wouldn’t even be trying.”

  Trying.

  Even as I said the word, I knew that I wasn’t. Not really. It would be so easy to give up, because it was all so hard. I needed to do more, because the consequence of not trying was catastrophic. I’d seen where I could end up, huddled under a threadbare blanket in the rain.

  “Is it helping?” she asked softly, fishing in her handbag for tissues.

  “Some. But not as much as I’d like.” Even after everything, I still couldn’t fully let go and admit to everyone that something inside me didn’t work properly anymore. And I hated myself for it.

  “I don’t know what to do,” Jana said softly.

  I threaded my arm through hers and pulled her close. “It’s okay, Jannie. I think I might have finally figured it out myself.”

  It was up to me, and me alone.

  I just had to work harder, try more, push myself and it’d all come back together. It had to.

  Chapter Twelve

  Rebecca

  The vibration of the garage door rumbling up announced Sabine was home. I reached for two wine glasses, debated, then set one back. If Sabine wanted a drink, she could be in control and choose it for herself. Control. So important to her, but even more so now. I poured a glass of Pinot and set the bottle on the counter. The first sip was soothing, the second even more so.

  I heard Sabine drop her backpack at the base of the stairs, then greet the cat with a fond, “Titus! Hello, handsome. Did you have a nice day? Oh…okay, see you later then, precious boy.” Footsteps made their way to the kitchen and she appeared with takeout bags in both hands.

  I smiled, enjoying the easy pleasure which always accompanied her being near. “Hello, darling.”

  “Hey, babe.” She leaned over to kiss me then placed our dinner on the counter. After a sneaky sip from my wineglass, Sabine began to empty her pockets, dropping the contents next to the Murano glass bowl which held our unopened mail. A needleless syringe, an unused Band-Aid, a packet of gum, the backing from a wound dressing and an interesting stone which she slid across to me. She’d always had this adorable habit of bringing me home little things she’d found during her day, like a cat bringing its owner a mouse as a gift.

  I turned the smooth stone over, admiring the flecks of black and gray through it. It was warm from being in her pocket. “How was your day? Did you see Jana?”

  “Mhmm. Looks like the coffee guy is history. Goodbye, free samples.” Her smile was wide, her voice calm and even, but something seemed off. And she’d only answered one of my questions. I recognized the expression, her tone. She was upset and trying desperately to hide it.

  Sabine turned away from me to fetch a wineglass. “I got sushi.” She refreshed my drink and poured a glass for herself. “I was going to go to the deli but the line was too long.”

  “Sushi’s great.”

  She drank a slow mouthful of wine, stared at the bottle then set it down again without topping up her glass. “Did you have a good day?”

  “Busy. There was that school bus crash this morning.” I pulled two plates down for us.

  “Oh.” She took off her uniform jacket and draped it neatly over a kitchen chair. Her stare was intense. “Are you okay?”

  “Yes, darling. No fatalities, and they were all stable when I left.” I ran my forefinger over the now-cool surface of her stone.

  Sabine smiled wearily at me, a smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes. “You are so clever.” She sat at the table and began to unlace her boots, slender fingers pulling the laces with her typically efficient and careful movements.

  She rubbed her thumb against the toe of her boot, as if trying to clean something off the tan suede, and I watched her for a moment, admiring the strength in her hands. God I loved those ha
nds, capable of pulling me to dizzying heights one moment, then saving lives in another. “Not as clever as you, Magic Hands.”

  She made a little scoffing sound, but a slight smile tugged at her lips. Sabine was a surgeon, and as much as she tried to hide it, she had a surgeon’s ego. She dropped her boots carelessly on the floor beside her then after a pause, almost as an afterthought, straightened them to sit parallel with the chair. “Actually I might take a shower before dinner.”

  “Sure.” I turned away to unpack plastic containers of sushi and seaweed salad, placing them in the fridge for after her shower. “No chopsticks?” I asked, shaking the bags out.

  “Pardon?”

  “Chopsticks,” I repeated.

  “They should be in there. I asked for some. And extra wasabi for you.”

  “Oh…they must have misunderstood.” I smiled. “Because neither of those things is in there.”

  Her beautiful mouth twisted into an ugly sneer. “Well, you know, I asked. What a bunch of fucking idiots.”

  The response was so uncharacteristically rude I couldn’t think of a response. I turned away to hide my frown, opened the drawer and pulled out forks. “No harm, I’m sure it was just a mistake.”

  Sabine’s hand closed over my wrist as I placed the forks on the table along with our plates. “Bec, I really did ask. I didn’t forget, I swear.”

  I tilted my head, staring at her as though I could figure out why she was so worked up about this. “Sweetheart, I believe you. Seriously, it’s not an issue. At all.”

  Sabine looked down at the table, her free hand flexing open and closed. She took a few deep breaths, then burst into tears. Clearly this was about more than chopsticks and wasabi. Despair stole my breath and I had to stop and force myself to inhale. I sat down and grasped her hands. “Hey, talk to me.”

  She leaned over and wrapped her arms around me, sobbing noisily against my shoulder. There was nothing I could do but hold her, stroking her hair and the back of her neck as I waited for her to calm down to a point where she could articulate. After a few minutes, she said a simple, quiet phrase through her tears. “I had a really fucking bad day today.”

  “Oh, darling, I’m so sorry.” I rocked her gently, kissing her temple. “You’re home now, you’re safe. I promise.”

  My reassurance only seemed to make her crying worse and she clung tighter to me, her tears seeping through my blouse. I squeezed my eyes closed to stop my own tears and we held each other until her crying became erratic, hiccupping sobs. When her breathing had steadied a little, she pulled away from me and wiped under her eyes with her palms. I left her at the table and went to collect the roll of paper towels from next to the microwave.

  Sabine unrolled a few pieces of towel, wiped her eyes and blew her nose. “I so did not want to cry.” She flashed me a wonky smile. “I’m going to be famous, Bec. We had a visitor today, Congressman Marcus Palmer. Some publicity bullshit with photos and an interview too. Me, Mitch and one of my patients.”

  My gut began churning the moment she mentioned an interview. I had a suspicion about why they wanted her and what they would have wanted to talk about, but she answered my question before I could ask it. I placed my hand on her shoulder, gently stroking her neck with my thumb as she talked.

  “I mean, it’s obvious why me, right? They wanted something juicy to sell their bullshit of how well the machine is working over there if someone like me can come out of an attack like I did.” She balled the paper towel in her fist and her shoulders shook as she drew in another unsteady breath. “Bec, it was so awful and all I wanted was to come and find you but I couldn’t, because you’re not there anymore and for just a moment, I forgot that. And then there was this guy in the city. A vet huddled under a stinking blanket in the rain. He was so young and cold, and he’d lost his leg over there, and now he’s homeless and I just—” Sabine closed her eyes, more tears leaking down her cheeks. “I didn’t know what to do.”

  There was so much torment that I didn’t know where to start with helping her unpack it all. Massaging her shoulder, I prompted, “How did it make you feel?”

  She coughed out a laugh. “Which part?”

  “Why don’t we start with the young man?” There was no point in asking her how being interviewed had made her feel. I already knew.

  She looked up and her brimming eyes found mine. “So scared. That…could be me if I don’t fix this.” Her eyes widened and she tripped over the words in her haste to get them out. “It’s not you, Bec, I swear. It’s not something you’ve done or haven’t done to make this better. It’s me. And I need to change. I need to fix it. I need to get better or I think I might drown.”

  What could I say to that? Grief scratched at my insides like a caged beast. But I couldn’t let it out. If I did, if I broke, then I didn’t think she would be able to keep herself together. She needed me to be strong enough for both of us. A few deep breaths helped me find some words. “Darling, I know you’re confused and upset, but it’s going to be all right. I promise. I’m here, and we’re going to work through this.” I didn’t know how many times I had to tell her, to show her, but if she needed it every day, every hour then that’s what I would do.

  The look she gave me was heartbreaking, as if she’d expected me to have an answer right then that would solve everything. But I had nothing because I too was so shattered by everything that had happened in the past few years. Too shattered by my guilt and having to atone. By being the pillar she needed. But now Sabine was home, it was wearing me down even more, right when I needed to be there for her.

  She nodded, slowly. “Okay. I’m going to start right now. Bec, I hav—” She glanced at her ringing phone, her forehead furrowed. After a few rings, she snatched up the phone.

  “Oma,” Sabine explained. “I should probably take it.” She cleared her throat and tapped the screen to answer. “Oma, hallo! Wie geht es dir?” Sabine spoke in her usual rapid-fire German, her voice miraculously steady. Her speaking voice was so naturally husky that her recent bout of tears was hardly noticeable, and I doubted her eighty-eight-year-old grandmother would realize anything was amiss.

  I caught a few words as she left the room but most of it was unintelligible. The words were muted, the sound of her voice moving back and forth along the hall as she paced the way she always did on phone calls. I picked up my wineglass, but the deep red of the wine now seemed to taunt me.

  Crossing the floor in a few swift strides, I tipped the Pinot into the sink and carefully placed the glass on the counter. Then I took a step back, another sideways, unable to find a way around my overwhelming sense of hopelessness. I gave in to it, leaned forward and rested my elbows on the kitchen counter with my face resting in my hands.

  One simple decision. That’s all it had been. It had seemed so innocuous at the time. A question asked by her and a favor given by me. And because of it our lives had been irrevocably turned about. The familiar guilt made me nauseated, and I drew my hands into tight fists as though I could force away the accompanying rush of gut-wrenching fear that appeared whenever I thought of that day. It was the same stomach-dropping feeling that had hit me when I’d heard her name on the incoming call. My colleague. My subordinate. My lover.

  I knew she didn’t blame me for what’d happened. She blamed herself. As though she could have cut and resewn the fabric of time to make it turn out differently. The blame I allocated myself was more than enough for both of us, but I would have shouldered hers too if she’d put it on me. I deserved it.

  After the call informing me of what’d happened, it took twenty minutes for her to arrive. Right on sunset I’d stood with her friends and coworkers, watching the convoy of armored vehicles rushing through the checkpoint toward the hospital, knowing Sabine was in one of them. The rear vehicle dragged a ruined, uncooperative Humvee like a grotesque string of Just Married cans on a wedding car. I’d stared at the mangled vehicle and all I could think was that she’d been in that wreckage and somehow survived it.
At least, up until that point.

  Unconscious Sabine being carried in, her tanned face pale—unsurprising given the blood seeping through her field dressings. For the first time ever, I’d wanted to shed the weight of my leadership. But I had to carry those under my command while I tried to repair the damage to the beautiful body I’d loved less than a month before. Even if I’d been able to address my own needs, requesting someone else take the case was pointless because everyone at the FOB knew her. She was a professional conflict for us all.

  The memories of that horrific day were always disjointed, which made reliving them even worse because I could find no clear path through the events. I could recall watching her as I’d scrubbed, her screams of pain bouncing off the walls of the OR while they prepped her. I could recall the way she kept moving in my peripheral vision, trying to catch people’s eyes or talk, then choking on the blood in her trachea. And I could recall how I’d had to ignore it, had to shut it all away where it couldn’t touch me.

  There was nothing but blank space where recollection of her surgery should be. I knew the clinical details, but the memory of my hands inside her chest was lost and I was grateful for it. When they took her to recovery and I could finally breathe again, I’d had to get outside before I fell apart. I had to get some distance from her. I didn’t shower after her surgery. Didn’t even strip off my scrubs. Later, much later, instead of throwing them in the communal laundry hampers, I dropped them and my shoes into one of the medical burn pits.

  They’d hidden the wrecked Humvee in a shed, waiting for orders on what to do with it. Inside the compound, it would become a shrine, a Look what they did to our guys, and yeah we got ’em! sort of morale boost.

  When I approached the shed I heard all the loathsome macho revenge talk I hated, but I didn’t begrudge them. Whatever they needed to do to get through their day was fine by me. But it felt wrong somehow because these weren’t field soldiers chest-beating and talking smack to get them through their next terrifying mission. These were my Med Corps. At my approach, a dozen bodies straightened and came to attention.