by Gail, Stacy
And then there was Beth—patient, cheerful, generous Beth. He could finally give her the commitment and attention she deserved. He would move into base housing and they would take things slowly, going through all of the new-relationship milestones they skipped during that whirlwind week in June. He would send her flowers, buy her dinner, take her to a movie and sneak his arm around her shoulders. They would stay out way too late on a weeknight, neither one of them ready to leave, until they’d both had too many beers and had to call a taxi to run them back to her place. Then he’d kiss her in the backseat, tasting that mischievous tequila shot they’d downed as a nightcap, and she’d pull him by the hand into her bedroom, and they would make love like it was the first time and the hundredth all at once.
For the first time since waking up in the hospital bed in Germany, Chris felt positive and hopeful, and he couldn’t stop the smile that crept across his face.
His future was salvageable. He was going to be okay.
“Here we are,” Beth announced as she cut the engine. “We’re at Radina’s,” she specified, naming the downtown coffee shop that was popular with the university crowd. “Their sandwiches are good and I figured it wouldn’t be too crowded. Do you want to bring your cane?”
Chris wrinkled his nose. He hated that thing—although he supposed he’d have to get used to it eventually.
“I’d rather take your arm, if you’re offering.”
“I’m at your disposal.” Soon she was guiding him over the slippery pavement to the door, and then into a seat. The coffee shop was warm and aromatic, as scents of roasted coffee beans, peppermint hot chocolate and what he assumed must be a small Christmas tree combined to create a festive atmosphere. From the low din of conversation it seemed like plenty of locals had braved the post-blizzard streets. He caught fragments of discussions about shoveling driveways, delayed flights and what still needed to be bought, wrapped and stowed under the tree. It all seemed so comfortingly ordinary in comparison to the state of suspension he’d felt down in San Antonio, where he’d hung between being back from Afghanistan yet still cut off from any semblance of normal life.
“Is this okay?” Beth asked.
“Fine with me. What’s good for lunch?”
“It’s hard to go wrong.” He heard her drop into the seat opposite his. “Do you want me to read through the menu for you?”
“Just order two of whatever you want,” he said, reaching into his pocket to retrieve his billfold. “Everything tastes good to me at the moment.”
Chris opened his wallet to count through the bills he’d been taught to fold according to denomination, when he realized he had no idea what the prices were.
Beth must have seen him falter because she said, “Oh, no, I’ll get this.”
He shook his head. “Definitely not. This should cover it.” He decided to err on the side of caution and pulled out forty dollars. That had to be enough.
She went to the counter to order, and when she came back she hovered beside him as she counted out his ample change into his open palm. As he pocketed the money, she leaned down and brushed a kiss over his temple.
“Thanks for lunch, Captain.”
“Anytime.” Emboldened by her affectionate gesture, he decided this was as good a time as any to share the thoughts that had been swirling around in his brain ever since he’d gotten up from the kitchen floor.
“I know I haven’t given you any real reason why I sent that last email,” he began, flattening his hands on the table. “And that’s because I don’t have one. I sent it right after I arrived at the hospital in San Antonio, when the doctors confirmed that the damage to my vision was potentially irreparable.”
He drew a bracing breath and continued quickly, not wanting to give her a chance to interrupt his confessional. “In the few days before the bomb, I was trying to figure out how to tell you that I was falling in love with you. I was worried you wouldn’t believe me, or think I was trying to manipulate you. I mean, who falls in love after four days together and a couple of phone calls?” He shrugged. “I do, apparently. But after the explosion, when I was stable enough to think coherently about my future and the implications of my injuries, I decided it would be unfair to burden you with my situation. I didn’t want you to feel obligated to be with me, and I didn’t want you to be held back by someone who was so helpless and dependent. I hoped you would never find out that I was wounded, and that you would simply write me off as a jerk and a bastard and move on with your life. Obviously, it didn’t work out that way.”
Beth was silent on the other side of the table, and Chris wished he could see her face, so he could gauge her reaction and speak accordingly. Instead he had to stumble forward in love as blindly as he did in day-to-day life.
“You don’t have to say anything today, or ever,” he said quietly, clenching his hands together. “If I hurt you too badly, or you can’t trust me after what I did, or you just don’t want to tie yourself to someone who needs so much extra help, I understand. I really do, and I won’t judge you for it. I’m not sure what I would do in your situation, to be honest. But if you think you might want to give me another chance...” He raised his head, hoping he was looking in her direction, “I would be very grateful, and I would do my best to make you happy.”
He dug one hand into the other, feeling more vulnerable in his sightlessness now than he ever had before. For all he knew Beth could look horrified, or disgusted, or be about to slap him again.
He heard her inhale and steeled himself for her response, when two sets of footsteps marched up to their table.
“Beth! I thought that was you,” exclaimed a female voice. “Jim, this is my colleague Beth Tate, from the department. This is my brother, Jim, the one who lives in Seattle.”
“Nice to meet you,” a male voice chimed in.
“And you,” Beth replied. “Chris, this is Shauna Byrne, whose office is next to mine. Shauna, Jim, this is Chris Walker.”
“Hello,” Chris said briskly, praying they hadn’t stuck out their hands to shake.
“Chris Walker,” Shauna repeated, broadcasting her recognition without a hint of subtlety. “This is the guy who—”
“My boyfriend,” Beth said firmly, and his heart squeezed in his chest. “He’s back from Afghanistan and he’s staying with me for a few days before Christmas.”
“I see,” Shauna said, clearly unconvinced. Chris sensed she was about to say something else, but luckily the barista chose that moment to bring their plates to the table.
“We’ll let you two eat your lunch. Call me, okay?” Shauna urged in a low voice before she and her brother took their leave. Under any other circumstances, Chris would have sat there ruing how much silent communication he missed out on without being able to see, but he was so elated at Beth’s declaration that for once he couldn’t care less.
“Your boyfriend?” he asked, abandoning any effort to keep the excitement from his voice. “Did you mean it?” He slid his hand across the table to grab hers, but she jerked it away as soon as their fingertips touched.
“Maybe. I don’t know. I need to think about it,” she muttered, clearly troubled.
His heart sank, and his optimism deflated like a leaky balloon. “Of course,” he said with more enthusiasm than he felt. “That’s completely fair.”
“Let’s take this one step at a time, okay?”
Chris was so sick of that phrase—it was one of the medical professionals’ favorites.
He forced a smile. “Absolutely.”
* * *
After the strained atmosphere during lunch, Beth was grateful when Chris asked whether she minded if he put a football game on the TV. Soon he was stretched out on the couch, and although she found it slightly eerie that he lay facing the ceiling instead of the actual television set, she took advantage of the time to herself to slip bac
k into her bedroom and open her laptop.
Unsurprisingly, at the top of her inbox was a message from Shauna. “What is going on???” asked the subject line, and when Beth clicked to open it she didn’t get past “You didn’t tell me he was BLIND!!” before signing out of her email.
She flipped through a few more articles on PTSD, zeroing in on the first-person accounts of their experiences living with soldiers who suffered from the illness. After about ten minutes she realized she wasn’t absorbing anything she read, so she shoved the computer to the side and flopped back on the pillows.
Two months ago, Chris’s revelation that he was falling in love with her, that he’d never tire of her and was only trying to do what he thought was right would’ve been so welcome it might have brought her to tears.
Now, though, she hesitated. What if she agreed to be with him, only to have him change his mind again in a few weeks? Could she believe that he’d only broken up with her because of his injuries? What if that was just an excuse? Maybe he was worried that no woman would go out with him now that he was blind, so he might as well take what he could get.
Then again, she considered as she turned over onto her side, what if he had told her immediately? What if she’d gotten that call from the hospital and heard, in a voice thick with drugs and exhaustion, that he’d survived an explosion and he might never see again, that he loved her and that he was coming home soon.
Just the fantasy of those words coming from his mouth—that he loved her—was enough to make Beth clamp her eyes shut and clutch her fists to her chin.
She knew with complete certainty that she would’ve been on the first plane to San Antonio. She would’ve exchanged awkward introductions with his parents in the hallway and then sat by his bedside as long as she was allowed, holding his hand, touching his bandaged face and telling him it didn’t matter, they’d find a way to get through this because she loved him more than anything.
But he didn’t call her, she reasoned as a cold, hard shell of detachment came over her. And she’d spent many long weeks working to dislodge every last scrap of him from her heart.
Did she love the man lying on her couch? She was afraid of giving herself permission to find out.
Beth walked out to the sitting room. Football players still chased each other across the screen but Chris had turned onto his side, and from the rhythm of his breathing she could tell he’d fallen asleep. She sat down in the narrow space between his back and the edge of the cushions and, on impulse, put her hand on his shoulder.
He stirred slightly, and she ran her palm down his chest. With his damaged eyes closed and his scars pressed into the sofa, Beth got a glimpse of the man she knew, and of what might have been for the two of them.
With his eyes still closed, Chris reached up and covered her hand with his, pressing her fingers against the fleecy material of his pullover. She ran her other hand idly through the tufted hair over his forehead, wondering how he would look if he left the army and gave that soft, thick brown hair a chance to grow in.
“Are you awake?” she murmured, and he nodded.
“I’m going to shovel the driveway. If you wake up and I’m not in the house, I’m outside.”
Chris yawned and stretched, rolled onto his back and fixed her with that blank, clouded stare. “I’ll come out and help you. I was just dozing.”
“You don’t have a coat or boots. Stay in here where it’s warm. I won’t be long.”
He pulled himself to a sitting position and yanked her onto his lap so unexpectedly that she squeaked as he wrapped his arms behind her.
“Let me help you,” he implored, brushing a kiss across her lips. Her heart began to pound in her rib cage.
Hold it together, she told herself sternly. Don’t get carried away. You haven’t made up your mind about him yet.
He twined his fingers in the hair at the back of her neck, sending delicious tingles running across her scalp.
“Your hair is longer than it was in June,” he mused, rubbing a lock between his thumb and forefinger.
“I’d just had it cut then.” She gave in to her need and laid her palm across his cheek, barely noticing the scars beneath her fingers.
“Is it the same color? You haven’t dyed it or anything, have you?”
“Still that dirty dishwater blond, I’m afraid.”
He tsked his disapproval. “Don’t say that. It’s a beautiful blond. It reminds me of grain ready for the harvest.”
She snorted derisively, but her throat was tightening with emotion, and she had to force her voice not to waver. “I think your memory is taking some artistic license.”
He shook his head, shifting his hand to cup her cheek, running his thumb over her lower lip. “I remember it perfectly. I remember every inch of you.”
Beth’s breathing hitched, and she buried her face in his shoulder, closing her arms tightly around his broad chest as she fought a wave of despair. No man had ever looked at her like Chris did, or made her feel as sensual and gorgeous—why did that have to be taken away from her? Why did she have to worry about whether he was going to have a nightmare and strangle her in her sleep, or have a mood swing that left him storming through the house smashing anything he could get his hands on? Why couldn’t he just have come home, all in one piece, every bit the same man she’d said goodbye to six months earlier?
It felt so good to be crushed against his chest and wrapped up tightly in his embrace, and Beth tried to focus on that. Everything else would fall into place, one way or another.
She scooted higher in his lap and her slippered foot accidentally caught the remote control and sent it crashing to the ground. As it bounced off the wood floor the channel jumped from the low-volume chatter of the football game to the middle of an action movie, where guns blazed and explosions peppered the soundtrack.
Beth felt Chris startle beneath her and she threw herself after the remote, punching the power button and silencing the television. She glanced up at Chris from her place on the floor.
“It was just the TV,” she assured him, scrambling back onto the couch beside him.
He stretched his arms languorously. “Let’s shovel.”
Chapter Six
“I think we can safely assume he never fell asleep on watch again,” Chris said with a flourish, enjoying Beth’s lighthearted laughter as she led him back into the house through the garage.
“You’re so mean,” she chided him playfully. “You’re lucky you just did an exceptionally good job shoveling my driveway, or I might have to call up to the fort and tell them you’re not upholding an officer’s standard of behavior.”
Now it was Chris’s turn to laugh. “You clearly haven’t met many officers.”
“I’m going to make some hot chocolate,” she announced, placing his hand on the kitchen counter so he knew where he was. “Do you want some?”
He nodded. “In a minute, I’ll just try my folks again to see whether anything’s melting up their way. If they’re driving down tomorrow they’ll want to start out early, and they’ll be anxious if we don’t have a plan in place tonight.”
“Mine are the same way,” she agreed. “I won’t pour until you’re back.”
Chris found his way to the guest room with a smile on his face. He felt invigorated from shoveling snow, which was probably the most outdoor exercise he’d gotten in months. Recalling the advice of one of the rehab therapists, he tried to focus less on what he couldn’t see and more on the senses he still had. After a couple of false starts he figured out a way to line up the edge of the shovel with the bump that delineated the sides of the driveway, and move forward along a mental grid to create clear-cut rows. Precision and repetition were two skills that had long been honed by his army service, and after a while he heard Beth’s shovel clunk to the ground.
“Why am I even bothering
?” she wondered aloud. “You’ve done twice as much as me in the same time.”
Even without a coat the exertion had warmed him to the point of sweating, and he yanked off his pullover as he dropped onto the bed, stripping down to the T-shirt he wore underneath. He flexed his arms before reaching for his cell phone. They were a little bit sore, the muscles slightly fatigued. His grin widened. It felt good to be useful.
His parents’ landline rang so many times he almost hung up and tried one of their cell phones, even though the signal tended to be unreliable so far out in the country. His finger hovered over the button when someone picked up the line, and a child’s voice asked, “Hello?”
Chris frowned, at first wondering if he’d dialed the wrong number. Then he had a pang of recognition.
“Gabe, is that you?”
The pause was cautious. “Who is this?”
“It’s your cousin, Chris.” Or second cousin, or whatever they were—Gabe was his cousin Tina’s son. He was sure his mom hadn’t mentioned that they were coming up from Oklahoma—was this a last-minute thing?
“Cousin Chris!” Gabe exclaimed. “We came for your parade. Are you coming to dinner tonight? I brought my new tank to show you.”
A lead weight seemed to settle in Chris’s stomach. “What parade, Gabe?”
“Because you’re a hero,” the boy answered. “Because you got blinded.”
Chris scrubbed a hand over his forehead as an ominous comprehension passed over him like a thundercloud. So that’s why his mother had been hysterical about the blizzard, why his parents had encouraged him to bring his dress uniform back to Kansas and why his brother Joe had been even more callous than usual. Did they really expect him to willingly star in a surprise parade celebrating the fact that he’d emerged from a war zone with only one major, life-altering injury? Was this their idea of something he might enjoy? He knew his parents were proud of him—that the whole three-hundred-person town had been pulling for him since the day he was wounded—but that didn’t mean he wanted to be the center of a spectacle.
