by Skye Taylor
Whatever doubts haunted Ben’s soul, two things that he’d said haunted Meg. Do you still love me? And I just hope that when you figure out what you want, there’s still a place for me. She did still love Ben. She would always love him. And if he wasn’t a part of her life, there would be nothing left to hold her together. But he seemed to doubt both. She had to open up and tell him so. Which meant trying harder to explain the source of her melancholy and digging into feelings she didn’t want to face. And owning up to guilt that shamed her.
Meg stood up and wiped her sweaty palms on her thighs. Ben was her personal lifeline. Just as Captain Allan had suggested. But as the doctor pointed out, Meg had to reach out and grab that lifeline. Ben couldn’t grab it for her.
She went down the stairs and started across the gravel driveway. Her heart pounded, and her chest felt constricted. But she was going to ask for Ben’s help. There was no need for this anxiousness. Ben loved her. He was her rock. Her steps quickened.
When she opened the door to the kennel, Columbo didn’t greet her, which was odd. He was a self-appointed doorman for the place. Both guard and greeter.
“Ben?” Meg’s voice echoed in the quiet cavernous building. All the dogs were outdoors. Perhaps that’s where Ben was. Meg hesitated. She’d forgotten Mike would be out here, too.
Then she squared her shoulders. Suck it up, Marine. Oorah!
She strode down the walkway between the training area and the runs to the door leading to the outside training yard. She blinked in the bright glare of sunlight and then brought her hand up to shield her eyes.
Two dogs sat at attention in front of Mike in the middle of the yard. The rest of the dogs were in their runs. All except for Columbo. Meg opened the gate and headed toward Mike and the dogs. She was a little surprised to find that she didn’t feel that gut-tightening awfulness that had filled her the last time she’d been out here.
Mike looked up as Meg approached.
“Where’s Ben?”
Mike nodded back in the direction of the kennel building. “In his office, last time I saw him, ma’am.”
She’d known Mike for years, but she guessed the formality was due to her being the boss’s wife now that Mike worked for them. “Thanks.” She turned and headed back to the building.
It was still just as silent and still. And again, Columbo did not greet her. She retraced her path between the training area and the runs, back to the far end of the building where Ben’s office was located.
Her steps quickened almost to a run as she reached his door, but she stopped dead when she looked in.
Ben held the phone in one hand, but not up to his ear. His face was ashen. Columbo sat in front of him whining softly in his throat.
“Ben?” Meg stepped into the room and crossed it in three strides. “What’s wrong?”
Now she was the one asking what’s wrong. Something was horribly wrong for Ben to look like that. If her heart had felt constricted before, now it felt like it had stopped beating. “Ben.”
She squatted next to the dog and pulled Ben’s chair around so she could see into his face. She removed the phone from his grasp and set it back into its cradle.
“Chuck’s dead,” Ben said with an anguished sob. His eyes were awash with tears. “He killed himself.”
Meg stopped breathing for several heart-pounding moments. Chuck committed suicide? The reality hit her like a freight train. Soldier suicides were becoming all too common, but Chuck? Oh, God, not Chuck!
Meg fell onto her knees and snaked her arms about Ben’s waist. He buried his face in her neck and clung to her, his chest heaving.
“I just talked to him. Just two days ago,” Ben moaned. “Why didn’t he tell me things were so bad?”
“Maybe he didn’t know,” Meg said, trying to soothe her husband.
“He was laughing,” Ben protested.
“Maybe it was an accident?”
Ben shook his head. “He put a gun in his mouth, Meg. Hardly an accident.”
“Oh, Ben. I’m so sorry. Oh, my God, I’m so, so sorry.”
Ben stood, and she stood with him, unwilling to let him leave her embrace. He held her, resting his chin on the top of her head. His entire body shuddered. Meg hugged him tighter. She hadn’t realized she was crying until she felt his shirt growing damp beneath her face. She leaned back and looked up. Tears ran down Ben’s cheeks as well, dribbling past his chin and into the collar of his shirt.
“I have to go over there,” he whispered brokenly.
“I’ll go with you.” She tried to wipe his face with the palms of her hands, gave up, and grabbed the hem of her T-shirt.
“The boys?” Ben stepped back and finished the job of drying his face with his shirtsleeve.
“Mike will watch for them. I’ll call and get your mom to come over. Or Kate. Do you want me to call Will?”
“That was Will who called me.”
“I’ll just be a minute, then.” With a purpose and something that she knew how to organize, Meg sprang into action. She hurried out to ask Mike to watch for the boys to get off the bus and keep an eye on them until some family member could arrive to take over. Then she went back to the house to call for back up.
Neither Ben’s sister Kate nor Sandy Cameron answered the phone, so Meg called her brother instead. The boys loved having Stu over to babysit. Probably because he let them watch things on TV that Ben and Meg never would have allowed. And he tended to haul them down to Ethan’s for ribs rather than cook anything himself. But the boys loved ribs as much as they loved Stu. Better yet, Stu would probably be here before the bus dropped them off, and he’d keep them so entertained that they wouldn’t think to ask questions about where their parents were or why.
“We should stop at Winn-Dixie,” Meg said as Ben pulled out onto Stewart Road. “I’ll get cold cuts and rolls and bread and stuff. Soda and tea and beer too. There’s bound to be a lot of people, and Mrs. Royko won’t be in any state to figure out what to feed everyone. Better if there’s stuff there that anyone can put out when they need to.”
Ben looked across the truck’s cab at her, his eyes still bleak. “Do women always think of these things? Or just you?”
“We all do,” Meg muttered absently. Her mind was still compiling a list of things she should get. “Stop at Ralph’s. I can grab some of those New York bagels everyone loves, too.”
WHEN THEY ARRIVED at the stately southern home that had been in the Royko family for three generations, Meg was proved right. Ben hadn’t considered the number of people likely to drop everything and be here within hours of the news.
Cars lined both sides of the long curving driveway and were parked in either direction along the side of the road. Considering the sheer number of grocery bags they had in the bed of the truck, Ben was glad there was still one space left in the driveway across the street. Another of Ben’s high school friends had grown up here, and he was sure the Quinns wouldn’t object to him using their driveway.
What am I going to say to Mr. and Mrs. Royko? Or Anne and Donald? What could anyone say?
Ben swallowed hard, blinked back another onslaught of tears, and climbed out of the truck. He gathered up most of the bags of groceries his wife had bought and let Meg grab the bagels and two jugs of sweet tea. He’d come back for the camping chest filled with ice, soda, and beer.
They crossed the street in silence. He glanced at Meg, trying to discover if she was as shocked and distressed as he was. Words didn’t begin to describe all the emotions churning in his gut. He just prayed that Meg would not freak out. Chuck had seen action in places too much like where Meg had been. Ben couldn’t begin to guess what kind of nightmares might be awakened for Meg.
Because of all the groceries, they left the front walk and detoured around the back to deliver them straight to the kitchen.
The door opened as if someone had been watching for them, and almost immediately, they were engulfed in Aunt Bea’s motherly embrace. She hugged them both, an arm about each of their necks. Her eyes were red, but she was all bustling business.
“Bring those things right here.” She stepped aside and indicated a folding table that had been set up inside the screened-in porch. Ben should have guessed Aunt Bea would be over here organizing things. The Quinns and the Roykos had been neighbors since they’d been newlywed couples, long before Chuck was born. Bea was Chuck’s godmother, too. No wonder her eyes were red-rimmed.
Beatrice Quinn ushered Ben and Meg through the kitchen and into the parlor where there was barely even standing room. Charles Royko stepped forward first and drew Ben into a hug. His eyes were as red as Aunt Bea’s, but at the moment, he was dry-eyed.
“I’m so sorry.” Ben managed to get the words out with difficulty. Charles passed him along to his wife Jeannie and turned to hug Meg.
“Mrs. R.” Ben pulled the diminutive, gray-haired woman into his embrace. This time his voice did fail him, so he just stood there rocking her for the longest time, wishing he was anywhere else.
Someone tapped him on the shoulder. With a murmur of regret, he turned away from Chuck’s mother and looked into the face of his mirror image. Will’s eyes were full of shock and disbelief. Without a word, the brothers embraced, hugging each other hard, patting each other on the back, unwilling to let go.
Unwilling until, with a wail of despair, Anne threw herself at the twins. Will stepped back, and Anne flung her arms about Ben’s neck and wept noisily into his shirt. “Why didn’t he—tell us—something was—wrong?” Anne pleaded between hiccoughs. Anne was a self-centered woman, but she and Chuck had been close. Ben understood her anguish. He shared it.
Chuck had told Ben things weren’t good. Yet somehow, Ben hadn’t read between the lines. Hadn’t heard the utter despair that must have led to this final, irrevocable act of a desperate man.
Ben let Anne weep without offering any answers to her question. Guilt ate at him. He should have known. Should have seen how bad things were.
LATER THAT EVENING, after tucking the boys into bed, Meg found Ben sitting on the porch with a half-drunk bottle of beer in his hand. The cardboard carrier sat beside his chair; only two bottles still had caps on them. Ben was not a drinker. Meg was alarmed.
Suddenly, the shoe was on the other foot. For the last month, she’d been the one prowling the house at night, trying to avoid sleep and outrun memories she didn’t dare face. And it had been Ben coming to find her and offer solace and understanding.
She didn’t know what else to say that she hadn’t already said at least three or four times since Ben had gotten that heartbreaking call earlier that afternoon.
Chuck had been Ben’s best friend since grade school. Ben, Will, and Chuck had called themselves the Three Musketeers and shared everything, from trouble to triumph. They’d been on the same teams in school and got into the same scrapes out of school. They’d hunted together, both birds and girls. They’d gone off to college together, too and been inseparable until graduation and adulthood arrived and different choices of career sent them in different directions. But they’d stayed close. Chuck had been an usher at their wedding.
Losing Chuck would have hit Ben hard anyway. Losing him in such a horrible way was shattering.
Not wanting to sit in the other chair, too far away to even reach for his hand, Meg sat down in Ben’s lap and wrapped one arm about his shoulders. She took the nearly empty beer from his hand and dropped it into the carton with the other empties. Then she snuggled in with her head on Ben’s shoulder and took his hand in her free one.
“I wish I was smart and knew all the right words to say.”
“Nothing much anyone can say,” Ben murmured.
Ben was done with tears, but the misery in his voice tore at her heart.
“I just wish he’d told me how bad things were. I mean, really how bad. Why didn’t he ask for help?”
“Maybe he didn’t know what to ask for.” Meg thought about her own aimless confusion over the last few weeks. Not that she’d ever considered taking her own life. Or even come close. Her gut had twisted with indecision, and at times it felt like she was coming out of her skin, but she had never been desperate enough to end her life.
But frustration and lack of purpose took their toll on anyone. Especially someone who had been so intensely involved as Chuck had been. Then there were the nightmares that no soldier ever fully escaped. A Special Forces guy for most of his career until injuries got him medically discharged, Chuck’s nightmares must have been a thousand times worse than hers. He’d seen so much more and been further into the depths of hell than she ever had.
How had Chuck managed to avoid the mandates for discharge that sent her to see Doctor Allan? Or maybe he had seen an Army shrink but had skated by not talking about the things that haunted his nights and stalked his days.
“Maybe he thought it made him less of a man if he admitted he was in trouble.” Meg tucked Ben’s arm about her waist and pressed her hand to his chest where she could feel his heart beating steadily beneath his clean white T-shirt.
“But he was kidding around about that plate in his head last time we talked. He told me he was talking to aliens and that the plate was really a receiver some Army intelligence people had invented. I thought he was joking.”
“He probably was. Joking, I mean. Not talking to aliens. It’s easier to joke about the really bad things than to admit they really get to you.”
“But he could have told me anything. I’d never think less of him. He should have known that.” Ben pleaded for understanding.
Meg suddenly remembered seeing Chuck swiping at his eyes when he and Ben had been talking while she cleaned up her workshop. “Why was he crying that day at the fair?”
“A buddy he served with got killed in a car wreck,” Ben answered after a pause. “He was upset because he didn’t find out until too late to go to the guy’s funeral. He felt like he let his fellow soldier down.”
“Yeah, well. He would.” Meg pulled away to look into Ben’s face. “If something like that happened to Keek, or Pudge or Meredith, or the Joker—and I failed to show up to honor their memory, I’d have been just as distressed. I’d have felt like I let them down.”
“But he didn’t hear about it in time. How is that his fault?”
“Depends. Could be the family kept it small and didn’t tell many people. But what if Chuck didn’t pick his phone up for three days? And what if someone had been trying to reach him? He’d blame himself for that.”
She sat up and put her hands on either side of Ben’s face. “You didn’t let Chuck down, Ben. He let himself down. He let his family down, too. He was in a lot of pain, but he didn’t reach out for help. You can’t help someone who doesn’t want to be helped.”
“What about you?”
“What about me?” Did Ben think she was suicidal?
“I keep asking you what’s wrong, but you won’t tell me anything.”
“That’s different.” She’d been on the verge of telling him when this all happened. But right now he didn’t need more pain and more problems. She’d let him get through Chuck’s funeral before she dumped her load of guilt and anxiety on him.
“How is it so diff—”
Meg stopped his words with her mouth. His lips felt stiff and unresponsive, but she deepened the kiss. He tasted of beer and smelled of shampoo and the mountain-fresh scent of his just-washed T-shirt. When he finally gave in and responded, his mouth was hungry and demanding. Meg melted into him, taking the harsh assault eagerly. They both needed to banish the unspeakable and find release.
“Take me to bed, Ben.”
“Mmmm,” he mumbled, his mouth never fully leaving hers. His hands were already under h
er pajama top, his calloused palms cool and rough as they closed around her breasts.
“Now,” she gasped, as excitement raced through her. They couldn’t make love on the front porch. Even if it was completely dark outside and there was rarely traffic at this time of night. “Ben?”
Ben stood in a rush, carrying her with him. She wrapped her legs around his waist as he strode through the door and shut it behind them with his heel.
The lovemaking was fast and furious. Without foreplay or words. When Ben finally flung himself onto his back, spent and breathing hard, there were tears running down his cheeks again.
Chapter 22
THE MORNING FOLLOWING Chuck’s death dawned clear and warm. A perfect day for all the Veterans Day festivities the people of Tide’s Way had planned in spite of the sudden, stricken sadness his act had visited on the small community. School was out, and most folk had the day off. The boys begged to go to the town parade.
The last place Ben wanted to be was at a parade honoring soldiers. Captain Charles Royko Jr. should have been marching with the rest of the veterans from the local VFW. He should have been saluting when the rifles were fired at the cemetery and applauding the various speakers. But he’d chosen not to be there in the most final way he could.
Ben went anyway.
He was more worried about Meg than he wanted to admit. Chuck’s suicide created a whole new and far sharper focus on Meg’s erratic behavior since she’d returned from Iraq. She wasn’t exactly moody, but she tended to pull into herself far more often than he remembered. Actually, he didn’t recall her ever being so self-contained and contemplative except for the first few days after her first overseas deployment. Although that one had been far briefer and not into a war zone.
Meg had declined to participate in the parade when first approached by the commander of the local VFW. Ben remembered the day the man had come to talk to her about it and her vague explanation of why she wouldn’t be going. It hadn’t mattered so much to him, so he hadn’t pressed her for more.
