by Kaylea Cross
Never too early to plan for a rainy day, his dad had always told him.
He opted for the Gone Country satellite channel, donned his sunglasses and departed for the check-in.
Coop rounded the corner to the Special Warfare base at Coronado, stopped at the guard shack and addressed the flunky on duty. A new one. Navy Regular. Clean cut. Cooper was thinking he might luck out and get on base without a wisecrack since the guy was new, but had no such luck.
“Well if it isn’t the stud of Coronado and his limp dick pleasure palace.”
Coop studied the new man’s nametag, Dorian Hamburg. He and his Team guys could have fun with that name. And the look on the man’s face told him he had a hair trigger. That was always fun. So the other regulars had told him about Coop’s motor home. No problem. If the guy wanted to spar, Coop would spar with him, and make him pay for it.
“Nice to see the ladies’ve told you about it. That’s why they won’t lick your sorry ass.” Coop watched his words punch Dorian in the face and make him redden. But the man was quick on his feet, unlike some of the other Navy regulars.
“I hear the health department wants to do a study of all the interesting cultures growing in that bat mobile, especially on the ceiling…”
“Nice try, asshole, or is it Dorian? If I were you, I’d go by the name asshole. Dorian sounds queer.”
“You ought to know…” Dorian squinted at Coop’s upside down nametag hanging at a slight angle. “Calvin.”
Sticks and stones don’t bust my balls…
“Well Dorian, you can call me Special Operator Cooper. But for your information, the only other Calvin I ever met was a real big black dude, and he definitely wasn’t gay.” Coop handed over his military ID.
“When are you gonna fix that rag on your head? Don’t they pay you boys enough for a hairpiece or some plugs?”
“Lost all my hair going down. If the girl likes it, she kinda tugs. Hurts sometimes, get my drift?”
“Um hum.” The sentry handed Coop back his card. “You be careful how you park, hear? And straighten that god-damned nametag.”
The rumble of the engine left a thick cloud of black smoke in its wake. Happened every time Coop plastered his foot against the floorboard.
Timmons’s office was all metal and no frills, except for the bright lime-green ceramic frog holding a surfboard that SEAL Team 3 bought him. It stood two and a half perilous feet tall, perched on top of a metal bookshelf. This was the replacement to the statue Timmons had destroyed on a rather ill-tempered day last year.
Timmons had bouts of anger, more frequently now, especially about procedural things. Coop knew the enlisted man was not longing for the forced retirement. It meant more time at home with a wife who publicly made fun of him. The Navy was his life, always had been. But that wasn’t going to stop them from retiring him anyway.
“Chief?” Coop called out as he stooped under the doorframe to avoid hitting his head.
“Sit down, son,” Timmons said, pointing to one of two metal folding chairs in front of his paper-strewn desk.
The cold chair matched the eerie chill that tingled up his spine every time his Chief Officer used the term son. He licked his lips and waited while Timmons looked like he was gathering strength. Whatever it was, it wasn’t anything good.
“I’m afraid I’ve got some bad news. We’ve just been contacted by the authorities in Nebraska.” He looked up at Coop with his watery light blue eyes. Coop held his breath.
“I’m not sure if you’ve heard it in the news, but there’s been a tornado in Pender and parts nearby, and I’m sorry to say that your family and the farm are gone, son.”
Cooper had been trained to deal with the death of a Team guy. He’d held them sometimes as the life force exited their bodies, rocking them slowly or telling them little jokes to ease their way home. But his real home, his roots in Nebraska, those always remained.
Gone? All of them? Gone? He never figured this could ever happen. I’m completely alone?
His body tensed as he came to terms with the reality of what was just spoken. One by one, every nerve ending began to shout, until the rage inside, the scream Hell, no! consumed all his energy. He dug his fingernails into his thighs and, without realizing it, had drawn blood through the green canvas of his cargo pants.
Timmons got up, which prompted Coop to stand as well, although he was weaving. If Timmons hugged him, he’d deck the guy and end his career for sure. But Timmons stood a healthy two feet away, which was close enough to smell the angst of the older man who nervously flexed and unflexed his fingers at his side. “I’m so sorry, son.”
There’s that goddamned word again. Coop took a deep breath and then felt the tears flood his eyes. I’m no one’s son any longer. Mercifully, he couldn’t see his Chief’s expression. Coop’s fists tightened, he stepped to the side and belted the frog statue, which crashed up against the side of the wall and shattered. Although his Team had recently replaced it for well over two hundred dollars, the green, glassy fragments exploded and fell in a satisfying tinkle all over the floor, the windowsill and Timmons’s desk.
Timmons looked over the mess in silence, nodding his head. He apparently thought the frog had suffered a good, honorable death, after all. Team 3 would have it replaced as soon as the donations came in. Next time maybe he should find a way to bolt it to the wall. But that could be dangerous.
For the wall.
Chapter Two
It was a dusty day as the silver plane nosed down through billowy clouds on its way to kiss the ruined earth. A united gasp went up from passengers as they saw the raw, brown, smoking soil that would normally be covered in patchwork patterns of an industrious agricultural people. But what was missing was the green. Coop clenched his jaw, grinding ice, and rocked to the loud metallic music of selection number seven on the in-flight radio. He held his breath.
Looks like a flooded and bombed-out valley in Afghanistan.
He wasn’t used to seeing Nebraska look like a wasteland. Wastelands got you killed or killed your friends. They never healed. Nobody loved them.
He stared down at the remains, and, as incredible as it was, he still loved this place.
He’d never felt alone before. Completely alone. He’d missed so much, being away on deployments, but he had always had home to come back to. Even as he clowned around on Coronado Island, home was always here, in Nebraska. It had always been a constant. He just couldn’t deal with it being gone for good.
All of them. How could this have happened?
The stewardess walked up the aisle quickly, scanning the packed plane for seatbelt violators. Her expression was grim, and Coop would have enjoyed a little flirtation on any other day.
But the miracle of good times seemed a distant memory. Even the babies on the plane were quiet, as if suspecting their cries would be inappropriate. People with window seats looked straight ahead, not outside at the devastation. There were those in the middle and aisle seats who wanted to see, and took turns jockeying for the right position, without offending. Coop could hear sniffles and someone softly sobbing. A toddler asker her mother what THAT was. THAT was a huge gash in the earth that had taken his whole family and many others.
A few minutes later came a message. “Ladies and gentlemen, we have begun our final approach to Omaha International Airport. Please remain in your seats with your seat belts fastened. We anticipate a bumpy landing, due to the storm.” The sweet lilting voice was not reassuring. Coop could feel the pull of thoughts sending them deeper, faster. As if everyone on the plane wanted to end their lives together.
The landing was hard, shaking everyone, but the passengers accepted it. An overhead bin burst open from the impact, dumping its contents on the balding, elderly man seated below. Underwear and T-shirts cascaded, followed by someone’s hand-knit afghan and a cap. Several passengers helped unbury the gentleman, who managed to laugh and shake his head, unharmed but embarrassed.
The plane turned sharply and then
revved up engines to taxi down another lane. A large Red Cross vehicle and several military transports idled nearby, swarming with an anthill of people loading packages and white plastic cargo containers marked with the familiar red emblem. Coop knew what a cargo staging area looked like. Helped that it was in the good old U.S. of A. and not some sand cave where you waited with a dying man and prayed to God the chopper would come in time.
But never in Nebraska. The land where it was green and cool. Where churches were kept clean and kids still walked home from elementary school by themselves.
Not that his mom didn’t worry. All during Cooper’s boyhood, Mrs. Cooper would be at the back kitchen door holding back his dog, Bay. When Coop came home from school and started down the little rise that was the only “mountain” in the county, a whole one hundred feet tall, she would let Bay run out to meet him. That dog tried to break his timed runs every day. And every school day Coop would brace himself as the brown mutt leapt into the air to nearly tackle him in a belly-to-belly thing that could only be called a hug. He felt the arms and hands that dog never had, just in the way he crashed into him. Even the last time he was home and Bay was going on twelve. He still looked out the kitchen door, waiting for the little boy who was now a man and came less often.
Bay’s gone too. They’re all together now.
It looked like rain outside until Coop realized his eyes were filled with tears.
The plane had been emptied.
He grabbed his duffel, put on his canvas jacket with the SEAL Team 3 logo in black stitched onto the breast pocket.
The captain was just exiting the cockpit.
“Mornin’, son.”
That word again. Everyone’s calling me son.
Coop nodded in the captain’s direction and briskly walked by before he could be snagged in an unwanted conversation.
Music in the terminal was ridiculously loud and cheerful. Couldn’t they turn the goddamned thing down? Have a little respect for the dead?
Coop hunched his shoulders and sighed. He knew life went on. He just didn’t like to be reminded of it.
* * *
The funerals couldn’t be held in the church he was baptized in, because it was missing, as well as any evidence a family of Coopers ever existed on the face of the Nebraska earth. His grandpa would roll over in his grave, if they ever found his body, at being attended at a Unitarian church. The family had been Baptist since their folk came from Denmark to freely practice their religion, and try their hand at farming. They were three generations of Danish-American farmers who had lived in Nebraska for nearly a century. But now, it was like they had never existed.
Loraie Swensen was the church secretary in charge of making the arrangements. Coop listened to the order of service and approved everything except the last hymn.
“Well, we always play Will The Circle Be Unbroken at our funerals,” she said.
“Look, Mrs. Swensen. You can play anything you like when your family passes. Mine is going to be sent home with Rock of Ages, and that’s that.”
He didn’t look back at her because he knew she sported an un-Christian-like expression he didn’t need to see. Not in his home county, in the land of milk and honey.
* * *
Pastor Jepsen droned on and on over the collection of five adult-sized coffins, and one casket half the size of the others. Coop counted them several times during the service to keep from falling asleep. There was Mama, Dad, Grandpa Iverson, who was Mom’s dad, Coop’s sister Gayle, her husband Butch, and their little daughter Camilla, aged three. The last time he’d seen her she was sporting butterfly wings—part of her Halloween costume.
All of the boxes were empty, as far as he knew. Of course he never asked. Sheriff Lanning had been efficient, ogling Coop’s tattoos and itching to hear war stories Coop wasn’t going to give him. But he said, matter-of-factly, it was a blessing nothing could be found. Saved Coop from the identification process.
When Coop speared him with his blue eyes, Sheriff Lanning shrugged. “God, Coop. I don’t know what to say here.”
Try saying they’re coming back.
But of course, the gentleman was a fine lawman, even if he wasn’t a believer. And these past few days were probably totally shitty. And going to get shittier.
* * *
At the gravesite, Cora Newsome, sitting in the middle of the crowd, laid a plant on him with her big blue eyes he could feel, just like in high school. She would always be a looker. Married right after graduation to the guy who knocked her up and then the man did the only decent thing he’d done in his life—left her for someone else. Cora still had her figure. The lively white-blond five-year-old daughter in black Mary Janes and deep velvet blue dress looked like a handful, all right. The little one reminded him of his niece he was burying today. He tried to avert his eyes each time Cora leaned over to hush her daughter to silence.
Cooper got a good view down Cora’s ample chest—something he used to dream about at night all during high school. He’d lay in bed thinking about what those pillows of flesh felt like in his callused hands as he listened to the crickets outside. She caught him looking, and smiled. During the freaking funeral!
You’re one sorry son of a gun.
He tried to stem the tide of erotic pictures staring Cora and how she could perform unspeakable acts of passion. She could love all his anger right off, as easy as washing a car. She used to stand in front of him with those tits she’d unload into his hands after football games, and he’d practically come before he could get properly naked. But that was then. This is now—and-what-the-hell-am-I-doing?
Now he was at the funeral for his dead family. And then he was going to get the hell out of this town and go dodge enemy fire. Or jump HALO at midnight.
For fun.
After the service, he accepted Cora’s kind invitation to have a little dinner, along with the unspoken promise of a tasty dessert of the flesh. The little one said her goodnights in a pair of pink-footed pajamas—even planted a kiss on his cheek. Cora beamed and told him with bedroom eyes she’d be right back.
What the hell am I doing here? He didn’t come here to get laid, but he needed it anyway. Cora was a sure thing, but not an easy out. It wasn’t about cheating on Daisy. The real problem was it might get complicated when he tried to leave. Though his body wanted some soft flesh to help him forget, his mind told him to wait.
Cora came back from putting her daughter to bed. “You want another beer, Cooper?” she said in a husky voice.
“No. I’ve had enough. This was real nice, Cora. I appreciate it.”
She swung around, surprised, as he stood up. “You don’t have to go just yet.” She walked toward him, then leaned her large chest against his and rubbed him from side to side. “I thought we were going to get caught up.” She put her arms up around his neck and stood on tiptoes. Just the way she used to do.
“Much as I’d love to, honey, I just can’t.” He extricated her arms but then bent down and kissed her on the lips.
It was clearly a mistake.
She melted into him. And damn, it had been years since he’d met someone who could kiss as good as Cora, so he talked himself into a few minutes of fooling around until his hand found her panties under her skirt and she had encircled his cock with her left hand. Everything moved at lightning speed and within seconds he found himself pressing against her body with most of his clothes still on. She’d tried to unzip him, her hands in his pants, making him ache for her. But he just couldn’t, for some reason.
His last vision of her was as she lay across her overstuffed living room couch, unfulfilled lust in her eyes, the Disney movie her daughter had been watching earlier playing in the background.
He said his good byes, retreating to a cheap motel just off the freeway. Tomorrow he’d fly out of here, and who knew when he’d return, if ever. He decided he’d try to get one last look at the area the farm had been on his way to the airport.
Next morning he wondered why he didn
’t feel anything as he drove down the two-lane highway towards Pender. Maybe he was dead. Maybe he had a date with death. Maybe a stray bullet would get him. Or a rocket-propelled grenade. He just hoped it would be quick, now that there was little to live for. Only bad thing was the verbal thrashing he’d get from his dad when he got to Heaven.
Tell mom I’m coming home soon, dad. Don’t let Bay get fat.
When he got to where the homestead had been, he got out and trudged unseeing over the muddy ground, barely noticing the thick black ooze of that fertile soil he’d plowed for more than a dozen years, ever since he could reach the shift levers on the big tractor. He could almost smell the fresh cinnamon buns his mother made in the mornings. And the fresh coffee. They’d be out there from sunup, and when they came in for breakfast, it was the best meal of the day for him.
Several summers ago his dad had built a summer kitchen for his mom for her canning. She had put away so many fruits and vegetables in their cool barn, she could have fed half the state with her award-winning preserves and canned fruits. His dad never could afford big combines, since they paid cash for everything. The family didn’t trust those big machines with state-of-the-art computers and satellite link to digitally add soil conditioner and seed. Mr. Cooper strictly relied on mother nature, good luck and the good Lord, in that order, to provide what they needed. Their farm equipment cost less than a tenth of what other farmers used. Coop knew how to fix everything. And the family hadn’t been in debt, since his dad didn’t believe in credit. He shook his head.
If you can’t pay cash, you don’t deserve to own it, his dad had always said.
But this, this was something they had never planned for, talked about. This was something he’d seen overseas in those hellholes. Not here. Not to him. Not to his family.
