When the medics take Michael away, Darren fights tears and watches, feeling like he has nothing left to give or offer.
A whisper of a reminder comes in his heart, where King David’s words in Psalm 27 give him the answer. A clear, simple, and straightforward answer.
“Wait for the LORD; / be strong and take heart / and wait for the LORD.”
7
Darren’s hands shook as he finally opened up the letter and read it. They had been in the plane for over an hour. The elation of heading home had been overshadowed by the tragedy with Lance and Michael. He was finally bringing himself to read the note the specialist had written to him.
Dear Chaplain Turner:
When I think of myself raising Alexis and Elijah, I think of you. I picture a man with strength and wisdom, but also one who carries around two very important things in this world. Humility and humor.
I hope my children will have the privilege to find a father like you.
I want to thank you. You never preached at me, but you did preach for me. I guess God’s got a way of using everything, right, including mules. For me, it was beef jerky. Seems fitting enough.
Thank you for not only giving me that Bible but also explaining things from it. And thank you for sharing Psalm 39:7 with me:
“And so, Lord, where do I put my hope? / My only hope is in you.”
That’s the only hope I carry now too.
Lance
8
Halfway across the Atlantic Ocean, Darren decided to write one more entry in his personal journal.
He wished he could openly share these thoughts online, but he couldn’t.
He was the one who answered questions, not the one posing them.
He was the one who shared his faith, not the one searching for it.
He was the chaplain who offered up prayers, not the soldier making the requests . . .
This pen marks down my heart. I’m not sure I’m still writing inside this. Not anymore. Perhaps all these words inside this journal will eventually be laid to rest somewhere, perhaps buried at sea. I began writing them for Heather and the kids to read one day, but I don’t think I want them to. Ever.
Nobody needs to hear about so much pain.
I’m flying back home a wounded man. I didn’t lose a limb and didn’t lose my life. I have no scars anybody can see. But I carry bags and bags of hurt and sorrow.
I don’t know where I’m going to be able to store them.
My prayers have been difficult lately. I’ve asked God time and time again the following questions: Why take a man professing his belief? And why maim one confessing his confusion? Is this an example of Your righteousness, Lord? Or is this just an example of the bitter and hard realities of this war?
I ache because I grieve and can’t show it.
These wounds—I can’t let Heather and the children see them. Perhaps one day Heather can, but I know I have to come back and be strong for so many.
I still have a job to do, and I’m bracing for that.
For me, arriving back home won’t mean I can simply unplug and tune out. The grief I’m holding is held in some way and measured by every soldier on this plane.
They’re going to need someone to go to, someone with some answers, someone with hope.
But what if that hope already came home on a plane? What if it’s trapped in a coffin and buried underneath eight feet of dirt?
Where will I be able to go? Who’s going to give me answers?
Will I be able to find hope once more?
PART 3
REINTEGRATION
JULY 2008
1
Amidst the family members waiting with excitement and surrounded by balloons, welcome home signs, and American flags, a woman waited for the man she loved. She shook with nerves, wondering how he’d act and what he’d say and what she should say back. There were so many things Heather wanted to tell Darren, so many things she wanted to show him, so many things she couldn’t wait to do with him. Yet she knew this was going to take some time. Not just for her, but for all of them.
As they waited behind barricades at Hunter Army Airfield, Heather held Meribeth’s hand. In her other hand, the toddler waved a yellow ribbon. Sam and Elie stood next to them waving flags.
“Now remember, kids. Daddy’s going to be really tired when he gets in.”
“He can’t be,” Elie said. “We’re going to play tea party and save the princess. And he has to watch all my dances before—”
“No way. We’re gonna play Fort Bumblefoot and sword fight so I can show him my karate moves,” Sam yelled.
“There will be time for all of that,” Heather told them. “It just can’t all happen this afternoon.”
As the first sign of soldiers walking down the stairway, a burst of cheers swelled over the airfield. A few at the front of the group jogged down and ran toward their families as reunions began to unfold like flowers blossoming in a field. All around them came the glorious sounds of laughter and surprise and shrieks of joy. The photo op beloved by television news shows.
Heather’s eyes quickly scanned all the returning soldiers, looking and looking until she found him. Darren walked toward them, looking taller and stronger than ever. As he spotted them he began to jog their way. Sam and Elie scaled the barricade, jumping and then running to meet him. Heather called out to them but she couldn’t stop them from running into their daddy’s open arms.
The cries let out by the children were a combination of inhaling this sudden joy while exhaling the sadness they’d been carrying for months.
“When did you guys get so big?” Darren said as he lifted Sam and Elie, leaving his bags on the ground.
“Babe. You’re here,” Heather said with a steady smile as he embraced her and Meribeth.
“We’re all here,” Darren said as the five of them clung together as firmly as a set of folding hands.
When they finally all let go, Darren lifted Meribeth in his arms. “Meribeth! Look at you!” he said with astonishment.
Meribeth looked uncertain and overwhelmed by everything, and quickly began to cry.
Heather stroked her arm. “It’s okay, sweetie. It’s Daddy.”
The little girl leaned over toward her mother, so Darren handed her back with a nod of understanding.
For a brief moment, Heather saw something on his face. Something more than simple exhaustion. The expression looked different than any she’d ever seen on Darren. Perhaps it was just because she hadn’t seen him for so long.
It’s all going to take time. Even the simple things like that.
2
The streets they drove on and the stores they passed all felt surreal to Darren. He figured he’d maybe gotten four good hours of sleep in the last four days, so finally getting a good night’s rest would help clear his head. As Heather drove and Sam and Elie talked over each other trying to tell him stories, he couldn’t help but think of all the things he would need to do in the next ten days.
“Just wait till you see my karate belt!” Sam told him.
The ten days of reintegration training included many things for the returning soldiers, such as having a health checkup, seeing a dentist, dealing with any legal or pay issues, adding new babies to insurance, processing a divorce, registering cars, restoring service to cell phones. And after those ten days, they would all get an entire month off.
Thank you, Uncle Sam.
Darren knew every single soldier deserved it. He couldn’t wait to spend time with Heather and the kids, go to the beach, visit family, and just enjoy being with each other.
It would be nice to just be Darren again and not Chaplain Turner.
As their Pathfinder SUV turned down their road and neared their house, Sam couldn’t contain his excitement.
“There’s your ribbon, Dad!”
Sure enough, a yellow ribbon was tied around their front tree.
“Yellow means welcome home,” Elie said.
“Wow,” Darren said. “Loo
k at that.”
As they pulled into the driveway, the kids bolted out of the vehicle as they’d done a thousand times before. Darren sat as Heather shut off the engine. He stared out at the house he’d left fifteen months ago.
“Does it look the same?” Heather half joked.
“Yeah,” Darren said.
But deep down, it didn’t look the same. Nothing looked the same.
He wondered if it ever would again.
3
Normally it was Darren working his magic cooking steaks and burgers, but tonight Heather was the one manning the grill. That was the one thing he had asked for when he got home: a nice, thick rib eye. Thankfully she’d had fifteen months to burn and char enough meat on the grill to finally get the hang of the gas burner.
After Heather checked on the slow-cooking steaks and the hot dogs she had just put on for the kids, she went back inside to continue preparing for dinner. It felt like a Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner, not because of the menu but because of the momentous occasion. Daddy’s first dinner back home was something she had been thinking about for a long time. That and many other firsts as well. She saw Elie setting the table in the dining room while Sam was going through his collection of plastic swords, picking the ones he and Daddy would play with later.
At least one out of two of them is helping.
The baked potatoes were ready and the toppings were already on the table: butter, sour cream, bacon bits, and lots of shredded cheddar cheese. Sometimes she could make a meal simply out of these. She had gone a little overboard with the vegetables, making her garlic-roasted broccoli that she knew Darren liked, but also doing a new recipe she’d recently discovered for a brussels sprouts hash that included walnuts and crispy sage inside.
Once the steaks were finished, she put them on a plate and brought them inside. She wasn’t sure where Darren had disappeared to, so she called out to him that dinner was ready. After getting Sam and Elie to bring the drinks to the table, with everything else ready to go and Darren nowhere to be found, Heather walked into the family room and saw him standing still in front of their picture window.
Staring lifelessly at the Lewis home across the street.
“Hey—did you hear me? Dinner’s ready.”
Darren didn’t even turn. She walked up beside him, looking out the window and then back at her husband.
“Tonya and the girls left to join Michael at Walter Reed yesterday.”
She reached over to touch his shoulder, wanting him to know that in some small way, she understood. But as her hand touched Darren, he flinched and jerked his body away from her.
“Whoa, gosh—sorry, babe. I called several times, but didn’t mean to—”
Heather stopped as Darren shook his head without looking at her, as if to say Don’t worry about it. Yet it felt dismissive, especially since he was still looking outside and ignoring her standing there.
Tightening her lips and breathing in, she went back to the kitchen. Dinner could wait.
4
Any moment now in the dark, he expected to hear the crack of gunfire or the roar of a mortar blast. His body ached with exhaustion, his mind fuzzy from the fatigue and his heart simply feeling heavy. Lying on his side against the plush couch in the living room, his eyes wandered around the room, watching the slight glow of the streetlight slipping through the blinds and spotting the red dot of his cell phone charger.
Everything inside swore at him, telling him he needed rest. Yet he fought it off, knowing what it would bring.
This is temporary . . . it’s just tonight . . . I can control this.
Buried underneath this dam of emotions, Darren knew it was all simply due to the lack of sleep and to the stored-up pressure he’d been carrying. Tonight, it felt like the dam had sprung leaks and was starting to drown him.
This time Heather didn’t surprise him as she walked into the room. He heard her steps clearly. Too clearly, in fact.
The nights had trained his ears to listen carefully, even as he slept.
“Babe . . . ?” Heather whispered in the shadows. “Did I take up too much of the bed?” Her voice felt as light as a colorful leaf gliding down off its branch high above him.
“No,” he finally told her.
She waited for a moment by the wall next to the couch. “Okay . . . well . . . want to come back in?”
The smothering sensation inside of him pressed down. Darren gritted his teeth and blinked and remained silent.
“Anything I can do for you then?” Heather asked.
So patient, so soft, and so calm . . . She sounded like a dream, the sort of lovely dream he hadn’t imagined in such a long time.
“Just let me stay awake,” he admitted to her.
She couldn’t see his tears, yet maybe she could hear them laced inside his words. It didn’t matter.
She walked over toward him, then sat on the floor, leaning against the couch. She didn’t say a word. All she did was put her hand on his arm, perhaps to simply let him know she was there in the dark, and she wasn’t going to let him go.
5
The rustling of the wind outside. Then a crackling in the background. Troops on the move and gunfire following them. Darren stirs in his deep sleep, his mind thousands of miles away. A voice, high-pitched and sweet, hovers over him, then another loud, brash voice calls out.
For a moment he thinks of the dead girl in his arms and the weeping father watching him carry her. He remembers the medics standing over the soldier, gently covering his face with a sheet. Darren can feel the fabric resting against his face, shifting over his entire body.
His arm jerks up; he tears the blanket off and leaps up onto his feet. His eyes flicker, seeing the blistering Middle East sun spilling out across his feet. Then he realizes the ground is too comfortable, he’s standing on the carpet in their living room. Heather sits beside him on the floor, leaning against the couch he slept on.
“Hey, you destroyed my roof,” a wide-awake Sam shouts.
Elie joins Sam in pulling cushions and blankets around them. Darren can feel the surge going through his body, the adrenaline waking it up even as his mind is still half-asleep. All the movement and laughter and excitement surrounding him are too much to take in right away this morning.
“And now that you’ve been there, you can show us how to really play war!” Elie commands as she stands on the couch.
“Please. Stop. It’s not a game.”
Sam is piling cushions next to him, calling it Fort Bumblefoot, while Elie laughingly orders him to start doing jumping jacks and to stand in line.
“I said it’s not a game! Now drop it!”
Both of the kids stop moving, not only shocked but scared. Darren didn’t just yell, he roared at them as if they were all trying to talk amidst gunfire. Heather stands up, a startled look filling her tired face.
“Daddy?” Elie whimpers, her eyes filling.
He can barely breathe, with a head feeling foggy and a heart racing for whatever reason. Their hurt, confused expressions only further frustrate him. He doesn’t know what to say. He can’t figure out how to simply sit down and relax for a moment. There’s a rage that woke up directly beside him.
Heather’s look . . . She doesn’t have to say anything else. It matches the panic inside of him. A suffocating feeling even though he can breathe. A falling sensation even though he’s standing still.
“I’ve just got to . . . go out for a while,” he says to all of them and no one in particular.
Heather guides Sam and Elie away toward their bedrooms. “Come on, kids. Go get dressed for breakfast. I’ll make pancakes.”
Their little steps running down the hallway only make Darren’s head hurt more. That sound, the echoes, the laughter . . .
It’s too much.
He slips on his tennis shoes and heads to the front door. Heather follows him, waiting for him to say something, wanting some kind of explanation.
“Hey, I’m home. Okay? Just—just give me more
than a few days to figure it out.”
“No one’s pushing you, Darren. It’s just—while we’re waiting, our babies missed you a lot. And need to know their daddy still loves them.”
Missed you. Need to know. Still loves.
You know nothing about missing and needing and loving and living and dying.
“I’m not going anywhere, okay? And if anyone’s wondering, I love my family.”
He whips the door open and rushes outside. So he can breathe and not think. So he can douse the furious flames inside of him, the ones set on fire for no reason.
AUGUST 2008
1
“It’s so good to hear your voice,” Heather said into her cell phone. “I’m sitting on our front steps, looking at your house right now.”
Tonya gave a reflective chuckle. “I wish all of us were there right now. It’s going to feel weird when the four of us are all back home.”
When her phone rang this afternoon, Heather was delighted to see it was Tonya calling. They hadn’t spoken in at least a week, so she wanted to hear how things with Michael and the girls were going.
“What’s it like having Darren home?” Tonya asked her.
All Heather wanted to do was share everything with her friend. They had grown close over the past fifteen months, and both of them had spent many hours talking about their husbands. Tonya would have been as surprised as Heather if she heard about Darren’s state of mind since he’d come back.
The last thing this woman needs is more bad news. Or anything negative.
“It’s been a long three weeks,” Heather said. “But another time, okay? How are you doing?”
“I think maybe I’m still in shock. Not just after coming here and seeing Michael. But . . .” Tonya’s voice began to quiver, and Heather could hear the emotion in her voice.
“What’s wrong?”
“It’s something . . . something that happened earlier today,” Tonya said, clearing her throat. “When Michael was awake.”
As she waited for Tonya to continue, Heather glanced over at their house, remembering the first day they saw their neighbors. Recalling how Michael banged on the door and yelled, then took off down the road in anger. She couldn’t imagine what he might be feeling right now.
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