Happy New Year, Baby

by Laura Marie Altom

  “From your lips to God’s ears.”

  She sighed. “So? Out with it? What did Brody do?”

  Wincing, Trace said, “It’s not so much what he did, but what he didn’t do—namely, make a single payment on his business loan for the past year. I’m sorry, Lilianna, but we have to start foreclosure proceedings.”

  Lilianna groaned. “I can’t. Let me make a few payments—put it off.”

  “You’re a single mom. You need your money. Besides, what makes you think that even if you paid his account in full that he’d come back? Are you prepared to quit your secure job here, cram Donny into a backpack and launch a new career in adventure tourism?”

  “What?” The idea was so ludicrous, all she could do was stare.

  “I’m joking—sort of. Bottom line, Brody needs to be told. The bank has an investigator and I had him track your brother-in-law to Hallowell, where he’s been bartending. If he shows the slightest inclination of wanting to come back and set things right, I promise we’ll work with him. The only question now is, do you want to tell him? Or should I?”

  “Let me. The news shouldn’t be a surprise, but it should at least come from family. I’ll ask Kitty to watch Donny, then see if Colby will fly me over in the morning.”

  “That’s a sound plan. I’ll make arrangements with Colby. How about you take this little guy and head home for the rest of the afternoon. It’s almost dark. Spend the rest of your day letting this soak in.”

  “Thank you. Seeing Brody again...” Won’t be easy.

  Chapter Six

  BRODY CHECKED OFF the last of that afternoon’s beer delivery. All present and accounted for. He nodded to the distribution rep.

  With a backhanded wave, the guy climbed back in his rig. The same one he spent most every day in while dropping beer at every place with a liquor license along the Parks Highway. Brody would hate the job—dealing with so many people.

  After punishing his body and soul with a winter spent crabbing and spring fishing, Brody had headed for Denali—losing himself for weeks at a time until needing to stock up on coffee and booze. Along with autumn came frigid temperatures and the realization that at some point he needed to rejoin society until spring thaw. He could accept that—as long as it wasn’t the Kodiak Gorge society, who no doubt still held him accountable for Brandon’s fall.

  On a Monday afternoon in mid-October, he’d hiked from the park to the Highway, hitched a ride to the nearest town that just happened to be Hallowell, and he’d been here ever since—tending bar. Renting the efficiency apartment upstairs that aside from a downgrade in fancy finishes wasn’t all that different from his garage apartment back home.

  He’d never planned on staying, but it was as good a hideout as he’d find this time of year. Summer tourists were long gone and with less than a couple hundred folks remaining in the small town, Brody lived mostly in solitude. Plus, he was partially paid from the tap. A good thing seeing how it took an awful lot of beer to keep the nightmare of watching his brother’s fall at bay. As for the rest of it—the darkness lingering from years spent in Iraq and Afghanistan? He added a half-dozen whiskey shooters to his nightly tab.

  He wheeled the dolly loaded with bottled beers into the cooler, then doubled back to take the cement block from the back door, locking it behind him.

  Once the beer was stowed, there was plenty more mindless work before the lunch crowd rolled in. He made it a point to keep moving. When he stopped was when the demons snuck in.

  Brody filled a bucket, grabbed the mop, then flipped on the overhead floodlights to better see the ugly vinyl floor.

  “Hey, now!” Darrow winced. He was a regular who had his own key and preferred the back-corner booth. He settled his own tab with the owner and Brody didn’t ask questions.

  “Sorry. I’ll turn it off soon as I’m done.”

  The wiry old dude with a craggy face and salt and pepper hair down to his waist nodded before returning his attention to YouTube on his iPad. “And what’s up with the decorations? Looks like Santa exploded.” True. A half-dozen blinking strands of colored lights hung from the ceiling and around the bar. Giant cardboard cutouts of Santa, elves, candy and toys had been taped to the walls. Two decorated firs had given their lives for the occasion—one fishing themed. The other in glittered beer bottle labels the owner’s wife had made into ornaments. A star created from green Heineken cartons crowned her crafted glory. Brody hated it all. He must have accidentally hit the decoration switch while turning on the other lights.

  “Patty put ’em up yesterday. I told her patrons are here to escape the holidays—not get attacked by them.”

  Darrow snorted.

  Brody finished mopping, wiped down the tables and bar, cleaned the bathrooms, then remembered to kill the overhead lights for his lone customer. He’d just stocked the bar’s beer fridge when the bell over the door jingled. “Not open till eleven!”

  The sun’s glare impeded his view of the figure standing in the open door.

  While he readied the cash drawer, the door creaked closed. In case of problem bears or patrons, Brody kept a rifle under the bar, but hopefully this customer would leave without a fuss.

  “The man said we’re not open!” Darrow called from his booth.

  Brody glanced up from his count, only to feel as if he’d been sucker-punched in his gut. No. This wasn’t happening. She was a ghost. A mirage.

  But then Lilianna stepped forward.

  He instinctively backed up.

  “Brody…”

  Steeling himself for the inevitable lecture to come, he shook his head. “Leave.”

  She strolled closer and closer until bellying up to the bar. She’d worn her long blond hair down and wind-tousled. Her red coat and matching gloves, scarf and boots made her look like a glossy fashion magazine’s version of an Alaskan winter. The reality was a whole different story. If she wasn’t careful, her ridiculously inadequate gear would kill her.

  “Colby flew me over,” she said. “He’s waiting at the airstrip to fly us both home.”

  He shook his head.

  “You owe me that much.”

  Turning his back to her, he diverted the punishing river of guilt and blame surging through his head in favor of focusing on unloading glasses from the dishwasher, setting them on the wooden shelves behind the bar.

  Keep moving.

  Keep busy.

  Demons can’t hurt if they can’t get in.

  “Against my better judgement and the advice of my boss,” she said, “I bailed you and your business out of foreclosure. How could you just not make a loan payment for an entire year? Did you think there wouldn’t be consequences? You worked so hard to get your business up and running. To make it into such a success that you had a waiting list for expeditions. Come home, Brody. A year is more than enough time to get your head on straight.” She bowed her head. Faintly, sadly laughed. “I should know. Besides, your poor mom is a wreck. It’s almost Christmas and the anniversary of—”

  Crouching, he didn’t know any way to shut out the screaming pain of her voice other than holding his hands over his ears.

  “Brody?” She’d somehow joined him behind the bar, holding him in an awkward sideways hug. He’d been alone in his head for so long that he no longer knew how to be with her. Sure, he saw people every day, but they didn’t matter. She did. “Honey, what’s wrong?”

  Rising enough to escape her touch, he shook his head.

  “Is there somewhere we can go to talk?”

  “Leave.”

  “No. Where are you staying? Let’s go there.”

  “I have to…work.”

  “Yes, you do. At the business you built from the ground up and loved. I’m sure your five employees miss their jobs. The bank misses your regular loan payments. Your base of operations misses regular maintenance. Last time Colby checked your place, you had a rabbit family residing in your reception-area sofa.”

  Having regained his composure after the initial shock
of seeing Lilianna, of realizing how much he’d missed her—everything from her porcelain complexion to her grassy-green eyes to her achingly familiar floral scent—Brody eyed the digital clock mounted to the neon Corona sign. Ten-thirty. Plenty of time before opening to get her gone.

  “Darrow,” he called, “I-I need to run upstairs.”

  The older man saluted.

  Brody gestured for Lilianna to follow.

  He led her through the dingy back room and up the too-narrow stairs. The stairwell was dark and gloomy and probably hadn’t seen a fresh coat of paint in twenty years. He opened the door on his apartment that wasn’t much better. Seeing it now, through her eyes, made him instantly reassess the past months’ decisions. The place reeked of the former tenant’s curry and onions. The brown shag carpet was matted. Gray walls were scuffed. Gray tile floor chipped and broken. His queen-sized mattress sat on the floor. No sheets. He used his sleeping bag for bedding. His laundry pile had stacked up in the far corner by the window curtains he perpetually kept drawn. The kitchenette wasn’t too bad, but only because he ate his few meals downstairs or at the diner across the street.

  But then there were the kegs—dozens were stacked to the ceiling against most walls. In some areas, the rows were two-to-three deep. Mingling with the curry and onions was the stench of skunky beer.

  “Brody…” She stood at the threshold, taking it in. “What happened to you?”

  “Life.” He pulled out a chair for her at the narrow table built for two.

  “Come home. Your mom needs you. I need you. Your friends miss you. No one understands why you’ve been gone.”

  “You think I do?” He shook his head, raking his fingers through his too-long hair. “After that night—when you and I talked…” He slowly exhaled before words—so many words—that had been trapped inside him spilled free. “The weight of Brandon actually being gone was…too much. You without a husband. Your baby without his dad. Mom without her son. I’ve seen so much death—too much death. Old men gunned down in the middle of streets. Women and children picked off for target practice. Cocky teenagers literally exploding beneath suicide bomb vests. SEAL team brothers who lost limbs and eyes and bled out… Their life force spilling into my hands. Staining my hands… Their blood… It won’t come off.”

  The horror of it threatened to swallow him whole, so like his VA shrink long ago counseled, he paused for breath. To remind himself all of that was in the past.

  In another world.

  Another lifetime. Keep busy. The trick of survival was keeping busy. But how could he do that with her here?

  How could he explain? He had to find the right words to make her understand, so she’d once again leave him alone. “I-I thought my past was behind me, but then Brandon’s death brought it all rushing back. I couldn’t deal. So, I didn’t.” He looked up to find silent tears flowing down her cheeks.

  “You stupid, silly, prideful man.” She swiped the tears with the backs of her gloves, but more followed. “Don’t you have any idea how many people love you? How any one of your friends or parents or me would move mountains to help?”

  “I’m helping myself.”

  “You’re hiding.”

  Yes.

  “You’re not living, but existing. Punishing yourself for horrific events over which you had no control. Do you think your brother’s death makes you less a man?”

  Yes.

  The cold inside him grew unbearable. He started to shiver.

  “Look at you… You’re freezing.”

  She rose as if intending to hold him, but he scrambled up and out of his chair, pressing his back against the cold metal wall of kegs.

  What was wrong with him? His teeth were now chattering.

  “Come home…” Her voice fell pillowy soft against his defenses. Once upon a time, before she’d been claimed by Brandon, before the Navy, she’d been Brody’s best friend, his confidante, his world. Even back then he couldn’t stop running—escaping the fact that she would never be his. “Let me take care of you.”

  Because he was exhausted—mentally, physically and every other way in between, he nodded.

  It took five minutes to cram his meager belongings into his backpack. Another five to turn over his keys to Darrow, asking him to please apologize for not giving notice to Patty and Stew—the owners.

  Just like that, wincing at the brilliance of the sun, still shivering, Brody allowed his brother’s widow to lead him outside.

  Hallowell’s only Uber driver sat waiting in his blue Corolla.

  “Back to the airstrip?” the kid asked once he and Lilianna sat in the back seat.

  “Yes, please,” she said.

  The ride was short, but Brody struggled holding his eyes open. He was tired.

  So very, very tired.

  Colby met them in the corrugated metal shack serving as the airstrip’s office.

  While his oldest friend and Lilianna exchanged worried glances, Brody let Colby take his pack. “I figured you wouldn’t be long, so I left our ride idling. Let me run a quick check. I’ll wave when I’m ready.”

  “Thanks,” Lilianna said.

  “Appreciate it,” Brody somehow managed.

  Colby wrapped him in a bro-hug, slapping his back. “Good to see you. It’ll be great having you home.”

  Again with the niceness. All of this would be simpler if everyone else hated him as much as Brody had grown to hate himself.

  Chapter Seven

  “WHAT THE HELL?” Colby asked once Lilianna had sent Brody up to her home’s guest room to shower. “He looks like a ghost of his old self.”

  “You should have seen where he was living. That place was a step above being homeless.”

  “Did you get anything out of him? You know, about why he’s been gone?”

  “Honestly?” she removed her coat, scarf and gloves, draping them across the back of one of the kitchen bar stools. “At first—I was startled. I’d forgotten just how alike Brody and Brandon physically were. It took me a minute to regain my composure. But then once he finally started talking, I could tell something was off. He was there, but not—if that makes sense? I think he’s gotten his brother’s passing mixed up in his head with whatever you guys went through overseas. We went to his apartment and Colby, it was so sad. He’s been spending nights in his sleeping bag that was on top of a bare mattress on the floor.”

  Colby shrugged. “Better than a lot of places we’ve crashed.”

  Liliana frowned. “As I was saying… Brody started telling me about the deaths he’d witnessed. It was all at the same time heartbreaking, yet gruesome. I wasn’t sure what to do. I just knew I had to get him home, figuring we could sort it out later.”

  “Good call. Does Brody’s mom have Donny?”

  She nodded. “I texted her on the way here. She wanted to come right over, but I convinced her to hold off for a while.”

  “Wise. You see about getting Brody fed and cleaned up. I’ll track down the VA counselor who brought him back last time.”

  “Thank you.” She gave Colby a quick hug. “Please say hi to Rose and Nick. Tell her I want the boys to have a play date soon.”

  “Will do. Only that’d be kind of hard since your kid is still basically a blob.” He winked.

  “That’s a horrible thing to say,” she complained through a smile. Thankful for the laugh—however brief—she walked him out, then forced a deep breath.

  Operation Bring Brody Back to the Land of the Living had officially commenced.

  First part of her mission? See why he wasn’t yet in the shower. Then wash his clothes. If he had nothing clean to wear in the interim, she still hadn’t cleared out Brandon’s things. It had been easier to close his closet door, pretending he was away on an extended work trip.

  She tugged off her boots, leaving them on the entry hall floor, then trudged upstairs. The room she’d shared with Brandon was to the left. At the top of the stairs, she turned right, toward the nursery and the guest room at the en
d of the hall. Two more bedrooms served as storage areas for Christmas decorations and extra food storage. Alaskan winters were painfully long. It paid to be prepared.

  “Brody?” She knocked on the guest room’s closed door. When she got no answer, she entered anyway. Though it was only one in the afternoon, it got dark early this time of year. She opened the shades to take full advantage of the glorious sun. Sunset was around three-thirty. “Brody? Where’d you go?”

  He’d leaned his frame-style hiking pack against the wall beside the knotty pine dresser.

  The bathroom door was closed, so she repeated her earlier drill. When she again got no answer, heart pounding, she inched open the door. “Are you decent? May I come in?”

  Still nothing, which kicked her already hammering pulse into overdrive.

  She fully opened the door to witness raw pain on an unimaginable level. Brody had stripped, then climbed into the roomy soaking tub. But apparently, that’s where his forward momentum had stopped.

  He sat straight, hugging his knees to his chest, crying, shivering, yet not making a sound. His behavior was eerie and terrifying and shot her into action. He was no longer a naked man, but her profoundly lost former best friend. He needed her like no one had ever needed her before.

  With her every mothering instinct on full throttle, she crossed the short distance to him, kneeling to hold him, but he was too close to the picture window for her to reach. “You’re freezing. I’m going to turn on the fire and then the water, okay?”

  He didn’t respond, so she went ahead with her plans. The gas log fire facing the tub mirrored the one in the master suite and put out a surprising bit of heat.

  Never had she been happier for the stupid computerized tap Brandon had installed that made the water spill out at the perfect temperature. She set it for ninety-nine, figuring it would be best not to go too warm, too fast. Brandon would feel vindicated knowing she now appreciated what she’d once called his ridiculously overpriced man-toy faucet.