by S. K. Lessly
She frowned and waved her hands in front of me. “That’s not likely going to happen if you give the right answer. However, if it does happen, that person will have to elaborate on their answer. The answer still has to be short and to the point with the understanding that further discussions could take place at a later time. What do you say?”
“All right, I’m game. Let’s see how this goes,” I told her.
“Great,” she replied and then started to rise from my lap.
I held her still. “Don’t run.”
Her laughter rang through the dawn, and I smiled. “Please, big boy, I’m not afraid of you or your questions. I was just trying to make you comfortable.”
“Don’t worry about me,” I told her, placing her back on my lap. “You’re fine right where you are.”
We both stared at each other, stupid grins on our faces.
“Okay,” I said finally. “Who’s going first?”
Her smirk still in place, she wrinkled her brows. “I think I already started this little game of ours.”
I feigned surprise. “Really? When? I don’t recall the question?”
A wide and beautiful grin grew across her shadowed face. “Cute. Okay, I’ll ask it again for sake of the game of course.”
I smiled back. “I appreciate your sacrifice.”
She grunted, but her brilliant smile never left her face. “How old were you when you first had sex?”
“Fifteen,” I answered quickly.
“Really?”
“Is that a question?” I asked, giving her a side eye.
“No, sorry, just observation. Okay, where?”
“Where what?”
Misty rolled her eyes at me. “Where did you have sex for the first time?”
“Ah, um… my tree house.”
“It figures you over-privileged boys would have a tree house. Who did you consummate with?”
“Angela.”
Misty tilted her head. “Was she your girlfriend or just a tryst that you met at some high school party?”
I laughed. “Is this the moment when I need to give you a little more?”
Misty nodded. “Yes, but keep it short. Details definitely aren’t needed.”
I shifted in my seat, keeping Misty on my lap. “Okay, I had a crush on Angela since the first day we met in middle school. She and I were the best of friends for at least four years. We were complete opposites. She was quiet and smart, and I was loud and crazy. Anyway, I kept my feelings to myself until one day I’d had enough and told her how I felt. She told me she felt the same way and in the same breath she told me she was moving away in two weeks. She and I decided to become boyfriend and girlfriend for those two weeks and spent as much time together as we could. She was moving to the west coast with her mother. There was no chance I would ever see her again. On her last night in town, we were hanging out in my tree house. One thing led to another and that was that. It was beautiful and special and the next day she was gone.”
Misty remained quiet while she studied me. I kept my eyes on her and waited.
She said, “Wow, Shane, I didn’t expect that.”
I shrugged. “Shit happens. My turn. Same questions back to you. How old were you when you first had sex?”
Misty seemed startled by my abrupt change in conversation, but she rolled with it. “I was nineteen. Shocked?”
I shook my head. “Not in the least. Where?”
“In a motel.”
“What? Why was your first time in a motel? Who were you with?”
Misty didn’t answer my question right away. She gazed down at my abs and started to absently run her hands along the ridges of my torso. She then said to me, her eyes casted downward, “I was with my new husband.”
Shit…
“You were nineteen when you got married?”
Her head moved in such a way that indicated a positive answer to my question.
I asked, “How old was he?”
“Twenty-five.”
“Damn, baby, that’s a huge age difference,” I admitted.
Misty looked up at me, defiance in her eyes. “Not really.”
“Yes, baby, really.”
“Shane, how old are you?” she asked, folding her arms in front of her.
I didn’t answer her. There was a bit of a difference between our ages, she was in her late twenties and I was hitting the peak of my thirties. For me, though, she and I were different. I said to her, “I understand what you’re trying to get at, but it’s still different. You were just getting out in the world, learning who you were. His ass had been in it for a while.”
She scoffed. “Please, Shane, I had been in the Marine Corps for two years at the time we met. Believe me, I had seen a lot.”
She wasn’t getting it. Granted, there were a lot of people who got married early in life. I probably wouldn’t have said anything if she’d said he was also nineteen. But because he was twenty-five, I questioned his motives. A man hitting twenty-five knew a little something. They weren’t just starting out in the world. They would’ve graduated from college already, hopefully found a job and an apartment. They were fucking anything that move, or at least they were trying to.
Of course I knew there were exceptions, but this didn’t feel like an exception to me.
“What did your parents say?” I asked
Misty laughed sardonically and gave me a small smile. “Oh, they were insanely pissed off, especially because Donald and I got married without my parents’ knowledge.”
“What?!”
“Yup, it was stupid on my part, I know. The thing was, back then, I didn’t care. I was in love. When I told my parents about Donny and that I was in love, Ashton and Thomasina were completely against it, especially when they met him. My father hated him, and my mother wanted to poison him.” She shrugged and released her arms from around herself. She resumed touching my stomach. “As the saying goes: love is blind. Donny was amazing in my eyes. He treated me like a queen. He reminded me of my father and how he treated my mom. That’s what did it for me.”
I ran a lone finger down the side of her cheek and caressed her chin. “So how did you two meet? What happened between you two? How long were you two married? Matter of fact, why aren’t you still married?”
Misty laughed and shook her head. She said softly, “That’s a lot of questions at once. You’re supposed to ask them after I answer them.”
“Sorry. I was never good at following rules.”
Misty grew quiet, seemingly completely absorbed in her thoughts. She stood from my lap, and this time I didn’t stop her. She turned her back to me and looked out into the brightening skyline in front of her. “This is a pretty nice view,” she commented.
My unit was on the back end of the apartment complex. There wasn’t much to see but the tops of trees and rooftops from houses and apartment buildings. That was it. Nothing else impeding you from seeing the sky above.
“Yeah, it is.”
She turned around and faced me, leaning her body against the rail of the patio. “I haven’t had the pleasure of seeing all of your apartment, but this view alone would have sold me.”
I smiled. “Wait until you see the rest.”
Still wrapped in the sheet, she looked down at her bare feet and wiggled her bright pink toes. She ran her fingers through her hair, but not to remove the strands from her face. She was still looking down and her hair was just falling back into its place. No, when Misty forced a hand through her hair, it meant she was nervous. I figured she was debating on whether to continue down this road or figure out a way to get out of talking to me. But I wasn’t going to let her bail out on the question.
“What time is it?” she asked.
I shrugged. “Who knows? You’re stalling.”
“Huh?” Misty gave me these sad eyes as she looked at me. Maybe she thought that would deter me or make me feel sorry for her. It wasn’t working.
I slouched further in my chair, propped my elbows on the a
rmrest and laced my fingers in front of me. “Baby, don’t think those puppy dog eyes are going to soften me up. You started this game of ours. Now, quit stalling, King, and give me the rundown on this Donald piece of shit.”
Misty stared blankly at me for another few seconds before a smile erupted along her face.
“Same rules apply?” she queried.
“Yup, I’ll take the highlights for now.”
Misty outwardly sighed and wrapped herself tighter in the sheet around her body.
“Okay, Donny and I met at some bar a few miles away from Camp Lejeune where I was stationed for a few months. And yes, before you ask, the bar was serving alcohol to underage soldiers.”
“Really?”
“Yes. Don’t look so shocked, Captain America. I’m sure it was the same thing for you when you joined up. Now, stop interrupting me.” I put my hands up in surrender and she continued. “Okay, the day Donny and I met, we hit it off. We had so much in common. He loved action and horror movies. He hated romantic comedies, but I overlooked that flaw. Most of all, he loved shooting at the gun range.
“All very important qualities,” I added sarcastically.
“Yes, they are. Well, they were to me back then,” she countered. “He made me laugh all night. Afterwards, we exchanged numbers and managed to talk every night. During the day, when I wasn’t training, we’d hang out. As I said, the way he treated me reminded me of how my dad took care of my mom. I had witnessed my dad try to give my mom the moon and the stars every day of his life. I’d always wanted that in my life, but I didn’t think it would happen for me. Those are a huge pair of shoes to fill, that father of mine.”
I nodded my head. “I agree with that.”
She smiled. “Back then, I believed that I needed to make a choice on where my future was going. In other words, I had to pick either a house in the suburbs and a family as life goals or the Marine Corps. Donny made me believe that I could have the best of both worlds. So, three months later, when he asked me to marry him, I said yes.”
I didn’t hide the shock I felt. “Three months?”
“Yes. I know, but really, when you know someone is the one then, you know, right? And at the time I believed he was the one.”
I let my head fall to the side and regarded the woman before me. “Okay, so you said he proposed and you two got married in secret or rather behind your parent’s back.”
“I like the term in secret better.”
I grunted. “Yeah, I bet you do.” She gave me the finger and I blew her a kiss. “What happened after you two got married? You said you were already two years invested in your military career. When did you go overseas? And how was that?” I bent over and grabbed my bottle of water. I remembered I had brought her one too, it was sitting next to mine. I opened hers and handed it to her.
She leaned close to me and took the bottle from me, giving me a peek of her delicious body in the process.
“Thanks,” she offered me and then explained, “Things were good with us. Donny supported me. He told me it was a complete turn on to know I was serving my country. I was his little bad ass. He believed in me and encouraged me one hundred percent.”
Misty explained further how her husband had sent her letters all the time, care packages, and he made sure to greet her at the airport the moment she got off the plane when she came home to the States.
As she talked, I got up and grabbed another chair that sat on the other end of the patio. I brought it next to me and turned it around to face me. I turned my chair too as Misty sat down. Now comfortably facing each other, I asked her, “Okay, if things were good with you two, what happened?”
Misty placed both of her feet up on the chair and hugged her legs to her chest. “He wanted me to come home after my tour was over. Donny wanted a family. He wanted to begin his life with his wife, but I wasn’t ready.”
I didn’t reply.
She took a long swig of her water before she continued. “As you well know, the media’s portrayal of the war wasn’t the half. My unit and I were knee-deep in shit all of the time. We were sent into hostile situations more times than I could count to do a number of things. But I believed we were getting somewhere. There was only six of us and we would be assigned to locations to do reconnaissance work, hunt down terrorists, or rescue missing soldiers. We even received orders to tag and bag people. I didn’t want to leave my team high and dry. We worked like a well-oiled machine. You couldn’t find that kind of synergy in the Corps, and when you did, you didn’t want to mess with it. So, when the time came to get out, I didn’t. I re-enlisted.”
“I take it Donny wasn’t too happy about that decision.”
She shook her head. “No, he wasn’t. He was livid, hurt, and he felt betrayed. He and I used to talk about what we would do when I got out. We had made plans to start our lives together, find a house, and have kids. We‘d discussed me getting a job with him or somewhere else that I would like. It didn’t matter as long as I was at home. I ruined that for him. He went off on me the night I told him I wasn’t coming home just yet. He called me a coward, a hypocrite, and crazy. He said all types of things that really hurt. He accused me of cheating and having a death wish. Worst of all, he believed that I had re-enlisted because I didn’t want to be married to him anymore, which wasn’t true. I loved him. I just had to do what I felt was right at the time. I believed that because I was doing the right thing, if a family was in the cards for me, then I would have it.”
“What did Donny do for a living?” I questioned, curious as to the reason for his anger. If he didn’t serve as a public servant, it would explain his lack of understanding. It wouldn’t erase his anger or frustration, but maybe in time, he could have understood why she felt that she needed to stay and fight.
Misty’s mouth rose in a crooked smile. “He was an FBI agent.”
My eyebrows lifted at that news. Shit, my theory went out of the window. “I’m surprised he even wanted you to join the FBI with him.”
She shrugged, but didn’t reply.
I continued, “I can understand your need to stay with your unit and why you felt like you couldn’t leave them high and dry. Did you expect him to understand?”
Her shoulders rose and dropped. “Yes and no. I understood his disappointment, but the way I explained to him the need for me to stay a little longer, I thought he would eventually understand. He didn’t. After that day, Donny started to shut down on me. Our phone calls diminished and his letters and emails started to come less often. The care packages he used to send became nonexistent. I was devastated. I didn’t know what to do. Then one day my whole world changed. My unit was given a very simple mission that turned out be anything but simple. We were in a place we shouldn’t have been and my unit paid for it in the end.”
Misty’s eyes began to fill with tears as she rested her nose against her folded legs. I moved to the edge of my seat so I could be closer to her. In that moment, I wanted her back on my lap so I could hold her, soothe her. I knew the mission she’d spoken of and it was horrible.
Her unit had been ordered to travel into some remote area of Afghanistan to take pictures of some compound nestled in some mountains. However things changed shortly after they achieved their goal. The team had received intel to bury the very compound they were charged to take pictures of, under the mountain that was protecting it. No one was to leave from inside that place. Misty and her team didn’t ask any questions. They simply followed orders. However, they didn’t have all of the facts they needed to complete their task.
The place they hit was a biocontainment facility. There were certain protocols you had to follow for demolition of such a facility, but they weren’t followed. Needless to say, once the bombs went off, whatever was being grown in that facility went airborne, and all but two of her fellow marines were caught in the hazardous dust. Four died at the scene and one was down, but later died of a rare form of aggressive cancer. From what I read in the case notes, the four that died didn’t di
e instantly. They suffered miserably for a while before they found mercy through death. It was documented that the victims died of single bullets to their heads from 9mm NATO rounds. It was never discovered who shot them or how, but the only one that was capable was Misty.
Misty closed her eyes just as her tears fell. I reached for her legs bent at the knees and stretched them over my thighs. I then pulled her onto my lap and wrapped my arms around her. She didn’t resist me. She simply fell into my arms. Not another word came from her; she just nestled her face in the crook of my neck.
We were in that position for a long time with me rubbing her back.
After a spell, she mumbled, “You know this game was supposed to be about you, not me. How did you manage to flip the script?”
I chuckled, but remained silent. Then I sighed. “When I was fifteen, I got into a wreck in my father’s brand new black Ford Mustang and then I blamed Malcolm. My father grounded Malcolm for three months and he had to pay for the repairs with his own money.”
I felt her body shake a little. “How did you manage to pull that off?” I felt her cheek elevate against my skin.
“I had some dirt on him. It was either confess to his dirt, which was a whole lot worse than what I’d done, or take my heat. He took it.”
“But how did you get into an accident?”
“I was showing off. I didn’t have my license yet, but I knew how to drive. I grabbed my father’s keys when he was at work and went joy riding with some of my friends. We went to pick up some girls and hung out for a while. Some of my friends and their girls decided to walk off in the woods somewhere. I took that time to get acquainted with the girl that was with me. So there we were kissing and grinding on each other. I was getting ready to get my very first blow job when she inadvertently knocked the car into neutral. I didn’t realize we were moving until it was too late. Before I could stop the car we drifted into a telephone pole.”
Misty laughed out loud and sat up. Grinning, she shook her head. “Wow, Shane; that was very smooth.”
I returned her grin and shrugged. “We were going to dip off in the woods too, but she didn’t want anyone to see her so we stayed in the car.”
