by M. S. Parker
Why would I need to shave?
I was still a kid, wasn't I?
I looked at Madison. She was just the way I remembered her. But I wasn't. I was a grown-up. How was I an adult and she still just a kid?
“You think too much, Xavy.” Madison patted my face. “Now come on, let's play.”
I tried to tell her that I couldn't play. I had things I needed to do. Didn't I? There had to be something I was missing. Something I was supposed to be doing. A place I was supposed to be.
A bright light pierced my eyes, and I jerked my head. Lightning shot up my side, and I tried to make a sound but I couldn't. There was something in my mouth. In my throat.
I wanted to reach up and grab it, but my arms didn't want to work. They felt too heavy. My whole body felt too heavy.
Something was wrong.
All of this was wrong.
Movement at the edge of my vision fluttered. For a moment, I caught a glimpse of a beautiful woman, her dark hair pulled back to reveal a drawn face. She looked sad, and I wanted to tell her that it would be okay, but the darkness came again and took me.
I could see the bright spots of muzzle flash in the distance and knew that we'd walked into a trap.
“Fall back! Fall back!” I screamed at my men, but it was too late.
They fell around me, shot through the hearts, the heads. They lay all around me, screaming as blood poured from their wounds. Blown-off legs and arms littered the ground. Hundreds of bodies. And I'd killed them all.
Their deaths were my fault.
Always my fault.
I promised them that I'd look after them. It was my job to protect them.
But I'd failed.
Failed them like I'd failed everyone I'd ever cared about.
I didn't know why I'd survived. I shouldn't have. I should've died instead of them.
Mea culpa.
Mea culpa.
“Don't give up, Soldier. Please, hang on. Fight.”
I didn't know that voice, but it was a woman and I wondered if she was the one I'd seen before.
Then the pain was back and I couldn't think. Couldn't think of anything but how much I wanted to die.
But she'd told me to fight.
Asked me not to go.
How could I deny her?
But the pain was too much. I couldn't bear it.
But I had to bear it. It was my punishment after all. My punishment for all the wrong I'd done. I deserved this. Deserved no peace in the half-wakefulness that claimed me.
I could smell my body burning, smell the charred flesh. Feel them digging and prodding. Tearing, ripping.
I wanted to scream, but I couldn't.
I wanted to die, but I couldn't.
All I could do was remind myself that I deserved every agonizing second. I could see their faces. All of them. Every person I'd failed. It was because of them that I was burning but not dying.
This was my penance.
This was my purgatory.
Mea culpa.
Mea culpa.
11
Nori
I shifted in the chair, now more sympathetic to visitors who sat for more than a couple hours in these things. I'd always known they were uncomfortable, but there was a big difference between knowing it and experiencing it. And for the past two days, I'd been experiencing it.
I hadn't exactly been sleeping here, but I had come in early and stayed late after my shifts...and I might have accidentally fallen asleep last night. Dr. Fellner had okayed it, as long as I wasn't putting in for overtime, and I didn't do anything medical when I was technically off. I was fine with that. I kept an eye on his vitals, but mostly I just watched him.
When I was working yesterday, I'd seen a tall, good-looking guy in the room. I hadn't had a chance to speak with him, but based on the haircut and the way he held himself, I felt safe in assuming he was a soldier. The man I'd spoken to at the base on Monday said he'd try to get in contact with one of Xavier's friends. I supposed that had been him.
X, I silently corrected myself. Not Xavier. The staff sergeant had called him X. Just one of the things I'd learned about the soldier I'd been caring for.
Like the fact that X didn't have any family. There wasn't a lot the staff sergeant had been able to tell me, but I'd gotten the impression that had been more because he hadn't known rather than any sort of privacy issues. X's mother was deceased, his father unknown. No siblings, grandparents or other relatives. He had someone listed as his emergency contact, but that was it. The staff sergeant had said he'd make the call, but that had been Monday evening and it was Wednesday morning now, and with the exception of the one soldier, no one else had been in to see X.
He shifted slightly and I sat up, tensing as I leaned forward. Aside from the couple times I'd seen his eyes opening that first day, he'd been unconscious. He was on a lot of pain meds, which didn't make waking up any easier, but if he didn't wake up soon, even if only for a few minutes, I'd be even more concerned than I was now.
When it came to traumatic injuries, only part of the battle was physical. Emotional and mental health came into play more than a lot of people realized. While there were, sadly, plenty of people who fought to stay alive and lost, there were also plenty of people who should've survived their injuries but didn't, simply because they gave up.
If X had no family, no one to support him, no one to live for, I wondered just how high his chances of survival were. Yes, there were those with families and loved ones who gave up, but that support system at least gave them a fighting chance.
I didn't know X, or what happened to him besides what I’d heard downstairs or in the news. I'd never laid eyes on him before Monday. We'd never spoken or even exchanged a real look. There was absolutely no logical reason for the sense of duty and compassion I felt toward him. It was beyond what I felt as a nurse toward all of my patients, even the ones I liked. I'd occasionally checked in on some patients more than others simply because they were a joy to be around, but I didn't think about them off-duty. I didn't stay over or come in early, and I certainly didn't sit by their beds and wait for them to wake up.
I leaned back in my chair when it became clear that he wasn't waking up, just responding to a dream. I hoped he was having pleasant dreams. Something that soothed his subconscious. Something beautiful. Because when he did wake up, his life would be a nightmare. He would be in a great deal of pain, despite the medication. And that would be just the beginning.
Once he could get off the ventilator, we could get a better idea of any sort of permanent lung or brain damage, then figure out where to go from there. He had months of rehab ahead of him at the very least, maybe years, depending on the need for skin grafts. His arm being both broken and burned would cause the most problems, even without the risks that came with his condition. Broken bones needed to stay immobile, but the arm would need to move so that the scar tissue could stretch and he could keep mobility in his arm.
He was in for a long and painful recovery. A recovery that, no matter how well he did – barring an all-out miracle – meant he couldn't return to active duty. One of the few personal things the staff sergeant told me about X was that he'd been in the army for nearly a decade, joining up at nineteen. And that X had intended to make a career out of it.
He could do desk duty, I supposed. Recruiting or any of the other jobs that wounded career military men did. But he'd never go back in the field. His eyesight and hearing wouldn't be affected, but his lungs could have permanent damage. Even if those were fine and his other burns healed well, his left arm would never be able to handle the sort of conditions he'd be subjected to during active duty.
These sorts of injuries were difficult to recover from under the best of circumstances, but to lose something that had been purpose and life for so many years, to know that all the plans that had been made were gone...something like that could break even the strongest of men.
That, I'd learned far too young.
My heart twisted
painfully as the memories came forward.
I was fifteen when my older brother, Logan, enlisted in the army. Right out of high school, he was gone. Proud of his country. Proud to fight. He'd done well in boot camp and had told us that his instructors thought he had promise. He'd wanted to go career, move up through the ranks to command his own unit, to keep the country safe.
He'd written letters to me about that, about how he'd felt called to serve and protect, to make the country safe for me and for our family. For the high school girlfriend he hoped to marry in the near future.
His first tour had come up almost immediately, and he hadn't been kept stateside. He hadn't even been sent somewhere safe like Korea or one of our other outposts. No, he'd been sent right in the thick of things.
And he'd loved it.
My bossy, often over-bearing, way-too-protective big brother had thrived under the pressure. He'd been great at his job, receiving accolades from his commanding officers and respect from his fellow soldiers.
Four months later, his convoy was taking medical supplies to a village that had recently been decimated by some local warlord. His truck had been in the lead and he'd been riding shotgun. They'd hit a roadside bomb and that had been it.
Four members of his unit died that day. One ended up with permanent brain damage. And Logan lost his right leg from the knee down.
Before he'd even come back to the States, his girlfriend had written him a Dear John letter.
I'd gone to her house, slapped her, and said a few choice words. And I'd ended up with a restraining order. It'd been worth it.
They'd called him a hero when he'd come home, but all he'd been able to see was the future he'd lost. It had been that, as much as the loss of his leg, that had changed him from my brother to some stranger.
X was a hero.
Granted, he hadn't done any of that stuff overseas, but he'd still saved the lives of two people. He'd put himself in danger to protect others. The newspapers were all calling for medals and recognition. They'd been parked outside for two days now, asking everyone who came and went if they knew anything about X. Of course, none of us answered, but that hadn't stopped them from trying.
In fact, just last night, I'd caught a reporter dressed in scrubs trying to sneak into X's room to get a picture. Since then, the hospital had brought in a handful of extra security to watch the burn unit doors and check credentials thoroughly and often. The army was keeping fairly quiet about it, issuing a single statement to acknowledge that X was indeed a member of the military, but not adding anything else. Local law enforcement officials were being equally close-mouthed, refusing to say anything about the two people X had rescued or what had caused the fire in the first place.
In true paparazzi fashion, some of the less reputable news sources – and I used that term loosely – had taken to coming up with their own reasons for the silence. After reading part of one article that was claiming X had blown up the building himself to try to take out some sort of terrorist cell, I decided to ignore the media completely.
If X woke up, there'd be some answers. But I honestly didn't care about the whole story. I cared about him waking up. About him living.
I closed my eyes for a moment and let out a slow breath. When he woke up. It couldn't be if. He had to survive.
A noise made me open my eyes again and I immediately jumped to my feet. X's eyes were open, panic flooding them.
“It's okay, X,” I said quickly as I moved to his side. I hit the nurse call button and then grabbed his uninjured hand. “It's okay. You're in the hospital. Relax. It's okay.”
His fingers tightened around mine and some of the panic receded. I could tell that he wanted to talk, wanted to ask questions, so I kept talking, trying to think of answers to what he might want to know.
“You were in an accident and had some smoke inhalation. Your throat and lungs were singed enough that we put in a tube to help you breathe.”
His pulse began to slow.
“My name's Nori Prinz. I'm a nurse here at the medical center. You're still in San Antonio. This is the burn unit.”
The door opened and Dr. Fellner followed one of the other nurses in.
“It's okay,” I repeated, squeezing his hand. “We're going to take good care of you here.”
12
Xavier
Her name was Nori.
The brunette I remembered from before. That was her name.
She'd told me her last name, but I couldn't remember it.
I focused on trying to remember. It was the only way I could make it from minute to minute. Something to focus on, to try to keep my mind off the excruciating pain tearing through me.
Prinz.
That was it.
She said her name was Nori Prinz. She was a nurse. And she'd known to call me X, not Xavier.
I'd met a couple other nurses in the last few hours since I'd been awake. I didn't remember anything about them other than blurs of faces, all armed with meds and charts.
My doctor was Catlin Fellner. Dr. Fellner. Early fifties. Smart. Didn't pull any punches.
I wasn't sure if I should be glad for that or not.
She told me that she wanted to keep the tube in at least until tomorrow morning, just to be on the safe side. I'd agreed, but not because I wanted to. My brain was scrambled, but not so much that I didn't know that I wasn't really in a place to make any real decisions. So I'd trusted her judgment.
Then she'd told me why half my body felt like it was on fire.
Because it had been.
She'd listed off my injuries in a matter-of-fact manner, but she hadn't been cold about it, just professional. She'd told me of all the things I had to look forward to over the course of the next few months. What it would mean for the rest of my future.
Without the army.
She hadn't needed to tell me that part. I wasn't stupid. I knew these were career-ending injuries.
After all I'd been through, there were two things that had saved my life and the army had been one of them. I didn't know what I was going to do if I couldn't be a soldier.
Except I wasn't even sure I needed to think that far ahead.
The doctor was optimistic about my chances for survival, but there was caution in her voice. I wasn't medically trained, but I knew enough to know that it was far too early to tell for sure that I was going to make it.
And I wasn't sure I wanted to.
I closed my eyes for a moment and tried to push the darkness away.
Not the darkness that came with drug-induced sleep, but rather a different kind. The kind I'd experienced a few times before in my life, but not in a long time. I didn't want to go back there.
I had to think of something else.
Focus.
One detail, then the next. That was the way to do it.
Fuck, my arm hurt.
No, I wasn’t a detail to focus on, no matter how true it was. Because if I thought about how much it hurt, then I'd start thinking about what was wrong with it and what that meant for my future...
Home.
Philadelphia, not the base. I'd been at different bases and stationed all over the world. But none of those were ever home.
Even with all the bad memories Philadelphia held, it was familiar. It was home.
I tried picturing the different parts of it in my mind.
The graffitied buildings and rusty basketball hoops of my childhood.
The cobbled streets and small shops of Germantown.
When I'd been there last, I'd walked for hours, imprinting the images in my mind.
The various shapes and kinds of fish marking the sidewalk and buildings in Fishtown.
The rainbow flags that showed the transition into another neighborhood.
The trains that ran from one end of the city to the other.
Local theater. Historical monuments. The Liberty Bell. The famous steps that everyone wanted to run.
Hell, I'd run them more than once.
I w
ondered if I'd ever be able to run them again. If my lungs would heal enough to let me run like that again.
And there I was again, back to the pain.
I couldn't think about Zed or my men, or the base, because then I'd be thinking about my life without any of those things.
If I didn't have the army, what did I have?
The girl from the other night? What was her name? Naomi? Nancy? Nance. Right. She'd been fun, but that wasn't a relationship.
I didn't have someone to sit by my bed. No family. I was sure Zed would come by as soon as he was able, but it wasn't like he had some nine-to-five job. He'd come when he could, but that was only until he was shipped out again. And we were friends, but he wasn't family. I trusted him to have my back, but I wasn't his responsibility.
I didn't want to be anyone's responsibility.
Fuck it all!
How the hell had it come to this? I'd survived a hell of a lot, and this was how it was going to end?
But maybe this was how it was supposed to end.
The fragments of my dreams and memories from when I was first injured came to me, reminded me of what I'd been thinking during that foggy haze of time. That I deserved this.
Mea culpa.
Was this just karma's way of fucking me over like I deserved?
I didn't doubt it.
A flash of movement caught the corner of my eye and I tried to turn my head to see, but the stupid tube prevented it. It was unnerving, not being able to see, not being able to protect myself.
But I didn't need to protect myself.
No one could hurt me here.
Movement again, coming closer this time. I waited for it to come into my line of sight.
For a moment, I hoped it was her, the brunette. Nori.
She'd sat next to me. Held my hand. I'd heard the doctor talking to her when I first woke up and it sounded like she'd been here with me quite a bit.
I wondered why.
I didn't know her.
I was sure I didn't.
I wasn't one of those men who went through women so fast and so loose that he couldn't even remember their faces. And I knew I'd remember hers. It wasn't just because she was pretty either. I remembered how she'd kept telling me to hold on, kept encouraging me.
