Chapter 20 Oak
Oak
The steady rise and fall of her chest followed by the deep and even breaths tells me that she’s sound asleep.
Her limbs are wrapped around me like a vine.
My arms are loosely bound around her. My fingers play with the ends of her hair, and ever so occasionally I’ll plant a soft kiss to the top of her head.
Every time that I do it only causes her to burrow into me more.
In my head I can’t fathom how I am finally here, with her, letting her in.
She’s the only person who was strong enough to destroy my armor and break down the walls I have placed around my heart.
And although I’m letting her inside, letting her see the broken man who I have kept hidden since I returned from overseas, I can say that it’s going to take time to confess all my sins to her.
And it’s going to take more time to repair all the damage those sins have caused.
But Grace, my Grace is a fighter, and I’ll know she’ll always fight for me when I feel too weak.
But it will absolutely destroy me, break me beyond repair if I ever hurt her.
Which is why I softly untangle her limbs from mine even though my heart cries from the action. But it’s what’s best because my mind knows the damage I can cause once I’m asleep.
When I’m removed from her she moves to the space where I resided. Feeling my warmth where my body was and smelling my scent on the pillow she sighs contentedly in her sleep.
Moving across the room on light feet and in the dark I take cautious steps. I reach for my boxer briefs that are on the floor and slip them on. Then on stealth mode I carefully make my way out of her bedroom.
I take once last glance at her and my heart yearns to be by her side. My body physically aches from not having her close.
But it’s my head that reminds me what I’m doing is right. It tells me that I’m protecting her and deep down I know it’s true. Still, it doesn’t stop the ache that flares in my heart.
After what happened the last time a woman shared my bed I don’t trust myself to sleep besides her.
What I woke up to, what I woke up to finding myself doing, it was more of a nightmare than the one’s I’m plagued with every night.
I felt violently sick as a deep shame filled my veins and a loathing so profound resided in my heart towards myself.
I hadn’t touched another woman after that.
Until Grace.
I may have admitted to defeat but I will never put her in any danger, even if that danger is me.
So I lay down on the plush sofa that feels more like a cloud than a piece of furniture. And part of me feels uncomfortable with how soft it feels. Part of me hates how my body sinks into the plush seating. Then another part of me hates how my big frame doesn’t feel compromised.
I close my eyes and let out a deep breath as I force myself to switch off the part of me that was overseas.
But it’s easier said then done because as time passes I’m finding the sofa too god damn comfortable.
You would think after nine years I would have adjusted to civilian life.
And maybe for the most part I have. But there are still those nights where I find my bed the least appealing thing to fall asleep on.
There are still the days where I feel the anxiety creep up on me out of nowhere causing my adrenaline to spike and my heart to jackhammer against my ribs.
Not being able to withstand the comfortability of the sofa I lie myself down on the floor and take one of the throw pillows with me.
Turning myself on my side I lay as stiff as a board on the hardwood floors. Though the floor is unforgiving and bites into my bones I feel more at ease than I did on the sofa.
I fucking hate how this feels right.
I close my eyes despite my mind being wide awake. With deep even breaths I hope to wind my mind down. By counting back from one hundred I hope I don’t even reach one before I fall into a light sleep.
Deep sleeps are a thing of the past.
I haven’t experienced one since my first deployment and I forgot about them entirely when I returned home for the last time.
Somehow my body hasn’t given up on me yet by surviving on only three to four hours of sleep.
But it feels as if myself as a whole is a ticking time bomb, and I have no idea when it’s going to hit its last second before I implode.
Miguel, my brother in arms, wouldn’t be proud of the man I am today. Out of all the brothers on my team he was the one who always made the time to take in account how well we were mentally.
And we just talked.
All of us did.
When we were on missions that lasted for days and was forced to be in confined small spaces with nothing to do we fucking talked about anything and nothing.
Miguel led our talks to have meaning, to remind us of who are and what our purpose is.
Miguel was the heart of our group.
It’s nights like this that I miss Miguel the most.
“You know you don’t have to stay up with me,” I remind Miguel, keeping my voice low as to not disturb the others from their slumber.
This mission has been rough on us and the humidity has been a silent killer.
Even now, with the stars on display against the black sky, it feels like the sun is blazing down on us.
Miguel smiles at me and the warmth reaches his brown eyes. I swear he smiles so much that he already has crows feet and smile lines that represent a middle aged man. “I know,” he agrees easily before adding, “but that would mean you’re alone.”
I shoot him an amused look as my lips twitch. My head nods to the back of me where Roman, Isaac, and Jude are asleep on their sides, bodies pressed together because of the close quarters we are residing in. “I’m not alone, Miguel.”
“A man can be in a room with one hundred people and still be alone,” he wisely tells me.
“Are you suggesting I’m a lonely man, Miguel?” I tease him with a brow raised.
He chuckles softly. “I’m merely making a point.”
“A point that is being made because?” Over the years I’ve come to know Miguel like my own flesh and blood. He’s not known to make an observation and not explain what he sees.
He looks at me and then up at the stars.
“You’ve been quiet lately,” he murmurs. He then looks back at me and I see the worry in his eyes. “More quiet than usual.”
I swallow and avert my gaze.
“And you’ve been insistent on keeping watch at night,” he also points out.
My heart thumps inside my chest. “I’m the Sergeant, it’s what I should do,” I say matter-of-factly.
“I would believe that if I didn’t know you,” he says half humored. “Seriously, Ethan, what’s going on? We’re brothers, talk.”
I grit my teeth as I look out into the dirt field. We will be staying here for the remainder of the night before we move on in the early morning.
Our mission is to free women and their kids who are being held hostage by their own people.
The buildings in which they are located is another ten miles away.
While my mind has been focused on the mission it also has been drifting. Drifting to uncharted territories that I’m not quite sure I’ll survive once I make it back home.
I’ve seen too much here. We all have. And I can’t lie and say that the shit that I have seen, the shit that I have done hasn’t affected me.
There are times I’ll look down at my hands and see them dripping red.
There are times where it’s deadly silent and I’ll hear a pitched cry wail of one of the many of women who we couldn’t save.
There are times when I close my eyes all I can feel is the devastation from losing a brother.
But what’s worse than all of that?
Is how easy it’s all becoming.
“Aren’t you afraid?” I ask Miguel softly.
“Afraid of what?”
I swallow again, the grittiness in my throat not easing. “Of how easy it’s becoming.”
“What’s becoming easy, Ethan?” He gently probes.
I shake my head softly as I grit my teeth. With a heavy exhale I respond, “All of it.”
From my peripheral vision I see him nod his head.
“I never thought I would get used to the sight of blood,” he says to me somberly, “or seeing combat up close. But then again I never thought I would gain another family. One I would risk my life for. One if they called me fifteen years from now saying they were in trouble I’d stop everything to help them. ”
I nod my head, emotions choked in my throat, a tightness in my chest.
We’ve seen the best of each other and we’ve seen the worst.
And lately I feel myself slipping into my worst self.
“I’m not sure if it outweighs the bad,” I admit to him on a whisper. “The things I’ve done. . .”
“Saved lives, Ethan.”
“By taking another,” I argue.
“We all know that when we are in combat it’s kill or be killed,” he reminds me, “but that isn’t what’s really bothering you is it? The killing, the combat. What’s bothering you is because it’s starting not to.”
Fuck.
And isn’t that the worst part to admit to yourself? That this life is becoming easy. That it would feel almost wrong to go back to a life that isn’t this.
One day I’m fighting myself that I’m taking someone’s life because they’re only fighting for what they believe in.
That they are someone’s son, someone’s brother or someone’s husband.
They’re human beings. People who maybe had a family of their own.
But then the next day I see the body I killed as what it is, a product of war.
I see a man who was going to kill me and my brothers.
I see a man who is just a body at that point.
It’s an inner turmoil of war that I haven’t won.
I know that it’s kill or be killed, and I don’t regret the blood I have on my hands, but it does stain the soul.
“I’m not the same guy who enlisted, Miguel.”
“None of us are. Combat changes people.. Hell, life changes people. You just have to start looking at things at a different perspective.”
“Is that what you do?” I ask genuinely wanting to know. It seems as if combat hasn’t affected Miguel at all. He’s still that good man he was before he became a Marine.