Chapter 30 Connections
thirty
Connections
I'm absentmindedly sorting through a pile of sympathy cards.
Not reading the sentiments or the names, just transferring the pile from one place to another, anything to keep my hands busy.
One stops me—a plain, steel-gray envelope.
The handwriting looks familiar, and there's no return address.
My hands shake as I slide my finger under the flap and open it.
It's a flowered card, blank inside except for four words.
You're in my thoughts.
I stare at it for a long moment. It could be a harmless sympathy card. We've gotten them from all over the country. It could be from a stranger who saw what happened on the news and decided to reach out. I know it isn't.
I rip the card in half and push it to the bottom of the garbage can. No one notices but Michael. There's a question in his eyes I can't answer.
"Jess." Mom's voice pulls me out of my trance. She's holding the phone, her hand over the mouthpiece. “It’s Jasmine. She keeps calling. She sounds desperate.”
Jasmine always sounds desperate. Right now, her desperation feels like it’s intruding on my family’s grief. The drama queen in her can't stand not being part of this. I don't want to talk to her, but I can't make Mom deal with her either, so I take the phone.
“Jess,” she sounds breathless. “I’m so sorry. I can’t believe this.”
“Thanks.” I don't even try to keep my voice from sounding cold. I’m tired of talking, tired of everyone reminding me how horrible this is. I was better off when I was too sick to talk to anyone.
“When is the memorial service?” Jasmine asks.
“We’re leaving tomorrow for the one on base in Texas. The funeral will be here next Thursday.” Details I’ve heard repeated a hundred times.
“Have you talked to Gage’s family?” Her voice breaks when she says his name.
“Mom talked to Trina twice.” This is where she makes this her pain too.
She and Gage barely had anything. It’s heartless, I know, but I don’t have the energy to include Jasmine in the scope of my grief.
Seeing Kendra last night—not talking, not crying, just twisting her ring—completely shattered.
I can’t deal with Jasmine feeling like she has a share in this too.
“How are they doing?”
“Destroyed. Like the rest of us.” I close my eyes and shake my head. “Listen, Jaz, I can’t talk. I have to...”
“Jess, I need to tell you something.” She's talking fast, like she's worried I'll hang up on her. “I wouldn’t bring it up if it weren’t important. I don’t know who else can help me.”
She has my attention now. I’ve never heard Jasmine sound so scared. “What?”
“I’m pregnant.”
I lean against the wall. Michael comes behind me and puts his hand on my shoulder. “Gage.” I breathe his name. She doesn’t answer. She doesn’t need to. I already know. “Does he... did he know?”
“Yeah. I was in denial for a long time. I didn’t tell anyone.
My mom came to visit, and she figured it out.
She was furious, but she convinced me to tell him.
” She laughs. “He totally freaked out at first. Asked me if I was sure it was his. We had a huge, stupid fight about it." Her voice gets shaky. "He called back a couple of days later and said he was sorry. He said whatever I decided was okay with him. He said if I wanted to keep the baby, we could get married when he came home. He said he'd take care of everything. He said he loved me.” She starts sobbing. “What should I do? I don’t think he told his parents. I don’t know how to tell them. I was going to keep the baby. I even thought about marrying him, but now he’s gone.”
One o’clock in the morning.
I miss the haze of the fever. I can’t sleep.
My mind won’t shut off. The hole in my chest is consuming me.
I should have taken a sleeping pill, like Mom finally did, so I could abandon myself to a black, dreamless sleep.
I keep thinking about Kendra, about Tyler, and now Jasmine.
Gage is going to have a son he’ll never know. Matt will never have kids.
If I face the window, I see Gage’s face, grinning at me the night he snuck into my bedroom.
If I face the wall, I see Matt sitting in my desk chair, asking me to help him propose to Kendra.
When I lie on my back, the glowing stars on my ceiling remind me of the day Matt helped me put them up when I was eight.
I pull the pillow over my head and try to shut it all out.
The door opens. "Jess."
I turn. “Michael, what are you doing here?”
He stands in the doorway. “I’m sorry. Did I wake you? I just wanted to see if you were okay. A lot of bombshells got dropped on you today, on top of everything that's already happened."
"I wasn't sleeping, but yeah. Today was insane. Jasmine…" I shake my head.
He comes into my room and closes the door behind him. "That wasn't all. You got something in the mail that upset you. I was wondering what it was."
I can't meet his eyes. "A card from someone who I thought was out of my life for good."
He sits on the bed beside me. "Something you want to talk about?"
"No." The last thing anyone needs right now is for me to share my suspicion that the card came from Brad.
My parents have enough to worry about. Besides, he's still in jail.
He can't touch me. It was just another stupid attempt to get to me.
"Why are you still up?" I ask to deflect questions I don't want to answer.
"I couldn't sleep either. I just keep thinking about them—Chandler and Monroe, Ricks, and especially Matthew. My friends. Just gone. They were good men. All of them.”
“You knew all four? Not just Matt and Gage.”
He nods. “Chandler had a wife and two kids. Monroe was an only child of a single mother. I met his mom at the deployment ceremony. She was so proud of him.” He closes his eyes.
I remember Matt telling me the guys in his unit were like his brothers. For a minute I forget my grief and hurt for Michael and what he's lost.
He leans forward and puts his hands on his face. “I should have been there, Jess. They were my guys, my unit. I should have been with them. If I weren't such a coward, I would have been.”
I touch his back. "You're not a coward, Michael. You choose to go to medical school. That's not exactly the easy way out."
“Isn't it?" He shakes his head. "I’m sorry. You’re the last person I should dump this on right now.”
"It's okay."
"Can I stay?"
“Yeah.” I can see he needs to talk. I'm not sure how much more I can handle, but I feel like I owe him.
He's done so much for us. I move over to make room for him on my bed.
He lies next to me and puts his arm around me.
I lean against his chest. He runs his fingers through my hair, absently untangling the knots.
After a few silent moments, he looks at me like there's something he needs me to understand. "Do you want to know why I couldn't go with them, why I applied to medical school?"
Another conversation comes back to me, almost a year ago, when Jacob admitted he was afraid to go to Iraq. "I would guess you were afraid of being killed. There's nothing wrong with that."
He shakes his head. "No. I wasn't afraid of dying.
I was afraid I'd have to kill someone. I don't think I could do it, no matter what the situation.
No matter how honorable they make it out to be.
" He closes his eyes. "I took an oath, and I didn't want to go back on it, but I didn't want to be put into a situation where I had to shoot someone.
That kind of hesitation in a battle could be deadly, not just for me, but for everyone I'm with.
I didn't want that on my conscience. I had the grades, so I figured if I could be a doctor, then I could help people instead of hurting them. "
"That's not a bad thing, Michael. Some people might even say that's noble.
" I close my eyes, thinking about Brad and the card and all that I've been through because of him. "I was in a situation where I could have, maybe even should have, killed someone, but I couldn't do it. I shot him in the leg and now he's…” I almost say, still tormenting me, but that’s not something I’m ready to share with anyone, “now he’s in jail.”
"The guy who attacked you in the barn? Matt told me about that." He pulls me closer. "I'm so sorry that happened to you, but I guess that means you understand what I’m saying better than anyone could."
We lie there for a few moments, breathing together, both of us lost in our own pain and fear.
Then he talks slowly, like he's afraid of my reaction.
"I understand that there are situations where lethal force is justified, and I wouldn't ever blame someone for defending themselves, but that's the thing with this war. It’s not a defense.
There's no justification for being there.
There's no reason good men like Matt and Gage had to kill or be killed. They shouldn't have been there at all."
I lay in stunned silence. Michael almost sounds like Nathan. I've never heard a soldier talk about the war this way. It's so different from what I've heard Jacob say about being in the Army.
"My dad and my grandpa pushed me into ROTC when I was in high school.
The honorable thing to do, a rite of passage.
But the longer I was in, the less honorable it felt.
Then the whole thing in Iraq started. The more I've studied what's going on, the more I've felt like we shouldn't be there.
There's no way it's going to end quickly or cleanly.
It's already cost too much. I don’t have to tell you that.
" His mouth sets and anger resonates in his voice.
"Matthew shouldn't have had to die to pay for a college education. "
I don’t know what to say. Part of me wants to yell at him, to tell him he's wrong about all of this.
My brother was a hero. He died for what he believed in.
He died defending people who couldn't defend themselves.
But there's another part, a part that thinks he might be right, a part that's screaming about how unfair and senseless this whole thing is.
He reaches up and puts his hand on my cheek. I flinch at his touch. He rolls away from me, onto his back, staring at the ceiling. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said anything. I made it worse, didn't I?"
I can't answer him. The hollow place in my chest fills with an anger I didn't know I had. My hands ball into fists until my fingernails dig into my palms.
He takes my hand, rubbing his thumb over it, as if he'll soothe the hurt by loosening my grip. “I'm sorry, Jess. I didn’t mean to hurt you. Matthew was a good man. He was doing good things there. I know he was. I just…”
“It’s okay,” I whisper, even though none of it's okay.
He props himself up on his elbow, searching my face.
“I’ve never told anyone what I just told you—about being afraid, about how I feel about the war.
There’s just something about you, something that makes me want to tell you everything.
Something that makes me want to be with you.
I’ve never had this kind of connection with anyone, and honestly, it's a little scary, but Matthew asked me to take care of you.
I know what it is to lose a sibling, a best friend, someone you've fought with and loved and known your whole life. I understand Jess, so if there is anything you need, anything, anytime, just ask.”
I stare up at him. There’s something in his expression, a connection, like he keeps saying, something that feels safe and honest and solid. Something that could take away the fear and the gaping emptiness inside of me.
“Will you kiss me, Michael?”