Chapter Two
Jericho Hess
I stood from the institutional gray metal chair where I’d sat for an hour, listening to the guest speaker at the addiction group therapy session I’d attended at my shrink’s suggestion.
The speaker had told a story about how he’d spiraled out of control when his former boyfriend faked his own suicide and fled the country.
The guy said he’d tried to take his own life, but the weapon jammed.
After he’d failed at suicide, he took off on a two-year odyssey to try to drown the memories of the life he’d had with the man.
He said, in the end, it hadn’t done anything except cost him time with his family and wiped out his savings.
Been there. Done that. Just for a different reason.
My paper cup was empty, and the stale donut I’d had earlier sat in my gut like a rock. I glanced at my watch to see that it was three in the afternoon, and I had an hour drive back to Davidsonville.
When I got home, I had a day’s worth of chores and sixteen horses waiting to be fed and exercised before being put to bed. The life of a horse trainer didn’t come with downtime.
Before I left the meeting room, I tossed the brown paper cup in the trash, grabbed a bottle of water off the table, and walked toward the hallway that led out of the administration building at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center.
I’d gone to the campus to get my prosthetic adjusted because I’d been thrown from a rank horse the previous week and landed wrong to the point that my prosthetic foot wouldn’t bend properly.
Since I was going to be there anyway, I’d made an appointment to see my shrink, who suggested I sit in on a group therapy session that day because there was a guest speaker he thought I could relate to. I’d figured it couldn’t hurt anything, so I’d gone.
One year of sobriety was coming in June, and while living sober wasn’t hard for me, getting sober had been a nightmare. Letting down my walls to accept that I couldn’t do something on my own was hard to admit.
Without alcohol as a crutch, I’d had to accept some things I hadn’t known if I was strong enough to make peace with. Being rejected, just because my physical appearance was less than perfect, had really been a mind fuck.
And, of course, acknowledging that I wasn’t the free-wheeling Special Forces cowboy I’d been since I’d enlisted at eighteen had been a huge pill to swallow.
I had to stop feeling sorry for myself, so I didn’t fall back into the bottle.
I finally recognized that only I could do what was necessary to stay sober.
I had to choose to do the maintenance—attend meetings and take my life one day at a time.
“Sergeant Hess!”
I hadn’t been addressed that way in a long time, so I turned to see a sight for sore eyes. First Sergeant Henry Schatz was coming toward me at a slow jog from a nearby bench. My reflex was to snap to attention, but he was dressed in civvies, so I was pretty sure he wasn’t active any longer.
“First Sergeant Schatz, sir, it’s good to see you.” I shifted the repaired prosthetic under my left arm so I could shake his hand.
“Just Hank, Jericho. How’ve you been?” He glanced at the prosthetic I was holding. “You okay?”
I chuckled. “Yeah. Three years into it. We were scouting along the border with North Korea because of their stupid nuke launches, and I got caught in a homemade snare that looked like a damn bear trap. Took my foot clean off. Thankfully, they got me to Camp Humphreys before I lost too much blood, so they only had to take off four inches above the ankle. I can still ride horses, sir.”
Hank gave me a good-natured slap on the arm. “Yeah, if I remember right, nothing could keep you out of the saddle. I’m waiting for my brother, but do you wanna go get a beer?”
A tall guy walked up and put Hank in a headlock. I noticed he was the speaker at the meeting I’d just left. “Hank, what have we talked about? Don’t try to pick up handsome men or I’ll tell your husband. He’ll kick your ass.”
That was something I hadn’t known. The first sergeant was a member of the rainbow army. My gut relaxed a bit at the news.
It was always a crap shoot when I ran into folks I’d served with or knew through military channels. Some didn’t think those of us in the LGBTQIA+ community should serve. It never made sense to me. I had as much to fight for as any other person in the US.
I stuck out my hand to shake the speaker’s. “Jericho Hess. I met your brother when we were both assigned to a training op. He was our team leader. Nice talk you gave in there.”
“Lawry Schatz. I noticed you at the back of the room. It’s kinda hard not to notice a guy carrying an extra leg.”
I cracked up. “Yeah, I’d reckon so. Anyway, I’d like to take you up on that drink, but I need to get home. I live in Davidsonville, and I’ve got some horses waitin’ on me. Are you here on Army business?”
“I’m on the East Coast to be a godfather for a buddy of mine. He and his husband are adopting a little girl,” Lawry said.
“That’s nice. You got any kids?” I glanced at Hank, who smiled.
“Got a boy. He and my husband are waiting for me in North Carolina with the rest of the crew. My former CO, Dr. Ramona Hawkins, asked if my brother would come give that talk to... uh...” Hank’s face flushed.
“To us drunks?” I chuckled.
I was sure people who didn’t have problems with liquor like Lawry and me were steppin’ on their tongues when they talked about alcoholism. It was nobody’s fault we tried to solve our problems with liquor. Nobody to blame but us.
I appreciated hearing about Lawry’s experiences. I went through something similar, though I pretty much hid in the mountains of Pennsylvania in a buddy’s cabin for two years, trying to drink myself to death after I got outta the hospital.
“Look, I went through something similar to your brother. My mom got a message to me through my shrink at Walter Reed that my dad was sick, so I figured the time for pouting was over and took my sorry ass home. My father died a week before I got to Davidsonville, and after we buried him, Mom talked me into going to rehab because someone had to take over the business since every penny they had was tied up in it.”
And here I was sharing my dirty laundry in front of the administration building of the hospital where I did my four months of rehab.
I no longer had an issue with sharing at the AA meetings I attended at the Faith Lutheran Church in Davidsonville on Tuesday nights.
I’d made mistakes. If telling the details to strangers helped someone else, I’d never be ashamed of my past.
Lawry clapped me on the shoulder. “Good for you. Anyway, what did you do in the Army, if you don’t mind telling me?”
Hank chuckled. “My brother never served. I think he likes to torture himself with hearing about the shit we used to get up to.”
“Keep going, and the story I tell your husband will be so much worse than the truth, I swear. You’ll be sleeping in Raleigh’s Jon boat by the time I get done with you.” Lawry swiped at his brother’s hair and a mini wrestling match ensued for a second.
“Dude, Reed will glue your pecker to your leg by the time I get done telling him about having to roust you out of a dive motel with a sexy soldier.”
Hank looked at me, and I held up my hands. The last thing I wanted was someone’s jealous husband gunning for me.
After another few seconds, I had to break them apart. “Fellas, I hate to break this up, but I need to get going. It was good to see ya, Hank, and good to meet you, Lawry. Thanks for your encouragement. I appreciate it.”
I reached for my wallet and pulled out a business card, handing it to Hank. “If you’re back this way again, I’d love to sit with you while you have a beer and relive the old days. We didn’t get to work together nearly enough when we served.”
They calmed down and we shook hands. I hurried back to my truck to get on the road. Running into Hank Schatz had reminded me that it truly was a small world.
By the time I got to bed that night, my thoughts returned to seeing my Army buddy.
It sounded like he had a good life with a husband and son, and the fact that they had friends who were also under the rainbow made me smile.
I had no friends in my little corner of Davidsonville, but maybe there was hope I’d find some?
“Jeri! Phone!”
Sunday morning, Mom was fresh from church and headed toward the pen in her fancy dress and low-heeled sandals, causing me to nearly have a heart attack that she’d fall down the hill.
“Hold your head still, little boy.” I was trying to get a halter on a colt whose momma I was boarding at our place.
Miss Fancy Red, a beautiful sorrel mare, was a top earner in hunter-jumper circles.
The little guy had been a surprise to the woman who owned the mare, and she wasn’t happy about little Fancy Red Thunder.
I’d suggested I keep the pair at our place for free until the colt was weaned, and then she could take her mare, and I’d keep the colt.
We were both thrilled with the arrangement, and I happily exercised her mare twice a day to get her back into AQHA championship show shape before the end of October.
I released my hold on Thunder and hurried out the gate with the halter over my shoulder, heading toward Mom. “Stay there before you fall. Who is it?”
The hill from the house to the barn and attached open-air riding ring had a few gopher holes, and I was afraid my mother would step in one and break her leg. She was sixty-eight—I’d been a change-of-life baby for her and my father—and I didn’t want her to get hurt.
“It’s a Mr. Schatz. I never heard of him.” She shrugged as she handed me my cell, which I’d left charging on the kitchen counter.
It tickled my brain for a second until I remembered seeing First Sergeant Hank Schatz a week ago at Walter Reed. “Oh, I’ll explain it later.” I took the phone from her and unmuted it. “This is Jericho.”