15. Jay
Chapter fifteen
Jay
5 th SEPTEMBER, 2026
“Where’s Caleb?”
“Who’s Caleb?”
I growl.
“Sergeant Caleb Dalton. He was by my side the entire mission. Where is he?”
The woman—a nurse, I think—twists her expression into something I don’t understand. I don’t think I like it.
“Let me find out for you.”
I don’t see her again.
The following morning, Doctor Pink-Face clears his throat noisily as he adjusts the machine pumping some kind of drug into my arm.
“I’m sorry, Sergeant Bevan. We just got word. Sergeant Dalton didn’t make it.”
PRESENT DAY
“It’s funny—when you go out there, you know even before you set foot on the transport that you’ll be coming home incomplete. As a unit, not everyone will make it back. Maybe not all of you will make it back. I mean, shit, my leg nearly didn’t. But when you leave, it’s still euphoric—because you’re alive . You made it.
“But so many didn’t, and it’s—that’s the hard part. The hardest part. Because so many didn’t. Some of them, they didn’t even last a fucking day. My best friend, Caleb… he didn’t make it. He died that day. When I got hurt.”
Caleb and I stood shoulder to shoulder as we completed basic training. We joined the regiment together. We jumped together hundreds of times. He and I crawled through mud, water and fire together. Only, the last time we did—well, it really was the last. He didn’t survive the explosion that rocked the jeep that day. It’s a fucking miracle I did, and that my leg was still attached. I shouldn’t have survived. But I did. And as I hung there, upside down, pinned in place and resigned to burning alive, I found myself covered in my best friend’s blood, and crying for the one thing I wanted more than anything else in the world in that moment: my mum.
Katy’s silence is a patient one. I haven’t been able to get the words out until now, choked and frozen in the memories that flash behind my eyes. We ordered pizza earlier, but I could only manage to nibble at the crusts before my body felt too full, too heavy, too overwhelmed by a bone-deep exhaustion that had me falling asleep for several hours.
When I woke, Katy was reading something on her e-reader that had a pretty smile curling her lips. Now, she watches me intently from the other end of her sofa. The blanket she tucked around my legs hours ago is still there. We’re in her living room, the string lights bathing the late afternoon in a kind of glow that feels like a warm hug. Everything about this room feels like Katy . It’s small, but it’s cosy, with bookshelves built into alcoves on either side of an electric fireplace. They’re stacked to the brim with books and ringed with glowing string lights.
It’s pretty, it’s warm, it’s comfortable. Katy’s big brown eyes pin me with a stare somewhere between sadness and longing, but, to my surprise, not pity. There’s never pity on her face, even when I’m recounting my darkest days, the days I didn’t know whether I’d make it to lunchtime. When I didn’t know if I’d survive the next hour.
And there were days like that. There were a lot of them. Those are the days that haunt me when I close my eyes, the ones that wake me in the middle of the night in a cold sweat. They’re the days that dog me at every turn. The ones I can’t shake, no matter how far I remove myself from my former life.
It’s like this all-consuming monster, this enormous, dark shadow, following me everywhere. To physio appointments. To the gym. To the supermarket. Fucking hell, it even follows me to take a fucking leak. It’s always there, lurking in my periphery, just far enough out of sight and out of reach that I can almost forget.
Almost.
Until there’s a loud noise, or something moves too fast, or too slow, or there’s a particular smell, or I get a flash of that strange, metallic taste in my mouth, or something feels too hot on my skin, or I’m in a crowd, or I’m asleep and reliving my worst days in my nightmares. It’s exhausting, never knowing when the shadow will engulf me. Never knowing if this time, when I break, I’ll break someone else with me.
“Have you… have you ever talked to anyone about it?” She brings a lidded jar to her lips and sips at her water. Her pink lipstick leaves a perfect stain on the straw.
“I’m talking to you.”
It’s the first time I’ve said any of it out loud to anyone. It’s not exactly something I want to relive. They might have been the best times of my life—full of camaraderie and brotherhood—but they were the worst, too. Full of terror. Fear. Loss. So much loss.
They’re the days I’ll take with me to the grave, biting my tongue until it bleeds before I’ll tell a soul of the terrible things I’ve seen. The things I’ve done. The things that haunt my waking moments just as much as the sleeping ones. I know my response is cheap and evasive, but I don’t want to trauma dump on some shrink who’ll either tell me to man up and get over it, or drug me until my emotional response is a flat line. And I don’t want to do it to Katy, either.
But Katy never judges me. Even when she probably should. Her eyes harden, and I know what she’s about to say before she says it.
“Not really what I meant, Bevan. I think you know that.”
There it is.
“No, I haven’t seen a shrink.”
She sighs and places her glass on the coffee table, unfolding her legs and hugging her knees to her chest instead.
“It doesn’t have to be a shrink. There are plenty of people you can talk to—people who specialise in supporting people like you. People who’ve been through the absolute worst things humanity can do. People who’ve come out the other side. There are groups. Therapists. It doesn’t have to be a shrink.”
“Maybe I’ll think about it,” I say, noncommittally. I know I won’t. It’s not who I am. It’s not who any of us are. We’re stiff upper lip, hyper-masculine, no-emotion kinds of guys. But when my agreement placates Katy, and a small, sad smile lifts the corners of her pink-painted lips, I start to wonder if maybe there’s something to be said for talking to a professional.
“Good,” she says, smoothing out an imaginary wrinkle in her leggings. “I think it would be good for you. Helpful.”
“You think so, huh?” I raise an eyebrow in her direction and her eyes catch mine, clouding with something—maybe concern, maybe fear. My stomach dips and clenches uncomfortably.
“Not—Jay, not like that. You know I have no idea what you’re going through. Only what you’ve told me. But—”
“Relax, Princess,” I say with a quiet chuckle. I lean forward to nudge her ankle. “I know what you meant. I’ll think about it, okay?”
Katy offers me a small nod and a tight smile. I can’t face the sadness in her eyes, the way I can see her feeling the pain that should be mine and mine alone to carry, so I change the subject.
“Wanna watch a movie?”
Katy’s smile grows, and she shakes her head almost imperceptibly as she reaches for the TV remote.
“Time for the important conversation then, I guess. What’s your favourite film?”
I smile, and I think it’s a real one this time. It feels as real as the words that poured out of me, the ones I tried to hold back. I use the smile to cover them all. We launch into an argument over which Pixar movie is superior. Clearly, it’s Toy Story , although Katy swears it’s Ratatouille , and even though it’s been one hell of a day, and I’m absolutely exhausted, right down to my bones, there’s a part of me that wants to stay up all night and talk about movies with Katy.