Chapter 57
Gabriella
“Alright, ladies, all packed and ready to go?” I’m trying to keep my voice light so I don’t give anything away, but Kerri still hasn’t said anything to us about Europe, and we’re running out of time.
I know she doesn’t think she’s leaving without saying anything, then telling us over the phone or some shit while she’s in another country.
Last night, when Vic came upstairs and told me about the conversation with Trip, two things crossed my mind: one, I’m so freaking proud of Trip, and two, I’m going to strangle my mother.
“Are you going to say something to her?” Vic asks as he leans over and kisses my temple.
“Yeah, but we have three hours until their flight leaves. When do you want to do it?”
“Kerri!” Vic yells, “No time like the present, right?” All I can do is roll my eyes.
For a guy with so much tactical training, he’s got zero tact when dealing with his daughters…
Well, I can’t say zero, but sometimes he just announces the elephant in the room and expects everyone else to be ready to talk about it.
Ty and Emma chuckle at Vic’s forwardness. “Well, looks like it’s time for us to make ourselves scarce, my Little Fireball.” Ty smacks Emma on the ass, starting to walk out of the kitchen toward the living room.
“Not so fast, Mr. Harris.” Emma’s smirk emphasizes her sass. Ty turns around with an arched eyebrow, “We have to say goodbye to the girls.”
Kerri and Abby come downstairs into the kitchen. Abby bounds with excitement, and Kerri walks in, somber and reserved. “Did you guys hear me ask if you were ready and packed?”
“Yep, all packed!” Abby grabs a bunch of grapes out of the bowl on the counter and plucks one with her teeth. A look of confusion passes over her face as she chews, “But our flight isn’t for another three hours.”
“I know, sweetie, but we have to be there super early for an international flight, so we’ll head out in about thirty minutes. Did you finish all of your assignments for the last week of classes you’re going to miss?”
“Yes, ma’am!’ Abby snaps her feet together and gives me a salute with a chuckle. Smart-ass.
Sometimes I can’t help but grin when that girl’s sass shines so brightly.
I look over to Kerri, a smile still on my face, “Kerri, are you all packed?” She nods at me, standing in the corner of the kitchen.
She’s leaning against the counter with her arms crossed, and the hood of a giant hoodie I’ve never seen, pulled up over her head.
“Good. Abby, will you grab your sister’s bags and put both of your bags in the car so we can head out, then you can hang out for a bit?
Your father and I need to talk with Kerri for a minute. ”
Abby’s eyes doubled in size, “Ooooo.”
“Abby.” Vic scolds.
“Okay, okay, I’m going.” She turns, bounding out of the kitchen, but stops next to Kerri, “If you don’t make it, can I have your make-up and shoe collection?”
“Girl, you better go do what your mama told you to do before it’s you sitting here, havin’ a talk!” Emma hollers from the corner of the kitchen, Ty standing behind her, his arms wrapped around her waist and his chin on her shoulder.
Abby rolls her eyes and skips out of the room, “Good luuuck.” She sing-songs on her way out.
Kerri blinks slowly, takes in a breath, and blows out through parted lips, then opens her eyes, coming to the island. She grabs a seat and props her forearms on the counter, bracing for impact.
“You have something to tell us, K?” Ty’s the one who speaks first. Kerri flicks her eyes up to Ty, then over to Vic, then to me.
Kerri shrugs her right shoulder, “I dunno, did Trip tell you something?”
Vic’s jaw ticks, “Kerri, lose the attitude. This is about you, not Trip.” Kerri looks down at her hands. “Baby girl, talk to us. Please.” Vic’s voice softens with his plea.
“I’m taking a year off before starting school.” She spits the words out rapidly, squeezing her eyes shut, bracing for whatever reaction she’s been expecting.
“Okay,” is my response. Her eyes snap open, and she shoots me and Vic a look of confusion.
“Okay?” She asks.
“Okay,” Vic repeats. “Can you explain your reasoning?” Vic’s voice is calm and welcoming. God, I love this man. Kerri runs her hands through her hair and shares her thoughts.
After Kerri finally came clean and explained everything to me and Vic, we agreed with her reasoning and respected her choice. I also gave my mom a call and worked out all the details, after which we dropped the girls off at the airport for their summer in Greece with Grandma Lola.
With plans for Vic and me to meet Ty and Emma out for dinner, I run upstairs to change my clothes.
I’m feeling a bit nostalgic and cuddly, so I try to find my favorite shirt of Vic’s that I used to constantly wear to bed.
It used to drive him crazy, so I’m hoping wearing it out of the house, where he can’t do anything about it, will get him revved up for later.
I finally find the shirt in the back of the drawer under a stack of other shirts. “Gotcha!” Pulling it out with a swift tug, the shirt and something white come flying out of the drawer. As I hold the shirt high in victory, like a total weirdo, I see the item on the ground at my feet.
I pause for a moment. Maybe I should just put that back in the drawer. I mean seems like Vic had it buried in there for a reason, right?
Shifting from foot to foot, I contemplate my options. After about a minute of self-debating, I decide. We said no more secrets, right? I’ll just take a peek.
I kneel down, sitting back on my haunches, and grab the item.
When I unfold the paper, I see that it’s a white envelope with the words To a Stranger scrolled across the front.
Shit, this is Vic’s letter from the night at Emma and Ty’s when they had us each write two letters.
That night, I read the letter I wrote about me, and Vic read his letter he wrote about me, but we never got to the letters about him.
Another minute of debating with myself has me checking the closed bedroom door for any sign of Vic coming up the stairs. I take another deep breath and open the letter.
Hey Stranger,
I’m not really sure what I’m doing with this letter, but I feel like my marriage depends on it, so here goes nothing.
I’m supposed to tell you the truth about who I am, so here it is. I am a monster.
You may think that’s an exaggeration, but I promise you, it’s not.
I spent the better part of 17 years in another country while my amazing wife took care of our home, birthed our two beautiful daughters, went to school, and worked a job that she loved but still burned her out.
All the while I was living in deserts, jungles, and cities, doing what soldiers like me do.
I know you’re probably thinking, well, Vic, you couldn’t help that.
You couldn’t help missing the births of your children, you couldn’t help not being there for your wife when she slept alone so many nights in your bed.
It’s also not your fault that you distanced yourself from your family because you were scared of the person you’d become.
The thing is, it is my fault. At least some of it is.
I guess I could give you a bit more context.
You see, when someone like me is deployed, there’s a feeling of freedom.
A sense of relief, if you can believe that.
When someone like me is deployed, we focus on three things: eating, sleeping, and staying alive.
Even though it’s a dangerous one, it ends up being a pretty simple life.
In the grand scheme of things, being an adult is hard.
Life is complicated and messy. But not on deployment, especially when someone like me has a superwoman, like Gabbi, at home.
I was sad and disappointed, and you can probably add a little bit of guilt-ridden, when I missed the birth of our beautiful babies, but there was a small amount of relief, too.
That relief was because I didn’t know how to handle the situation.
I couldn’t stand to see my wife in pain.
I also didn’t know the first thing about being a dad. It’s not like I had a great role model.
Then I came home, and Gabbi had everything under control.
It turns out she didn’t need me anyway. I ended up just being an extra person in the way.
I mean, for the first 10 years, I just slipped back into the role of husband, lover, and dad.
As well as I could, at least. But then the deployments became more dangerous, to the point where I had blood on my hands.
I had taken lives so that my team and I could return to ours, but it was like each battle, each life, took me further away from what I loved.
Even with all that, I still found it easier to be deployed than to be at home.
I missed my queen and our babies every fucking day, don’t mistake that, but bills, school, soccer practice, dinner, work schedule, school drama, teachers, house cleaning, laundry, grocery shopping…
fuck…grocery shopping alone made me want to run and hide.
Do you realize how many choices there are for goddamn cereal?
The first deployment I returned from after Kerri was born, I tried to go grocery shopping to take some responsibility off Gabbi.
I had a fucking panic attack in the middle of the cereal aisle.
Can you believe that? A grown ass man who just returned from one of the most dangerous regions in Iraq, who barely made it out alive, can’t even pick out a goddamn box of fucking cereal.
I left the cart in the middle of the store and bolted to my truck.
I couldn’t face Gabbi, so after about an hour of hyperventilating in my truck, I stopped this older woman who pulled up in an old Chevy pickup truck with veteran license plates and asked if she could help me.
This woman was a fucking angel. She just looked at me, and I think she knew.
She took my grocery list and money, and she bought it all.
I showed up at the house with groceries, and Gabbi never knew the difference.
Her smile was so big when I got home, I felt like crowing, but at the same time, I felt like a fraud.
I couldn’t tell her, though. I couldn’t let her see how weak her husband was.
All I could do to save my girls from the weak monster I had become was to distance myself.
I pulled away from touching my wife after I nearly strangled her during some kind of PTSD episode, at least that’s what the doc called it.
I pulled away from my daughters when I saw how happy they were with their mother, and me out of the picture.
At this point, you’re probably wondering if I even love my family.
The answer is an easy hell yes. Every time I left them, a small piece of my soul died.
My wife is my soulmate, and combined with the girls, they’re my heart.
They are the reason I wake up and get out of bed every day.
Then why separate myself? Why let my demons win?
Because sometimes it’s hard to pull away.
For people like me, in the places I’ve been, there were times when my demons were the only things keeping me alive.
With all that said, I’m still selfish enough not to let Gabbi go. All I can do now is hope that she never finds out the monster I truly am, or at least hope that she’ll forgive me when she does.
Respectfully,
A hopeful man who doesn’t deserve a prayer.
Vic
Tears are in a steady stream down my face, and silent sobs rack my body. This is what he thinks about himself? Jesus, I can’t even…I don’t…fuck, I can’t even form a thought. My heart hurts, like my ribs are closing in around it.
Knock. Knock.
I hear the door open and quickly turn my face away. I know it’s Vic. I smoosh the letter under my shin, so he won’t see it, and try to control my breathing.
“Hey, baby, you almost…Gabbs?” He must have seen my face. Shit. “Hey, Rockstar, what’s going on?” Vic makes his way over to me and sinks down next to me on the floor.
Fuck, what do I say? After a stretch of silence, I look to his face and shrug my shoulders, “I’m just sad that the girls are gone for the summer and Kerri’s gonna be gone for a year.” I huff a fake laugh, hoping he buys me laughing at my ridiculousness.
Vic’s eyes crinkle at the sides when his lips tug into a small smile, “Oh, baby, come’ere.
” He wraps his arms around me, and I sink into him, absorbing all the heat and comfort he has to offer.
This feels so good, especially after the words I just ingested.
I know now that I can’t tell him about what happened at home during his last deployment; he would never be able to forgive me, or himself.
I rub my hand on Vic’s arm wrapped around me, “I’ll be fine, I’m just being silly. I’ll be right down.” I turn my head, looking over my shoulder at him, and give him a small smile.
“You sure, G? We don’t have to go anywhere.” I love that he doesn’t push me.
“No, I want to go out. I’m okay, I promise.” Smiling, I nod in encouragement for him to believe me. Vic skates his eyes over my face. I can tell he knows I’m not telling the whole truth, but he nods back at me anyway, kissing me on the top of my head before he stands and walks out of the room.