She felt his hand enclose around hers. “I know you do. Ashleigh…I love you so much that it scares me. Everything I do, I have you in mind. Even when I changed my mission, I was thinking about you. You have to take care of yourself AND our baby. Because I don’t know what I’d do without either of you. I only just found out about the baby and already…I…” He took a deep breath. “Don’t ever lie to me again.” She gave him a surprised look.
“I—”
“A few months ago your blood sugar level was high. I asked you what you’d eaten. You lied to me Ashleigh, and you didn’t tell me about the two candy bars that you’d gotten out of the vending machine.”
Her face turned red. “How--?”
“I saw. Don’t ever lie to me.”
Her eyes glistened. “I wasn’t trying to be sneaky. I mean--I just didn’t want you to think you had a girlfriend that was such a pig that she couldn’t even control herself-”
He pulled her into his arms. He was angry, and he was scared and unsure but he was also sorry that he’d made her cry. He felt her wipe away her tears and then she held him. “I don’t care if you’re big…I fell in love with that big girl, okay?” She nodded her head. “And you have an eating disorder. It’s not going to go away on its own. You don’t have to do it by yourself, Sweetheart. There’s medicine for the anxiety, or whatever you want to do. But I’m going to stand by you, okay?”
She nodded. “I won’t lie to you about anything.” She looked up, still holding him. “That was our first fight.”
He nodded. “Yeah. Can we make that our last?”
She nodded earnestly. “Yes.”
“Ashleigh, don’t get mad but your mother has blonde hair and light colored eyes and…well are you trying to look like her?” Ashleigh didn’t speak. “I mean, you don’t have to, not for me, not unless you just want to. But honestly, I’d rather see your brown eyes and…um…I have no idea what your real hair is like since you…you know…wax.”
Her mouth parted and her cheeks reddened. “Okay. You want me to…grow out my hair…in both places.”
He nodded slowly.
She smiled. “Yeah. Okay, I’ll do that.”
~***~
Sunday at his folks was a celebration; of his return, of their pregnancy and of their engagement. He was pleasantly surprised when he learned that Ashleigh had been coming to visit each Sunday, even without him. He was equally surprised when she stayed in the kitchen with the ladies and he walked in for another soda and saw Ashleigh and Alma whispering and giggling at the sink.
He couldn’t have been more pleased. The only drawback is that he wasn’t able to rough house with the kids.
At dinner his father stared at him while chewing on roast beef. He leaned into his mother. “Am I supposed to know who that is with the bandages, mother?”
His mother placed a patient hand on his arm. “That’s Christopher. He’s gone and gotten reconstruction surgery.”
His father’s eyes grew sad. He blinked back tears and looked away. “I never forgave myself for not having the money to get you the surgery you needed, Christopher. I’ve always wished that I could have traded places with you, son. Watching you in pain…” The older man swallowed.
“Daddy…” Christopher’s voice was deep with emotion. “I never once blamed you or anybody else. I…I guess I think like you and I feel that I would have gladly taken the burden on myself before I’d see any of you carrying it. God just gave me my wish.”
Alma sighed and looked away, swallowing back her tears. But she reached out and clutched Christopher’s hand in hers while Ashleigh gave his other hand a brief squeeze.
On the drive home she noted that he was very quiet and thoughtful.
“What’s wrong, baby?”
He glanced at her as he drove. “I just…”
“What?” She touched his hand and he moved it from the steering wheel and held her smaller one.
“I wonder if I’ll have the guilt that my Dad has if our child…” He couldn’t even say the words.
“If our baby has a cleft palate we’ll have the money and knowledge to get it corrected.” She said softly.
He nodded. “Even…even when it’s fixed there is still so much stigma. The scars are sometimes very visible. What if we have a little girl and—”
Ashleigh squeezed his hand firmly. “We’re going to teach our children that beauty is on the inside.”
He paused at the word children. “You…want to have more with me?”
When Ashleigh didn’t answer he glanced at her. She was staring at him in anger. “If you don’t know the answer to that then you really don’t know how much I love you.” She made to withdraw her hand from his but he captured it quickly. He brought it to his lips and kissed her through his bandages.
“I’m learning, sweetheart. Just…please be patient with me. It’s hard to undo a lifetime of insecurities.”
She gave him a solemn look. “I know.”
Later that night he held Ashleigh’s sleeping form in his arms. He was having a much harder time sleeping. Tomorrow neither he nor Ashleigh would go into work. They were going to drive down to Ft. Campbell Kentucky in order to arrive for his noontime appointment to have the stitches removed from his lips and his bandages changed. Then after that he wanted to face Bruce.
He’d called earlier and found that his Commander had been moved from ICU. There had been an explosion; the details were sensitive but Christopher thought he could figure it out pretty easily. When you gave arms to people that had never received formal training, you really had no idea of the outcome. Sometimes a frightened civilian didn’t want to tell you that he didn’t understand…friendly fire was the risk of helping to develop another country’s military force.
He tried to pretend to be upbeat for the drive down. He and Ashleigh talked about the type of wedding they’d have and they made plans to sale her condo and what pieces she would store and what items she’d bring to his house. She desperately wanted to move into his welcoming home.
They made good time and met with the doctor who would be in charge of taking care of his surgical issues from now on. Dr. Singh was young, pleasant and very knowledgeable. Christopher and Ashleigh took to him immediately.
When he began unwrapping the bandages Ashleigh sat on the end of her chair, hoping to get a peek of his face. But no such luck. Christopher wore a mask beneath the gauze that resembled a ski mask and all she could see were his eyes, his lips and a shock of messy red hair poking up from the top.
His lips were angry and swollen and he did look a lot like someone had gone crazy with the silicone injection needle. Black threads poked through his flesh and when the doctor began tugging at them Ashleigh had to leave the room in order to be sick.
When she was able to return she gave Christopher an apologetic grin. He was already re-wrapped in gauze but this time there wasn’t quite so much. The doctor left his hair at the top uncovered and Ashleigh couldn’t stop staring at Christopher’s unruly locks. He had curly hair! She would have never guessed since he’d always worn it shorn to almost non-existence. The doctor put salve on his bruised lips and then the final layers of gauze covered that as well.
Dr. Singh informed them that they could return next week for the big reveal. Then the two of them made their way to the Commander’s room. Christopher grew quiet and Ashleigh gripped his hand.
“Babe, I’m going to wait in the waiting area while you visit with him.” Christopher nodded and leaned forward to brush his bandaged lips against her cheek.
“I won’t be long.”
“No, take your time. I’ll be right here.”
He nodded and headed down the short corridor to his Commander’s room. He knocked once and received a gruff response.
“Come in.”
Christopher opened the door and looked at his Commander and friend.
“Beast.” The older man said. “Come in.”
“How’d you know it was me?”
Bruce scowle
d. “Who the hell else would it be? Nearly seven feet tall with a bandaged face…”
Christopher entered and closed the door. He was having a hard time breathing as he took in Bruce’s injuries. He had a bandage similar to Christopher’s covering half of his face. He was banged up pretty good; black and blue. But that wasn’t the worst of it.
His friend had lost his arm.
Bruce watched where Christopher was staring and then he looked at the stump that ended below his left elbow.
“It was my left, thank god.” The older man extended his elbow curiously. “Still feels like it’s there.” He met Christopher’s eyes. “The kid was just holding the grenade. He fucking froze. I yanked it from him but I knew I wouldn’t have time to get rid of it. I watched it leave my hands and I thought, ‘just a little bit further…’ then I saw my fingers disappear.” Bruce sighed. “Not sure why they had to take half my arm. I still had my hand…” He shrugged and looked at Christopher. “I lost my hearing on my left side. Got it back on the right-”
“Commander, I’m so sorry-” Christopher choked.
“I’m not your Commander anymore. Just Bruce.”
Christopher looked down and swallowed past the lump in his throat. “This is my fault.”
Bruce scowled. “No.”
“You were doing the job that I should have been doing-”
“Yeah. And? You’re twenty-five years old. You got your life before you.” Bruce sighed and looked away. He finally turned back to the younger man. “Listen to what I’m saying to you and then I never want to talk about this again.”
Christopher met his eyes curiously.
“I fucked up, okay? I fucked up. I handed that kid live ammo without making sure he knew what the hell I was telling him. I treated him like I treated you men; as if he knew what the hell he was doing. My attitude…it was my own fault, okay? I know you wouldn’t have made the same mistake. I watch you with people. So I know you wouldn’t have made this mistake!”
Christopher straightened his posture. “Commander-”
“I’m not your Commander-”
“Sir, with all due respect, you will always be my Commander. You trained us in order to train others how to protect themselves. You did a damn good job at it sir. Without your training none of us would have been able to do this job for as long as we have. And sir, THAT was your job!” And had Christopher been there to do his job than he wouldn’t have had someone get injured doing it for him…and that was something that he would never forgive himself for.
Bruce was quiet for a very long time. And when he spoke again it was to ask about the ‘little trooper’. The two friends talked for a while longer, and each knew that they would never speak of what had caused Bruce’s injury to the other again.
Christopher would not be allowed to return to work for months but he planned to go in Tuesday. He had to face his team…his ex-team the way that he had faced Bruce.
~***~
“I don’t want you to go to the gym today.” Christopher said as he prepared Ashleigh’s protein drink early Tuesday morning.
She frowned. “Why? The doctor said that running on the treadmill won’t hurt the baby and the exercise is going to be good for me.”
He felt himself smile at the mention of the baby. He wondered if he would do that for the next seven months. He already felt like a proud father. He grew serious as he poured the drink into a glass instead of a thermos.
“I’m not going to lie to you. The guys aren’t going to be too happy with me. And I need to go and talk to them.”
She frowned in confusion. “Why? They were worried about you. They were going to help me find you.” She accepted the offered beverage and relished its frothy goodness. Kiwi, strawberries…spinach? She wasn’t quite sure. All she knew is that she missed his special concoctions.
He began cleaning up. Yeah, they wanted to find him alright. They knew he’d come to them. If there was any doubt than they would have already shown up at his door. He didn’t know how bad things would escalate and he wasn’t taking any chance of Ashleigh getting in the middle of things.
“Those are your friend’s, Christopher. They care about you. They won’t do anything to hurt you.” She frowned when he remained quiet. “They wouldn’t…hit you in your face would they? Christopher?”
He gathered her in his arms. “No. They are not going to hit me in my face.” He pressed his cheek to her forehead. “Now, I don’t want you to worry. If you want we can meet for lunch, how about that? Invite Kendra and Lance and we’ll all go out; my treat.”
She grinned. “Yeah?”
“Yeah. I’ll meet you guys in the lobby like before.”
She stood up on her tiptoes and kissed his bandaged lips. “Okay.”
Christopher dropped Ashleigh off at the front door of The Federal Building and then drove to the main office where he had to collect his personal items and fill out paperwork. He was done within the hour and then drove into the underground garage and parked in his normal spot. He still hadn’t decided on a new job, but he wasn’t allowed back to ‘work’ so he supposed that this would no longer be his parking spot. They would be hiring some other guy to replace him and this would be his spot.
He frowned.
He scanned in and wasn’t surprised when sixteen guys were waiting for him on the other side of the door. Security cameras…they worked both ways.
“Shit.” TK said. “What happened to you?”
Ashleigh hadn’t told them. Great. Maybe the bandages would bide him some time so that he could actually get a few words in before he got jumped by sixteen angry Marines…no sixteen angry Special Ops Marines.
“I had six surgeries to fix the problems with my face.”
There was prolonged quiet. “Oh.” Carlos said. “Wanted to be pretty for the girl-”
“Don’t go there.” Christopher said tightly. “I did it because I was sick and tired of not having a face.”
“Well we think you just wanted to cop out of the mission because you didn’t want to leave your girlfriend.” Lem said stepping forward.
So they’d chosen Lem to face him. They were the same height, roughly the same build and evenly matched…well except for the fact that Christopher couldn’t take a punch to the face.
He held up his hand. “Look. I came to talk to you guys, not to fight.”
“The Commander got hurt filling in for you!” Someone said.
“I know! I was down in Ft Campbell visiting him yesterday, so I know!”
“Then you know that he lost his arm,” TK said evenly, “and his career.”
“I know,” he said, calming down some. “We talked about it. That’s why I’m here.” He looked at each of the men. “The Commander told me that it wasn’t my fault-”
“Bull-!”
“I KNOW IT’S MY FAULT!” Christopher began to pace. “Bruce Koepke is my Commander, my friend, the father I lost to dementia…” He stopped pacing and faced the men. “And he’s the person that I owe my life to.” The Military had given Christopher’s life direction. But Bruce had given him a chance to be someone truly special. “I apologized to Bruce…and that’s between us. I didn’t come to talk about Bruce with any of you. I came here because I owe each and every one of you an apology and an explanation. And I mean to give it.” No one spoke and he continued.
“I met a girl and I fell in love. No different than any of you all have done; met a girl, got married, had kids. But there is one difference. Each of you made the decision to stay in Special Ops. I made a different decision. I made the decision to get out. I’ll deploy again and when I do I’ll go and serve my time. But I want off the roster for special assignments. I went to Bruce and told him that. I’m a Marine for life but not with the special forces; not anymore. He tried to talk me out of it but I told him, just like I’m telling you, I choose my life with Ashleigh over the missions. Period. End of story.
“Bruce okay’d it and told me to start putting in for other jobs.” Some of the guys
looked at each other. “I hadn’t found any,” Truth is, every time he’d think about not being able to look at the cameras to monitor his sweetheart, or not being able to personally protect the building that she worked in, he’d find an excuse to keep looking. He’d passed up many jobs that he would have surely qualified for and gotten but…