Field Duty
He who knows when he can fight and when he cannot will be victorious.
—SUN TZU,THE ART OF WAR
Weeks passed. Every Thursday I’d arrive to Lucas waiting for me, yards of space between us. He’d give me his information and refuse to engage if I tried to speak of anything else. In turn, I declined to listen to any points of information that might lead to his immediate demise, something that frayed his patience with each vanishing hour.
I wanted so badly for things to go back to how they were before we slept together. Strangely, I missed wrestling with him. I kept up my workouts in case he ever changed his mind, but each week I was sent on my way without even a lecture.
To keep from brooding, I took more medic shifts. Zara was thrilled when I agreed to sit down for a chat one afternoon. Westole a small area of the sparsely populated café, far from the riveted windows where cold air leaked through.
She handed me a cup of English breakfast tea and settled in the chair beside me, elbows on the table. “It has been too long.”
I chose to stare at the table instead of looking her in the eye. “Sorry. Been busy, I guess.”
“Oh? Have you made new friends?”
I thought of Lucas pinning me to the ground. Lucas throwing a knife at the door to keep me from leaving. Lucas doling out life advice like a mother hen.
Never look at what’s obvious, Sophia.
“Not really,” I said.
She smiled. “Well, time gets away from us sometimes, doesn’t it?”
“I can’t believe we’ve been dealing with years of this.”
Her smile dimmed. “It seems as if things are improving a little.”
I shrugged, and Zara shifted the conversation to happier subjects—the rookie medics she was training, the soldier who always hit on her, a new interest in sketching the oak tree just outside the quarantine house.
I asked questions, but was at a loss to volunteer anything from my own life. I had no new hobbies or interests, nothing to speak of that wasn’t top secret or debilitatingly depressing. She must have sensed my growing discomfort, because her hand squeezed mine where it lay listless on the table.
“I’m here for you, Sophia,” she said. “I hope you know that.”
My lips rolled between my teeth as I battled the tears that always sat so close to the surface. I stared at her hand atop mine. “Do you remember when you told me that sometimes you fall in love with the wrong person?”
In her silence, I glanced up. Her dark eyes sparked with interest, and she set her cup aside. “I do.”
“Do you think it’s possible to make yourself falloutof love?”
She studied my face as a crease deepened between her brows. “I’m not sure it’s a decision that can be consciously made.”
“But what if—what if it’s doomed? Like, there’s no chance for a happy ending?”
A short silence, and then, “Have you fallen in love, Sophia?”
I jerked my hand back. “No. It’s just theoretical.”
“I—”
“Reeves!” barked a voice outside our sphere.
I jumped and turned toward the stranger, hand pressed to my racing heart. A soldier stood near the café entrance in combat fatigues, the rank on his chest declaring him a Second Lieutenant, though I’d never seen him before.
I stood and saluted him. “Yes, sir?”
“New mission orders. You’re on rotation for field duty. Briefing in the rotunda in five.” He spun and left me gaping.
