“Sir,” she snaps, her tone dripping with sarcasm. “I told you because I wanted you to know you’re not the only survivor on this planet.”
Her words land like slaps. Fast. Brutal. No room to dodge.
“Just because I came from money and you didn’t doesn’t mean you get to make snarky comments or assumptions.” Her eyes are lit with something between fury and pain, and she doesn’t blink. “At least you had a choice. No one forced you to join the army. I didn’t have that luxury.”
She turns sharply, like she can’t stand to look at me a second longer. Her hand moves with practiced precision—finger in themeter, click, blood. I watch the drop bead on her skin, bright red and fresh, a reminder that her body has become a battlefield, too.
“You think I like doing this?” she says, spinning around and shoving her finger in my direction, blood still wet. “And the fact that I have to do this for the rest of my life? Sucks.”
I don’t know what to say. I just stare at her back, muscles tense under the fabric of her shirt, shoulders tight with years of holding everything in. Guilt floods me—slow at first, then all at once. My stomach twists. She’s right. I have judged her. We have both been sizing each other up like enemies when really… we’re bleeding from the same kind of wounds.
Her voice cuts through the silence again, sharper this time. “And you’re being kind of hypocritical.”
She turns to face me, eyes locked on mine, and the way she holds her mouth—lips pressed together, jaw trembling slightly—tells me she’s been waiting to say this.
“I’ve heard you scream at night. So if getting help is so easy, why don’t you do it?”
Silence stretches tight between us.
There’s no hiding here. Not anymore. Just her pain. My shame. And the uneasy truth hanging heavy in the space we both keep trying to fill with sarcasm and distance.
“I have gotten help, but the drugs they put me on made me feel worse, so I stopped going because talking to a psychiatrist didn’t help. It only made me feel like a science project being dissected and studied.”
I see her shoulders shake a little.
“What’s so funny?”
“Nothing, just never had anyone compare counseling to being dissected.” I see her take a needle and inject it in her arm, and I never realized how much diabetics have to do just to survive, but this must be minuscule compared to what she’s had to do to survive since she was thirteen. I could relate in a sense, though. When Dax and I were kidnapped, we had to eat crickets to survive until we were found, since we went missing for six days.
“It’s been great talking with you, but I need to go get groceriesand learn to cook shit I’ve never cooked before, then head to work with a fucking smile on my face since this is s my life now.”
She snatched her purse off the hook with one hand, the strap catching briefly on the corner before she yanked it free. Loco immediately trotted after her, his little nails tapping the floor like a frantic metronome.
“If you don’t mind feeding Loco and letting him out while I’m gone, I’d appreciate it, honey,” she tossed over her shoulder, already halfway through the door. It slammed behind her with more force than necessary.
“Wait,” I called, grabbing my keys off the counter, heart ticking faster. “We need to go to the base to show them our marriage license to get your medical card to show the pharmacist. We were supposed to do that today.”
She came to a halt halfway down the driveway, exhaling hard as she turned back to face me. “Are you serious? I can’t just show them my regular ID?”
I shook my head, shoulders tense. “No, unfortunately not.”
She let out a groan, deep and frustrated, dragging her hands down her thighs. “Okay, c’mon, soldier.”
She marched over to the motorcycle like she was on a mission. I watched her swing one leg over and drop onto the seat with a casual confidence that made it impossible not to stare.
“Don’t you want to take the truck since you’re going grocery shopping?” I asked, half-hoping she’d change her mind.
She didn’t even glance back. “Nah, another fact about me: I prefer to ride motorcycles or convertibles. Not a fan of dark windows and enclosed transportation.” The engine roared to life beneath her like it answered to her moods.
I felt a warm little body settle against my ankle. Loco sat beside me, ears perked, eyes locked on the road like he was waiting for her to come back. When she finally disappeared around the bend, he looked up at me with those round, too-big-for-his-head eyes. Even though I wasn’t much for small dogs, I had to admit—he was kind of adorable.
I bent down, scooped him up, and ran my hand over his tiny head.
“Your mom is one crazy chic.” Loco barked once, sharp and clear, like he knew exactly what I meant.
After I left the military base, I headed to the restaurant early, hoping work would clear my mind, but my thoughts were a storm I couldn’t shut off. I sat in my office, hunched over the numbers, inventory reports stacked beside me like they held answers I couldn’t find. Veal, lamb shank, chicken pasta—they were doing well, but nothing consistent. I rubbed my hands over my face, the roughness of my palms dragging across my skin as I leaned back, exhausted. Every idea I came up with felt like a dead end.
Melanie’s confession echoed in my head, pounding against every wall I’d built to keep focused. The pressure behind my eyes was growing, and I wanted a drink more than a solution to our cost margins. That tight, charged feeling in my chest—the same one I used to feel before going out on a mission—was back. I hated it. I craved it. I tried to block the image, but it kept clawing back in—Melanie as a kid, scared, trapped, violated. Bile crept up my throat, burning. I swallowed it down hard.
