"I’m okay. What’s going on? You’ve been in shock or something?"
Brett swallows hard and leans his head back against his seat then runs his hand through his hair. "That hasn’t happened in a long time."
"What?" I question. "An accident?"
"The collision must have triggered a flashback," he mutters. "Afghanistan. There was an armored enemy vehicle, it took out the hummerin front of me. It was a suicide bomber."
I take a minute to digest what he’s saying. I’ve been around other military vets, but haven’t spent a significant amount of time with them. I know it’s common to have flashbacks, but I didn’t know they came like this. "Are you okay now?" I ask him.
Brett looks around, seeing the trees a few feet from the front of the hood and then the other driver outside of his door. "Are you okay?" Brett asks the other guy.
"Yeah, yeah, man, I want to make sure you’re good."
Brett still seemed hyper-focused on whatever is going on in his head, but he steps out of the truck, holding onto the metal as if he needs an anchor. He circles the truck. "There isn’t much damage aside from the dent on the front bumper. We hit the snowbank," Brett tells the guy.
"The dent is from the plow. I’ll pay for the damage. I’m so sorry. I—I’ve been out cleaning the roads for two days straight now."
"It’s no problem. It’s metal," Brett says, soundingsurprisingly unaffected, given his mental state a moment earlier.
"Let me give you my information," the other driver says.
Brett eases back into his seat behind the wheel, first staring through the window, then looking over at me. "Are you sure you’re okay? You’re not hurt?"
"I’m completely fine," I tell him, holding out my arms to show there are no injuries.
Brett places his hand on my leg. "Melody, I’m sorry."
"It’s not your fault. You have nothing to be sorry about."
The guy comes back with his license, registration, and insurance information. Brett takes his phone from the cup holder and types the information into his notepad app. I watch for a moment before I offer to help.
Brett looks at me with tired eyes, and I ease the phone from his hand. "Here, let me take pictures of the information, and then I’ll take a few photos of the damage. Just take a few breaths.”
I’m never the calm one in situations like these, but I guess when someone needs me to be the calm one, I can step it up and handle things. Good to know. I make sure we have a few images of the man’s information, and I walk around the outside of the truck, snapping photos of Brett’s truck and the other guy’s license plate and truck.
"You sure he’s all right?" the driver says asks me.
"We’ll be okay. Thank you, though."
"I’m sorry again," the guy says, leaving with a nervous wave.
Brett pulls his door closed, and I resettle into my seat too. "I’m so so—" Brett tries to say again.
I cut him off, though. I don’t want him to feel anything but okay for himself right now. "Don’t say that, please.”
"I keep a lot buried inside," he says.
"I can’t imagine how much you’ve seen or been through, and I’m not judging you.”
Brett covers his hand over his eyes and shakes his head. "Damn," he says. “It’s been the one flashback I get most, and it got worse after finding out Parker’s Mom was killed when a grenade hit her vehicle. Sometimes, I confuse the two incidents as if Abby was in the hummer in front of me when I was deployed, and I was there watching. But she wasn’t there. She wasn’t killed for another three years."
"That’s a lot to carry around," I tell him. "I know I’ll never understand what you went through, but if you want to talk, I’ll listen."
Brett’s eyes are filled with evident pain as he peers over at me. "I try to talk about it, but the memories get stuck, and I can’t find the right words. Then I tell myself, it’s better not to rehash old wounds, and I bury it away again."
"I won’t pretend like I know how to help fix this because I’m sure everyone is different, but talking through some of the events through might release some of the pain. I don’t know, though, and I don’t want to ask you to say something you don’t want to. Just know I’m here if you want to talk." I didn’t consider the complexity of the life he’s lived over the last ten years. Knowing he’s held in so much makes me want to sit by his side and wait for him to talk. I wonder if he knew what he was getting himself into when he enlisted? I remember thinking it was such a noble act to join the military, and I didn’t think about what it entailed.
"Honestly, no one has offered to listen. I don’t expect anyone to want to hear gory details about the war. It was my decision to sign up, and I feel like it’s something I need to live with now, but thank you for offering to hear my story."
