“Are you okay?” She asks. I hear it, but my chest hurts so much I can’t form the words to tell her I am. That I have to be. I flip the blankets back off my legs and try to get upI need to get dressed,I think. One foot in front of the other.
I don’t get far. My legs feel like Jell-O, and my hands tangle into the sheets as my body gives way to the news.Get up, you have shit to do.I push off my feet, straightening my shaking legs. I feel Rhea reach for me, but I move to the dresser while she sits up on her knees and watches me move around in the dark.
“Brighton?” Her voice is like a siren song,Come back to bed, be sad here with me.I rub the tear that escapes me with the back of my hand and yank on the drawer so hard it snaps on its hinges. I pull out the massive lockbox, setting it on the top of the dresser, and pop it open.
My jaw grinds at the sight of my dog tags, the old ones, the ones that were replaced with what I wear now. Clean and not stained with my mistakes… but I push them aside for the envelope with my name on it. I take it out with my shaky hands, set it on the dresser, and start to find clean clothes.You need to get your dress blues pressed.I stare at the dark closet thinking about the last time I wore them, and a shudder runs through my body.
They reek of death.
Fuck.
I can hear her shuffle on the bed, and when I look back to the mattress, she’s gone. But I can’t be worried about whatever the hell she’s doing. I pull on a clean pair of jeans and dig through my dresser without care for a shirt.
I stuff the envelope in my back pocket without opening it, and my phone starts to vibrate again.Shit.
“Hello?” I answer.
“Major,” Landon says. He sounds just as exhausted as José did.
“You’re a coward for making him break the news to me.” I snap at him.
“We all have our faults, Bright,” he says, moving around in the background.
“He killed himself, didn’t he?” I ask, knowing that Landon is the only one who will be honest with me.
“Found out last week that Laura’s getting remarried,” he says. “The claws of despair are rough, kid.”
“You should have told me; I could have talked to him,” I say, not angry with Landon, but at the situation as a whole.
“Yeah, because you’re so forthcoming in a conversation.” He jokes, and I don’t laugh.
“I could have done something, made him feel not so alone,” I argue.
“We’re all alone, kid. That’s life,” he sounds different, like his years of therapy are chipping away.He’s sad, too, you asshole. Harvey was his friend.“He didn’t want to talk, Bright. He wanted to die, honor that.” It comes off Landon’s mouth as an order, and my body tightens subconsciously.
“I’m sick of honoring rules made to kill us,” I grumble, and the line goes quiet for a minute. “I have his funeral stuff, I’ll bring it by the church in an hour. I have to stop at the dry cleaner.”
“You know better than to let your blues get dusty, Major,” he scolds with a light tone.
“We’re lucky I didn’t burn them after the last time,” I say, my jaw tightening.
November
A few weeks after medical discharge
Six coffins.There should be seven.
My bones cried out to join them, six feet under.
Soon.
I’ve been shaking hands for the last two hours, completely checked out from my surroundings with the eerie feeling of being watched.You are being watched.The crutch under my arm burns my skin, and the collar of my dress clothes eats into my throat, desperate to strangle me.Let it.
I didn’t deserve to be standing here with these people.
Their families.
Grant, Noah, John, Wyatt, Penn, and Bennet shouldn’t be dead.
