“There’s something I should explain to you,” he said. “Can I show you something?”
He turned and walked back down the hall, disappearing into his bedroom. I sat on the edge of the sofa and thought about what had happened, what we’d both said.
I love you, Andrea. I have forages.
He came back a moment later, carrying something, then set it down on the low table between us and sat opposite.
It was the box I’d seen in his bedroom.
He opened the lid. Inside were a few things arranged neatly—a folded paper and a photograph. A small metallic disk with a ribbon tucked beneath it caught the light briefly before he turned it face down.
What was that—amedal?
He lifted the photograph.
“This is Samir,” he said. “He was ten in this one.”
The boy was smiling, one arm hooked possessively around Liam’s leg.
“He used to hang around the base,” Liam said. “He was a good kid. Clever. Liked anything with wires.”
I took the photo and studied it. Liam’s head was thrown back in a laugh. He was tanned, wearing fatigues, probably about twenty-six. It was creased around the edges, like it had been held a lot.
How many times had he looked atit?
“We were close,” he said quietly. “I tell myself it wasn’t my fault—”
His hands were shaking. I’d never seen that before.
“Liam—” My heart picked up.Was this what had been driving him all along? Not some abstract need to do good, but something specific and painful that had a little boy’s face onit?
He reached out and took the photo back from me.
“It’s all right. I know it wasn’t my fault, really. Technically. I get it. And they tell you that all the time in counseling, too. But the kid and I—” He breathed in deeply and looked at the floor. “He was just a really good kid, Andy. He trusted me. And when the explosion happened, he was looking for me, like I might be able to protect him—”
His voice broke.
Liam always wanted to protect those around him. It was who hewas.
“He ran to me, Andy. To me. When the bomb went off. And that’s why—”
I couldn’t imagine it. The pain. The guilt that didn’t belong to him, that he’d carried anyway. Was that why he’d been the way he had, after the RAF? Why he’d avoided relationships and getting close to anyone?
Could he just not bear to let anyone into the pain he’d been carryingalone?
After a minute he said, “This is where it started… I had this idea that if I couldn’t stop something bad, I could at least try to balance it. Like good things could somehow… make up for it.”
My eyes were stinging, and I reached out and took his free hand.
“But they don’t, Andy. The bad things are still bad. I just didn’t know what else to do with it. With the fact that he trusted me.”
“You don’t have to turn it into something useful, Liam,” I said. “You’re allowed to let it just… be awful.”
He set the photograph back in the box and closed the lid slowly.
“I don’t know how.”
I hesitated.
