He had stood dutifully beside his favorite crack in the boards, his eyes straining to see in the dark. I bumped into a side table and gasped, prompting him to ask if I was okay and a subsequent offering of shared light in the middle of the room.
“Sorry,” he said, sitting across from me. “I’m not sure yet if they’re attracted to light.”
I shrugged, even though it was pointless. He probably couldn’t see the gesture. I still didn’t feel the need to voice my answer, possibly from spending so much time with Bryce, who already knew my next thought.
We sat there for some time without speaking, neither one of us uncomfortable with the silence. I was listening for any sounds that might mean trouble, and I assumed he was doing the same.
His hair was just starting to grow out from that weird military buzz cut. The dim light gave me an excuse to study his face; his prominent chin with a faint indentation in the middle, and his upper lip that was a little on the thin side. His eyes were deep set and a little buggy, but it didn’t make him unattractive. I wasn’t sure there was anything about him that was unattractive. It all sort of fit him and made him that much better, kind of the way imperfections give a house character.
The wind hissed through the trees, and a low rumble sounded in the distance.
“Shit. Is that thunder?”
Joey nodded, pointing a few times with his handgun. “It’s going to go south of us, I think.”
I opened a can of cashews and popped one into my mouth. “I can’t stop wondering where my mom is. If she’s okay. I wonder if she’ll ever get back here.”
“Where is she?”
“She and my stepdad went to Belize.”
“Oh.”
“Do you wonder about your parents?”
“Yeah.”
“Your high school friends?”
“I’ve been away a long time. I joined the air force right out of high school. You lose touch.”
Talking to him was so frustrating. He didn’t offer any extra information at all. “Aren’t you worried about them? Your parents?”
“My mom is the daughter of a war widow, and then became one. If anyone can survive this, she can.”
“You really think she made it?”
“We’re from North Carolina, and the coasts were the first to get hit. I talked to her while Dana was in surgery. She was reporting all kinds of crazy shit going down, but she was at her neighbor’s house, and he’s a hardass former marine. I believe he’s keeping her safe. I have to.”
“Is everyone you know military?”
He chuckled and shook his head. “Not everyone. I lived in Jacksonville. Right next to Camp Lejeune, which happens to be the largest marine base on the East Coast. I’d say Mom has a good chance.”
I smiled. “I’d say you’re right. So you’re a marine, then? I’m going to go out on a limb and say you’re not air force.”
He smiled. “What makes you say that?”
“I don’t know. When I think air force, I think lanky pilot with glasses. You look like a jarhead to me.”
“Oh yeah?”
“If you don’t want to answer, just say so.”
“I’m just enjoying the commentary. I am air force, actually. I’m a PJ.”
“PJ. I’m assuming you don’t mean of the pajama variety.”
He chuckled quietly. “No. Of the Pararescue variety.”
“Oh.”
“ ‘Oh.’ You say that like you know what it is.”
“I have an idea,” I said, maybe a little more defensive than I would have liked.
“Okay,” Joey said, holding up his hands. “Most people don’t. Well, some people don’t.”
“Some people. Like females, you mean.”
“Yes, that’s what I mean.”
I rolled my eyes. “Oh. You’re one of those guys.”
He shook his head. “I’m not. Don’t peg me like that. I have a lot of respect for—”
“The girl that was in your truck?” I said, watching for his reaction.
“Dana.” His eyebrows pulled together and he picked at his boots. “I’d just got back, and our friends threw a welcome-home party. It was stupid. I should have just . . . I should have just stayed home with her. Enjoyed her. She was the only one I wanted to see, anyway.”
“She was yours.”
He nodded and his mouth pulled to the side, and then he looked up quickly and sniffed. “Yeah. She was attacked after the party. She got really sick.”
“Is that why she was in the hospital gown?”
“She had an appointment for some kind of exam. It came back bad. She’d lost like twenty pounds in a couple of days, so I knew . . . I knew that she . . . they took her straight to surgery. I was going to wait for her as long as it took, you know. I would have,” he said, nodding, “but she was gone for less than an hour. They’d just opened her up and then closed. Her insides were dead. There was nothing they could do.” I watched as the memory replayed in his mind, and then his face compressed, his pain filled the room, barely leaving room to breathe. “Not long after she woke up the hospital went crazy. Those things were running around attacking people, and after the phone call with my mom, I knew what was happening. I didn’t know what else to do. I just scooped Dana up and ran. The goddamn truck ran out of gas just outside of Fairview, and so I held her. She was in and out a lot, but when she finally came to . . . she was in a lot of pain. They’d stapled her up. It was a pretty shoddy job. They figured in a few hours she wouldn’t care. I’d watched a lot of people come back as those things while I held Dana in the truck, so when she went . . . when she went, I knew I’d have to put her down. My Glock was under the seat.”
He pressed the barrel of his gun to his temple, clearly trying to push the thought from his mind.
“That’s horrible.”
His eyes jumped up from the floor, instantly pulling away from the horrible nightmare in his head. “I’ve been on two tours. I’ve seen limbs blown off, bones protruding . . . smashed, I’ve seen the incomplete bodies of children brought in and out of my helo. I’ve seen intestines on the outside of a man’s body more than once. I’ve seen eyeballs hanging from their sockets. I’ve seen grown men bawling and begging for their moms to save them from the death they knew was just minutes away. I’ve seen horrible. The woman I wanted to spend the rest of my life with died in my arms, and then again when I put a bullet in her brain. That was f**king gruesome.”
I stared at Joey, speechless. Every word he’d just uttered and every visual that came with them sizzled as they were branded to my brain. I wanted to cry, or throw up, or run away. But instead threw my entire body at the stranger across from me and pulled him against my chest. My fingers gripped at his T-shirt, hoping the tighter I held him, the less pain he would feel. His chin dug into the tender part between my collarbone and the muscle of my shoulder, but the pain meant nothing next to his. After his initial shock, he held me, too, and then his entire body shook as he mourned the loss of so many things. When his grip became too tight, I just kept hanging on, letting him do what was needed to finally grieve.
When he let go, he simply nodded in thanks and stood, walking over to the window to resume his post.
The space between us was suddenly thick and full of energy, but not the good kind. That moment, however innocent, was far more intimate than it should have been, and neither one of us realized it until the moment had passed. Being in his presence was suddenly unbearably awkward. “I’m uh . . . going to head to bed,” I said, whispering so low I doubted Joey could hear. That statement suddenly sounded inappropriate, too, and I cringed, hoping he didn’t think it was an invitation.