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“Do you know this was the very first meal I ever made for Ethan?” I popped a chunk of avocado in my mouth and savored it. “He brought along some Dos Equis, and ended up getting hooked on the Mexican beer and the Mexican food,” I said.
“I know,” Neil answered with a chuckle, as he added some spices to the sizzling chicken. “He talked about you all the time. Said you were a brilliant cook, and to give the Dos Equis a try with a sliver of lime.”
“Did he?”
“Yeah. I knew he was done-for at that point. Not because of the Mexican food, mind you, but because of the beer. He left off with the Guinness practically overnight,” he said with a snap of his fingers and a sorry shake of his head.
“That would be Ethan for you. He makes a decision about something, and that’s that.” I sighed pitifully, thinking about our unresolved “problems.”
Neil stopped chopping tomatoes and looked up at me. “He’ll be home soon, Brynne. There’s nowhere he wants to be but right here with you.”
“I know, but he left when things…weren’t right between us. Do you know why, Neil?” I asked, realizing it was entirely probable he did know.
He nodded. “Yeah. I saw the photos of you and Oakley at the coffee shop. Publicity Tweets is all that was to be expected really.”
“I didn’t think about that part. It was just something I had to do, and when Ethan gets home I will explain everything, but it just wasn’t the time for me right then, you know?”
Neil’s dark brown eyes were very warm and understanding. “The two of you will work through it, Brynne. I know Ethan, and there is nothing he wouldn’t do for you. He’d walk through fire to get back with you.”
I stifled a sob and worked on the corn salsa. “Neil, what’s the deal with Sarah Hastings? When Ethan saw her again at your wedding, he was really affected by her presence, and not in a good way. He told me some of what happened to her husband, Mike, and how horrible his death was to witness. I understand that part of his trauma…and at the same time, I cannot imagine how devastating it is for him to remember when he has a flashback.”
“Sarah? She’s all right, and I can only guess that she has something to do with his therapy, but he hasn’t said—and I won’t ask.”
“I understand,” I said bleakly, realizing that I would just have to be patient with him, and wait until the time came when Ethan could tell me what role Sarah played in his emotional health. “Ethan told you about his therapy sessions with Dr. Wilson at the Combat Stress Centre?”
“He did, Brynne, and I am so glad he’s finally getting something in the way of support. I know it’s only because of you that he’s been able to get himself over there.”
“What happened to him was so horrible…” I trailed off, unable to even express my feelings about what Ethan had endured.
Neil stopped with the food prep altogether. “It was bad, Brynne, really bloody bad.”
“I know he feels guilt, he told me he does, but why does he? Being captured and tortured was not his fault.”
Neil hung his head and closed his eyes for just a moment. He paused with his head down over the kitchen counter for a long time. I figured he wouldn’t tell me anything, or couldn’t tell me because of strict rules within the British Army. But finally, he picked up his knife and returned to chopping vegetables, and then he started talking.
“I don’t know everything, but I know enough to puzzle it together. E’s shared what he could with me, and the rest I know because I heard the comms when they came through—the communications between base and squad when they’re out in the field. I commanded my own team, as did Ethan. I wasn’t there, just E and his men were. There were five troops, and Mike Hastings was one of them. None of them returned alive. Mike survived the ambush along with Ethan…and you know what happened there. E went through debriefing once he was returned, and he said on the day they planned to execute him, the building where he was being held was bombed into a pile of rubble. Nobody knows how E walked out of there alive. Not even he knows. He said he had no explanation of how or why he wasn’t crushed to bits in the blast. It was something truly miraculous.”
I held my breath as Neil explained the “why” for so many of my questions. Things Ethan just couldn’t talk about. I now understood why, and it just shredded my heart for him, and what he had to suffer. “No wonder he has angel wings on his back,” I whispered.
“Yeah.” Neil gave the chicken another stir and told me the rest. “Mike’s torture and execution was brutal, and I know Ethan feels tremendous loss and guilt. He believes because it was his call as commander, that he put them all into danger, and as a result of his decision, five young men lost their lives.”
“But it was war. How can what happened be his fault?” I ached for Ethan even worse than before, and wanted nothing more than to have my arms around him, and his chest, with its fiercely brave and beautiful heart, beating up against mine.
“War is fucked no matter how you look at it. What happened to their team was indescribable really. They were lured in by a dead mother with her throat slit in the middle of the road, and with her hysterically crying son clinging to her body. He was no more than three years old. Hours of this went on and the comms kept coming in. Ethan wanted to go in and get the boy. And after many hours of haggling back and forth, he was finally given the go-ahead. But it was all a trap. The Taliban used a woman and child as decoys to take out a whole squad of elite soldiers—sympathetic Westerners, who would never conceive of such treatment to anyone or anything. It worked. Ethan went in, grabbed the boy, but he was shot and killed just seconds later, while still in E’s arms. A firefight ensued and at the end of it, two innocent civilians were slaughtered, four of our own were dead, and Mike and E were captives.”
“Oh, my God…”
I didn’t even have words for Neil. What cou
ld I even say to him? Were there even words to be said? No…no words could make that story feel any better, no matter how many years passed. I rubbed my belly and thought of Ethan, and how much I loved him. He was so much more than I ever could have known when we first met. He was a true hero in every sense of the word, who had served honorably and suffered because of that service.
“Thank you for telling me, Neil, it h-helps me to…know.”
And it really did help me, but knowing the truth was horrifying, too. I felt sick, and knew I couldn’t eat the food I’d just been preparing with Neil. How did any of them eat anything ever again, when faced with the memories of wartime experiences I’d just heard? I knew how Ethan’s mind worked, and I could honestly see him feeling the burden of terrible guilt over all of the deaths…how he suffered when he relived the events in dreams.
“I just love him so much. I’d do anything to be able to help him,” I said finally.
“But you do, Brynne. Your love has helped him already, more than any other thing.”
