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“No shit. I thought you went Special Operations Forces.”
I nodded. “I did. Did a tour of duty in Afghanistan before I got out and started my company.”
“I’ll bet the money’s better,” Fillmore said with a laugh.
“What are you doing, Master Sergeant?” I asked as we stopped outside a classroom “Teaching fitness?”
He pointed to a sign on the door beside us. MCMAP Fitness Class. “I’m retired but I try to keep in shape and do personal training on the side. Wife runs a touristy clothing shop on the strip.”
I nodded. “We’ll be staying at the Yacht Club for a few days. I’ll make sure to bring my staff to one of your fitness classes. You can whip their asses into shape.”
He grinned. “Hell, you can help me run the class. See if you remember your stuff. Didn’t you used to do yoga or some other such Buddhist shit?”
I laughed and he walked me out of the club to my bike in the parking lot. It was good to see him again and I was surprised and a little chuffed that he remembered me.
“Make sure you come by Saturday,” he said as I got on my bike. “I got a whole new crew of recruits starting.”
“I will,” and we fist bumped once more.
“Semper fi,” he said in Marine Corps tradition.
“Oorah,” I replied.
I went back to my hotel and worked on the presentation I’d be giving to a group of investors I was hoping to woo during the weekend, spending time describing Brimstone, its origins, its mandate and the work we had already undertaken.
Brimstone started as an idea Graham and I had during our time in Afghanistan. We were with Bravo Company, a Special Ops team and part of the Joint Special Operations Command. We’d spent time in the worst hell-holes in Iraq and Afghanistan, and undertook missions that put us in the most dangerous parts of the country. We worked with Special Operations Forces from other coalition nations, including the British Special Operations Forces teams and called in their artillery to enemy targets. Laser guided, the Brimstone missile the Brits used was effective against enemy armor. In addition to other duties, our recon unit went into enemy territory to find and eliminate armored vehicles so our own forces could move in.
We called ourselves the Brimstone team, not only because of the missile, but because we lived through hell while in Iraq. I got the idea of using the name when we came back from Afghanistan and left the Marines, intent on starting my company.
For the rest of the night I spent my time working on the presentation, eating in my hotel room. I hit the rack at midnight, feeling as ready as I’d ever be. I planned on driving into Wilmington in the morning to meet with a few of the Wall Street types and wanted to be fresh.
The stress of everything must have gotten to me. I woke in the middle of the night in a cold sweat, my heart pounding, a nightmare of the explosion and aftermath of the accident in my mind’s eye. I bolted upright in bed and once I realized where I was, I did some deep breathing to try to calm myself. The clock radio at the bedside table read 4:45 a.m. – the usual time I woke up when I had my nightmares.
Casey had urged me to go to the VA for PTSD counseling, but it just didn’t feel right. I came out of the whole business with the least damage. I was alive. Sure, I had a very visible scar to show for it, but I was alive…
I had to buck up and take it like a Marine.
Maybe shaking Lewis’s father’s hand and offering my condolences to his mother, returning the letters to them, would help heal those wounds I did still have.
The kind of wounds you can’t see.
I got up and went to the bathroom for a piss, then drank a glass of water and stood at the window. I cracked the drapes and looked out from the hotel towards the marina and ocean beyond. A wind had picked up during the night, and the metallic sign outside the hotel swung back and forth, its rusty bearing screeching in a rhythmic fashion that I knew would grate on my nerves and prevent me from falling back asleep. Dawn was still an hour away, but I could see a faint crack of brightness on the far horizon.
Might as well get up.
I threw on my sweats and t-shirt, put on my running shoes and went for a run along the beach. Twenty minutes of running would wake me up, and if that failed, I’d run into the surf and that would be sure to do the trick.
When I returned to the hotel, the sky was visibly brightening on the horizon and so I went inside and decided to sit on the deck and have my breakfast while watching the sunrise. Luckily, the hotel restaurant was open at 6:30 and so by 6:45, after a quick shower and after I dressed in my casual clothes, I was seated at a table on the faded wood deck, a cup of coffee in hand, reading the Wall Street Journal on my iPad. A breakfast of fruit and eggs finished the early morning off.
While I waited for my suits to come back from the dry cleaner, I went over my first and second quarter financial numbers, wanting to show investors how much we brought in – what Graham and I brought in – to the company. Besides my DARPA contract, I had a number of clients I advised on security when they were over in Afghanistan and Iraq, or other countries in the Middle East or Pacific Rim states. Graham had the war tourism part of the business, and I’d been able to find a few old SOF guys to take a couple of his contracts, but they were only in the business part time and I wanted to get out of it completely.
After my suits were delivered to my hotel room, I dressed in my grey suit and arranged for a local car service to come pick me up and drive me into Wilmington for my afternoon meeting. I opened my laptop and read over the brochures I brought along with me for the meetings while the driver took me into the city.
The meetings went well. I knew a few former Marines who went into finance after they did their time in Iraq and it was those contacts that helped me get Brimstone Solutions Inc. off the ground when Graham and I started it three years earlier. The guys agreed to come out and spend an evening in Topsail Beach. I thought about going to Oceanside for dinner and seeing what it had to offer, but wasn’t sure whether my presence would be appreciated.
To tell the truth, I’d become a bit obsessed with the Lewis family since I discovered our shared fates over in Afghanistan and since I’d met Miranda and read her love letters. Her words kept coming back to me now and then unbidden – how she missed his touch, his kiss, and his presence in her bed. How she missed waking up with him on a Sunday morning in their place in Wilmington where they spent the summers while she was off from school and he was in between missions.
I thought about them making love in the warm sunlight and felt a stab of grief in my chest. Immediately, I thought of Sue and remembered our time together, and the last time I saw her.
