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Now, there’s just this gaping chasm, this pattern of familiar sniping with none of the old smiles and warmth.
I hate how it’s like I’ve been flung back in time with none of the laughter, the jokes, the butterflies.
It’s like the past seven years just disappeared.
I’m sixteen again, with two scheming older boys who have their noses up in everything I do—and one boy who’s already trampled my heart.
4
Wallowing In Mud (Weston)
“Thanks,” I say, dropping the crumpled bills the customer just gave me into the tip jar.
There are days when I wonder why I still pick up extra hours at the Purple Bobcat. I don’t need the money when I’ve got my own shop plus towing biz, and fixing cars brings in far more coin than slinging drinks.
Then again, this place is owned by my Uncle Grady—a stand-up guy—and business has been good. So solid, in fact, that he’s finally landed several other employees and doesn’t need my help to fill holes like he did when he was getting off the ground.
I’d needed his assistance, though, just a few short years ago, after I returned home from the soul-staining bear trap known as Afghanistan.
Uncle Grady understood what I’d been through. He was in the Army, too, a deadly sniper with more medals squirreled away than any other man I’ve ever met. We’re both in good company. Plenty of other folks in Dallas have done their patriotic duty too, across the twenty year brushfire wars after 9/11, volunteering sweat, muscle, and valor for every reason under the sun.
To serve our country.
To help others.
To gain valuable career skills between the heroics.
To get the fuck out of Dallas.
That last one was part of my reason. I’m not ashamed to admit my intentions weren’t always pure. Hell, I needed to get away.
Right now, I’m feeling that same way, that pull at the back of my mind that makes me wonder if I’m cut out to spend my whole life here, just like my uncle and his rug rats.
I also want a drink more than I’ve wanted one in years.
Danger.
Maybe that’s another reason I still work here at the bar. Exposing myself to the very thing that once had my life by the throat reminds me where I’m going and what I’ll never be again.
It reminds me just how fucking damaging an uncontrolled spiral into the bottle can be.
Uncle Grady saw that, and he’d been there.
He was angry when I needed him to be angry with me, and a kind ear when I needed that, too.
That’s why I keep working here, I think.
So he knows that the time and effort he put into helping me out of my hole is still paying off. I’ll tumble into my grave before I ever dive back into substance abuse. It’s a screaming miracle I’ve spent several years dry, minus a couple odd beers I can count on one hand and one stupid, but spirited drinking contest at Uncle Grady’s wedding.
Besides his personal commitment, Uncle Grady introduced me to the local vets’ program. Thank fuck he did because I needed the community.
That’s why I started the rallies, why I made my childhood interest in trucks that could roll over a Humvee mean something. They’re a fundraising pipeline for the same programs that helped me.
I can’t take back the past, but I can do something in a visceral present where vets of all stripes need all the help they can get.
Granted, I came late to the hellish party long after it started overseas, almost a decade in.
I trained. I fought. I killed.
