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“So we agree then? Good.”
“I know you like to keep things casual.”
“It’s easy—”
“It’s the easy way out.”
Troy threw down the hammer and crossed his arms to level a glare at his dad.
“If you would just invest a little time and have a little faith, you’d be amazed at what could happen.”
“And if it doesn’t work then I’ve wasted a little time and what little faith I have.”
His dad shook his head. “I know you’ve been through a lot.”
Troy hated the softness in his dad’s voice. It made him feel vulnerable that someone knew about everything that had happened. No one really knew all of it, other than his therapist. His dad knew a lot though, and Troy hated when he brought it up.
“But you have to have hope. If you can’t have faith, you have to have hope that it will work out.” His dad walked up and clapped a hand on his shoulder. “Take her somewhere nice tonight. See where it goes. Who knows? She could be the one.”
They picked up the tools and shut down the project for the night. Troy and his dad rode back to the small house, and after Hank had showered, Troy got him settled in the chair for the trifecta of news,Jeopardy, andWheel, complete with a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and glass of milk by request.
Then it was time to get ready to go. Troy showered and put on some new jeans, a blue button-down shirt, and a sweater. He grabbed his coat, which was a replica of a WWII bomber jacket—his birthday present to himself last year—and headed out for the night.
He was picking her up this time, which made him smile. Before, he had respected her meeting him there, but there was something nice about being trusted to travel in the same car. Most of the girls he had been with over the years preferred to drive themselves. Dating apps and being safe played a huge role, so Troy understood, but it made picking her up feel so personal.
He checked her address again but didn’t bother popping it into the GPS since it said she lived right on the main street through town. Troy set off, anticipating all that might happen this evening.
His dad wasn’t wrong. He was starting to get obsessed. By now in any other city he would’ve checked out the local girls on the dating apps who were like him, looking for some quick casual fun, but he hadn’t even bothered. He had gotten a few messages from girls back near post whom he had been chatting with before he had left so abruptly. Troy knew he only had a few more weeks of leave, so he had exchanged quick messages last night to let them know he wasn’t ghosting them, to keep his options open when he got home.
But it didn’t feel the same.
Before it would have been nothing to chat online all night while listening to his latest audiobook, but now it was an annoyance to give them an update. He had typed out a quick message, explaining the family emergency, and just copied and pasted it four different times, which didn’t make him feel great. The whole thing had gone from feeling playful and fun to something he really didn’t want to do. All he wanted to do was text funny cat pictures to Megan.
How in the hell hadthathappened? Usually when girls sent him funny little pictures throughout the day, he might give them a quick thumbs-up if he really liked them. Otherwise, he would just say he was too busy at work and ignore them. How the tables had turned. Over the past few days when he would text her, he kept checking to see if she had opened his message and started low-key getting nervous when she left him on read and didn’t reply.
Troy had never felt like this before. Late night anxiety had started a few days ago. At first he was just tossing and turning while wondering who she worked with. There was that EMT. What did she call him? Jordan. He looked about their age? Where they a thing? What about that guy that drove the fire engine? He never talked, but waved back when Megan had said hi. How would they handle a fire?
He saw her hair, the color of fire, blend in with the surrounding flames. He hadn’t known where they were, but there was fire everywhere. The roar of the flames and popping obscured everything he could hear, and the smoke blinded him.
He was trying to ground himself at night, but then the anxiety had shifted back to the familiar places he dreaded.
Fire. There was fire everywhere. He could see the outline of the Humvee and the flailing of arms and legs inside, clawing against an enemy that wasn’t there. That’s when the screaming started.
Troy had woken up and reached for the glass of water he habitually kept by the bed. He was blind and clumsy, but after the third time, he plunged his hand into the water, snapping himself back to the present.
This was a trick his therapist had taught him a while back. First water, then lights, next look at the clock on his phone—not the time, but what year it was. Deep breath in, deep breath out, start tapping. First right next to his eye, then under it, next under the nose, then the chin. He went through the routine on autopilot, coming back to present.
Right now, riding in the truck, Troy could feel the anxiety clawing into him, the memories he didn’t want fighting for control of what he was seeing and experiencing. He reached down below and grabbed the icy cold can of Coke. He rarely drank it, but always had something there. The cold, smooth metal pulled his attention and he started his breathing exercises again.
The lights illuminated the main street of Goldvein, just as they had when he had been young back when his nightmares were just about his mom and brother. Everything looked the same, but the feelings where sharper. Sadder.
He pulled into an open spot in front of what he knew to be the original bank and sat for a few moments, breathing and tapping to bring his mind back to the present.
His name was Troy Chapman. He was here in Goldvein, his hometown. He was in his car driving to pick up Megan.
Like a lightning rod, her name and face calmed him. Megan. He was going to be with Megan and pick out paint colors.
The anxiety tried to outrun him. Paint colors because the house burned down with the memories of his dead brother and mother who he would never see again. The house almost burned down and killed his dad meaning he would be all alone and no one would ever care about him or what he did on this planet again. The dad he couldn’t even get to quickly and hadn’t seen in a year because he was such a shit son. Adam would’ve been better, but he died and Troy was nothing but a big disappointment. A mistake. His dad had everything, and Troy couldn’t keep up—
