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“You had the dream again, didn’t you?”
It wasn’t a question, and we both knew it. After a few long seconds, I nodded anyway.
“Aww, I’m so sorry.”
Her arms opened, and a moment later she was enveloping me, holding me tightly, pulling me against her. Her ample chest felt warm against my face as she caressed it, slowly running the backs of her fingers down my stubbled cheek.
“It’s a part of the job,” I blurted for no good reason. “Everyone knows it when they enlist.”
She kept holding me, touching me, stroking my face. “Why did you enlist?”
I laughed bitterly. It was all the information she needed.
“Your father, huh?”
“Yes.”
“You wanted to follow in his footsteps?”
I pulled back for a moment so I could look at her. In the moonlight, her eyes were endless, shimmering oceans.
“Hell no,” I answered. “I saw what the Army did to his marriage. We grew up all over the country, moving every one to two years.” I shook my head. “Eventually my mother got sick of it all. She finally split, taking my two younger sisters with her.”
“That’s awful,” Quinn murmured.
“Yeah, well… they were probably my half-sisters,” I explained, “not that I blame my mother for that. And I’m pretty sure he knew it.”
It seemed like a lifetime ago, yet I could remember it like it was yesterday. My mother, packing her things, crying her eyes out. Holding my face in her two tiny hands, and assuring me that we’d be together again soon. Even though I knew in my heart we wouldn’t.
“I’d just turned seventeen by then,” I went on, “so my father drove me down to the recruiting station the next day and signed his consent forms. He told me to enlist, pointed down at the paperwork, and explained that this was my future now, because I had no life with him.”
“Oh, Joshua…”
“I know, right? That was the reward for sticking by him. For changing towns and schools so often I couldn’t maintain a single friendship, my final prize was getting a recruiter’s pen jammed into my hand.” I let out a grim laugh. “I can still hear the crunch of gravel beneath his tires as he sped away. That was the last I ever saw of him.”
A tear was flowing now, but not on my face. It ran down Quinn’s delicate cheek as I finished the story.
“What about your sisters?” she asked.
“Emma and Courtney?” I let a smile return to my face. “They’re amazing. Eventually they had college ambitions that were never going to happen, so I sent back whatever money I could to help with tuition. Courtney’s a veterinarian now. Emma’s married, with a family of her own.”
“That’s… that’s incredible,” Quinn sniffed.
“What is?”
“That you’d do something like that.”
“Of course I would. They’re family.” I reached out and brushed the tear from her cheek. “You didn’t think I’d let a shitty father and absent mother destroy the concept of family for me, did you?”
Her eyes were full of admiration. “That would happen to most people in your situation, yes.”
I considered her words for a moment, then shrugged.
“Yeah, well it turns out the Army is like family too,” I explained. “I ended up in Ranger school, and joined the Special Forces. At first I hated going down the same path as my father, but very quickly I grew to love the camaraderie and brotherhood of being part of a unit. The Army became my new family. They were the brothers I never had. My CO, the father I never saw.”
“And then you met Evan,” she said. “And Cole…”
I nodded. “Like I said, brothers. It was instant for us. We formed bonds that will never be broken.”
