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She felt his hand move across her shoulder, the blankets her only shield. A little whimper tore from her. “Go away!” she cried out, her voice muffled by the blankets. Lauren heard him laugh softly.
“You don’t mean that, sweetie. Come on, I have candy waiting for you down in the basement. Your favorite. I know you like it…”
“N-no!” she cried out, trying to wriggle away from the hand slowly moving across her shoulders. She hated his touch. She knew what was coming. He would hurt her again. Lauren tried to wriggle to the side of the bed to escape his large hand. Terror sped through her.
“Come here…,” he soothed, “…come to Daddy… he won’t hurt you…”
Lauren felt him grip her, pull the covers back, revealing her. Raw terror roared through her as he leaned over, smiling down at her, his hands brushing her shoulders, as if to sooth her. At nine years old, she stared up at him, paralyzed as he pulled her toward him. His smile was fixed, and his eyes glittered, never leaving her face.
“N-no… I don’t want to go with you!” she whined, struggling to get out of his grasp.
“Shhhhh, sweetie, don’t wake Mommie. Don’t cry. Everything’s going to be all right. You’ll see…” and he lifted her easily into his arms, carrying her toward the partly-opened door.
Tears flowed down Lauren’s cheeks as she kicked, struggling, trying to break free. But her foster father’s arms tightened, holding her captive, and there was no way she could escape. She was breathing hard, her heart pounding as if it would leap out of her tiny chest. He carried her swiftly down the carpeted stairs to the first floor. She sobbed, unable to move her hands to strike out at him. He would take her to that dark basement. It was going to happen again and she cried and tried to scream but he pressed her small face against his massive chest to drown out her wailing. He stopped to open the door that led to the basement.
Lauren sat up, screaming, lashing out with her hands into the darkness. The sound of thunder crashing down, the hut vibrating, scared her even more. It was dark. So dark. Dark like the basement. For a moment, caught in the grip of the nightmare, she thought she was back in that basement, that she was being carried down its stairs by her foster father.
“Malen ‘kaya?”
The words were different. Foreign. Lauren jerked, pushing away from the sound in the utter darkness. She whimpered, tears blinding her, her heart racing as she gasped for air. Her back hit the wall of the hut. Trapped! She was trapped!Again. Always. A small whimper tore from her contorted lips.
“Lauren? Lauren? It is all right. It is Alex. Please… it is all right…”
It wasn’t the voice of her foster father. Who was it? She shut her eyes, sobbing, her legs drawn up against her, her hands covering her face, terrified. And then, lightning flashed, illuminating the hut. Her hands jerked away from her face. She saw a man’s face, concerned, staring at her. It wasn’t her foster father! Her mind twisted and canted. Lauren moaned, trying to reorient herself. The thunder boomed shortly after the bolt of lightning had sizzled overhead. The hut trembled. Lauren found herself shaking, coming out of the nightmare, finally realizing where she was. She tried to stop sobbing, tried to control the rampant terror leaching through her, eating away at her control.
“Malen ‘kaya,” Alex rasped, “you are safe. You are here, with me. Listen to my voice? You are not there. You are here.” Desperately, Alex wanted to reach out but he didn’t dare touch Lauren. He knew from experience, when he’d tried to hold Kira one time after she’d awakened screaming during a nightmare, that it didn’t work. It had terrified his sister even more and she’d fought like a wild-woman, scratching his face, striking him with her fists, blackening one of his eyes. No, he would not touch Lauren, no matter how badly he wanted to. Hearing her sob ripped him apart.
He had been jerked awake by her screams. Her shrieks had torn through him, and he had sat up, twisting toward the sound, realizing Lauren was trapped in a PTSD flashback.
And then, the impossible happened. He heard Lauren whimper and he felt her trembling hands on his arms, reaching out… reaching for him. It was painful to hear her crying, unable to stop. “It is all right,Malen ‘kaya,” he soothed, his own voice unsteady. “I will hold you safe. Come here if you want me to hold you…”
Lauren crawled into his arms, her face pressed against his neck and shoulder, quivering like a frightened rabbit. He wrapped his arms around her gently, speaking to her softly, pushing the hood off from her head and running his fingers through her unbrushed hair. He felt the depth of her terror.
She’d wrapped herself up against him in an almost fetal position, trying to hide, seeking protection. Alex settled against the wall of the hut, holding her, allowing her to shake and cry. The rains came down with the lightning, followed by pounding, drum-like thunder. It was a hard, sudden, deluging rain that blotted out every other sound in the camp.
Smoothing her hair, he rasped, “You are safe, Lauren. You are here, with me, Alex. I will not let anything hurt you,Malen ‘kaya. You are safe…” and he kept up the low, thick words in English so she would understand him. His heart twisted in agony for her. He felt so damned helpless as she wept wildly in his arms. He felt her tears through the thick material of the t-shirt he wore. It soaked in her warm tears. Lauren trusted him. It was such a powerful realization, one that Alex had thought would never happen. He tried to wrap his mind around it and could not.
Gradually, Lauren stopped shaking. Stopped crying. The sky was weeping openly with her, Alex thought, as the wind-whipped rain continued down in torrents. Luckily, the spec ops boys had known to dig a ditch around these huts so that the rainwater was diverted away from them, flowing behind the huts so that they remained high-and-dry during these fierce equatorial storms. He felt Lauren hiccup, and reach up to dry her eyes. He pressed his cheek against her hair. “Better now?”
He felt her give a jerky nod, her hand sliding around his torso, laying her brow against his jaw, seeking his closeness. He represented safety to her. Alex felt tears burning under his tightly-shut eyelids. Lauren trusted him, and she wanted to be held. Tight. Close. It reminded him of the ride in the Black Hawk yesterday. The way he’d bracketed her body against his own bigger one. She’d felt safe then. He gently moved his hand slowly up and down her long back. With each stroke, he felt her gradually begin to relax, to lean fully more and more against him.
“You trusted me, Lauren,” he whispered near her ear, stroking her head gently, “you allowed me to unburden myself about my family, about the pain I hold for my sister Kira.” Voice softening, he whispered, “Unburden yourself to me? I am here. My heart has ears,Malen ‘kaya… please… talk to me. What was your nightmare about?”
Shutting her eyes tightly, Lauren felt raw emotions shearing through her. The only place she could bear to be right now was within Alex’s arms. For whatever reason, she knew that he would keep her safe. It was crazy, but her instincts had never led her wrong. She started speaking in raw, halting tones. The more she told Alex, the faster the words came tearing out of her. Sometimes stuttering. Sometimes anguished. And, through it all, he gently held her. There were times when his arms would tighten a little more around her, but then he would soon relax them once again. Through the whole thing, Alex listened and never interrupted her, simply stroking her hair, the palm of his free hand moving up and down her spine, making her feel calm in a world that had never been calm like this for her before. Lauren choked out, “That’s it… that’s all of it…” She felt Alex take in a slow, deep breath, his hand halting over her head, caressing her hair.
“What of your mother?” he asked her quietly, using his thumb to remove fresh tears from her cheek. “Where was she? She was supposed to protect you.”
“M-my mother was lost without my real father. When he was killed, when I was eight, she fell apart. Looking back on it, she was a very weak person, Alex. She’d leaned on my father, having no strength of her own. When he died, she immediately went out and found another man to lean on. My foster father…”
“I see,” he murmured, holding her close. “Tell me about your real father?”
“My father was an honest-to-God hero, Alex. He was an officer in the Marine Corps. He was a sniper. H-he had earned two silver stars, two bronze stars with a “V” for valor, two purple hearts. He was… he loved me. Every time he came home, we’d do stuff together. I was always so happy when he was home…,” and her voice cracked. Another roar of thunder rumbled across the jungle, further to the east of them now. The wind was still gusting, but not as strongly as before.
The rain splattering noisily across the top of the hut, striking the wide leaves, was lessening in intensity. The storm was moving past them and Lauren saw the symbology in that, too. She swallowed hard, pressed her face against Alex’s chest, finding solace for the first time in her life since her real father had held her. Alex never made a move to do anything but be there for her. He did not take advantage of her. Lauren’s trust deepened toward him. She could feel his care radiating outward, cradling her.
“Your mother never believed you?”
Shaking her head, pain gutting her, Lauren whispered, “No… she never did.”
