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“Did you like it? Your time in service, I mean.”
Sully gives me a hard look. He’s not angry, but I can tell there are things about his past that he wants to keep there. “I served proudly. We all did. But it wasn’t something to be liked,” he says. “There’s nothing to like about war and violence. Not after what we saw. What we did.”
“Being in the military has a way of bending a man’s morals,” Matthew explains, his brow furrowed. “You think you’re doing the right thing, you romanticize the entire experience before you even get on the plane. But once you get there, once you’re in the thick of it, once you realize how much of yourself you’re going to leave behind on the battlefield… it hits different.”
“We had to become monsters in order to protect others from different monsters,” Sully says, staring at the water bubbling in front of him. “Monsters, all the same.”
Matthew sighs heavily. “It’s over. We did our jobs. We fulfilled our duties. We’ve got different lives, now.”
“Maybe you have a different life now, Mr. Inheritance,” Sully shoots back, bitterness dripping from his voice as he looks at Jason and adds, “Mr. Starting Over.”
“Hey, you’ve been a constant force since the day you got back,” Jason tells him. “Your path is just different from mine or Matthew’s.” He glances my way, realizing that I’m present and listening to this exchange with wide, curious eyes and a knot in my throat. “While Matthew decided to take over his father’s business and I started my own in Providence after we left the service, Sully had a slightly longer adjustment period. But he’s come leaps and bounds since. He’s one hell of a fighter, and the kids he trains at the community center practically worship him.”
“I live and breathe violence, even today,” Sully says. “Though I suppose today’s version is in some way beneficial.”
I can’t help but reach underwater and place my hand on his shoulder. As soon as he feels my touch, Sully turns his head, smoldering embers radiating from the dark pools of his eyes. “As long as you feel good and at peace with who you are and what you’re doing, nothing else matters,” I tell him. “Were it not for my job at The Sartorialist, I probably would’ve lost all hope a long time ago. Having a passion in life, any kind of passion… that’s what truly matters. It motivates you, it keeps you going, it gets you out of bed in the morning. Doesn’t it?”
“It does,” he nods slowly, his gaze set on my lips. “As bloody as it can get sometimes, I like what I do. I enjoy the violence.”
“Or maybe you enjoy having an outlet where you can burn off the violence,” I suggest. “You don’t strike me as the kind of person who likes hurting other people.”
He shakes his head. “I don’t.”
Matthew smiles, then laughs until the rest of us are staring at him, wondering and waiting for the punchline. “Remember when we raided that stash house in Mogadishu? Al’ Shabab’s place?”
“Oh, man,” Jason bursts. “First-Through-the-Door here almost didn’t make it out alive.”
I look to Sully, noticing the amused twitch on his lips. “What happened?” I ask.
“We were supposed to raid a stash house in a really bad area. We had intel that the particular gang in charge of that neighborhood was funneling drug money to the local warlords, which made it harder for us to help keep the current government going,” he says. “What we didn’t know was that they were keeping women and children in that stash house, as well. They used the kids as drug mules and they had the women in charge of weighing the packets before they split them into sellable doses.”
“Sully forgot the whole purpose of our mission when he stumbled upon the kids,” Matthew says. “I will never get over the look on his face when he saw them. He may come across as a rough, hard man by nature, but Sully’s soft side is the sweetest you’ll ever find.”
“I was pretty sure you were going to adopt a bunch of those kids and bring them back to the States with you,” Jason tells Sully.
“We had the women and children staying with us at our barracks for a couple of days before the Somalian social services took charge and relocated them to safer places,” Matthew adds. “During that time, Sully spent every minute he could spare playing with the kids. Football, checkers, dolls…”
“Dolls?” I giggle, trying to imagine Sully in that particular frame.
“The girls liked their dolls,” he shrugs. “Who was I to tell them they couldn’t play with dolls after a whole crew of Marines shattered their way through the house, guns cocked and ready to kill anybody who so much as sneezed?”
“My point is,” Matthew continues, “Sully doesn’t like violence, no matter what he says. He might be remarkably good at it, and he has found a way to build a career upon it after the service. But he truly doesn’t like it.”
“It makes sense,” I reply. “An outlet, clearly.”
Matthew gives me a long look and smiles gently. “I’m gonna hit the sack, soon,” he says. “It’s been a long day, and I could use a good night’s sleep. You take all the time you need out here, Selina. You deserve all the rest and relaxation you can get.”
“Yeah, I think I’m ready to go to bed too,” Jason sighs, planting a kiss on my cheek before getting out of the hot tub.
I’m not sure what shifted between us, but part of me was hoping we’d get busy like they did with Cynthia. Yet I’m left with Sully in the quiet of the night, the moon shining above us as we listen to the receding footsteps of Matthew and Jason. Was it something I said? No, I think they really are just being nice and polite. And I’m sure they are tired, it’s been a long day.
Well this sucks.
I’m tired of white gloves. I want something nasty and wily and barebacked, shameless and rough, something that’ll make my cheeks burn red and my pussy sore. Damn you, Cynthia, and your overly detailed diary. I never should’ve looked through it.
“I’m not rushing,” Sully says after a long and rather tense silence. “It’s been a while since I’ve been able to enjoy this tub.”
“I don’t blame you,” I giggle softly. “It’s something else, so relaxing.”
