Page 28 of All of You

He kept his eyes from me, but I could see his lips pressed together in pain, in anger, in frustration and so many unspoken thoughts. My heart rattled inside me, aching for him, breaking for him, and longing to somehow assure him that his survival wasn’t a bad thing.

Before I thought of what to say, he spoke again.

“I used to have a hard time waking up every day and remembering that. So questions about the award, especially from people who don’t understand… that’s tough. I’m not a hero, and I never will be. I’m just a guy whose best option was the Army.”

I stood up. I wanted to go to him. I wanted to wrap my arms around him and tell him he was amazing, and I was so glad he was here, and I was so glad he’d fought to stay here.

I moved to him slowly and stopped next to him at the bar. He swiveled to face me.

I stepped closer and asked in a voice with the barest volume, “Can I?”

He nodded once, his eyes not leaving mine, and I stepped between his legs and wrapped my arms around his broad shoulders.

My body pressed into his warmth, hoping to offer him something. My arms held him tight, my hands flat against his back. I leaned my head just to the left, my neck grazing the collars of his jacket and shirt. My throat felt clogged, so I held him a moment longer, then pulled back before he got too uncomfortable.

I wanted to tell him everything then—that I knew some of what he’d seen because he had told me about it. And all I’d wanted, in those moments when his eyes had burned with pain and fury at the loss he’d experienced, on behalf of his friend and his family, had been to make it better for him. I wanted to tell him that his vulnerability was astounding, and how much I admired him for it.

But my throat never did clear up, the words never able to get out. Instead, we were just there quietly for a few minutes, me standing near him where he sat on the chair at my kitchen counter, until he let out a slow breath and smiled sweetly before telling me goodnight.

CHAPTER TWELVE

Whit

It was an ugly thing to admit, but I could do it: I’d thought about Ben Holder more in the last few days than I’d thought about anyone else in my life.

Usually, my thoughts centered on me.

We all do this. We like to pretend we’re concerned for others, but ultimately, we’re mostly worried about how what other people are going through might influence us. And if we meet someone who’s not that way—who is genuinely outwardly focused, it’s a shock. It’s confusing and convicting, and most of all, alluring.

Maybe thinking that way was a symptom of being in the industry I’m in.

This wasn’t me—I wasn’t alluring in that way. If anything, in the last few years, I’d allowed myself to sink further into self-centeredness as a way to block out some of those pesky things like my ugly non-relationship with my parents or the perpetual longing for something more that I couldn’t seem to grasp no matter how many albums I sold.

I know. Again. How cliché.

But what was true was that Ben Holder had taken root in my brain and wouldn’t leave. I’d thought about him often after that first conversation when writing the song, and sometimes while singing it, but really, this was a far more dangerous Ben.

No longer was he the nameless, sympathetic wounded soldier grappling with death and grief. No.

Now, he was Benjamin Michael Holder, brother of two. Now, he was an actual man with real depth, with a will to live his life without drowning in what had come before. He was a generous and easygoing person while still being real and not without problems.

All of it posed a danger to that idea I’d had of him—the untouchable, sweet, honorable man who was, if I was being honest, more than a little beautiful.

The fact that I’d see him again in a few hours didn’t help things. Ben had been hanging around the edges of my consciousness from sun up until sundown all week. The meetings about the upcoming mini-tour had been shaded with him. The time I carved out to write—there he was.

We’d messaged only once during the week—both of us had busy days, and we’d made a plan to get together today. He would come to the house, and then we’d go out for cocktail hour—one last date before the holiday weekend.

I wasn’t going to make it easy for anyone to notice we weren’t together for Thanksgiving. In fact, I planned to lay low and make it impossible to find me. Reese had invited me up to his place near Fort Campbell and had promised Erin could make me some diet-friendly food. I’d told him I was still considering it.

But after the last week, I definitely needed something to distract me. Because the whole time Ben would be gone—to somewhere in Alabama, though it now dawned on me I wasn’t entirely sure where his family hailed from—I would be thinking about him. And it would be annoying.

“Focus, Whit. You know you need a good burn right now. When you get on the road, you’re going?—”

“I know. I don’t need a lecture.”

Kendra was my trainer, a total beast, and she treated me like I was an adult who could make her own decisions about her health and who was capable of maintaining a healthy weight without being micromanaged within an inch of her life.

Oh, wait, no.

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