Page 50 of Domino
“It was an order I should have ignored.”
“I doubt you could have even if you’d wanted to, Max. They don’t train you to think for yourself. The military depends on people following orders.”
“So, I’m a mindless drone then. Great.”
The moment the words cross my lips, I regret them. The memories bring up a lot of shit inside of me, but I shouldn’t be taking it out on Ashley. I turn to her and give her an apologetic expression.
“Sorry. I don’t mean to bite your head off. It wasn’t your fault,” I tell her.
“And it’s not your fault either. You did what you had to do to say alive. It was your commander who put you in that position to begin with. If anybody’s at fault, it’s him.”
“My brain agrees with you. But my heart doesn’t. It was me who took the shots. It was me who put them down.”
Maybe it’s because she knows she can’t talk me out of the way I feel and doesn’t want to keep pressing me, or maybe it’s because she genuinely doesn’t think I should blame myself, but Ashley pulls me into a warm, tight embrace. I lay my head down on her shoulder and let her hold me. And for the first time since it happened, I feel a slight lifting of that weight upon my shoulders. It’s not much, but it’s something.
We remain like that for several long moments, and I cherish every single one of them. That she can look at me after hearing what I told her and not think of me as a monster but as somebody worthy of forgiveness makes my heart swell with emotion. How can she forgive me when she has a son of her own? The fact that I’ve killed children should have sent her screaming into the night. But she’s not screaming, and she’s not running. She’s encouraging me to forgive myself.
Although I’m reluctant to leave her embrace, I finally sit up and look at her, amazed that she can be so kind and so forgiving in the face of a story so heinous as the one I told her. But she takes my hand and favors me with a small, warm smile.
“We need to find a way for you to get past this,” she says.
“I’m not sure it’s possible.”
“Of course, it is. But we need you to find a way to forgive yourself. This is not your fault, Max. This is a weight you should not have to carry.”
I open my mouth to respond, but she puts her finger to my lips to silence me. With a small smile on my lips, I do as she says, and close my mouth.
“We’re going to work on this. We’re going to find a way for you to shake off this burden.”
“So, I guess that means you’re in for a second date, huh?” I say.
She laughs softly. “Always with the jokes and sarcasm.”
“All the better to deflect you with, my dear.”
“As I well know,” she says. “And do you want to know the first step in getting you to that point is?”
“Tell me.”
“Ice cream.”
She laughs and nods. “The magical power of ice cream has long been known to be a cure all.”
I laugh along with her. “Well, then, let’s go get this magic elixir.”
Chapter Nineteen
Ashley
We’re sitting in his truck on a bluff overlooking the water. Far out on the sea, bolts of lightning arc down from the clouds, and we can see the silhouette of the massive ships on the water. Over the course of our evening together, the clouds had rolled in, blanketing the sky with a thick screen of slate gray.
Small droplets of water dot the windshield and I hear the tick-tick-tick of rain falling on the roof of the truck. It’s peaceful and the silence between us is companionable, but the atmosphere inside the cabin is saturated with a sense of anticipation. Expectation. Or maybe it’s just me. I don’t know.
My date with Max has been unexpected in a lot of ways. It’s honestly been a lot better than I thought it would be, and we’ve shared more of ourselves than I expected. Like most all of us, he’s a damaged person, but unlike so many, he acknowledges his faults and flaws. He doesn’t hide from them or try to pretend he’s perfect. He’s more real about who he is than I’ve found most people to be. It’s actually refreshing.
Max has been more open with me about his life and who he is. And I have to say, I find him even more attractive now than I did before. Which, I suppose has led to this feeling of anticipation bubbling up inside of me. I’m not sure what it means or where the rest of this night is going to go, but there’s a part of me that hopes it’s going somewhere good.
I take a bite of my sundae as the hit song,Natural, plays softly from the speakers. It’s yet something else that surprises me about him.
