Page 15 of Because of Liam

Chapter Nine

“Hey,pack some stuff. Enough for a long weekend. We’re spending Easter with Skye’s family.”

I frown at Logan. “You’re going to meet the parents?”

“I already met the parents. Spent Thanksgiving with them. They have a farm a couple of hours away from here. They’re very informal, pack everyday clothes and they might make you work, make sure you have something you don’t mind getting dirty in.”

“I’m not going.”

“The hell you aren’t.” The look he gives me tells me I wouldn’t be able to get away with it.

“This is the first holiday we get to spend together in over four years. As far as I’m concerned you are the only family I have and I’d like my family to be with me when I spend Easter with my girl.”

“I don’t know anyone there.”

“You know Skye and you know River.”

I snort. “Yeah, River—as if that’s a good reason for me to go.”

“I’ve seen you staring at her tits and her ass and her mouth and—”

“Okay! Enough. You caught me checking out the goods. So what? It’s been a long time. Pussy didn’t come around easily in Afghanistan.” I hate the way the words spill out of my mouth. This is not the way I normally talk about a woman.

“You don’t seem to be interested in anyone else’s goods. If you called any of those girls who were always all over you, they’d be running over here.”

“I called one of them, remember? And how well did that end up? I can only imagine what Tate is telling everyone back hom—back in Connecticut. All that was a long time ago. It’s not my world anymore.”

“You’ve been back for over a month now, Liam. Did you even tell them you’re back?”

I know who he means by them. Our parents. The same parents who manipulated Logan his whole life. The same parents who told me they would not pay for college if I didn’t comply and go to law school. The parents who knew that being only seventeen, I couldn’t get any student loans, not that I was eligible anyway with all the money they had. Well, seventeen had been too young to get student loans on my own, but as soon as I turned eighteen I enlisted. So, fuck you, Mom and Dad! Fuck you for forcing my hand and making me the angry asshole I am today. I’ve seen more blood and carnage than any one person should have to. I could be in the middle of medical school right now. They knew it. They’d always known it. As long as I can remember I always, always wanted to go into medicine. But when they shattered my dreams, I went into the navy and became the closest thing I could. I was a corpsman. But all the lives I saved cannot, will not make up for the ones I lost. Especially, not hers—I look at my hands and I can still see Hannah’s blood on them. I made her a promise. Told her I’d keep her safe. I failed.

Like always, any time my thoughts drift to Hannah, I’m brought right back to that day, to that moment. The moment I relive in my mind over and over, looking for a different outcome and never finding one. I feel myself folding into the darkness as guilt builds around me.

Logan’s voice brings me back to the present.

“Where did you go, man?”

I realize he’s been talking to me and calling my name.

“Nowhere. When do we leave?” I don’t meet his eyes. I’m sure he’ll be able to see the nightmares that follow me even in the light of day.

“We’ll head out tonight around seven.” He hesitates. “You know you can talk to me, right? You can tell me anything. I don’t presume to imagine the shit you saw and went through, but I’ve had my share of crappy days and I’ve seen friends go down. I’m here for you, Liam. You know it, right?”

I nod, not sure my throat would work right now. Logan hesitates, trying to read me. He can tell something is off, but he’s on the clock and has to leave for work. When the door closes shut behind him and silence fills the room, I close my eyes and descend into darkness as the memories take over, dragging me down a road I’ve traveled many times before. I don’t resist. The pull of despair and guilt is familiar. I’m an observer and a participant, watching a movie in which I’m the main character, and try as I may to think a different plot, to guess at what-ifs, the ending is the same. Like moth to a flame, I let myself burn, welcome the pain, and accept the outcome as I punish myself the only way I can.

Fragmented images, smells, sounds invade my mind, mixed pieces of different puzzles. Explosions, shots, fire. Screams, words I don’t understand. Blood. So much blood. It’s hard to breathe. I taste blood and sand. Thirsty. I’m so thirsty. I’m being dragged still holding on to Hannah or what’s left of her. Someone tries to take her from me, but my arms hold on to her harder. Pain, so much pain and then darkness again. There’s peace in darkness, there’s nothingness in darkness.

The next time I wake up I’m on a plane. Can’t open my eyes, but I hear the hum of an engine. I try to move. I can’t. A muffled voice tells me to hang on and I do. The last thought I have before darkness takes me again is Hannah is no longer in my arms.

Five days later, I wake up for good. I’m told that after emergency surgery to stabilize me at a military outpost, I was airlifted to the Landstuhl Regional Medical Center next to the U.S. air base at Ramstein, Germany, where I could get a more extensive treatment. There are bandages around my chest, back, and left shoulder. There are bandages around my neck and head as well. Doctors told me I was clipped twice. Chest and left thigh, and the explosion had inflicted dozens of shrapnel wounds. There was impact to my head, causing my brain to swell, and they induced me into a coma. They removed all the shrapnel. I asked about Hannah. I already knew the answer. She didn’t make it. Her body had already been sent home. I failed her. I had promised her I would keep her safe and she would see her little girl again. I asked about my unit. Three lives lost, including Hannah’s. She was dead before I even got to her, they told me. She hadn’t suffered. I don’t find comfort in the words even though I know they’re meant to comfort me. I still failed her. They tell me that in trying to save her, she had actually saved me. I would have been dead if I hadn’t left the cover of that truck trying to get to Hannah. Then she saved me a second time when the explosion went off because her body took most of the impact.

On my final day at the hospital after being there for over a week I was granted my discharge papers. I was free to go home. Except I had no idea where home was. I requested permission to stay in Germany, located an old friend of mine in Munich, and stayed with him another two months then spent nearly a year traveling through Europe’s countryside aimlessly. I worked odd jobs in farms, in exchange of food and some cash. I needed time to think and for my wounds to completely heal. I hated all the scars on my back. There were dozens and dozens of them over the entire left side. I hated them because they were a reminder of my failure and I hated them because I knew anyone who saw them would ask questions I didn’t want to answer. That’s when I decided on the tattoo. I wanted it to mean something. To hide the scars, yes, but to mean something as well. I spent weeks looking for the right place and the right person. I had an idea of what I wanted and the right artist would be able to create the image I had in my head. It took hours and hours of work, over a month to complete it. When the tattoo was finished, not a single scar could be seen. I could still feel them under my fingertips, but this guy had used his skills to hide the scars in the design in shades of red and blue and green. In shades of gold and black. The tattoo took up most of my back. It moved with me as if alive. I think the day he finished I smiled for the first time in over a year. I felt free. It was time to go home.

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