Page 28 of The Gunnery Sergeant's Ready-Made Family

Chase was nervous about walking into the church hall, he imagined a circle of soldiers, all looking at him, judging him, pointing their fingers at him. The fear was almost enough to make him run for the hills, or for home at least. Despite his trepidation, he pushed the door open and walked in, surprised at the sight that greeted him. Yes, there were chairs arranged in a circle, yes, some of the people in attendance were in uniform, but then again, so was he. What he didn’t see was anyone looking at him, oh they glanced in his direction, many nodding by way of greeting, but no one was staring at him, and certainly, no one was judging him or pointing their fingers at him. He took his time pouring himself a coffee and selecting a muffin from the generous refreshment table, before choosing a seat flanked on either side by veterans in their uniforms.

“Welcome everyone to today’s session. As you can see, we have a new face here, Chase, please make him welcome. Now, would anyone like to start by sharing?”

“I will.” Chase saw a hand shoot up across the room, a young girl who looked barely old enough to drive, let alone serve her country. “My name is Laura, I’m twenty-two. I joined the army at eighteen, my father is a veteran, as is my grandfather. My first tour was textbook, then, on the second day of my second tour, the convoy I was travelling in struck an Improvised Explosive Device, I was the only survivor,” a sob tore from her and she brushed away her falling tears. “My family don’t understand why I’m not happy to be home, how can I explain it to them? How can I look my father and grandfather in the eye and tell them that I wish I had died as well, that I wish it every day. I put on a brave face for my family, but look at me,” she gestured to her stump of a leg, the scarring on her face, and to her missing arm, “who on earth would ever be able to love someone like me? I’ll never be able to walk down the aisle, to dance, to hold my own baby properly.” The sobs overtook her and the room fell silent. Chase noticed that more than a few other veterans had tears running down their faces. Chase expected the chaplain to speak, but it was the man to his left that leant forward.

“Any man worth having will see your beauty, Laura, that is how you will know he is the one for you. He will see past your outer scars and through to your inner beauty. He will see the person who fought and sacrificed for her country, he will see the courage and strength she displayed by getting herself out of the vehicle and crawling over five hundred miles to raise the alarm for help. He will see all of this, and when the time is right, he will carry you in his arms as he dances with you, he will help you to hold your babies. If he is worthy of you, he will see everything beautiful about you, even those bits you don’t like about yourself.”

“Thank you,” Laura sniffed and gave a wobbly smile.

“I know it is hard, we all carry the pain of lives lost, of injuries sustained, that’s why we come here, because this is the one place where we don’t have to pretend that everything is fine, where we don’t have to be anything other than ourselves. There are no loved ones here for us to hurt with our truth, only other people who understand.”

Chase shuffled uncomfortably in his seat, maybe he could unburden himself here? Maybe what he had to say wouldn’t be that shocking to everybody here, maybe they really did know how he was feeling. Before he could find his voice, the man beside him spoke again.

“My name is Mark Waters, currently stationed here at this base. I'm the only one in my family to have joined the military. A couple of years ago my team was tasked with a rescue mission, on paper it was a straightforward assignment, we were to hit the target in the middle of the night and retrieve twelve of our men and bring them to safety. Our intel was wrong and we walked into an ambush. We managed to get out twelve soldiers, but only three were still alive the rest had been tortured and killed a long time ago, before we even got the assignment. Two of my men were also killed, and my commanding officer was medically discharged. A week later his body was found, along with a note, he blamed himself for the deaths of those soldiers. I was lucky to have been uninjured, but the scars I carry inside are the hardest to overcome. I turned to alcohol as a way of coping, I pushed away everybody who ever cared about me, and I hurt a lot of people. I can't undo that, that is something that I have to live with every day of my life, but with Alcoholics Anonymous, and God's grace, I have been in recovery now for eighteen months.”

“Hi, I’m Chase,” the decision made, Chase cleared his throat. “Almost three months ago, my best friend died during combat. He died...he was killed...” Chase cleared his throat again, desperate to dislodge the thickening tears he felt there. “I killed him, he was my best friend and I killed him.” Chase ignored the tears running down his cheeks, what did he care now that his secret was out? “We were on patrol, our intel was good, but we saw nothing. We had been walking endlessly, the heat, and the dust, all magnified by the relentless sun. I was in the lead, walking point, I gave the order to stop, for the men to rest. Everyone was relaxed and happy, we were talking about what we would do when we eventually got home. My friend, Kyle wanted to get home to his boys. His wife died last year, and he wanted to get home to his boys to make them a cubby house, they are only little, Ranger is four and Finn is one, too young to lose their father as well as their mother, just too young.” Chase shook his head and drew in a ragged breath.

“When I gave the order to move out,” Chase continued, “Kyle offered to take the lead while I brought up the rear. We decided that if we didn’t find our target soon, we would head back to base and get fresh intel. I should never have agreed, I should have said no, and refused his offer, but I didn’t. I knew a pair of fresh eyes were better than my weary ones, no matter how well trained, so I agreed to let Kyle lead. We had only been walking for less than twenty minutes when the shout to take cover came, and the sound of a bullet whistled through the air. My men scrambled in all directions, looking for cover, sheltering behind anything they could find. It was chaotic, the sounds of weapons being set up and fired, shouting in a foreign language, the smell of gunpowder in the air. I shouted orders, I never stopped shouting orders, I tried to reign in the chaos, tried to stem the panic before lives were lost, but I failed. I saw a pair of boots in the dirt, the body was face down in the dirt. I crawled over there; I dragged the soldier back to the relative safety of the cover my men had secured. I...I turned the body over, it was Kyle, my best friend, my brother. We had been friends for two decades, and I got him killed. His blood is on my hands, how can I live with that? Every time I close my eyes, I relive it, night after night, I am transported back to that place, to see him again, to relive his death.”

The chaplain had been right, Chase did feel better for sharing his burden, for listening to the stories of the other veterans. No one blamed him. They simply listened to him without judgement, and once he was finished, the two men seated on either side of him simply laid their hands on his shoulders and waited for his tears to subside.

“I know you can’t hear this just yet,” the man to his right spoke, “but you are not responsible son, you did not kill Kyle. You keep coming here every week, okay? We have all been where you are right now, you keep coming here and we’ll tell you every week that you weren’t to blame, we’ll get you through this, together, I promise.” Chase merely nodded, too overwhelmed to answer.

Chapter Eighteen

Today marked three months since Kyle had died, since he had lost his best friend on deployment, since he had been the one to get him killed. It didn’t feel like three months, at times it felt like forever since Kyle had been here, laughing, joking around, and at other times it felt like yesterday. Today also marked Kyle’s birthday, he would have been thirty-two years old. It had been a sombre mood in the house today, Stevie was withdrawn and quiet, Nikki teary. Both Ranger and Finn had picked up on the underlying tensions in the house and had been out of sorts and fussy. After an unusually quiet breakfast, they had all come to visit the memorial for the fallen. Chase hadn’t been here in a long time, not since his first deployment from this base had lost two lives. The place hadn’t changed, he noted. He handed Ranger and Finn a gerbera each that they had picked from the garden this morning, and with Stevie’s help, the small group walked over to Kyle’s plaque in the wall, Chase showing them how to lay their flowers.

“I miss you, Daddy!” Ranger suddenly blurted out, his bottom lip wobbling

“Oh, Ranger,” Stevie pulled him into her arms. “We all miss him, darling boy, that’s why we came here today, to tell him that, and to show him that we will never forget him. Your Daddy will always live in your heart,” Stevie touched Ranger’s chest with her palm, “just here, because you will always love him, that’s what keeps his memory alive, love. And you can always talk to Daddy, just like you talk to God, would you like to try?”

“Hi Daddy, we got a dog, did you see? Her name is Bella and Aunt Stevie says she is really cheeky because she is a baby like Finn. Finn had a birthday cake and it was so yummy and the frosting got in his hair but he didn’t care, it was funny. Uncle Chase lives with us forever now, just like Aunt Stevie, and I got a new Nanna and a Poppy, but I still get to keep my Gran. Okay Daddy, I love you.” Ranger blew a kiss at Kyle’s plaque and then dashed off to the picnic blanket his grandmother had spread out beneath a tree

Chase stood back, watching, as Stevie lovingly traced the letters of her brother’s name on the plaque, slowly and deliberately, smoothing away specks of invisible dust before laying her hands flat against the cold metal and stone memorial.

“I am an American fighting in the forces which guard my country and our way of life. I am prepared to give my life in their defence. Article One of the Code of Conduct for members of the armed forces of the United States. Stevie, we can take comfort in the fact that Kyle died doing what he loved, serving his country. Kyle made the ultimate sacrifice Stevie. He didn’t choose to die, choose to leave his family, he chose a life of service, so that others may benefit. His sacrifice won’t be forgotten, not in his family, not in this town, and not in his platoon.” Chase spoke softly to Stevie, both of them remembering Kyle in their own way. “Come on, let’s go cut Kyle’s birthday cake before Ranger stages a mutiny,” Chase broke the tension, picking up Stevie’s hand in his and leading her over to the blanket.

The birthday cake was delicious, a chocolate and orange swirl cake that Stevie made, frosted with a chocolate fudge frosting. It had been Kyle’s favourite cake and it was only fitting that they should have it today. Chase had produced some candles and they had sung happy birthday, Ranger blowing the candles out. Chase loved that there was a small fenced park next to the memorial for the fallen, it meant that families could come together, without fear of disturbing anyone’s peace or reflection. Legs stretched out, Chase leant back on his hands and watched the scene in front of him. Nikki sat beside him, reading her bible, Ranger and Stevie were standing with Finn, who had taken his first steps a couple of days after his first birthday and now thought that he was invincible. Finn was trying to run between Ranger and Stevie, and he looked like a wobbly giraffe. Chase watched as he fell again and again, but kept getting back up. Smiling and waving, Chase stood, and headed towards the memorial for the fallen, wanting a few moments of his own with Kyle. As Chase walked back to the blanket, he found that his eyes kept seeking out Stevie, needing to know where she was, wanting to make sure that she was okay. Needing to be close to her. Chase stopped in his tracks, breath hitching in his throat.

Watching Stevie today, with Ranger and Finn, as they remembered Kyle, seeing her quiet strength, her dignity, Chase was suddenly struck by the realisation that he was in love with Stevie. Coming here with her had helped him to see what he had already known, what he suspected the night in the hospital. His mother was right, as was Nikki. It seems that everyone knew how he really felt about Stevie, except Stevie and him. At least, he hoped that Stevie didn't know, he wasn't prepared for the awkwardness he was certain would follow such a revelation. Chase sat down on a nearby bench, analysing his emotions, thinking about his motives. He was in love with Stevie, of that he was certain. The question he needed to answer was for how long had he been in love with her? Had it always been there? Had his crush on her as a teenager, as a college student, actually been more? Had he been too blind to see his crush for what it really was? He certainly hadn’t meant to fall in love with her, she was his best friend’s sister, she was off limits, and yet, here he was, sitting on a park bench, completely frozen, rendered speechless by the realisation that his feelings ran deeper than even he himself knew.

He wondered when it had actually happened, when had he crossed the line from friendship into love. Was it obvious? Could his mother tell from his tone of voice? Chase ran his hand through his hair, thinking. This was terrible, he was married to a woman who he had fallen in love with, he had done the very thing that he had promised would not happen in this marriage, he had developed feelings for his wife, for his best friend. An uncomfortable feeling settled in the pit of his stomach, had he known that he loved her when he had proposed to her? Had he unknowingly been duplicitous? Had he duped her into marrying him under false pretences? No, he shook his head, his conscience was clear, while he knew he had some residual feelings towards Stevie when he proposed, he had no idea of the depth of them, of that he was certain. Chase had no idea how he was going to fix this. He certainly couldn’t tell Stevie, that much he was sure about, not after promising her again and again that theirs was a marriage of convenience only, for both of them. Yet, he couldn’t ask her to stay, could he, not knowing what he now knew. Going forwards, keeping this from her would be paramount to lying.

Chase knew that there was no way that he could ever expect Stevie to love him, not once she knew that it had been Chase who had killed her brother Kyle, that he was to blame, that he was the reason that she was now mother to two orphan boys. There had been a time, when they were both teenagers, that Chase had imagined what it would be like to have a life with Stevie, had pictured a future for them together, but those days were long gone. It was ironic really, he was living a life that he had always wanted, Stevie as his wife, a family, a dog, and now he would lose everything. His mouth felt like it was full of cotton balls, and he desperately tried to swallow down the panic that was rising within. Chase knew that he couldn’t continue living with Stevie, not now, not now that he knew the true depth of his feelings, not when there was an even bigger lie festering away between them.

He had to tell her, he had to tell her the truth, now, before the boys became even more attached to him, to their new family. Chase felt sick to his stomach when he thought about Ranger and Finn. He had been selfish, so very, very selfish, he saw that now. He thought that he had been doing the right thing, by marrying Stevie, providing for her, for the boys, as Kyle would have provided for his family, but now Chase realised that he had acted out of a sense of guilt, not love. He had sullied Kyle’s memory and cheapened their friendship, and worse of all, he had taken Finn and Ranger and unquestioningly oved them as his own, even knowing that he had killed their Daddy. What kind of a person did that? what kind of a person takes on the family that he was responsible for destroying in the first place?

Ranger and Finn would grow up to hate him, once they knew the truth of what he had done, they would despise him, rightly so. Chase absently wondered if Stevie would tell them. Of course, she would, he decided, Stevie was always honest with everyone, no matter what it cost her. He wondered what she would tell them when they woke up and found him gone. He hated that they would be confused, he hated that they would need to move after all, all because of him. When Stevie leant the truth, she wouldn’t want to look at him, much less have him in the same house as her anymore, not that he could blame her. Well, he wouldn’t make her ask him to leave, he wouldn’t put that on her, he would file for divorce himself, he would set them all free of him, even if it broke him in the process. He wondered where they would go? Maybe they would all go to Nikki’s house, it was certainly large enough and she liked the company. His mother would be devastated, he would have to tell his parents the truth as well, he wouldn’t have anyone blaming Stevie for this.

Once Chase had decided to tell Stevie the truth, everything was painful. The drive home, their last as a family, shot pain into his chest, eating dinner together, listening to everyone making plans for the coming week, caused his chest to throb, and kissing Ranger and Finn goodnight caused an ache in Chase’s soul he wasn’t sure he would survive. If Stevie had noticed Chase’s melancholy mood, she made no comment, for which he was grateful. When it was just Stevie and Chase left downstairs, Chase made his move.

“Stevie, would you sit with me on the porch please, I need to tell you something, it’s important.” Nodding, Stevie followed him as he led her out to the porch, gesturing for her to sit on the swing while he remained standing.

“Chase, is everything okay?” Chase couldn’t stand to see the concern for him in her eyes, and turned away, facing out into the night, into the darkened, empty street before him, an omen of his life to come.

“I haven’t been entirely honest with you.”

“What do you mean? Is this about the kiss, Chase?”

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