Text

4 Nathan

On my way home from work, I drove through the drive-thru and got a bucket of fried chicken and some biscuits. I wasn’t used to being up North. When you ordered iced tea here, it didn’t come sweetened. What the hell kind of person drank unsweetened iced tea? It was downright un-American.

As soon as the person at the window handed me the bucket and I drove away, I reached in and pulled out a leg, biting into the crispy, fried skin. It wasn’t as good as they did it in the South, but it was close enough.

As I drove and ate, I marveled at the views beyond the dashboard of my Wrangler. I’d been stationed here six months, and I still wasn’t used to the landscape. It was so different than what I was used to. The mountains were never ending. The way they rose right up from the ground and into the sky was remarkable.

The roads here were two-lane and curvy as hell. Driving a stick shift on these back roads was the worst. Thank God I had four-wheel drive because I had a feeling this winter was going to be a bitch.

Tall trees bursting with autumn hues filled the mountains and grew up to the roads. Rolling hills of tall grass and flowers gave way to small neighborhoods and homes perched right along the curving, dangerous roads.

Pennsylvania was a far cry from the South where I grew up. I was born and raised in Jacksonville, North Carolina. It was a Marine town if I ever saw one. The population there was probably at least half Marines. The economy was always steady because of this and there were bases scattered around town.

The land there was flat. We didn’t have the mountains in Jacksonville, but there was no shortage of beaches. Because the town was so close to the coast, on a super hot day, sometimes you could smell the salt that blew in from the ocean. Jacksonville boasted two temperatures: hot and hell. Sure, sometimes it would be “chilly” in the mornings at sixty degrees, but the sun always chased away the chill.

Here in Pennsylvania, it was always cool. It didn’t matter how high the sun rose, the heat could never compare to that of the South. I guess that was a welcome change. I enjoyed not sweating my balls off in my cammies all day long.

I came around a sharp bend in the road and downshifted, pulling up to my rental, which was one of those houses that sat along the winding road. It also sat away from the others, surrounded by trees and creating the privacy I desperately wanted.

The house needed some work, which was one of the reasons I rented it. It would’ve been easier to rent something closer to where I worked, something in Allentown. But I didn’t want to be around that much congestion. I wanted room to breathe.

Plus, working on the house was a great way to keep busy. And save on rent.

I parked alongside the home and threw open the door, grabbing the chicken and biscuits and going inside.

The house was covered in wooden shingles, making it appear like it belonged in the woods, sort of like a cabin. There were overgrown bushes along the front and the yard was already blanketed with a thick layer of fall leaves.

I unlocked the chipping brown front door and walked through the living room into the kitchen. The large window over the sink flooded the room with sunlight that filtered through the trees in the back yard. I set down my dinner and headed down the hallway, unbuttoning my cammies as I went.

I peeled off the blouse and tossed it across my bed and then bent down to unlace my boots. Once those were off, I undid my boot band that held my pants in place over my boots and tossed those onto the growing pile of clothes on my mattress.

My belt and trousers were next, along with my army green T-shirt. When I was down to nothing but my boxer briefs, I went into the adjoining bath and turned on the shower. The water pressure in here sucked. But at least there was water.

Bathing with baby wipes was worse.

I peeled off the boxers and kicked them away, stepping under the lukewarm spray and pulling the curtain shut.

I stood under the water a long time, hoping it would wash away my day. But my brain wasn’t going to be controlled, and it went to places I really didn’t want to go.

After finishing up, I tossed on a ratty pair of jeans, a white T-shirt, and a long-sleeved thermal tee.

I sat at the kitchen counter and ate my southern dinner, the picture hanging on my fridge taunting me as I ate.

Finally, I dropped the leg I’d been working on and wiped the grease coating my fingers on a napkin. I pushed away from the stool and stalked over to stand in front of the picture, crossing my arms over my chest as if I were accepting some unspoken challenge.

The faces in that photo stared back at me, reminding me of better days, of days when I didn’t carry around thick scars that no one could see.

Prior was grinning into the camera, a helmet strapped under his chin. A rifle was slung over his shoulder and war paint smeared his baby face. We used to laugh and tell him that he only wore the paint so women wouldn’t think he was twelve.

To the left of Prior stood Gidding. A solid house of a man, with dark skin and a wide white smile. When he wasn’t working, he was lifting weights. When he wasn’t lifting weights, he was flirting it up with any pair of female legs he could find.

They were both dressed in cammies and boots, with covers perched over their regulation haircuts. They were good men. They didn’t deserve what happened to them.

My eyes wandered over the sole survivor in that photo.

Broad shoulders, narrow waist, extremely short, dark hair. The smile he wore was almost an urban legend, because it was a sight that wasn’t often seen now.

He was the least likely of the trio to survive any kind of attack. He was the least likely of the trio to actually be caught in a dangerous situation.

Yet he had been.

And he was the only one who survived.

I almost didn’t recognize that man in the picture, but it was hard to forget a face you looked at every day in the mirror. I looked a lot different now than I did then. Not so much in features, but in appearance. I was no longer young and motivated. I no longer carried an air of youth and innocence.

Now I was just edgy and rough. Scarred and hardened.

I gave a weary sigh.

I spent my days trying to forget. Yet I hung a reminder right on the fridge that I was forced to look at every single day.

No more.

I couldn’t continue to beat myself up over the fact I was still alive.

I snatched the photo off the fridge and carried it to the trash can in the corner of the room. I stood over it a long time, staring down at the faces of my friends who were no longer alive.

Without tossing the picture away, I pivoted from the can and slid open a drawer. It was the kind of drawer that seemed to collect every odd and end in this house. MacGyver would have a field day with this thing.

I shoved the picture into the back, burying it underneath the rest of my accumulated junk that was too valuable to throw away. Then I slammed the drawer and returned to my chicken.

My eyes strayed to where the picture used to hang, my gut tightening in preparation for what it was going to see. Only the space was empty.

My gut released.

Putting that picture away wasn’t going to fix my problems, but it was a start.