“Now, Callie,” he soothed, gripping her hand, kissing the back of it, “don’t you dare go there. You’re a civilian, you’re not a military person. You’ve never been trained up to deal with what got thrown at you in that ambush. I’ll never hold that against you, ever. You did your best and it was damn good! Do you hear me?”
She swallowed, avoiding his intense gaze, the urgency in his voice. Callie lifted her chin, holding his stare. “I hear you, Beau.”
“Never question my love for you, all right? Never.” He relaxed his hand around hers, releasing it. Even lifting his left arm caused a lot of discomfort to his rib cage. “After I got hit in the side, I was having a lot of trouble breathing. I lay there stunned, unable to move. Every breath I took, Callie, I thought was my last.”
He heard her gasp, throwing her hand up across her mouth, her green eyes going wide. Pushing on, he said roughly, “I knew I was dying. I could feel it. Every breath was less and less. I had blood coming up out of my right lung, filling my mouth and I was choking on it. My last thoughts, sweetheart, were of you.” He reached out, touching her hair and cupping her cheek, holding her tear filled eyes. “I now understand what you went through, Callie. You thought you were going to die, too. None of this diminished one whit about how I feel toward you. If anything my love is stronger for you now than it ever was.” He leaned over, very carefully, and kissed her mouth, moving against her lips, feeling her returning warmth. God! Didn’t she know he needed her more than life itself?
May 20
“C
ome on. Let’s
sit down on the swing,” Callie urged Beau.
Up ahead of him, in an area between the chicken coop and corrals with the barn, sat an ancient elm with thick, spreading limbs. Rallying, Beau nodded, taking her hand and walking toward it. Right now, he was a mess inside, beating himself up for not having been sensitive to Callie’s struggles. But he had been. He’d done so much to support her during that period.
Since she had admitted it nearly a week ago, he’d chewed on it. She’d been an emotional wreck after the ambush in Afghanistan and he’d been unsure how to help her get through it. He’d not known what to do, what to ask her, or what to say. Callie never blamed him for it. In part, it was her fault because she never shared how she was feeling with him.
They slowly walked across the gravel parkway between the swing and the main cabin. Beau had begun to recognize how important it was for those who experienced trauma to have a sounding board, just as Callie was for him. She’d suffered in silence. Callie was teaching him to be transparent, that it was all right to unveil his deepest feelings to her.
His fingers tightened around hers. The pain in his heart was more acute than the jabbing pain he experienced each time he placed his right boot on the ground, activating pain in his injured lung. The crunch of the gravel was drowned out by a red rooster crowing in the hen house area. A couple of sheep, which his mother kept for shearing twice a year for blankets, called back, as if to answer the rooster.
Sitting down in the ancient swing made by his grandfather always gave Beau a sense of peace. Thick chains held the large swing beneath an overhead limb, and Beau sat on one end, his right elbow on the wooden arm because it stabilized his healing rib cage. Callie, who wore a pair of pecan colored twill pants, sat facing him, one leg beneath her. The spring breeze lifted strands of her hair, now glowing crimson and gold as sunlight shot through them. Beau swore she looked like an angel with a halo of light around her head.
“Comfy?” she asked him, resting her hands in her lap about a foot away from where he sat.
“Yeah, I’ve always liked this swing.” He casually glanced in her direction and was relieved to see the tension dissolving from her features. Placing his hand over her knee closest to him, he added, “As a kid, I liked coming out here after our chores were done for the day. I’d watch the clouds come overhead and find images of animals and insects in them. Sometimes, I’d even see a face.”
“Funny,” she said, leaning against the back of the swing, “I used to do the same thing up at our ranch. I had a small hill where I rode one of our horses. I loved doing it all summer long. And like you, once I got my chores done, I’d tell my mom where I was going and take off across the pastures to my hiding place.”
“It wasn’t much of a hiding place, though,” Beau teased, grinning.
Laughing, Callie agreed, “No, everyone knew where it was. Dara and I were trained from early on to always let our parents and grandparents know exactly where we were going.”
“You had a nice time growing up, so did I,” and he gave his home a wistful look. “There are so many memories here. Good ones.”
“Amber said that your grandparents used to live in that other cabin where your father now makes his furniture?”
“Yes.” Beau looked at the third cabin that sat off to one side of the property. “Eli and Sally Gardner built that cabin together. After he homesteaded this land, one of the requirements was to put a building on it to prove you were using the land and not squatting on it.”
“Why do you think they made it so long? It’s like one long room.”
“I don’t know. It served them, though. My pa loves the way it’s built because he can completely assemble and make couches, chairs, and cabinets in there. There’s plenty of space for all his tools and equipment, and for his projects in the works for other folks.”
“He’s magical with his hands and wood,” Callie agreed, impressed by what she had seen since she’d arrived. “I love going in there to see what he’s working on.”
“My pa is an artist. But my Great-Grandpa Eli was too.” He lifted his left hand. “I didn’t get that gene.”
“You do other things very well,” Callie said.
He became somber. “I look at what I do—and I take lives, Callie. I’m not saying those evil bastards didn’t deserve to leave this earth, because they did. If they’re left alive, they’ll make so many other people suffer. I’m not sorry I took them out.”
She studied him as a light breeze sifted overhead, moving the newly sprouting leaves. “Are you looking at what you’re doing with your life? I know I did.”
“Yes,” he said, frowning. “Coming here is peaceful. There’s no strife, no threat to home and family.”
“That’s the way I felt when I returned from Afghanistan after that ambush. I was never so glad to get back to our ranch as I was then, Beau. It meant peace and quiet, and I knew I could let down and finally let go.”
“I was so glad to see you leave Afghanistan,” he murmured, meeting her sad gaze. “You turned the corner when you got home, though.” He lifted his head, gazing across the huge gravel circle, the corral, barn, and cabins on the other side. “I guess I never realized how much home meant to me until just now.”
“It’s a haven to heal up in,” Callie offered. “Your parents are so happy that you’re with them.”
“There was so much stress on ’em after I got shot,” he said, frowning.
“This experience will change you, Beau. And them. I know it’s changed me.”
“I can feel the changes inside me, Callie. They’re not that clear yet. I don’t see them, but I feel my life turning around. When I was lying in that playground, gasping like a fish thrown onto the ground, I remember thinking I didn’t want to die. I had you. I loved my brothers, my folks. I just wanted to go home. All I could think of was your smile, walking our acreage here at home, helping my pa sand down some wood he was working on, or helping my ma can vegetables or fruit in the kitchen. I remembered thinking it was all over.”
“Were you scared?”
“No. Long ago, Callie, I knew I could die because of the career I’d chosen. I was at peace with that. What startled me was that I wasn’t ready to die. I wanted to be at home with you in my arms, and I had to see you carrying our children. I wanted to watch them grow up and be happy, like I was while growing up.” He shook his head and pushed the rocker with the toe of his boot a little bit.
“I wanted to make you happy. I remember as I lost consciousness I saw your smile, how bright, sunny, and beautiful it was. I heard you calling to me.” Beau gave her a sideward glance to gauge her reaction. He saw Callie’s lips part in shock.
“Yeah, I felt you with me, Callie. Honest to God, I did. I could feel you kneeling beside me, your knees against my back to keep me on my injured right side, your one hand on my upper arm, the other cradling beneath my head. You kept telling me to breathe, to hold on, that help was coming, that I wasn’t going to die because you loved me.”
Callie stared. “I-I never knew that . . .”
He squeezed her fingers. “I wanted to tell you when I felt the time was right. We’re beyond the crisis now and I’m at a stage where I’m starting to heal up. You were there with me. I felt the indent of your knees into my back to hold me steady and stay on my right side. I felt the strength of your hand around my arm, Callie. You were holding me in a position that allowed me to breathe instead of drown in my own blood. I asked Nurse Evans about that back at Bethesda. She said pushing me onto my wounded side allowed me to get enough air out of the good left lung.” He gave her a long, warm look. “You saved my life this time around, sweetheart, whether you knew it or not.”
Shaken, Callie stared at him open mouthed. “T-T-that’s . . . unbelievable . . . wonderful . . . did you tell Nurse Evans about it?”
“I did.”
“What did she say?”
“Well, I thought she was gonna laugh at me, but she became very serious. She said she’d heard other men who were badly wounded have a loved one come to their side, comfort them, talk to them, and tell them to hold on, too. I wouldn’t have believed it if it hadn’t happened to me.” Beau held her luminous gaze. “Callie, I could feel you infusing me with life. I could feel how hot your hands were around my arm and my head. I could feel powerful waves of energy coursing through me from your hands. I can’t explain it. But it happened. It wasn’t a dream. Maybe my head was all screwed up and I imagined it, but to this day, I believe you saved my life. Now, we’re even,” he said, giving her a crooked grin.
Beau saw the surprise in Callie’s face, her lovely green eyes huge with disbelief. Her expression was one of wonder and awe. That was how he had felt when it happened. “She urged me to share it with you. Nurse Evans said that if I told my doc, he’d explain it away as nerve firings in my brain causing the hallucination, but she told me to hold on to it and remember it just as it happened. It was so real, Callie. I swear to God, it was.”
She sat there for a long time, staring off into the springtime afternoon, absorbing Beau’s revelation.
“I remember nothing about it,” she said. “But you know what? My grandpa always said that love could push back death.”
Beau nodded. He knew Graham was a black ops Marine sniper who had seen the worst of the Gulf War in Iraq. He’d almost died on a later mission. “Has Graham ever talked to you about the time he was shot?”
“No. Ever since I came home from surviving that ambush, he’s opened up a lot more to me about what he did over there. But just snippets, not much detail.”
“Has he ever talked to you about his wife after he got shot and was bleeding out?”
Callie gave him a searching look. “No. Why?”
“Sometime, when it feels right, tell your grandpa about my experience with you coming to my side and holding me in the right position so I could breathe and live until help could arrive. Okay?”
Callie gave him a curious look. “I will.”
“Every day, I’m more and more convinced it wasn’t my imagination,” Beau murmured, looking away, watching the sheep in the corral. “It was real. I know it was. I felt you there. You leaned over me, your hair was loose, and it tickled the side of my face, Callie. I felt your warm breath against my temple when you were telling me to relax, to just breathe and not move, that help was on the way. That was as real as me holding your hand right here and now.”
June 1
Beau watched as
Callie got down on her hands and knees in the huge five-acre garden along with his mother. He sat near his father’s furniture-making cabin, hearing his radio playing bluegrass music. His ma’s male yellow tabby cat, Butch, sauntered in, his crooked tail waving languidly from side to side. Butch had wandered into their lives five years earlier. He was a stray tom, his face beaten up, scratches all over it, one ear missing, but he was a formidable gopher hunter, and he kept Amber’s garden rid of gophers.
The sunlight felt wonderful as he leaned against the side of the cabin, his face tipped up, absorbing the rays. Callie’s laughter mingled with his ma’s, and he smiled. It was getting easier to take in a full breath of air, finally, and there was no longer pain as he inhaled. He was glad that the VA had finally released him because he’d hated the place. His appointments were always being cancelled and rescheduled, only to be cancelled again. Thanks to Bay Griffin’s expertise as a combat medic, Beau was on a solid healing curve. She came down twice a week to examine the scar alongside his ribs, check his heart, blood pressure, and press here and press there. The VA was letting vets fall through the cracks, and some had died. He hadn’t, thank God, because Bay tended him—one vet helping another.
Callie worked in concert with Bay. Beau continued to use his breathing apparatus, having to blow into it and force the total inflation of his lungs. She made sure he did the exercises like clockwork, every day. The woman he loved was now a seamless part of his family. Amber had taught Callie how to crochet and often, if they weren’t out weeding the garden, he could find them in that swing beneath the limbs of the elm, crocheting and talking.
Slowly, he was emerging from his personal hell. Gabe Griffin, Bay’s husband, came down at least once a week just to visit with him. They would sit outdoors, sometimes walking the nearby trails, and talk. Gabe had gone through his own dark place, and it was easier to share his feelings with the ex-SEAL. Feeling guilty that he couldn’t do the same thing with Callie, Beau was afraid that his description of how he’d nearly died had already upset her. It didn’t upset Gabe, who had seen it all, because he was a black ops brother.