Authors: Lindsay McKenna
Sabra frowned. "What did you do?" She wasn't a pilot, but she knew the risk of strong gusts of wind. It chilled her to think that they could have been blown into those power lines….
"I ordered my crew chief to drop the litter basket we carried for such rescues. My helo was dancing all over the place, and Summers was watching out the window, telling me how close we were to the wires." He shook his head. "We had so many close calls that day, I lost count. Finally, we managed to rescue
Cal
. We flew him to the base hospital and saved his life. That evening, I went to see how he was doing. That's when I met his wife, Linda, who was pregnant then with their first child, Sammy."
Sabra heard Craig's voice drop, and she slid her arm around his waist, squeezing gently. "They are very lucky to have you for a friend. You didn't have to go find out how he was."
"I've always been that way," he muttered, absorbing her touch.
"Something happened, though?"
"Yeah," he whispered roughly, releasing her and pushing himself into a more-upright position against the wall. The covers pooled around his waist, and Sabra moved close, her hand on his blanketed thigh, her eyes soft with compassion. Glancing down at her, Craig said, "It happened during Desert Storm." He almost choked on the words.
Sabra's hand tightened on his tense thigh, and she held his grief-stricken gaze. "I thought it might have."
He studied her a moment. "How?"
"Terry had seen action in
Vietnam
, and he warned me the first day we teamed up not to touch him to waken him—just like you did."
"I see…."
Sabra reached out to captured the hand that lay against his belly and tangled her fingers with his. "It's a symptom of posttraumatic-stress syndrome. I know I'm not telling you anything new. But Terry sat me down and we had a long heart-to-heart talk about what he'd seen during the war and how it affected him." Sabra shrugged, saddened. "I'm pretty used to what you think might be terrible to tell others, Craig. In the past five years, Terry has had some nightmares as bad as the ones you've had. I remember the first time he had a night terror, and I ran into his room to help him, like an idiot." Sabra touched the side of her jaw. "I forgot what he'd told me, and he nailed me with a right cross that sent me flying halfway across the room."
Craig's eyes narrowed.
"I had it coming," Sabra said wryly. "It broke the skin but didn't break my jaw. I was young and idealistic then, thinking I could change things." She studied his scarred, burned hand against her own perfect-looking one. "Terry taught me a lot about PTSD, Craig. I understand that it's hard for you to communicate what happened because you're ashamed." She fought back tears, her voice dropping to a husky, uneven whisper. "I see no shame in what's happened to anyone who's been in a wartime situation. I don't think less of you for crying out. For wanting to cry, even if you don't…."
Craig tightened his fingers around her slender ones. "So you knew all along…"
"In a way, I did. I didn't want to make assumptions, though. I felt it was only fair to wait and let you share with me when you were ready, Craig. Terry taught me that everyone reacts differently to any given situation. One thing you have in common, though—the trauma is like baggage."
His mouth flattened and he managed a twisted smile. "Yeah, that's for sure." His terror dissolved a little more at Sabra's understanding look, and he felt more emotionally stable with her holding his hand. He placed his other hand over hers. "I haven't been giving you very much credit, have I?"
"You remind me of Terry in some ways," Sabra admitted softly. "So it's easy to allow you the space you need. But it would help if you could share what happened."
Craig hung his head and concentrated on running his fingers across hers. Sabra's skin was so smooth and unmarred, unlike his own. But scars went beyond the visible ones; he carried the worst ones inside him, where very few people could see them. Struggling to speak, he said, "I…tried to talk to Linda about it, thinking she'd understand…" He shook his head, then rasped, "After that experience, I didn't talk to anyone again. Ever."
Sabra changed position, sitting next to him, capturing his hand and holding it firmly between her own. "We share something very special," she quavered. "I hope you can trust me enough to tell me, Craig. Whatever it is, it's eating you up alive. I see it in your eyes when the nightmare's got a hold on you. I saw it earlier tonight."
He closed his eyes, tipped back his head and rested it on the headboard, glad of Sabra's steadying touch. "No one knows what happened. Not even the widows and children who were left behind," he whispered, his voice barely audible. "I was flying my second raid of the night. It was windy, very windy, and I was flying ‘nap of the earth.' Brent was copilot, and in back, I had two more Recon teams to drop close to the enemy lines. We were responsible for the first assault, before the rest of the forces engaged.
"It was so dark that night, and I've never sweated like I did then. My flight suit was wringing wet. My gloves were so sweaty they were slippery on the controls, and I worried about losing my grip, and sending us crashing into one of those dunes. Cal Talbot was there. He and his men made up one of the Recon teams. We carried a total of ten men…."
Craig opened his eyes and stared up at the ceiling as the scene rolled out as if on film before him. "We were all nervous—except
Cal
. He came over just before the mission, slapped me on the back and told me how lucky he felt having me as the pilot on this mission. I remember saying I didn't feel lucky that night. I was scared. I'd just come back from the first drop, and the damn wind was so bad it had nearly knocked us into a high sand dune. Luckily, Summers saw it and warned me in time. We'd had three grenades launched at us, too, though we'd managed to avoid them somehow…. Still, my hands were shaking like leaves, and my knees were so weak I sat in my chopper for fifteen minutes before I had the strength to get up and walk out of there.
"
Cal
thought I was joking. He'd never seen me scared. He pulled a small plastic bag from his pocket. In it was a lock of hair from each of his daughters. He told me he carried it for good luck and gave it to me to hold onto for this trip. I said no, that he should keep it, but he just laughed and stuck it in my left sleeve pocket. He laughed and said that if we crashed, I'd survive.
"I stood next to my bird while they were refueling, just shaking.
Cal
went back to check his team before boarding, but I had this knot in my gut. Finally I ran away from the lights and the crews and puked my guts out. That's how scared I was."
"With good reason," Sabra said unsteadily. All the fear Craig had worked so hard to control was alive in his eyes as never before. Did he realize how strong he was? How brave he was to try to behave normally in society while carrying these awful memories?
With a shrug, he muttered, "I came back, washed my mouth out with some water from a canteen I borrowed from one of the ground crew and climbed into my bird. Once we had everyone on board,
Cal
came up, patted my shoulder and slipped a white envelope into my hand. He told me to hold it for him until he got back. There wasn't time to talk, so I jammed the envelope into my uniform.
"The wind was just as bad the second time, and the mission was more dangerous because we had to fly through the Guard lines to drop the teams behind them. I was really worried about SCUD missiles and grenade launchers. Summers kept a sharp watch calling out the elevation of the terrain as we flew along only about ten feet above it at any given time."
Craig felt sweat popping out on his brow, and shame swept through him as he lifted his hand to wipe the moisture away. Sabra's lips parted, and her eyes grew sad, but her hand remained strong and stabilizing on his. Taking a ragged breath, he forced himself to go on. "Things got really tense near the drop zone. We'd already had two grenade launchers shoot at us. Luckily Summers saw the flash from the barrels, and I was able to haul the bird up and out of target range. But each time we did that, I knew we were exposing ourselves to enemy radar. It couldn't be helped. I was afraid we'd been spotted, but I had to drop the two teams near an ammo dump they were going to blow up. That action was necessary to create a diversion that would allow a much-larger force to sweep down and catch the Guard off-balance."
More sweat broke out on Craig's upper lip, and he could feel perspiration trickling from his armpits. His voice was shaking now as the adrenaline began to surge through him, like it always did when he relived the event. Sabra reached over and gently wiped the moisture from his brow and upper lip with her fingers. The empathy in her eyes gave him the strength to continue. "We were almost to the drop zone when it happened. The wind jostled us badly and threw us off course. I was wrestling with getting us back below radar range and Summers was calling out the elevation."
Craig shut his eyes tightly, his voice breaking, his breathing becoming erratic. "Neither of us saw it coming. Neither of us…I don't know how many times I've replayed it in my mind. Why didn't we see that third grenade being fired?" He squeezed Sabra's hand more tightly. "I remember Summers screaming out, jabbing his finger toward the right, but it was too late. The grenade hit the main rotor, and the bird flipped up, like a wounded thing. Shrapnel and fire showered through the cabin. The Plexiglas shattered and blew in on us. The fire was over my arms as I wrestled with the bird, trying to stop it from sinking tail first.
"We slowly turned over, the rotor screeching and I heard screams from the rear. Brent was slumped forward, hit by something. Probably shrapnel. All I could do was try to control the helo enough so that we might survive the crash. Everything slowed down, as if I were moving in slow motion. Smoke clogged the cabin, and I lost my sense of direction. No matter what I tried to do to control the bird, it wouldn't respond. I figured out later that the cables to the rudders and tail assembly had been severed by the grenade blast.
"We went down. The bird flipped onto its side and crashed on the slope of a very steep dune that felt like concrete. It hit on Summers's side, and I thought the jolt would snap his neck. I heard the metal tearing, and I remember
Cal
's voice above everything, ordering his men to not panic. I was amazed at his calm—that he was even conscious, much less thinking clearly. He was such an amazing man…."
Wiping his face savagely, Craig squeezed his eyes shut. Every word became a major effort, and his chest rose and fell as he went on, perspiration covering his entire body now. "When the bird came to rest, I managed to cut myself free of the harness, and I pulled Summers out through the nose. The screams of the Recons were awful. It was so dark, and the fire's dancing light hurt more than it helped. I scrambled around, trying to locate the hatch. Since the bird was on her side, one of the escape routes was blocked. I managed to climb up on top, and I tried—God, I tried to get to that other door. It was jammed from the grenade blast, and I couldn't open it. The fire was getting worse, and I could hear the screams of the men inside. They couldn't escape through the cabin because it was already consumed by fire."
Craig opened his eyes and slowly lifted his hands. "I tried to open that door. The fire was so bad. I threw myself against it, I lost count of how many times. The screams—those screams for help…I could hear the men pounding against the inside of the helo. I heard
Cal
crying out." His hands shook and he let them fall into his lap. "There was an explosion. I felt this blast of heat, and I was thrown through the air." His brow furrowed deeply. "It was the last thing I remembered."
Shaken, Sabra slid her arms around his damp neck and held his broken, dark gaze. "Oh, Craig, how awful…."
"For me? No," he said harshly, "I survived. I was the only one to survive. It was a lot tougher for Summers and
Cal
, and the other Recons." He managed a tortured grimace. "I was the lucky one."
"Were you captured by the enemy?"
"No. Another helo with an Air Force flight surgeon on board was sent in to pick up survivors. I—I don't remember anything until I woke up at a burn unit behind the lines. My hands—" he picked them up and studied them darkly "—suffered third-degree burns. They were suspended away from my body when I regained consciousness. The left side of my face was pretty much totaled, too. I had a real deep gash on my left cheek. But compared to what those men suffered before they died, it was nothing."