I hated that Gus had already been exposed to so much of the ugliness in the world. “Yeah, buddy, he did. But he’s okay.”
“It almost killed him, but he was super lucky.”
Apprehension raced up my spine. “Did he tell you that?” Josh was really private about his injury. So private he hadn’t even told me the full story.
“Dad did.”
I turned him in my arms to see his face. “He what?”
“Chill out, Ember. I’m not crazy.” He craned his neck back, but couldn’t see the movie. “Dad took me to hockey, so he knew Coach Walker. He talked about him sometimes.”
Don’t be a moron. Of course my brother wasn’t talking to dead people. “Yeah, sorry, buddy.” The movie sucked him right back in.
Sam took a seat on the couch next to us. “So what do you really think is going on? Do you think he’s hurt again?”
“He’s at drill,” Gus answered with a huge slurp.
My stomach fell through my body and a gaping hole opened up that cried out desperately to be filled with any piece of logic. “Drill for what, Gus? Like construction?”
His head swiveled, and he gave me the my-sister-is-dumb look. “No, like drill, Ember. You know, for the army. That’s why Dad liked him. Josh is a soldier like he was.” Gus turned back around like he’d announced that his hair was red. So matter of fact.
“Drill? Soldier?” No. No. No.
Gus sighed and stood up. “Seriously? You’re going to have to rewind the movie if you keep talking, Ember. I’m missing the good parts.”
Sam grabbed the remote and hit the pause button. “He’s in the army, Gus?” she asked softly.
He nodded. “How do you think he got shot?”
Where the gaping pit in my stomach had been, now was a sense of crushing, of everything imploding into me like a black hole had opened up in my soul. Once a month. He disappeared for a weekend a month. Drill. “He’s in the Guard,” I whispered.
“Yup! Sergeant Walker!” Gus plopped down on the floor in front of the TV.
Sam pressed play and then pulled me into my bedroom, shutting the door behind us. “Talk to me, girl.”
It all made sense now. Wrong place, wrong time. He’d only failed to mention that the wrong place was half a world away and he’d been in uniform. He’d been lying to me from day one.
Oh God. I was in love with a soldier. I couldn’t love a soldier. I swore I never would. I would never put my heart in the hands of someone who threw his life away in a foreign country, fighting for people who didn’t even want us there, and left for months at a time.
I couldn’t love a soldier. I couldn’t sit home and wait and wonder if he’d ever come back. I wouldn’t answer the door when strangers knocked. I wouldn’t fall apart. I wouldn’t hang a gold star in my window.
I wouldn’t be my mother.
“You’re not speaking, Ember.”
I snapped my focus back to Sam. “He’s wrong. He’s wrong! Josh would have told me. He knows how I feel about the army. He would have told me!”
I was on my feet before I realized I’d wanted to stand. I had to know. “Gus, stay with Sam!” I flew out the door, not bothering to shut it behind me as I pivoted and pounded on Josh’s door.
“Hold the fuck up!” Jagger shouted, ripping the door open. “What the f— Oh, Ember. Hey, did you forget something?”
I shook my head and pushed past him, stumbling through the apartment like a drunken crazy woman. Maybe I was.
“Ember?” He followed me into Josh’s room.
“He’s not right. Gus can’t be right,” I muttered, opening Josh’s drawers. “He’s just a kid. What would he know?”
“What are you looking for? Right about what? Josh isn’t seeing anyone else, if that’s what you’re worried about. Hell, he’s barely looked at another girl since you showed up in December.” He closed the drawers once I was done rummaging through boxers, jeans, shirts, and socks, trying to find something that would prove Gus wrong.
“Gus, he told me . . .” I glanced up at the photos. There were no pictures of him with other soldiers, or deployments, or in uniform. Uniforms.
“Where is your flaw, Josh Walker?”
He laughed. “I keep it in the closet.”
Right. I sidestepped Jagger and opened the closet door, flipping the switch just inside.
“Ember, no!” Jagger yelled.
He was too late.
My eyes skipped over the various hockey jerseys and sparse dress clothes and were drawn to the ACUs like a magnet. Two steps and a reach, and I could touch them. The fabric was as foreign and familiar as it came, the backdrop of my whole life. “No, no, no,” I whispered, praying I was wrong.
The uniform slid from the hanger, and I held it out in front of me. On the left shoulder was the patch for the Colorado National Guard, on the right, signifying he’d been deployed, his combat patch was identical. The stripes of a sergeant were fastened across the chest, and across from the US ARMY tape was the word that froze up the love and hope in my heart.
“Walker.” The whisper left me broken. I crushed the fabric in my fists, wishing I was strong enough to rip it at the seams, to shred the future I knew it stood for. The one I refused to be a part of.
“He wanted to tell you,” Jagger said softly. “He just . . . couldn’t. He couldn’t lose you.”