Tread carefully if you want to fly again.
“I have a little trouble sleeping, and when I do, I have nightmares once a night.” Three, four, five times. Who’s counting?
“How is that affecting your relationship?”
“I’m engaged to a very understanding woman.” Who you don’t deserve. “I’ve had no angry outbursts, especially in her direction. I’m not going to, either.”
“Anything affecting your daytime hours?”
“Besides this very annoying, itchy cast, the laceration on my thigh, and the incision on my chest from the splenectomy?”
He arched an eyebrow in my direction. “In the mental sense.”
“No sir.” Except that one time you tossed Ember off the counter because you thought the garbage man might be packing serious heat.
He scribbled something in my file. “Crowds?”
“I haven’t cared for them much since my first deployment, but things look a lot different from the sky than they do the ground. I’ve gotten better with it since I’m not kicking in doors on raids anymore.”
He nodded. “And what do you generally think about the state of army mental health care?”
“I think we’re both checking a block. You want to make sure I’m not psycho, so you’re not to blame if I go on a murderous rampage and blame PTSD, and I want to make sure you’ll let me fly again. It’s a business relationship.”
He leaned forward, instantly intrigued. Fuck, you need to shut the hell up.
“Do you want to fly again?”
“Yes.”
“Hmm.” More jotting down in the file.
“Is that a problem?”
“No.” More notes. “Sometimes you see pilots a little more skittish after a crash.”
“Yeah, well, back on the horse and everything, right?”
He looked up at me, his eyes seeing things I’d rather they not. “Right. Tell me, Lieutenant, do you think you need ongoing appointments?”
Forgive me, Ember.
“No, sir. I think I’ve been through this before, and I know how to handle it. The nightmares will stop once I’m done processing what happened. The grief will take a hell of a lot longer, but grief isn’t going to keep me from flying.”
“No, it’s not,” he said, tapping his pencil on my file. “What do you plan to use to pull you through this time?”
“If you’re asking me if I’m going to turn into an addict, the answer is no. I haven’t touched alcohol since before I deployed, and I quit pain meds within the week of the crash. I have a very supportive fiancée”—aka, your drug of choice—“and I’m headed to see my mother. Nothing like a few days at home to soothe your soul.”
He turned those assessing eyes on me again, narrowing them through his glasses before writing on my chart again. “True. Well, how about we meet one more time when you’re back?”
He must have heard my sigh of exasperation because he looked up. “Only to clear you, of course. If you’re doing as well as you think you are, I’ll have no problem signing off. Until then, a follow-up isn’t going to affect your schedule, or go on your record.”
He paused, making sure I’d realized what he’d said.
Off the record. He was giving me a way to talk to him that wouldn’t affect my wings. “Thank you, sir. I’ll make sure to follow up, but only to be signed off, of course.”
“Of course.”
We shook hands, and I rose to leave, but he stopped me as I reached the door. “Chamomile tea. That always helps me sleep. Melatonin, if you need it. And while you’re so certain that it’s not affecting the rest of your life, just make sure your fiancée feels the same way. She’ll have some adverse reactions to this, too, so take care of yourself.”
“Yes, sir. Thank you for seeing me.”
“I’ll see you back here in two weeks, Lieutenant Walker.”
I gave him a nod, scheduled with his secretary, and got the hell away from there before he changed his mind. I knew Ember wanted me to pour my heart out to the guy, but he had control over my career, my wings, my life. I wasn’t going to let him take any of those, so I’d given him enough truth to check the important boxes and hid the rest that would check the wrong boxes.
Ember would have to understand…or rather, never know.
“Pink?” I asked Jagger that Sunday as we sat stretched out, our legs elevated by his coffee table. His new full-leg casts were so bright they were nearly radioactive.
He glanced down and shrugged. “It takes a real man to pull off hot pink.” He nodded to the racing game on Xbox. “Besides, I’m still kicking your ass.”
“I’m just taking it easy on you and those non-weight-bearing casts.”
“My hands aren’t broken.” He shook the remote with a grin. “Hell, I could probably still beat you if they were.”
I flipped my baseball cap backward. “Challenge accepted.”
“You looking forward to heading home?” he asked, cutting off my car.
I gunned it and flew by him on the left. “Yeah, it’ll be good to see my mom, tune up my Ducati.” My lips tilted into a small smile. “I ordered a full set of hot-weather gear for Ember as a surprise. She’s never ridden that bike.”
His car was back on my rear. “I didn’t think Ember was a big fan of motorcycles.”