Page 46 of Love Always

Devon does not understand how I have to parent my son. Nobody in my family really understands. They see me, but I know on some level, they don’t see me. I don’t expect them to either. Even the night light is a thing not worth discussing. Devon thinks it plays into his fear of the dark. She does not understand there are other challenges to overcome. Unlike other kids, he may sleep with a night light the rest of his life. Claire and Chloe and the guys have been so good doing back-up daycare for me. Paying for school meant I had to get rid of his regular provider; I couldn’t afford to do both. But I know when I finally come and take Cory home, there must be a sigh of relief, and the sense they can get back to their life.

But that’s the way it should be. My life is with Cory and for Cory.

It is this tug between that little boy in the room and the smell of Mateus on the sheets that makes me cry for the last time tonight.

Chapter Ten

Mateus

After about four hours of sleep, I wake up with a start, bathed in sweat, panting hard, almost lightheaded. Pain shoots up my left leg, from the heel, coiling around, beginning with the phantom and crossing into flesh, flaring around my thigh. I swing my legs over the little twin bed for a moment and, in that space between waking and sleeping, I almost forget I’ve lost a leg.

Almost.

I run my hands through my hair and wipe the sweat from my chest. Fuck me. I remember now. It burns so badly, how can it be gone?

I keep two glasses of water by the bed so I don’t have to get up and hop to the kitchen. Most people in my situation use crutches for these moments of quick trips, but I can’t make myself buy a pair. A pair of cutches represents defeat. Stupid, I know.

So, two glasses of water always sit on my nightstand. I drink one and wait for my heart to stop pounding. The dream comes back in flashes, the same frames of a film both terrifying and yet almost routine by now. Bryce and I are in open water, using two medical dummies for simulated injuries during a Tactical Combat Critical Care (TCCC) and Prolonged Field Care (PFC) training. I’m in the water, getting ready to tow Abigail-the-dummy up with me. Bryce has gone on ahead with the other dummy, George. I know he had a date and wanted to get topside.

It’s weird. I never dream about the explosion itself. I guess that’s because I can’t remember it. I was concussed, but I didn’t see any of what followed either and yet I dream it like I’m watching a movie. Water swirls with a pulsing red that grows stronger with every beat of my heart. Blood drains from my body with every thud. I know I’m going to die. I can’t breathe, my mouthpiece is gone, and I have to find it but I can’t move.

Thud. Thud. Thud. My heart trembles under my sternum while lungs burn, slowly, painfully. In reality, I was unconscious for all this—in my dream this burning is real. Bryce is on the other side of a dream-induced glass wall, unable to get to me. He has another regulator in his hands. There are two more SEALs from our unit. None of them can swim through the glass.

This is when the dream begins to flash-cut: my arms floating, lifeless, I can’t breathe anymore, my lungs are collapsing, my eyes are cold hard marbles in my head. My chest shudders with one more contraction of heart muscle and Bryce is pounding on the glass unable to get to me.

Thud. The water is red now completely. There’s a buzzing, shivery, thud beneath my ribs.

My chest shudders with a last, desperate attempt to pump, but there’s nothing left.

This is when I always wake up.

When I was a kid, my grandfather told me never to dream of death. “You could die in your dreams,” he said.

If that’s the case, I’ve died hundreds of times. What really happened was that Bryce saw or heard the explosion, swam down to me, tore a CAT tourniquet off his belt, tied off what was left of my leg, cut my tether line, and started towing me up, trying to get the regulator in my mouth to keep me from drowning.

He nearly drowned himself. It took two other SEAL team members to get me to the surface. I was in the hospital for weeks before I really woke up, slowly, in stages, and then the realization would hit me. Kind of like tonight. It seems like every day for months I would wake up and blissfully not remember—but the moments of that bliss grew shorter and shorter until I accepted what had happened.

Now there are just the dreams. I take a deep breath and hold it, trying to get my heart to slow down. I can still hold my breath for just a beat over three minutes. Even though I haven’t spent any time in water since then, I still practice.

Slowly, the reflex sets in. My heartrate slows as my body starts pulling oxygen from my blood stream. A minute goes by. I don’t move. The thud in my chest grows louder, but this time it’s real, not part of a dream. I lay down on my back and relax totally, feeling my lungs begin to burn, searching for oxygen, but I refuse. I hold very still, feeling the pulse in my neck tremble, and a rush in my ears. A vein deep near my navel pulses. Another minute goes by.

Then, just as I’m about to pass out, just as I feel my chest flutter, my diaphragm spasms, and air rushes in. I lay on my back for a long time, breathing deeply. There’s a rush of almost euphoria and then the question flits by.

Will I always be fucked up?

Rising, I take the second glass of water. It’s going to make me pee. I’ve got a half gallon mason jar by the bed too.

Fuck crutches. I used to run. I’ve watched Laurel in her gear go out on the sand. That beat. That ability to move.

Fuck me.

I can barely take care of myself. I have no right to ask her to take care of me and a kid, a kid with autism. I have to set a watch to make sure I eat.

Laurel has enough stress in her life.

΅

It’s six in the morning, and we are all in Finn’s office on the second floor. Jackson’s in a chair, Bryce and I stand, and Finn’s back is to us, and he’s on one of five computers. All screens are lit.