Chapter 84

THE LIGHTS IN the rehab center reception room flickered then came back on, their white incandescence practically blinding me.

When I took in the scene, I saw that the walls had cracked like eggshells, and the carpet was littered with shards of plaster and glass. I was both at Blue Skies and in Afghanistan, memories still pouring into my head like gasoline streaming over hard desert ground.

Men ran toward me, phosphorescent green figures against the black of night. I put Danny Young down on the ground, and then-the great gaping hole opened up in my memory. I was there. And then I wasn't.

I was dead-and then I returned to life. For what reason, I had no idea.

There was intense and painful pressure on my chest, and Rick Del Rio was in my face. "Jack, you son of a bitch-"

He hadn't known I'd left Jeff Albert to die.

He hadn't known-and I hadn't either. I had been out of my mind, hallucinating that I was in a bar. I'd thrown a jab at Rick. Now I was remembering for the first time, falling down the hole in my memory toward searing mortification.

Everything I believed about myself melted before this terrible truth. I'd left a man behind. I'd promised him I would be back, but I had left him. I wished Rick hadn't brought me back to life.

I wished that I had stayed dead.

A voice called to me, "Jack. Jack, are you all right?"

Rick? Where the hell am I?

I stared at the gray-haired man, whose face was close to mine. Who was he? How did he know my name?

"I'm Brendan McGinty, Tommy's therapist. You were moaning. Where are you hurt?"

"I'm… okay. I just-"

I struggled to stand, and Dr. McGinty held out his hand to help me up. I clasped his forearm and pulled myself to my feet. People scurried past in pairs and groups.

McGinty was speaking in a soothing tone. "It's going to be all right. I'll call a doctor to look at you, Jack."

"No, I'm fine. I'm really fine."

McGinty said, "Tommy, we have to postpone our session. We'll reschedule."

I looked up and saw my brother standing only a few feet away. He said, "Hell, no. We don't have to cancel anything. Jack's been through firestorms on the dark side of the moon. A little quake isn't going to bother him. Right, Jacko?"

I wanted to get into the Lambo and jam the pedal down to the floorboard. I wanted to drive until I fell asleep at the wheel. I wanted to do whatever it took to get away from the guilt and the unbearable pain of what I'd finally remembered. I had carried a friend who was dead out of a burning helicopter, and left another man behind.

"You are okay, aren't you, bro?" Tommy asked. "What the fuck. You're already here. You're a busy man, remember."

I was so dazed, I could hardly speak, but I got out a few words. "Let's do it," I said.

Chapter 85

THE WORLD OUTSIDE my head seemed insubstantial, as if the present could be a dream and my memories much more solid and alive in the now.

Sounds were irrelevant; the sirens shrilling outside on the highway, the blaring voice over the PA system, Tommy and Dr. McGinty talking together as they walked down the hallway with me trailing behind.

I ducked my head as I crossed the threshold into Dr. McGinty's office.

The room was small, and the quake had flung pictures and books across the hardwood floor. McGinty returned a floor lamp to its upright position and switched it on.

He said, "Jack, honestly. We can do this another time."

"I'm fine," I said. "Really. I'd like to have our talk now."

We cleared the center of the room and placed two identical wooden armchairs side by side across from McGinty's recliner. I felt Jeff Albert's presence eyeing me from a corner of the room as Tommy and I sat down in the chairs and McGinty got comfortable in his La-Z-Boy. It was a pretty crazy thought, but I wondered-had Jeff Albert been calling me every day to tell me that I was dead?

Tommy said, "I don't think California broke off the continent, at any rate."

We were dressed the same. White shirts, blue blazers over jeans. I wore loafers; Tommy wore moccasins. The smirk on his unshaven face made him look a little like the guy who stars on Mad Men.

The arrogance was completely unearned. The smug, invincible affect had come from my dad. Tommy was grounded in Tommy Sr.'s crap.

McGinty asked if either of us needed anything and then said, "Let's begin. Jack, we're hoping you can give us some additional insight into your father's personality."

Speak of the devil.

"How would you describe him?"

My father had been dead for over five years, but he would never really be dead to me. I said, "He was cruel. That was his best trait."

Dr. McGinty smiled, then asked, "Can you tell me more, Jack?"

"Oh, hell, volumes. He was abusive to my mom all the time. He pitted Tommy and me against each other for his amusement. He didn't stop until someone bled or cried. He was never wrong about anything-sports, human nature, the weather. He was a perfect godlike creature in his own mind."

The shrink nodded. "What we call in my business 'a real SOB.' " He looked to my brother. "Tommy, what do you think about your father?"

"Jack just sees it his way. Jack is never wrong either. Dad was trying to toughen us up," my brother said. The smirk was gone. I'd attacked something he had defended his entire life. "He didn't want the world to take advantage of us."

I barely listened as my brother excused my father's brutality. He said to Dr. McGinty, "Jack never gives him credit. Dad wanted us to succeed. He encouraged Jack to play football and to be good at it. Jack and I were black belts before we were thirteen. And when Jack became a Marine? Dad lit up when he talked about his son the war hero. He was really proud."

I was looking over Dr. McGinty's head, seeing Jeff Albert's face through my NVGs. I saw the fear and the agony, the broken bones coming through his pant legs. He was screaming, "Don't leave me here to burn!"

"What are you thinking right now?" McGinty asked me.

Images were firing off like fifty-caliber rounds. I had repressed the truth to protect myself. Now I had no place to hide. I wasn't who I'd thought I was.

I said, "This was a mistake. I don't belong here. I have to go."

Chapter 86

I GOT OUT of the chair, made for the door. I had my hand on the knob when Tommy called out, "Hey, Jack. Whatever it is, you should stay. Take my session, bro. Okay, Dr. McGinty?"

"Of course. Please, Jack. Sit down."

I didn't want to let the demon out. It was too big and still too raw. How could I tell a stranger what I'd managed to keep from myself all these years? How could I tell Tommy?

"This is a safe place," McGinty was saying.

McGinty was wrong. It wasn't safe. Dropping my guard with Tommy took more than courage. It was a high-risk bet with bad odds and an irretrievable downside. At the same time, the pressure to talk was building into a runaway need to admit what I'd done.

"I was flying a transport mission from Gardez to the base at Kandahar," I choked out. "I had fourteen Marines in the back. You can hear a screwdriver drop in the cargo bay of a CH-46, so when the missile came through the floor… the sound… of the aircraft being ripped up…"

I envisioned the dead Marines piled up against the left side of the cabin.

I forced myself to continue. I described the crash and the aftermath: staring into the cabin through my NVGs, seeing the dead men, my friend soaked in blood.

"I had Danny slung over my shoulder-a fireman's carry-and then Corporal Albert woke up. He begged me not to leave him there to burn. I already had Danny. I had to get him to safe ground. Albert was half-buried under the casualties. His legs were in pieces. I needed help to get him out of there. I promised him that I'd come back."