“All I see is hope, Jesse, and maybe you don’t get that. No, I know you don’t. You don’t understand a love like that, because you walk around thinking everything is about you. Everyone has done you wrong and you have no hand in anything. You have a family who wants to love you, but you make it so goddamn hard. You’re so fucked in the head you wrapped your hands around my neck and tried to kill me!” I snap my mouth shut as soon as the words spew out.

“Exactly,” he sighs, and it’s then I realize I just walked right into what he wanted. He played me.

“You know what? You’re right. You’re so messed up I feel sorry for you,” I whisper, knowing there is no saving us. We’re done. I can see it in his eyes. The way he’s shutting me out, I can’t save us.

“Don’t feel sorry for me, sweetheart. I deserve everything I get.” His tone drips in resentment. The need to go to him, and tell him not to be so hard on himself fades. He has done this to himself. He is the one who pushes everyone away. I’m done trying.

“You do deserve everything you get, Jesse. I never used to think you did, but standing here right now, I see it. You’re lonely because you want to be. You push everyone away ‘cause you’re scared. Scared they will see the man you have become. You’re scared of what loving me back means to you, so you’re going to push me away too.” I squeeze my eyes shut, swallowing past the pain.

“I do love you, Bell, but at what cost.” He points to my neck.

“This means nothing!” I point to my neck, but it doesn’t matter how hard I fight, it won’t change anything. Without another word, he turns and walks out, leaving me standing more alone than I’ve ever been in my life.

He breathed possibility into my life, showed me what I was missing, and in one night, he took it all away.

Thirty-One JESSE

“Carter, just let me go,” Conner pleads as I do my best to make a tourniquet on his leg with my belt. The barrage lifted a few minutes ago, leaving the smell of burnt flesh and death behind.

“We need a medic!” I shout, still waiting for the medevac.

“I don’t wanna live like this.” Conner keeps fighting, pushing me away as I release his belt to start on the second leg.

“Conner, Jefferies is gone. I’m not fucking losing you too. Do you hear me?”

“Incoming.” Wilcox the convoy leader finds his way into the Humvee to update us. “Medevac is two beats out,” he informs us with a nod.

“Roger,” I reply, then send a silent prayer that we get him out of here alive. The truth is, deep down, a part of me understands his plea. If I was in the same position, one leg blown off, and the other fucked up who knows how bad, I wouldn’t want to live either.

“What sort of fucking life is this? Just fucking kill me, just do it now, Carter. Please, just fucking end this for me.”

I wake with a jolt to the sound of Conner’s pleading.

Jesus fuck.

“You okay, Jesse?” my mom’s voice floats from across the room. I sit up realizing I’m not at home, but in my father’s hospital room. Shit, I must have drifted off.

“Err, yeah.” I rub at my face. “What’s the time?” I ask, looking over at my father. He hasn’t moved since I’ve been here, the machine next to him delivering enough pain relief to keep him from waking up to see me. What a waste of time.

“Eleven. He hasn’t woken.” She stands and moves closer to the bed. She fiddles with some wires, and then pushes some buttons until the machine beeps, breaking the silence of the dark room.

“I don’t think I can do this, Mom,” I blurt without thinking. Wiping my sweaty hands on my jeans, I stand and get ready to retreat.

“Why is it so hard for you to let go, Jesse?” She looks up, her eyes have sunken in from the stress of it all, aging her more than her sixty-five years.

“Why didn’t you ever leave him?” I reply with my own question. I don’t expect her to comment, but I wait anyway. I mean, growing up experiencing everything we had, I think at the very least I deserve to know why she stayed.

“I thought about it a few times. Even made it as far as packing a bag once. But I couldn’t bring myself to do it.” She shocks me and I can’t keep the accusation out of my voice any longer.

“Why would you stay if you had the chance to get away?”

She moves back to the chair she was sitting in, and shakes her head once before taking a deep breath. “There are things you don’t know, Jesse. Things he’s seen, things he went through as a child.”

“Things that excuse him for beating us, beating you?” I push, needing more. Smoke and mirrors have always been Mom’s way of dealing. I’m not accepting that anymore. For a long time I hated her too. Often wondering how I was supposed to trust her when she stood by and allowed the abuse to happen. She was just as much to blame as him. But after a while, that blame shifted to pity. I witnessed my mother's physical and mental suffering, I saw her limitations, her inabilities and how her world was shrunken. I saw myself in her.

“Your father was a sick man, Jesse. Ever since he came back from his first tour, I knew he had changed. At first, I thought it was just a phase, something he would eventually get through, but it only escalated. He promised me he would get help and I believed him. In sickness and in health…”

“But he never did, so why didn’t you leave?” I push for more, not allowing her to hide behind her fear any longer.

“I wouldn’t have been able to give you boys the lives you had without him, Jesse. A single mom, three boys. What sort of life would that have been?” she asks, and I almost laugh.

“You think we had a good life? The schools, the clothes, everything he provided for us, it meant nothing.”

“It meant something to me, Jesse. I wanted to give you boys everything I could. I’m not saying it was the right decision, but I tried my hardest. I second-guessed everything, but in the end, I loved him. I couldn’t do it. And maybe that makes me a bad mom, a doormat wife, but I couldn’t walk away from him when he needed me.”

“Yeah, well, guess that’s where we differ, Mom. I’m not so forgiving. He doesn’t deserve the peace you all think he does.”

“You’re right but, son, you deserve peace. Forgiveness isn’t about the person asking to be forgiven; it’s about allowing yourself permission to stop hurting. Walking around with this much hatred in your life isn’t going to go away when he dies, Jesse. What he did to you, to me, to our family, it will always be with us, but you need to separate the ugliness growing inside of you before it takes over. Don’t you want peace for yourself?”

“That man took my peace. Because of him, I am the way I am. I spent too many years searching for acceptance and love, that when I finally found it in a woman, I pushed her away because I’m scared of it. Do you know how fucked up that makes me? I have seen death. I have lived through pain, and rejection, Mom, yet love scares me.” My hands shake at my side as I fight my tears.

She’s silent for a moment, the distance between us growing when she doesn’t give me what I need.

“You need to find your own peace, Jesse.” She finally looks up, her lip trembles but she controls it. “Find it for yourself, sweet boy, before this ugliness grows in you too.”

“How, tell me how, and I will?” The plea gets stuck in my throat and comes out strangled. Ignoring my question, she moves from her chair to the desk in the corner and pulls out a white envelope.

“I wish I could give it to you, Jesse, but it’s you who needs to allow yourself to stop suffering and release the burden. Only then will you see how you did survive. And still are surviving.” My eyes move to the envelope as she offers it to me. “Your father asked me to give this to you when he passed. But I think you should have it now.” She places the envelope into my hand before pulling me into a hug, her arms coming around my middle and hold me tightly, just like she would when I was a kid.