My wrist is killing me as I walk back to the dorms. It’s not the pain that’s at the forefront of my thoughts. It’s the way Captain Mathis looked at me after I asked him if he’s going to kiss me again later.
Because I really want that to happen, whether or not I should. I can’t get over the way he kissed me last night and hugged me. Almost like he was concerned and definitely like he’s attracted. I know we both feel what’s between us, even if we don’t talk about it. I’m not sure how to handle it, given that we sit on opposite ends of the spectrum in pretty much everything.
For the first time since meeting him, I think I understand better what he’s been through. Why he’s so cold. What surprises me: how right I was the first day here during our team building exercises when I guessed he was always alone. I can’t blame him, really, not when I think of Jenna almost dying. It’d kill me if she did.
The guilt of knowing I should’ve been more aware is killing me now. She’s so sweet and innocent … and she trusted me to take care of her.
How does Sawyer make it through the day with four deaths on his conscience? By staying numb to the world? What kind of life is that?
Why didn’t I stop to think about what he’s going through at any point over the past four months? How can he take the time for something like wrapping my wrist when I’ve been blaming him for Mikael’s death?
I haven’t been able to stop these thoughts since last night, when I fell asleep with Jenna in my arms.
Sawyer is human, someone hurting as much as I do. And that disturbs me for too many reasons. I want to help him and hate him, melt into his arms and run away.
I don’t know what to think about him anymore.
“You swim in your clothes?” Petr calls as I enter the quad area.
I wave him away.
“Hey, Baba wants you home this morning.”
“What?” I face him, not expecting this news. “Why?”
“Not sure. He called last night and said he needs you back.”
I frown. “Is he okay?”
“I think so.” Petr is hiding something. He has a little tell, a crunching of the corner of his right eye. I learned it when he was lying to doctors about his pain level, because he’s too stubborn to admit when he needs help. “Zach is on his way to get you. I’ll pack up your stuff and bring it by this afternoon.”
“Now?” I ask. Before I see if Sawyer is serious about kissing me later? I feel like a teen who’s never had a boyfriend. Why does the idea of him holding me excite me so much?
“Yeah.”
“Oh. Well, I need to say goodbye to Sawyer. Captain Mathis. I mean, the kids,” I stammer. “Just the kids.”
Petr’s eyebrow rises. He considers me for a minute. “The guys are coming by Saturday before they ship out.”
Ship out. Any excitement I experience about seeing Captain Mathis dissipates instantly. It’s not possible for me to forget who and what he is, but for a short while … I don’t know. I forgot that his reality is so far different from mine. Maybe I really am not thinking straight. I’ve never considered dating someone who spends his life overseas. I don’t even know if there’s anything between us that would survive a deployment, considering we know nothing about one another. I lost track of my own brothers when they were gone. How can two people who barely know one another even consider something like this?
How can I see this as anything other than what it is: a potential one-night stand, however incredible it might be? He’s got to resent me for how I’ve acted towards him, even if he does want to sleep with me.
You’re an idiot, Katya.
“Never mind,” I murmur. “Let me grab my purse and I’ll go out front.”
“I’ll walk with you.”
My spirits are sinking. They shouldn’t be. I came here determined to hate Captain Mathis and am leaving doubting everything from why I bothered to come to the camp in the first place to who I should really blame for Mikael’s death.
“Captain Mathis won’t have a partner,” I murmur. He’s more than capable of taking care of the kids on his own, but I kind of want to stay. And run. And cry because I’m so freaking confused.
“Harris is leaving this morning,” Petr says. “We’ll combine the two teams.”
“Harris?” I echo.
“Family emergency or something.”
Petr isn’t usually vague or moody like he is now. I’m not sure what’s wrong with him.
“Your leg okay?” I ask.
“Great! Can’t wait to tell the doc how many of his rules I broke.”
“Petr!”
He grins, his dark mood vanishing. He’s not usually clingy either. He doesn’t leave my side, even following me into my room. I’d normally yell at him, but I appreciate the company this morning. I’m feeling hollow again. He walks me through the dorm, where the kids are still sleeping, and along the trail leading to the front of camp.
I feel kind of like I’m giving up. Or that I failed Mikael this week by leaving early. I don’t say anything to Petr, knowing Mikael is never far from his thoughts, either. We wait quietly for Zach. When he comes, I hug Petr and go home.
In a way, I’m glad I’m leaving early. I’m not sure what would’ve happened between Sawyer and me, had I stayed. I can’t quite understand my own feelings or why I suddenly need space, even from Petr, even if that means not watching over him to make sure he’s okay.
There’s too much stimulus here. I’m drowning in emotions and struggling to hang on to my anger about Mikael being gone, because it’s the only thing that helps me through the day.
As we pull into the driveway of my home, I realize I can no longer summon the emotion to blame Sawyer Mathis. I’m angry with him, but it’s tempered by the knowledge that both of us are suffering, and neither of us has healed from my brother’s death. It’s hard to blame someone that I innately want to help, someone broken like me.
I go to my room without saying hello to my father. I need to be alone right now. I need to sort through everything in my head.
***
A day passes and then a second and a third. Baba never does tell me why he pulled me out of camp. I wonder if it’s the Brianna issue. If so, it’s absolutely my fault for not being more mature about seeing her.
Petr sends pics, and I smile when I see them and save them, so I don’t ever forget this week.
Captain Mathis, however, never bothers to text again. Not even one of his annoying Where are you messages that drove me crazy. I’m not sure what to think about his silence, except that maybe everything we went through this week was a matter of circumstances rather than any real attraction.
For him maybe. I end the week rawer than when I started it. The only good thing about this all: I don’t have to be in the rain that started the day I left and continues to storm through Saturday. It washes out the barbecue the guys on Petr’s team were supposed to have today. It’s left them confined to the house and me avoiding the common areas downstairs, so I don’t accidentally run into anyone.
I don’t feel up to it, especially since I’m pretty sure Brianna was invited. Every time I mess up, she rags on me, and I’m sick of it. I tell myself this is the reason I don’t go downstairs, but I’m pretty sure it’s to avoid Sawyer Mathis and the complicated mess of emotions surrounding every interaction with him.
Baba taps on my door in a familiar rhythm. I close the browser on my laptop and lean back from the office corner of my large bedroom.
“Kitty-Khav?” He opens the door. His large face breaks into a smile. “Why are you hiding?”
“I’m not hiding. I don’t want to be around anyone,” I reply curtly.
“You’ve been up here for days.”
“Just thinking, Baba.”
He enters my room and closes the door behind him. My father goes to the couch facing a fireplace and sits, patting the spot beside him. Reluctantly, I join him. He wraps an arm around me the way he always does and kisses my forehead.
I sigh and sink into his warmth. He smells of his spicy aftershave, and his bushy beard tickles my temple.
“What is bothering you, kotyonik?” he asks. “It is not like you to hide.”
I debate what to tell him. “It was a rough week,” I say finally. “Being in the forest made me miss Mikael too much.”
“He loved the forest.”
“Yeah, I know.”
We sit in silence.
“Petr and the boys will miss you, if you do not come down.”
“I don’t want to see anyone.” Especially not Captain Mathis. I want to erase him from my life and curl up in his arms simultaneously. I can’t really handle those emotions. I’ve been in deep thought for days and my head remains a disaster area.
“What is this?” Baba leans down to the coffee table to grab a jewelry box I forgot about.
“Nothing.” I reach for it.
“We love secrets.” He chuckles and plays keep away, finally flicking it open with his thumb. “I have not seen one of these in a very long time.”
My face is hot. I take the box and close it.
“Ruptured Duck,” he continues. “Mint condition. You looked hard for it?”
“No. Just … whatever.”
“Who is it for?”
“No one, Baba.”
I bought it the day after I came back with express shipping, wanting to give it to Captain Mathis, so he’d have his lucky charm when he returns to Iraq. I then decided it wasn’t a good idea. He’s not the kind of man I need in my life, and I don’t want him thinking there’s something between us, when there can’t be.
He’s a career military man. I’m a trust fund baby who can’t figure out what to do with her life, but I’m pretty sure it’s not wait around for a deployed boyfriend to come back from Iraq. I will never stop opposing the war and violence, and he will never stop being involved in them.
Even if the war is fought by good men like him and my brothers.
I’ve never been so conflicted in my life.
Fingering the box, I open it and stare at the little gold lapel pin I spent hours hunting down. I still wonder where he got his, since he’s an orphan. Was his charm the last piece of family history he had? He said it mattered to him and had for ten years.
If so, and I give him another one …
It’s way, way too complicated and intimate a gesture for someone I need to forget. I’ve given myself a headache debating what to do about the stupid duck pin.
“Baba, I think I need to go into counseling again,” I murmur, closing the gift that will never leave my room. “This week really … really brought a few things to light.” My voice is trembling.
“I think, this is good.”
My father has a talent for dramatic understatement. The words sound simple, but it’s his way of saying it’s a damn good idea.
“Katya moya has not been happy since she was nine. Always trying to protect her father and brothers to make sure she doesn’t lose them,” he says. “You need to be Kitty-Khav and let go of us all. I promise. We can land on our feet like my kitten can.”
I rest my head on his shoulder, listening to his gruff, soft voice. “I feel so lost without him, Baba,” I whisper.
“We all do, devoshka moya.”
“I don’t know what there is outside of you guys. I’ve never really been interested in what I took in school.”
“You are interested in the camp?”
“Yeah, that was cool.”
“I had thought to create a new charity to help military families and put the camp under it. It will need someone to help manage it. You have always wanted to help people.”
I run my thumb over the seam in the box. It doesn’t slip past me that I can help people like the kids I met this week and Captain Mathis, who was also an orphan. I can help others like me, too, who are hurting from losing a family member. The camp was an incredible idea, and I imagine there are other positive ways to help others that also ease my pain.
“I might like that,” I murmur.
“Petr will help you.”
“I thought he wanted to go back to the military.” I lift my head.
“We talked about it. We think you need us now, devoshka moya. You have taken care of us long enough. Now it is our turn.” My father gazes at me tenderly.
Tears spill down my face. I’m too touched to speak. I know they love me. I’ve never felt broken before, never really thought I needed them as much as they do me. Dealing with Captain Mathis made me confront the reality that I’m not ready to let go of Mikael or accept his death.
“So he will stay for a while, until you are ready to send him back.”
I give a startled laugh that quickly turns into sobs. Baba wraps his arms around me and holds me. I cry into his expensive sweater, and he murmurs to me in Russian.
The time I spent with Sawyer was frustrating, infuriating, crippling. He managed to pry me out of my shell and hold a mirror in front of me, so I could see how damaged I am. Like him, I’m broken by Mikael’s death.
Am I fixable? Is he? Why do I hope we both are and that one day, we can sit down for coffee and have a normal conversation?
I don’t think I’ll ever see him again.
The idea crushes me. I’m too upset to know why exactly.