They made love one more time that night before they both fell into an exhausted sleep. Maddie didn’t know what eventually woke her. She opened up her eyes and looked at the dark room. Rick started mumbling something and thrashed in his sleep. He called out several times, and she heard him say her name. Harvey started barking out in the hall and scratched at the bedroom door. When Rick called out again, he barked louder and demanded entry. His giant paws pounded the wood with each hit, shaking the door on its frame. Rick called out once again, and she realized that he was in the middle of a nightmare.
She didn’t know if she should touch him to wake him up. She had read somewhere not to do that. She wasn’t sure what to do, but she knew that something had to be done to wake him. She began to call out his name. Maybe if he heard her voice it would pull him out of the nightmare. He yelled her name once more then stopped. He began gasping in air as he turned to look at her. He was awake. Thank God!
“Maddie, you’re here?” He rubbed his hands over his face several times, and she wondered if he had been crying.
“I’m here, Rick. I’m right here.” She reached out her hand to his chest and felt that he was covered in sweat. He sat up quickly and turned his back to her. She ran her hand over his shoulder and down his spine. She could feel the heat and sweat under her hand. He leaned over, and she knew that he was putting on the prosthetic that would allow him to walk unassisted. He didn’t say anything when she said his name. She wanted him to tell her about the nightmare. She was in it. She knew that she was. But Rick remained silent. Without saying a word to her, he stood up, walked to the bathroom to grab a towel, and left the room.
Harvey greeted him when he opened the bedroom door, and Rick said something to the dog. So he will talk to the dog, but he won’t talk to her. He was pushing her away again. She wasn’t going to stand for that. That nightmare was triggered by whatever had happened earlier the day before, and he needed to talk about it. Whatever it was, it affected her, too.
After quickly grabbing her robe, she walked out to the great room. The deck door was open. A glance at the clock on the oven revealed that it was almost six. The sun would be up soon. She walked over to the door and saw Rick sitting on the glider swing watching Harvey in the grass. He pushed the swing with his foot to get it moving. The towel was wrapped around his waist.
“Did I scare you?”
The question surprised her. She didn’t know that he knew that she was there.
“No. You didn’t scare me.” She stayed where she was and watched him. He never looked over at her.
“Maybe you should leave.” He continued to watch Harvey running around in the grass. The sun was beginning to rise. The first slivers of light appeared over the lake and made the water sparkle like diamonds.
“Why would I want to do that?” she asked as she walked over to his side. He stopped the swing and looked up at her.
“Because this isn’t fun. That’s all women want, isn’t it? The relationship will only work as long as it’s fun. That’s all anyone wants anymore. We must have a good time, all the time.” The bitterness and pain in his voice broke her heart. What happened yesterday? She sat down next to him and watched his profile when he faced forward again.
“What happened, Rick? Tell me what happened.” His eyes began to water up, and she saw him swallow several times. He sat in silence for several minutes collecting his thoughts as he struggled to control him emotions. She waited for him to talk. She wanted to reach out and touch him, but she was afraid that he would shrug her off. Harvey started barking joyfully at something out in the grass. He probably spotted a squirrel or a rabbit. The birds were in their morning mode of chirping to greet the new day. The sun began to peek over the water. Still she waited for Rick to say something.
“I sometimes get nightmares of the explosion,” he finally said. He didn’t look at her. His head faced forward, but he was looking at something other than the lake, other than Harvey. “Stress brings them on. I used to get a lot more of them. When I was at the Navy Medical Center in San Diego after the explosion, they were really bad. Once I got out, I came home to Iowa. I wasn’t sure what I would do, what I could do. Thankfully, I was hired on at the EMS service. I don’t think I would have survived without that, without having a job to go to. Being a paramedic was all that I ever wanted to be. After mom died and they said that she would have lived if she had gotten help right away, I knew that was what I wanted to do.”
“I remember you saying that once.” He nodded his head but still would not look at her.
“When I came back, I stayed with Donnie and Kathy. I worked. I thought that the PTSD episodes would go away. When they didn’t, I started drinking to help me go to sleep. I started going to bars with friends when I first came home. There were a couple of times that I picked up a woman in the bar and showed her a good time. I’m not proud of it because it was just sex. After I would leave the bar, I’d go to my room at Donnie’s house and drink myself into a stupor. It was every night. It began to affect my relationship with my family. It began to affect my job. I was never drunk at work, and I never missed a day. But I went into the station with a hangover every morning. After a few months of this, Donnie gave me an ultimatum. Stop drinking or leave. Carlos, at work, tried talking to me, too. One day, I took a good long look in the mirror and didn’t like what I saw. I was headed to a bad place.”
“I voluntarily went for treatment at the VA here in town. I went through their PTSD and alcohol programs. I cleaned up, got my head screwed on straight. Gramps sold me this place, and I worked on it for over a year as therapy. It helped to focus my mind on other things. The nightmares came less often. I got Harvey. He’s been great at pulling me from them. I stayed away from women. Things have been going good.”
“What happened yesterday, Rick?” She reached out her hand and touched his shoulder. She knew that he was over the hump of whatever was troubling him. He would accept her touch, now. There were a few more tattoos on his upper arm and his chest that she hadn’t seen because of his wearing shirts or because they were in the dark. There was one under her hand. Another one was on his hip. She could see the edge of it by the towel. The tattoo under her hand had a scar tissue ridge that was hidden in the design of the tattoo. She recognized it as the Celtic symbol for strength. She suspected that scars were hidden in his other tattoos, too. So many scars on his body, but he had turned them into things of beauty and wore them as badges of honor and symbols of strength.
After a few minutes of sitting in silence, she began to wonder if he would tell her. Just when she thought that he wouldn’t, he began to speak. “Yesterday was like any other day until around three. We got a call about a suicide attempt, a prescription drug overdose. When we got there, the mother of the guy called us into a back bedroom. I knew the guy. He was a Marine in Afghanistan when I was there. I bandaged him up one day. We started talking about where we were from. He was from Iowa City, too. We went to the same high school only he was probably in yours or Kerri’s grade. We met again in treatment. He was in for PTSD, same as me, and for alcohol. The last time I saw him, he looked good.”
“Yesterday, he was still awake when I arrived. He told me that it didn’t go too well for him after he left treatment. He was clean for several months then began drinking again. He couldn’t find a job. He said that his wife and friends thought he had become a drag. They wanted to go out to the bars, go to concerts, and party like they used to before he went into the service and went into treatment. He went through treatment again six months ago. His wife left him, and his friends deserted him. He took the overdose because he knew that he was going to start drinking again. When he drank, the PTSD became worse. Everything became worse. I stayed up at the hospital with him. Nobody else came except his mother. He died a little after eight.”
Maddie sucked in a breath and watched Rick. Silent tears began to run down his cheeks. “What if I’m like him, Maddie? What if I’m not strong enough? It’s only been two years since I’ve been dry. When I was recovering from my injury and I started having nightmares, I thought that I was going crazy. It got to the point where I wanted to die, and I knew that I had to do something or I would. I still occasionally have nightmares. My nightmare this morning wasn’t about the explosion, though. It was about sinking back into it and losing myself again. I can’t go back to that.”
“Do you want to drink? I mean do you feel the urge to drink?”
“No, I don’t.”
“Do you still want to die? Do you want to hurt yourself or anyone else?”
“No.” He shook his head and wiped his hand over his jaw. He wasn’t looking at her, but she could still see the pain on his face. “I can’t take you out to bars and clubs, Maddie. I can’t show you a good time. You had a beer the night of the game. I won’t tell you not to drink because you don’t have a problem. But it would be easier for me if you didn’t drink around me. One day, I might be able to have others drink around me, be able to go into a bar and not feel the need to drink, but I’m not there yet.”
“I don’t need to go to the bars or drink to have a good time, Rick. I like what we’ve been doing together.” He looked over at her and raised an eyebrow. She knew that he was thinking about the night before and the other times when they touched each other sexually. “I like that, too, obviously,” she told him with a little laugh. “But I also like just being with you. I liked going to the game. I like playing softball and spending time with your family. I liked it when you took me fishing.” She reached over and touched his face. He kissed her softly on the lips then on the forehead before she cuddled against his side.
They watched the sun finish rising over the water together and enjoyed the peaceful morning, content to sit in silence and watch the morning play out. Harvey barked again and ran into the lake after a duck that had made the mistake of landing in the water next to the boat. It took back to the air before Harvey could reach it and quacked its disapproval at the need for escape. Silence reigned again shortly after that when Harvey found a rawhide bone and dropped onto the grass to enjoy it. Rick’s hand rubbed over her arm. She didn’t want to move, didn’t want to upset the quiet, but she knew that it was about time to go back inside. Before she moved, though, she wanted Rick to know what she thought. She wasn’t worried.
“Rick, I think that you’re strong enough. You might not realize it, yet, but I think that one day you will. You will be ok.” She reached up and brushed her fingers over the stubble on his face. When he glanced at her, his hazel eyes were warm and confident again. The haunted and defeated look was gone.
“Maddie, have you ever had sex on a swing?” The question, spoken so seriously, broke the somber mood and made her start to laugh. She shook her head. “Well, you’re about to.”
He pulled her across his lap so that she straddled him. With one quick movement, his towel was gone and she could feel him against her. One of his hands moved down and touched her to see if she was ready. Finding her ready, he pushed her down on top of him. She gripped the back of the swing as he filled her. Oh, my! His mouth found her breasts inside her robe. Then he started to rock the swing. He left it up to her to keep the swing rocking with her movements over him. Each movement brought more pleasure for both of them. They found a rhythm that they both liked until they were satisfied. Afterwards, she collapsed against him and began to laugh.
“What’s so funny?” he asked her as he hugged her against him.
“I was just thinking that that was fun. Here you thought that you wouldn’t be able to show me a good time.” She pulled back and looked at his face. He gave her one of his lopsided grins.
“I think that makes eight. Not bad for a first night.” His smile became full blown and full of manly pride. She laughed even louder at him.
“You’re still keeping track?”
“You bet! I think that I told you that there wasn’t a lot to do when stuck on base for a long time except read. I’ve accumulated a lot of knowledge. Now I have the chance to put it to use.” He became serious again and looked her in the eye. “I’m glad that you stayed. Maddie, what I said last night about using you to get even with Kevin...”
“You didn’t mean it. I know. That’s why I stayed.” She stood up and took his hand. “I’ve never made a man breakfast after a night of sex. Come with me and let me see what I can pull together.” When he stood up and wrapped himself in his towel, she called Harvey in and walked with Rick back to the kitchen. They would be fine. They would be a couple that would make it. She couldn’t stop herself from singing as she made a batch of pancakes. When she looked at Rick sitting at the table watching her and saw the warm smile on his face, she knew that he wanted forever, too.