Something Like Normal(45)
As Charlie’s mom talks, I catch a glance at Harper out of the corner of my eye. She’s wiping her nose with the back of her hand, so I pull off my gloves and hand her one. I’m probably breaking some stupid USMC uniform regulation, but she doesn’t have a tissue and the glove is absorbent enough. Her words hiccup in her throat when she whispers thank you.
Charlie’s mom doesn’t try to paint him as a patriot whose love of country came before anything else. He was like the rest of us—trying to figure out what he wanted from life and the best way to get it. She’s strong, though, standing up there in front of everyone with her eyes all shiny, but not breaking down as she talks about a son she doesn’t have anymore.
When she’s finished, she looks at me. “Before he died, Charlie would e-mail me as often as he could and his letters were always peppered with Solo this and Travis that. So I’d like to invite Travis Stephenson to say a few words.”
I stand up and look into the middle distance, trying to calm nerves that haven’t been this jangled since the last firefight before we left Afghanistan. No matter how many times we engaged the Taliban, it was always completely butt-clenching scary. I blow out a breath and though I don’t look at her, I think I feel Harper touch my palm. I curl my fingers around the spot, holding it there, then go to the podium. Ellen smiles at me and I wait for her and Jenny to sit down before I begin.
“Many nights in Afghanistan we played poker,” I say. “Since none of us carried much cash, we’d use make-believe money. At last tally, I owe Charlie eight million dollars—” Charlie’s mom gives a little chuckle from the front row, which sends a ripple of quiet laughter through the room and dissipates my fear that a joke would be in bad taste. I give Ellen a grin. “I really hope you’re not planning to collect.”
Her eyes are full and she puts her fingers over her mouth as she smiles. I stand there for a moment, looking out at the crowded room. It’s as if all of St. Augustine turned out for this. Family. High school friends. Ex-girlfriends, maybe. Someone here has to be more qualified to make this speech than I am.
“I, um—I struggled for a long time trying to figure out what I was going to say and now that I’m here, I still have no idea,” I say. “The things that keep coming to mind are not really appropriate, like his fondness for Miss November, or the time he put… Yeah, never mind about that.”
I clear my throat and look for a spot in the back of the room, so I don’t have to see tissues and tears. Instead, I see Charlie. He’s leaning against the wall like he’s waiting to hear what I’m going to say about him. Like he’s waiting for me to tell his truth.
“The thing is, Charlie was just… When I first met him, I thought he was a complete motard—ridiculously motivated to be a Marine, you know? Because he’d volunteer for anything, and who does that? But then I realized that’s who he was. He attacked life so he wouldn’t miss out on anything, and if I can tell you one thing about Charlie that you don’t already know it’s that he went out of this world as bravely as he made his way through it.”
My eyes search out Charlie, but he’s gone.
I look at his mom.
“He was the person all of us should be, but most of us aren’t. And if I could have taken his place to buy him a little more time in the world, I’d have done it. I’m sorry I couldn’t.”
Ellen shakes her head and I know she’s telling me I don’t have to be sorry, but how can I not be? How can it be okay that I’m here and Charlie isn’t? I step away from the podium and my empty seat is right there. But when Charlie’s mom comes up to introduce Peralta, I quietly excuse myself to her.
And I leave.
Chapter 14
Harper says my name as I leave the room, and even though I’m being disrespectful for walking out in the middle of the memorial service, I don’t stop. I can’t stop. Because my eyes are watering and I’m afraid I’m about to lose my shit. I walk fast, my shoes making sharp taps on the sidewalk as I head toward the hotel. My hands clench and unclench at my sides. I suck in large lungfuls of air and release long breaths. I need to get away from downtown St. Augustine, where tourists are still roaming the streetlamp-lit sidewalks, blissfully unaware that Charlie Sweeney is dead.
I take a shortcut down a side alley that leads to the back entrance of the hotel. Heading for the pool, I work open the clasp on the collar of my uniform. The pool deck is empty in the fading light and all the lounge chairs are lined up in a straight row with fresh towels folded on the ends. I drop the heavy jacket on one chair and my trousers on another as I strip down to my boxers. Leaving my socks balled up at the edge of the pool, I dive in.
As I churn through the water, my breath and brain work in tandem and I don’t have to think. I only count my strokes—one, two, one, two, one, two—until the muscles in my shoulders burn and the sadness, the rage, I feel is under control. I have no idea how long I’ve been in the water or how many lengths I’ve swum when I stop. The sky has faded from dusk to dark—so I know it’s been a long time—and Harper is standing at the edge of the pool, holding a towel.
My arms shaking from the exertion, I haul myself out of the water and stand there on the pool deck, dripping water everywhere. As she wraps the towel around my shoulders, her eyes meet mine. “You okay?”