"How can you say that?" I ask, pulling away. "How can you say that knowing what he did?"
Pappy is thoughtful for a moment. "May I come in, Kelli?"
I nod, sniffing and wiping my nose on the sleeve of my sweatshirt. I am so beyond caring about anything at the moment that I'm not even embarrassed.
Pappy enters my tiny apartment and with the raise of an eyebrow, and the inclination of his head, asks if he may sit on my couch. I nod and go to sit beside him as there is no where else to sit except the floor.
Turning my body to face him, I wait. He came here to say something, so I'll let him. I look at him expectantly, but say nothing.
Pappy is clearly struggling with how to begin and finally he looks at me with clear eyes and his face set with strong conviction. "Ian is a good man," he says plainly. I begin to shake my head and he cuts me off, "He's the same man he was two days ago. He's the same man ye've fallin' in love with lass."
I stare at him with an opened mouth when he says this. I just figured out I was in love with Ian, how could Pappy know?
"I don't expect ye to understand. Hell, I don't understand. But war does terrible things to a person. Consider it - ye take men and women who have been taught their whole lives that killin' is wrong, and then ye send ‘em to some god-forsaken land and tell ‘em to do exactly that - to kill. Can ye imagine what that does to a person? How that must rip ye up inside?"
"They know what they are getting into when the enlist, Pappy," I say unapologetically. "Ian didn't go into this blindly. He chose to join the military."
Pappy nods his head slowly. "Aye, he did join willingly. And maybe he thought he understood. Thought he could handle it. But I don't think we can know how we'd react until we are in that position ourselves. And thank the Lord, that's never been asked o' us."
"So what are you saying? That because he was asked to murder for his country, that he was so morally conflicted that he destroyed a family?" I'm shouting, quickly having lost any grip on self-restraint. "His country didn't ask him to murder civilians, Pappy! His country didn't tell him to rape a woman in her home over the dead body of her husband with her child watching!"
I'm crying again and Pappy simply sits there, waiting for my sobs to subside. They do, and he tries again, "I have no idea what ‘tis like to kill a man. But when Ian came home from the war, it was clear that what he saw there, what he did there, had changed him. He was so different from me lad, this man who returned. He was hard and bitter and sullen. It took months before he'd speak freely, and I'm not sure he smiled the whole first year he was home." Pappy pauses and looks to gauge my reaction. I keep my face stoic.
"Ian started therapy ‘bout a year after he came home. I was sick with worry, I had no idea what to do with this stranger. I begged him to talk to me and he wouldn't. One day I went with him to the VA and saw that they offered psychological services. It took another four months, but I finally convinced him to go.
I thank the Lord each day for Dr. Wyatt. It was a slow road, one filled with setback after setback, but finally, me lad returned to me. About three years after he had been discharged."
Again Pappy pauses, but I have nothing to say.
"Do ye think Ian would rape a woman here, now?" Pappy asks.
I immediately blanch. No, of course I don't, but then again, I wouldn't have thought him capable of doing it ever. I look into his eyes, "I don't know."
"Aye ye do, dammit," he says with frustration. "Ye know damn well that Ian wouldn't hurt a fly unless he absolutely had to, and there's no way in hell that he'd hurt a woman, or another man for that matter."
"But he did!" I yell. "He did both of those things!"
"In WAR!" Pappy yells back, for the first time losing his cool. "He was in war, Kelli! He doesn't even remember how he came to be doin' it. He was not in his right mind. Can't ye see that?"
"That doesn't change anything, Pappy!" I scream at him.
"Aye, it does!" he bellows back. "He was sufferin' from post traumatic stress disorder, lass. It was his second tour and the sound o' gunfire and shells sets him off. Sends him to a place he doesn't know how to escape from. A place where he loses time and memory. There was fightin' that horrible day. His triggers were present. He didn't know what he was doin'."
I'm crying hard at this point. I want so badly to believe Pappy. I want so badly to believe Ian was suffering from a disorder, that his actions were beyond his control. In the end though, does that matter? He still did those things.
"In the court o' law people are excused o' murder if they are shown to be sufferin' from mental duress -" Pappy begins.
"Fuck the court of law, Pappy!" I'm angry once again. "This isn't a courtroom. This is real life and the man I love just told me that he raped a woman and murdered her husband. How the fuck am I not supposed to think he's a monster?"
"Because he's not a monster darlin'," Pappy says softly. "And there's no one who needs more convincing o' that than Ian."
My anger leaves me again and I'm back to sobbing. Softly, this time.
"I can't tell ye how long it took for him to be able to look in the mirror without punchin' it. After he broke ‘em all, we just didn't replace ‘em. Have ye been to his place?" he asks. I shake my head no. "Well, he still doesn't have any. He and Dr. Wyatt have worked very hard, for many years, to have Ian forgive himself."
My mind flashes to his tattoo - forgive me. A fresh sob escapes me.
"He got to a point where he was doin' really well. Livin' again. He found ways to give back in the community, the pub was doing well. He still didn't have any friends outside the pub or the VA, and he never dated, but he was doin' well. And then you came along."
My head snaps up at this. Is Pappy accusing me of setting Ian back?
"I still remember the look on his face the first time he saw ye. Ye had your back to him, but he was listening to ye try and convince me to give ye a job, and I could see he took an instant likin' to ye. Then ye turned around and he got a good look at ye. I think ye were a bit too preoccupied with lookin' at him to notice, but just seein' ye that first day reopened somethin' in him. Somethin' he had kept pushed down for a long time.
O' course, the more he grew to know ye, the more he liked ye, and the more guilty and fearful he became. ‘Twas hard to watch. I'd see ye and him together, laughin' and smilin', and it would warm me heart. I could imagine my lad livin' the life I'd always wanted for him - happy, in love with a wonderful woman. Maybe with a baby someday.
Then he'd catch himself. He'd realize he was happy, that he was fallin' in love, and he'd pull back into his shell. He doesn't think he deserves to love, Kelli," Pappy finishes.
I look at him, my heart shredded and bleeding. "I'm not sure he does, Pappy."
Pappy looks down at his hands, a single tear tracing a path down his cheek. "Aye, he does lass. Aye, he does."
******
Pappy leaves and I can't stop thinking about all he's said. My mind tells me I need to give Ian some latitude; I need to recognize that war does indeed do crazy shit to a person. But my heart can't seem to believe it. My heart keeps pushing images of a woman bent over a table and a little ball of limbs in a corner on a floor.
I'm tempted to repeat my Xanax and red wine cocktail from yesterday, but think better of it. I need to get out, try to get my mind on something else. I decide to walk down to the beach. I hope the ocean's calming effect on me holds.
I walk there, being careful to take a route that doesn't lead me past the pub. I call my sisters, but neither picks up, which is probably for the best. Instead, I listen to music on the way, and try and focus on anything other than the reel in my head playing back images from Iraq.
******
A week passes and I haven't spoken to Ian or heard from Pappy. In fact, I haven't spoken to anyone except the cashier and barista at the Coffee Bean. I even bagged off on my weekly Skype session with Rachel. I can't tell her yet; I can't face admitting what the man I love has done.
But I can't hide forever, and I need to get a job. I realize I should probably actually quit McGregors, but how? I could email Pappy, that's probably the best way. I've taught Pappy how to use email, and even Facebook and Instagram. He's firmly grounded in the digital age now.