Unraveled(38)

"Nice move, Mr. Miyagi."

"That's Master Miyagi to you."

Bo dropped down in a chair next to me and handed me a hamburger hot off the grill. Noah followed with the beer.

"Not complaining, but are we having a private party because you're finally going to confess your love for me?" I took a bite of my hamburger. "Don't need to say it. I knew you had a thing for me since boot camp, when you kept staring at my shorts."

"You had a label on them."

"My mom did it to be a smart ass. How many times I gotta tell you that?" I cuffed Bo lightly across the back of the head.

"As many times as it still produces a rise, I'd guess." This pithy observation was from Noah.

“What happened to the Widow Sam? She drove up and you guys took off but you came home in a real snit. What gives?”

I just ate my burger and ignored the question.

Bo tried again. “Okay, Widow Sam is off limits. How about the real deal about you leaving the Corps?”

“Don’t call her that,” I said flatly.

“Huh?”

“Don’t call her Widow Sam. She’s a person, not a character.”

Bo raised his eyebrows at me and then turned to Noah and said in a stage whisper, “Another one bites the dust.”

Rather than rising to Bo’s bait, as Noah called it, I tried changing the subject. “You’ve a nice place here. Think this is where you'll stay?"

"Nope. AM wants to go to grad school at the University of Chicago."

"How about you, Noah?"

"Dunno. Go to Chicago too. More opportunity there."

"That's a first, you following Bo instead of the other way around."

The crickets made more noise than the three of us as Bo, Noah and I ate in silence. Finally, because he had less patience than a three-year-old at Christmas, Bo blurted out again, "Are you in trouble?"

“No," I sighed. “I just have a lot on my mind.” And I didn’t want to talk about it even with Bo and Noah, two of my oldest friends. I cast about for something to tell them, something that they would believe so I wouldn’t have to put into words feelings that I didn’t really understand myself. “My ex is sniffing around and I didn’t want to spend my entire leave dodging her.”

"Your ex isn't still with the LT?"

"No. They broke up after she had the syphilis scare."

"That was a janky thing to do." Bo reached for another burger from the stack Noah’d brought over. "You do know that she was an asshole, right, and not just for cheating?"

"Because she tried to pass on the syphilis without saying anything?" The talk of my cheating ex and her STI was making me lose my appetite. "What’re you eating, Jackson?"

"Pork chop." Noah waggled the pale meat at me.

Drawing back, I shook my head. "Looks delicious. Not. Aren't you allowed to eat real food when training?"

"Not really. Conditioning is different. I have to last five rounds instead of all day."

"Bet it feels like all day after you get a dozen elbows to the chin."

"So what's this all about anyway?" Noah asked. I could put Bo off. He was never serious about anything except his new girlfriend. But Noah wasn't a bullshitting type of guy.

Stretching my legs out and tipping my chair, back, I sighed and gave in. "I'm twenty-five. I have an associate’s degree in business admin that took me four years to get. From what I hear of other Marines, present company excepted, without a degree on the outside I'm pretty much fucked. Infantry Marines are good at following orders and breaking stuff. Other than being a cop or going to private contracting, I'm pretty much SOL. If I get out now, I'm on the wrong side of my twenties and just entering the work force. Then there’s the whole female thing…" I trailed off. That was as much as I could get out without looking like I had a vagina.

"So this comes down to your philosophy that you can't have a serious relationship in the service because your girlfriend slept with the local recruiter while you were deployed," Noah surmised.

I shifted guiltily in my chair. "Not just. It’s about leading men, being responsible for their mental wellbeing and their physical health. It’s about having women like Sam waiting on tenterhooks to hear that their man is home safe and then, when they can’t bear it anymore, getting their fears dispelled by some guy at home. Nearly every guy I know has been cheated on or has cheated or is divorced or is on their second or third marriages, and those are just the guys enlisted underneath me. One thing just leads to another.” Noah opened his mouth but I didn't stop talking. "I get it, Noah. You wanted to slap a ring on Grace's finger when you guys finally got together. Instead you waited two whole years."