“Welcome aboard the…”
The man didn’t get a chance to continue before Santino cut him off. “Yeah, yeah, now where’s this ‘tea’ I’ve heard so much about?”
***
It was another fifteen minutes before the last of the team cycled through the airlock, and another ten before we had our gear in lockers, hung up our wetsuits, and changed into duty gear the crew had provided for us.
Gathered in the small briefing room, the team waited and chatted while we waited for our briefing to begin. Joining the team was the sub’s skipper, Captain Billings, whose physicality could have in no way better fit the role of a sub commander. He was short in stature and thin like a runner, a perfect build for the cramped confines of a submarine. His square jaw and perpetual five o’clock shadow gave him a roguish look that ladies probably slobbered over. I couldn’t help but notice Helena’s interest, which was probably more annoying than it should have been.
Don’t be jealous, Jacob, she’ll probably never see him again.
Jealous? What the hell is wrong with you? She’s the one who almost knocked you out.
Shut up. Just shut up.
I tried to distract myself by probing my damaged eye, which was still black, and hurt like hell. At least Santino seemed to think it was funny.
The thought of my troublesome friend brought my eyes across the aisle at him. I found him already looking at me, flicking his eyes in Billings’ direction, then over at Helena, giving me another one of his annoying smiles.
He’ll never let me live this down.
Still, despite his antics, I appreciated his attention. It reminded me I had a friend with me. Someone I could rely on. Even if he was an arrogant jackass. So I did what any good friend would do and took a rubber band from my briefing packet, and loaded it around my fingers. Taking careful aim, I fired, nailing him right between the eyes. One of his hands reactively flung to his forehead to ease the sting, and he gave me the same glare he’d offered earlier when I kicked his chair out from beneath him.
I couldn’t help but chuckle.
“Something funny, Hunter?”
I glanced over at Helena. “Hmm? Oh, nothing. Just Santino being Santino.”
She leaned forward to see him rubbing his struck forehead, mumbling.
“You two have a history don’t you?”
“Oh, yeah,” I sighed. “We certainly do.”
“Oooh, I feel a story coming,” she replied excitedly, clutching her hands together between her thighs and shrugging her head between her shoulders, giving me an uncharacteristically childish smile.
Cute. Annoying. But cute.
I sighed again, realizing I owed her a story. I was doubly annoyed because I knew I couldn’t just end this one with Santino. It was about more than just him.
“In a nut shell,” I began after taking a long breath, “his Delta squad was cut off from extraction while on an op in North Korea. We were assigned as their standby unit and were sent in to pull their asses out if they got in trouble. They did, and my team was ambushed in the process of rescuing them, and we were cut off from Santino and his men. Through a stroke of pure luck, our two positions ran into one other. The momentary confusion on the enemy’s part allowed us to finally get the hell out of there. But on our way out, I was shot in the leg. Twice. In the same damn leg. The wounds were pretty bad and I was losing a lot of blood. I knew I was done for when a bad guy blundered onto me.”
I had to pause and close my eyes as the flashback forced me to recall one of the most horrible memories I had. My hand instinctually moved to my thigh to massage the area where I’d been hit.
“He pointed his gun at my face and started to taunt me, laughing all the while. I’d lost my rifle after hitting the ground, and my pistol was inaccessible. A few seconds later, he shot me in the arm.” My hand now moved to massage the area just above the elbow on my left arm. “Just for the hell of it. It was at that point that I knew I was going to die. Even thought I saw some angels. But, the next thing I know, Santino was there, ramming his knife through the back of the man’s throat, severing his spinal column. Guy died instantly. That’s where he does his best work, you know, up close. Santino’s as quiet as a ghost and even scarier than one with a knife.”
Helena nodded, waiting for me to continue.
“Anyway, we didn’t really know each other yet. We’d only met once during a cross training operation a year back. We were barely acquaintances. Even so, he came back for me. He slapped on a few field bandages, picked me up, and pulled my fat out of the fire. He even found my rifle for me.”
“For such a free spirited asshole, he seems like a good man to have your back.”
“He’s the best. I spent three months in the hospital where we ended up. Santino was assigned to a training detail on the base at the same time and he came to visit every day. I always wondered if he used some of that Delta pull to swing the training detail, but he’d never tell me if he did. We just sat there every chance we got playing cards and video games, cracking jokes at lame day time soap operas, and shooting the shit. We became instant friends. I’ll never make a better one if I live a dozen lives.”
I smiled, remembering the days as Santino became one of my best friends, before sighing a third time, my mind wandering to the rest of the time I spent in the hospital. The time I spent in the company of someone else.
A few minutes ago, I’d thought about telling Helena the rest of this story, but now, I wasn’t so sure. The second half began the day I awoke from my surgery, and was assigned a very attractive nurse to take care of me. It was a story I hadn’t told anyone before, and even Santino didn’t know the full extent of it. That nurse changed the way I looked at the world.
After a few sessions of rehab where we had to work very close together, it was obvious the nurse was interested, and so was I. After a few weeks, our time together transcended the typical patient/care giver relationship and bloomed into something more. During my recuperation, we would go on long walks and spend hours in the gym together rehabbing my injury. I remembered how every day when she came to my room, Santino would just sit there as she completely ignored him, tending to my ever need.
I sighed to myself, Helena still waiting patiently for me to continue.
I’d never grown more close to a woman than I did during those few months. Relationships had never been my strong suit, but somehow she and I just clicked. I fell hard for her, and even though I couldn’t explain it, I rolled with it. I was completely unphased by the fact that I knew we’d probably never be able to see each other again after I was reassigned to active duty. The war had barely just begun and the average life expectancy of service men and women deployed in the field shortened every day.
I’d only known her two months by the time I thought about proposing. Thought about, yes, but I never went through with it. Deep down, I knew it couldn’t last. The world was too confusing and bigger than either one of us, and I knew we could never be together. Sooner or later, I would have to leave and she would have to stay. Even with thoughts of marriage in mind, I tried my hardest to keep our relationship to a minimum, but it grew too fast for us both.
After I was finally discharged, I knew it was over.
When she and Santino carted me out in a wheel chair the nurse helped me out of it while Santino went to pack the car. Neither one of us knew what to say, and we just stood there looking at each other. After a few seconds, still not knowing what to say, she threw herself into my arms and gave me a kiss that held us there for minutes. When she pulled away, she told me she hoped to see me again, but I knew she didn’t even believe her own words. I said goodbye as strongly as I could, which only managed to be little more than a whisper. She put on a brave face, but as I watched her retreat back towards the hospital, I noticed a trail of tears tracing her steps like fat rain drops on the pavement.
It had all been like a fairy tale until that point.
Thinking about those happy, but inevitably painful few months did little to lighten my mood. Those days could have been better. It’s why I hated this story. It was like one of those dreams where everything was so perfect, and you felt so happy, only to wake up and realize that it was all just a dream and your life is everything
