Just Jack and me. And a horribly charred steak. And the realization that what we had done wasn’t making a baby. It was reigniting a flame, an old one, one too intense, perhaps, for either of us to stand. We wanted that fire. We never wanted it to go out. And, lost in Jack that night, I never could have predicted how irreparably we, like that steak, would burn.
TWENTY-FIVE
true south
sloane
March 28, 2016
Dear Sloane,
You can’t imagine how much the thought of you keeps me going, how much knowing I have you to come home to makes me know everything is going to be OK. Now that I’m the Sarge, everything feels different. I have to be the strong one now, Sloane. I have to be the brave and fearless leader, the one they look to when they are feeling low. It’s hard for me to stay strong sometimes, but I look up at the stars at night, and I picture you there in Georgia, in the land of peaches and pecans and peanuts, of all the things that are right with the world. And I know one thing for sure: you are my true South. No matter where I am, no matter how far away, my heart’s compass will always, always lead me back to you.
All my love,
Adam
WHEN I HEARD THE voices downstairs begin to get louder, I finally roused myself to get ready for the day. For Grammy’s day. Her last day at Starlite Island.
We think and talk a lot about our firsts, but we never really take the time to savor our lasts. Not enough time, anyway. Maybe it’s because they break our hearts so much. I don’t actually remember, for example, the last time I nursed either of my babies. I likely won’t remember the last time either of them sits on my lap or kisses me on the lips. Maybe that’s just as well, because it would be too hard. In the savoring, we would never be able to let it go. And letting go is the essence of life, the thing that keeps us moving forward.
That’s what made this morning particularly difficult, realizing it was, definitively, the very last time we would spend the day with our sharp, beautiful grandmother over at the island where we had spent countless hours with her in childhood. That last made me think about the last time I had Skyped with Adam. I had been upset with him, angry even, something I seldom was. I was an expert at putting on my brave Army wife face, but on the inside, I was a wreck most of the time. The thing I respected about Adam most, his dedication to his country, freedom, and his family, was also the thing that bothered me most. Because, in my heart of hearts, I just wanted him to come home. To me. To the boys. He could get a regular job or go back to school. But I never said that. Well, not until that day.
Through my tears, I had said, “Adam, please. Make this your last tour. Just come home already.” The look on his face had pained me.
“I know this is hard on you, babe,” he had said, to which I had retorted, “No, Adam. ‘Hard’ is an hour-long spin class. This is unthinkable.”
I knew the exact difference between the two, in fact, because Caroline had made me go to an hour-long spin class the day before.
Even through the not-always-wonderful Skype reception, I had seen Adam was hurt. I didn’t want to hurt him, especially not when he was living through something so unimaginably difficult. I wanted to make things easier for him and be that strength he needed, and 99 percent of the time, I was. But not that night.
“I can’t stand this, Adam. The kids are getting older. They’re going to start to remember when you aren’t here for months on end. I know your country means a lot to you and so do your men, but you need to choose us.”
I knew he wanted to argue with me then because he thought fighting for freedom and safety was choosing us. That was how he saw it. Sometimes, that was how I saw it too. But not that night. He didn’t bother to argue with me.
He simply sighed and said, “OK, Sloane. I’ll think about it. We can talk about it when I get home.”
That had been our last conversation. Oh, I hated that. I always said that last conversations didn’t matter when you truly knew how much you meant to each other. But now I understood. It was awful to think that the last time you spoke to someone, especially someone you loved so much, was in anger.
But there was little I could do about that today. All I could do was make sure I didn’t have another regret, that I gave my grandmother a proper good-bye, the kind of good-bye that would make me look back with a smile, not with sadness that I hadn’t done the right thing.
It was that idea that finally got me out of bed. Sometimes, no matter how you’re feeling, how sad you are, how hurt, the only option is to get up and keep going. I had heard it all my life. Now I was living it.
An hour later, Caroline was leading the charge to the boat, and all I could think about was how Mark and Emerson were so in love, giggling and cuddling. It was like stepping back in time, as if I were looking at the head cheerleader and star center from Peachtree Bluff High, the kids they had been when they fell in love the first time. Nothing had changed at all. They didn’t even look older. I hated them a little.
“OK, Grammy,” I said to my grandmother, who
