Every morning I woke up, and I got on with my day. Every day I made a conscious effort to be mentally healthy. That in itself was a major win.
“Do you have any regrets? About enlisting in the Marines?” he clarified. My dad and I didn’t usually get into these types of conversations. We didn’t talk about deep shit or philosophize about life but now he was broaching a subject we’d never discussed. “I always wondered if you did it because I talked it up so much. If you enlisted because of me.”
“No. It was my choice. No regrets.” Not sure if he believed me but he didn’t need to be saddled with guilt for a decision I’d made.
Truth was I’d been a good Marine, and while I was in the Corps, I’d loved it. Coming home was the challenge, and it sucked that the place I’d always loved had become a battlefield. Instead of leaving the war behind, I’d brought hell to my own front door.
“It was a different time when I was a Marine,” he said. “I never got sent to a combat zone. If you did it because of me, I’m sorry about that.”
It dawned on me why he was talking like this. There was nothing like facing your own mortality to make you question your life choices. To study and analyze your decisions, mistakes, the wrong turns and detours that had led you to whatever place in the road you were currently at.
“I have plenty of regrets, but becoming a Marine is not one of them,” I stated firmly, needing him to believe that.
He nodded, accepting my statement as truth.
A few more seconds of silence ticked by until I finally said the words I should have said a long time ago. “I’m sorry I’ve been gone for so long.”
I didn’t just mean physically gone, I had been gone.
“You were never a runner. Quite the opposite. If you felt you had to leave, I guess you had your reasons.” I was tempted to ask my old man if he was getting soft in his old age but I sensed he had more to say. “But be prepared,” he said. “Your mother won’t let you get away so easily this time. She wants you to take over the business. Keeps saying it’s time we took that vacation to Hawaii that I’ve been promising for the last decade.” He paused, studying my face to see what effect his words had on me.
I schooled my features to hide my reaction. “You should take her on a vacation. You both deserve it.”
“The business was always meant to be yours. It’s time you step up and take over.”
I was afraid this was going to happen. It wasn’t only my mother who wanted me to take over the business. He wanted it too.
“You’re ready to retire?”
“I’d still have a hand in the business but I don’t need to be there as much as I have been over the years. It’d be good to spend some time in the garden. Maybe take up golf.”
I snorted. I couldn’t see my dad golfing.
“Give it some thought. No need to make any decisions right now.”
The door opened, saving me from having to comment further. An enormous canary yellow bouquet entered the room. A bouquet of flowers attached to a pair of slender legs with sculpted calves from years of running. I’d be able to pick out those legs in a lineup. I knew every curve of her body. Every dip and swell. Every freckle. Every inch of silky soft skin.
Or, at least, I used to. I used to know everything about Lila Turner. Her hopes and dreams and fears. Her strengths and weaknesses. I used to be able to read her face like a well-loved book that I’d committed to memory.
She set the flowers on a table and we stared at each other across my father’s hospital bed. If anything, she was more beautiful now than she’d been the last time I saw her. Dark, glossy hair fell in waves around her bare shoulders. Full, pink lips I’d kissed a thousand times.
Mine. Except that she wasn’t. Not anymore.
Unlike the old days, the times I’d come home on leave, catching her by surprise twice, she didn’t fly across the room and throw herself into my arms. Of course she didn’t. Why would she? We were strangers now.
“Hey Lila.” I leaned back in my chair, adopting a relaxed posture that belied my inner turmoil. As if this was just an ordinary day and it hadn’t been six years since we’d last spoken.
“Hey Jude.” She licked her lips and lifted a trembling hand to adjust her top. It was one of those off-shoulder numbers—dark blue with daisies. Her skirt was denim, and I studied the brass buttons down the front, trying to work out if they were snaps. Irrelevant. I wouldn’t be ripping the skirt off her so it didn’t matter if they were snaps or buttons.
I dragged my gaze away from Lila and focused on my dad, who’d been watching us with an amused look on his face. Not sure there was anything to be amused about.
“Well, I um... I need to go,” Lila said, backing away toward the door.
“Don’t leave on my account.”
“I just wanted to drop off the flowers.” She smiled at my dad. “I tried to choose the manliest ones.”
My dad returned the smile, his fondness for her apparent in the gruffness of his response. “You did good, darlin’.”
“I, um...” She glanced at me. Her chest rose on a deep breath. Inhale. Exhale. “I have to get to work. I’ll stop by tomorrow, Patrick. Good seeing you again, Jude.”
Good seeing you again, Jude.
Her tone so formal, so polite, like we were merely acquaintances.
She left in a rush, practically tripping over herself to get out the door. When it closed behind her, I continued staring at it.
“Go,” my dad said, giving me his blessing to chase after the girl I’d been
