She chuckled. “You know I teach undergraduates. Dating you ... if that’s what we’re doing ... it feels like robbing the cradle.”
“Lady, you’ve got no idea what you’re talking about. I’m a lot of things, but ... I don’t feel young. Not anymore.”
She was silent. I’d stepped in it a bit. I usually didn’t even make oblique references to the Army or Afghanistan. I didn’t like to talk about it, and she knew it.
“Sorry,” I said.
“You don’t need to apologize,” she replied. “I’m happy to talk about it any time. It’s you who won’t.”
“There’s a lot of good reasons for that,” I said.
“Alexandra said…”
Her voice trailed off, and I waited. Finally, after what seemed like an interminably long wait, I said, “Alex said ... what?”
“She said Dylan has talked about Afghanistan quite a bit.”
I didn’t answer right away. I just looked out at the park. The sun was going down, and headlights bracketed both sides of Morningside Park. So why could Dylan talk about it and I couldn’t? Why could a 60-watt bulb light up a room, yet be swallowed in the darkness of the park below me? Why not ask the ocean why it had current? Or the sky, why there was wind? It was just too big. Too big to get my mind around, too big to think about even. Not to mention that any day now, a JAG lawyer was going to open an envelope, and find a letter and thumb drive inside. And when that happened, my whole future would come into question, my whole life.
Or maybe not. Maybe the lawyer would look at the contents, and decide it was better left alone. A simple format command, and everything on the thumb drive would be erased.
Maybe I shouldn’t have turned it in.
Maybe I should have gone in person.
No. I couldn’t stay there. I couldn’t stay in the Army. At least now, when it all came out, it would be on my terms.
Finally, I said, “I think is Dylan is starting to see a future.”
Abruptly, she changed to a quick, almost clipped tone. “Maybe that’s it. I’ve gotta go, talk to you later.”
I sat up straight, as it started to sink in that I’d said something seriously wrong.
“Wait,” I said, but it was too late. She’d hung up already.
I get it. I’m not the brightest bulb in the room, but even I know when I’ve said something stupid. I had this awful feeling in my gut. Because if she was feeling about me the way I was about her ... then I’d have been hurt if she said something like that. So I called her back.
It rang three times, and I thought for sure she was going to send me to voicemail before she finally picked up. By the time I heard her voice, I was sitting up straight in my seat, my pulse pounding at my temples.
“Hello?”
“Look,” I said without any introduction. “It’s not that I don’t see a future. In fact ... I’m gonna lay it out there, Carrie. I like you a hell of a lot. I rated my possible schools by the places you’re most likely to be. I’m honestly ... a little overwhelmed by how quickly my feelings have developed about you ... us. But it’s an adjustment for me, all right? It’s not even been a month since the only thing I could look forward to was making it through the day without getting shot at.”
She was silent, but I could hear her breathing. Finally she asked, “Did you really do that?”
“What?”
“Rate your schools by where I might be?”
I coughed. “Yeah. Yeah I did.”
“Start thinking Georgetown or American University then. I’ve got a place here at Rice ... but I’m up for a fellowship at National Institutes of Health in Bethesda. I’ll know in a couple more weeks.”
I swallowed. “Does that mean I’m forgiven?”
“Nothing to forgive,” she replied. “And … it’s just crazy to pick out schools based on where I might be.”
“Right now it’s crazy for me to think about where I’ll be in a week. Much less, next year. But I gotta start somewhere. Might as well start somewhere with a friendly face.”
“What if you turn out to be a crazy stalker?”
I sighed. “Then you tell Alex, and Alex will tell Dylan, and he’ll hunt me down, and we’ll have an epic battle, destroy some buildings, flip buses around, make a big mess. They’ll call out the Air Force, but those wusses will run away, so then they’ll send in the 82nd Airborne.”
She chuckled, but I wasn’t done making an ass of myself yet. “Anyway, when the 82nd Airborne fails miserably, as they undoubtedly will, they’ll send over the Marines, and we’ll send them packing for a swim.”
She snorted, and I thought Carrie might be the only person on earth who can make a snort-laugh sound sexy. “What happens then?”
“Well, then they send in Chuck Norris.”
“You’re ridiculous.”
“I’ve lived this long, haven’t I? I know what I’m talking about. Chuck will recognize what badasses we are, we’ll all go for a drink, and then Dylan and I will punk him and get back to business. And then finally the President sends in his ultimate weapon, who finally subdues us.”
“Who? The secret service?”
I scoffed. “Are you kidding me? No, he sends in the IRS.”
“That’s it, you’re doomed.”
“Yeah ... anyway. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t worry about it,” she replied. “It’s just….”
I listened, waiting to see if she’d continue.
Finally she did. “It’s just ... I’m almost thirty. I’m not looking for a commitment, Ray … it’s too soon. But I am thinking about the future. I mean ... I want to be a mom someday. I don’t want to waste my time if you’re just looking to get laid.”
Part of me wanted to give her a flippant response. Part of me wanted to say, “Sorry, you’ve got the wrong guy.” But that was a small part. Instead, my thoughts turned to Weber. He would
