Aspen nods and swallows her bite of food. “When Buck first took me to meet his parents, after Luke and Katelyn got married, Marina made lasagna. I swear to God, it was like heaven on a plate.”
Kelly stiffens again.
“You okay?” I ask.
She chews the lasagna and swallows. “Yeah. Why?”
“You just seem…tense.”
Which is an understatement. The tension is flowing off her in waves, and I sensed it get stronger when Buck mentioned his mother.
“I’m fine.” She takes another piece of lasagna with her fork and shoves it inside her mouth.
“My mom’s a good cook,” Aspen continues, “but nothing like Buck’s mom. She should be a chef. She could open her own Italian restaurant.”
“My mom doesn’t want to work that hard,” Buck laughs.
“But she could make it big,” Aspen says. “Her cooking is the best Italian food I’ve ever had.”
“She wouldn’t trust anyone to do any of it,” Buck says. “She wouldn’t hire a chef. She’d want to be the chef. And she would never take any time off, because she wouldn’t trust any other chef to do it right.”
“I agree with Aspen,” I say. “This lasagna is the best I’ve tasted. By the way, how come you never took me home to dinner?”
“Because, Phoenix, you’re not nearly as pretty as Aspen is.”
I laugh. Buck and I will give each other three shades of shit all night. It’s part of how we cope. We’re good friends, of course, but we also have the same horrendous memories from our time on duty. From the scrapes we got out of. And one where we barely made it out alive. We both have the scars to prove it.
So we give each other shit. We laugh. We enjoy life. Because we understand what a gift life is. That’s why Aspen is so good for Buck. She understands that life is a gift. Those women were lucky to escape with their lives, and they all have the scars to prove it as well.
Buck told me a bit of what happened to Aspen over there, but there’s a lot he doesn’t talk about, and I certainly won’t force it. Those are Aspen’s stories to tell, not his. Suffice it to say that Buck says what Aspen went through was nearly as bad as what we went through or worse. I’d say worse, for sure, because we signed up and knew what the possibilities were. The women did not.
And beside me sits Kelly. Kelly, who doesn’t seem at all grateful for the second chance she’s been given.
Every once in a while, a shred of humanity seems to shine through her. But most of the time, she’s been shut off. She’s built a big brick wall around herself, and I understand why. It’s tempting, when you’ve been through something unspeakable, to wall yourself off and never feel again. Buck and I both struggled with that when we came home.
But it doesn’t help. In the short term, maybe it numbs the hurt, but in the long term? It’s no way to live.
I’m not a therapist. I can’t help Kelly in that way. She’s on her own. She has to recapture the joy of life. I wish I could help her, but I can’t.
The beauty of Buck’s delicious meal—other than deliciousness itself—is that we don’t have to make much conversation. We’re too busy eating. I clean my plate like a pro and take a second helping.
Kelly cocks her head at me. “Are you a bottomless pit or something?”
“Yep. And damned proud of it.”
“How can you eat so much?”
“I exercise a lot. I expend a lot of energy and calories. Buck and I both do. When we were overseas, we ate about six thousand calories a day. That’s when we could get food, of course. These days, I eat around three thousand calories a day.”
“What do you mean, when you could get food?” she asks.
“We were in a third-world country, Kelly. There wasn’t always food available.”
“Yeah, and those MREs get old pretty fast,” Buck says.
“MREs?” Kelly says.
“Meal, ready-to-eat. That’s what it stands for,” I explain. “All processed stuff that’s vacuum sealed against every microbe. Sounds delicious, right?”
“You guys are big. Surely they gave you enough calories in your MREs.”
“Yeah, they tried anyway. And we ate it because we had no other choice. But there were times…”
“Don’t go there, bud,” Buck says.
I clear my throat. “Suffice it to say, there were times when we didn’t have access to food. So we made do.”
Kelly says nothing further.
12
KELLY
Something is happening to me that I don’t quite understand.
I have questions. Lots of questions that I want to ask Leif about his time overseas and as a SEAL. About not having enough to eat. About needing six thousand calories a day.
So many questions…
And the weirdest thing is? I haven’t been this curious in a long time. I can’t remember the last time I wanted to ask someone this many questions.
I ask Macy a lot of questions during our sessions, but they all concern me. Sometimes they’re about my mother, but mostly about me and my life.
Here sits a man I barely know, and I have all these questions about his life.
I won’t ask, though. First, I’m not comfortable asking, but more importantly, Buck told him not to go there.
What does that mean?
They were in the military—Navy SEALs, which means that they were the best of the best.
Which also means…they probably saw and experienced some hell.
If I had gone into the military instead of taking that serving job after graduation, would I have had those experiences? Added to the horrendous life I’d already led?
On the other hand…perhaps my life would be better. I wouldn’t have been in combat, but I might have been sent overseas.
But the biggest reason? During my fifth year at the restaurant, I was taken.
If I’d been in the military, I wouldn’t have been at the restaurant, and maybe I wouldn’t have been taken to that horrible island.
Before I know it, the huge portion of lasagna Buck served me is gone. It was delicious. The best meal I’ve had in some time.
We were fed very well on the island. A lot of seafood, though, which isn’t my favorite, but I learned to get it down because it was all that we had. We weren’t starved on the island by any means. No, we needed to be strong because the men who hunted us wanted worthy prey.
The only time I’ve been starved was during my childhood. When I lived with my mother. The only time I knew hunger, and I don’t ever want to know it again.
“So you liked it, I guess.” Leif gazes down at my clean plate.
“I did. Thank you, Buck.”
Buck smiles. “You’re very welcome, Kelly. Aspen and I would love to have you dine with us again sometime.”
Again, I resist dropping my jaw.
Why are these people being nice to me?
It’s an easy question to answer.
Because Reid Wolfe is paying them.
Always an ulterior motive.
No one is nice to me unless they have to be.
“Would you like some more?” Aspen asks.
“No, thank you. This was more than enough.”