Page 71 of The Infinite Light of Dust

“Can you believe I’m going? I’ll be Private Fischer as of tonight. It’s wild, right?” Fischer said to me in a tone that reminded me of a child seeking praise from their parent. I patted his shoulder, pulling him toward me.

“You’ve come a long way, Private Fischer,” I told him, struggling to not look at Karina.

It was impossible, though, and when I did, I found her already looking at me. She looked happy, as happy as she could be given the fact that she was so against her brother enlisting. I gave her a weak smile and she looked away, turning to Elodie, whose face was soaked with tears.

“I’m happy. It’s . . . I’ll miss him, you know?” Elodie said, breaking into a full-on sob.

She had been through hell filing for divorce from Phillips, and she was only a few weeks away from reaching the mandatory thirty-day waiting period that Georgia law enforced. Phillips had gotten some fucking sense and wasn’t contesting the divorce filing. Elodie’s visa status was up in the air, but I wasn’t worried about it, considering I knew her and Fischer were going to get married the moment they were legally allowed to. They hadn’t said it, but it was beyond obvious that they couldn’t be apart. We were all hoping that Elodie wouldn’t have the baby until he was out of basic training, but the timeline was tight.

“You’re on Karina duty until I’m back, remember?” Fischer wrapped his arms around Elodie from behind, kissing her cheek. “Making sure she’s eating and leaving the house, not just crying on the—” He shut up when Karina’s elbow landed in his ribs.

“Sorry.” He winced, realizing that I was the cause of her misery.

“Anyway, Dad has been texting me all day. I know it’s annoying to do the rounds, but you should see him before you go,” Karina told him.

“Can’t he come here?” Fischer whined, and Karina rolled her eyes.

“You better come back more mature. You’ll have a baby to raise,” she scolded him.

Her hair was blond again, a warm tone at the top fading into a lighter blond near her ends.

“Let’s take some pictures to remember today,” Elodie said through her tears, pulling her phone from her pocket and holding it up. “Come here, Martin.”

I stood next to Fischer and he draped his arm over my shoulder, smiling as Elodie took photo after photo. She gave us a few different commands of different poses before she had Karina join in. Fischer clearly didn’t get the memo because he stood on the side of his sister, forcing her to be between us.

“Closer, please.” Elodie shooed me with her hand in the air. I stepped closer to Karina, so close that I could smell her shampoo.

God, I missed her so much. Now that I was physically near her, I longed for her so much more. It was excruciating.

After we posed and posed, Elodie stepped in, and I stepped out. I took as many photos as I could before Fischer had to leave. I reached into my pocket and pulled out a note I’d written him and shoved it into his hand, warning him not to read it until he was on the plane.

“What is this? Martin, you romantic, you didn’t have to write me a love letter,” he teased, batting his lashes at me.

“Shut the hell up.” I laughed with him. “It’s not much, so don’t get your hopes up,” I told him as he hugged me.

I didn’t want to make a sappy speech in front of Karina or an already distraught Elodie, so I’d written down my thoughts for him, to express how proud I was of him and how much his life was going to change.

Karina was staring at me, expecting more information, I assumed, or maybe she was surprised by the gesture, but she didn’t say anything as she hugged her brother goodbye. A few tears escaped her eyes as he got into Elodie’s car and they drove away. We stood in silence for a few minutes, her sniffles coming less and less frequently. I didn’t want to leave, and I knew she would tell me to, so I stood as quietly as I could. Eventually she turned to me, and I held my breath, having no fucking clue what she was going to say.

“Thank you,” she breathed out, her eyes soft and wet.

The words confused me, but right as I began to ask her what she meant, she continued, “Thank you for helping my brother. I hated you at the time, but enlisting really was what’s best for him and I see that now. So thank you, Kael. I know you love and care about him like family.”

I broke eye contact with her; the intensity of it was too much for me. “I did what I could, he’s the one you should thank for having the strength to save himself.”

I thought back to the boy I’d met, the one with bloodshot eyes and slurred words. The one who continuously got himself into shitty situations and made really dumb choices again and again but who had a heart of gold. That heart was what had gotten him where he was now and would continue to lead him through his life. With the war calming, he likely wouldn’t be deployed, until the next one at least, which gave me some peace.

“Still, you helped him, even though you knew the consequences. Just take the compliment, will you?”

The corners of her mouth turned up into a half smile and I couldn’t stop myself from wiping my thumb under her eyes. She sighed but didn’t stop me.

“You know I hate compliments,” I said, brushing away the little flakes of black mascara that had landed on the tops of her cheeks.

A small laugh fell from her lips. “Yeah, I know.”

“I miss you,” I told her, not caring if she told me to go to hell.

Her eyes opened and she narrowed them at me. “Don’t,” she protested.

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