Page 44 of Worth the Wait
Nathan let out a dry laugh. “Christ, Webb. You were never short on words before.”
Freddie dragged a hand through his hair, half-laughing, half-growling under his breath. “Why is this so fucking hard?”
Nathan arched a brow. “D’you really need me to answer that?”
Freddie made a noise somewhere between a scoff and a sigh, then drummed his fingers on his thigh as if psyching himself up. “Okay. Fine. I can talk. I’m talking. So… how long you back for?”
“Indefinitely.”
A half-smile, soft, almost hopeful lifted Freddie’s features, before he quashed it with a nod to Nathan’s leg. “Because of the injury?”
Nathan stilled. So he’d noticed the limp.
How long had Freddie been watching him?
“No.” He kept his tone even. “Last op. Ligament damage. It’ll heal.”
He didn’t say more. Not yet.
“What happened?”
“War happened.”
Freddie lingered, chewing on his bottom lip as if the words he wanted were hiding behind it. Nathan hadn’t meant for them to get into anything heavy. Not right then. He hadn’t meant for them to talk through it all now. He’d meant that they shouldn’t keep walking past each other like strangers.But now Freddie had opened the door, Nathan wanted to hear what might come out of it.
Then Freddie said, “I’m sorry.”
No preamble. No hedging. He dropped the words between them with a quiet weight that shifted the ground beneath him. Because it wasn’t about the leg. Or the war. Or any of the other things people said sorry for when trying to be kind without having a real stake in his pain. This was different. An apology that came with history. With fifteen years of silence wrapped inside it. A quiet offering, held out with both hands.
Nathan hadn’t expected it to hit so hard.
But it did. Like a blowanda balm. And it knocked the wind from his lungs even as it loosened the tightness clamped in his chest for so long.
His throat seized. Pressure built behind his eyes.
Fuck.
He looked away. Sniffed once, as if that would be enough to hold it all down. But it wasn’t. His vision blurred and his face twisted as he wiped a hand roughly across it. Sweat, dust, tears smeared his skin. He’d done it enough times in desert heat and moonless nights. But this was different.
This washome.
And he hated how that made it harder.
“Shit.” Freddie stepped forward, alarmed. “Nate—”
Nathan held up a hand, trying to catch his breath. Steady his spine. Steady himself. Was this what they’d meant in those briefings? When the army said the hardest part wasn’t war, it was coming back? That it wouldn’t be the noise of gunfire that got him, but the quiet that followed. The silence in kitchens. The flash of emotion in someone’s eyes. A fuckingapology.
Was this PTSD?
He didn’t know.
He just knew thatthis, whatever this was, hurt more than he was ready for.
He felt raw. Open.Exposedin a way no soldier wanted to be. No helmet. No armour. And with the same quiet conviction he’d carried through every long night on a rattling fold-out bed, bombs pounding in the distance, prayers mouthed into sweat and grit, he found the words to reply, “Me too.”
Freddie exhaled as if he’d been holding his breath for years. Maybe he’d needed to hear that as much as Nathan had needed to say it. Neither of them moved. Until movement behind Freddie broke the moment. Mr Ellison stepped out of the building, slowed by another teacher at the exit. Nathan straightened, clearing his throat. He needed to go.Hadto go.
“I need to get—”
