Page 101 of We Thought We Were Invincible
I turned toward the living room once again where my father now stood, his glistening cheeks matching mine. In this, we were together.
“California,” he said, his hands gripping each other in front of him. “You look just like her.”
I smiled at the best compliment he could have given me even as my eyes welled up again.
He looked to his mother helplessly. “Please don't cry again.”
“I don't know what I'm supposed to say,” I admitted. “I only planned the 'I'm your daughter part'.”
Dylan cleared his throat. “So, I take it we aren't surfing this afternoon?”
My father looked at him, then turned to me, a nervous twitch on his lips. “Do you surf?”
I grinned, wiping away the remaining tears. “Of course.” I met his eyes. “As you say, I am my mother's daughter.”
He laughed then, breaking all remaining tension and clapped his hands together, his face lit up with joy.
“To the beach?” Dylan asked.
“To the beach,” my dad responded, looking my way.
I nodded, knowing this was a language we both spoke. Surfing. It was a start. “Let's go.”
Epilogue
Jamie
10 years later
I never thought I'd be back in Gulf City. That first year gone, all I'd wanted was to come back and regain what I'd lost. My friends. My girl. Then I got used to being away. It became easier with each passing day until it lost its power over me.
I became a part of a new family. Had new friends. Even a new girl. My platoon. They were the ones I wanted to be with now, but they were back on base in Georgia, and I was here.
I didn't want to be here, but I had no choice. There was a funeral and no matter how I felt about it, this was where I was supposed to be.
Mourners packed the church, but I paid little attention to any of them. They didn't recognize me. They wouldn't. My once scraggly blond hair was buzzed short. My lean frame had bulked up considerably. I wasn't the Jamie Daniels they knew. This new Jamie had seen things, done things, that changed a person.
I kept my head up, catching the attention of quite a few people with my dress uniform, but managing not to be pulled to the front.
I watched as my brother, looking just as he always had, sat in the front pew. His mother, having had a service in Washington D.C. wasn't there. Two people joined Jay, and I recognized them at once. Colby, dressed in a stylish suit, was greeted by each person he saw. His face had grown leaner, losing the softness of youth. Callie stood beside him, standing tall in her elegant black dress. Her hair was different - dyed dark chocolate and sitting just above her shoulders in soft layers. Gone was the simple long braid. This version of Callie was older, more mature; mesmerizing.
For the first time in ten years, the confidence I'd cultivated slipped.
She put her arm around my brother, and I wanted nothing more than to feel her touch, see her smile.
I slid out the back after the funeral, needing to drive around for a little while to regain control before I saw all of them.
Control. It got me through my missions. I became a ranger because I wanted to do something big with my life. I was damn good at it. We ran into the situations everyone else ran from.
How did Florida feel more like a minefield than that?
He's dead, I told myself. My dad was gone. So why did the thought of him still make me feel so inadequate?
I pulled to the side of the road in front of a house with too many memories and a street that overflowed with cars. The place looked the same as it always had. That porch was the first place I'd ever gotten my heartbroken. My face had been broken by my father's fist in that entryway. Hell, pretty much every room held a memory like that. His anger had seeped into the walls themselves.
I stood by the open door, watching the people who only knew the face my father put on, not the real man.
A young boy was sitting on the bench by the door and I stopped, not quite ready to go in.
