was all man.
“What are you doing at the VA?” I inquired and started to look down but paused when I saw the same twitch in his cheek I had back in the lobby. But being the seasoned military professional, a beat later it was gone and I was questioning if I’d even seen it.
“My unit’s just getting back from deployment. Routine debrief and psych evals.”
His tone left no room for further questions. Though I had plenty.
I looked to his right sleeve and noted the American flag patch but no special forces, sapper, airborne, or ranger tabs. Then I looked above the U.S. ARMY tape stitched on his left breast and there was no occupation patch. Nothing on his uniform gave away his MOS. The only thing I knew was he was a sergeant.
“Do you enjoy working at the VA?” he asked.
“I do. I only work there two days a week. I also work at a sports rehab center. But I like working with our warriors more than the rehab center. They tend to whine less.”
Unless their name is Trey. Then they complained and whined more than the athlete who pulled a muscle.
My attempt at levity fell short but Jake still chuckled.
There was an uncomfortable silence as we looked over the menu. By the time the waiter came to take our order, I was rethinking lunch.
Something about Jake was off. There was some indication the guy I’d once been in love with was still there but he was now encased in steel. But that wasn’t what was off, it was something more than that. Something simmering below the surface.
“You wanted to talk,” I prompted.
“Adalynn Walker, never one to procrastinate,” Jake said, his voice dripping with sarcasm.
That was me. I lived by the motto “cinch by the inch, trial by the mile” therefore I didn’t dally when something needed to get done or be said. I didn’t like things stacking up and weighing me down. So far, the way I lived my life had served me well, but his tone told me he didn’t like it.
There was nothing to say to his comment so I remained quiet and waited him out.
“Addy,” he started and sighed. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend you.”
“You didn’t,” I lied.
“Honey, you know you have a shit poker face. I’m just nervous and don’t know how to start.”
Well, at least he’s being honest.
“Why don’t you start with why you wanted to have lunch with me?”
A beat of silence stretched to darn near a minute before he finally spoke.
“I don’t like how I left.”
Neither did I, but we couldn’t rewind time. “There’s—”
“I knew my deployment was going to be longer than six months and I couldn’t tell you that. I knew I’d have no communication with anyone back home and I couldn’t tell you that either. I didn’t want you waiting for me thinking I’d ghosted you. I was stuck. Either I had to let you go or leave and let you think I was ignoring you.”
“Why couldn’t you tell me?”
“Addy, you know why.”
I did know why, my dad and uncles had all been in the Army. There had been times when my dad had left in the middle of the night to whereabouts unknown for an undisclosed period of time. But my dad was Special Forces. Jake was in the regular Army. The two were vastly different. He could’ve told me, he simply chose not to, but I wasn’t going to press it. There was no purpose; we’d been broken up for a long time and there was no reason to rehash the past.
“I wasn’t regular Army, then or now,” he said as if he pulled my thoughts from my mind.
“What?”
“I wasn’t infantry, Addy.”
My irritation spiked and I leaned forward. “You lied to me?”
“I lied to everyone. My family still doesn’t know what I do.”
“What do you do?”
“Can’t tell you that.”
Irritation turned to anger and I took a breath to clear my thoughts. Then I took another and another but it didn’t work. I was pissed.
“Then why’d you bring it up? Why am I even here? So you can tell me you lied to me? Great. Thanks for the info.”
“I wanted to explain why I broke up with you. I didn’t want to. I didn’t want to leave you. I was in love with you. I thought about you every day I was gone. And when I finally made it home, there were so many times I wanted to reach out. But I knew the same thing