Away From You (Back To You Book 2) (18 page)

The crushing
weight of the crowd around me started to make my breath come hard and fast. My
eyes darted around, seeing Marines in uniform everywhere I looked. Even though
they were busy greeting their families with excited smiles on their faces, the
edges of reality blurred. The family members flickered in and out of focus. The
smiles on the faces of the Marines contorted into fierce grimaces. I knew they
were really carrying their sea bags on their shoulders, but those turned to
M16s on a strap, their postures turned guarded. I lost track of where I was and
why. I couldn’t breathe.

Hard hands
came down on my shoulders and shook me. “Mills! It’s so great to see you, man!”

Spencer had
turned from hugging his dad to me, and it all happened so fast that my minor
freak out went unnoticed. I shook it off and smiled up at him, faking
excitement and returning his hug. I caught Olivia’s gaze over his shoulder and
noted that she hadn’t been fooled. A huge part of me wanted to go to her and
bury my face in her neck. As much as I hated to admit it to myself, I had been
scared. The comfort of her arms was my first instinct. I pulled it together and
tried to act normal.

“How’s it
going, man? Welcome back!” I said to Spencer enthusiastically.

“It’s so
good to be on land, bro. Holy shit.” He chuckled, hopping once to punctuate his
statement.

He moved on
to saying hello to the rest of our group and I stole a glance at Olivia again.
She was watching me carefully, smiling for everyone else, but I knew the look
in her eye was concern for me. I winked at her to let her know that I was fine
again. Regardless of whatever happened between us, we both knew that I was
having some serious issues in my own head. She didn’t know the half of it, but
I could tell that she was worried. She’d mentioned PTSD to me several times
after talking to Catherine and Brooks. While I’d shot her down each time she
brought it up, I started to wonder if she might be right.

“We need to
celebrate! I’m in desperate need of a cold one.” Spencer said eagerly, rubbing
his hands together and biting his lip.

“Y’all are
more than welcome to come to my house. I’ve got burgers and plenty of beer.”
Mike winked at Spencer.

“Sounds good
to me, how ‘bout you, E?” Spencer asked Ellie, pulling her closer.

“Whatever
you want! It’s your day.” She smiled lovingly up at him.

“Well it’s
settled then. Can you all come?” Spencer addressed the rest of us.

Everyone
nodded and agreed, but I could tell that Olivia was hesitant for some reason.
She eventually nodded, and that settled it. When we got to Mike’s house, I was
instantly reminded of the good ol’ days, hanging out here when Spencer and I
had first joined up. Everything seemed so simple then.

Dinner was
fairly uneventful. Afterwards, us guys went outside to smoke cigars and shoot
the shit while the ladies did whatever they did inside. It all seemed so normal
and casual. Spencer hadn’t changed at all, and it was easy to forget about
everything else that was going on with me. He wasn’t there, so there was no
connection to him and the incident.

Brooks, on
the other hand, kept watching me like I was a ticking time bomb. I was slowly
losing my patience with him, getting more and more frustrated with it the more
beers I consumed. Spencer started out matching me bottle for bottle, but I
passed him by almost double in no time at all. I knew we were getting kind of
rowdy, but no one said anything. It was his homecoming, after all. He had a
right to get drunk. I was just being supportive.

Olivia poked
her head out the back door. It was nighttime now, so she squinted through the
cigar smoke at us. “Matt?”

“Yeah?” I
called, stepping from the spot in the grass I’d been standing and into the ring
of light from the porch.

“What are
you guys doing standing in the dark?”

“We didn’t
want to ash on the porch. What’s up?”

She came
outside, Ellie and Catherine on her heels. “It’s getting late, are you ready to
go? I have a test tomorrow so I need to get to bed.”

The thought
of her going to bed suddenly angered me because I realized that I never knew
whether she’d be sleeping at home in our bed or at her mom’s house. I bristled.
“Whose bed are you gonna sleep in?”

“Hey, man,
what the hell kinda question is that?” Spencer asked from behind me, clearly
unaware of our current sleeping arrangements.

Olivia held
up a hand. “It’s fine, Spencer. Matt, I’m going home with you. C’mon.”

Spencer,
Mike, and Brooks joined us on the patio.

“Are you
ready, too?” Catherine asked Brooks.

He nodded
and put his cigar out in the ashtray on the table. “Yeah, let’s take off.
G’night, guys.”

I swayed as
I took another swallow of my beer. “Man, really? Let’s hang out a bit longer.
There’s still beer.”

“Not much,”
Mike replied gruffly.

“Naw, man.
Let’s call it a night.” Spencer clapped me on the shoulder and started to usher
me inside. I brushed him off and staggered as it threw off my equilibrium.

“Matt,
c’mon. I mean it. Let’s go.” Olivia was staring at me like she was afraid of
what I might do, which pissed me off to no end. What the hell did she have to
be afraid of?

I took a
step forward, but something in my posture made Spencer grab me by the shoulder
again. I shrugged him off harder this time, staring up at him coldly. “What are
you doing?”

“What are
you
doing? You need to calm down man,
I’m not
gonna
ask you twice. Look at your wife. She’s
ready to go.”

“Yeah, ready
to go. I bet you’re just going to drop me off at home and then leave aren’t
you? Head to your mom’s house, if that’s even where you’ve been staying.” My
thoughts were clouded, but I pushed back the small voice telling me to shut the
fuck up. I swayed again, really feeling the booze and self-pity working
together in my bloodstream.

“You’ve been
staying at your mom’s house?” Ellie asked Olivia, and put a hand on her back.

“Hey, don’t
comfort her! It’s her choice to stay there. Don’t comfort her.” I took a swig
of my beer. “Looks like you two aren’t as close as you once were. You only tell
your problems to your new best friend, Liv? Did Cat replace Ellie?”

“That’s
enough, son.” Mike started towards me but I dodged out of his grasp. My bottle
went flying to the ground, making an earsplitting crash as it broke. I jumped
into action as if it were an explosion and pushed Mike out of the way. Just as
quickly as it happened, I realized it was only the bottle. Knowing all eyes
were on me, I silently stared at the bits of broken glass on the ground. After
a moment, I went inside. I intended to go to the bathroom, but the room spun so
wildly that I stopped just inside the doorway and leaned my head against the
wall. I was out of sight from the rest of them, which is what I’d wanted
anyway. Their stares were filled with judgment and fear.

“What the
hell, Liv?” Spencer asked my wife.

“He’s just
having a hard time right now.” Olivia answered him.

Catherine
cleared her throat. “I think it’s a bit more than that, Liv. He needs help.”

“I know,”
Olivia answered.

“Has it been
like this ever since he’s been back?” Spencer asked. “E, why didn’t you tell
me?”

“I didn’t
want to worry you, Spence.” Ellie responded quietly. “But now that you’re home
I think we need to figure out a plan to help Olivia. You can’t do this by
yourself anymore, Liv. He’s getting a out of control.”

I couldn’t take
it anymore. I couldn’t listen to them try to come up with some sort of plan to
help my wife as if I were a problem that needed to be solved. I zigzagged back
outside, feeling the full weight of their surprised stares as I did.

“All of you
need to mind your own fucking business.” I pointed a finger at them in a
sweeping gesture. “I’m just going to remove myself from the situation. You want
to help my wife fix me? There’s nothing left of me to fix, okay?”

“Matt,”
Olivia started with a calm tone, palms facing me as if she were addressing a
dangerous animal.

“Are you
fucking kidding me? I’m not going to
bite
you!” I yelled at her.

She dropped
her arms, looking around at the others for help.

I threw up
my hands in frustration. “I’m leaving. I’m done. Olivia, stay with your mom.
We’re done. I want a divorce. I want to be done with this. You can’t
fix
me.”

“Mills, I
don’t think you know what you’re saying right now.” Brooks piped up.

Everyone
else just looked shocked. It shouldn’t have been such a shock. Did they think I
would just come home from getting shot and be just fine? Oh, wait, Brooks did.
That thought made me want to punch him really hard… right in the face. You know
what? Why not?

I lunged
forward, but Spencer and Mike grabbed me before I could even touch him. Well,
that was embarrassing. I went limp in their arms, holding out my hands. “I’m
done. I’m done.”

“You
certainly are, kid.” Mike shook his head disappointingly at me. “Spencer, put
him to bed. Olivia, I think you should go. I don’t think you should bring him
home while he’s like this. He needs to sleep it off.”

Spencer
started to lead me into the house, and I didn’t fight him on it. Before we made
it through the door, I turned around and looked straight at Olivia. She was
white in the face, but not crying.

“If you
think I’m going to change my mind when I sober up, you’re wrong. I want a
divorce. Don’t be there when I get home.”

Her hands
flew to her stomach like I’d knocked the wind out of her. That was the last
image I saw of my wife before I blacked out.

Olivia

I never thought that I would be the
type to get divorced before my one-year anniversary, but judging by my current
situation, it appeared that I was. After Matt made his drunken declaration and
then passed out that night, I’d been staying at my mom’s and hadn’t heard from
his since. Not for lack of trying, of course. He wouldn’t return my phone calls
or texts. Yesterday marked one week since I’d packed my stuff and left our
home, and before I fell asleep last night I vowed that I wouldn’t try to reach
out to him again. If he wanted to talk to me, he’d call.

“Liv?” Ellie
snapped her fingers in front of my dazed expression. She looked concerned, with
a hint of annoyance that I was obviously not listening to whatever she said.

“Sorry,” I
mumbled.

“It’s okay.
We definitely don’t need to do this right now if it’s too much. I feel
horrible.” Ellie bit her lip and looked from me to Catherine.

“No! I’m
fine.” I threw my hair up into a loose bun on top of my head, stifled under the
weight of my dark curls. “I told you guys that my situation with Matt was
absolutely not going to get in the way of my duties as Matron of Honor. You
have so much to do in so little time and I still want to help you, Ellie.”

“Even though
I’m not in the wedding, I can totally pick up the slack for you a bit if you
need time to get your stuff figured out!” Catherine offered. “I promise I’m not
going to steal your spot up there.”

I stuck my
tongue out in response to her wink. “You guys, I mean it. I’m fine.”

“Do you want
to take a break from this and talk? These invitations aren’t going anywhere.”
Ellie gestured to the table covered in pieces of DIY invitation pieces.

We sat
around Catherine’s coffee table putting them together in an assembly line.
Ellie tied the burlap ribbons into a bow around the invitation itself,
Catherine stuffed the invitation and response card into the envelope, and I
sealed the envelope and placed monogrammed stickers on the back. It was the
perfect mindless task that allowed me to wallow in self-pity without it being
too obvious. Or, at least, I had thought it wasn’t too obvious.

“They may
not be going anywhere, but they sure won’t put themselves together on their
own. Now, c’mon! Chop, chop.” I clapped my hands at them both, as they’d
stopped working and were holding up our very productive system.

“Okay, okay.
But at least talk to us about it while we work,” Ellie said, resuming her
ribbon tying. “Have you talked to him yet?”

“No, and I
decided last night that I’m done trying. He’ll reach out when he’s ready.”

Catherine
nodded. “That’s probably for the best. He might just need some time.”

“Yeah,” I
agreed sadly. “I wish I could help. I wish he would
let
me help. It’s kind of like I failed our marriage or something.
Shouldn’t we be working through this together?”

Ellie
sighed. “I don’t know, Liv. I see why you’d feel that way, but I don’t think
what’s going on with Matt is normal marital stuff. He has a lot of the symptoms
of PTSD, and what he needs more than anything is professional help. You can
love him and support him all you want, but he needs more than that.”