Gray

BACK AT THE BASE, MY days simultaneously ran together and refused to end. Every night I went home and worked on the afghan, or BG as I called it, because I was a Marine and we only ever referred to anything by its initials. BG stood for Big Gesture but could’ve also stood for Big Garbage, since that piece of shit looked like yarn that had been chewed up and vomited out by some large animal. Hopefully when I showed it to her she would realize it meant that I was placing her first in my life and that I was trusting her with my damaged heart, the one that I realized I now wore outside of my body, exposed.

I slept, ate, exercised, trained, worked. Whatever calling I thought I had here was missing. I'd left all my ambition and my soul at the feet of one girl. But she hadn't stomped on it. I'd been the one to grind all that we could have had into the dust with my size thirteen boot. Ironically, I was better suited to serving now. The fear I’d once had watching over these guys was nothing compared to the fear I’d had watching Sam fall out of the sky or the fear that burrowed deep in the back recesses of my mind that I’d never win her back. Those were real fears. The fear of leadership wasn’t even close.

"Marine, you are one sad sack." Captain Dailey looked up at me over his long, hawkish nose. The bushy, beetle-shaped eyebrows were furrowed together, forming one long, hairy snake over the tops of his eyes. I stared at the row of fur in fascination, waiting for it to crawl off. I was back in his office to hear yet another lecture on the glory of the Corps.

"Yessir." I snapped off a knife-sharp salute. You said, “Sir, yes sir,” even if your commanding officer told you to suck his dick.

"I haven't seen your reenlistment papers." I guess he’d conveniently forgotten I’d already told him I wasn’t reenlisting.

"No, sir."

"Why's that, Marine? You're too soft for us now?"

"No, sir." If anything I was more hardened and determined than ever. My goals had shifted but I wasn't revealing that to the captain.

He stared at me, trying to wait me out, but I'd learned a few things in my seven years of service and the mantra that they should never see you sweat was one of the important ones. Show a weakness and they'd needle you forever under the guise of making you a stronger warrior.

Maybe that was how you created a better Marine, but I wasn't convinced that trying to find someone's weakness and exploit it always made good sense—but I knew better than to tell the CO my thoughts on the matter. Instead I stood with my heels together so that I stood straight as a tree and as unmoving as a steel post. My arms were glued to my side, fingers pointed straight down. I could have been a plum line, my bearing was so perfectly erect and straight. I'd practiced this pose for years watching Dad and Pops. I'd stood in front of the mirror and saluted. I’d had the best salute in boot and was even praised for it, when they weren't busy spitting obscenities in my face and mocking me for being a hard charger.

My dad had never forced me into this. I had been happy I was going to fulfill the dreams he and Pops had of one of the Phillips boys carrying on the tradition. I'd even had those dreams myself. Of Carrie and I having a son who'd be in the Marines. And maybe he'd be an officer, and it'd be a proud moment for both of us where we'd choke back manly tears.

Being a Marine had been what I'd wanted to do for as long as I can remember and now I was going to give it up for a girl. But it all felt right to me.

Captain Dailey sighed and thrust his short fingers through his non-existent hair. "At ease, Marine."

I let my body relax, shoulders dropped, grateful for the rest. I folded my arms behind my back.

"I don't understand you, Phillips. You've an exemplary record, a high tolerance for bullshit, and a sterling family history in the Corps. You’ll probably make gunnery sergeant in record time. What's out there in the civilian world that's worth throwing this away for?"

I hoped the question was rhetorical because I didn't have a good answer. If pressed, I was going to lie and say college but I was afraid my lack of enthusiasm for sitting in a lecture hall with a couple hundred snot-nosed teenagers who thought it would be funny to make pew pew pew sounds when I walked by would be all too evident.

Captain Dailey didn't need an answer. He paced in front of me for ten minutes, giving me a lecture on the glories of being a Marine.

"It is an honor to be a Marine. We have the smallest number of men compared to any other military branch but we are the first to be called out. We stand constantly ready and can be shipped out in twenty-four hour notice because the president knows that we are always ready. The Marines were called on first to lead the charge into battle. The Marines were the first to orbit the moon. John Glenn was a Marine. John Wayne wanted to be one. The Marines are first, ready, able. Our fighting force is so fierce that the Germans called us Teufels Hunden."

He was really worked up using the German word so I threw him a bone. "Devil Dogs, sir!"

"That's right. We're the Devil Dogs, the first to go..." His steam was running out. Last to know. I finished the saying in my head.

He walked around and dropped heavily into his chair. "We need men like you, Staff Sergeant Phillips. Not just because of your record or your family legacy. You care about what happens to the other men here. You wear your leadership lightly and those under you know it. Think about it. There's always going to be room in the boat for you."

"Yes sir." I saluted.

"Dismissed." He waved a weary hand at me.

I walked as fast as I could without making it seem like I was running. Captain Dailey's speech was one I'd heard before in a million variations but it still struck me hard. I did love the Marines. I loved, in a non-sappy, brotherly way, the guys I slept beside in the sand for days without a shower.

I'd still stay close to those men. I stayed in contact with Bo and Noah and they'd been out for two years. I'd keep coming back here to Camp Pendleton to check in with old buddies. I'd be a Marine for life, even after I got out. No one would think less of me. I just had to convince myself of that. It was all worth it. Letting this go so that I could be with Sam.

Later that night, I texted her as I did every night.

Almost bit my tongue to prevent from laughing when a poolie (new guy for you Army folks) got my rank wrong today. They're supposed to greet every individual higher in rank than them with a salute and acknowledgement of rank. A lot just use "good morning, sir" no matter what time of day it is but this one said "Good morning, Gunnery Sergeant.” It was dusk. I patted him on the shoulder but I could hear a Lance Corporal chewing him out. I haven't heard back from you about my flying up to see you. I’m still working on getting some days off.

I debated telling her I was coming regardless but figured that sounded too threatening. I’d been texting her so that I was constantly in her thoughts, not so that I could creep her out. Of course, it was possible that she deleted my texts before even reading them. Or that she’d blocked me and I didn't know it. Could she do that?

I grilled myself a hamburger and washed it down with a bottle of Miller, and then took another bottle into my small living room. I flicked on the television to ESPN, picked up the instructional book I'd bought a week ago and the mess of yarn and needles. I was trying to knit the blue section of the flag with the white stars—the part that had stumped Sam—only doing it so that the stars were knitted into the pattern instead of added later. Intarsia was what Sam had called it. Fucking impossible is what it was.

I'd started and ripped out the section what seemed like a thousand times. It'd taken me a week just to figure out the basic stitches and how to get the tension right. I'd had to remind myself that I could do amazing things with weapons and tanks and even excelled at fine motor skill dexterity tasks, but holding two needles in one hand while threading yarn in and out was about the most complicated fucking thing I'd ever had to do.

What I currently had going was a lumpy mess with loose stitches creating a misshapen thing that looked like a geometry test gone wrong. There were no right angles, only waves of misstitched edges. But at this point, I wasn't ever going to finish if I started over, so I just went forward. It'd be the ugliest part of the flag, but somehow I'd gotten it into my head that if I presented this to Sam, she'd fall on her knees in joy.

In fact, I'd dreamed of that moment more than once. In my dreams, the stupid thing was perfectly created, but that didn't matter as much as Sam hugging it to her chest and then stripping down to her birthday suit and begging me to take her hard. Or sometimes I imagined that our reunion would start with my face between her legs. Either way, it ended with me doing her for hours as she gasped out my name in time to my thrusts. Unfortunately, since it was only a goddamn dream, I woke up with messed-up sheets, a hard-on, and an aching heart.

Weirdly, knitting actually made me feel closer to Sam. I imagined she was knitting at the same time that I was. Although given our two-hour time difference she was probably sleeping. Still, I felt some kind of kinship. I can't say that I understood why she liked knitting, but I hoped the effort would make her understand how much I loved her.

A knock interrupted both the Padres game and my futile struggles with the yarn and wooden poles. I stuck those under the sofa cushion. I didn't need that kind of hazing out on a training mission.