Home for a Soldier (17 page)

“They write to me twice a year. I
return the letters unopened.”

“Why?” Grace held her breath and
prepared for the hurt, in case Rory stalked away in protest, angry at her
probing.

He stood by the refrigerator,
twirling the empty bottle between his fingers. “Ten years ago they blamed me for
something unforgivable. They write to me, and try to take back the words.”

“Why don’t you let them?”

He took a few steps across the room
and crouched beside her to dump the bottle in the trash under the sink. His
nearness rendered her breathless. Making it look accidental, Grace reached over
to tighten the dripping tap, so that their arms brushed. The contact stirred the
longing inside her, and she cursed herself for not being able to contain her
feelings.

“I don’t want them to take the words
back, because they are true,” Rory said. “What I did was unforgivable.”

What did you do?

The question soared in her mind, but
Grace suppressed the thought, knowing it would be too intrusive. “Why don’t they
just come and see you?” she asked instead. “They live in New York, after all.”

“They tried a long time ago. I told
them that if they ever approached me again, I’d leave, and never set foot on US
soil again.”

“Is that when you joined the
military?”

Rory stood straight. A haunted look
swept across his face but he banished it with a bitter half-smile. “Yeah,” he
muttered. “They got the message and have kept away.” He drifted to the door,
then stopped, and strode back to collect the letter before he disappeared into
the hall.

Grace finished tidying up. Her
movements were slow as she struggled with her rioting emotions.
Rory didn’t
trust her.
He had taken the letter, afraid that she would open it. His
actions confirmed that she had been right to keep her distance. Every day she
yearned to go to him, touch him, try to comfort him, but her promise not to
pursue him bound her.

Many times, she had thought of
breaking that promise and reaching out for him. Now she knew that she mustn’t.
If she wanted to cling to any hope of winning Rory’s love, first she needed to
gain his trust.

Whatever the cost, she couldn’t break
her promises to him.

Rory folded away the blanket he had
spread on the hallway floor to do his daily workout. The wounds in his body were
healing, but the scars in his mind festered raw. He had lived, while others
under his protection had died. The failure tormented him. Nightmares haunted his
dreams.

Every day, he yearned to pull Grace
into his arms, to kiss her and hold her close.

Every day, he rejected the thought.
His lack of worth ate at him. Grace must have sensed he didn’t deserve her,
because since his return she no longer looked at him with longing in her eyes.
Instead, she moved like a shadow through the apartment, keeping out of his way.

Rory glanced at his watch. Almost
eight. Grace had started staying late at work, and sometimes she went out with
colleagues. The apartment felt like a barren wasteland without her, but he did
nothing to ask her to remain at home. During the lonely evenings, he tortured
himself with images of her with other men. Laughing. Flirting. Kissing.

The lock on the front door clicked
and Rory masked his anguish by pinning a neutral expression on his face.

“Hi,” Grace said as she breezed in.
Her pale green summer dress fluttered with her quick steps. Rory recalled the
conversation about the color of her eyes when they chose their wedding rings.
Today her eyes reflected the green of the dress.

With a pang of regret, he realized
she never wore his earrings any more. At least she hadn’t removed her wedding
band. He checked, each day. It had become a superstitious routine. As long as
the golden circle that tied them together remained on her finger, his life had
an anchor that kept him from drifting into a destructive loneliness.

“Are you going to cook tonight?” he
asked.

“No. I stopped for a burger with a
couple of people from the office.” Her eyes flickered up to him. “If you are
hungry, I can fix you something.”

“No need.” He clutched the folded
blanket in his hands, trying to think of something to say. He knew Grace worried
about him. Even though she kept aloof, she made unobtrusive little gestures to
look after him. Every time she made a trip to the basement laundry to run the
washing machine, she told him the load wasn’t full, and asked if he had anything
to fill the empty space. When she cooked, there was always enough for two. Her
concerned eyes followed him around the apartment. Once, when he came out of his
room without a shirt to cover his chest, she had stared at his scars with a
pained expression on her face.

“I might go out for a walk,” he told
her.

“It’s a nice summer evening. Not too
steamy.” She crossed the hall to her room. Rory stared at the door that closed
behind her. He realized he’d hoped that she would offer to come out with him. He
wanted the pretence of indifference between them to end, but didn’t know how to
take the first step. His mind reeled back to the letter from his parents. He
wanted those hostilities to end too, but didn’t know how to go about starting
the peace negotiations.

For ten years, gut-wrenching guilt
combined with resentment and stubborn pride had kept him hurtling down a
solitary path. Rory knew he needed to accept his vulnerability, if he ever
wanted to move on. He needed to risk rejection and loss. Otherwise, life would
pass him by. And when he finally died, if would be as if he had never lived at
all since the day he killed Laura.

* * * *

Grace sprawled on the sofa, tears
streaming down her face. On the TV screen, a beautiful woman lovingly cleared
out a closet, folding away shirts and suits that would never be needed again.

The slam of the front door sent Grace
bolting up. She reached for a tissue and patted her face dry. Her red nose and
brimming eyes she could do nothing about.

“Are you all right?” Rory rushed up
to her and sank to his knees beside the sofa. “What is it?”

“It’s nothing.” She pointed at the TV
screen. “It’s the movie. Her husband has just died, and it made me think of—”
Grace forced herself to stop in time, before she told him how desperately she
had worried about him while she waited for him to come home. “I’m the perfect
tear-jerker demographic. I cry at anything sentimental.”

Rory reached up to smooth her brow.
“I didn’t see you as the mushy type.”

“Oh yes,” Grace muttered, savoring
the sensation of his warm touch on her skin. “I cry at anything. When I was
little, I cried at Snow White and the Seven Drafts, because I thought it was so
unfair that each of the dwarfs couldn’t have their own Snow White. And I cried
for Cinderella’s ugly sisters, because they must have been terribly unhappy to
become so cruel and twisted.”

Rory gave a low laugh and stood.
Grace curled up to make room on the sofa. “Do you want to sit down for a while?”

“It’s okay. Stay as you are.” He
settled at the far end and lifted her feet into his lap. “Don’t let me disturb
you. Keep watching.”

On the screen, the story unfolded,
but Grace barely noticed. All her senses were focused on Rory, who slowly peeled
off her cotton socks and started to rub her feet. His thumbs pressed into the
soles, forcing her to relax.

“That’s lovely,” she murmured. “How
did you learn to do that so well?”

“A soldier knows how to look after
his feet. All that marching.” After a pause he continued. “And my mother used to
be a ballet dancer when she was young. She gave it up long before I was born,
but dancers can have problems with their feet even after they retire.”

Grace didn’t know why, but the
comment felt like a door opening. It was as if Rory had taken the first step of
sharing whatever secrets he guarded so tightly inside him. She took a deep
breath to hold back the questions she wanted to ask. He would need to move at
his own pace, but for the first time since they met, Grace felt he was reaching
out to her.

“Are you going out tomorrow night?”
he asked.

“Yes.” For a brief instant, she
considered telling him no, and canceling the arrangement, but she decided it was
important to continue building her own life. “I’m going to see a movie with
someone from work.”

“Who?”

“One of the guys from Marketing.”
After it had become clear that Rory would keep his distance, Grace had tried to
keep busy. She worked late, and on some evenings, she organized dates. When one
of Debbie’s old boyfriends sought her out, desperate for a chance to win Debbie
back before her marriage to Doug, Grace agreed to hear him out. She had always
liked Orlando, who in addition to freelance modeling worked part time in real
estate and had a stabilizing impact on Debbie.

“Are you going to be late?” Rory
asked.

“I don’t know.” Grace wriggled her
toes. “Why do you want to know?”

Shutters came down behind Rory’s dark
eyes. “No reason. Just making conversation.”

“I’ll try not to slam the front door
if I get back late.”

“Don’t worry. I won’t be asleep.” He
lifted her feet from his lap, stood up, and walked out of the room.

Grace stared after him. She didn’t
want to go to a movie, but she needed to get on with her life. Otherwise, she
might break her promise and try to hold on to him when it came the time to file
for a divorce.

* * * *

Rory glanced at his watch. Almost
eight. Two days ago, he’d stared a campaign to knock down the walls he had built
around his heart, and instantly everything seemed to be thwarting his plans.

Last night, Grace had gone to a movie
with
someone from Marketing
. Tonight, she hadn’t come home after work. He
didn’t want to think where she might be, but his imagination came up with
possibilities that cast dark shadows in his mind.

He decided to go out and punish his
body with another long roam through the streets of Manhattan. If he exhausted
himself, he might manage an hour or two of fitful sleep before dawn.

As he pounded the streets, Rory
reviewed his life. Some of his choices made little sense now, with the clarity
of hindsight. Why had he carried a grudge against his parents all these years?
Why had punishing them appeared to ease his guilt, when causing them more pain
should have added to it?

A man had to be crazy to waste his
emotional energy on bitterness, when directing the same force to love would give
so much greater rewards.
Love.
He admitted it to himself now. He loved
Grace. With her quiet dignity, and her innocent devotion she had forced her way
into his heart.

When Rory returned around midnight,
glowing with the force of the love he had finally unleashed inside him, a light
shone under the door of the living room. Murmured voices drifted out to the
hall. He strode to his room, planning to wait until Grace was alone. Unable to
waste a moment longer, he changed his mind, whirled about and stormed across the
hall. He yanked the living room door open without stopping to knock.

Two heads bent together on the sofa.
A smile brightened Grace’s face, but her pleasure faded when she saw him. At her
small alarmed sound, the man beside her spun around and directed his attention
to Rory.

“Hi there,” the visitor said. “You
must be Rory.”

Fear gripped him. Was he too late?
Had he pushed Grace into the arms of someone else? Emotions roiled through him,
all mixed up and disjointed. “Who to fuck are you?” he growled. He edged closer
to the sofa, his hands clenched into fists.

“I’m Orlando.”

“What are you doing here, Orlando?”

The stranger lifted his brows,
looking baffled. His hair fell in an ebony sweep down to his shoulders, and the
green shirt picked out the unusual color of his eyes. Model looks, and a dress
sense to match.

“I’m talking to Grace,” the man said.

“You’re talking to my wife?” Rory
raised his voice. He couldn’t understand the belligerence that drove him, but
the pounding fury in his veins left no doubt that he ached for a fight.

Orlando shot a worried glance at
Grace. “Perhaps I should go.”

“There’s no reason why you should.”
Grace turned to Rory. “Orlando is my friend. We went out to dinner, and I
invited him up for a drink.”

“Grace, I think it’s best if we
continue this another time.” Orlando leapt to his feet. He collected the leather
jacket that lay folded over the armrest of the sofa and hurried out. On his way
past, he offered Rory a curt nod.

Rory waited, listened to the door
slam shut. “
Until death do us part
,” he said through clenched teeth when
he could be sure the man was gone. “I’m sorry I didn’t die.”

“That promise was made in error,”
Grace replied, her voice barely audible. “But there was another promise you
extracted from me, and I’m honoring it.”