Between Here and the Horizon (35 page)

“
Ophelia
.” Sully had stopped struggling and was looking at me. “Please. It’s okay. Just go and be with your mom, okay? I’ll come find you as soon as I can, I swear.”

And so that was it. They led Sully away, and he was gone.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Afghanistan

2009

Sully

“We can’t do this, Sully. There’s no way we can pull it off. We’re mad to have even considered it.”

I straightened Ronan’s tie and cuffed him on the shoulder, trying not to let my nerves show. What we were planning on doing was madness indeed, but there was nothing else for it. Ronan couldn’t take another day here in-country, let alone another month. Or three. Or five. Or twelve.
 

Whitlock hadn’t called me into his office to tell me my deployment was being extended. In a strange twist of fate, he had called me into his office to thank me for my fine service, and to tell me I was going home. Not only was my deployment over, but my contract with the army, too. I was out. I was done. I was finished. Unless I wanted to re-enlist, of course. I’d stared at Whitlock at first, too stunned to speak or even blink. But then the cogs had started turning.
 

“
No, sir. I think I’ve had my fill of Afghanistan. For this lifetime, anyway,
” I’d told him.
“It’s high time I went back to New York. I’ve made my girlfriend wait six years for me already. I should probably marry her before she grows bored and gets hitched to some barista or something.
”

Whitlock had laughed, but I could see it in his eyes—he thought I was less of a man for leaving. “
Well that’s settled then. Lucky for me I get to keep hold of at least one of the Fletcher boys for a little longer.”

As soon as I’d left Whitlock’s office, I’d gone to find Ronan, to explain my plan, and that had been it. Ronan had argued at first, told me I couldn’t make such a ridiculous sacrifice for him, that I was mad, but in the end he’d given up. He couldn’t stay. I could. That was all there was to it.

“If we get caught...” Ronan fidgeted, rubbing his hands over his face.
 

“We’re not going to get caught, asshole. We’ve been screwing with people our entire lives and no one’s ever been able to tell the difference between us. Why would they now? I know your men. We’ve gone through every single aspect of your past missions. I’m not going to trip up and make a mistake here. It’s going to be fine.”

“And what am I going to do when I get back to the States? I’m just gonna move in with your girlfriend and pretend to the world like I’m happy and in love? Magda’s going to
hate
me for this. Living with her, pretending to be you? That’s not just going to affect me. It’s going to affect her, too.”

He was right on that count. Magda and Ronan had never been all that close. Ronan had constantly told me she wasn’t right for me, while on the other hand Mags had always said Ronan was a liar and couldn’t be trusted. Now, we were
all
going to be liars. I’d explained to Magda what was going to happen as best I could without directly saying the words, and after a while she’d managed to decipher what I was talking about. She’d been mad. Boy, had she been mad. But she’d agreed to play along for my sake.
 

“Just make sure she’s not too worried,” I said, handing Ronan his military bag. The one with
CPTN. S. FLETCHER
stenciled onto its side. “And remind her she can’t talk about this to anyone. Not her parents. Not Rose. She can’t even write about it in that diary of hers, okay? Hey? Are you listening to me?” I took Ronan’s face in my hands, forcing him to meet my eye. “This is so fucking important, man. Tell me you can handle this.”

“Running home, hiding from my responsibilities? Oh sure. I can handle that just fine,” he said bitterly. “I can’t believe you’re doing this for me. I’m never going to be able to forgive myself for this.”

I shook my head, sighing. “There’s nothing to forgive. You’d do this for me if I needed it. I have your back. I always will. Now go, before you miss your damn flight out of this hellhole. And make sure you give my girl a kiss for me, brother.”
 

Behind me, a private I didn’t know hurried through the tent flap, saluting us both, eyes frantically flickering between the two of us before landing on me.
 

“Captain Fletcher, sir. You’re needed in Colonel Whitlock’s office immediately. He needs you out on night patrol with B company.” The private hadn’t batted an eyelid. He’d found the letter R on my breast pocket—
Cptn. R. Fletcher
—and he’d believed I was Ronan. I smiled at my brother, and then slapped him on the shoulder:
see?
 

“Goodbye, Sully,” I said, hugging him hard one last time. It was weird calling him by my name, but it was a good show in front of the private. “Catch you on the flipside, huh?”

Ronan nodded, giving me a tight smile. “Sure thing, brother.
Thank you
.”

******

Three months passed. Six, and then eight. Whitlock used me for night patrols nearly every single shift, which was fine by me. The city lit up with gunfire after the sun went down. We played cat and mouse through burned-out buildings, hunting down insurgents, disarming bombs, providing backup to Seal teams and support to the marines, and through it all I was confident in the knowledge that Ronan was safe back in the States.
 

I spoke to him every few days at first, and then once a week. As our communication trailed off, I told myself it was because he felt guilty. We didn’t talk about the missions I was going out on, or the danger I faced every day. But I knew it was hard for him—seeing the uniform made him visibly pale and uncomfortable. When Magda started answering her phone less, I figured…I don’t know
what
I figured. We went from talking every day, her missing me, her loving me, her crying every time I said goodbye, to her screening my calls and rarely picking up at all.
 

I knew what was coming deep down in my bones, but I wasn’t prepared for it. Exactly nine months after I’d assumed Ronan’s identity and sent him back to the States to pretend to be me until my return, I got the call that changed everything. Not a call from Magda or from Ronan, but a call from both of them. I knew the moment I saw them on the laptop screen, sitting at the table together, chairs pushed too close, hands hidden under the table, that they were about to tell me something I didn’t want to hear.
 

“We didn’t mean for it to happen,” Magda said, tears welling in her eyes. “But living together, spending so much time together, pretending all the time... It was inevitable, Sully. We couldn’t help it.”

Ronan looked like his shame was eating him alive. “I don’t know what to say,” he whispered. “You gave me everything, and I took even more. It’s unforgiveable.”

I stared at the screen, trying to figure out if it was all a huge joke. God, it had to be, right? How could it possibly be true? And then Magda drove the final nail into the coffin. “I’m pregnant, Sully. I’m so, so sorry. We’re having a baby.”

Baby
?

The word rattled around inside my brain, setting off explosions that clean took my breath away.
 

“I still love you,” she whispered. “I love
both
of you. How can I not?”

“So, what?” I choked on my laughter. “I get done out here in a couple of months, come back to New York and then we all live together? One big, happy family? Ronan gets you Monday through Wednesday, I get you Thursday through Saturday, and we take alternating Sundays?
Jesus fucking Christ, Magda.”

She cried, unbearable, gut-wrenching sobs, hands covering her face, and it was Ronan to put his arm around her and comfort her, not me.
 

“How long?” I demanded. “How far along are you?”

They were both silent for a moment, and then Ronan gave me an answer that made me want to throw up: “Sixteen weeks.”

“Four months?
Four fucking months?”

“I know, brother. I’m so, so sorry. I know there’s nothing I can say to make this right, but—”

“Don’t call me that. Don’t call me brother. We’re done here, Ronan. You’re right. This
is
unforgiveable.” I slammed the laptop shut, cutting off the connection. It wasn’t enough, though. I picked it up and threw it, sending it hurtling across the tent.
 

It was over. It was all over. The world as I knew it was gone. Magda was having Ronan’s baby, and I was still stuck in Afghanistan, pretending to be him. I rushed out of the tent and ran across the base, my head thumping, my heart galloping in my chest. It didn’t take me long to find the colonel. He was bending over some intel reports in the comms room, squinting through the wire framed glasses he’d taken to wearing. When he saw me, he drew himself up to his full height and cleared his throat.
 

“What can I do for you, Captain? Where’s the fire?”

“I want to extend again, Colonel.”

His frosty expression thawed a little. “That’s not possible, Fletcher. Much as I’d like to keep you on out here, you’ve been in-country too long. The higher-ups will demand you go back to active duty in the States for at least six months before we can have you—”

“With all due respect, Colonel Whitlock, do you think I am unfit for duty?”

“No. I don’t think so.”

“Do you think I’m mentally competent?”

“Normally, I’d say so, but right now you’re looking a little crazed, Ronan. Might I ask what’s brought this on?”

“Just the need to serve my country, sir. The need to protect those I love and keep them safe.” This was the perfect spiel to reel out to Whitlock. Blind patriotism got him in the feels every single time. He scratched his nose, looking at me, and then gave a perfunctory nod.
 

“All right, then. I’ll have the paperwork drawn up for you to sign in the morning. I’ll write a personal letter of recommendation requesting that your application for another extension is granted, but I can’t guarantee it’ll be accepted.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“No, thank
you
, Fletcher. Good men are hard to come by out here.” He paused for a second, glancing back down at his intel papers. “You know, out of the two of you, I was always sure your brother would be the one to build an exemplary military career for himself, Ronan. Don’t get me wrong. You were always an excellent soldier. You’d never have made it to captain otherwise. But when Sully left, you really began to shine. I suppose sometimes a man needs to step out of his brother’s shadow in order to show his true colors, hmm?”

Five months later, I was on my back in a desert just outside of Kabul. My body was burned, my lungs raw from smoke inhalation, and Colonel Whitlock was calling me a crazy bastard, ordering men to get me onto a chopper before I bled out and died.
 

On the other side of the world, Magda was giving birth to my nephew. His name was Connor. On his birth certificate, under the section titled “father,” a nurse in bright pink scrubs, exhausted from a fourteen hour shift, wrote the name
Sully James Fletcher
in
neat blue ink.
 

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

Trigger

The funeral was gray and grim. The sun never seemed to stop shining in California, but somehow the world was a dark, black place, and the cheerful weather couldn’t do anything to change that.
 

Mom hadn’t stopped crying. I hadn’t stopped either. It was all too much. Dad was gone. Sully had been dragged off by the military police, and no matter how many times I’d called to find out what was happening with him, no one would tell me anything. Eventually I found out that he was being held at Camp Haan Army base in Riverside, and that he was awaiting a hearing. I still couldn’t believe any of it.
 

Impersonating a commissioned officer. That’s what the soldier had said when they arrested Sully at the airport. There was no way he had impersonated a commissioned officer. No fucking way.
 

We held Dad’s wake at the restaurant. Half of the neighborhood turned up to bid my father farewell. We drank, we ate, and we told stories. The afternoon was bittersweet—a true homage to a wonderful, kind and generous man who had touched so many people’s lives. My aunt, Simone, organized absolutely everything. She was a godsend. She greeted everyone at the church. She coordinated everyone, making sure they knew where and when to show up for the wake. She arranged the flowers. She made sure everyone was comfortable and had enough to eat and drink. She corralled people away from Mom and me whenever it looked like we were on the brink of total breakdown (which was often).
 
Without her we would have been lost.
 

As the day was winding down, I busied myself collecting plates and glasses from the restaurant, trying to keep my head—it was lovely that so many people had come to show us their love and support, but I really couldn’t take another person telling me how sorry they were for my loss. I was carrying a stack of plates through the back into the kitchen when I saw a tall, bird-like figure dressed in black, stood apart to one side.
 

Robert Linneman.
 

He gave me a small, sad wave when he saw me. What on earth was he doing here? I put down the load I was carrying and made my way over to him. “Mr. Linneman? You came here for my father’s funeral?” Even as I was saying it, I knew it made no sense.
 

Linneman shook his head slowly. “No, Miss Lang, though I was terribly sorry to hear of your loss. I also have to apologize for showing up here like this, but I came on Mr. Fletcher’s request.”

“Sully? You’ve seen him?”

“Yes. I’ve represented both Sully and Ronan for a very long time now. I represented their father before them, too. Anyway, I was called and informed of Sully’s situation. I’ve been out here trying to resolve the matter for a couple of days now. Sully asked me to bring this letter to you. Against my advice, I might add.” He held out a small envelope, which looked like it had once been sealed and then ripped open again.