Bryson sat alone. Everything was moving so fast now, but
for the most part the pace had helped him keep his mind off things like the
events of a month ago. The physicals, the tests, the papers he had to sign, the
people he had to meet, and the overall hustle and bustle of the office kept him
preoccupied. Now came the “hurry-up-and-wait” he had been told to expect, and
everything came flooding back to him like a bad dream. A single tear traced its
way down the crease of his nose and landed on his shoe. He reached down and
wiped it off before erasing the trail it left on his face. This was the home of
bravery and masculinity, not of tears and bad memories; still the thoughts
remained.
“Forrestor, Bryson!” he heard as he sat with his head
buried in his hands. Slowly he pulled himself off the chair and made his way
toward the uniformed titan standing in the office doorway.
***
Everything had been beautiful outside when Bryson left his
house on that humid Florida morning, or at least he thought it was. Now that he
was returning in shame everything was losing its color. What once was a bright
deep blue sky now took on a gunmetal gray sheen, and the green grass he passed
was masked by what appeared to him as ominous shadows; an omen that should have
foretold the coming disaster that was spread out before him as he left home. As
he reached the sidewalk he couldn't bear to even look at the cars that passed
by for fear of more heartache; that doom would reach through the window of a
passing car and rip his stomach out the way his heart had already been stripped
from his chest. Such a thought didn't ease him any, and as he made his way to
the nearest tree he felt all the life drain out of him, just as his breakfast
spewed forth from his stomach and drained down the trunk of the tree.
How could this happen? Just a week after graduation, everything seemed to be in
perfect order. He was enrolled in college, the same college that his best
friend, Ian, and his girl, Julie, were enrolled in. It seemed like it would be
the perfect set up. He was almost certain that when they got to school he'd be
rooming with Ian, and Julie would be a stone's throw away. Maybe later on they
could rent a house or a large apartment together; most likely after Ian found
the love of his life like Bryson had. They could do everything together, and
why wouldn't they: Bryson and Ian had been friends since they were six years
old, and he had been dating Julie for the last four years. They were
practically family.
Of course, “were” was the key word now. That one word incensed Bryson as he
started back out on a brisk walk toward home. The walking pace didn't last,
though; as he thought more about the word “were” he quickly moved on from a
brisk walk to a run. “Were” ruined friendships. “Were” tore apart lovers.
“Were” broke apart families. “Were” brought nations to their knees. “Were”
caused the world to stop spinning. “Were” was a destroyer of the future. If the
world ended today, aliens would pass by the wreckage and say, “There WERE
humans there.” When you die your conversations with other dead people would
most likely begin, “If I WERE alive...” “Were” was the most useless, no,
heartbreaking word in the English language. Then again, “Was” wasn't very far
off, in Bryson's mind. “I WAS going to college,” he thought.
How could he have been so stupid, though? He always felt that Ian was making
eyes at her, or whatever it was called these days (a steady diet of old
television programming, like The
Many Loves of Dobie Gillis, sometimes clouded his judgment on exactly what
lingo was considered modern). Bryson lived in such an old school world in his
mind that he never thought once of it; let alone twice. Seriously, though, how
could he have forgotten the way Julie looked at Ian? Bryson knew he, himself,
was lazy, but he could have taken Ian's place as captain of the soccer team
easily if he had the ambition. He could have even run the Math League had he
not been busy with World of
Warcraft. Captaining the football team might have been a tad bit harder,
but Bryson was confident he could pull it off. Okay, maybe he was kidding
himself a little bit. Wait, a little bit? Try a whole lot! There was no way he
was as good a person as Ian, and that made things hurt that much more. He knew
he would never be on his level. For Christ's sake, he would be lucky if he
finished his undergrad, let alone go on to further education like Ian was
destined to do.
In all honesty, he could take betrayal from Julie more than he could from Ian.
There was more than one occasion where she had left him in the past and he had
always taken her back. Even Ian had wondered why Bryson had always taken Julie
back. Bryson never had a question in his mind about it though. Each time Julie
left him, he took her back with open arms, no matter what had happened. Why
wouldn't he? She was the class president and captain of the volleyball team. On
top of that she never neglected her participation on the yearbook staff or as
the editor of the Astronaut
Herald.
All in all he wondered where he fit into their schemes and things. He tried
playing sports his freshman year of high school but gave that up when the coach
pissed him off. There was that time he tried out the school choir but got
himself kicked out when he had the whole boy's section cracking up in class as
he made fun of the choir director. Now that he thought about it, he was more
known for spreading joy through the lower levels of the student body with his
shenanigans than he was ever known for his school spirit or academic valor,
while those closest to him embodied those latter qualities.
***
Bryson walked into the office and sat down in a chair
opposite the burly uniformed individual that had called him in. Looking him
over Bryson saw that his name tag read “Sgt. Thompson”. As Bryson sat there
Sgt. Thompson kept jotting notes in his notebook, a serious look on his face.
What he was writing Bryson was not sure. He hadn’t had a chance to look at his
own face so he wasn’t sure if his eyes were red as if he had just been crying
or not, but he hoped that he wasn’t giving off a wussy kind of vibe. After all,
he needed this.
“When were you thinking you wanted to leave for Paris Island?” Sgt. Thompson
asked, not looking up from the paperwork before him.
“As soon as possible,” Bryson answered without hesitation.
“Well, you have a few choices: each Friday for the next three weeks we’ve got
groups shipping out; otherwise, there is one that will be leaving here at
seventeen hundred hours today.”
“I'd like to leave today, if at all possible.”
For the first time since Bryson entered the room Sgt. Thompson looked up from
the paperwork with a surprising smile gracing his lips. “Oorah! That's what I
like to see, a gung ho future Marine. Well, I'm sure you'll want to call your
family to let them know you'll be leaving.” Thompson walked him out of the
office, and pointed to a corner of the waiting room where a pay phone stood.
“You can use that phone over there, call’s free courtesy of the USMC. You can
tell your parents that you'll call them again when you get to Paris Island to
let them know you arrived safely. When you're done just come have a seat back
over here, we have more paperwork you'll need to fill out before shipping out
today.” As Bryson walked toward the phone Sgt. Thompson called Garrett, David
into the room after him.
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