Total pages in book: 86
Estimated words: 80834 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 404(@200wpm)___ 323(@250wpm)___ 269(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 80834 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 404(@200wpm)___ 323(@250wpm)___ 269(@300wpm)
Eventually, I roll out of bed, pull on one of Jack’s big t-shirts, and shuffle into the kitchen. The light in here is gorgeous, all gold stripes and sharp angles, catching on the streaks of flour still dusting the counter. Jack’s at the table, reading news on his iPad, steaming mugs already set out.
“Hey, gorgeous,” he says without looking up. “Sleep well?”
“Like the dead,” I yawn, and steal his mug. Black coffee, bitter as sin, just the way I like it. “You always up this early?”
He grins, setting the iPad aside. “Twenty years of reveille at oh-six-hundred. The Air Force kills your ability to sleep in.”
We nibble on toast and fruit, sitting across from each other, bare legs tangled under the table. There’s an easy quiet to it—no rush, no need to fill the silence with noise or jokes. Just the warm hum of two people who know what it’s like to be alone and are suddenly, miraculously, not.
Out of nowhere, he says, “I used to hate Sundays.”
I tilt my head, surprised. “Why?”
He shrugs, picking at the edge of his toast. “When you’re in the service, Sundays mean the week’s about to start again. The mission. The grind. You spend the whole day bracing for the next hit.”
“I take it you don’t miss it?”
He thinks for a minute, eyes fixed on something in the middle distance. “I miss parts of it. The people. The purpose. But mostly, I miss what I thought my life would be like when I got out.”
The words hang there, weighty and true, and I want to ask more, but I get the sense he’s not done.
“I ever tell you I was married once?” he says, still not meeting my eyes. I pause, surprised, my heart beating rapidly.
“No,” I say softly, trying to look normal. “When was this?”
“Oh, ages ago. Twenty years at least. It didn’t last, obviously. She was great, but the Air Force wasn’t her thing. I was always gone. Training, deployments, bullshit meetings in the ass-end of nowhere. She wanted roots, and I was still flying loops.”
I reach across the table, cover his hand with mine. “What was her name?”
A flicker of a smile. “Claire. We met in Texas. She left after two years—ran off with a dentist, of all people. Guess he had better teeth.”
I squeeze his hand. “I’m sorry.”
Jack laughs, but it’s not bitter. “Don’t be. It’s ancient history. But sometimes I wonder, you know? If I’d made different choices, maybe I’d have a couple kids, a wife, a mortgage, all that normal shit.”
He looks at me then, really looks, and I see something raw in his eyes.
“I always thought I’d have time later. For a family, for…” He trails off, then shrugs. “Then I blink, and I’m forty-five. No family, no nothing. Just a pile of medals and a dog I don’t even have yet.”
There’s a vulnerability to him I’ve never seen, and it makes my chest ache.
“I want kids someday too,” I say quietly, surprising even myself. “Or at least, I think I do. But the more I work at Gibson Grant, the less I can picture any kind of future. I just… float.”
Jack nods, understanding. “You could do anything, Eliza. Law, art, whatever you set your mind to.”
I laugh, but there’s a catch in it. “I don’t know what I want. I just know I don’t want to be like my parents, stuck in a rut for the rest of my life. They’ve been leading the same life for more than twenty years. They’re the same that they always have been, and I don’t want to be that. The world is changing fast, and I don’t want to be left behind.”
“You won’t,” Jack says, certainty in his voice. “You’re too smart for that.”
We sit in silence for a while, fingers still entwined. The sun climbs higher, splashing light across the table, making everything look impossibly hopeful. And for a second, I can see it: Jack and me, making pancakes on a Sunday, a kid or two underfoot, maybe even a dog snoring on the rug.
It makes my heart bloom, but also terrifies me a bit. Do I really see a future with this man? As the father of my children, and maybe even my husband? But he doesn’t know about what I do yet, when the doors are locked and the camera on. I haven’t let him in on my deep, dark secret life.
Jack must see the indecision on my face, because he smiles, squeezing my hand. “Don’t worry, sweetheart. We’ve got time.”
Before I can answer, his phone buzzes on the table. He glances at the screen, frowns, and stands to answer.
“I should take this,” he says, and disappears down the hall.
I watch the light move across the table, the steam rising from my coffee, and try to make sense of the sudden, sharp ache in my chest.