Chapter 6 - Scars Beneath the Surface
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The harsh hum of the neon beer signs overhead was the only sound accompanying Bull's ragged breathing.
The young Marines in the corner booth watched their fearsome leader crumbling before their eyes.
They had never seen him vulnerable; they had only known him as an unbreakable force of nature.
"Look at me, Crawford," I ordered, my voice firm yet wrapped in unexpected compassion.
Bull slowly lifted his head, wiping his wet face with his rough forearm.
"You are not a coward for surviving," I told him, leaning across the small table so only he could hear.
"You are a coward only if you abandon those eight young men sitting over there because your own heart is broken."
I unbuttoned the left cuff of my leather jacket and pulled the sleeve up to the elbow.
A jagged, pale surgical scar ran from my wrist all the way up into my bicep, surrounded by smaller puncture marks.
"Kunar Province, 2018," I said, pointing to the mangled flesh.
"We walked into an ambush behind an insurgent compound."
"I lost two of my best operators before we could establish a defensive perimeter."
"One of them was a twenty-one-year-old corpsman who gave his life treating my shredded arm while under direct mortar fire."
Bull stared at the scar, his breath hitching in his chest.
"For two years after that night, I didn't want to wake up in the morning," I admitted candidly.
"I drank myself to sleep every night in cheap motels just like this one."
"I thought that punishing myself was the only way to honor their memory."
Pete walked over, carrying a pitcher of ice water, and set it on the table between us with a quiet nod.
"Self-destruction isn't penance, Crawford," Pete said, placing a heavy hand on Bull's broad shoulder.
"It's just vanity dressed up as grief."
"Those boys who died didn't give their tomorrows so you could piss yours away in a gutter."
Bull took a deep, trembling breath, the heavy truth of the words slowly puncturing his fog of misery.
"How do you carry it, Commander?" Bull asked, his voice raw.
"How do you wake up every morning knowing they aren't coming back?"
"You carry it together," I replied, nodding toward the young Marines in the back.
"You teach them everything you know so they make it home to their own families."
"You honor Jackson by being the leader he deserved, not the broken bully who stumbled into this bar tonight."
Bull stared at me, his eyes clearing for the first time since he had kicked my stool out from under me.
Before he could speak, the bar's television screen blared with the sharp, shrill screech of an Emergency Broadcast alert.
The red ticker tape across the screen flashed with alarming urgency.
Pete quickly grabbed the remote and turned up the volume, drowning out the gentle murmur of the dive bar.
"We interrupt this program for a critical emergency announcement," the news anchor declared with frantic tension.
"A catastrophic flash flood has washed out the bridge on Old Mill Creek along Route 17."
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"Multiple civilian vehicles and a local transport bus have been swept into the swollen ravine."
"With emergency services delayed by fallen timber and blocked roadways, local authorities fear multiple casualties are imminent."
