stopped talking as the tears increased. She turned and retrieved a tissue from her purse. She dabbed at her cheeks and looked again at Shawn.
“I’m sorry, Susie,” Shawn said softly. “I wish it was different, but I didn’t have much of a choice.”
There was a long pause, then, “I know.”
Susie looked at him again. The tears were gone and her eye contact with it.
She pulled farther back and said, “I wish you the best. I don’t know when I will see you again. I will try to wait for you.” She raised her head and stared into his eyes. “If you want me to.”
“I can’t ask you to wait. I want you to, but I don’t really know what my future will be. I don’t know when I can come back. I don’t know anything, except I will miss you.”
Susie softly blew her nose and took a deep breath. She forced a small smile and said, “I will miss you too. I hope things go well, and I will expect an email from you as soon as you get settled in San Diego”
Shawn recalled that they had quickly said goodbye and gone their separate ways, promising to email each other. He had watched her walk away and wondered if he would ever be with her again. He recalled how their emails were irregular in the beginning and slowly dwindled to nothing.
Finally, Susie had said in an email, “You don’t seem interested anymore. I’m done trying. Maybe we can meet up when you get back here.”
Despite Shawn’s feeble protests, or perhaps because of them, Susie held firm, and their emails had stopped.
Shawn’s mind returned to the cell. Wow, look where I am now. What would Susie think of me? A criminal again, he thought.
He visualized her walking away and thought that she was better off without him. He put the emails aside, stood, and walked to the small window with a heavy metal grid over it. He stared out at the compound grounds, focusing on nothing. He ran his hand over his hair and pursed his lips.
He thought, How the hell did I get here? This sucks! I have to get out of here—but how?
He drew a deep breath again and returned to his bed. Shawn gritted his teeth and reminded himself that he was a SEAL and that he had faced tougher situations, even life-threatening ones. This was not one of those times, but he needed to do whatever he could to change his circumstances. In that moment, he had decided to be as cooperative as possible and hope for the best. He returned to the emails from his mother.
It was the fourth email that caught him up short. It started out simply enough, recounting the daily activities on the ranch and stating that the chores had become too difficult for Hank to keep up with. Hank was only fifty-three years old, but the alcohol use had left him weak and at times confused. Linda said that his uncle Jeff and his sons were doing most of the bucking of hay bales and the feeding of the cattle. This was all work that Shawn would be doing if he had been home. Instead, he was sitting in a Navy brig, awaiting sentencing.
Shawn rubbed his short-cut hair vigorously and thought, I have to watch myself. I could get really down. I need to stay up. Visions swirled, and his mind tossed with thoughts of self-recrimination.
Shawn continued to read. There was a break in the writing. Then the writing began again.
It’s been a few days since I started this email, and it’s been crazy. Shawn, I don’t really know how to tell you this, so I’ll just go ahead and say it. Hank was in an accident last night. I tried to stop him from leaving, but you know how he is. He was drunk, of course. I hesitated to call the police because he had done it before and came back home okay. He didn’t come home this time. I called my brother, and he called the police. They found him down by the river. He had gone off the road. It was awful! He is in the hospital now with severe injuries. He is unconscious. I feel so alone. I have my brother, but he hates Hank now. He thinks I should have gotten out a long time ago. Oh well, I guess you don’t really care.
I know you hated Hank in the end. He was awful to you, and I know you have a hard time understanding. Oh, son, it has been so hard, but I don’t know how to live without your stepfather. He wasn’t the same after Ellie died. He was a pretty nice guy before that. He blamed you, and he shouldn’t have. It was after he started drinking that things got really bad, but you know that.
I have to get back to the hospital. So I will stop now. I will send this letter so you know what’s going on.
Love,
Mom
Shawn stared at the email and reread parts of it. He paused to think about his sister and the changes her death wrought. His face became blank, and his lips began to quiver. His gray-blue eyes became vague and misty as the tears hung on his eyelids. He had no awareness of his tears at first, but finally he swept his arm across his face.
If only I had seen the deer! His mind traced the details of the accident, and he let out a moan as he remembered the anguish of calling Ellie’s name and receiving no reply. He shook his head and set the email aside. He reminded himself to stay present. Then he remembered that his present was not so good either.
Shawn held the fifth email, dated June 15, 2015, in his hand, feeling afraid to look at it. He wondered what he would find. Part of him didn’t care if Hank died. But he worried about his mother. How would she react? Her life had been painful and even dangerous over the past two years, but she had been so focused on her husband that she really had no life of her own.
He started to read.
Dear Shawn,
Hank died last week. I have been too busy and too tired to write before now. It was expected, but it has been really hard just the same. It has been so awful the past couple of years that I feel some relief. I think we all knew it would end this way, but I kept trying. I guess he is at peace now. He didn’t believe in God pretty much since Ellie died. At first, he just questioned God, but as he got deeper into the bottle, he dismissed the idea of the existence of an all-knowing, all-powerful, all-loving being. He called it “hogwash.” He used to say I was stupid for believing it and weak for going to church. I don’t know, but I feel a need to believe. I even think Hank will end up in heaven.
Anyway, everybody has been kind. I have received a lot of notes from people I haven’t seen for months, even years. Susie wrote me a letter. She said to say hi, but she didn’t ask too many questions about you. Uncle Jeff, Aunt Sally, and your cousins have been really helpful. I don’t know how I could carry on without them. Since our ranches are close, it hasn’t been too hard for them to work the herd and keep up the fences. Our ranch is bigger than theirs, and we are up against the BLM land for about a mile of our property. We have lost some of our cattle up in Diggers Creek. I guess two of them slipped off the ridge up there. It’s just a loss we can’t afford. I wish you could help out, but it’s too much for just one person anyway. I’m grateful for my brother’s family.
Your uncle Jeff says I will have to make a bid to the BLM to keep our cattle up in the hills behind the ranch. He says he will help me fill out the forms. We really don’t have too much competition, he says. I’m a little worried about the cost, but I think it’s the best plan.
I sometimes wonder if I should just go ahead and sell the ranch. It’s really too much. But I’m getting ahead of myself. I hope you are doing okay. It’s very hard to not know what’s going on with your life.
Love,
Mom
