for what?

there will be an endless amount of trials to face,   and some will be easier than others. ella is not naive enough to fool herself into believing that everything will magically become perfect just because her life is finally beginning to take a real shape. she sees her future with nate, and while it is much brighter than she could have ever expected it to be, there are going to be darker clouds ahead as well. they have both been through so much, but now they don’t have to do it alone.

there will be darker days, but they are easier to get through when there is a hand to hold, and ella made the promise to hold onto his forever. she will never let him fight these things alone.

❝  if i didn’t know any better, i would say you are starting to take pages out of my book.  ❞  she teases, though she’s comforted by his optimism. ella shares the sentiment, too, and it warms her to know that he can feel it as well. with a short nod, she lifts her head to meet his gaze.  ❝  yeah, at least try to. i don’t feel as restless as i did,  ❞  her hand reaches to gently brush his cheek,  ❝  how about you?  ❞

        nate didn’t know that his life would lead him here. how could he? how could he ever have predicted the path that he ended up on? and sometimes he’s hated his choices, sometimes he thinks he’d have been a lot happier if he’d chosen a different road, but he didn’t, and there are no do-overs in life. it is what it is, and you’re stuck with it, no matter what. but he wouldn’t have wanted to be anyone else, not really. maybe he wished it, in the darker days, but he doesn’t anymore; those choices have brought him here. and here is where he wants to be. in the bad moments as well as the good, because they have made nate who he is. 

no amount of books she has read  could have prepared her on what a life like this could be like. it doesn’t matter how many fairytales a person reads, they are nothing but fiction. ella had spent her entire life filling up her mind with the stereotypes of what love would be that she hardly knew she was falling in love in her own way. love isn’t always magical and perfect. it certainly has its moments, but no two days are ever the same. now that she has a feeling of what it really means to truly love someone, she never wants to let it go.

they will grow, still, and ella feels incredibly lucky to be at nate’s side through it. lucky to come home to him, talk to him, trust him, and love him.

❝  look where we are now.  ❞  ella repeats with a small smile, relaxing against his shoulder. it’s nice, to hear the sentiment come from him. words that ella was never used to hearing before all of this.  ❝  thank you. we are. it might be hard to remember that sometimes, but we are much better;  i love you, good days and bad.  ❞  of all things, ella hopes he will always remember that.

        life is a goddamn unpredictable mess. that’s the only way to describe it; nobody can know what’s coming around the corner, not even a reconnaissance marine, though god knows nate tries. things can change suddenly, or take you down routes you never expected to be on...and that’s okay. as long as you adapt, as long as you still manage to keep going, that’s okay. and if you have to sit down a while, if you have to pause your journey and recover...nate’s trying to be okay with that, too. even if it doesn’t feel like progress. and it’s easier with someone at your side. it’s not something nate knew he was missing, not really---but now he doesn’t know how he does anything without ella. she was something he couldn’t predict, either, and she’s just about the best thing to ever happen to him.

it’s a bit odd to think about it sometimes.  to think about the past and be able to see how far they have come. it’s certainly not the path that ella had ever imagined herself taking all those years ago, but it’s the one that she is so thankful that she ventured down. to not only have her wildest dream of starting her own charity beginning to come true, but to be at nate’s side through all of his accomplishments and progress, is so much more than she could have ever asked for. some days, she doesn’t know how she got to be so lucky.

it’s what makes nights like these just a little easier to get through. for her to be able to know that it’s just a bad night. to know that come morning, they both will have gotten through their setbacks. it just takes a little bit of time, and a little bit of comfort.  ❝  i suppose that probably wasn’t the best way to phrase it,  ❞  she grins, gaze falling to the inside of her mug as she brushes her finger around the rim.  ❝  but…  we are. really, i didn’t think about it much until now. i’m proud of you, of everything that you’ve done, all of the progress you have made since i have known you. i’m proud of us.  ❞

        he is glad to be here. even on a night like this, he’s still glad; it can be hard to remember the progress that’s been made, sometimes, hard to see how far he’s come, but the fact is that his bad days ( or nights ) are less frequent, now, and less bad. there are still the ones that hit him with the full force of a grenade launcher, but there was a time when that was almost every day. the progress might be nate’s own, but ella has helped tremendously, and he is so grateful for her. where would he be without her? it wouldn’t have taken much to change the course of his entire life, and he’s glad to know her. glad to love her. glad to see her progress, too.

        each day is a new one. it’s another tiny step forward. and maybe he’ll always be looking in the rear view mirror, but at least he’s not headed backwards.

he can only agree with that before hands raise up into the air in a display of victory and relief that finally somebody had seen sense on the great potato debate. “ fucking finally, someone sane ! thank you ! ”  he laughs, then continues with a small tilt of his head.  “ a little. mind you i don’t think we’ve seen enough to remember the answers. i’d go out of my mind if i had. but quiz shows and shit are the only thing we can agree on watching. i’m more of a reader if anything. so are you in the marines ? ” 

THE MOON FALLING on the horizon is distant and cold. It’s a strange sensation after so long sweating in the desert. And it’s the moon, not the desert emitting the chill. He still feels sweat dripping down his spine, but the white of moon feels too much like frost for him to know it.       In the next moment an explosion in the city sends up a puff of black smoke, blanketing the moon, it’s cold, cold beauty. Brad blinks, looking away, down into the dirt, at Nate’s boots, up at Nate. He sees the white light of the moon reflected there in the deep green of Nate’s eyes. They’re bleached like sea glass on the beach with the sunlight glinting off, but he memorized their shade weeks ago. He’d recognize it anywhere, reflecting any form of light.       Tonight they too are cold. Nate’s beautiful eyes are as dark as the night that hung the moon and as distant as the moon itself. Brad aches to reach out, to touch and to feel. He wants as surely as Nate does, an undercurrent flowing through him as sure and steady as the heat of the desert. It is just as suffocating, to watch him work every day, to grant him the same careful deference as any other officer–      No. Not the same. He bows to lesser men because decorum and protocol dictate. But he has never bowed to Nate as a lesser man. To Nate he gives way because his honor demands. And because Nate has earned it.       Nate’s arm drops into the space between them, and Brad telegraphs the move a mile away. He drops his too, the lines of the two limbs pressing against one another through MOPP suits and gear. It’s a far cry from the way he’s dreamed of tracing the line of Nate’s arm, but it’s enough. For now.       Brad knows what he feels like, the heft and strength of his muscles and the give of his flesh. He turns his head when his lieutenant does, answering the small smile with one of his own.             ‘ It would make you an officer and someone entirely capable of commanding me to go to sleep. But fine, have it your way, sir. We won’t tell each other to sleep, and we’ll just sit here, staring off into the distance. Like any LT and his TL might… ‘ He tips his head back a moment, breathing in gunsmoke and ash and fine sand. He reads the meaning in what Nate doesn’t say, and the smile widens.             ‘ Command me to stay, then. ‘ 

        this could be a beautiful country. perhaps if nate came back as a tourist, he’d be able to appreciate it. but for now, he looks out at the horizon and he sees the next mission, the next job. he sees the enemy hiding, the conflict, the confusion. and the weight of it all hangs over his head: will his orders get his men hurt? will they get someone killed? nate’s conviction has lessened with every officer meeting, and if someone dies because of orders he didn’t believe in, but had to execute regardless...he doesn’t know how he’d live with that. he doesn’t know how he’d be able to get back up, and drag that burden around with him. no, there’s no beauty here. just potential for disaster.

        he is one man. and maybe he has the support of his gunny, his team leaders, brad---but if he’s not careful, he’ll lose his command. and then who’ll look out for his men? who will he be able to sit beside, like this, and find some element of soothing for his soul? it may not be enough for forever, but it’s enough for now. nate’s never appreciated brad’s stolidness more.

        nate swallows as brad’s arm presses against his, though this is what he wanted, eyes searching the shadows of brad’s face. he looks tired, too, and more gaunt than when they left camp, but though this touch is not skin on skin, it burns red-hot all the same. who needs words, then? who needs words, when so much more is said in silence. when restraint is as visible in brad’s cool eyes as it must be in his own, and a promise that some day, far away from here, they’ll not have to hold back anymore. is that enough?

        yes. yes, for now. until. 

they’ll get through everything together.  from here on out, no matter what challenge they may face, whether it be in their own home or out there beyond their front door, they face it together. even before they were married, ella was sure she would do just about anything she could to make sure that he was happy. if she could just see that smile, everything would be alright. some nights, it takes more than that. there are nights like these, still, where the darkness still threatens at their door.  (  here, they find a way to bring in the light.  )

 ❝  it’s just a bad night, yeah? it will pass.  ❞  ella sighs quietly, relaxing further into his side when she feels his head rest against hers. she already feels warmer, more content, just being able to sit here and talk to him.  ❝  it certainly brings back some memories, doesn’t it?  ❞  a grin finds her lips, her gaze soon moving to him.  ❝  sometimes i think about that, too. it seems like so long ago when i opened the door for you. i think that was the first real night we had together, you know?  ❞

        progress is not a straight line. things would be so much easier if it worked that way, but it doesn’t; for all the getting better, there’s going to be a bad day, or a trigger that sends you spiralling, or a nightmare that lingers longer than it should. it’s not always going to be easy, and sometimes all the hard work seems to just be drifting away, faster than you can catch it. nate rides the waves of progress, and half the time it feels like he’s barely hanging on, barely coping---and then he realises that he is. that things are getting better, and he can see it, just as he can see how much better ella’s gotten, when he thinks back to when he first knew her.

        it’s not a straight line. but time --- and hard work, and the right company --- nudges it in the right direction, anyway.

“ yeah – we don’t really do too much with our evenings, can you tell ? ” he jokes, warmly. a joke based in truth ? perhaps.  “ luckily i don’t think she’ll hold me to it. anyway it’s that or re-runs of who wants to be a millionaire – which would you go with ? ”

“ mashed potato is vile. it’s the worst conceivable thing you could do to a potato. chips are the far superior potato and PLEASE say you agree or i’ll owe pam a tenner. ”    @assuredofthis

THOSE TIRED LINES on Nate’s young face are like looking in a mirror. They have sand etched in them, his skin worn and haggard. It ages him at least a decade, and they’ve only been out here a few weeks.       There’s strength, too, in those shoulders, a resiliency Brad almost envies. It’ll carry him through, however long this lasts. Nate’s own quiet brand of stubborn resistance to the dry, dusty hell they inhabit is entirely removed from Brad’s own. He’s steel, strong and sure, but capable of bending. Brad is all ancient stone. Unshakable, rigid. Prone to crumbling.       At least, that’s how he feels on the inside. He hasn’t been able to sleep properly in days, no matter how well dug his grave is for the night. It feels more like he’s lying under a headstone as time goes on, or that he should. That he should trade places with the young girl beside the road, the boy shot in the stomach, the man in the blue car.       However, when he feels pieces of himself slipping away, chips of stone falling from his shoulders and cracking into nothing, he finds it all too easy to borrow his lieutenant’s strength. He can get back up again the next day. He can keep moving. It’s a gift he won’t be able to repay, no matter how long he lives.       A bright flash on the horizon is followed swiftly by a rumble under his boots, and wide eyes fix on it from Brad’s shadowed face. His chest tightens. His instinct tells him to move closer, to reach out for Nate’s hand. He doesn’t do that.       Instead he turns to look at his lieutenant. He arches a brow.            ‘ You are in the optimal position to order otherwise, sir. That’s what the bars on your shoulder tell me, anyway. ‘

        nate is weak.

        he is weak because the only thing he believes in is his men. he doesn’t believe in the missions he fights, nor their overall objective, or even them being here --- doing more harm than good, and fucking up themselves as well as this country. he doesn’t believe in command, in the wisdom of those above him, tossing his men’s lives around like they’re worth nothing...and he would include himself in that, too. nate is trying his hardest, but it’s not good enough. that’s a fact. he’s stretching himself to the limit, bending himself so out of shape he doesn’t think he’ll get back to where he started, and it’s not enough. 

        he is weak because he wants. not the things that matter --- though sure, an actual bed would be nice, a shower, real food --- but because despite everything, he sits beside this man, and all he wants to do is touch. and this is not the place for it, but it burns red-hot beneath his skin, even when he’s focused on something else. it’s filed away, in the later pile, but nate knows it’s there. is he allowed to want something for himself, here? he doesn’t think so.

        he just...feels so old.

        nate’s arm drops beside him; if brad did the same, they would press against one another, a touch easily explained, but a touch all the same. nate exists in a separate world to the men, most of the time...but so does brad. by his own design, perhaps, but he holds himself apart. does he pretend to be cold to protect himself? because nate knows, he knows brad’s not cold at all. he opens his eyes and turns his head to look at brad, smiling ruefully.