One Million Tiny Things

Army medic

Dear General,
I'm home now and I have to say that I am happier than I have ever been.
Thank you. I can never forget your kindness to me. I can never express my gratitude for you letting me go early. I signed a contract for 5 years but you gave me the chance to go home in 4.

A few months back you came to my room to talk to me and you asked me who were the people in the photo on my bedside table. I just turned down the photo and gave you no response. But, with your recent help, I've come to see you almost like family and I think you deserve  an answer. I'm not trying to keep secrets, nor do I have big mysteries. I just have a rather miserable past.

It all began when I was 20. I was young, all I  wanted fun.
I met him.
Jace.

He was a famous footballer.
Rich, charming, talented.

I was a struggling med student.
Broke, awkward, inept.

We hit it off.

Surprisingly our love affair didn't end soon, the way everyone expected. Eventhough we were stark opposites we got along with each other better than anybody else I knew. We grew up, he helped pay off my student loans, I came to each and every one of his games, he loaned me his Jersey, I loaned him my heart.

My family, although skeptical at first, soon came to see him as a son and a brother. I saw him as the love of my life. I was ready to settle down.

We eventually got married, bought a house, had two kids, Katie and Nick. We were happy.
But, if things had gone well, I wouldn't be serving in the army, would I?

Jenine Wilson was the reason my life turned 180° from wonderful to horrible. She came as a sports agent to help out my husband's team. They spent enough time together to make me jealous. She knew that and played on all the right keys to make me mad. Jace and I began to argue more than we ever had.
Jenine wormed herself into our family, she became really good friends with the kids and almost a best friend with Jace. But throughout all of this, she saw me as the vermin she had to get rid of. She gave me sidelong glares when I game to Jace's games and was unnecessarily rude to me when we met.

To add to my problems at home, hospitals were sending out some of their doctors as army medics and my director wanted me to go with them. But being a mother of two young children I couldn't abandon my family. I refused to leave and was barely holding onto my job with my fingernails. Then one night Jace was going out for a "buisness" dinner with Jenine. Looking back, it probably was something simple and innocent. But, at the time with everything slipping out of my hands, I lost control. I screamed at Jace the whole night and didn't let him leave the house. I still don't know what came over me.

A couple of epic one-sided screaming feasts, Jace suggested the four of us leaving for a vacation to get away from the town stress. When I was at the base, I'd close my eyes and wonder what that vacation would have been like. Me in Jace's arms with Katie and Nick running around the beach. It would have been perfect.

But, unfortunately, in real life things weren't that simple. I kept pulling up arguments with Jace that whole week. No matter how well sown something is, once the threads get picked and pulled apart, the whole thing unravels. And just like that our marriage broke into a million pieces.

A month later, instead of being in a cabana in Hawai, I was signing our divorce papers in a courthouse. It wasn't Jace's idea nor his fault, I had nobody to blame other than me.

But you can't divorce one of the most famous footballers in this country without the media raising its head and coming swarming to get the latest buzz. Soon, we were all over the news as the closest couple that got pulled apart. Jace begged me more times than I knew to reconsider the divorce but I was just sick of it all. The attention, the insecurity, Jenine.
I didn't listen to reason.
I didn't listen to my heart.
It didn't end well for me.

My director heard about the divorce and immediately pounced. Now, without a family I was completely eligible to be a medic. My pleading didn't work for him. Barely a week after a divorce, I left the country with my head shaved in army uniform to help in a war I wasn't involved in. I left behind the war I had created in my home.

Lieutenant Peter threatened me with my life for not doing my job for my country when I tried to weasel out of the 5 year contract. You were right when you demoted that man. He abused his power and made everybody else into his pawns.

When you let me go a year earlier than I should have, I was so thankful that I hoped that everything in my life would fall back to place. Eventhough I wondered if Jace had found a new, less crazy wife. I wondered if my kids even remembered their mother. Your kindness fuelled me to take a shot in the dark. I sent Jace a letter, apologising and explaining. He replied three days later. Much sooner than I had expected. When I read that letter, I cried for the first time since I came here out of sheer happiness. Jace was as sweet as he had always been.

He apologised for making me uncomfortable with the Jenine issue. He explained profusely that I was the only person he had or ever will fall in love with. The letter was so Jace.

He promised to be there at the airport when I came back home and confessed that he never approved the signed divorce papers. They burnt to crisp in our fireplace, courtesy of my husband.

I flew back home two months ago, general. Jace and the kids were waiting for me with a wreath of roses. (He still remembers my favourite flowers) I found heaven, general, and thank you cannot cover the gratitude I feel for you.

When I wake up in the middle of the night clinging onto my sheet shaking from fear of the memories from when I was there, I no longer have to pace the room until the sun comes up because I was much too scared to fall back asleep. Jace holds me until I sleep and he stays with me every morning till I wake up.

Being there, being in a place where I could lose my life in a couple minutes, where I watched the despair in people's eyes as they took one last glance of this world while I watched unable to do anything to help them, I realised the value of the life we've got.

I found my soul mate when I was young and I almost let him go. But, today, if there is one thing I have learned it is that we've got very little time in this world. It would be a waste to not spend the few precious seconds we've got without those we love.

The picture on my bedside table is my family. I wish that I had properly shown it to you. One day when you come back from the battlefield, please come to see me. You've been like a father to me and it would be such a pity if the kids and Jace never got to meet you.

Especially Katie, she's obsessed with the military. She's already made a list of questions to ask you when you get here. So you better come prepared for the world's most thorough interrogation.

All my gratitude,
Ellie.