Holding On

Chapter 11 - Coming to Light

Courtney's POV

The night after the phone call was a rather amazing night. It turned out to be just John, Alex and me but I wasn't all that surprised. It was relaxing really. We stayed at the house and just hung out together, and I also learned the back story behind John.

Come to find out, he was once in the military. He worked in the navy, though he wasn't part of it for a very long time. He went into the military when he was in his early twenties, ready to be away from home and on his own. He had a want to be in the navy and went through the training, coming through with flying colors. He seemed rather proud of himself, though Alex was the one that did the boasting, being sure to mention the tattoo John had on his shoulder blade. Apparently it's an anchor.

This all explained his short cut hair and his muscular form. Once he had completed training and boot camp, he said he was put out with his squadron to do a routine check on their borders. By this point, he was ranked petty officer third class and took his position seriously. As time went on, everything stayed clear and calm. He and his squadron were pretty at ease with this task. However, all that changed early one cloudy day.

When they made their normal patrol to a section of the border, an enemy ship could be seen on the wrong side of the waters. Doing as they were ordered, the squadron prepared for anything. That was when it all broke loose.

Guns were fired as the ships drew close to each other, and the squadron was forced into an all out fight. John ordered men to call back to base as he knelt on the deck, firing his gun towards the opposite ship. Then, in a blink of an eye, he was down.

Several bullets had nailed his right shoulder and he wasn't able to move on his own due to the pain. Several men had dragged him into cover as they waited helplessly for others to get there. He said that was as far as he could remember.

After that, he said that he woke up in the hospital after surgery, receiving the news about his shoulder. Even threw physical therapy, John says his shoulder has never been quite the same. He made it clear he could still shoot well, but he didn't have enough strength to lift the guns they were required to carry. He was medically discharged and relieved of duty from the navy soon after recovering.

After that, he met up with Hunter and Alex. He said in a weird twist of events, he ended up involved in a fight between Hunter and a leader of a different street gang. Even though he had a newly weakened shoulder, Alex said he was able to scare the leader enough to take off. After that, John just kind of hung around, becoming more and more involved with what Hunter and Alex would do.

It was nice really to finally know the stories behind these three guys. It was a bit more ensuring really. After the story, there was a short discussion over dinner and we finally decided on Chinese. Alex had offered to cook, but it was revealed that the last time Alex cooked, the kitchen caught on fire. None of us really wanted pizza again, or burnt dinner, so Chinese was the last option given.

While waiting for dinner to arrive, the men let me pick out a movie to watch as we waited. I could have been mean and made them live through a chick flick or romance story, but I decided to be a bit nicer. Besides, I enjoyed the slight look of surprise they wore when I held up Fast and Furious in my hand.

John was pretty much on and off the phone the whole evening, getting things arranged and making sure all would go down smoothly. Alex informed me that this was normal for them. John was always the one getting information straight and making sure no one got killed. It just kind of naturally became his job, along with watching Alex when Hunter couldn't.

We all sat around and enjoyed our Chinese food, watching the movie all the way through. We talked about anything and everything that came to mind, completely at ease with each other. We laughed, made fun of each other, and just had fun. However, two things were stuck in the back of my head the whole time the night played out. One: as the time kept going by, I knew more and more that I didn't want to leave. However, I also knew that Daniel wouldn't give up and would keep looking for me no matter what.