Torin and Summer

Chapter 15 (Torin): I Walked Away

Six months later...

Pausing for a moment to wipe the sweat off my forehead, I looked around at the bathroom I was tiling. Seemed I was always sweating lately, even with the air conditioning working in the homes I was helping to build. In the six months that I'd been separated from Summer, I'd begun working construction and focusing on getting my head straight. Working in a field where I wasn't responsible for lives or operating in life-or-death situations after so many years of living that way was freeing. It felt like I'd shed so much dead weight. 

The realization of how much and how deeply my work had affected my life was why I'd decided against becoming a police officer or a firefighter. I was done being the hero. I'd put in my time -- too much time -- and it'd cost me too much. Now, I was using my body, my strength and my hands to build places people wanted to live. Places they'd call home and be happy in. It was hard work, but it was amazing what an effect it had on my outlook. The builder I worked for, Corbin, believed in all of us having a working knowledge of all steps needed to build a home, start to finish.

"Once you have some solid experience in all aspects of it, you'll find something you like. Something that really speaks to you, and then you can start focusing on that, become a master at it. That's what all my guys do eventually."

"I have absolutely no experience in anything related to house building," I told him.

"You have military experience, and I bet when you started, you didn't have experience in what they taught you." He shrugged. "I like hiring veterans. I'm one myself. It's the whole reason I got my general contractor's license and went into private homebuilding. The whole process eased something in me."

At that point, I'd just separated from Summer, so I could relate to needing processes that eased something in me. I worked long hours, exhausted myself with the demanding physical labor, and then got home at night, showered and fell into bed after being alone with my thoughts for a while.

Work wasn't the only thing that kept me busy. I began attending a veterans' support group for post traumatic stress disorder. That had been eye-opening, giving me a lot of things to think about at night in my apartment. A lot of things to regret. Definitely many things to work on and face.

Our support group facilitator, Keith, began each session talking about different aspects of PTSD, behaviors I'd been exhibiting but hadn't realized were PTSD. 

"A lot of vets think they don't have it if they aren't exhibiting the so-called classic symptoms -- nightmares, startling easily, bad reactions to unexpected loud noises. But there are a lot of different signs and symptoms that tell us what the problem is we're experiencing," Keith told us.

Anger, self-destructive actions, mood swings, feeling numb when it came to emotions. Add to that difficulty with relationships, feeling removed from everything, having angry outbursts, being especially irritable, displaying aggression...and I was a walking-talking checklist for the disorder.

But I hadn't yet started my new job and talked with my new boss when Summer had woken up the morning after I'd shot and killed Bridgette, so I wasn't entirely aware of all of that. All I knew then was I'd wanted my wife to go back to sleep so I could hold her longer. 

I'd known what was coming. I'd thought all night about what I'd suggest to Summer when the sunlight shattered the nighttime cocoon we'd created. Every minute she slept was a slight stay of execution for me. I'd remained awake that long night, holding Summer, making sure I memorized every last detail of the woman in my arms. With the morning would come the reckoning and possibly the end of my marriage.

"Good morning," I'd said to her when her eyes blinked open.

"Morning," she'd said, and I could see it all come back to her.