My Marine

Chapter 3

I head towards my office and dread the idea of going home. I sit down behind my desk and lean back on the chair taking a deep breath. "Damn this one is going to be tough." I mumble to myself  as I watch the security camera screen that points to his door. I watch as the sneaky bastard opens the door and tries to wheel himself out of the room. I watch the screen as he heads the opposite direction of my office. When he clears the hall I grab my tablet and change it to the security cameras and I follow after him. I wait at the end of the halls until he has cleared a hall as I follow him through the facility. 

'Where the hell does he think he's going?'  I think to myself as I follow him through the halls until he finds a dead end. As he's facing the end of the wall I lean against the steel wall frame. "Where do you think your going?" I ask and he whips the wheelchair around to face me. 

"Did you fucken follow me?" He asks as he wheels himself towards me. 

"Yep." I say popping the P.  I continue leaning against the wall monitoring his movements. The way he holds his body, and the way he only uses his arm muscles to move around. I notice the way he looks at me with his strong jaw pointed directly at me, his blue eyes holding a pointed glare but sunken in from pain and suffering both externally and internally, and his five o' clock shadow making him look sickly. 

"Well don't." He says pushing past me down another hall. 

"Its my job, so what are you looking for?" I ask keeping up with him easily. 

"The blasted mess hall." He says looking around. 

"Ohh you mean the cafeteria, alright this way." I say walking down a hall not bothering to see if he is following me. But I can hear the wheels of his wheel chair following me. 

"Why are you being nice to me?" He asks from behind me and I let a smile form on my face. I turn around to face him whilst walking backwards. 

"Because I believe there are four stages of healing deep sadness, anguish, guilt, and anger. Every one of my patients have go though at least one of the four. You are different you will experience all four at least once. Thats why your a tough case. Most don't want to handle a full grown man having a psychiatric meltdown." I say turning around as we reach the end of the hall and turn right towards the cafeteria. 

"Im not having a meltdown." He states. I grin hearing the tone of his voice as it is much calmer and reasonable. 

"Not right now you aren't, but you will." I say as we turn down the last hall. 

"No I won't." He says in a defiant tone. 

"Oh really?" I say as we walk into the cafeteria and I walk to the back as he heads to a table. 

"I won't." I hear him say as I grab him and myself some food. I smirk as I walk back over to the table and sit in front of him. 

"Do you have nightmares?" I ask making mental notes as this conversation continues. I watch his face as his nose flares. 

"Nope." He says mimicking me by popping the P. 

"Liar, your nose flared. Now I know your tell so you can't lie to me." I say and watch as his face contorts into one of anger before he calms down and actually listens to reason. 

"Yes I have nightmares but most veterans do." He says and shrugs his shoulders if its nothing. 

"Yes they do, but do you go into trance like states and have nightmarish dreams while awake?" I ask watching for his trigger. He looks at me as if seeing me for the first time. 

"You've suffered through something too." He says as he bypasses my question. 

"Yes, but that is irrelevant. Answer my question." I say stubbornly and immediately regret it as a smirk appears on his face. 

"Alright, I will answer your questions if you answer mine." He says his smirk only broadening as what I can only believe as shock flashes across my face. 

"Thats not how this works, my job is to fix you. Not you fix me." I say nonchalantly trying to change the conversation off of me. 

"No, I will only answer your questions if you answer mine. I won't work with you if I don't trust you." He says and I ponder this for a moment understanding it from his point of view. 

"Fine but answer my last question first and then this starts." I say slouching in my chair knowing that I had lost that fight. 

"Yes I do fall into trance like states." He says avoiding my eyes. "My turn, did you loose somebody?" He asks. I look down and my hands subconsciously land on my stomach. 

"Yes." I say taking a deep breath. "Did you?" I ask quietly I mentally kick myself in the ass for showing weakness to this beast of a man until I notice that he slouched down too. 

"Yes." I nod my head. 

"Im sorry." I state while starting to eat the sandwich I had made. 

"Me too." He says doing the same as I did. We sit in a comfortable silence for a while until our food is finished and I grab both trays despite his protesting and throw them away. 

As we start to walk back I notice that he is thinking really hard and lagging behind me. I slow down to match his slow pace before he stops at the beginning of our hall. He looks anywheres but my face until he comes to a decision about something and looks up at me. My tough exterior almost fading as I see the venerability in his eyes. "Who did you loose?" He asks. I look away from him trying not to cry as I walk the rest of the way to his room and open his door he goes inside and he waits, the only thing between us is the open door. 

"My daughter." I state before turning around the flood gates wide open as the tears start to stream down my face I just barely make it to my office before I start to sob. I close the door and make it to my couch before laying down and crying myself to sleep.