Army Way of Life

Chapter Seventeen

A look of hurt flashed across his face. "When?"

"Tomorrow."

"For how long?"

"I don't know."

"You know I leave in 17 days..." He said, and I could sense his urgency.

"Yes."

He removed his arm from around me. "Why are you doing this, Q?"

"Doing what?"

"Pulling away from me?"

"I'm not."

"Then why are you all of a sudden making a trip to Hawaii, to visit people you don't even want to see."

"That's not fair. I very much so want to see my brother and sister."

"Okay... But why now? When everything is good?"

I sighed. I wanted to just tell him. But I couldn't. So I said, "I don't know. I just feel like I need to go."

He hung his head in defeat. His hands went up to cover his face. We sat like that, in silence, for a few minutes, and I was so scared about what would happen next.

"What did I do?" he asked, pain obvious in his voice.

"You didn't do anything," I admitted. "I just need to see my family."

He sighed. "Okay. But this isn't over."

"What isn't?"

"Us."

"I never said anything about us."

"It sure feels like it's about us," he said quietly, still not making eye contact.

"I love you, Jeremy. Don't forget that."

"I love you too," he said, and we laid on the couch for the rest of the night, both of us falling asleep.

He woke me up in the morning before he left to say goodbye.

After he left, I cried. I cried for my heart that was breaking at what I was doing. But I couldn't let him give up his dreams. So I was leaving so he didn't have that chance.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I let Ryker sleep as long as he wanted to that morning, figuring it'd help him on the plane.

I had planned on leaving for the airport about 10 for our 12:45 departure time.

Ryker slept until 9:30 and I had everything ready to go, already loaded into the car. I had changed into a pair of yoga pants and a bright blue tank top and put tennis shoes on and then put Ryker in a black body suit with a bright blue Under Armour logo and a pair of bright blue Under Armour shorts and his black flip flops when he woke up.

I made sure to stuff the diaper bag with all of his necessities and then made sure I had all of the stuff I needed for my backpack.

Ryker had a bowl of cereal for breakfast, I was too nervous to eat.

At 10:05, I was pulling the door closed behind us after making sure I had everything and everything was turned off.

The traffic was light and we made good time getting to the airport.

I placed Ryker in the stroller and struggled to get everything. When I finally made it inside, I checked in to get our tickets and get our luggage where it was supposed to go and then moved toward security. The line was forever long and I was getting impatient. Ryker was holding up far better than me.