Travis got his private pilot license with the minimum twenty hours solo time. He signed up at the flight school to fly rescue missions and meanwhile kept racking up his flight time. He took paramedical training. I had no idea what was going though his mind or what he was preparing for. He seemed to have given up any idea of going to university. That mystified me. He had always been so keen on learning everything he could.
Beth and Bob moved to Kentucky. Beth wrote to Travis regularly. He never told me what was in the letters, except in the most general terms. Apparently Bob was enrolled in the engineering technician course he had mentioned, and Beth was working as a waitress in a bar. Whenever Travis got a letter, he would bury himself in whatever he was doing for a few days. Little by little he would start acting normal and then a few weeks later he'd get another letter and the whole cycle would start over.
I was starting to wonder if I had done wrong by not suggesting he marry Beth himself. God knows he would have been happier than he was now. But I made the best choice I knew at the time, and if I'm honest, I would make the same choice again.
Beth's letters got further and further apart, and gradually Travis started returning to his old self, with one exception. Even when he gave the appearance of being happy, his eyes held a deep sadness that nothing seemed able to erase.
It was months before I heard him laugh, and I sent a quick prayer of thanks skyward, knowing his healing had begun.
YOU ARE READING
A Soldier's Heart
Ficción General"Travis was a soldier with heart. His love for his family, his country and his community is unquestioned. He never hesitated to put his life on the line for those he loved- and he loved many and deeply." So begins Travis Barrett's eulogy. A true her...
