A Candle for a Marine (Always a Marine) (3 page)

A line appeared between his brows, and he took a step toward her. “Zehava, I shouldn’t have said that.” Contrition, not apology, scored under the deep-seated anger in his voice, lancing it like an infected wound.

“Right or wrong, it has been said. You have a right to your anger.” Clasping her hands together kept her from fidgeting. She missed the way his hair used to curl over his forehead and the softness of his eyes. No matter how much she’d expected his reaction, it didn’t ease the laceration to her soul.

“Maybe. I don’t have the right to be rude or to treat you badly.” He shut his eyes against the wintry sun shining down on them. “I imagined how this would go a hundred times.”

Intrigued, she edged closer. They didn’t need to shout this conversation. Too many of their neighbors knew their history—the drawback of such a close-knit community. Secrets didn’t thrive. “How are we doing so far?”

A chuckle rumbled out of him, hard and reluctant, but humorous nonetheless. “Pretty bad.”

Biting the inside of her lip, she fought a smile. “It is good to see you, Isaac.”

He said nothing for so long, she thought he might have to reach to find a similar sentiment. When he opened his eyes, the raw pain reflected in them tore her apart. “I missed you, Z. Thanks for the invitation, but I need to go. Be safe.” And he turned and walked away.

Mute, she blinked back tears. Thankfully no one saw her lose the battle or the hasty swipes of her hand as she tried to keep the dampness from tracking down her cheeks. Nothing about Isaac had been easy. She should never have expected seeing him again to be anything but difficult.

Unlocking the center doors, she focused on opening the blinds, and setting up the tables. When Shabbat services ended, many families would go to lunch. Many more would have to go to work, and their children would come to her.

Activity books, crayons, markers, and blocks went in one room. Sports equipment, some dilapidated and some new, went in another. The center would be open until after sundown when the children would go home. She would teach her painting classes, tutor those who needed help with homework or projects. She would referee games and settle disputes when the hardheads got into it with each other.

All of this she decided as the ritual of getting the community center ready to open helped calm her jangled nerves. She would not think about Isaac, or the choices they made, or the child she’d given up for adoption. Yet, the harder she tried not to think about it, the quicker the thoughts came to mind.

Walking to the front doors and pushing them wide, she used wooden wedges to brace them open and waited for the children to arrive. When their chatter crashed over her, maybe it would drown out the bleak thoughts and too-loud questions banging around in her head.

She couldn’t help but stare up the street toward the Jankos’ where Isaac had disappeared. He was right there—within reach, and harder to reach than when he’d been thousands of miles away.

“Z!” The high-pitched yell of the five-year-old racing toward her drove the melancholy from her mind.

She smiled. “
Shabbat shalom
, Alicia.” Bidding the child the traditional greeting and a peaceful Sabbath steadied Zehava.

“
Shabbat shalom
!” The girl bounced and threw her arms around her. Zehava hugged her close and waved to the little one’s harried mother, who returned the wave before driving off. Like so many single parents in the neighborhood, Alicia’s mother had a job that didn’t allow for the Sabbath off. That was what the center offered—a safe haven for the neighborhood children.

“I’ve already put out the crayons. You can set up snacks if you like.”

“Oh, yay!” Alicia raced inside.

Zehava counted it good luck that the kids liked to be useful. It wouldn’t be long before more children swarmed in, some walking from Temple together in groups and others, like Alicia, being dropped off. With so many voices around her, she didn’t think too hard on Isaac. In her heart, she knew where she wanted to go at sundown. Angry or not, she’d missed him. She had to find a way to convince her mind that was a good idea.

Isaac wasn’t proud of his behavior. He spent the rest of the day turning their encounter over and over in his head. Zehava had behaved like a lady, absolutely classy, filled with poise and determination. Meanwhile, he’d been an ass. After sundown supper, he managed to extricate from his family and headed north to Allen to check out Mike’s Place. Not a lot seemed to be going on for a Saturday night, but he headed there again on Sunday and Monday.

He didn’t plan on avoiding her.
Oh, who am I kidding?
Everywhere he went at home on leave, she was there. Friends brought her up, his mother mentioned her. Even his father brought up the subject—he volunteered every Monday at the community center to teach some of the boys about vehicle mechanics although his best student turned out to be a fourteen-year-old girl who’d already begun rebuilding a transmission on a donated car.

Instead of dealing with it, Isaac took off like some petulant teenager and parked himself on the edge of an empty ball field. The only thing missing: a case of beer and a good, solid drunk.

“Who pissed in your Wheaties?” Zach Evans strode along the front of the bleachers, and Isaac rose to clasp his proffered hand by way of greeting.

“Hey, man, how are you?”

“Better than you, from the scowl on your face.” The blond Marine’s ready smile warmed his expression. He motioned for Isaac to sit again and dropped onto the bench nearby. “How long have you been in town?”

“Couple of days. Visiting family for the holidays and thought I’d come check out the work in progress that is apparently a heck of a lot bigger than I expected.” He motioned to the field.

Mike’s Place occupied a huge campus. From the medical buildings, to the parks to the apartments, it reminded Isaac of an idealized military base. The facility’s reputation continued to grow, and he’d heard more than one mention of it from others in his unit and on his assignment. Apparently everyone knew someone who had been helped or was being helped here.

“Well, hell, you need to come by later and we’ll head out for drinks.” Retirement sat well on Zach. Always easygoing, he had an air of relaxed contentment about him. He’d found a life, a purpose beyond the Corps, and it seemed a good one.

“I’ll keep that in mind. Not sure I’ll have time for it on this trip.” He didn’t have to report until well after Hanukkah. He’d accrued a hell of a lot of leave and had to report before the first of the year, but he kept that information to himself. Unwilling to create expectations, he’d told his family his leave had been limited and currently wished he’d chosen a smaller window of opportunity.

Zach’s hard, perceptive blue-eyed gaze locked on his. “Hey, Isaac, what the hell is eating you?”

Isaac sighed. “How do you do that?” It irked him since most would not push past the front he showed the world. Evans wasn’t most, and proved it repeatedly.

“Because you have a crap poker face and Logan mastered the
nothing’s-wrong
look a long time ago.” He stretched his legs and leaned on his elbows, adopting an air of ease and relaxation. “I know how to read between the lines. So, what’s got you stewing?”

“You’re not going to leave it alone are you?” He appreciated his friend’s patience and observance, even if it irritated.

“Nope. I can be a real pain in the ass.” And too cheerful about it by half.

Reluctant laughter eased the boulder sitting on his chest. While they’d never served in the same unit, he and Zach pulled several training details together and discovered an easy camaraderie they’d been able to maintain over the years. Perhaps talking to someone completely unaffected by the turmoil seething in his heart would help.

“Just remember, you asked.” He scrubbed a hand over his mouth and struggled with where the hell to start. Never having been a beat-around-the-bush kind of guy, he exhaled a hard breath and stared at the field in front of him. “I avoided coming home for years because I knew the day I did, I would see my ex.”

“Okay.” No judgment, no question, simply acceptance from the Marine.

“When I was in boot, she found out she was pregnant. She called, let me know. We talked, and I asked her to marry me.”

A grunt of acknowledgment only. Considering Isaac labeled her his ex, Zach should be able to read between those lines.

“Yeah, stupid, but it’s what you do when the girl you’ve dated for years tells you she’s pregnant. Zehava didn’t want to get married and pretty much called bullshit.”

“I’m guessing you didn’t want to get married, either.”
Observant, too
.

“No. I wanted to be a Marine and I loved her.” The past tense sounded wrong. “And like I said, the right thing to do.”

“Okay, so your girl was pregnant, you asked her to marry you, she said no. And?” Really, the story could have ended there, but it didn’t.

“She wanted to put the baby up for adoption.” Damn, if that didn’t still claw at his insides. “I argued against it. We have big families, strong ties in the community, and if we got married, I could provide for her and the child.”

From the corner of his eye, he saw skepticism on Zach’s face, though the man said nothing.

“I get it. Next to nothing income and deployment coming, but we could have made it work.” Want something bad enough, and ways to make it happen could be found. He believed it to his bones, and maybe so had Zehava. She hadn’t wanted that life enough—not the uncertainty, the shitty pay, the lengthy separations—none of it.

“Did she?” Zach asked after Isaac went silent.

“She did.” She’d offered him a picture of the baby once, and he’d turned it down flat. The day the paperwork arrived for his signature, he’d been tempted to ignore it and see how far she got if he did nothing at all. “I’d been in Iraq—two, maybe three months—when she gave birth. I found out about a week after the fact when the adoption paperwork arrived for my signature. Turns out for her to do everything, she needed my legal consent.”

“You gave it.” Not a question.

“Yeah, I gave it. She wanted it, and I was eight thousand miles away. Not a hell of a lot else I could do.”

“That’s the pussy response.” The harsh words turned Isaac around, and Zach met his stare, hard and unyielding. “You signed the papers because you knew it was the right thing to do. You’re not a stupid guy, Isaac. You’re not a jackass, either. She didn’t want to marry you, she wanted something good for the kid, and you were too far away to do anything about anything, so you gave your consent.”

“How the hell do you know?” Isaac scowled.

“Like I said, you have a crap poker face.” Zach leaned forward, elbows on his knees, his hands resting loosely between his legs. “So what’s the problem?”

“She gave our son up for adoption, and the first time I see her, it kicks me square in the gut. I hate her.”

Zach shook his head. “That’s not it.”

Isaac glared at his friend. “Seriously, that’s what you have for me?”

“Well, if you want to shovel that bullshit for yourself, go ahead. But you don’t hate her. All right, look….” He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “You know Logan and I got married.”

Isaac blinked. “What?”

Zach grinned, lightning fast and amused. “Not to each other—to Jazz. Our girl.”

“Wait, what?” He couldn’t wrap his mind around it. He’d heard a rumor and dismissed it, because what guy shares his girl?

“That part isn’t important.” Zach waved it aside, laughing. “What’s important is she’s a stubborn Marine herself. Logan and Jazz are probably two of the hardest, most boneheaded Marines I’ve ever met. Makes it damn hard to win an argument, so you gotta be patient. You gotta let the tempers cool and wait for reason to return. When that happens, you see the bigger picture. You’re pissed right now. You’re pissed at her. You’re pissed at you. I get it—you’re
pissed
. But you don’t hate her, you hate how you feel about her, because you think you shouldn’t still care and you do. A tough nut to crack.”

Isaac had locked on the shared marriage concept, and it took a moment for the rest of his words to sink in. “She gave up our
kid
.”

“Yeah, but no.”

He would regret asking this, he knew it. “Why
yeah, but no
?”

Clapping a hand on his shoulder, Zach gave him a quick shake. “You signed the papers, man. At the end of the day, you’re angry because you couldn’t see an alternative to her plan. She didn’t give up your kid. Adoption isn’t surrender. It’s putting your kid before yourself.”

“So you’re basically saying I’m being a dick.”

“More or less.” Zach gave his shoulder another squeeze. “I need coffee. Great place around the corner, and we can walk for it. You in?”

The man was halfway down to the field and Isaac chewed on that thought. “Hey, Zach?”

“Yeah?”

“You realize that’s pretty fucked up. You and Logan being married to the same lady?”

The man grinned. “It’s our kind of fucked up. You gonna have a problem with that?” Despite the easy smile and general cheer, Zach dared him to make something of it.

“Not really any of my damn business.” Isaac rose and started down the steps. “But it’s fucked up.”

“Fair enough. Say that to my wife and you’ll be picking up the pieces of your jaw. Got it?” The lighthearted tone enveloped the steel core of the threat.

“I’m a dick, not an idiot.”

The old Zach returned, easygoing and affable. “Good to know. Now, coffee, then I’ll give you the nickel tour and introduce you to the captain. He offers everyone a job, so start thinking about how you want to turn it down if you’re not interested….”

“He did
not
say that to you.” Shannon Fabray stood in the center of the community center’s art room, hands on her hips. Zehava hadn’t meant to confess, but the sculptor was an old friend and a wildly popular guest teacher at the center.

“In all fairness—”

“Screw fairness.” Shannon had stopped by to deliver sculpting supplies for the class she planned to teach when Hanukkah passed in the weeks leading up to Christmas. While Zehava appreciated her dedication, Shannon fought to stay busy because the man she waited on had four more months of deployment.