Grey (Storm's Soldiers MC Book 2) (6 page)

I swiveled my feet out onto the coffee table instead and nudged the show’s case over to her. “I put in the first disc.”

She glanced at the TV then went back to her computer screen. “I just watched that with my brother a few weeks ago.”

Her brother. I still had only the one sighting of him, and that had gone about as shitty as possible. The thought of him still brought to rise all the reflexes Pop and Calix had built into me: anger and loathing. Megan’s image followed like a salve though, and bit by bit she was dulling the impulses.

“Name something else you wanna watch,” I said.

“I’ve gotta write, you put on what you like.”

I nudged up next to her, peered at what her tapping fingers were producing: Media, Vietnam.

“Got a better idea.” I went back to the player and switched out the miniseries disc for Full Metal Jacket, then sat back.

She looked up as the buzzer flipped on in the opening scene, gave a “hmph!” and went back to a flurry on the keyboard. I watched the men go through their preparations and boot camp - real soldiers headed for a real war. Calix had wanted to take over the image. He’d been the one to shave my head when I first joined up. Field discipline, he called it.

Well, next to Vietnam, Atlanta wasn’t much of a field.

I laid an arm around Meagan and watch the movie for a bit. Meagan glanced up once in a while, but she never stayed glued. I’d seen the movie twice, so I started glancing at her screen too. She was banging out some sort of outline, flipping between a half dozen different screens. Her face was all scrunched up cute as she pursed the pages, but even a rough like me could she wasn’t getting anywhere fast.

“You need some help?” I asked.

“Not now, Vaughn. I really gotta map this out, at least, then maybe we can head back upstairs.”

I chuckled. Couldn’t fault her for thinking I was talking about what I usually talked about. “I’m talking about your paper or map or whatever.”

She cast a doubtful eye at me. I kept my easy smile, but inside I knew I deserved it. The girl had gone to Emory - for a bit, at least. I hadn’t cracked a textbook since I left high school.

“That’s sweet, but it’s ok. You keep watching. I like working nestled into you.”

The sympathy ate at me more than her sarcasm ever could. I looked past her to the web page she had open: ‘The Tet the media lost the war.’

Shit, I actually did know about this. I thought back to the title. Media post-Vietnam.

“So you’re writing about the Tet Offensive?” I asked.

“Not exactly,” she mumbled, intent on the screen.

“Media and war, right? Tet’s your angle, darling. It’s the day the ‘nam went south.”

Her eyes tipped my way, suspicious and curious at once.

“See in the US, every single major station painted it as a failure. They called it a massive surprise attack on the holiest of Viet holidays. They played videos of soldier after soldier streaming out of the jungle at our positions - all perfectly coordinated across the front armed with everything the Commies had. They showed that, but they didn’t show what came after.”

Meagan twisted in my grip to look me full on. All expression had left her face – she was simply a receptacle for my words. I smiled and went on.

“Truth was, we took out ten Cong for every one American that fell. They threw everything they had at us and we were still standing. The Cong leadership nearly slit their own wrists. They completely underestimated our boys. But once they caught wind of how the networks here twisted it into a defeat, they started playing up the propaganda. We might have been able to win the war, but not after our victory was turned to shit.”

Meagan sat in stunned silence a bit, then frowned. “How do you know that? That’s not really high school stuff.”

“You think I just sit around watching movies and call myself a professor? War history’s kind of my thing.”

“Vietnam?”

“I don’t have favorites. They’ve all got interesting bits.”

She flicked open her monitor and typed some stuff down for a bit. Notes that had come out of my brain. It was a damn good feeling watching that. Not quite as good as being inside her, but a close fucking second.

“You take any war history classes?” she asked, looking back up.

“Nothing since high school,” I said. “I just read some stuff we got hanging around at the house and every once in a while, I’ll pick up some literature on cheap at some pawn shop.”

“Well, I don’t know how much you actually know, but you sound really convincing,” she said. “Did you even look into college?”

“Pop had a thing against the biases colleges taught you,” I said, seeing how flimsy the answer was, even as it rolled off my tongue. “My brother went straight to the Soldiers after dropping out, and it just seemed right to follow.”

“You never graduated high school?”

“Na, I finished. I did pretty alright too. Just joined the Soldiers after that.”

She had that nurse look to her again. I knew the choices I made. History was a past-time, not an occupation. I got no purpose out of it.

Then again, the purpose I’d gotten from the Soldiers wasn’t holding strong either.

This wasn’t supposed to be a pity party. I straightened in my seat, and turned it on her. “What are you doing in community college anyway? I see all the Emory gear you got.”

Her eyes blurred with memory. “I failed out.”

“Oh, sorry.” I felt shitty, but tried to push through. “You’re damn smart though.”

She smiled and squeezed into me. “I am. But that wasn’t the problem. Just hung around the wrong people.”

That struck deeper than it should have. I did my best not to follow. “Well, whatever the case, you’ll bounce back. I’m sure this essay is cake.”

“It is, but thanks.”

It wasn’t exactly comfortable what we’d said, but it felt real. I felt even more at ease with her in my arm, watching the movie.

It didn’t last. The lead started shouting slurs at their black squad mate, and I remembered why my brother had gotten me to watch this movie until I fell in love with it. Meagan’s eyes fixed firmly on screen through the first brutal exchange.

“Vietnam was the first fully integrated war,” she said. “Maybe that was part of the bad press.”

“Maybe,” I said.

“But I guess the white deaths mattered more anyway to the press.”

The whole topic was headed way towards a place I couldn’t be. I found another bit of me to share. “Shouldn’t have been any caskets to begin with.”

“You just said we could have won if not for the media,” she said.

“Doesn’t mean we should have fought. It was just people fighting for their homeland. We’re the invaders.”

“That’s…awfully enlightened.”

I shrugged. “That’s white nationalism’s position too – self-determination for every ethnicity.”

She snorted. “Yeah right.”

“It’s true,” I said, feeling a sudden burst of passion. Maybe there was something positive about the Soldiers to bring to our relationship. “Our position is that slavery was a shitty thing to do.”

“But that it’s not too late to send everyone back and fix it.”

“Well, not exactly. I guess.”

She waited, lips firm, but I had nothing good to add. Should have kept my lips shut.

“So your group is all white nationalists?” she asked. “They’re all peaceful?”

“That’s the idea,” I said, then added the truth. “Not that most see it quite that diplomatically.”

“Sounds about right. Good to know, I guess.”

We went back to our own things and I sat there uncomfortably. My thoughts were still in turmoil, but the wind was starting to blow mostly one way. I tried to find the words to express it.

The truth sounded best of all. I caught her chin and tipped her my way.

“Darlin,” I said. “All that, whatever it is – it’s past. We’re both here now.”

“We are, aren’t we?”

She smiled and leaned in with a tender kiss.

The warmth of it threatened to wipe out even more of what I’d thought I was.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Meagan

Class on Friday had a hollow feel to it. It was strange sitting in the hard plastic seats: one, cause of my sore and overused thighs and, two, realizing that it had been about this time yesterday that those legs had been high in the air spreading for the vast force of Vaughn. He’d been around much of the week, and though he was gracious enough to allow me to get some work done, we couldn’t stay next to each other for long without coming together.

I was eager to get back home and get ready. Vaughn had gotten me to sign up for a trip out of town after class. I’ll admit, it made me nervous at first, but he’d sold me on the idea:

“It’s about time we start fucking in different scenery.”

I couldn’t argue with that.

I bounded out of my seat the second Professor Greene shut up for the day. I had to get home and get some stuff packed before he showed up. Faith and Aubrey caught up with their white girl speedwalks though and cornered me.

“Rushing off again?” Aubrey asked. “That’s the whole week we’ve barely seen you now.”

“We hang out like every day at lunch.”

“You’re not really tuned in then either.”

“Sorry, just preoccupied.”

“More like occupied,” Faith suggested.

I blushed hard enough for her to see. “Yeah, you’re right. I’m being a real ghost. I guess I’ve got time for a coffee.”

We hopped up on stools around one of the high tables at the campus coffee shop. Faith had gotten a plain black blend, and Aubrey had some fancy soy chai tea blend. I stuck with a whipped cream caramel cider that suited the weather. Last thing I needed was to get my nerves up more than they were.

The two of them asked the usual prying questions until I was forced to admit that, yes, I was back with the boy that had left me heartbroken last week.

I’d had to make the same revelation to the girls at the bar the night before after failing to drink away the new bounce in my step. Marissa had shrugged it off with an “it happens,” but Jeanie had returned to her usual frowns and Kiara had given me that wobbly wide eyed look that only she and babies could pull off. I wasn’t quite sure I’d convinced her we hadn’t broken up over a fistfight. There was some trouble in that girl’s past that I should really ask her about some day.

My college friends were all smiles. I didn’t get into the details of our differences and they had no reason to suspect them, not with the golden lives they’d led.

“I bet the makeup sex was nuts,” Faith said. “I got back together with Ken once, and it was so good, I wanted to break up all over.”

“It was pretty hot,” I had to admit.

“What did he say to win you back?” Aubrey asked through a mouth of foam.

“The truth of how he felt about me. It wasn’t perfect, but it was sweet, and I believed him.”

“Aw, that’s nice,” she said. “I like my guys rough, but it’s still nice to get a guy to speak his heart.”

I snorted. How rough could her guys get? “He’s plenty rough, don’t worry about that. That’s what made it so surprising.”

“Nice.” Faith bobbed her head. “So you guys still just friends with benefits or what? It sounds like more than that.”

“No,” I said, reflexively.

“You sure? You’ve been hanging out with him almost every day right? Don’t tell me you guys have been in bed the whole time.”

“We…haven’t.” I wasn’t sure if that sounded good or bad.

Faith raised an eyebrow.

Was it really that bad to hang out a lot with a guy after sex? No, but it was still fun. Were we just working on the ‘friends’ part of ‘friends with benefits?’ Or were we moving towards a whole ‘nother definition for what we were?

I thought of the tender kiss he had given me on my forehead before he’d set off the other night and the way we had lingered in each other’s grips.

“Realizing something?” Aubrey asked, peeking in.

“Stop psychoanalyzing me,” I said, covering my face with my cup.

“It’s fine,” Faith said. “We’re not judging you or anything.”

“I’m just curious,” Aubrey agreed.

“OK, well, we’re hanging out and it’s fun. That’s where we are now.”

They nodded and we talked about classes and restaurants a little bit. Apparently Rico was on both their cases on Facebook with messages like ‘Big news for Meagan.’ I didn’t want to hear it. Eventually, Aubrey sucked her paper cup dry and looked inside wistfully.

“You guys hungry?” she asked. “That Mexican place I mentioned is right around the corner. They have this awesome horchata too.”

I checked the time. “No, honey, I really gotta go.”

“Go where?” Faith asked smirking.

“Uh, to pack up for a trip. Yes, with him.”

Aubrey sighed and turned to Faith. “You in?”

“I am so in.”

“Raincheck guys, sorry,” I said.

“Will you two be hanging out Sunday afternoon?” Aubrey asked. “If not, we could do a brunch thing then.”