Live Free and Love

This is a work of fiction. Any names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons--living or dead--is entirely coincidental.

Live Free and Love copyright @ 2014 by Emily Stone. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embedded in critical articles or reviews.

Live Free and Love

Chapter 1

“Our oldest memories are the ones that die last.”

“Kristina, Mr. Cooley wants to see you in his office.”

Kristina looked up from her computer at her boss’s secretary. “Is he in a mood?” she asked.

“You know Mr. Cooley. He’s always in a mood,” she said, smiling.

Kristina got up and grabbed her coffee cup. Refilling it, she headed to Mr. Cooley’s office. Knocking lightly, she stuck her head in.

“You wanted to see me?”

“Yes, Kristina. Come in, come in.”

She took a seat in front of his desk, and waited.

Mr. Cooley tended to cater to the dramatic. He linked his hands together, and stared at her.

She smiled behind her coffee cup. This man needed a hobby.

“How long have you been with us, Ms. Morganson?”

“It’s been about three years, Sir.”

“Yes, three years. I’ve been watching your work. You did a good job on that article last week. We got good reviews from it.”

“Thank you, Sir. I enjoy my job.”

He pushed his chair back and rose. He began to pace, clasping his hands behind his back.

“There’s been a boom in stories done on soldiers, we’re the only ones that haven’t touched on it.”

“Jackie did a piece on the deployment of soldiers last year,” Kristina reminded him.

“Yes, yes, but we haven’t done any about them coming home. With so many solders ending their tours of duty, I want a big piece done on the way they’re coping, how being at war has affected them, how the ones who are going back feel about their redeployment. I want stories from three different points of view.”

“What’s the deadline?”

“I’m giving you two months. I want this to be good, Kristina. I want our readers to feel what these soldiers feel. If you do a good job, you might be up for that promotion that you’ve been wanting.”

Kristina’s brows rose. The lead journalist job was open. It was a big deal, especially for someone her age.

“You can count on me, Sir. I’ll start right away.”

“One more thing, Kristina,” he said as she rose to leave.

“Yes?”

“Don’t you have a friend in the Marines?”

“Um, yes, but we really don’t talk that much anymore.”

“Maybe you need to rekindle that relationship.”

“Sir I don’t think—”

“Kristina, you have your assignment. Two months.”

“Yes, Sir.”

On her way back to her office, Kristina couldn’t help but think about Danny. He was her best friend, the one she went to when her father was on one of his binges. He never judged her or asked questions. He just offered his support.

Danny...

She hadn’t talked to him in almost three years. She thought back to the night everything had changed between them. She had finally had enough of her life at home.

After a really bad night with her father, Kristina just couldn’t take it anymore. She was tired of coming home to her father so drunk he couldn’t stand. She refused to watch her mother continue to pretend there was nothing wrong, and that things were perfectly fine at home.

After picking her father up off the floor and pulling him to the bed, Kristina walked to Danny’s house. It was something she had been doing for years, whenever she dealt with her dad.

She climbed up the ladder to his room and tapped on the glass. Danny’s smile greeted her as he opened the window.

“I was wondering if I would see you tonight,” he said

“Yeah? So you’re a mind reader?” she replied, plopping down on his bed.

“No. I just saw your dad carry his regular into the house a few hours ago. I knew then I would be seeing you tonight. You okay?”

“Honestly, no. I hate seeing him like that. He’s going to kill himself,” she said, tears falling from her eyes.

Danny sat down next to her on the bed and pulled her against him. He didn’t say a word. He never did when she cried.

Kristina relaxed into his side and let her tears fall, not even trying to wipe them away.

“I can’t stand the way she just walks around like he’s fine, like he doesn’t turn into the devil when he drinks. Sometimes, I sit in my room and pray he passes out already.”

Danny tightened his hold on her arm.

“He never shuts up, Danny. He’s always yelling at her, saying it’s her fault that he is the way he is.”

Kristina shifted. “She just keeps making excuses for him. I can’t do it anymore. I can’t watch them self-destruct. I won’t do it anymore.”

Sitting down at her desk, Kristina was completely lost in her thoughts. She would never forget the way he had looked at her. How he had turned her face to his and brought his lips to hers.

All of it hadn’t mattered anymore. None of the pain and hurt of living in a house with parents like hers.

All that had mattered was the way his lips softly floated over hers, how his thumbs came up and wiped away her tears.

“Don’t cry,” he whispered. “You’re too beautiful to cry.”

Kristina fell in love with him that night. He had kissed her tears away, had held her through the night, and she had woken up in his arms.

“You’re a thousand miles away.”

Kristina jumped, almost spilling her coffee.

“Janine, you scared me half to death,” Kristina said, as her best friend took the seat in front of her desk.

“What has you so deep in thought?” Janine said, crossing her legs.

“Cooley just gave me an assignment,” Kristina said, sipping her now lukewarm coffee.

“Which is?” Janine asked when Kristina didn’t continue.

Kristina sat her cup down

“He wants me to do a piece on the soldiers returning from overseas.”

“Okay, I still have yet to see how this had your head in the clouds.”

“He wants me to interview three soldiers: two men and one woman.” Kristina paused. “He also wants one of those men to be Danny.”

“Shut up. Danny. He can’t be serious,” Janine said, her eyes wide.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought.”

“But you haven’t talked to him in a few years. How would you even get in… wait. How did he even find out about Danny?” Janine asked, looking confused.

“It had to be Trevor; he’s the only one besides you who knows about him.”

Trevor was a long-ago infatuation Kristina had the misfortune of having. They had dated for a year, and Danny had come up in conversation a couple of times.

“That man is a snake. I don’t know why you didn’t listen to me when I told you he was a creep.”

“Well, lesson learned—the hard way, might I add,” Kristina said.

“I’m guessing when he heard that Cooley was doing this story, he wanted to make things hard on me. He knows how I feel about Danny,” she continued, sitting back in her office chair. “It was a constant argument between us.”

“I can beat him up in the parking garage if you want me too,” Janine said, only half-joking.

Laughing, Kristina replied, “That won’t be necessary. A creep like him will always get what’s coming to him.”

“You never told me why you guys stopped talking,” Janine said.

“You’re talking about me and Trevor? Well he was a self-centered, arrogant—oh, and he used to do this thing with his teeth that I couldn’t stand.”

“Not him, Kris, Danny.”

“Oh, well why you didn’t say so?”

Kristina took a deep breath, her past once again taking over her thoughts.

“Well you know most of the story. We grew up together, and he was there for me, to put it simply.

When we turned eighteen, I was going to move to get away from… well let’s just say home life,” she said, not wanting to let Janine know too much about her parents.

“It was graduation night. His mom had taken us out to dinner after the ceremony to celebrate. We were sitting in the hammock in his backyard when dropped the news on me.”

***

“Kristina, are you sure you want to move to Philly? It’s so different from here.”

“I think that’s the point, Danny. Plus I have an aunt there. She’s gonna help me when I first get there. I’ll be okay,” she said.

She looked at him and noticed he was a little preoccupied.

“Is there something wrong, Danny?”

He looked over at her and smiled. “Not wrong, I’m just trying to figure out how to tell you something.”

“You know you can tell me anything. You always could.”

He grabbed her hand. “I’ve decided to enlist. I leave one week after you head for Philly.”

Shock went through her body.

“The military, Danny, are you serious? What happened to college? You said you were going to college.” Her voice caught on the last word

They both knew why she was upset: so many soldiers were being sent overseas to fight, and so many never came home.

“Why, Danny?” she said, her voice shaking

“I feel duty-bound. All the men in my family have served our country. They have given of themselves to protect our freedom. I want to be part of that.”

“I’m scared for you. I don’t want you to go, Danny. Please. Don’t go,” she pleaded with him.

I’ll be okay, Kristina, but this is something that I have to do.” He looked her in her eyes, “I have to, Tina.”

***

“We kept in touch all through his boot camp; I even went to his graduation. We spoke often, and we texted more than that. Once he went to MOS school, the calls came less often. Even when we did talk, he seemed preoccupied. He would always rush off the phone. This continued all through my time in school. He didn’t even come to my graduation like he said he would.

“Once he was stationed, he came to see me once. I loved the time we spent together. He stayed for about a week. After that, we both kind of got busy with our careers. {p} I had just started as an intern here when I heard he was deployed to Afghanistan. We haven’t spoken since. I don’t even know what I would say to him. ‘Hey Danny, its Kristina. I know you just came home and all, but can I interview you on your exploits as a solider?’ He’d probably laugh in my face.”

“Then don’t tell him,” Janine said.

Kristina looked at her friend. She didn’t like the mischievous grin she had on her face.

“I can’t not tell him,” she said.

“Why not? You don’t have to tell him right away. Just get to know him again, who is he now. Ask him a few questions for reporting’s sake and write your story.”

“That’s deceitful, Janine.”

“What reporter isn’t? You do what you have to do to gather your research and get your story,” her friend said.

“First off, I resent being called a reporter. I’m a journalist,” she said, and Janine rolled her eyes. “Second, what if he finds out what I’m doing?”

“Cross that bridge when you get to it. How long did Cooley give you for the piece?”

“Two months, but I’m sure I can squeeze a few extra weeks out of him. I’ll probably do the two other points of views first before I head back to Humble.”

“Sounds good to me,” Janine said, getting up. “I’ll talk to you later, chick, I have work of my own to do.” She laughed as she left her friends office.

Alone again, Kristina’s mind drifted to her parents. She hadn’t seen them in the four years since she left.

This was going to be an interesting couple of months. She just hoped she was strong enough to step foot back into Humble Texas.