Return

 This was a piece I wrote for a writing workshop during my senior year of college. I have revised it a little bit and posted it here. Tomorrow(promise), I’ll write a bit on how I came up with the piece and how I intend to move forward with it. I welcome any feedback on this piece as I would love to work more on it in the future. I don’t really have that much more to say though as this post is already very long so enjoy and I will see you all tomorrow!

---

“Williams! Where are you!” Greg scrambled through the trees, running towards the sounds of gunfire and explosion. 

“We need you!” 

“We’re dying out here!” 

“I’m coming! Just hang in there!” 

Greg felt pain as his leg collided with a root. He stumbled, beginning to lose all of his momentum. Gaining a moment of clarity, he rolled. He had no idea how far he went, but what he did know was that he could immediately launch back into his sprint the second he was able to plant his two feet onto the ground. 

The forest was dark, the treetops blocking the moon. The only source of light now was the bright flashes accompanied by a tirade of gunshots and artillery explosions. The flashes helped keep whatever sanity he had together, reminding him that he was still in a space that he could see. On the other hand, the strobing effect messed with his vision, it was almost as if he was at a photoshoot processing his surroundings through the afterimages that followed  the flashes. 

Those same flashes gave Greg a constant reminder of his current objective’s location. His squad mates were calling for him and he needed to help them. Yet every time it seemed like he would emerge from the treeline, the forest would expand out in front of him and there was nothing that he could do. A tight pain gripped his entire upper body, he was running out of breath. Before he could react, he ran face first into a branch. Refusing defeat, his legs still pushed themselves through a running motion even as they went out ahead of the rest of his body. He wasn’t sure how long he had been in the air, he wasn’t sure how much farther he had been able to get before he slammed into the ground, what he was sure of was the incoming waves of pain and fatigue now that his body had finally stopped.

“Greg, you’re letting us down!”

“We’re all going to die out here if you don’t come and help us!”

“Do something otherwise you’ll never make it back!”

Tears streamed from his eyes as he strained to pull himself back up. The world around him went numb as  The voices began to fade as the explosions started getting louder.

*

Suddenly Greg was awake in his bed, the explosions still echoed in his head long after his dreaming mind had banished them. His eyes were still closed, but could feel flashes of colors, white, green, and red behind his eyelids. With a herculean effort he cracked his eyes open and looked out the window, fireworks again. Was it a surplus supply from some holiday sale or a bunch of kids having some pointless fun, Greg couldn’t care less. He just wanted to sleep. With a groan, he got up and looked at his clock, 11pm. He had barely gotten an hour of sleep this time. He really wanted these dreams to stop.  The explosions went away quickly, but the voices echoed in his ears as he dragged himself across the room towards his still packed away belongings. A pile of boxes in front of a closet that was longing to be filled with their contents. Among these items was a simple wooden crate. The lid was still ajar, showing a sliver of camo underneath. He reached at it and pulled out a slightly worn down pair of fatigues. He folded it up neatly and set it down gently on top of the box. He stared at it, trying to forget, until the sun came up in the morning.

He knew the sun had come up because his morning alarm had started to get on his nerves after ringing for a while. The realization that, unlike most days, he actually had something to do today finally allowed him to pull away and turn the shrill ringing off. He sighed heavily as he put the uniform back into the box. It lay alone in the box, almost like it was asking Greg to keep it company, but he wanted nothing more than to seal it away. His hand moved to shut the lid fully, but stopped. His hand started to tremble his other hand clenched into a fist, knuckles going white. Across his entire body he could feel tension, the shaking of his arm made it feel like it could fall into pieces. He couldn’t bear it any longer, he pulled his hand away. 

Defeated again.

The shrill beeping of his alarm had gone on for long enough. He got up off his floor, feeling worse than when he had got there, and turned it off. He walked back to the closet, to his pile of packed belongings, but this time he reached for a suitcase. He opened it, revealing all of his civilian clothes. After a quick change he looked at himself in the mirror. He looked normal, definitely more normal than how he felt right now. Breakfast was simple, a piece of toast with some freshly made strawberry jam from the market down the street. He started to look through the paper as he nibbled on some crust. most of it wasn’t anything that he was interested in. He tried the crossword puzzle, giving himself fifteen minutes like he always did. Unfortunately, he didn’t make much headway when his time was up. He put the papers into an ever growing pile of newspapers with unfinished crosswords. One day he was going to finish them. That was later, because if he didn’t leave now, he was going to miss his bus.

*

“Williams!”

Greg jumped awake, not fully comprehending his surroundings yet.

“What’s going on… can I get another five minutes?”

Greg didn’t hear the answer so much as he felt it, he was pulled out of his rather spartan bedding and forced to his feet. Suddenly, he realized where he was, he was in the barracks and the man in front of him was his commanding officer.

“Sorry, sir!” Muscle memory brought him from a tired slouch into a straight standing salute.

“It’s your first day rookie so I would expect you to conduct yourself properly with you being fresh out of basic!”

“It won’t happen again, sir!” Greg raised his voice, hoping that volume would be enough to satiate him.

“It better not, now get going. Briefings for today’s patrols begin soon, but you’re already late.”

And with that, he stomped out of the room leaving Greg behind in nothing but his sleep wear. He immediately ran over the foot of his cot where a small wooden crate sat. He quickly pulled the lid aside, revealing a freshly cleaned set of camo fatigues. He could barely keep the excitement off of his face as he changed into them. Reveling in the feeling of finally being able to wear them. There wasn’t a mirror nearby, but Greg knew that he looked ready for action.

*

Greg had grown up in the city, something that made him enjoy living outside of it more than in. When he was younger, all he saw outside his windows were the tall looming skyscrapers. He never liked how they always seemed to get in the way of the sun. The large looming shadows always scared Greg, made him feel boxed in. The only negative was that getting into the city when you currently don’t own a car was very inconvenient. 

So there he was, stuck in the bus wondering if he would still be on time. He normally was, nothing really held up the bus as it went into the city. As the cleanly cut lawns and fences merged into a neverending network of glass windows, alleyways, and concrete supports, he pulled out his phone and checked his notes app. In there he had written a time and a place, a coffee shop that he used to go to almost daily. A tradition that he had yet to pick back up again. An old friend, James, had heard he had come back and almost immediately reached out. The two coordinated a time to meet, and today was that day.

Greg didn’t immediately recognize James when he entered the coffee shop. The two had hit it off pretty quickly when Greg was first deployed and they had spent a lot of their rec hours trading stories about back home. Unfortunately, James was on the last stretch of his tour and had been sent back overseas before Greg had properly settled in, but not without promising that they would reconnect someday. Civilian life had suited James. He looked completely different from the weary veteran that left Greg behind. He had grown his hair out, showing off tangly wheels of brown hair that would have never been allowed to flourish if he had kept it regulation length like Greg had. He had also grown out a beard, it draped over his Adam's apple like a thick curtain. After a cautious wave, James and Greg sat down at a secluded window seat where James had been working on his laptop. While the conversation started out pleasant with James remarking that he had forgotten what good coffee had tasted like during his service, the conversation soon went to a topic that Greg dreaded.

“And the nightmares you told me about… Do you still have them?”

Greg didn’t want to answer that question. He wasn’t sure why. James was always a comedian, but he would never make fun of Greg for revealing something so serious especially if he was the one asking. Yet, whenever he tried to say something about it he was reminded of all the fear he had felt in those moments and was forced to back down. Perhaps he was still in denial.

“Look man, it’s ok to say yes, I had them too when I first came back. I’m not claiming to be your therapist, but I am here for you.”

Some dainty crumbs flew towards Greg as James was in the middle of eating what felt like the thousandth pastry he had gotten from the counter. He was deep into a second cup of decaf, still steaming and fresh from the pot. Meanwhile, the indistinguishable mixture of cream and coffee staring up at him from his cup was slowly becoming more appealing than the person sitting across from him. He couldn’t see his face, but he knew there was a disappointed expression.

“Ok fine, if you don’t want to talk about I won’t push, that’s not why we’re here anyway.”

The knot that had been welling up in Greg’s stomach loosened slightly, he was finally able to tear away his gaze from his coffee and look at his friend. 

“So.. how have you been, besides you know… the nightmares that you won’t tell me about.”

There was a second of hesitation before James quickly backtracked, probably seeing the piercing look on Greg’s face

“I’m kidding! Look, sorry for bringing it up. Humor was my coping mechanism so I thought it would maybe work.”

“No, it’s ok, I’ve been doing fine. It just feels a little weird being back, guess on some level I got used to being on tour.”

“Well I got just the thing for that!  A job. Something that’ll really get you back into the civilian mindset. The pay is, well… not ideal, but it’s something for you to do at least.” He pulled out a brochure from his pocket and handed it to Greg.

The cover screamed techbros who were in too deep on their own. The poster went on about making a super app to solve any user’s needs. They were looking for a full time worker with experience in coding and digital design that had flexible hours. It would’ve easily been something Greg would’ve immediately dived into a couple of years ago. Unfortunately that Greg hasn’t quite been around for a while.

“Why me? Tech hasn’t really been something I’ve done for a long time.”

“Yeah, but you used to. Come on man, it’s the perfect opportunity”

“Look James, I really appreciate this, but I’m not sure if this is the right thing I should do now.”

James frowned.

“Then what is the right thing you need to do right now?”

“I don’t know, I really just want time to think.”

“If you try to figure that out on your own then you’ll never be able to answer your own questions. At least give it a try, I’ve talked with them, it seems like you’ll still have time to do all your thinking, but at least you’ll be on the clock while doing it.”

“Well, if you’re not gonna stop bothering me about it, I might as well see what this is all about.” Greg begrudgingly took the poster, setting a reminder on his phone to call them later.

The two kept their conversation going for a while, James had seemed to mostly move on from Greg and began to talk about his own escapades. James was doing HR for some generic sounding office based company while finding time to run a blog on the side. It was some lifestyle stuff that Greg never really cared for, but he was happy that James had found something to do at least.

“Awesome dude!” James gave him a playful slap on the back, “Can’t wait to see proper civilian Greg for real this time!”

“Yeah… me too…” Greg muttered as the two walked out the door.

*

“Thanks to the actions of Private Williams and his team, we were able to expose and then cut off a crucial supply line to the eastern side of the forest…”

The debrief had been going on for what felt like an eternity to Greg. All he really wanted to do was jump immediately into the next mission. After the rough day, all he wanted to do was earn the respect of his commanding officer, that embarrassment was something he did not want to experience again.

‘Williams!” The familiar stern voice pierced through his inner thoughts.

“Yes sir!” Greg straightened out, fixing whatever was wrong with his posture.

“Stay behind for a sec, everyone else is dismissed.”

Some goofy oohs and ahs came with his leaving squad mates as the commander’s imposing form sat in front of him.

“Command just wanted me to inform you that they’ve taken notice of your hard work, and from me personally I just want to say that I’m impressed at how well you’ve recovered from day one. I think your squad has had a very impressive success rate considering you’re all rookies.”

“Thank you, sir. Just doing our duty.”

“That’s good to hear, and because you all have been carrying out your duty so well, we feel like you guys might be ready for some bigger missions.”

Greg didn’t even try to contain the smile overtaking his face, “Thank you, sir, that means a lot.”

“You’ll want to get all the rest you can, we’ll be reassigning your squad to another section tomorrow.”

“I won’t disappoint you, sir!” Greg shot out of his seat and gave the cleanest salute he had ever given.

“Good, get to it then,” The commander returned the salute and walked towards the door, “let’s see what the real Greg is made of.”

*

The next thing on his notes app was a small office no more than a fifteen-minute walk away from the coffee shop. It was a small inconspicuous brick building that Greg would’ve missed had he not been actively looking for the building number. The door was a deep brown, nothing too special yet he felt that it was almost beckoning him to come in. Luckily, that was why he was there.

Upon entering the building, there was a small waiting room. Some small couches and a large sofa faced an empty desk with a shiny metal bell. The words “ring for service” on a plaque sitting right in front of said bell. Everything was arranged neatly, perhaps a little too neatly for Greg’s tastes. The silence was also a bit off-putting for Greg, he felt a little too alone like this.

“Hello?”

A voice came from behind him and he almost ran right out the door.

“Jesus, you can’t creep up on people like that…” Greg composed himself, no sense in embarrassing himself any further.

A young woman, not looking much older than Greg stood in front of him. She was wearing a semi-professional-looking outfit complete with a blazer and everything.

“Well… you did come inside.” There was a hint of sass in the reply that annoyed Greg as much as it intrigued him.

“I suppose you’re right. Anyways, I’m here to see Dr. Larson.”

“That would be me, right this way.” Without waiting for him, she started down a hallway on the left, gesturing to a room.

Pretty soon the two were sitting across from each other, large windows on almost all sides of the room letting in a large amount of natural light ensuring that they could see each other clearly.

“So, Greg, why have you come today?” Dr. Larson had a notepad in hand but was fully focused on Greg.

“Well, I’ve been having trouble sleeping lately.”

“Ok… would you care to tell me why?”

“It’s kinda hard to explain. I’m not sure, just what should I do to get better sleep?”

“That’s not really an answer, and if it was really nothing then just taking melatonin would do the trick. There has to be a reason why you specifically chose to meet with a therapist.”

“No you’re probably right,” Greg stood up and started walking towards the door.

“Greg.” The sternness in her voice froze Greg in place.

“What?”

“I can see that you’re not ready to explore what’s really bothering you, but just know that it’s important that you are taking the steps to deal with it now.”

“Sure… uh thanks.” Greg gave a quick smile and darted out of her office.”

*

“Command wants us to secure this area,” The patrol captain’s crackly voice came clear through Greg’s earpiece, “this area has been quiet for a few weeks so that’s all the more reason we get this done.”

“So we’re expecting nothing?” another team member asked.

“Yep, low risk mission, we just have to make sure that the perimeter hasn’t been breached.”

Some more words were spoken, but soon they became muddy as Greg’s eyelids threatened to close for one of the many times that night. He had been awake for well over 36 hours at this point. He had been promising himself that this mission would be the last one for the last few in a row, but perhaps this time it actually was time to take a rest after this one. He could only do so much to keep himself in the game.

He shook off his momentary tiredness to refocus on what the patrol captain was saying, “-Team one is getting off here, team two will follow us on my signal.”

As the other team left, Greg made sure to recheck his gear. His radio was charged, rifle loaded, and his vest was strapped tight to his chest. It was probably going to be a while before the moving orders came in so he propped himself against a tree, watching the setting sun go down below the treetops. He was in the middle of dozing off yet again when the signal to move finally came.

The first leg of the journey was uneventful, the regular check-ins between the two groups pointed to what the briefing said: it was going to be a quiet night. Greg was finally glad to be moving, it helped keep the constant temptation to sleep at bay. He hated how the trees seemed to lean in towards them in the dark, gradually making it feel like he was being constricted into a labyrinth of leaves and branches. He found some comfort shining his flashlight at them, almost like that was the only thing keeping them away. Suddenly, he saw a bright glint through the treeline almost as if his light had passed over a mirror. 

He stopped and looked towards the rest of his group, their pace had been a little slow and he was at the back. There was probably no harm in going off the path for a second to make sure that he was thorough. He would just be away for a moment, quick enough to catch up and report on what he saw if it was significant. Kept periodically shining his light in the general direction, making sure to always confirm that the object was there. The ground was covered in fallen leaves and undergrowth, he was making sure to watch his step.

Whether it was his own carelessness or tiredness, he let his guard down for a moment right as he was about to reach his destination. Just as he was getting close enough to take a closer look, he suddenly felt a floaty sensation as his foot went right through a patch of leaves. Greg tumbled for a bit, quickly approaching the bottom of the ditch where a rather large rock sat. There was nothing he could do as the rock rapidly approached and Greg’s world went black.

“Williams! Where are you!” Greg was jolted awake by the deafening shout that came through his ear piece.

He wasn’t sure how long he had been out. The only thing that brought him back to reality was a massive explosion that shook the ground around him. He did his best to shake the grogginess from his body as he climbed out of the ditch, his mind beginning to hear the cacophony of sounds that was his squad mate’s radio chatter.

“Get eyes on our attackers!”

“Man down! Man down!”

“Somebody get command, tell them we need reinforcements!”

“Get some cover you’re gonna die!”

“Where are you guys! I’m gonna be there!” Greg hoped they could hear him, he could barely squawk those words as he clawed his way back to the surface.

He quickly made his way back to the path and immediately began to sprint in the direction of the rest of his squad. He could only hope that he wasn’t going to be too late.

*

“I was too late…” Greg clenched his fists, hoping that the same ditch would swallow him away from this conversation right now.

“Too late for what.” Dr. Larson sat across from him, except this time there was no notebook in sight. 

Greg had a tough time reading her expression, she was staring intently as if she was paying attention, but behind it all, she was definitely taking a mental note. As much as she had learned about Greg, Greg had learned about her just as much in return.

“By the time I reached them, they had all been slaughtered,” Greg started to break down further, “If I hadn’t been so stupid and gone off alone, maybe I could’ve been there to make a difference…”

“Greg, Stop, what did we say?”

“I know I know, but you know, it’s hard not to feel that way.”

“Let’s keep focusing on the positive here, a big step is understanding why you feel that way is revisiting the incident itself.”

“Yeah… I guess I haven’t really opened up to anyone about it, not even James.” 

“I think the more time you spend looking at this incident rationally, the less time you will spend treating the moment the way you have been treating it.

Greg had stopped crying at this point. If anything, finally being able to revisit that moment brought a great sense of relief. There had been so much bottled up in repressing that one moment that Greg was just glad to finally be rid of it for now.

“Now let's shift our focus to something else, how is your job?”

“Oh the job is going well, to be honest, I don’t really know how either of them got anything done before I was there.”

“That’s nice, so I take it you’ve been whipping them into shape.”

“Something like that, I’m still the new guy so there’s not much I can really say that they’ll listen to. I’m really just doing my job.”

“How much do you remember from your college days?”

“It’s sorta coming back, spending two years away from the field hasn’t done me any favors, but apparently this old dog can learn a few tricks.”

“Well, I’m glad to hear that your professional life seems to be getting back on track as well.”

“Yeah, and if things go really well I might be able to even go back into school for this stuff, do it for real and not try to piece something together with those guys.”

“All good things to hear,” Dr. Larson pulled up her watch, “well unfortunately that is all the time we have today, but I think we made some true progress today.”

“Yeah… that was something, I’ll be sure to keep what you said in mind doctor.”

As Greg left the office he immediately got a call from his boss.

“Greg, where are you!? We have a scheduled work meeting in less than an hour and you still haven’t even clocked in yet!” A crabby voice blared through his phone.

“Coming boss, I’ll be there soon!” Greg immediately hung up and started to walk towards the nearest bus stop.

For the first time in what felt like a long time, Greg felt himself smile as he started off at a brisk pace down the sidewalk.