I decided to ask them to postpone their visit.
Before I’d returned from Afghanistan, I’d telephoned each of them, explaining everything about Sebastian: how we’d met, why we’d been forced apart. It had been deeply uncomfortable, and I was afraid of their censure. Instead they’d been supportive, although I could tell that they were hurt that I’d never been completely candid with them before. I hoped they understood my reasons. I hadn’t told them we were engaged, although I wasn’t sure why.
I took my phone and walked down to the beach alone.
“Nic, it’s Lee.”
“Hey, honey! What time do you want us tomorrow?”
“Look, it’s not good timing. Sebastian is… struggling. He’s not ready to meet anyone.”
She could hear the tremor in my voice.
“Fuck that, Lee! I want to see you. This isn’t something you have to do by yourself.”
“I know that, Nic, but now just isn’t good. Maybe in a few weeks.”
There was a short silence.
“How bad is it, Lee?”
“Bad,” I said. “Really bad.”
And then I started crying, and couldn’t stop.
Nicole listened to me sobbing into the phone for several minutes. When I finally began to calm down, she spoke to me firmly.
“Lee, you need professional help on this; Sebastian needs professional help. Can’t the VA hospital do something? I mean, the military has programs to help with exactly this problem.”
I shook my head wearily, wishing she was there to throw a comforting arm around me.
“He refuses to talk to anyone, Nic. He barely talks to me. I don’t know what to do – he says he’s had enough of hospitals and never wants to see another doctor. I get that, and I feel the same in some ways, but I’m at the end of my rope here. And he’s drinking; he hardly eats. He doesn’t touch me, and won’t let me touch him. I don’t know what to do.”
She hesitated for a moment.
“Are you sure you want to do this at all, Lee?”
I took a sharp intake of breath.
Out of everything I thought she’d say, that had been furthest from my thoughts. And I had considered that I might not be what he needed, but I’d always assumed that he’d be the one to walk away.
“I can’t abandon him now, Nic. He needs me, more than ever.”
“I’m sure he does, but unless he accepts your help, you can’t do anything. He has to want to get better.”
I knew she was right; I just wasn’t sure what to do about it.
By then the nightmares had started, too. Or rather, I hadn’t realized how bad they had become, but now we were sharing a bed, it became clear to me how traumatic they really were. Sebastian would have intense dreams and wake up screaming. Once, I thought he was going to attack me, his flashback was so vivid. He held back at the last second, his eyes wild and black with terror; I think it was seeing my fear that stopped him from… from hurting me.
He started checking that the windows and doors were locked two or three times a night before we went to bed, and he became paranoid about people coming to the house, whether it was the mailman or one of our neighbors dropping a leaflet through the door.
He refused to leave the house, but hated me going out, too. We became virtual recluses. I tried to carry on working, but there was only so much I could do from home, and I began to resent his attempts to control me.
One day, he yelled at me because there was no alcohol in the house, and I’d refused to buy any more.
And I yelled back.
“If you want a fucking drink, then get your fucking ass off that couch and go get yourself one, Sebastian!”
I marched out of the bungalow, my blood boiling.
I felt horribly guilty the moment I slammed the door behind me, but I so wasn’t backing down. We’d reached an impasse: something had to change.