“I think I can handle it,” I assured him. “But it’s up to you.”
His body shifted, making me bob in the short wake of waves. “The crash happened on one of our last ops in Costa Rica, right before we were set to ship back home. Great timing,” he added sarcastically. “The whole thing was routine. Our unit was going in to clear what was tipped off to us as a link in a chain of illegal arms checkpoints, those of which were funneling into the states. Cap led, Wink…” He paused, then clarified, “Sam Swan, you’ll meet him, is a sniper. His brother Tyler, who we call Echo, was the muscle behind the two of them and at least four more guys filing in together. My job was extraction.”
A twist of unease whirled in my stomach like windswept leaves.
“Like I said, easy peasy. The boys drop in, hike the distance through the canopy to the house, and make quick work. But when they got there it was apparent the place had been abandoned. Whoever tipped us off, word got back to the dealers we were on the way and they’d taken off into the village at the base of the valley. Turns out it was a complete guerrilla coup there—nothing like we were prepared for. So my order was to land, pull the guys out, and head back to base to regroup.”
“You didn’t,” I guessed.
Frankie’s head shook languidly back and forth. “I should have done what I was told, but there were kids there. Their mothers were basically throwing them at the chopper when I landed, Ophelia. It’s hard to describe how helpless I felt, how wrong it felt to look at them and say no. If we left and came back and they were gone, that's blood on my hands. It’s a battle I have to have every night with my own conscience.”
I pictured my own students home safe right then, naive to how lucky they were. My throat swelled painfully with a spindle of emotion I tried with fervor to unthread while Frankie continued.
“I started taking people on, and Cap followed my lead for once.” He said deprecatingly. “He’ll never make that mistake again. We pulled as many kids as we could onto the helicopter. The whole time I knew in my gut I was pushing the limit too far and putting us in danger. But I fucking did it anyway.”
Frankie’s knee bounced beneath the water and I reached over to calm it.
“I was halfway to altitude when the first engine went. There was too much weight, but we were too high to drop safely and going back wasn’t an option. Military choppers can handle an engine going, but that’s only with the right amount of bodies on board. Suddenly, it was like I was playing God.
“The choice wasn’t between flying or crashing. It was crashing on the next sliver of flat open land, or taking my chances on the emergency rafts and crashing in the ravine. I figured at least with flat land, no one’s going to have to know how to swim.”
I was chewing a hole in my cheek so deep I tasted iron on my tongue. Frankie gave me the chance to back away from the details, and I understood why. No part of this could be easy to reflect on again. I was grateful he trusted me enough to drum it back up, and I would make damn sure he didn’t regret it.
“I accepted that I made a mistake,” he stressed. “It was my burden to bear, and the best chance of the passengers surviving meant I needed to take the brunt of the impact at the nose and pray I’d done enough good in my life to come out of it.”
“I’m so glad that you did,” I muttered.
“By some saving grace they all survived with minor injuries. Broken bones, a few concussions, nothing fatal. Taken safely into US custody to be reunited with their families. I got tossed around the most, lost almost complete feeling in my back and was pretty sure I was paralyzed, but it was actually the shock that froze me. I truly thought I’d be seeing my dad that day.”
The emotion I’d wrangled before stung my eyes and Frankie laced his fingers through mine on his knee, swiping his thumb back and forth.
“So I had to have what’s called a posterior lumbar spinal fusion, to correct fractures and herniated discs in my lower back,” he explained. “That’s what those scars are that you love to touch when you think I’m sleeping.”
“I’m a little obsessed with what you look like naked,” I admitted quietly. Frankie’s dark eyes softened on cue and I was pleased with myself. “You are so much more than you give yourself credit for. It’s fucking cliché, I don’t care, but you’re a hero. You know that, right?”
“Not flying away from endangered children isn’t heroic, O, it’s human. Unfortunately I’m not as robotic as the military expected me to be. Or Cap, or Sam, or Tyler. We paid for it though, I guess.”
“To those kids you are. I doubt those mothers go a day of their lives without thinking about you. Would you? If it were your kid?”
Frankie’s throat bobbed up and down, the veins in his neck lengthening with the tilt of his neck as he turned toward me. “No,” he conceded. “I wouldn’t.”
“You were meant to be there that day. There’s a reason for everything.”
“Technically, if I didn’t get injured that day I wouldn’t be sitting here right now with you, so maybe you’re onto something, Trouble.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, I got home and immediately went into recovery, which for me was a fuck ton of time lying on my back in bed, feeling sorry for myself. I needed help doing the most basic things, and even shit I could manage on my own became impossible because my mental health was in the gutters. I was convinced I’d never fly again, and honestly afraid to try. Still afraid to try.” Frankie’s voice tapered off. “I was a lot to deal with. Not my proudest moments, and Vanessa suffered for that.”
A chill crawled up my spine and bit into my skin. “Don’t you fucking dare.”
Frankie’s eyes darted to mine, surprise creasing his forehead. “What?”
“She cheated on you.”
“It’s more complicated than that.” He shook his head.
“There’s nothing complicated about it,” I fired back. “You trusted someone with loving you. That doesn’t get a dismissal when things get too hard. You needed her and she fucking gave up on it.”
“I wasn’t there for her like she needed me to be. I was useless for a while.”
“You were fucking hurt! You don’t need to be everyone’s wall, Frankie. I know you now. I know you try so hard for everyone around you all the time and never for yourself. You’re worried about your mom and sister, you’re worried about your friends. You don’t want to leave here and chance someone needing you. But what about you? What happens when Frankie needs something, and everyone else has already gotten what they wanted out of you?”
My chest rose and fell harshly. I’d worked myself up into an embarrassing emotional outbreak and Frankie looked just as perplexed by it. He continued brushing his thumb across the back of my hand softly, tracing my tense body with his eyes. The silence around us roared.
“Are we having our first argument?” he finally replied with a touch of amusement.