“No, what you see as a mistake is wisdom,” said my father. “Perfection is the province of God and therefore unattainable. That’s what the rug means. Nothing is perfect.” He teased the threads of the four-pointed leaf with his maimed hand. He spread his hand over the different leaf. “It’s just like me,” he said. “All you can do is try.”   

“Who made it?”

“The owner’s wife started the rug. His daughter finished it for her dowry. The groom’s family demanded more and when it couldn’t be paid, her in-laws burned her to death with cooking oil. The mother died from grief. The father murdered the groom’s family and reclaimed the carpet.” 

“Damn, dad, that’s a terrible story.”

“I know. It makes me wonder how something so beautiful can be connected to something so terrible. I come out here sometimes after I dream of the burned woman and I just unroll it and…I don’t know, just look at it. Sometimes, I just need to. Do you understand?”

“I think so.”

*****************

I come from a family of service and sacrifice, but I did not join the Marine Corps like my father and sister. I joined the U.S. Navy and deployed on board the USNS Samaritan, the world’s largest hospital ship and the U.S Navy’s contribution to the Multi-National Humanitarian Expeditionary Force. Once construction is finished, her sister ships, the Savior and Salvation will fill out the rotation. There are parts of the world that are horrifying for their level of human suffering. For the disaffected and disenfranchised, misery is a powerful recruiting tool and that is what we seek to undermine. For my part, I fly logistics and medical evacuations in a MH-70 helicopter. I fight on a different front than my father and sister.

When I had finished flight training, my father pinned Meghan’s wings on my chest.    

On the side of my ship, an artistically inclined mechanic painted an image of my sister dressed out in one of the old-style green flight suits. Behind her, an Osprey soars amongst sunlit clouds. The whole image blends into the tactical gray paint. The pin up is a bit sexier than the reference photo I gave the mech. Her smile is edged with seduction and a bit inappropriate for a helicopter deployed to a hospital ship, but the mechanic captured something in her eyes that is all her, so the painting stays.

*****************

I have a daughter, her name is Meghan, and she told me she wants to be a Marine like her grandfather.

“Don’t ask me where she got that idea from. I didn’t fill her head with such nonsense,” said my father. Softer, he added, “I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.”

He spent a lot of time with her, practically living in my house while I deployed. He said it was to help my wife out, but it was really because he was lonely since mom died and the chemotherapy treatments from the war cancers were wearing him down. He was still lean and Marine, but a lot slower than he used to be. Sometimes he forgets things, but never the things he wanted, or needed, to forget. When he visits, he unpacks a photo of himself and mom standing at the top of Oahu’s famous Haiku stairs trail. He proposed to her at the summit, and another hiker took the picture. Their arms are wrapped around each other. Her left hand with her engagement ring rests on his chest. Hawaiian rain forest, softened by cloud frame them. He would place it so he could see it while lying down. At night he would press his fingertips to his lips and touch mom’s photo.

He did the same with Meghan’s photo. She is standing in front of her Osprey, her blue eyes visible above the dark aviator glasses held at the end of her nose with fingertips. Her hair is a windblown tangle behind her. She looks fierce and feminine and all Marine.

*****************

When my father last visited, my daughter took him by the hand and led him down to the end of the boat dock to watch the mullet jump in the evening light.     

“Do you know why you love me so much?” she asked.

“You tell me,” he said.

“Because we are so much alike,” said my daughter.

“Yes, we are,” he replied.

I fear the day when I find out exactly how much alike they are.

My wife set the outside table. The air was soft and cool and a breeze kept the mosquitos at bay. Dragons and damsels coursed across the sky on blurred wings. The outside thermometer read 68 degrees Fahrenheit and the dosimeter showed green. When my father and daughter returned from their adventure at the end of the pier, we sat and ate.

“I have some news for all of you,” said my wife.

*****************

I named my son William Victor, after my father. One halcyon morning, I saw that he had taken the small flat-bottomed skiff we used for fishing. He never came back. Deep in the salt marsh at the end of a labyrinth of narrow waterways, there is a small island. Upon that island is a giant oak. The tree of life spans the 100-foot long island with its immense branches. He left a note and all it said was, “I’m sorry. I love you.” 

Twenty veterans a day commit suicide in the United States and that rate has been consistent since 2017. The only answer I can offer is that sometimes the war kills you years later. War is like the ocean. If steeped in it long enough, it becomes part of you.

When I need to, I stand barefoot upon the tree of life and cry for my father who came home broken, my mother who held him together as long as she could, and my sister who never returned. I think of the mother and bride toiling for years to craft something pointlessly beautiful. I think of the blind burned woman who haunted my father’s dreams. I pray they are in each other’s good company.

In my study, the morning light slants through the windowpanes and illuminates the carpet, and I can hear the rustle of leaves and the flutter of wings. I can feel the soft grass beneath my feet. The lovers embrace beneath the tree of life, and I feel better.

Mike Barretta is a retired naval aviator who works for a major defense contractor. He holds a masters degree from the Naval Postgraduate School in Strategic Planning and International Negotiations and a Masters degree in English (creative writing) from the University of West Florida. His stories have appeared in Apex, Redstone, New Scientist, Orson Scott Card’s Intergalactic Medicine Show, and various anthologies including the Young Explorer’s Adventure Guide, War Stories, and The Year’s Best Military Sci-fi and Space Opera.

This originally appeared on CIMSEC in 2019.

Image: Reuters.