Written Fireside is the brainchild of the fabulous and lovely Lori Connelly and this is the fourth time I've taken part. I'm particularly happy to be writing part of this story because it will eventually be published with all proceeds going to the charity Pets For Vets. This is a US charity dedicated to providing a second chance to shelter dogs by rescuing, training and matching them with American veterans who need a companion pet.
Noah Hale is an author suffering from PTSD related insomnia, needing peace and sleep. All he wants is to be left alone. A certain little dog has other ideas.Catch up with the story so far here...
PART 1 - Lori Connelly
PART 2 - Elsa Winckler
PART 3 - Angela Campbell
PART 4 - Jane Hunt
And without further ado, here is my PART 5...
Noah sensed the explosion even before it tore through the armoured vehicle. A sense of something huge, an expanding force beneath him, the air tightening. Then came the explosion, so loud it forced out everything else in his consciousness. The falling, the crashing impact of the ground against his shoulders and back, and a moment of perfect, clear silence before the screaming kicked in. Disorienting blackness, the acrid bite of smoke in his throat and his eyes. Then he became aware, through the darkness, vaguely at first, of a slight weight on his chest and something wet swiping at his face. He swatted at it blindly, his mind focusing on that one small sensation, one thing that didn’t fit with the all-consuming sense-crushing flashback.
He opened his
eyes. Gertie paused mid-lick, then apparently decided he still needed reviving
and got right back to it. She was sitting on his chest. The screaming, the
smoke, the blackness disappeared as he raised shaking hands to pet the small
dog. His body, catching up with his mind, was braced against the hard
flagstones of the yard. He relaxed his taut muscles slowly as the pounding of
his heart and the beads of sweat on his face began to subside.
Not the roadside in Afghanistan. His
duplex. The cool darkness of his neighbour’s yard.
‘Noah?’
His neighbour.
‘Noah?’
The sudden memory
of Amanda’s scream made him sit up and Gertie jumped from his chest to the ground.
Amanda was kneeling
on the flagstones next to him and as he sat bolt upright she pressed a hand
tentatively against his shoulder. Gertie capered around them.
‘Are you OK?’ she
said gently. ‘You scared the hell out of me.’
Her worried blue
eyes were inches from his own. He fought a mad impulse to just lean that short
distance and kiss her, to just block out the horrific past with her reality.
‘You can talk,’
he said. ‘I heard you scream and then I lost my footing. No big deal.’ He had
no desire to talk through his nightmares with her, to taint her view of him with
the baggage of his past. ‘What the hell happened? Are you hurt?’
She shook her
head.
‘I’m fine,’ she
said. ‘I got through the window alright but then I tried to climb down and fell
on the dressing table.’ She held up her wrapped hand a little. ‘Bruised butt
and this. I got off lightly except that I broke the mirror. Seven years bad
luck, as if I need any more.’ She offered him a small smile.
He got to his
feet and held his hand out to help her up, oversensitive to every touch of her
skin against his.
‘Let’s get you
inside and see to that hand. I’ve got first aid stuff in my kitchen.’
He
had held her hand a beat too long, making butterflies flip in her stomach. His
side of the duplex was so military-tidy, almost austere, a major contrast to the
girly clutter in her own side of the building. Gertie ran ahead and capered
around the floor, as if she thought the place needed livening up too. What had
happened in the yard continued to gnaw at Amanda, despite his brush-off
assurance that it was no big deal, distracting her for once from the relentless sensation of missing Rachel that plagued her everywhere she looked. Seemingly
unaware of her presence, Noah had been thrashing and shouting at something or
someone who wasn’t there. When she tried to rouse him, he’d been bathed in
sweat and the look in his eyes when he opened them had been one of panic.
No big deal.
Ten minutes later
and her cut was cleaned and dressed and he apparently couldn’t get her out of the duplex
fast enough.
‘Thank you for
helping me get back in,’ she said.
He held the door open for her.
‘Even if you did
pay for it with your hand?’
She shrugged.
‘Without you, I’d
still be out there and Gertie would be stuck inside. I’d never get a locksmith
out this late. You have to take a risk sometimes, right?’
He didn’t answer.
****
Sleep was the enemy. The terror of the panic
attack was still fresh in his mind. Two attacks in these last weeks. I’m regressing. Dread coursed through
him at the thought. He’d come so far with his therapy. He’d thought he had some
level of control. Putting his negative relationship with Jessica behind him had
been another healing step forward.
Sleep was out of
the question.
From the depths
of a kitchen cupboard, he grabbed a six pack of Red Bull that he hadn’t touched
in months. His old weapon against sleep from the early days of his struggle
with PTSD, from the time before Mary’s counsel, when avoiding sleep had been
his go-to course of action.
Just for this one
night, he told himself. He couldn’t face the thought of another night-terror so
quickly on the heels of the last one. For this night only, sleep could go to
hell. He drank a can of Red Bull off straight, then took a second out to his
yard and sat down in the chair, letting the caffeine course through his veins
and spike his awareness. The night air was cool and sweet against his skin. He
glanced across at Amanda’s side of the duplex, now in darkness, his mind
imagining her before he could stop it, asleep in bed in her insubstantial vest
and pants, her dark hair fanning across the pillow. He swallowed hard, and took
a huge slug of his drink to distract himself. Her gentle concern for him had
touched him, but he couldn’t allow himself to be seduced by that. Who knew what
she might become if she knew the truth about him. Would her sweet concern
transform into exasperated impatience, the way it had with Jessica?
His eyes felt
gritty with tiredness and he rubbed his hands slowly over them.
The whining
started perhaps an hour after Amanda had finally got to sleep, the painkiller
that Noah had pressed on her at last kicking in and diminishing the discomfort
from her throbbing hand. She’d tried at first to ignore the racket by squashing
the pillow over her head, but Gertie had just turned up the volume and now she’d
added door scratching into the mix.
‘Gertie, be
quiet!’ she groaned, exasperated.
In apparent
triumph that she’d managed to wake Amanda up, Gertie launched into a series of
excited yaps.
For Pete’s sake.
Amanda dragged herself
out of bed, forced one eye open and staggered to the back of the kitchen, where
Gertie was now hurling herself at the door.
She leaned close to
the window and frowned, then checked the illuminated numbers of the kitchen
clock just to be sure. It was three in the morning and Noah was sitting out in
the yard, apparently having a drink.
She undid the
lock, being careful to latch it this time – there would be no repeat performance
of the earlier locking-out debacle, thank you very much – and stepped out barefoot
into the cool darkness. Gertie dashed ahead, found her way through the dividing
fence and threw herself at Noah.
‘Noah?’
He jumped
guiltily, then turned to nod a greeting as if it was perfectly normal to sit on
your patio in the small hours. There was a long pause as he groped for
something to say that wouldn’t make him sound like a total arse.
‘What’s wrong?’
she asked softly, and her voice was so kind and gentle that it made his heart
twist in his chest.
‘Nothing,’ he
said, gruffly. He leaned down to pick up his drink so he didn’t have to look at
her, took a sip. ‘I’m sorry if I woke you. I thought I was being pretty quiet.’
‘You didn’t,’ she
said. ‘That pain in the arse of a dog woke me. And you might want to sit outside in the middle of the night on your
own but she’s having none of it. She was clawing the door down to get to you.’
He put the drink
on the ground, then pushed his chair back and picked Gertie up. She snuggled
against him as he crossed the yard to Amanda.
‘What the hell is
it with you?’ he whispered to the little dog.
Amanda’s dark
hair hung in loose sleep-waves and her skin shone smooth in the moonlight. He
wondered if her cheek felt as silken to the touch as it looked.
He handed Gertie
across the fence. Amanda took the little dog from him but didn’t step down and
head back into the duplex. Instead she held his gaze with her blue eyes, making
his pulse quicken.
‘I’m having trouble
sleeping,’ he said, because she was obviously waiting for some kind of
explanation.
‘I’m not surprised
if you’re downing Red Bull at three in the morning.’ She nodded at the can of
drink on the ground next to his chair. ‘Are you mad? Most people would go for
cocoa and maybe a warm bath.’
He avoided her gaze.
Gertie looked from one of them to the other.
‘Well if you think giving her back to me is
going to cut the mustard, you’re deluded,’ Amanda said at last. ‘This dog is on
a mission. You’d better come round to mine.’
‘What?’
She stepped down
from the fence and put Gertie on the ground.
‘Come round to
mine. I’ll make us both some warm milk and we can talk it over. Whatever’s
bugging you.’
Her voice was
matter of fact. She had not the slightest clue what can-of-hideous-worms a chat
with him would open up. He stared after her. He didn’t do talking it over with virtual strangers.
‘Come on,’ she
said again. Gertie ran from Amanda back to Noah at the fence, yapping madly. ‘She’s
not going to quit that until you do. She’ll wake the street.’
Gertie jacked up the volume, clearly determined
that he would not be getting out of any midnight talk with his gorgeous
neighbour, no matter how ill-advised it might be.
‘OK,’ he said at
last, giving in.
His last relationship had been a train-wreck
and now he was apparently relying on relationship advice from a dog.
You can read Part 6, written by Mandy Baggot, on Tuesday 28th July.
Follow the story, and please share xx
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