Saving Sonny James

Because at times he’d still been in a lot of pain, and a few times he’d had plenty of—too much—pain medication, and then there had also been those other, weirder times that Sonny couldn’t explain. Luki would just check out right in the middle of a conversation, stay completely blank until he’d suddenly say, “He was just a kid,” or, “He had the greenest eyes.” Those times never lasted long, though, and Luki’s pain got less and less, and Sonny just didn’t expect the thing that happened to Luki not long after they got home. It was almost like Luki… died inside. Like whatever made him Luki drained off and left Sonny a handsome and heart-wrenching Luki-like shell.

It didn’t really matter that Sonny knew psychological trauma did this to others: soldiers, agents of the law, people who relied on violent skills to guard the world against violence. This development in Luki astounded Sonny. The very idea that Luki Mililani Vasquez could be so overcome, so incapacitated that people felt the need to watch over him, medicate him, counsel him, be careful of him, for God’s sake. It was like weaving a wall-sized tapestry, spending hours with it and knowing every warp and weft intimately, and then one day discovering the image had changed from day to night, ocean to desert, rock to dust. How could it make sense?

But Sonny also knew immediately that he didn’t have the power to bring the real Luki back. So he lived his daily life with Luki always in his field of vision—at least figuratively—and he did what he could to help him find what was real from one moment to the next and get where he needed to go when he needed to be there. Theoretically, that wouldn’t be difficult. But Luki, even broken as he was, always wanted to do things Luki’s way.

Luki was supposed to go to psychotherapy, as he was obviously having trouble processing the fact that he’d shot and killed that young guard, whom he insisted on remembering as an innocent kid, completely discounting the indisputable fact that if he hadn’t shot first the green-eyed kid would have killed him. Luki still had the badge he’d so sneakily reenlisted for behind Sonny’s back before they even knew Luki’s teenage nephew Jackie was missing. Sonny hadn’t wanted him to do that, but the agency shield had come in handy when it turned out Jackie’s sicko kidnapper also happened to be a large scale moonshiner. Who would have imagined such a coincidence!

Sonny still harbored no great fondness for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, but he had to admit his pleasant surprise. The powers that be at ATF wouldn’t let Luki resign, not until they saw to it that he took advantage of every resource they could throw at him that might make him well. What was happening to Luki wasn’t unusual, Sonny had learned. Agents of the law sometimes killed people and—if they were good people themselves—it messed with their heads. Or hearts, perhaps. So agencies like ATF had a response in place involving professional care, and they enforced—by means Sonny didn’t understand—their directive that the sick must be treated. But Luki seemed to take the Bureau’s no, you can’t resign at face value.

So Luki was supposed to go to the therapist, and he was supposed to take the pills the agency psychiatrist prescribed to go with the counseling. One for depression. One for anxiety. One for nightmares. Sonny thought Luki might have tried them all, but he knew for sure that after the first few days he wasn’t taking any of them, and he certainly wasn’t meeting with the psychotherapist twice each week. Not even once a month. For the most part, what Luki did was lie in bed, sometimes sleeping but sometimes not. And when Luki wasn’t sleeping, he spent a great deal of time staring, and sometimes patting Bear, who looked annoyed but long-suffering. Luki would turn the TV on and not watch it. He’d read but never turn the page—wouldn’t even remember to put on his reading glasses. He would come to the dinner table and not eat. Some days he lay in bed, got up to piss, maybe drank some water, asked, “What time is it,” and went back to bed no matter the answer.

Thank goodness for physical therapy; if not for that scheduled activity, the physical demand, and maybe exactly the right kind of guy for a therapist, Luki might never have left his bed except to go to the toilet or the couch. Sonny couldn’t begin to explain what was different about PT—why Luki would do that but nothing else. Whatever the explanation, on PT days, Luki showered and dressed, actually had coffee and breakfast, and with Sonny behind the wheel of the Mustang, rode to Sequim to the clinic. He went in and listened to instructions and tested his muscles to their full capacity, and sometimes stayed dressed and up until dark.

He went to PT three times a week, thanks to Sonny, who had begged Luki’s doctor to make that a must, because Luki wouldn’t go to psych therapy, and an extra PT session was better than no extra session at all. His physiotherapist, Val, was a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom, and himself suffered PTSD—Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, a fitting name for the condition. Sonny didn’t think Luki’s assignment to Val’s caseload was an accident. Luki didn’t talk to Val, of course. He didn’t talk to anyone. Not even Sonny or his uncle Kaholo. No one. Well, no one except Bear. But when Val talked to Luki, which wasn’t a whole lot, Luki seemed to listen.

And though Luki’s mind, heart, and soul gave no sign they might be healing, his body regained its fitness. Sonny had never truly realized just how monster strong Luki’s deceptively compact muscles had been. He’d never tried to quantify it in any way until he watched Luki squat well over three hundred pounds before the thigh muscles were even firmly healed. Rather than having lost any strength, by the time Val had worked with Luki for five or six weeks, Sonny thought Luki was probably stronger than ever.

And he was utterly beautiful. And now, having backed the Mustang out and pulled it around to the house, Sonny sat with the engine idling, watching Luki, the only real lover he’d ever had or ever wanted, approach the car with the same sure stride and icy gaze he’d always had. He wanted him. He lusted after every inch of soon-to-be sweaty skin and well-trained muscle. Wanted to drag his tongue up every salty valley, mouth every rise and mound, coax him hard, and suck the cream from his cock.

But—even on PT days—Luki wasn’t interested. He rolled over and went to sleep before Sonny could so much as kiss him good night. Or if Sonny reached out to hold Luki, or tried to walk into the shelter of his arms, his blessed arms, he gave Sonny a quick squeeze and platonic peck on the cheek. And Sonny really, really needed holding.

“Give it a little time,” Kaholo had said on the phone.

Sonny knew he might be right—they’d only been home three and a half weeks.

“Don’t give up on ’im, Sonny.”

That pissed Sonny off. He was the one who was there every day, trying to keep their life in some kind of order, trying to outlast Luki’s trouble. “I’m not,” he said, sounding more vexed than he’d intended. “I won’t, I can’t. But I don’t know what to do. I can’t just wait for him to get over this when he isn’t even trying.”

“Well… I know a little bit about this, about how it might be for him. Did Luki ever mention to you about the time I was in Vietnam? What my job was?”

“You were a sharpshooter, a sniper.”

“That’s right. So of course you know that the only job a sniper has is to kill the man in his sights. The thing is, even back then we had good optics, good enough to get a really good look at the human being on the other end. For me, well, I’m fairly practical.”

Sonny smiled at the understated description, even though Kaholo couldn’t see the expression a thousand miles away in Nebraska.

“So,” Kaholo went on, “I figured a job is a responsibility, and a soldier’s gotta take the job he’s given, and in a war some jobs are less… desirable than others. Time and again I’d get my mark in my sights and shoot him dead. In my mind I said words for the stranger—which is just my way—but then I forgot him. But one time it turned out different.

“My platoon was hidden, see, in a gulch, thick vegetation down there, and we knew we couldn’t be seen from camp, even though it wasn’t far. But we had to move—we had to join up with the rest of our company. We figured out a way to go—we wouldn’t be in their line of sight if we crossed the stream and headed up behind a rise. But every time we made a move to get out, the enemy knew, and they hit us hard and we’d go running back to hide. We couldn’t figure out how they knew our movements. Finally, my lieutenant spotted motion on a tiny ledge high up on a rock face perpendicular to the cleft we’d taken cover in.

“‘That’s where they’re getting the news from, Hula Boy,’ he said. ‘That’s your mark.’ So I did my job, got the Viet Cong soldier in my sights. But he wasn’t much more than a boy. He was alone, looked scared. I started to lower my rifle—no man wants to shoot a child. But just then our soldiers started to move, the first two stepped out to cross the creek, and I saw the boy pick up a flashlight and start to signal. I lifted my gun, took aim, and fired. It was part of my job to make sure I killed the mark, so I watched through my sights. He looked right at me, his eyes liquid brown and resigned. A red fountain poured down the side of his head, and then he fell…. Shit,” Kaholo said. “It’s hard talking about that, even after all this time.”

“Kaholo, you didn’t have to—”

“No, Sonny, I didn’t have to. But I thought maybe, if I told you how that tormented me for months—hell for years, off and on, maybe I can help you understand my nephew a little bit—maybe understand all he’s going through and all he’s putting you through.”

“Yes,” Sonny said, feeling overwhelmed.

“Luki and me, we’re not much the same, Sonny, except we’re both big Hawaiian dudes.” Kaholo laughed, and it gave Sonny permission to do the same. But then Kaholo continued. “And then, too, his heart’s as soft as mine, maybe softer. He told you about that guard, right? No more than a boy, green and scared and undoubtedly regretting signing on with Marcone’s bunch—though if his family owed loyalty he may have had no choice. A man can see all that, you know? When you look at your mark, if you have any experience of violence… of a soldier’s life, a cop’s life, Luki’s kind of life…. You can see that scared boy and you know him like he was your son or your brother.”

“Green eyes.” Sonny swallowed. “He keeps saying the kid… guard had green eyes.”

“Yes, and I’m thinking that’s like code, Sonny. It’s shorthand for everything he thinks he saw. Luki saw all that in a flash. And then he fired his gun and killed the kid.” Kaholo went silent for a moment, then, just when Sonny was going to try to figure what to say, the old man spoke up. “The thing is, Luki’s just the kind of man who’s going to have a hard time putting that aside, I think.”

“But Luki would have died!”

“He knows that!”

“Then I would have died! If Luki had died, I would be dead or as close to it as makes no difference!” Sonny lashed out with characteristic sudden anger, but Kaholo didn’t deserve it. “I’m sorry.”

“You shouldn’t be, son. What you should do is try to let Luki know you feel that way, and then continue to be patient. You’re doing fine.”

TWO days later, Sonny hoped maybe a chance had come to try to talk to Luki, as Kaholo had suggested. He could hear Luki brushing his teeth—something he didn’t always do on days when he had no therapy appointment. It spurred Sonny to take a chance. “Luki,” he called through the bathroom door. “Honey?”

“Yeah,” Luki said, his husky voice monotone, disinterested. But at least he’d answered.

“I’m going to sit outside to drink my coffee. Shall I bring you a cup?” He waited. Nothing. “Will you join me?”

Nothing… two… three… four….

“Yeah, sure. Thanks.”

Sonny’s knees nearly failed him right then and there. Could this be a turn of the tide? Could there be a flicker of hope? He had to fight his urge to wait right there by the door and make sure Luki came out, but he won that battle. “Okay,” he said, hoping he sounded casual. “I’ll see you out there, then. How many tons of sugar today?” That’s it, Sonny, make it normal, like nothing ever happened… but….

Luki was quiet. But then, like something magical was happening, he chuckled, and joked. “A half ton’s plenty, baby.”

So they sat together on the driftlog that had seen so many of their previous conversations, even their first fight. This time there was no gun, and no cigarettes, so that was a little different, but once again Luki was clad poorly in a pair of Sonny’s ill-fitting jeans, wrapped in a blanket, his chestnut curls swirled this way and that like the finger painting of some childish god. Sonny passed him his coffee. He drank, said, “It’s good.”

Sonny nodded, but found now he didn’t know what to say or do, or for that matter what not to say or do. He had too many hopes that had been lifted too high by this one little gift: Luki had come outside for coffee. How could Sonny speak without dashing it all to the ground? What could he say that would be safe?

“Sonny,” Luki said, just loud enough to be heard over the small sounds of the straits in endless motion and the light September breeze. Sonny looked at him with something close to alarm. Luki met his gaze—something he hardly ever did these days. Then he licked his lips and said a little louder, “I love you. That hasn’t changed.”

Sonny was left speechless. Time went by, and ultimately Sonny did stretch around his fears and answer as expected. “I love you too, Luki. Lots.”

“I know that. When are you leaving?”

“What?”

“For Europe?”

“What?”

“Sonny, I’m crazy, not fucking deaf or blind.” Luki suddenly sounded angry, but what he said pissed Sonny off enough that he didn’t—for once—spare worry for Luki’s feelings.

“You’re not fucking crazy!”

“You only say that because you can’t get inside here!” Luki jabbed at his temple. “Maybe you can’t see it, but believe me, some crazy-ass shit’s going on in there.”

“Then why won’t you go to the psychiatrist, or the therapist? Why won’t you make even the slightest effort to fix whatever the fuck is wrong….” Sonny trailed off. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be.” Luki gathered up his blanket and his coffee mug. “Don’t be,” he said again and trudged back toward the house.

As Luki walked away, kicking up small clouds of fine gray sand in the breeze, Sonny stripped and went to the water’s edge—his almost daily habit. But this time he stood staring at the watery September morning sun. “No,” he said and then shouted, “No! You fucker,” though he had no idea to whom the comment was addressed. “You’ve taken everyone I’ve ever loved from the time I was a little kid! You can’t do this!”

He waited.

He waited.

For what?

Oh fuck it, he thought and ran into the low rolling waves of the Juan de Fuca current.

WHAT the fuck is he doing? Luki had heard Sonny shout, though he couldn’t make out the words; and now he watched Sonny splash out through the shallows, reach the drop off, and sink below the surface. So far—except for what Luki could only think of as Sonny’s attitude—nothing alarming; he splashed out that far all the time. But it seemed like a longer than usual time before he came back up—and then he started swimming out into the channel! What common sense Luki could lay claim to in his compromised state told him that was not a place particularly safe for swimming—nor was this Sonny’s usual behavior.

It alarmed Luki and woke him up. He felt something big stir down deep in his soul; the sleeping paladin, the knight errant that the sharpest, most painful blade could not kill or cut away. And this was—

Sonny!

He dropped his mug and blanket on the grass and glanced around. Coiled a few feet away was a wrist-thick rope Sonny sometimes used to drag logs out of the forest with Melvern’s old truck. One end was secured to an equally thick chain, and Luki didn’t want to be burdened with that, so he grabbed up the machete that always waited just inside the mud porch and hacked through the rope with a few serious strokes. He hoisted the coil on his shoulder and started running toward the water. His vision clouded at first—not by tears, no. But it cleared as he ran, watery fog parting and then melting away. He concentrated on moving his feet as fast as he could, on not tripping on the broken, wild ground. When he could, he looked ahead with confused but clearing vision, watching Sonny move.

Sonny didn’t turn back toward shore. At one point, his head disappeared under the surface, and Luki shouted even though he knew Sonny couldn’t hear him. For the first time in weeks, Luki’s own miseries and confused regrets completely fled his mind. He thought only of Sonny, and of running to save his beloved husband’s life. But about the time Luki was knee-deep in the shallows, Sonny did indeed turn back on his own. He was swimming a little raggedly—not at all his usual graceful stroke—but he was headed toward shore.

Then he stopped—just stopped swimming. He tried to tread water—haphazardly, it seemed—for a couple of startling seconds, then went under. As that was happening, Luki became aware of his own painfully cold feet, and with that he realized all at once what was happening to Sonny. The water in the straits was cold, always. Sonny had a certain tolerance; he was in that water almost every day. But no one could tolerate being immersed in frigid water for very long. It took Luki but an instant to realize this, and he wanted to stop and panic, but the part of him that needed to keep Sonny safe had risen up from beneath the depression and mental fugue that had paralyzed him for weeks. St. Christopher!

In the next instant, Sonny surfaced, but he was already down current about thirty feet. While running in that direction down the beach, Luki observed—his professional training and habit falling into place. Sonny was still trying to swim, a good sign, but he spluttered and splashed. A sand bar jutted out into the straits not too far ahead. It wasn’t long enough for the current to dash Sonny onto it, but if Luki could get there before Sonny went by…. He waved and yelled, hoping to get Sonny’s attention, but he was already running out on the sand spit before Sonny saw him. Sonny was just about to float by, looking more exhausted now, shaking his head “no.” Just before the love of his life would have passed out of his reach—most likely forever—Luki tossed the rope and landed the knotted end almost on top of Sonny.

Probably by instinct, Sonny grabbed it, but then he let go.

“Hold on, Sonny!”

Sonny took it again, but his grip was so feeble Luki knew if he tugged, Sonny would lose his hold. “Sonny, please, baby. Grab on! I know you’re tired! I know you’re cold! But just hold on hard enough and I’ll do the rest. Just hold on!”

At first it wasn’t even clear if Sonny heard him, but he went for the rope, and he latched on hard this time, with two hands above the thick knots that had always been there for some reason Luki didn’t know.

“Ready?”

Sonny nodded, a stiff and exaggerated gesture Luki couldn’t miss.

Luki was already tired. Trying to fight that current with Sonny’s weight added to the wet rope took every ounce of rebuilt strength Luki had. He could feel his still tender thigh muscle straining, possibly tearing. He felt like his neck would snap. But he couldn’t let that matter. This was Sonny’s life. He had to get him safe. If he didn’t do that… unthinkable.