The Perfect Union

Excerpt From: The Perfect Union

November 2006

Calleigh Wells was so glad the sun came out from behind the clouds as she walked down the street. Boston had been in a dreadfully rainy pattern over the past week. It had been cold but not enough to turn to snow. She lifted her head to the sky to soak up the burgeoning rays. Now, the temperature was low, but at least, the sun was shining.

She opened the door to Bean Town, her favourite coffee place, and stepped inside. The warm air from the heat flowed over her cheeks that tingled from the crisp air. There were four people ahead of her in line as she tried to decide if she wanted her standby hazelnut latte or if she wanted to be adventurous and try the caramel macchiato.

She felt a vibration against her side and opened her purse to see an incoming call on her iPhone. She didn’t recognise the number, but it was a long distance area code.

“Hello?”

“Is this Mrs. Wells?”

“May I ask who’s calling?” She moved forward a step, glancing to the board and decided to be adventurous on another day. The hazelnut sounded good right then.

“This is Sergeant Cooper. I’m trying to locate Calleigh Wells, wife of Sergeant Kevin Wells.”

“Oh God. No.” Her heart stuttered, and she couldn’t breathe. There was only one reason someone from the Armed Forces would be calling her.

“Mrs. Wells, I regret to inform you that your husband had been injured in the line of duty. He is being transferred to Ramstein Air Force base in Germany.”

She blindly reached out to keep herself from falling down. When she looked up, she had hold of the man’s shirt in front of her. He turned around with a questioning look, but it immediately changed to concern.

“What happened? Is Kevin okay? What—”

“I’m not at liberty to discuss the event. If you wish, I’ll put you in contact with his unit liaison. They will be able to make arrangements for you to fly to Germany. Do you have a pen and paper handy?”

“No…wait…please.” She looked at the two men standing side by side in front of her. “Do you have a pen and paper I can borrow?”

The man with black hair held out a pen while the man with auburn hair grabbed a napkin off the counter beside them. Taking the items, she put the phone back up to her ear. “Okay, I’m ready.” She wrote down the information and ended the call.

She couldn’t seem to move. Her feet were cemented to the floor. She looked around aimlessly, but nothing was in focus. The colours blurred, and her vision swam. She felt herself being guided over to the side and found herself sitting in one of the chairs scattered around the room.

The dark haired man knelt down in front of her. “Are you okay?” He looked up at his auburn-haired friend who had pulled the chair out and was resting his hands on her shoulders. Taking her cold hands between his, the first man rubbed. “Miss? Do we need to get you help?”

His deep voice cut through the haze in her mind. She looked down into a pair of bright sapphire blue eyes. “I need to go home.”

“Okay. Did you drive here?”

She shook her head no. She tried to dial the number to her house, but her hands shook too badly. She held out her phone to the man in front of her. “Can you call? I can’t get it to work. My mom can come get me. She has my babies.”

He took the phone from her shaking hands, and handed it to his friend. “Tell you what? Why don’t we make things easier on your mom? Conor and I will take you home. I’m Rick.” He stopped the woman’s head from shaking back and forth by putting a hand to her cheek. “We are completely safe. I promise you. You can talk to your mom the entire way there if you want.” He helped her to stand and turned her around so she could see Conor behind her.

“Miss. I think I got the number ye wanted,” Conor said, holding out the phone.

She took the phone from the tall man. Her vision was still blurring and all she could decipher were images of red hair and blue-green eyes. She noticed that he had some kind of soft lyrical accent. “Thank you.”