It Only Hurts Me When I Laugh
Once there was a man who had almost everything he could want.
Almost.
The house was big. His wife was gorgeous. The kids were relatively good, kind hearted and strong.
Patients loved him. Everyone loved him.
Except...
It was getting hard to breathe lately. Waves of anxiety clenched him at the thought of leaving that big house. He wanted to drink but didn't dare. Just seeing Margaret brought up old memories that would leave him clenching the bedsheets and dripping sweat.
"Spun in. No survivors," he woke up saying one night. A puzzled Margaret clicked the light on.
"You said..."
"The war was a long time ago. I must have been dreaming," he sighed, turning over. He was shaking.
Some twenty years had passed since Hawkeye left Korea in the dust. Why now? Why, when everything had fallen into place so smoothly, did the panic bubble up and leave him scared?
He was twitchy. He rubbed his lower lip until it bled. Now he couldn't sleep because the guns would go off and the camp would arise from dreams. Blood was everywhere.
"I believe in God, but sometimes it's a struggle to accept what He hands us," Father Mulcahy once said. Hawkeye didn't understand it at the time. He thought it was all in check.
It wasn't. It never was.