When the Strangers Come

Sparks E. Skyler, Private

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"Babe, I'm home!"

Skyler eased the front door open and stepped inside the house. The sudden gust of frigid air was a welcomed respite from the deathly heat outside and he paused to lose himself in the sensational breeze for a fraction of a moment. Inhaling slowly, he eased the door shut behind him and gently placed his duffel bag down on the ground. The residential house was relatively new. Stark white walls sported little if any decoration aside from a few old pictures of family and friends and a few other knick knacks lay scattered throughout – mostly still in mundanely colored boxes piled in their respective corners.

His boots made a soft thumping noise as they traversed the polished hardwood floor. He moved north and into the dining room. A large table stood directly in the center of the spacious area upon a colorful tapestry, obviously much older than the house itself, and an even more dazzling chandelier dangled above. It swayed eloquently from side to side as the gentle current from the air conditioner connected with invisible feather like force. He took a moment to admire the silver lining and sparkling white designs that riddled the surrounding walls. Among every room in the house, this one had been the most taken care of.

"We have to move again?" The voice caused his attention to deviate onto the archway that led into the kitchen. A woman emerged from the room with arms crossed. "You said this was the last time."

Skyler winced. The first response poised on the tip of his tongue was an inquiry to who had told her. He bit back, however, and settled on the blame undoubtedly belonging to the wives and girlfriends of the fellow Marines in his unit. He cursed them all silently. "I know, I know, Tiffany" He said. "Battalion is changing our station again." There was no point sugar coating it. His girlfriend had long ago learned to decipher his beat-around-the-bush technique when delivering bad news.

She pursed her lips and leaned against the wall. "But you said…" She trailed off and averted her eyes out the nearby window. Miles upon miles of a neighboring farmer's wheat bathed in the rays of the sunlight while a subtle touching of the wind moved them like fields of perfectly synchronized swimmers performing some sort of dance. It was a cruel irony. Outside was the pictured perfection of paradise, and inside was an atomic bomb waiting to explode.

"I know," He pivoted his body to face her this time. "I just…" He paused and bit his lower lip. He just, what? He didn't have an answer. He didn't know why he was dragging this poor girl around the universe for him just because he wanted to fight the good fight.

She shifted. "You just what?" She choked on the last word and her eyes began to water. He winced even more at that. "You just thought this would be the last time? You just thought that you wouldn't be lying to me this time?"

Her voice trembled with unbridled irritability, although she was far to kind hearted of a person to show outright anger on anyone. "Tiff," He began and dared a step closer. She held her ground. The two were separated by the table that was abnormally large for a duo of people and he decided to keep it that way for the moment. She hadn't made a move to round the piece of furniture and cross the proverbial line that separated the two 'sides' of the argument. "I don't have a say whether we move or not. It's not my decision. We go where the war is, you know that."

'No," Tiffany fired back. One arm reached up to wipe at her eyes with the shoulder strap of her white sundress. "How long have we been dating?"

Skyler cocked his head to the side. "Since high school," He stepped forward again and rested both hands against the top of one of the four chairs fitted around the table. "Why?"

She pushed off the wall and moved towards the table. Eyeliner followed the pathways her tears left down the sides of her cheeks even as she pulled one of the chairs out and sat down. "We're so young, Skyler." She sniffed. "You're barely twenty-one, and I'm barely twenty!"

Moving his weight from one foot to the other, a sinking feeling in his gut guessed where this was going. He eyed the chair next to her before deciding not to tempt fate and instead slid into the one directly opposite, still keeping to his side of the room. "Listen," His voice lowered to barely above a whisper and outstretched both hands onto the table in wordless beckoning. Gingerly, she took them, and he squeezed. "People are saying the war is almost over. That the Covenant is retreating and that we've won." It was all false propaganda he knew, but desperate times called for desperate measures. "Just one or two more transfers and I know we'll be settled in."

Her eyes locked onto his in that way that most everyone's did when making love or after sharing a passionate first kiss. It was the look of true, unbridled committed feelings – feelings for one another that just kept growing no matter how much they aged, as long as they aged together. Skyler drank in her beauty for the first time in far too long. Sun kissed golden hair curled down just below her shoulders and tranquil blue eyes that could stop the hearts of many men, and were on the fast track to stopping his yet again, were easily the most distinguished features on her heart shaped face. Lips that could curve into a gleaming smile at any moment that gave even the darkest situations a bit of light were knitted into a tight frown. On long deployments he kept a picture of the two of them clipped on the interior of his helmet in case he needed a moral boost. Most nights, though, he found himself simply gazing upon her natural beauty. He leaned back and squeezed her hands into his. To him, the woman in front of him was as perfect as they came.

And his gut told him he was about to lose her.

"Skyler…" Her voice lowered to a whisper as well. "I love you."

"I love you too."

Both sat wordlessly for what seemed like hours. Tiffany wept silently – eyes on the table below her and Skyler clenched his jaw. He felt helpless. Every other time he was not the reason for her break downs, and always was he able to remedy even the worst of situations. Right now he felt like a goddamn deer in the headlights of a truck. Outside, the wheat had ceased its graceful dance and remained perfectly poised like it was watching the happenings inside the house as a child would a tantalizing movie. Seconds passed, then minutes, before she finally looked up and offered him a feigned smile.

The smile was not one someone might produce after a heated argument had been reconciled, or one that may incline she was giving him another chance. It was a sad smile that longed for happier times. "I'm so sorry."

It felt like someone had plunged a knife into his chest and twisted it relentlessly. Her hands slowly slipped away from his as she rose. He wanted to yell. To scream, to beg for to stay, but when his mouth opened nothing came out. Memories flashed in his mind of them. First neighbors in grade school, then their first kiss, the inevitable declaration they were dating their third year of high school, Skyler joining the UNSC at the age of twenty after taking two years off, Tiffany promising to be with him no matter what happened. "You promised…" He finally managed to whisper.

She paused halfway to the archway and turned her head. "Did you say something?" She sniffled again.

"You promised." He said, a bit louder this time. It was no more than a show of desperation. The only thing worse than traveling four times in one year simply to fend off the Covenant was making the fifth trip alone. "You promised you'd never leave."

Another silence befell both as Skyler rose. Both his palms spread evenly across the table. Tiffany's lower lip trembled and she shook her head. "That was a long time ago. We were teenagers."

Skyler was having none of it. "We were in love, Tiffany. We're still in love. This will work, I know it will."

"You just don't get it, do you?" She choked back another stream of tears. "I'm miserable. I hate this. I hate having to go to bed worried about whether I'm going to hear about you the next day when you're on your deployments. I hate having to move. I hate having to make new friends everywhere I go." She paced quickly back towards the table. "But most importantly I hate being alone. I hate, hate, hate being alone for months!" It was the loudest he had ever heard her get, albeit it wasn't even to the point of her yelling. It sounded more like a mixture of choking sobs and the first words that came to her mind. "Dammit I'd do anything for you! Anything! Just not this, Skyler."

There was something behind her eyes -a deep sadness. It didn't take a genius to figure out that the strenuous and lonely lifestyle of a UNSC soldier's estranged significant other had broken her. Behind the false façade of normality, the once bubbly and outgoing woman had deflated into a dark state of depression and regret. The emotional knife that twisted inside of him was now stabbed repeatedly through his heart and he slumped back down in the chair. He must have looked just as miserable as she had felt for the past year. Sitting in his dull grey BDUs and fighting back his own tears. Hell, he almost took pity on himself. "I'm sorry."

Again, she wiped the tears away from her face and straightened her posture. "I…I'm moving to Reach. My uncle teaches at one of the academies." Her voice had turned stoic and calm. "He says if I hurry I can make it before the semester starts."

His eyes never left the table. Both hands cupped over one another, as if trying to keep her final touches from escaping. "I hope you find everything you ever wanted, Tiffany." He found himself mumbling. It hurt, but, he was sincere about it. He had spent the last year unknowingly ruining this woman's life apart. He'd be damned if it was left on a bitter note.

He didn't hear her move for a few seconds. His thumbs twiddled amongst each other and his right foot began tapping habitually against the ground – a nervous tick. "I will never stop loving you." Skyler looked up when she said that. She stared down at him through stray bangs and tear stained eyes. "You'll never know how much I do. When the war is over, please, come find me if you can. I can't promise I'll wait for you but no matter what I find on Reach I want to know that you turned out alright."

He only nodded and watched as she turned on a heel and disappeared around the corner. Moments later he heard the door open. Part of him hoped he wouldn't hear it close. Part of him wanted her to rush back in, embrace him, and move on from the traumatizing day. He found himself sucking in breath, and only when the resounding click of the door shutting echoed through the house did he release it. The sound rang hollow in his mind and it felt like a part of him had been violently ripped away.

Hours passed. The sunlight that gleamed through the windows so vibrantly disappeared slowly throughout the remainder of the day. Skyler wasn't quite sure why he didn't move. Maybe a string of hope still attached itself to him, reassuring him that the love of his life would come back even after the night sky shrouded the residence in a hopeless black. The air conditioner ran through the evening and even the icy outside temperature copulated with the artificial cooler didn't usher the smallest of movements from the Marine.

Finally, a series of knocks rattled against his front door. At first he didn't bother to even get up and answer it. A few Minutes later the knocking increased ten fold. Still, he didn't move, and finally he heard the door being opened and footsteps not very dissimilar to his own shattering the eerie silence. "Hello?" The voice called out.

The voice was familiar and Skyler turned to investigate when he saw the shadowy figure stroll into view. He had to squint to properly identify the man, and when he did he cleared his throat. "Danny?" His voice was which could probably be accredited to lack for fluids.

"Sparky?" The man reached around in the dark for a few moments before he managed to locate the light switch. Skyler's eyes screamed in protest as light struck them harder than a knife to flesh and he rubbed at them feverishly for a few moments. "What the hell are you doing sitting alone in the dark?"

Skyler turned slightly in his seat and debated whether he should let the man know what had transpired of the prior afternoon. He wasn't sure he wanted to embarrass himself with letting everyone now just how he'd failed to keep Tiffany from waning away from him; especially after all they had been through. On the other hand Danny was his best friend. Both had joined the Marine Corps at around the same age and bonded remarkably well all through basic training. Working his jaw from side to side, he rose so he wouldn't arouse suspicion to his glum state and sighed. "Tiffany left, man."

Danny was a fair looking man by any woman's standards, and a comic at heart, but even he dared not attempt any of his goofy smiles that eased even some of the tensest situations. "Oh man," He breathed and stepped forward. "I'm really sorry, dude, are you ok?"

Skyler's shoulders rose and fell in a menial shrug. The two must have looked ridiculous by Marine standards. Both still donned their BDUs and were talking about feelings, or, 'feelings and shit, man', as most enlisted personal referred to relationship talk as. "I'll be fine." It was a bold faced lie and he knew it. Regardless of the unwritten rules about lying to your best friend, he'd rather risk a deduction of 'bro' points from his comrade than suffering one of his terrible relationship lectures.

"Good." Danny reached into his pocket and withdrew a pair of keys. "Because we're going out tonight, and I need a wingman."

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Hey, thank you so much for reading! I promise things are going to get really good as this story develops! If you'd be so kind as to review with any questions, comments or any constructive criticisms you might have I'd really appreciate it! :)