Chapter 6: Checking Back Into Life (Before Paradise was found)

The morning of the second day at the resort, Charlie phoned in to his orderly room at the base and let them know he had arrived safely and was stateside. They let him know that his personal belongings were there at the squadron building, set back in a corner in the conference room and he could get them at any time. There had been a couple of welfare visits made on his apartment by a couple of friends, one being the squadron operations office clerk herself. She was a nice girl, and friendly, and just wanted to make sure no one was trashing the place or anything.

“Sylvia, that is really sweet of you. Help me remember you need a treat for being so thoughtful, okay? I’ll be up in a week or so. I’ve decided to go ahead and put in my paperwork to separate.”

“Ohhhhh,” Sylvia let out. She sounded disappointed.

“It’s okay, hon, I just think it’s time to do something else for a while after that whole fiasco. I’ll be fine, and God knows you all can find better pilots. Maybe some that might make it back with their buggy in one piece.”

“Major, you need to stop that right now. You know, and I know, and the entire shop knows you did all you could against amazing odds and lasted longer than any of the rest of these yahoos could have. Don’t put yourself down like that.”

“I won’t, Sylvia. I’m good. I mean I’m all right. I just need some different scenery for a while.”

“Okay. Well, take care of yourself and call before you come in. Where are you, anyway?”

“Hilton Head at the Omni. Not far from home, young lady. Not far at all.”

“No shit, you could have just yelled.” She giggled. “Okay, take care, and if you get bored looking at the scenery, drive up and we’ll grab lunch and talk or something.”

“Sounds good, Syl. See you soon.”

They hung up and Charlie sat back in the easy chair. Nice kid, he thought. Gotta be careful talking to cute little Staff Sergeants, though. That kind of thing is frowned upon greatly. ‘Oh, well,’ he thought, ‘I won’t be a Major for very long. Maybe, just maybe ... Dirty old man’, he said to himself.

It was around ten in the morning when Charlie decided he wanted to go down to the pool, but he had nothing to wear, so he asked at the desk if there was anywhere around where he could shop for some swimwear and things, was given a few options, then went out into the great big world, a wad of twenties and hundreds in his pocket. Charlie thought, ‘It feels good to be wealthy. Very good.’ He’d always been comfortable, or maybe even well off, as a kid, and even as an adult, but this was different.

One thing he noticed as he was out and about was the fact that he was scoping out women, girls, ladies, the fairer sex. Since he wasn’t thinking about flying, staying alive, making sure his career stayed on track, etcetera, his mind started to wander back into other subjects.

Since meeting Nancy, just short of a couple of years ago, he just didn’t worry about his love life. They dated for a few months, fell into some sort of like, or infatuation, or some serious relationship, or maybe situationship, then after another year or so of him sensing her feeling like she was in a stagnant lifestyle, she started to grow a bit distant. One evening he ran down to the mall in Sumter to pick up a suit he’d ordered for a friend’s wedding. In an odd twist of fate, and speaking of odd, what are the odds that he would see his girlfriend walking the mall with one of her friends, Amanda something or other, each of them holding hands with obviously non-military young men.

Yes, he approached her. He asked her for the key to his apartment and told her to have a great life. As she was getting ready to cause a scene, while pulling the key off her key ring, he derailed her thought process. Charlie congratulated her boyfriend and told him he’d found a winner. Her scrambled eggs were to die for and as a matter of fact he’d just enjoyed them for breakfast at his place just a couple of days ago.

She turned beet red, knowing Charlie had just told the fellow he was doing whatever he was doing with someone else’s current woman. He took the key as she meekly held it between her thumb and forefinger, turned on his heels and left.

Charlie heard her say to him, as he was walking away, “We’ll talk later?” He raised his hand and waved without looking back. That had to be an uncomfortable situation for her, and for him, the guy, the new boyfriend, come to think of it.

In any case, the next few times she called, he ignored the calls. A couple of weeks later, Charlie’s aircraft flight of four F-16s was shipped out to Kuwait for a three-month TDY in support of some ground operations cleaning up in northern Iraq and Syria. He just got busy and forgot about her, if he remembered the timing correctly.

Oh, yes, after returning from his shopping trip with a couple of wild shirts and some swim shorts, he made it down to the pool, picked up a huge margarita from the bar and went out to enjoy some sun.

It wasn’t too awfully long, maybe half an hour, before a very cute young lady, in a very sparse suit, was standing over him, blocking the sun from his face. Her smile made him do the same.

“Hey, there. You alone?”

“Yeah, actually, I am. Hi. I’m Charlie.” He reached up to take her hand.

“Courtney. Nice to meet you, Charlie. Are you alone by choice?” She returned the little handshake giving him the opportunity to notice there were no rings or tan marks left behind on her left hand.

“No, Courtney, more so by circumstance. Can I buy you a drink?”

“Sure. What brings you to the island?”

The conversation went on for about an hour or so. She was down from Virginia, ‘between positions’, she called it, just blowing off some steam and stress, getting ready for a new start. He told her he was just taking time off before heading back to civilization, himself. They each sipped on huge frozen margaritas, his lime, hers strawberry, then she said she had to meet up with a friend. She asked if he was busy later. Of course he wasn’t, so they shared numbers, made plans for a date, with no specific activities scheduled, but she assured him they’d find something fun to do on the fly.