Flyboy: Part 3 of 3

    I have to start taking blog notes during the week. I've been having these great ideas for the personal blurb that pop into my head on Tuesday or Wednesday, are refined down to really good around Thursday morning, and then are completely gone by Friday when I have the time scheduled to sit and do the actual post. I always think that "this idea is so great there's no way I'll forget!" Yeah... crickets. Totally forgotten. I remember that it was a great idea, though! Lol :)

    My hubby and I did something writer-ish-ly fun! (Meaning: I did a writer thing and he not only didn't roll his eyes, but he added support and encouragement and I got a hug.) 
    That little modern romance novella we did as an ebook? Yes, that one! We found a local printer / publisher that made a (currently) limited amount of pretty paperbacks for us. Click the photo to check out When it's Not Perfect from my Etsy store!

    The forgotten blog post idea had something smart about being an author, something witty about being a mom, and something cool about my kids. The smart author part got eaten by book gremlins during a great writing session, the witty mom stuff got flattened by being a mom, and the something cool about my kids ended up being a really long list this week so I don't remember the one highlight. Good reasons to not remember a blog post idea, also good reasons to get a notebook lol.
​    Have a great weekend!

3. Another Year Older

        He thought of maybe answering, but instead lay back down and went to sleep. The next time he woke up was a repeat on the food and book, but the time after he could read a few paragraphs before the words started swimming. He put the book down again.
        “How long have we been here?” he asked.
        “Chopper went down four days ago plus one,” she answered.
        “So five days ago. And where are we?”
        “Three miles from friendlies.”
        He thought about it for a while. The terrain that close to the boarder was well covered, they hadn’t had problems that close for over a month. 
        “So, why are we still here?”
        “I have a problem.”
        He waited a few minutes for her to continue. 
        “Anything I can help with?” he eventually asked.
        “Doubt it,” she answered, looking down after a moment and then over to him.  “You are the problem,” she said, not unkindly.
        That was a confusing response.
        “Oh,” he said.
        She turned completely away from the slit and settled facing him. For the first time he could see the rifle cradled in the crook of her arm. It was incredibly custom and had the extra parts that proved she’d been off-world, despite the fact that her uniform was standard Earth Unified Government. Then again, the EUG had labeled this war as a local skirmish and ignored it for months now, so even a standard EUG uniform wasn’t something that should be here on either side of the boarder.
        “My extraction was supposed to be three days before you showed up,” she stated. “It was supposed to be a simple pick up. There were also certain conditions of that extraction, the foremost being that no one person be able to make me in a positive ID. Now my problem is that not only did you manage to extract me from a very bad place, you also got me far enough away that I could get here and have so far managed to live through all of it even after injuring yourself rather badly. Now you know not only what I look like but also what I sound like, giving you easy opportunity for positive ID at this location at this time. For me, that’s not a good thing. At this point, though, I would have been a lot worse than dead if not for you. Do you see the dilemma?”
        He looked at his feet, unsure whether or not answering would help or hinder his precarious situation. The feeling of being a rabbit returned as he realized all of the weapons in the rat hole were on her.
        “Personally, I’d rather not kill you,” she added, watching him expectantly. 
        “Considering my headache, I’d appreciate it if you did,” he said, trying for humor.
        The corner of her mouth turned up in that small smile. She shifted and settled back to looking out the slit. He fell asleep sitting up.
        She was gone when he woke up, as were the packs and rations. A single canteen of water sat where the bags had been, an off world unit crest stamped in the side confirming that the sniper and her rifle were not EUG standard issue grunts like he’d worked with before. There were two 10mm side arms, generic, loaded, and eight extra magazines, all full, in the middle of the floor beside what was left of his flight helmet; it had been split in half from the crash impact. The tags from the rest of his flight crew were sitting in one half of his helmet. He sat forward and realized that he felt… fine. The middle of his chest was tingly in a hand-print shape, but his head was good. There was a small, yellow envelope in the other half with ‘Flyboy’ written neatly across the front.
        The card inside had a picture of a puppy in a birthday hat on the front. He opened it carefully. The card was printed with ‘Happy Birthday!’ and didn’t have anything inside. A note had been written on the back in the same tidy printing as on the envelope:
           
                Josh,
                Your tags have your DOB. 
                Happy Birthday. 
                Eva.