Along the Broken Road by Heather Burch

Ian. He handed them out the window. “No charge.”
    Ian had already dug a twenty out of his wallet. He held it in midair.
    Rodney nodded to it. “Really. No charge. Thanks for serving our country.”
    Ian would have argued, but what could he say? Slowly, he slipped the twenty into his wallet. “Thanks. Very much.”
    It wasn’t the fact that someone was willing to offer him a few bucks’ worth of ice cream. It was the fact that they remembered, were aware that young soldiers put their lives on the line every day, living on foreign soil, missing out on time with their families.
    As they turned to walk to a picnic table, Charlee bumped his shoulder. “Nice gesture, huh?”
    Ian was a little choked up. “Yeah. Seems like a good guy.” He wasn’t fishing, no, not really, wasn’t trying to determine the relationship between this guy and Charlee.
    “He’s a good friend. Known him forever.” Charlee slid onto the seat across from Ian and took a bite. “Mmm.” Her eyes closed and Ian was glad because that sound wrapped right around his gut and shot downward.
    Charlee opened her eyes and winked. “I don’t think he really liked you at first.”
    “I think what he didn’t like was that I was with you .”
    “What?” Her spoon dug into the whipped cream again.
    “He’s got a crush on you, Charlee.”
    She pointed at Ian with the spoon. “Don’t say that. He does not.”
    Ian’s sundae was melting so he took a giant bite. “He totally does.”
    Charlee shook her head, concern pinching her brows. “No. He couldn’t; I mean he knows about . . .”
    This brought Ian’s gaze up. “About what?”
    Charlee looked lost in her own thought. “Not what. Who. And you know what? I don’t want to talk about it.” She flew off the picnic table bench and headed for the truck.
    Ian remained seated, took another bite. “How you gonna eat that and drive a stick shift?”
    She squared her shoulders and came back over to the table. “I can’t.”
    Ian grinned up at her. “You can sit down if you’d like.”
    She plopped onto the seat. “Okay, but as far as that other stuff, I don’t want to talk about it.”
    He shrugged. “No one’s asking you to.”
    “Oh,” she said. “Okay then.”
    And they finished their ice cream with Ian wondering just how far he was going to let this go before he admitted the real reason he was there. He pushed the thought aside. It wasn’t something he could just come out and say to her. He knew that. Had been told that. She’d need time. She’d need someone she could trust. But how much would she trust him when she learned the truth? His appetite for ice cream was gone.
    He wasn’t doing this for himself; that’s what he needed to remember. This was to honor a promise he’d made. Whatever the outcome for him, it couldn’t matter. Helping Charlee understand was what mattered. And that would take time. But at least he was seeing some cracks in that granite shell of hers. At least those walls seemed to be eroding just a touch.
    “You okay?” Charlee’s voice. Soft and tender.
    “Sorry. Got lost in my own head there for a few seconds.”
    There was a speck of whipped cream on her lip. “I saw that. You know, I understand that it’s got to be pretty difficult to enter society again after being deployed so long.” Her tongue captured the whipped cream while her fingertips grazed the edge of her dish.
    Ian stayed quiet. It was. For so many more reasons than he could say.
    “If you ever need to talk . . .”
    His eyes came up to meet hers. Sincerity drifted from her, that tiny glimmer he’d noticed when they first met and she’d softened when she realized he was a soldier. It made sense. She had four brothers in the military—as far as he knew, they were all deployed right now—and her father had died a military hero. “Thanks.” It was all he could manage because what made life in society difficult for him was her. Her and the secret he carried. Her and the truth