Macho watched the water come closer and closer as the pilots maneuvered the aircraft for landing. With the LSOs screaming for power and the wave off lights warning them of impending disaster, it seemed as if they were going to ditch the aircraft in the river. The waves came closer. Death came closer, a death she deserved and would welcome, if only it could be her and not the other 30 passengers, innocent and oblivious to what Macho knew about herself. The water was right there, seconds from impact. Macho wondered for an instant if they were going to hit the carriers’ ramp, and then the airport shoreline popped into view and the pilots performed a gentle flare over the runway. They floated above it for a few moments before the wheels kissed the concrete and they were down. Alive.
The turboprops dug into the air with a WHAAAA as the pilots put them into reverse, and the aircraft slowed and turned off on the nearest taxiway. As the passengers gathered their belongings and started texting on the way to the gate, Macho kept her gaze outside, lost in her thoughts. Betrayal. She knew it well. She was drenched in it, was swimming in it. She lolled the bitter bile of it around her tongue, knowing it would be forever hers. She could not escape it.
On the flight from Norfolk, she had had time to think about what she was planning to do. She still didn’t have a clue about how she would be received, but each step brought her closer to the dreaded reckoning. She deserved humiliation, in public, screaming invective aimed at her for what she had done, deliberately and with malice. A black eye, scars, broken bones…. She had earned them, and she would stand still to receive them.
It was a pleasant day in Washington as she stepped off the aircraft and onto the bus that took the passengers to the terminal. Macho gave a polite nod to the linesman as he directed her to stay well clear of the stationary prop. He must have taken her for a young woman naïve about the ways of airplanes, he being her protector on this dangerous ground. But that was a flight deck lesson Macho could teach him: Never walk through a prop arc, and you’ll never get hit by a prop.
Once inside the terminal, Macho followed the directions to the Metro station, fumbling through the ticket machine for a pass before boarding the Yellow Line to Metro Center. She took a seat in the front car and watched commuters get on and off as they dove into the Crystal City underground. At the Pentagon, a commander wearing khakis got on the train and stood as it departed the station. Macho stole glances at his rows of uniform ribbons; he was a surface warfare officer, with a pin signifying command at sea, and ribbons denoting the number of deployments, their locations, command and personal awards, the everyone-gets-a-trophy end-of-tour recognition the senior officers wore on their chests to validate themselves to each other and to the public. No doubt this passed for street cred here in the Pentagon, and if she stayed for a career, she too would have a nice “rack” of been there-done that ribbons.
A nice rack. That’s all Coach and Trench had seen in Shane.
Macho’s eyes then met those of the officer who had caught her eying him, and she looked away. She now knew a great deal about him by his ribbons and devices, but he knew nothing about her — and would never suspect that Macho had a Silver Star.
A career. Annie had stayed for a career.
The train burst out of the underground tunnel and onto the 14th Street Bridge trestle. The water made her think of the ship again. On the ship was the last time she had seen Shane. Her face — a blended image of hurt and bitter contempt toward Macho for what Macho had caused her to lose: her dignity and sense of belonging and her trust in her squadronmates, current and future — would remain an indelible image in Macho’s memory.
In less than a minute, the metro dove again, now under the district streets, as Macho stared out the window at the darkness of the tunnel wall, similar to the darkness she had brought to herself and to another human being who personified light and love of life. Macho had won, but was it worth it to destroy the trust of one — and her own soul — in the process?
At Gallery Place-Chinatown she switched to the Red Line, and a crowd of midday riders pushed in. After a few stops, Macho took a seat, and, with her hair caressing the shoulders of her sleeveless teal dress, she looked like any other young professional woman in Washington taking a break for lunch. She gazed out the window into the empty black subway wall as the train moved from stop to stop, careful not to make eye contact with a scruffy older man who was staring at her in the same way Trench and Coach looked at women. And she had made them pay — at great cost and with significant collateral damage. The “no-load” eyeing her now wasn’t qualified to carry her helmet bag, but he was a man and men looked.
Although she was wearing Sketchers on her feet, the dress, the hair, and the spray of perfume all made a statement. And she could not turn it off for this man and then turn it back on for a professional man her age whose attention she might welcome.
But none of that today…. She was on a mission, and she had to remain focused. There was only one man she had to talk to today before she returned to the airport to catch the flight back to Norfolk.
Crossing into Maryland, the creep got off the train, and Macho relaxed. She kept her professional face expressionless, though, like the other bored young professionals who stared at nothing or were lost in their cell phones. They should be happy, she thought, living in this incredible city, partying all night in Georgetown and getting up the next morning to do it all again. She studied the jaded expressions of the twenty-something girls and their expensive suits, perfect make-up, and killer shoes. She was embarrassed to be caught in her clunky sneakers, despite the comfort. The young men in their wrinkled, ill-fitting suits needed haircuts and seemed unsure of themselves around the girls and around each other. Screw them, she thought. They were up here making policy on Capitol Hill that she and the Skipper and Big Jake and Olive had to execute, that Annie had given her life for. None of the girls looked like down-to-earth girlfriend material, and for a moment Macho judged them in contemptuous superiority — until she realized she had proven to herself and to Shane that she was not down-to-earth girlfriend material either.
At the Medical Center station, Macho got off the train and climbed the broken escalator into the humid air scented with the fresh cut grass workmen had blown off the sidewalks. The maple and oak trees were still green — though the fall change was only days away — and the sunshine felt good. She walked to the crosswalk at Rockville Pike and crossed with the crowd to the long semicircular driveway of the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, the former Bethesda Naval Hospital. After showing her ID to security, Macho found a ladies’ room and changed into the black pumps she carried in her tote bag. She also freshened her makeup and looked at her reflection, scowling at the image that scowled back at her, nervous at what was about to happen. You earned this, she told herself.
Alone in the elevator, Macho’s heart raced as her clammy hands pushed the “4” button. When the doors opened on the ward, she stepped to the desk. A young nurse, an ensign by her collar device, lifted her head.