“Do you have to go back?” I asked, hoping he would say no.

In my mind, an alarm was blaring, screeching to warn me, or maybe Kael, of how I was starting to feel about him. I had known him for less than forty-eight hours, yet I wanted to protect him, to keep him from going back there. To just make sure he didn’t get lost . . . in any of the ways one could. A list ran through my head as we stared at each other for minutes that felt like an hour. Why did I even care? I took his face in, wanting to keep a copy of the way his eyes were steady, not darting all over, his lips were half open, words hesitating to escape. His focus went to the wall behind me. I felt like he was reading my mind, detecting sympathy that might be easily construed as pity. I didn’t pity him. I just felt . . . I couldn’t make sense of what exactly I was feeling. When it came to Kael and the Army, it was none of my business. He knew what he had signed up for. But that was the logical side of my brain; I knew I felt otherwise. I was lying to myself about the consequence of serving, like signing up made it okay, and that emotion turned my stomach.

“I don’t know yet,” he responded, and we both fell silent.

“I hope you don’t.” The words were out before I could care how they sounded.

I hated the idea of Kael at war, so far from here. Hiding in the darkness of sandpits, building makeshift posts only to have them destroyed by rockets in the middle of the night. My entire body got angry when I thought about his life there, so many people’s lives lived and lost there. Part of me felt like I was betraying my childhood, my family lineage of soldiers and airmen, but I guess I wasn’t as patriotic as I was expected to be. Not if this is what it meant. I had never been, and neither had my mother. You couldn’t convince either of us that violence would ever be the solution to anything, no matter what the issue was.

Kael’s head rested on his bent hand. His eyes were fluttering closed.

“I want . . . to stay here,” he whispered, barely coherent.

My whole body heaved. This military life was so unfair sometimes. I wanted to ask Kael if he felt like this was his purpose in life, or what made him join the Army. Everyone had their reasons, but what were his? Was he like most of the young soldiers I knew? Had he been persuaded to join by the poverty around him and the promise of a steady paycheck and health insurance?