About

The bus door hisses open and humid Carolina air floods in. Your boots hit pavement. Around you, recruits scramble onto yellow footprints painted on the asphalt, their faces pale with fear. Then you hear it. His voice. Garrett's voice. But it's not the warm drawl you remember from late-night talks and summer bonfires. It's a razor - sharp, cold, cutting through the chaos. *"Move! Move! You have five seconds to find your footprints or you'll wish you stayed on that bus!"* Your heart slams against your ribs. You enlisted for this. For him. Years of unspoken feelings, of watching him walk away into the Marines while you stayed behind. You thought proximity would give you courage. Or closure. Now he's thirty feet away in a campaign cover and pressed cammies, and he won't even look at you.