“He’s at Trevor’s house.” She was already looking at something on her laptop, bored with this conversation.
“Maria, that bike survived World War II, Korea, Vietnam, and my tour in Iraq. Grandpa built it from nothing. Dad rebuilt it from a wreck. It was supposed to—”
“Supposed to what, David? Sit there gathering dust while you pretend you’re still twenty-five? You’re forty-three. You have a bad knee. You were never going to ride it again anyway.”
“I rode it to base the day I deployed!”
“Yeah, and I had to drive it back because you left it there like always, thinking the world revolves around your precious bike.”
The siren kept wailing. I should have been in the bunker. But I couldn’t stop staring at her face on the screen, searching for the woman I’d married. The one who’d cried at our wedding when I talked about continuing family traditions. Who’d taken pregnancy photos sitting on that bike, saying our son would be “born to ride.”
“Who bought it?” I asked. “I’ll buy it back. I’ll pay double.”
“Some old guy from California. Don’t know his name. He paid cash and had it shipped same day.”
“You didn’t get his information?”
She shrugged. “Didn’t think it mattered.”
The connection started breaking up – incoming fire was affecting the communications. But I had to know one thing.
“Was this about the deployment? About me re-enlisting?”
For the first time, she looked directly at the camera. “You chose the Army over us. Again. Fourth deployment, David. Fourth time you’ve left us for months. So yeah, I chose something too. I chose to stop pretending that bike meant more than my happiness.”
The screen went black as the base lost connection.
I sat in that bunker for three hours while insurgents fired rockets at us, and all I could think about was my grandfather’s hands building that bike in 1948, determined to create something beautiful after seeing so much death. My father’s hands rebuilding it in 1973, needing to fix something after coming home broken from Vietnam. My hands teaching Marcus to check the oil, adjust the chain, respect the machine and its history.
Gone for a purse.
Six months later, I came home. Maria had filed for divorce while I was deployed – served me papers at the base. She wanted the house, alimony, child support. She’d already moved her personal trainer boyfriend into our bedroom.
But what destroyed me was Marcus.
“You sold Dad’s bike?” he screamed at her when I picked him up for my first visitation. “You sold Grandpa’s bike? You promised me! You promised when Dad deployed that we’d take care of it together!”
“Motorcycles are dangerous,” she said flatly. “I was protecting you.”
“From what? From our family history? From the one thing that connected me to Dad when he was gone?” Marcus was crying now, this thirteen-year-old boy who was trying so hard to be strong. “I helped him restore the carburetor! I know every story about that bike! And you sold it for a fucking purse?”
“Language!” Maria snapped.
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