Chase

I knew that the war would kill me eventually, but I never would have guessed that it would be on that flight. I remember cussing out the refueling boy for spilling some gasoline on the deck of the carrier before I took off. It wasn’t his fault for spilling it—those tanks are heaver than in—and it was his fault for looking almost identical to that piece of shit, but at that point, but he did, and that pissed me off.

I suppose I should back up. My name is, or was, considering the fact that I was KIA, Chase Warren Depfield. Of course, that’s Officer Depfield to you scrubs; pilot for the United States of America’s Navy. All that razz. It was only three weeks ago that I gave my beautiful daughter to some shit kid with only a pen and a piece of paper to his name. Chris was his name, I think. My daughter was, for reasons unbeknownst to me, completely and totally enamored by him—head over heels, if you prefer simpler colloquiums.

Anyway, he asked me for her hand, and I said no. He pressed the issue and I cussed at him until he left. Once that piece of trash was gone, Callie sat me down and told me just how much she loved him, and she threatened to elope if I continued to withhold my blessing. I saw the sincerity in her soft eyes and had to let her win, but I made her know that I wasn’t going to like it. She skipped off, leaving a trail of fluttering “thank you daddy”s in her wake. She was just like her mother—too damn hard to deny.

A few months later, I found myself in uniform, pacing furiously in the lobby of an old southern-style church down in Mississippi. Chris had apparently grown up here and Callie thought it best for us to get married near his family. They were, as I expected, a bunch of deadbeats. Pot smokers, most likely. Every single one of them was some sort of writer or singer or painter or something else requiring no work and making no money. I shook my head and continued pacing until I felt a soft hand press lightly against my shoulder.

“Daddy? Are you ready?” Callie’s voice calmed me almost instantly.

“It’s for her,” I reminded myself. “Yes sweetie, I’m ready.”

I escorted my baby down the crimson, blossom-laden aisle while the organ coughed out some rancid melody. One of Chris’s relative’s pieces, I assumed. Shaking my head noticeably, I continued to strut down the aisle, trying my hardest to show those artsy-fartsies how a real man looks. They didn’t seem to care much for it, because they whispered and murmured to one another as I walked past.

Before I gave my daughter up, I gave her a hug and told her that she could always come back home to her daddy—he would always love her. She wiped the tears from her eyes, nodded her head and turned her back on me.

Anyway, I hadn’t seen her since the wedding, and my flight boots smelled like gasoline.