Chapter 22

I fit right into the job, and settled into learning the engines, and the company's procedures. Soon I was a full-fledged employee, with the company's insurance instead of the base hospital – though as Max's dependent I had access to it, stained dungarees and works shirts instead of BDUs, and a manager I called Paul instead of by his rank and last name. It was easier to get used to being a civilian than I'd expected, but I had, after all, only been in the Air Force for six years. That was nearly half as long as I'd been alive when I enlisted, but by now it was only a quarter of my life.

I had a dependent ID card now, so I could shop in the commissary and the BX. Because I was Max's husband I could drink in the Officers' Club, and could meet socially the officers she worked with, and their spouses. As "Mr. Alba" I could speak to the group commander's wife in a friendly way – and, for that matter, I could speak to him as well, though I didn't make a point about it since he probably wouldn't have appreciated it.

In a sense, I now outranked all the other jet engine mechanics I'd worked with in uniform. They were enlisted people, but I was an officer's spouse. I didn't have to salute anyone, but they had to salute my wife. That was the hardest thing to become accustomed to. Even when we'd been unofficially dating, right up to my last day in the Air Force, if Max and I had met while we were both in uniform, I would have had to salute her. And now people I'd worked with, who'd gotten greasy beside me, who'd skinned their knuckles along with me, had to salute the woman I slept beside every night. It was a very strange sensation. I was beginning to truly understand, from the inside, why Captain Mitchell hadn't wanted me to keep on working after he'd offered me the hardship discharge. It really would have disrupted the shop for everyone else to have to work with someone who's fiancé they had to salute and call "ma'am" or "lieutenant."

And yet I still didn't like the policy prohibiting fraternization. Men and women come to love each other because of who and what they are, not because of the rank they wear. There is no natural law, nor any law of God, which says that officers will only fall in love with officers, and enlisted personnel with enlisted personnel. Just one or two little incidents – such as a crowded McDonald's and a busy bar – can lead to consequences that the policy doesn't and can't contemplate.

But things were going well in spite of the fact that I was having to get used to my new life. Max and I loved each other, which was the main point. We learned to live with each other, to accommodate each other's idiosyncrasies, to recognize when we were hurt or angry or sad or simply in need of peace and quiet. We learned each others' favorite songs and TV shows and meals. We became, more and more each day, truly one flesh – not just in the literal sense which is indeed part of marriage, but spiritually and emotionally as well.

And then reality set in. We had both known, all along, that it could happen, and probably would sooner or later. But we'd only been married about two and a half months when Max came home and flopped down on the sofa, and looked at me where I stood in the kitchen doorway. "You've got a funny look on your face," I said.

"It feels more like disgust, or maybe frustration."

"Whatever it is, Max, what's caused it?"

She took a deep breath. "The squadron got a notification today – we're going to deploy to Iraq."

I didn't say anything. My emotions were in a traffic jam for a moment – I didn't know what I was feeling, or which emotion was uppermost. Finally I said the one thing that would come out coherently. "When?"

"We're not sure, but the tentative date is 1 August."

"And the way deployments are, you'll be gone for our anniversary."

She nodded. "We knew about these things when we got married."

"We did. But I had hoped that we could have a year safe..."

"I'd hoped so too, beloved. But I knew a couple at Kunsan who'd spent their first four anniversaries apart – a deployment here, a TDY assignment there, unavoidable duty another time. That's how the military is. We get to live together now that we're married – 'subject to the needs of the service.'"

I turned and tossed the dish towel I'd been holding back onto the table. When I faced Max again I said, "I never thought I'd say this – I never thought I'd feel it or think it – but the needs of the service don't interest me right now."

"I know," she said. "I'm about ready to tell 'em to take a long walk off a short pier. I suppose I could see the group commander and ask for an exemption, or a reassignment, or something, on the grounds of hardship."

"And what would that do to your career, Max?"

She patted the sofa beside her. "Come and sit down, beloved."

I hesitated, and then yielded to her request. She put her arm around my shoulders and pulled me tightly against her, allowing me to cuddle as she'd cuddled against me so often. "Derek, my career is very important to me. You know that – we've talked about it enough. But if a separation over our anniversary would hurt you, I'll risk my career. You're more important to me than that."

"And you're important to me, honey. I don't want you to louse up your dream. We've sacrificed enough already. We've decided – without deciding, I guess – to postpone children for a while so that you can fly without hindrance. I've set aside my dream in order to support your flying, and I'm glad I was able to do that for you. And as much as it will hurt me to celebrate our anniversary alone, I'm not going to let you throw your career away for me."

"It's mine to throw away," she said.

"Not anymore. It's ours, Max. What you do affects me too, now. I honestly don't have any strong ambition to be 'the colonel's lady, ' but I do want you to be the colonel, or even the general. If you can lead and manage the way you can fly, you can get stars on your shoulders, maybe even command of something really big. If I woke up in the morning and saw, beside me, the face of CINC ACC, it wouldn't hurt my feelings at all."

"You're very flattering, Derek – I'm just a first lieutenant—"

"Captain selectee," I said.

"—and that means I'm way too junior to think about running a major command."

"Which ignores my point, Max."

"Yes, it does. Okay, let me address that point." She sighed above me, and squeezed me tightly for a second. "I admit that, assuming I'm as good an administrator as I am a pilot, I might rise to that height. And I admit that using our first anniversary as a reason to get out of this deployment would probably delay my career, perhaps enough that by the time I retired I wouldn't have had a chance to get that high. But as much as my career means to me, it is not the only thing in my life. You are my life, Derek. You're my husband, the one man in all the world I have given myself to. And I won't let my career harm you."

I thought about that. And as much as I wanted to tell her to talk to the wing commander, I knew I couldn't do it. "Max," I said, "we'll have other anniversaries. Yes, this is our first, and we'll never have another first anniversary. But we're going to have other anniversaries – many more, till we're old and gray and our children have grandchildren. Let them send you along. Just as not going could hurt your career, going can positively help it. You'll be flying Eagles in Indian country, and that's something not every F-15 driver will be able to say. Go, Max."

She took a breath, and it was a shaky one – I could hear it, and feel the juddering in her chest where my cheek rested on it. "Okay, Derek, if that's what you want." Her hand stroked my shoulder, and rose to run a finger gently around the curve of my ear. "I love you..."

Much to our surprise, for we knew how things could change in the process, Max's squadron actually did deploy on the first day of August. The plan was for them to stay in Iraq for a year, providing air support for the Army's combat operations against the terrorists. They wouldn't be doing any air-to-air combat, since the Iraqi Air Force had signally failed to fight during the invasion and was in any case now on the side of civilization. At that, the United States, looking around a post-Cold War world, would have to really scrape to come up with an enemy who could stand against us in the air. Russia's air force, once a respectable foe if it had come to shooting, was – like the rest of that country's military – a victim of economics, and was just a shadow of what it had been. The People's Liberation Army Air Force – it's easier just to say the Chinese Air Force, but it really is just a branch of their Army – is probably the only one which could put up a decent fight, and that would be due to numbers more than to technological parity or the quality of its pilots.

But there was Max, ready to take her standard F-15, designed to kill Soviet aircraft, and drop bombs on whatever nest of terrorists her superiors directed. And there I was, with a crowd of squadron families, to see her off. I was the only male spouse, and it felt a bit odd – there were pilots' wives all around me, and I couldn't help thinking that I was an odd looking pilot's wife.

There were speeches – as always, kind of boring since the ones making them weren't in the speech-making business. There were the pilots, standing in formation on the flightline to the side of the speakers' stand. There was the hot New Mexico sky overhead, with just a few traces of clouds that couldn't provide any shade from the burning sun. And then there was the last chance for the families to see and speak with the pilots before they stepped to their aircraft.

Max and I found each other in the crush, she having it easy because I was the only male adult, and me because of her pale hair that shone in the light. "I'm going to miss you," she said as she held me tightly.