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BOOK OF THE MONTH: HOMEFRONT
CHAPTER TEN
Gale would rather get a root canal than sit through staff meetings, but as a first sergeant, meetings were part of his duty description. A large part, sadly. How painful said meetings were, however, depended on all parties involved.
Seeing how this past weekend their battalion had apparently set records for misconduct on Fort Hood, Gale braced for at least a two-hour marathon with an option for three. And that would all be before the sergeant major got hold of them and spent another hour running a wire brush over their collective backsides.
He was going to lose his damn mind – if not from sheer boredom, then from lack of getting anything done. He was bringing evaluation reports along to read through and red line. Maybe he could get some of those done while the other command teams were getting their asses handed to them.
Gale glanced at his watch, wondering where the hell his commander was. Teague had been popping up missing lately and Gale needed to corner him and find out what was going on.
Hopefully, this wasn’t a sign of trouble in Paradise. He knew Teague was seeing the lawyer but that didn’t mean things couldn’t already be screwed up.
He wouldn’t put it past him to have done something stupid. He hoped not. He shot Teague a text, but when no response came he tucked his phone into his shoulder pocket and walked down the hall toward the battalion conference room.
And stepped into utter and complete chaos.
Gale had probably heard every variation of the expression “tension thick enough to cut” but walking into that conference room he could tell there was tension to spare.
Nichols, the Chaos Company commander, stood toe to toe with the Diablo Company commander, and neither of their first sergeants seemed inclined to pull them apart. Gale sighed. Just what he wanted to do: break up captains having a hissy fit.
He dropped his leader book on the table with a bang. “Well, ladies. What seems to be the problem here?” he said, stepping into the middle of the confrontation.
Diablo’s commander, Captain Bello, took a step back. “Nothing we can’t hash out later.”
Nichols still looked ready to fight, but a single hand on his shoulder by First Sergeant Morgan made him, too, take a step back.
Oh good, bad blood between commanders. This was going to make everything so much more fun. He’d talk to Nichols later.
“Gentlemen, whatever is going on, I strongly suggest you squash it sooner rather than later. The battalion commander has no qualms about firing anyone,” Gale said. “Give him a reason and I’m sure you’ll be looking for gainful employment elsewhere.”
Bello moved to the opposite side of the table with his first sergeant, leaving Nichols on the same side of the table as Gale. Teague arrived a moment later and they all took their positions around the conference room table.
“Everyone is in such a sunny mood,” Teague mumbled out of the side of his mouth. “What’d I miss?”
“Chaos and Diablo were getting ready to brawl,” Gale said beneath his breath. “Know why?”
“I’ve got some suspicions.” Teague rubbed his hand over his mouth. “Tell you later.”
Gale glanced around the conference room. The lawyer was nowhere to be found and the staff was slowly trickling in. The new command teams were all set now, with the exception of the support company. Apparently there had been some drama at brigade about who was going to command the unit responsible for supplying logistics to the rest of the battalion.
Kind of an important job: only beans, bullets, and bandages. No biggie. Gale shook his head, marveling at the workings in the higher echelons of leadership that kept decisions from being made.
He sat back and took in the power dynamics of the new teams, especially the first sergeants he’d be working alongside for better or for worse for the next year to eighteen months, if not longer.
Gale glanced between Nichols and Captain Bello. They must have some history together for them to be at each other’s throats like that. Still, as long as Gale and his commander didn’t get dragged into it, Gale couldn’t see where it was any of his business.
What was fascinating, though, was the silent animosity radiating through the space. No one was talking. It was as if everyone was sizing each other up.
Gale didn’t have time for who-had-the-biggest-dick games. They were short a command team and they were less than four months out from heading to the field to prep for the next deployment.
And they still had a shit-ton of personnel issues to clean up across the battalion.
He’d have to pull the new first sergeants aside and figure out what the major malfunction was. They needed to be working together, not playing childish games.
And two captains pissing on each other’s legs qualified as childish games.
The operations officer, Captain Loehr, walked in and gave the warning. A moment later, the battalion commander walked in and everyone rose smartly to their feet.
“Take your seats, everyone.” LTC Gilliad waited for everyone to settle. “We should have a new support command team very soon. In the meantime, I want our continued focus on getting soldiers in the right places¾if they need medical attention, make sure we’re engaging at the commander level to ensure they’re getting treatment. If they’re having legal problems, we’ve been given direct access to our own lawyer. Get them out of my Army.” He paused. “We just got the word that our deployment schedule has been moved up by three months. More to follow as we get more information from higher up, but I wanted you to hear it from me before the rumor mill started going ape shit. Captain Loehr?”
Gale rocked back in his seat at the news as Loehr took over the briefing. Three months earlier. That meant instead of leaving in ten months, they were leaving in seven.
He studied the paper in front of him, the words blurring as hope died in his chest.
He’d thought he’d have time to try and be the father he’d never been. He rubbed his chest as his heart twinged against his ribs. Damn it. He’d thought he had more time.
But he didn’t.
He’d been lying to himself. There wasn’t enough time in the world to help him fix things with Mel. To regain Jamie’s trust after abandoning her and her mother.
The meeting went on without him. He heard bits and pieces of information and wrote down things he may or may not have heard correctly.
And when it was over he left, needing to put some space between him and the people that he would deploy with yet again.
He wasn’t ready to go.
He’d only just gotten here.
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