Road to Romance - The Face from the Past
By Alex White
- 17 minutes read - 3527 wordsThis is one of four stories which were being told simultaneously by a game group. The other stories will be added here as they are released. These are transcripts of live sessions, and not carefully plotted short stories, so please don't expect them to be polished!
- Unexpected Strength
- Bodyguard
- The Chosen
- Face from the Past (this one)
Safety Discussion
We wanted to push the boundaries of what we were comfortable with, and so elected to aim for sensual/steamy romances. We did a lot of check-in during the game to make sure that everyone was comfortable with where we were going.
“The Face from the Past”
A Contemporary Classic Romance on a Military Base
- Protagonist: Calliope (Callie), an older female officer in the air force. She longs for true love, and is held back by pride. Played by Diana.
- Paramour: Salvador (Sal), a lower-ranked officer who is transgressive and a wounded hero, having lost his right arm at the elbow. Played by Alex.
- Trouble: Francis Morgan (Fran), Callie’s pre-existing relationship with another officer. Played by Belton.
Introduction
It’s a Thursday morning in the hanger, and Calliope wipes heavy beads of sweat off her forehead. The dust is in her skin. It’s been hot working by these planes. The tarmac and the concrete is just baking. She looks around and sees all of the energetic young flight recruits, and just feels experience in her bones. And then at the edge of her hearing she notices the high pitched bravado, the absolutely obnoxious song of Sal’s voice coming through, and she just grits her teeth.
She remembers someone whose voice she liked a lot better in the past. Fran Morgan. She reaches for her locket which is where she always goes when she needs to slow down her mind. She rubs her thumb across the back, and it’s smooth, and she can feel Fran’s name there. And she knows that inside is the picture of his warm smile.
She remembers working with Fran in a hanger like this twenty five years ago, when they were much younger and it was cool and everything was going to work out. They were going to be good, they were going to get out and buy that house
“In Maine, like you wanted” he had said.
“Maine could work”
“It’ll be perfect”
Sal’s voice cuts through her reverie...
Encounter
Sal calls out her name “Callie, get your fat butt over here”
“For F**ks sake Sal”
“Language, in front of the trainees” he laughs.
“I am your superior”
“Maybe, but you didn’t really see action like I did, and you need to come over here so we can get these idiots sorted out!”
Callie is taking it far too seriously, not realising that Sal is being quite lighthearted about it. This level of insubordination was normal for him.
“Tell me what all that clatter was about” she demands.
“Well, as you know the trainees have been trying to strip and manage the M16s, but the calibre of the people, heh, calibre, joke, just isn’t really up to anything. You need to run this up past your superiors and let them know. We can’t have you slacking like this Callie”
“Pardon”
“Sorry, Ma’am”
“What is the next task at hand?”
“A perimeter run as punishment”
“I’d rather you get them up to speed on this stripping and cleaning. Go and get the cleaning supplies and give a class. I’d like to watch”
“Has it slipped your mind? That only having one arm makes it really difficult for me to do this?” Sal’s right arm ends at his elbow, which he waves around.
“Use. Your. Words. As an officer” and her cadence is really cutting in front of the recruits. “Demonstrate your leadership skills and cut the humour, sir”
“Yes Ma’am” and as she steps back he mutters under his breath “what a stuck-up bitch”
She notices the slight silver in Sal’s hair, and catches herself noticing it, before remembering that she is very upset with him. And can’t stand the sound of his voice.
Sal kind of turns back to his trainees and winks at them. “Okay, come on guys, get it together. Got to put on a good show for the boss here. She deserves a good show”
She thinks “he’s actually quite good with them. They are snapping to it, and he knows what he is talking about. He clearly is good with them. Why is he jerking my chain?”
Her parting shot “Why didn’t you shine your shoes today?”
“One arm! Remember!”
She remembers the time he put a toilet plunger in his sleeve, and various pranks over the years, and she walks away, her shoes clicking.
And Sal’s thinking to himself “I bet she is good in bed...”
Callie turns as she is across the hanger and sees his muscles through the back of his shirt, and a bit of sweat there. “Idiot” she says to herself.
Complication
It’s the same day after the training session, with all that back and forth.
She’s having a whisky in her office when there is a knock on the door.
“Come!” She calls out and the door opens.
It’s Francis Morgan. He died 25 years ago.
“Callie, so great to see you!” And he goes to give her a hug.
She is rigid. There’s tears brimming in her eyes. It’s like seeing a ghost.
“Maybe she doesn’t want me here?” he’s thinking. “Can you pour me one of those?” He asks.
“Fran...?”
“I was in town and I thought we could catch up?"
“You’re dead...”
“Oh, you didn’t know?”
And she reaches up to touch his face, and like, can’t believe it, and she just reaches in for a kiss and holds on for dear life.
They embrace and he can feel her tears streaming down his own face. She clutches to him.
“I’m OK Callie. They mixed up the records. “
She squeezes his hands
“I was in a coma for a month”
“Your hands look so much older” the veins are visible and she lovingly traces them. “Twenty five years... They said you were dead. I drove, I drove so fast, Oh I couldn’t. I couldn’t...”
“Come on” he says “Let’s get out of here and I’ll tell you the whole story”
She grabs his old coat from the hook where she kept it and puts it on. It says ‘Morgan’ on it. She hooks her arm into his. Something is a little different, her body eventually softens against Frans. They walk out the door and Sal is in mid-step towards the office to ask her something.
He sees the two of them and thinks “Oh, now I’m screwed. Bastard”
First Kiss
This is a flashback. it's 25 years earlier. And Callie's been driving all night to the base. Hasn't slept. It's been a 17 hour drive. She gets back to the officers' barracks. She has a bag of things she had with her in the hospital. And she has Morgan’s coat. She feels utterly alone and so broken. She has no future. It's been ripped away. She couldn't hear the physician finish the sentence. She just ran.
And now she's at Sal's door. Knocking at his door.
“Hang on”. And then Sal opens the door. He smells of cigarettes. He stinks. He's been out. He's got a glass of whiskey in his hand. Does he have company? No.
“What do you want? Come, come in”. His arm, at this point, is freshly bandaged at the elbow.
And she stumbles in. “What have you got to drink?”
“Whiskey. I’ve been drowning my sorrows. But I've got enough for you”.
She's already started pouring. “Damn it, Callie. I did everything I could to save Fran. Everything I could”
“You're a f***ing coward!”
“That's …not the way I remember it“
“I'll never know the last thing he saw. I'll never know the last thing he thought. You took that away from me.”
“I was trying to save him… “
She drops the glass which smashes. “Because if you had the courage Sal, half the courage he had, you'd be in that bed and he'd be here.”
“He's. He's my brother. I gave my arm for him.”
She cuts her hand picking up shattered glass. He gently takes it.
“It's okay.” He says “There's glass in there. Let me get something so I can get that out. Don't want it to get septic”
She slaps him right across the face. And then she just collapses against him. “I don't know what to do” she cries.
“Hey. Look, we got to pull the pieces together“ he says.
Sal picks up a damp rag and uses it to mop away some of the blood. Callie notices that His hand is so soft. She reaches up to his wound tenderly.
“Blame me. If it helps you get us over this, blame me. If I'd have been quicker. Yeah, maybe if I'd got in front of the grenade with my whole body, I could have taken it. He'd be here with you and I wouldn't. I wasn't quick enough. I don’t know what I can say”.
“What was the last thing he said to you?”
“I mean, ‘get back it's a trap." I think it's what he said.
"I didn't get back. I could have held back. He could have saved my life, but I wanted to try and save his. To save him for your sake. I know you guys really loved each other”.
“Sal, what do we do without him?“
“We, we do what we can to support each other. We keep on going. I think it's what he’d have wanted, I think. “
“He's so handsome” she thinks, looking up at Sal. She's a couple of whiskeys deep.
“Hey, you” he says “We're in it together, right? One way or another” And puts the stump of his arm over her shoulder.
She reaches up tenderly.
Sal is a little nonplussed. “Uh, yeah, I don't like to, look. I'm kind of only half the man I was, but.. .”
She just tenderly touches the edge of the bandages... because it's a fresh wound. Yeah. And then she... traces Sal’s shoulders. and feels his ear.
“Callie, we can't. We can't do that”
“We can't?”
Sal is saying “We can’t” but he’s pulling her gently in to him. “If only I could do something to...”
“Let’s” she whispers.
Catastrophe
Back to the present day. It is still swelteringly hot. Francis Morgan lives. They are at an outdoor table at some kind of Tex-Mex place with the third pitcher of margaritas in front of them.
Fran is laughing. “Do you remember that time when we found out that Sal didn't know how to swim? And I threw him in the creek. He's floundering around, and then he figures out it's only two feet deep. That was awesome”.
Callie replied “And then the fishing trip. Right? He got on the boat and then realised that he was on the water, and he lost his mind.”
“Yes” Fran said, “he damn near did drown that time”
Callie continued “He got so sunburned on that trip. What a fool. What an absolute imbecile. You know, not packing the sunscreen, not preparing. You just think he's absolutely inexperienced. He doesn't understand anything about this world. Completely incompetent”
“But we all had a lot of good times together” Fran said.
Callie asks “What did you ever see in Sal? How did the two of you end up being so close?”
Fran looks thoughtful “He's got some rough edges, but you know, the man is loyal to a fault. If you're his friend, he will go to the end of the world for you. And he almost did, more than once”
Callie shakes her head “I disagree. His decisions took you away from me for 25 years”.
“Listen.. I know” Fran said quietly, “We've missed all those times that we were gonna have together”
She whispers “I never have…”
“No”, he continues, “But we can make new ones. We have today, we have now, we have… We can still have something like what we had before.”
Callie is upset and angry. “All the things we were planning, all of the dreams we had, were taken away. By Sal and his pathetic decision making skills.”
Fran taps the table. “We can make new plans. I'm back. We're here, you're still you, I'm still me.”
“We're not. We're old. I hurt”
“I don't care. We can still be together” and Fran puts something on the table between them. And it’s a ring. A ring.
“It's not the story we wanted” she says slowly.
“No, so we tell a new one”
“You're supposed to say something different.”
“I'm sorry. Calliope, will you marry me? “
“Yes”
AW: just have to include the table talk here!
EC: Oh. Oh, my God! No! How are they gonna get out of this?
BM: And I love that you're talking about Sal the whole time as I'm trying to lead up to the proposal. That was beautiful.
DG: I was so preoccupied with Sal. Yes. There's something in my subconscious. Sal is there. Sal's in my heart.
EC: Sal's the present, not the past.
DG: But I'm trying to fix what was taken. Right. what broke. Pride.
BM: And you think you can
DG: Thanks for proposing to me. I didn't know that scene was going to go there.
BM: That's fine. Oh, this was that went instantly into my head as soon as soon as we talked about the catastrophe. Of course he has to propose to her!
Comeuppance
Callie is wearing the engagement ring; she and Fran are a couple more jugs of margaritas in now on that same night.
“I want to know what the hell happened 25 years ago” Callie muses. “Why 25 years? Why didn’t I hear from you?”
“I don’t know what I expected at the end of that day. I couldn’t face him, after everything. I couldn’t” Morgan is deep in his cups.
“Well, he is the one that made a bad call that led to the accident, right? You sacrificed yourself, and he only lost this much of his arm” Callie gestures, “You don’t have anything to feel bad about”
“The bastard didn’t know when to get out of trouble. Never did know when to get out of trouble. I told him we had to pull back. He said that we had orders, that we would jeopardise the whole platoon if we did.” Morgan toys with his glass “We had to get out of there. Man’s loyal to a fault I tell you. He’s loyal to a fault”
Fran continues “The judge said the rest of the platoon would have died if it wasn’t for him”
“That’s not what he told me. In fact he said the opposite. Are you calling him a liar?”
“Oh he’s a liar, there’s no question about it. He just lies for his friends...”
“Anyway, I woke up from the coma, couldn’t face what had happened, and got on with my life. Married for a number of years but we recently divorced. I always wanted to come back to you. It took years to build up the courage”
“You’re saying that for 25 years you never came back to me... because you couldn’t tell the truth?”
“I wanted to Callie. Every day I wanted to”
“No, you didn’t. Because if I was what you wanted, you would have put all of that aside. How dare you?”
“But I do want us to be together. We can have it all back. We can make it new”
“Dammit no! 25 years! That life is gone. And why? Because of your pride? Your ego? Morgan, I don’t know you”
Morgan passes out on the table; Callie takes off the ring and puts it down in front of him, then leaves.
Happily Ever After
We're back at the office, and Callie's had a long night. But Callie's going to start this day this same as every other day, and suits up. And the jacket with Morgan’s name is packed away in a box.
And, she can hear Sal's voice echoing. In the hangar “Go on, you numpties! Get it together!”
“Heh, Sal, come on up to my office. Need a word”
“Okay” she shouts back. Then to the juniors “You, you and you. Three circuits. now. Get on it”.
“I said now!” Callie demands
“Yes ma’am”
Then he goes up stairs.
“Have a seat Sal”
“Formal, are we? Okay. ma'am”
Callie opens up. “You have a bit of explaining to do”
Sal replies guardedly “Look, I know that they got wet, and I had some marching longer than I should have done, but they were being jerks. They've been giving some lip, and they needed to know...”
She cuts him off. “Sal, 25 years of explaining, you need to tell me the truth. What happened on that mission?
“I can't really do that, Callie"
“Is that... Is that what really draws me to to you? Because, damn it, I can't figure it out”
“Look. It's not right to speak ill of the dead. Yeah? And, yeah, Fran was my friend, as well as your lover. But with him passed away, I would have no blame laid against his character. Would not be right”
“The Fran we knew did pass away that day. And yesterday, I saw a ghost”
“Don't believe in ghosts, ma'am”
“Sal, I have a ghost story for you. He's not dead”
“What?”
“Precisely what I said. He's not dead, and for 25 years, he has avoided us”
“But why would he. Why would he not be back for you?”
“He's a coward. I. I, um... “
“It's bloody stupid. How could anybody not come back for you?”
“Sal, you have been here. You have been here, right in front of me. And I. I absolutely love you”
“Ain’t that the funny thing” and Sal chuckles to himself.
“No, it's not funny”
“No, that's not, that's not what I'm laughing about”
“You know it too, right?”
“I've always loved you. 25 years. But I wouldn't tread on, you know, my mate Fran, or on his memory. I couldn't do that”
“He needs to explain himself to you. but I need you to know that Sal, I choose you”
“You gotta know what you're getting into if you choose me. I mean, I'm. I'm half a man” he waves his stump “and I've not got the airs and graces. I'll, I'll make mistakes. I'll call you names.”
“You'll piss me off royally, too”
“That I will"
“But, you know, Sal, I'll probably do the same. Can we just get around to calling this what it is?”
“What is it?”
“I think we're in love. And I'm ready to lay down my pride and really love you”
Sal looks pensive, then speaks slowly. “25 years ago Fran sent me into the building as a practical joke. He thought it was secure, it wasn't secure. He thought I'd fall on my face. He didn’t see the trip wire. The explosive. He was stupid, I didn't blame him. I didn't want to blame him. As far as I know, he died that day and I didn't want there to be shame on his memory, I didn't want there to be shame for his parents. I didn't want there to be shame for you. It wasn't my place to do something like that”
He continues with a distant look in his eyes “I've been put up for promotion several times, but it meant moving away, and to be honest, I didn't want to move away. From you”
“So that’s the truth of it, eh? Fran made the mistake, you did what was right, saved the platoon and lost your arm? And took the blame for him?”
“...Yeah”
Callie just looks at him for a while. Then says “Uh, what are you doing tonight?”
“Well, I was planning to get the whiskey out, to toast a dead friend again and drink myself stupid. But apparently that's not actually a valid thing to do anymore. Who knew?”
“There's a boat cruise we could take”, and she kind of winks at him. “Or, perhaps we could just go for a walk down by the marina”
“Yeah, water's not my favourite. Even now”
“Well, it's been 25 years and we're both pretty bad at this, so...”
“Look, how about how about we get a jeep out of the pool?” He suggests ”We can go up to Lover's Leap, we'll watch the stars come out and see where it goes”
Later, we see them together at Lover’s leap. Ugly hair. Dishevelled clothing. And the stars are out and they’re laughing and they're passing a cigarette back and forth.
Callie lost 25 years, but she landed with the right guy. She remembers that actually, there's been 25 years where Sal's been around, he's always been there. In her room we see pictures of awards and honours and personal moments on her wall and Sal is in every picture. Every shot. Always at her side.