Free In Love and In Danger (Loving) by Susan Leigh Carlton

Chapter 1
    The world stopped spinning for Rebecca Turner on April 17, 2012.  There was nothing notable about April 17;it was a typical sunny day, temperature about 7 9 ° , cloudless, the hummingbirds were hovering and occasionally fighting over the red container of sugar water. It was about to change.  The doorbell rang; Rebecca opened it to find a US Army notification team.  They had come to tell her the love of her life, Jason Turner had been killed in Kandahar the day before.  Rebecca did not shed a tear as the senior member of the notification team gave her the details.  She stood there with a blank stare on her face; she was neither seeing nor hearing anything. 
    Emily Walker, t he wife of Jason’s commanding officer, Major Robert Walker, stayed behind.  She had been part of the team since her husband had assumed command of Jason’s company at Fort Bliss.  She recognized the symptoms exhibited by Rebecca as one of non-acceptance and shock.  There had obviously been some kind of mistake.  Jason would call; he would come home when his unit rotated back.
    Emily Walker sat with the zombie-like Rebecca for the better part of the day.  She fixed a lunch, nibbled at but not eaten by Rebecca.  She talked with her, told her of all the support mechanisms available to survivors.  Eventually she left, and told Rebecca she would see her the next morning.
    * * *     
    Emily Walker returned the next morning to find Rebecca still dressed in the same clothes she had worn the previous evening. 
    “Would you like to go for a walk, Rebecca?”
    “No, I have some cleaning to do.  I need to call mom and tell her Jason isn’t coming back.  Have they notified Jason’s parents yet?  I don’t know what to do next.  I just don’t believe it.  He really isn’t coming back is he?”
    “I’ll help you with all of that Rebecca.  That’s why I am here.”  Now let’s sit down and talk.  Where will you want to hold the funeral services?  Here or in your home town?  You can also use Arlington or any of the national cemeteries.”
    “I think we will want to use Rossville.  That’s our hometown, it’s in Illinois.”
    “I’ll pass the word on, and give you the schedule.”
    Thank you, Emi ly.  I appreciate it.  I’m not sure I could go through this by myself.”
    “You’re in the Army.  You’re not by yourself. ”  Tell me about you and Jason.  I know he went to the Point, but how long have you known him?”
    We’ve been in love since the third grade, though it was in the fifth grade when he told me wanted me to be his wife. 
    We were married in the chapel at West Point the day Jason graduated.  Two weeks before that, I graduated from the University of Illinois.”
    “ Then you guys have known each other forever!”
    “ Pretty much, we lived next door to each other. In Rossville.”
    * * *
    All of the arrangements were made and a funeral with military honors was held at the United Methodist Church in Rossville and Jasonwas interred in the Rossville Cemetery, next to his grandparents.
    Rebecca moved back to Rossville in May, 2012.
    * * *
    Rebecca Turner rotated the “Open” sign that hung on the shop door to the closed side, walked back toward the rear of the small antique store.  Rebecca had bought the store located on Chicago Street in Rossville, Illinois with the some of the insurance money she had received after her husband was killed by an IED in Afghanistan.  The shop had been one of the few stores to survive the 2004 fire on Rossville’s main thoroughfare...
    It had been a long day.  Business had not yet developed to where she could hire any help, so everything was on her shoulders.  What she really wanted to do was lock up, and go home and collapse on the bed.  That’s what she wanted to do.  Before she could allow herself that luxury, she had to inventory the delivery left by the UPS driver earlier. 
    Rebecca was busy appraising an old vase the young woman in front of her