That week was hell for me. Once word got around that Jack and Erica had gotten married, I had every single serviceman at that base 'dropping by' the shop to give their condolences on the breakup of our relationship, and not too casually expressing their interest at taking his fictional place in my bed. I managed to duck out of them all that week by saying how I was still kind of heartbroken over the whole thing and just wanted to take time away from dating anyone, but I knew they'd be back.

I never realized before that week just how much Jack had helped my time in the Corps be as enjoyable as it was. After he got married, it was a chore. Just work... and I had eighteen months left in my cruise.

When Jack finally returned the next weekend, I got to hear all the details of their Honeymoon. Romantic evenings, dinners at the lake, feeding ducks at some park, I wanted to puke it was so sweet! I'll admit it. I was bitter. Bitter, jealous, and angry with Jack for taking away my protective cloak. I think that's why he did what he did.

Jack told me about his plan for the weekend of March twenty-third, ninety-six. He'd thought of everything, but needed Heather and me to help pull it off. So we spent four weeks between Jack burying his mom and the weekend of the twenty-third plotting, scheming, and basically having a blast planning the surprise of a lifetime for both Erica and Richard. Rich almost caught us once. He walked into the shop while I had stuff out he shouldn't see, but he could be a bit oblivious at times. He never had a clue!

Rich once told me that he thought Jack didn't know how to plan ahead... that he seemed incapable of thinking more than five minutes into the future. He thought Jack was wasting his time and opportunities by not going to college on the government dime. We'd earned it, so why not take advantage? The truth is Jack did have a plan for what he wanted to do, he just had different priorities than Rich. He thought love and happiness, even in total poverty, were better than living in the lap of luxury...

...but Jack did know how to plan.

Jack told me that they talked, cried, kissed a few times, and professed their love for one another. That and a bunch of stuff about living in contentment with pain and such. Blah, blah, blah. Richard was a wreck. He hid it well, but I knew him better than anyone except Jack, even better than Heather. He was torn between wanting to see Jack happy against his protectiveness of Erica. I guess that means protecting her from ever growing up, having fun, sex, a marriage, children... etc. Men are idiots!

The rest of New Years morning was uneventful, unless of course you count Jack's proposal to Erica, but then I'm pretty sure they both knew it was only Jack being Jack. I told you that story already, though. The next few weeks were hard on them. Jack had no Liberty and Erica was swamped with school. Richard and Heather had gotten to the 'comfortable' part of being a couple, so they were used to the separation. Plus, they were sleeping together, which took off a lot of the tension. Jack and Erica... well... Erica told me what they weren't doing.

It got difficult for them to go slowly after only six weeks. Their needs pushed them father and faster than they'd planned to go, but sometimes you realize you gotta to take hold of life fast, and live it while you still have the chance.

Heather and Rich were inseparable after that. For about six weeks, every minute of Liberty Rich had was spent with her, leaving Jack and I to fumble around on our own. It wasn't until Rich's twenty-fourth birthday that Jack and I got to spend any time with him again, but by then it was a foursome.

Rich was done dating and Jack was stuck as my 'boyfriend' for the interim. We went on a triple date once. Rich and Heather, Jack and... Marie I think her name was... and me and Julie. It was awkward because they were first dates for Jack and me, but Heather and Rich were a permanent couple, so I think it made our dates a little uncomfortable. We never did it again.

By the end of the following year, Jack was in a bit of a depression. He was happy for Rich and Heather, but he'd begun to feel like he was never going to find anyone that would love him. It was shortly before Christmas ninety-five that I found myself in a position to repay all the help Jack had ever given me, plus interest.

Their graduation was apparently as uneventful as they usually are. There was apparently a party afterwards, but both of them said it was boring and not worthy of a story. Just things that happened, but then I think a lot of life is that way... just things that happen.

In the weeks that followed, Jack was working at his physical therapy. He said he was concerned that the Corps wouldn't take him due to his injury, but in the end, with Rich's help, he passed MEPS and, with his mother's signature, headed off to Paris Island in July while he was still seventeen.

Boot is Boot, so telling you what it would have been like for them isn't really telling you about them. It wasn't until they came home after MCRD and before heading out for SOI that things got interesting.

Jack spent the next three months in physical therapy. The only thing that kept them afloat was the money that Frank Hargrave gave them to help out. Rich said his dad felt responsible for the whole thing because he did nothing to stop Judith from playing matchmaker with the neighborhood floozy, not caring if Jack got hurt in the process.

He took classes between therapy sessions by state appointed tutor until he was able to come back to school, but by then it was early April and there was less than ten weeks of school left. Richard had classes to make up from his jail time, so he had to quit his job and go back home to have any chance of graduating with his class.

Rich told me the most about when Jack finally was able to go back to school. Jack didn't like talking about it, but he had the best stories about the things going on outside of school.

Rich told me what happened though. Wendy dated Jack through the rest of May and June and into July. Then her parents took her on a month-long trip to Florida. When she got back, right before school started, she told him that she'd found someone else and broke up with him. Rich said she was cruel about it, telling him that he was too much of a wimp for her and she needed a strong man. I don't know if it's true or not. Rich hated her for hurting him, so he might have just been bitter and wanted to say mean things about her. I guess now only one person knows the truth... and she'll never tell.

So Jack and Rich started their senior year of high school on a bad note, and it just kept getting worse from there.