Jana, mom and I decided to hop on that Carnival cruise deal last minute. Mental health break. We needed some sun. Since you’re back, you handle Victor. He’s been moody. Don’t wait up. Back Monday. There was a smiley face drawn at the bottom. I stared at the paper.
I read it twice, three times. Mental health break. They had turned off the heat to save on the electric bill while they were gone. They had left a 72-year-old man with stage 4 pancreatic cancer alone in a freezing house, unable to walk to the bathroom, unable to get a glass of water while they went to drink my ties on a boat.
They didn’t just leave him, they discarded him like a piece of broken furniture that cluttered up the living room. I looked back toward the living room where a war hero was shivering in his own filth, waiting for death to take him because his family was too busy having fun to care. I felt a shift inside me. The loving wife who bought wine and turkey died in that kitchen. The fatigue from my deployment vanished, replaced by a cold crystallin focus. I crushed the note in my fist.
I remembered the soldier’s creed I had recited a thousand times. I will never leave a fallen comrade. Victor was my comrade now. And Brady, Brady wasn’t my husband anymore. He was the enemy. I set the crumpled note down next to the sink, took a deep breath, and filled the glass with water.
The mission had changed. Operation Thanksgiving was over. The counteroffensive had just begun. The first priority was triage. That’s what they teach you in the army. You stop the bleeding, you stabilize the patient, and you secure the perimeter. My perimeter was this freezing, silent house.
And my patient was the man shivering in the living room. I cranked the thermostat up to 72. The furnace groaned in the basement, protesting the sudden demand before kicking on with a low, dusty rumble. I went back to Victor. He was too weak to walk on his own, so I had to lift him. He felt impossibly light, like a bundle of dry sticks wrapped in that cheap fleece blanket. This was a man who used to bench press 300 lb in his garage. Now I could feel his ribs through his soiled sweatpants.
“I’ve got you, Victor,” I whispered, guiding him toward the master bathroom.
“We’re going to get you cleaned up,” I ran a hot bath, testing the water with my wrist until it was perfect.
I stripped off his ruined clothes, trying to be as clinical and respectful as possible. He squeezed his eyes shut, turning his head away. I knew that look. It was the humiliation of a warrior who had lost the ability to command his own body.
“It’s okay,” I said softly, sponging warm water over his back.
“You’re safe now.” After he was clean and dressed in a pair of Brady’s thick flannel pajamas, which hung off him like a tent, I helped him back to the recliner in the living room. I went to the kitchen and opened a can of Campbell’s chicken noodle soup.
I crumbled some saltines into the broth just the way my mom used to do when I was sick as a kid. The smell of the salty broth filled the kitchen, finally chasing away the lingering scent of ammonia. I fed him slowly, spoon by spoon. He ate with a desperate hunger that made my chest ache. When he finished, he leaned his head back and closed his eyes. Within minutes, his breathing evened out. He was asleep. Now the house was quiet again.
But this time, it wasn’t a peaceful silence. It was the silence before an ambush. I needed answers. I walked into the kitchen and saw the family iPad sitting on the charging dock on the counter. Brady usually kept it there to look up recipes or check sports scores.
My hands were still trembling slightly, not from cold anymore, but from adrenaline. I swiped the screen. No passcode. Brady was too lazy for security. I was about to open the calendar to see when exactly they had left, but a banner notification dropped down from the top of the screen, Instagram. You were tagged in a photo by Hannah xxo. My frown deepened. Who the hell was Hannah? And why was she tagging my husband? I tapped the notification.
The app opened, filling the screen with a blast of bright, saturated colors. It was a photo taken on a sund deck. The ocean behind them was a brilliant sparkling turquoise. In the foreground, holding a fruity cocktail with a little umbrella, was a girl who couldn’t have been older than 24. She had bleach blonde hair, fake eyelashes, and a bikini top that barely contained her chest. And wrapped around her waist, wearing oversized aviator sunglasses, and a grin I hadn’t seen in years, was Brady, my husband.
The caption read, I felt the blood drain from my face. My stomach dropped so hard I thought I might throw up. Sugar daddy. My fingers flew across the screen, tapping out of Instagram and finding the Navy Federal Credit Union app. This was the lifeline. Every paycheck I earned from the Army.
Every hazardous duty allowance. Every cent of my life of our savings went into that joint account. The little loading wheel spun for a second that felt like an eternity. Then the numbers flashed onto the screen. Available balance 12 V45s. I blinked. I wiped the screen thinking maybe there was a smudge covering the other numbers. Maybe it was supposed to be $12,000 or even $1,200. But no, $1245. I tapped on checking history.
The list of transactions scrolled past my eyes like a casualty report. Novi 20 Carnival Cruise Line one. What you need in 50 volos Novi 20 Carnival Cruise Line drinks package 600 US ZES Novi 21 Seminal Hard Rock Casino ATM withdrawal 5 and 200 COS a year $5,200 in cash withdrawal at a casino. I gasped for air, clutching the edge of the granite counter to keep from falling. That money, that was the roof fund. Three months ago, Brady had told me the flashing around the chimney was shot. He said the contractor needed a deposit. He said, “Babe, don’t worry about it while you’re deployed. I’ll handle the house. You just stay safe.”
I had transferred $6,000 from my personal savings into the joint account for that roof. I had worked extra shifts, taken every overtime opportunity, eaten messaul slop instead of ordering out just to save that money. There was no roof repair. There was no contractor. There was just Brady, a 20-year-old girl named Hannah, and a slot machine in Florida. He hadn’t just cheated on me. He had robbed me. He had stolen the roof over our heads to finance a week of debauchery while his stepfather lay dying in his own filth in a freezing house.
A scream built up in my throat. A primal sound of pure, unadulterated betrayal. It wasn’t just anger. It was the realization that my entire life for the past 5 years had been a lie. I was the bank. I was the safety net and he was the parasite. If you are listening to this and you have ever given your heart and your wallet to someone who stabbed you in the back the moment you turned around, please hit that like button right now. Comment on my watch if you believe liars deserve to get caught.
I looked at the phone in my hand, the device that had just delivered the death blow to my marriage. I couldn’t hold it anymore. It felt like it was burning my skin. With a guttural cry, I hurled the phone across the kitchen. It hit the drywall next to the refrigerator with a sickening crack, shattering into pieces that skittered across the tile floor. The noise startled me into silence. I slid down the cabinets until I hit the floor, pulling my knees to my chest. The tears finally came.
hot, angry tears that burned my cheeks. I buried my face in my hand, sobbing, not for the loss of my husband, but for the sheer stupidity of trusting him. But as the tears fell, the soldier in me began to wake up. The initial shock of the ambush was fading. Now I needed to assess the damage. I needed a plan, and most of all, I needed allies. I looked toward the living room where Victor slept. We were the only two left, and we had nothing left to lose.
The rage I felt in the kitchen didn’t vanish. It just cold forged into something harder, something useful. I wiped my face with the back of my hand, took a deep breath to steady my pulse, and picked up the tray with the bowl of soup. I walked back into the living room.
The only light came from the small table lamp and the street lights filtering through the blinds, casting long prison bar shadows across the floor. Dinner is served, I said, trying to keep my voice light. Victor was awake. He heard me coming. He didn’t just lay there. He was gripping the armrests of the recliner, his knuckles white, pushing himself up.
It was painful just to watch. Every muscle in his body was atrophied, but he forced himself into an upright position. His spine not touching the back of the chair. It was muscle memory. It was the Marine Corps. Seerfidelis, always faithful. Even when your body is failing, you don’t eat lying down like an invalid. You sit at attention.
“Easy, marine,” I whispered.
He looked at me, his eyes sunken deep into his skull, but there was a spark in them that hadn’t been there an hour ago.
“Thank you, Sergeant,” he rasped.
I sat on the ottoman across from him, watching him lift the spoon. His hand shook, a violent tremor that spilled broth back into the bowl. He paused, took a breath, and tried again. He refused to let me feed him this time. He needed this dignity. We ate in silence for a few minutes. The only sound the clinking of the spoon against the ceramic bowl.
It was the companionable silence of two soldiers in a foxhole, waiting out a mortar barrage. You know, he said suddenly, his voice thin but clear. I saw the look on your face when you came in. The smell. It’s handled, Victor, I said quickly. Don’t worry about it. No. He shook his head. It’s not just the smell, it’s the situation. He swallowed a spoonful of soup with difficulty. She’s waiting for me to die. Jana Elaine, she’s been waiting for 6 months. I stiffened. Is that why she left? Victor let out a dry, hacking laugh that turned into a cough.
She left because I’m taking too long. She calls me a broken ATM. Said looking at me ruins her appetite. He pointed a trembling finger toward the wall above the fireplace. Look. I turned. There was a rectangular patch on the floral wallpaper that was a shade lighter than the rest. A nail stuck out.
Empty. Where is it? I asked. I knew what used to hang there. It was his shadow box, the display case holding his Vietnam service medals, his bronze star, his purple heart. The ribbons he had earned in the jungles of the Meong Delta in 1968.
“Bay,” Victor whispered.
The word hung in the air like a curse.
“She sold them last week, said she got 500 bucks for the lot, told me nobody cares about old metal anymore.
My blood ran cold. Selling a veteran’s medals wasn’t just greed. It was a desecration. It was stripping a man of his history, his sacrifice.
“I’m going to get them back,” I promised, my voice low and dangerous.
“Leave it,” he said, wincing as a spasm of pain shot through his abdomen.
He dropped the spoon. His face went gray, sweat beating instantly on his forehead. He grabbed his stomach, groaning through gritted teeth.
“The pain?” I asked, instantly switching into medic.
He nodded, unable to speak. Where are your meds? I scanned the side table. There was a forest of orange prescription bottles. I found the one labeled morphine sulfate oral solution.
“Here,” I said, grabbing the dropper.
“When was your last dose this morning?”
He gasped. Before before she left, I looked at the bottle. It was half full. I unscrewed the cap, preparing to drop the 20 miriam grousen dose prescribed on the label. But as I pulled the dropper out, I paused. I’m a certified combat lifesaver. I’ve handled morphine, fentanyl, ketamine. I know what liquid morphine looks like. It’s supposed to have a certain viscosity, a slight thickness like syrup, and it usually has a faint color depending on the brand. The liquid in the dropper was clear, perfectly clear, and it dripped too fast.
I frowned. I brought the dropper to my nose. Nothing. Morphine has a bitter chemical smell. This smelled like tap water. I put a tiny drop on the tip of my tongue. It was tasteless. It was water. I stared at the bottle in horror.
“Victor,” I said slowly, my voice trembling with a new kind of fury.
“Did she fill this?”
He nodded. I squeezed shut against the pain. She said the pharmacy raised the price. Copay was too high. She said she had to stretch it out.
“Stretch it out,” I roared, slamming the bottle down on the table.
“This is water, Victor. She’s been giving you water for stage four pancreatic cancer pain.”
“She needed the money,” Victor whispered.
His voice laced with a bitterness that was sharper than the pain.
“She needed a new bag, a coach bag for the cruise.”
The rooms spun. a coach bag. Elaine had tortured a dying man, denying him pain relief in his final agonizing days so she could buy a $300 purse to show off to strangers on a boat. This wasn’t just negligence. This was torture. This was a crime. I stood up, pacing the small room. My hands were fists at my sides. I wanted to fly to the Bahamas and drag her off that ship by her hair.
“Jana.”
Victor’s voice cut through my red haze. I stopped and looked at him. He had opened his eyes. The pain was still there, etched into every line of his face. But something else had taken over, a steely, cold resolve. He wasn’t looking at me like a victim anymore. He was looking at me like a commanding officer.
“Sit down,” he ordered.
I sat. He reached out his hand. His skin was paper thin, spotted with age, but his grip was surprisingly firm as he took my hand.
“You think I’m just a scenile old man?” he said.
“You think she took everything?”
“She drained the accounts, Victor,” I said gently.
“Brady took everything I had.”
“They took your pension checks. She took the checking account.” Victor corrected.
A ghost of a smile touched his lips. It was a terrifying smile.
“She took the joint account. She took the scraps. I let her see.”
I stared at him. What do you mean? I was a regional bank manager for 30 years. Jana, do you really think I’d let a woman who spends our electric bill money on lottery tickets have access to the main vault? He leaned forward, lowering his voice to a conspiratorial whisper.
“I have a trust,” he said.
“A revocable living trust. I set it up 10 years ago when I first got sick before I even met Elaine. The portfolio is sitting at Vanguard right now. Stocks, bonds, the sale of my first house in Virginia.”
My eyes widened.
“$3 million,” he whispered.
“And she doesn’t know it exists. She thinks I’m broke. She thinks I’m a burden.”
He squeezed my hand tighter. His blue eyes burned with a fierce dying light.
“They left me here to die in my own shit. Jana, they left you with nothing. They broke the code.”
He took a ragged breath.
“I don’t have much time. Maybe a day, maybe two, but that is enough time for a final mission. I want to change the beneficiary. I want to rewrite the will. And I want you to help me burn their world to the ground.”
He looked at the empty spot on the wall where his medals used to be.
“They wanted my money,” he rasped.
“They won’t get a dime, but they will get a lesson. Are you with me, Sergeant?”
I looked at this man, my stepfather, my comrade. I felt the weight of the water- fil morphine bottle in my pocket. I thought of the empty bank account. I thought of the coach bag.
“I’m with you, Victor,” I said.
“What are your orders?”
