No one tells you how deployment sounds. The door closes behind you you arrive home to the air conditioning kicking on and no friendly, "how was your day?" from the other room. Tonight, you walk into the kitchen and turn jazz on to cook dinner to. Usually, laughter fills the kitchen and you hear him singing along to whatever is playing, but rather, it is your own silence and your own thoughts that you hear. You watch TV alone on the couch and look up to see where he normally sits. It sounds like no "I love you's" in that goofy voice from that spot. It sounds like his heartbeat at night when you lay on his chest. It sounds like his sigh in the morning when it's time to wake up for the long day ahead. But tonight, it's silence from the fans running. In the morning, it's your sigh when you wonder when he'll call and if he's okay.
No one tells you how deployment will look. You stare into the mirror after a night of restless sleep from worry, circles under your eyes. It looks like a smile in the office hallway and your fight to hold back tears. It looks like glass of wine and no one to share your thoughts with. It looks like the flowers he bought you for your anniversary even though you couldn't be together. They make you smile, even just for a moment. You remember how much he loves you. It looks like scribbled notes that you keep reading over. It looks like old photos that you love to observe from the distance of time while a smile cracks on your face, "if only they knew how lucky they were." Life was simpler then. It looks like one side of the bed perpetually made up, waiting for him to come home. It looks like Thanksgiving plans with friends who take you in for the day. It looks like texts checking in with you from those friends. "Are you hanging in there? Are you doing okay?" It looks like unanswered phone calls. It looks like no phone calls. It looks like a box of Halloween decorations that you haven't put up because there's no one to decorate with.
No one tells you how deployment will feel. The loneliness, the fear, the anxiety. The depression that slowly creeps in and takes you over one day at a time. And one day, you wake up. That person you've missed so much may not even want to be yours anymore. That person may be a part of your past because no one told you that depression knocked you down and took you over. No one told you that anxiety would make it worse. No one told you because there's no way to quantify it. No one told you that you would become this. No one told you because they thought you would be different.
But you are different. You mess up and you fall down. But you get back up, put that smile on and continue to live. You continue to grow. And now, when you come home, you appreciate the moments. The moments that you hear from him, the jazz music in the kitchen, the memories, and the photos. The change comes when you realize that you are okay on your own. The change comes when you appreciate the sunsets, the sleepy mornings to yourself, the time passing, because one day, he'll be home with you.
