But, in all honesty, he wasn’t sure he was capable of loving anyone anymore, including himself, not since that last deployment to Afghanistan about three years ago. Something had changed dramatically inside him. None of the battery of physical or psychological tests and follow-ups in Germany or San Diego or the VA Hospital up in Martinez ever revealed what had been damaged or was missing. But he knew he wasn’t the same person as before the IED blew him up, despite the doctors’ inability to pinpoint something. He suspected his soul had been permanently damaged just like his leg. But of course the trauma to his spirit had never shown up in any X-ray or blood test or inkblot.
So, for Nolan, Jackie’s dying was more like losing a longtime roommate. And a roommate who was pretty worn out from a
