But I watched him sleep, and heard him talking to his Josephine, pleading, begging her not to die this time, as he relived his nightmare over and over.
For months I ignored it, maintained my distance, and maintained that precious gap between us.
I was weak. In the end, it turned out that actually watching a basically good man destroy himself with drugs and alcohol is more difficult in practice than in the classroom. We were together so much and his pain was so intense. And, worst of all, he wasn't really what I'd been trained to deal with -- he certainly wasn't betraying his country or seeking money or s*x or revenge or any of the usual motivations CI agents are trained for. He was just trying to stop the pain.
I could almost hear Josephine begging him not to do this to himself.
It ate
