Tangled Up in Blue

Justice

Blue

I head for the barn, and that's where Keegan finds me a few minutes later, slumped in an empty stall, sullenly picking at fragrant pieces of fresh hay.

I don't need to look up to know it's Keegan standing a few feet away. 

I recognized the sound of her steps as soon as she walked into the barn. Nobody else moves quite the way she does.

I can feel her anger before she even says a word.

"What in the hell was that?"

I don't look up; I don't answer her question.

"Blue?"

I flip a piece of hay toward the sound of her voice.

"Dammit, look at me!"

My eyelids twitch as if they're trying to stage a mutiny and raise my chicken-shit pupils on their own. But I don't let them.

Keegan stomps on the floor in frustration.

"I just cannot believe you're acting like this," she says through gritted teeth. "I just cannot believe it. Ever since you got here, you've been acting so weird, so hostile."

Her words cut into me, like barbed wire scraping across my skin.

"Everyone in there is just trying to help you, Blue, trying to save you. But just look at the way you're—"

And then I'm on my feet and in her face, snarling, fighting to control myself, struggling to keep from grabbing her by the shoulders and shaking her.

"That's just the point!" I hear myself shouting. "That's just the fucking point! I didn't ask for any of this, Keegan. I didn't ask to be hauled off the base by that prick of a lawyer. 

"I didn't ask for goddamn Hellfire Holmlund to be hired. I didn't ask to be propped by your grandma's fire like some imbecile!"

I'm sputtering now and trembling, still burning inside with the rage that's been building all day. 

One part of me wants to stop and gently wipe away the hurt, fear and fury crisscrossing Keegan's face.

It's fury that solidifies in her eyes. And seeing Keegan furious just fuels my own anger. 

It shouldn't. But it does.

"Why didn't you do what I told you to do, Keegan?" I yell. "I told you to forget me. Go on with college, go on to your journalism career. But instead, you got your grandmother involved, and I don't even know who the hell else is going to show up. 

"I'm not in control of my own damn life and. . . I told you. . .I told you what to do!"

She shoves me, and I stumble backward, stepping in a pile of horse manure in the corner of the stall.

Keegan follows and gets right in my face.

"News flash, Blue!" she spits out. "I don't have to do what you tell me to. What century do you think this is? Huh? If I want to try to save you, I'll damn well do it!"

We glare at each other, both of us shaking, both of us with clenched fists and lacerated hearts.

"And what are you even talking about, not being in control of your life?" 

 "You just turned yourself in to the U.S. Army!" She is still shouting. "You just handed control of your life over so they could lock you up for maybe the rest of your goddamn life, and you're mad at me for making you lose control?"