The first night was the worst. I don’t know what I expected when he came home from Vietnam. I guess I was too blinded from happiness to have him back in my arms again to really care. Everything felt right again. On the way back from the airport we had talked and laughed and sang along to old songs that held so many young memories. I talked and talked and couldn’t seem to stop. I was overbubbling with joy! I told him how our little town had grown and how Denies’ baby was due any second now. Everything felt normal. He didn’t talk about Vietnam and I didn’t ask. He was home. He was alive. That is all that mattered to me.
Then night came. Nothing could have prepared me for what happened that night. I was curled up at his side listening to his breathing. My thighs throbbed lightly from sex but I was content and I fell asleep to the sound of his heartbeat.
And awoke to the sound of his screams.
The sound startled me and I almost fell off the bed. At first I was stunned and looked around to find our bedroom empty. What was he screaming about?
“NO!” He screamed and I had to scramble out of the way of his thrashing body. “You can’t have him! You can’t!” He choked on his words as if he was going to cry. But my husband never cries. “Jimmy! Jimmy, look at me. Don’t close your eyes. Please! Jimmy!”
All I could do was stare at him confused. What was going on? I tried to shake him awake but he wouldn’t wake up. Then I realized with a start that he was having a dream of Vietnam. “Baby,” I whispered carefully, I was scared of how he would react to me. Was he having a nightmare? A flashback? I gently shook his shoulder. “Honey, it’s okay, you’re home now.”
“Get off me!” He yelled jerking away from my touch. “No! He is NOT dead! He’s not. Jimmy!”
I had to do something. Snap him out of it. “Baby!” I shouted grabbing his face and slapping it gently. “It’s just a dream. Wake up. Everything is alright. Come on. Please wake up!”
But he didn’t. Instead he thrashed out against invisible hands that seemed to be holding him back to the bed. “You can’t take him yet! He’s not dead! HE’S NOT! I won’t let him die!” Then he started to throw punches. His fist connected with my jaw and I went sprawling across the bed and tumbled off the side.
That night I lay on the floor and cried. I was in shock that he would ever hit me. Terror of what just happened filled me and I started to shake. He raged all night and soon I stopped listening, my ears numb to the comprehension of his words. All I could feel was the panic vibrating through my bones. I didn’t sleep at all that night and when morning came he woke up remembering nothing of the night before. Completely fine and cheerful wondering why I was on the floor and why my face was swollen.
What was I supposed to tell him? Oh, it’s nothing just you violently screaming and lashing out at me in your sleep. Nothing to worry about, really. What do you want for breakfast? Yes because that is what normal people would tell their husband right after they came home from the war. So I just told him that I must have hit my chin on the bedside table when I fell off the bed last night. Of course then he joked about me not being use to sharing a bed because he had been gone so long and I had to pretend to laugh at that.
I made him breakfast and we went about our day as if it was as normal as ever. He went job searching and I cleaned the house sense it was my day off. I listened to the radio trying to drown the memory of last night out of my mind and sooth the panic of the next night and what might happen. He had come home happy telling me he got the job and I smiled and kissed him. Then night came.
Night always came.

Every night just got worst and worst. More vivid and real. I heard him command men as “men unseen” came down upon his squadron. Another night he argued with his captain about the slaughter of innocent Vietnamese children. Then there was so, so, so much more and I started to have nightmares. Some nights I would dream of children getting blown to tiny chunks of wet red skin and other nights I would dream of feeling as if I was being watched only to turn around to see nothing but green. Green sky, green trees, green ground, everything green. Then whenever I turned around again to continue on my way a knife would slip around my throat and right before I could scream I woke up.
Nothing I tried before we went to bed would end his flashbacks or my nightmares. I tried tea laced with sleeping medicine, warm milk, and yoga during the day. Nothing would work. I tried calling some of my friends with husbands that came back from Vietnam to see if the same this was happening to them too. I would ask how their husband was and they would always reply happily that he was doing great and then I would get shy and not ask them how he was sleeping. I really had no one to turn to.
So every night he went back to hell not knowing it when morning came. But I knew. I remembered every night. Every bloody night.
Then we found out I was pregnant.
We were going to have a baby! We were ecstatic. He was beaming all day long and we started talking baby names and bedroom plans. Then night came. Night always came. I lay awake I our bed holding my tummy listening to him yell and fight and cry. I felt suddenly like I was living two lives. One during the day and one during the night. One was wonderful and happy the other was terrifying and haunting. Before I didn’t mind the scrapes and bruises he left on my body. But that was when it was just my body. Now I have to think about the baby. My fear is that he would accidently hurt him. I have to think about his safety now not just my own.
That is why I have to do it.
I sit up against out headboard stroking my stomach listening to my husband without really hearing him. I have to do this for our baby, for my sanity, and most of all for him. He shouldn’t have to live like this. Each night in horrid agony forced to relive that stupid war! That is why I have to do this.
I try to choke back my sob. I am shaking badly. I can’t breathe. I pick up the pillow that lies across my lap. Slowly, so painfully slow, I rise to my knees hugging the pillow to my chest. Carefully I straddle his waist. He doesn’t seem to feel me his mind stuck back in his never ending nightmare. I make a mistake and think about what I am doing. I am hyperventilating. Breathe. I can’t. I’m choking. My throat cracks and I start to sob.
I press the pillow to his face leaning forward as my sobs cause my body to quake. “I’m sorry. I’m so, so, sorry.” It is all I can say threw my jagged crying. His body starts to jerk in response to what his mind cannot. He is like a shell and only his body knowing he is dying. His legs kick a few more times while his lungs shut down.
Then he is still.
I fall to his chest weeping. “Please,” I sob. “Please forgive me.”
Off in the distance I swear I can hear helicopter blades cutting through the air. Carrying my husband to safety.