( he has a very real, very visceral moment where he wants to tell her no. where he wants to keep that old moment to himself, play close to his chest. the scars he'll talk about. the grueling walk through the desert that came closer to killing him than the bullets did. hell, he'd even tell her about the men who did it.

but the coordinates aren't only the place he got shot.

he sucks a breath in between his teeth, hands clenched beneath the still water of the tub. some of flora's questions have, in the past, been invasive, but she hasn't asked any that makes him angry like this one does. and he knows it's not reasonable or rational for that sudden ember of rage to combust into a conflagration, incandescent with the burn, but.

he has to walk himself back. focus on the mist. the air. the ambient sounds of the woods. somewhere, in the distance, a wolf is howling, and maybe that's how he finds center again. )

Sorry.

( for the shift, the change. his father's anger was a storm to be weathered, sam still recalls how the mood would drop like the ambient temperature when the sun had gone down whenever his father came into a room and he'd told himself they'd never have that commonality.

softer, )

Sorry. 'Don't get a tattoo if you don't want people to ask', right?

( breathe in. breathe out. the wolfsong has stopped, and he wonders if they're coming closer. )

It's just a place where a lot of people died.

( they'd been laughing. joking about something stupid. heartbeats between moments, and everything can change in the space of one. military equipment is built by the lowest fucking bidder, rocket launcher meets metal plating and it was like tissue paper. jefferson never stood a chance. none of them did. if he hadn't been so disoriented by the blast, maybe — maybe it would have been different. but it wasn't. )