Jeff stared at the smashed eggs

Jeff stared at the smashed eggs. The last bit of food he had left in the house since Emily had moved out two weeks ago was now cascading down the front of his counter into a shiny wet pool on the floor. Rolling back from the counter, Jeff slid himself to the floor with a roll of paper towels and spray cleaner at hand. As he moved closer to the mess on his floor he noticed that the color of the broken yolks seemed much darker than expected. Were they old, he thought, or was it the color of the floor showing through as the iridescent goo spread thin across the tile. It reminded him of the way the sun would look sometimes during a distant sand storm in the desert. Sandstorms in the deserts of Iraq were nasty when you happened to be stuck in one but quite beautiful when seen from a distance, especially at sunset. As the bright white sun dipped below the brown dust clouds high above the raging storms it would start to turn orange and seem to lose its power, its heat. The cloud, filled with tiny particles of sand would begin to sparkle like gold and for a short time, you would forget where you were and why you were there.

Jeff had completed two previous tours of duty overseas, one in Afghanistan and the last in Iraq. He had seen action in both but this third tour promised to be his last and would most assuredly help to forward his career. Besides, it was an easy assignment to watch over a small group of civilian communications contractors while they worked to rebuild radio towers around the base perimeter. As the tour was coming to an end, Jeff started making plans for his homecoming. In a video conference two weeks before he was to ship out, he asked his girlfriend, Emily, to be his wife.

Emily and Jeff had known each other since High School but they ran in different circles. It was several years later when a mutual friend invited each of them to her wedding that they found interest in one another and started to date. Together now for five years and confident that Jeff would remain stateside for the rest of his military career, Emily said yes.
Two days before Jeff was scheduled to leave, his unit was escorting some of the contractors up into the foothills north of the base. The north tower was the furthest tower from base and located midway up into a small range of mountains. About a mile ahead of the convoy, a small group of herders and their goats were coming down out the hills from the west and crossing the road. The convoy stopped and gave them plenty of room. Once they had made it across, the convoy continued north, up the road. As the convoy reached the area where the herders had crossed they saw another group of men on the west side of the road and the original herders on the east side. It was an ambush and they were trapped in the middle. The convoy was taking heavy fire when a rocket hit the vehicle directly in front of Jeff's Humvee. All Jeff could remember was seeing the truck in front of him launch into the air as it flipped and twisted above him.

That was two years ago now. Jeff called off the wedding because he did not want a relationship built on pity and guilt. Emily stayed as long as she could but it was clear to her that their relationship was over. In truth, Jeff loved Emily and didn't want to lose her but he knew she deserved a chance to have a normal life, children, and a man who could stand with her to raise them.

Miraculously, three of the eggs that crashed to the floor survived the fall so it appears that Jeff won't be going hungry tonight after all and after six hundred and eighty-three words of explanation I would ask, "how would you like your eggs"?