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“I can do whatever Ineed.”

“I can do whatever I need.” Her voice faltered at the last word.

“I can’t hear you, soldier. Say itlouder.”

She took a breath. “I can do whatever I need,” she shouted.

“That’s it.” His eyes blazed into hers. “And no motherfucker gets to tell me who I am.”

“And no...” She swallowed hard. “I’m not going to say that.”

“Say it.”

It wasn’t like it was imperative. Like the world would end if she didn’t, or a bomb blast would kill her. The fire blazing in his eyes made it clear this was life or death, and she knew it wasn’t. But it felt like it.

She squared her shoulders and faced him down. And she found her own soldier. “No... No motherfucker gets to tell me who I am.” She was breathing hard, her heart beating rapidly. “Including you.”

“Including me.” He nodded. “Be whatever you want. Get on the balance beam if you want. But if you don’t get on it, don’t let it be because it scares you. Because you’re afraid of doing a bad job. Who the fuck cares? Get on, try. If you fail, this isn’t war. Nobody’s going to die. You understand me? The only kind of failure that’s fatal is not trying in the first place.”

She had a feeling that he was saying that to himself just as much as he was saying it to her, and she didn’t know why that felt like it meant something. She didn’t know why she was responding to it.

This was something they both needed.

Maybe he needed to feel like he could help her.

Because she thought of everything he must’ve lost when his military career went away. And she wondered if the purpose, that sense of being somewhere he was needed, was one of the hardest things to lose. She swallowed hard.

It was just a balance beam. And the worst that would happen if she fell was that she fell.

She couldn’t get hurt. He was right. This wasn’t war. But she was so afraid to try because she was afraid of failing. She had identified as a quitter for all these years, but the truth was she had gotten to where she wasn’t even a starter. She was a never trier.

And that needed to stop.

She took a deep breath and walked to the balance beam. “I can do what I want,” she said, stepping up onto the beam.

“Atta girl.”

“I can do what I need.”

“Yeah, you can.”

“No motherfucker gets to tell me who I am or what I can do or...or how much I can have.”

“No, they don’t,” he said.

She took a step, wobbled and fell.

She landed on her feet, she was like one whole foot off the ground, but she felt incredibly deflated.

“Back on, Rory.”

“I was distracted.”

“Don’t quit.”

She stood for a moment, breathing hard.

“I said, don’t be aquitter, Sullivan.”