From This Day: With her, military man lets down his reserve

Their first real conversation took place at a Chili's in Columbia, S.C., four years ago. The topic was injury prevention.

Stacey Johnson had spent almost two decades in the Army. He had been deployed to Macedonia and Kosovo and Bosnia and Baghdad. Now he was a drill sergeant at Fort Jackson in South Carolina. He taught soldiers how to shave, how to shoot a gun, sometimes even how to tie shoelaces.

Heather Brunette had come to Fort Jackson as an athletic trainer. She'd grown up in Clearwater, played volleyball in high school and gone to graduate school at the University of South Carolina. This was her first job.

Heather had met Stacey before, but he had that military wall up like a suit of armor. He was tough and unemotional, his voice monotone.

Now at lunch, they started joking about the soldiers. They realized that sometimes the soldiers played off each of them, telling them different stories, sort of like a child might with his parents.

They laughed, and Heather felt liked she'd unearthed a piece of him.

About three or four months later, Stacey's stepfather and his uncle died two days apart. He tried to keep that rigid demeanor, but she could tell he was sad.

She felt like she was peeling back layers, finding more pieces of him.

She thinks she fell in love during the first kiss. It wasn't his best moment. He was nervous and he missed. They both laughed.

"He was not just this old crusty Army guy," she said. "I could see there was more to him than that."

He proposed in 2010 on a blanket during the Fourth of July fireworks.

As the lights flashed and exploded above them, he pulled a diamond ring out of his pocket and said, "I have something pretty, too."

Stacey, 37, and Heather, 27, chose to marry on Veterans Day on a terrace at the Hyatt Aqualea Resort on Clearwater Beach.

They set up a round table with a candle, a rose, a Bible, an inverted wine glass and a plate with a slice of lemon on it — to remember the absent soldiers.

Stacey stood rigid and tense in his Army uniform, next to the Army chaplain who would marry them, as he waited for Heather to appear.

As she walked down the aisle in her beaded ivory gown carrying a bouquet of red roses, he smiled and seemed to relax.

Leonora LaPeter Anton can be reached at lapeter@sptimes.com or (727) 893-8640.