They put the kid right next to us. Every time I heard that cry, I just wanted to rip my hands free and squeeze the life outta every fucker in that campground. It still makes me grit my teeth real hard thinking about it.
I don’t want to bore you, so I’ll skip to that morning after the journalist finally woke up and they dragged him off. I could see the sunlight through that itchy cotton cloth. It was still cold as all hell, but the wind wasn’t quite so bad. I couldn’t feel my feet and knew I’d have trouble walking if they led us anywhere. The boy seemed to have gone to sleep ’cause I hadn’t heard that hum from him in a while. I could hear him breathe though, which made me feel better.
“Pops,” Junior whispered. “I just can’t get free.”
“Me neither,” I answered. It made me real mad that he survived Iraq just to come home to this shit. I also felt real mad that I led him here outta my own dumbass revengefest.
“That fucking journalist got out of here real quick, didn’t he?” Junior said. “Didn’t even think about us or the kid.”
“Yeah, not surprised. What’s he gonna do? He don’t know us from Adam. We’re just some hicks to him, and this boy, well, hell, I would’ve put up a fight, but I ain’t him.”
Junior grunted in agreement and I felt him rustle around.
“How’s your foot?” I asked him.
“Hurts a little, can’t feel it all that well, not much blood getting to it.”
“Well, at least you got that going for you.”
Junior laughed and sucked snot outta his nose. Both of our sinuses were running real bad because of the cold. I was worried he couldn’t stand this too long. He always did have problems with his lungs getting infected and getting pneumonia.
“What the hell happened last night, Pops?” Junior asked. He was just talking to talk. We’d already talked about it, but he was like that as a kid. Always asking questions to talk, even when he knew the answer or knew I didn’t. I guess when we get scared, we go back to that place, when we were kids. I couldn’t blame him for it, he was holding himself together real good.
“I don’t know, son. Whoever they dragged in is gone now. Something came and took it.”
“What was it? Were they just trying to scare us?”
“I think so. I thought they weren’t man enough to kill us, but now I don’t know.”
“I’d met some fuckers while I was in-country,” Junior said. “They’d slit a reporter’s throat and videotaped it. We caught them, and I couldn’t talk to them ’cause they just talked that sandnigger trash, but I could tell by looking at them that they weren’t any kind of real man. They were just some punks trying to show that they were tough.”
“By killing some poor guy who was blindfolded?” I asked.
“Yup, fucking pussies.”
“Watch your language, Junior.”
“Sorry, Pops.”
I thought about that for a while. I wanted to ask whether he thought these were the same kind of men, but I guess he wouldn’t have brought it up if he didn’t think they were.
I heard the boy start rustling around on the ground.
“You awake, son?” I asked.
He began to cry again.
“Shhh, we’re not here to hurt you, buddy, we’re tied up just like you,” Junior whispered, in a real smooth kinda way that surprised me. I started to think that it probably wasn’t the first time he’d talked to a child that was in a situation like this. That made me real sad.
“What’s your name, son?” I asked the boy.
“Sean,” the boy mumbled, then let out a little more cry, but not much.
“Okay, Sean,” Junior started. “We’re working on how we’re gonna get out of here, and we’re taking you with us, okay?”
“Okay,” the boy whispered.
“Can you see anything Sean?” I asked. “Are you blindfolded like us?”
“Yeah, they tied something around my head.”
“We’ll get it off you as soon as we can, okay?” Junior said. I was very proud of my son at this point, and really started to believe he could. I started getting proud of both of us and thinking that we were going to make it out of this.
“Sean, can you get your hands free?” I asked.
“No, they tied my hands to my feet.”
I don’t know why, but that image got me burning, I had to keep quiet so I didn’t start cussing in front of the boys.
“Are you comfortable?” Junior asked.
“No,” Sean answered.
“I’m going to lie down next to you. If you can put your head on me or sit against me or something, go ahead, okay?”
“Okay. Who are you?”
“My name’s Sergeant Seth Ramirez, I’m with the United States Army and I’m trained to deal with these situations. My pop’s name is Oscar, he was with the Marine Corps, but he’s still an okay guy. Between the two of us, we’ll be able to get you out of this, okay?”
“Okay.”
Hell, I started to believe him myself.
******
Watching the blurry sun rising through that dark cloth got me to thinking about my wife. I’d noticed over the last few years that I had to look at a picture to remember what she looked like. I could remember how she felt perfect, and I can remember how she smelled, especially coming right out of the shower.
I guess maybe that blindfold did a pretty good trick on my head, ’cause I could remember the wife perfectly. The way she first looked. I’d been just off my tour, all screwy in the head and so confused I thought I’d go be a college boy for a while with my GI Bill. Well, school wasn’t for me, there weren’t nothing on that campus that made any sense to me, except for this one girl in English class.
She liked to wear those fuzzy sweaters. I don’t know what you call them but they kind of look like someone skinned a pink teddy bear. Well, she wore those a lot and she had her golden hair all nice and long and wavy. She’d wear skirts that showed just enough leg to keep me awake through those long ass lectures.
I didn’t learn nothin’ about Shakespeare, except how long it took him to say something small. I said that too, in class, and that’s when she first smiled at me, one of those low smiles where she kind of tucked it down so it could just be for me. Those smiles didn’t come easy either, especially in those days when college girls weren’t always too keen on vets.
I once had a fight with a couple of hippy college kids. Those boys and their girlfriends thought that they’d impress their friends and show that they’d believe in peace enough to call a jarhead some nasty names. Well, they sure got a whole heaping helping of reality that day. Got me kicked out of school, but that was fine. It makes me feel good that for everything my boy has to put up with these days, least he don’t have to put up with that. Those idiots did have idiot children, but now they are too ashamed to pick on combat vets.
Well, my wife, I was remembering perfectly that tucked-in smile and how her fingers sort of massaged each other while she was listening to those lectures. I felt pretty clean, though I wasn’t thinking all that clean, if that makes any sense at all.
Well, she was slipping me those smiles for a few weeks before I got the gumption to talk to her. We went out a few times and she was a proper girl in public, but when we were alone, well you don’t need to know about that.
One weekend, I had a relapse of malaria and I guess I started spouting off some things, having nightmares, and after that, she just dug into me. For years after that, she’d get undressed and press up against me and start asking me about the war. It helped with the nightmares. I told her things that I thought would give her nightmares, but she just looked sad for me. Then, she’d press in a little more. When I tossed and turned at night, she’d tug at me, whispering and kissing and it’d be okay.
At that moment, kneeled down with my knees breaking, my boy trying to be brave and that little boy doing those little humming cries, I could see every strand of that golden hair. I could feel the heat of her chest warming my shoulder
, her brown eyes dropping down in that sympathetic frown.
“Junior,” I mumbled.
“Yeah, Pops.”
“We’re gonna talk about the war when we get home, okay?”
I was a little surprised when it actually came out. I’d been trying to say that for a while, but never had the guts.
“Why?” my son asked, as I had when my wife first pressed me about it.
“’Cause son, you gotta, and there ain’t nothing you can tell me that I don’t already know, and if there is, you definitely gotta tell me.”
“Umm,” Junior began.
“Listen boy, I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. If your momma was here, she’d be the one to do it, or if you went out and found yourself a good woman to tell, then she could do it, but you sit yourself on that stool at the shop and stew for twelve hours a day. It makes me mad that the Lord took my wife from me and now you ain’t got no one to talk to, so you’re gonna talk to me, okay?”
“Okay, Pops,” my son whispered.
I felt like that would make my wife smile, one of those wrinkled ones that came after she’d gotten that smoker’s face and her voice got all deep and sexy.
“Pops,” my son said.
“Yeah, Junior?” I replied, taking a heavy breath, trying to hold on to that warmth a little longer.
“Someone’s coming.”
The little boy started crying a little harder; I didn’t know how he still had the energy.
“You need to be quiet now, just a little while,” I whispered. “Nothing will happen to you.”
I heard it then too, a rustling behind us. It sounded like one person. I rocked a little on my knees to try and get blood to my feet, but it just made my calves tingle.
The footsteps got closer, and the breaths were short and panicky. This person was either crazy or afraid.
“Daddy,” I heard the voice call.
“Baby Girl?” I replied. I was relieved at first, but then got real mad.
“Daddy, I’m sorry,” she said, kneeling down next to me and hugging me.
“Untie me, Baby Girl,” I whispered.
“I can’t, Daddy, people are coming this way,” she gasped. “I just wanted to let you know I would come back for you, I’ve got a plan. Me and that reporter have a plan.”
“Untie us,” Junior growled.
She hugged me quick and shuffled off the opposite way she came. I tried to track her rustling sounds, but they eventually faded and were replaced by others rustling toward us. There was a bunch of them, and they were talking to each other about microphones and speakers and shit like that.
“This is where everything will end tonight,” I heard a voice saying. It was mumbly, kind of like the guy was stoned or drunk, but still sounded smart and college educated. “We want cameras out here and recording devices. We’re not sure what we’ll be able to pick up, but it may be the only way to prove to the world the truth of the Prophet.”
“Do you guys have any kind of power source, generators or something?” another voice asked. The voice was real mellow and country.
“We’ll bring the ones in from the compound,” the first voice said. “We won’t need them anymore after tonight.”
“What the hell?” the older hick growled. “What the fuck is goin’ on?”
I guessed he didn’t know there were hostages here.
“Don’t worry about them.”
“Bullshit!” the country boy said. I’d started to think that his voice made him sound like an Indian … Native American, whatever the hell they call them today. He sounded off a reservation is what I’m saying. I found out later he was named Jack Daniels, so yeah, he was off a reservation.
“What the hell have you guys got yourselves into?” Jack Daniels yelled. He was real pissed and sounded pretty damn scared. I woulda been too.
“Do you want to join them?” the stoned guy asked.
That got JD to thinking, ’cause he didn’t answer. No one said anything after that, but they started moving around again, so I guess JD decided he didn’t have much of a choice. He didn’t, of course, and if I could’ve traded him places I would have.
The group finally retreated from the clearing and the little boy began breathing easy once they left. He might have fallen asleep.
I started thinking about my wife again, thinking about how warm she was, and also about how much we all needed her. Me, Junior and my poor, dumb-assed daughter. She’d needed a momma her whole life, and instead she had me. I guess I deserved this.
“Junior.”
“Yeah, Pops,” my son said.
“I was serious about us talking about the war when we get back.”
“Okay, Pops.”
Chris
Chris’s fingertips were burning and bruised. Three of the five members of Shropshire Plaid had crammed in a long rehearsal overnight. Delicious sat attentively in the control room after begging to sit in.
The band was a stripped-down version of Plaid with Cliff, Plaid’s original drummer, and Palo, a guitar player they picked up while in South America after their third album. Chris couldn’t keep tempo with the drummer, had trouble with just about every solo and had to hand off a lot of the lead duties to Palo. Palo and Cliff had continued playing for the last five years, but Chris had focused on being a full-time producer, and it showed.
Chris put up his hands and waved the music off after another mangled solo. Chris took off his guitar and sat it down on the stand. He walked out of the studio and into the control room. He shooed Delicious away from the mixing console, then pointed him toward the studio. Delicious cowered away and Chris shut the door. After a few moments, they began playing again with Delicious picking up Chris’s guitar.
Chris collapsed on the couch near the untouched blankets and pillows. Jim hadn’t been over for several nights and Chris hadn’t heard from him. All he knew was the band was supposed to be ready to play tonight.
Chris glanced down at the dark purple blisters on his fingertips. Chris told Cliff and Palo that he’d been playing all along, but the fingertips don’t lie. The calluses were long gone and replaced by useless soft, pink flesh. He only played for short periods of time when he had to help other guitarists figure out a song.
Chris sighed, pulled out his phone and turned it on. He was hoping to have gotten some word from their bass player, Billy, but he hadn’t called. Chris knew he was still living in Oklahoma City, and he had long suspected that Billy had some sort of fling going with Jim’s estranged wife. Chris also suspected that Billy didn’t want to be associated with this show. Not that anyone else did. Well, aside from Delicious.
Chris closed the phone and tossed it to a nearby chair. He leaned back against the sofa and grunted out a yawn. Cliff and Palo emerged through the door and Cliff sat down at the control board while Palo leaned against the wall. Delicious still played in the studio, and Chris was annoyed the brat was sprinting through all the solos Chris could no longer play.
“Maybe we should call it a day and get some rest,” Palo ventured. “We’ve been playing all night; I don’t think we’re going to get any better.”
Chris nodded, flexing and clinching his fist.
“What are we going to do about a bass player?” Cliff asked. “I just don’t think Billy Bob is showin’ up. If he doesn’t, we should have somebody else ready.”
Chris nodded again, but didn’t say anything. He stood up silently, walked to a mini-fridge and grabbed a beer. He closed the fridge door and fell back down onto the couch. He held the beer in his left hand, gripping it with his bruised fingers. The cold glass felt good.
“Are you going to be okay?” Cliff asked.
Chris didn’t answer as he laid on his back and threw his arm over his eyes.
“You could use super glue for tonight, might help,” Cliff said.
“About the bass …” Palo asked.
“I’ll call JD,” Chris grunted. “He’ll be running sound tonight, so he’s going to be there anyway. I’l
l let him know he might have to step in.”
“Who?” Cliff asked.
“The guy that owns The Listening Room,” Chris said.
Cliff and Palo glanced at each other, exchanging grimaces.
“Isn’t that the folk/roots music guy?”
“Yeah,” Chris said, keeping his face hidden. “He plays bass.”
“But it’s an upright bass,” Cliff replied.
“He knows the songs,” Chris grumbled. “We might see what boy wonder in there is doing tonight, bring him along too.”
The other two nodded, though Chris didn’t look at them.
“Chris?” Cliff asked.
“Yeah.”
“Jim isn’t showing up tonight, is he?”
“I don’t know,” Chris sighed and sat up on the couch, finally opening the beer. “He’s around, we have to assume he will.”
“Whatever you say,” Palo said, as he stood and walked to the fridge. He tussled Chris’s hair as he passed. Chris batted his hand away, grinning despite himself.
“People say that this was Jim’s band,” Palo said, as he dug through the fridge, glancing over the collection of foreign and domestics. Chris kept the fridge stocked with all the beers Keith wouldn’t let him drink at home.
“It wasn’t Jim’s band though,” Palo continued.
“Yeah,” Cliff said. “It was our band. Jim was Jim, but he was never the band. We could go on the road without him and not miss anything. The music might even be better.”
Chris shrugged, knowing where this was going. Chris had no intention of going back out on the road.
“I love Jim, but the music was second with him,” Cliff said. “And now, with all the shit that’s happened with him and this looney cult, it’s made us into a joke. All the music we put out, it’s all now just a punch line. If you want us to do this thing tonight, that’s fine, I’ll be there and I’ll play with or without Jim, but after this, I say we just bury the past and do something on our own.”
“I can’t sing, neither can either of you,” Chris said, then took a long swig of his beer.