Children of Paranoia

  “No.” I shook my head. I was sure of this answer. “I can honestly say that when we were fourteen, I couldn’t have imagined that we’d grow up to do what we do. Even if I had, I’m not sure if I would have been too excited by it.” I looked out over the beach. The early-morning beachcombers were walking down along the water. A few people had come out with long fishing poles and were casting them into the tide.

  “You’re lying to yourself, Joe. I know it and you know it. You would have been fucking thrilled. I know I would have been thrilled. When we were fourteen, playing basketball in your driveway, I was sure we’d end up in meaningless, dead-end jobs just like all the other losers from high school. That was if we made out at all, seeing how people in our families were dying around us and no one was willing to tell us why. Don’t forget why we became friends in the first place, Joe.”

  “I remember,” I said. It was superstition that led us to each other—not ours, the other kids’. They were convinced that we were bad luck. They wouldn’t even talk to us because they thought we had some sort of death jinx.

  “My mother, my brother, my uncle, your uncle, your grandparents, your father, your sister. I was pretty sure that everyone I cared about would be dead by the time I was twenty.” Jared stood up. “You want a beer? I’m going to get myself a beer.” It didn’t matter that it was around five in the morning. The beer sounded right. I nodded. Jared went into the kitchen and came back out with two bottles in his hands. He unscrewed the cap from one and handed it to me. Then he unscrewed the cap from the other and took a long swig. I wanted to hear the rest of his speech. I wanted to be convinced. “Instead, look at us now. Our lives have meaning, Joe. Do you know what most people in this world would do to have a little meaning in their lives?” He took a long swig from his beer.

  “You know those classes I teach,” I said. Jared nodded. I’d told him about them before. Not every soldier taught the classes. They only picked a few of us. Neither Jared nor Michael had ever taught one. “When those kids ask why we fight, we finesse the answer. We tell them what we know works. They don’t ask for more than that.”

  “That’s because they don’t need a reason, Joe. They’ve got all the reason they need burning up inside of them. When you’ve got passion, you don’t need reason. It’s only when you get old, like us, that you start asking questions. The older you get, the more your passion drains out of you and the more you look for a reason behind everything.” Jared took a swig of his beer. “You ever ask one of these old guys that you’ve stayed with when you were on a job what the War’s about?” I shook my head. I’d never thought to ask. I’d heard my share of stories, though. Everybody had. Jared laughed. “They’ll go on, man.” He shook his head. “They’ll tell you stories that’ll burn your ear off.”

  “Do you believe them? The stories they tell?”

  Jared thought about it for a minute. “Yeah,” he answered. “I figure you don’t get to be that old without knowing something.”

  “So we’re the saviors of the world?” I said, half asking, half just letting it float out into the air. “We’re the only ones who can stop them?”

  “I don’t see anyone else trying. Look, Joe, I don’t claim to know all the details but I know that the killing and the death are necessary. You know it too.” Did I? “Once we win, the world will be better off. We’ve got a responsibility.” Jared believed every word he said. I believed just enough.

  “I don’t know,” I replied, “maybe I’m just running out of hate.” I took a swig of beer.

  “It’s not hate, Joe. Your head is all fucked up.” He tapped the lip of his beer against my forehead. “It’s just the way it is. Hate is what I felt when I heard that one of those motherfuckers killed my little brother three weeks after his eighteenth birthday. That was hate. Hate was what you felt when you found out that your dad didn’t die in a car accident. I remember. I was there. I ran out of hate a long time ago. Hate’s got no discipline.” If there’s one thing Jared had, it was discipline.

  “So what is it now?” I asked. “What keeps you going?” I thought that maybe whatever it was that kept Jared going would work for me too.

  Jared gave it a quick thought before answering. “I don’t know. Knowledge. Purpose. Knowing that I have a cause. Someday we’re going to win this War and my grandkids are going to be able to grow up without being afraid and it will be because of you and me.”

  “So, we kill them because they’re evil, just like we were taught when we were kids? That’s what you’re getting at?”

  “Fuck, man. Do you doubt it?” Jared asked me the question and then he stared at me. If he could have found the doubt inside of me, he would have pulled it out and strangled it to death.

  “I don’t know,” I replied. “You really believe that they’re evil?”

  Jared looked out over the waves breaking on the beach. “Well, it’s either them or us.”

  I was sick of hearing that, Maria. I was sick of hearing that it was either them or us. I was sick of hearing that it was kill or be killed. Even then, even before I met you, that didn’t make sense to me anymore. That’s not what Jared was saying, though. What Jared was saying, I had to believe. “So that’s it? That’s your purpose? Them or us? First to kill is the last to survive? I can’t find any meaning in that.”

  “That’s not what I said, Joe,” Jared replied. His eyes were tight. “Don’t twist my words. You asked me if I still believed that they’re evil. Yes. Yes, I do. I have no doubt and I have no doubt because there’s just too much death for everyone to escape judgment. So it’s either them or us, Joe. I’m not saying that it’s kill or be killed. I’m saying that either they’re evil or we are, because there ain’t no way that everyone here is innocent. And I know for damn sure that I’m not evil, Joe. And I know that you’re not evil either.” He pointed his beer toward me. “I know you. I’ve known you since before you knew about this War. I’m certain that they’re evil because I know that you’re not.” I had to believe it, Maria. I didn’t have any choice. He had to be right. If he was wrong, I was lost. “There’s not going to be peace until we win this.”

  “Or they do,” I added.

  “Or they do,” Jared repeated, nodding. Then we sat in silence again for a long time. We sat and watched the sky go from red to pink. We sat and watched the sunlight begin to reflect off the low-hanging clouds before we could see even a sliver of sun. We sat and watched as the beach started growing crowded with people there just to watch the sun come up, like it did every other day. Then we watched as the sun first peeked over the horizon and slowly rose up into the sky. It always amazed me how fast the sun seemed to move when it just crested the horizon. Jared and I sat together and watched the world change. I looked over at him and knew that he’d only pretended to be doing this for me. He liked watching the new day be born as much as I did. When it was over, when it had officially gone from dawn to morning, Jared stood up. “I’m going back to bed, and I suggest you do the same,” he said. “Otherwise Michael’s going to drive us crazy tonight.”

  “Yeah,” I replied. “I’m going to follow you in a minute.” I wanted another minute to put my thoughts together. “This was good, Jared,” I said to him as he pulled the screen door open. “I needed this. Thanks.”

  “Anytime, Joe,” Jared said. His voice was strong. “Sometimes you just need to be reminded, you know? We’re doing a good thing, Joe. I know it. You know it too. I know you do. Don’t let yourself doubt it. If you start to feel doubt, you have to bury it. When you do what we do, doubt’ll get you killed.” Jared was serious, as serious as I had ever heard him in my life.

  “I know,” I replied. He was right. The problem was that burying the doubt wasn’t as simple as Jared made it sound.

  As we had agreed the day before, Jared and I let Michael plan our evening on the second night. He spent half the day talking about it while all I tried to do was while away the hours on the porch, watching the day go by. I left the house once in the middle the day
to go jump into the ocean and cool down. It felt good to be in the ocean. It felt good to be reminded how small I was.

  So that night we headed to the southern end of Beach Haven for dinner. We didn’t have reservations, but Michael figured he could get us a table at one of the fancy restaurants on the bay by greasing the hostess. Besides, he liked using his attempted bribe as an opening gambit to try to get the hostess’s number. The plan was for an upscale dinner followed by a trip to an overcrowded Beach Haven bar with live music and drunk girls. “College girls,” Michael kept intoning, like the words were full of magic. Michael dressed in his summer best, donning a bright red, floral print Hawaiian shirt and a pair of linen pants. He wore enough cologne to subdue an elephant. Michael hadn’t grown up with me and Jared. I didn’t meet Michael until two weeks after my sixteenth birthday. That was the day of my initiation. That was the day Michael and I sat next to each other while some stranger told us that people wanted to kill us and that, if we didn’t want to die, we’d have to kill them first. We went in innocent and came out something completely other than innocent—not experienced, just not innocent anymore. When the class disbanded, each of us was specifically told not to contact or seek out anyone else from the class. It’s dangerous, we were told. It could get people killed. Michael didn’t care. He found me. He couldn’t handle his new knowledge alone. He barely had any family left. He didn’t have anyone that could really help him prepare for what was next. Michael needed friends. No rules were going to stop him from finding them. He chose me, whether I wanted to be chosen or not. A couple weeks after Michael found me, I found out that Jared was one of us too.

  “You guys ready for a crazy night?” Michael clapped his hands together and began rubbing them like he was trying to stay warm.

  “Smells like you are,” I responded, laughing.

  Jared walked up to Michael, took a big whiff, and looked at him. “You’re staying at least ten feet away from me all night.”

  “This is my lucky cologne,” Michael said. “You guys’ll see, once the booze starts flowing and the music starts pumping, women will be drawn to this scent.”

  “Like flies to shit,” Jared said. “Can we eat before I get another whiff of Michael and I lose my appetite?” We could walk to the street where all the good restaurants were. We had to cross over the island, but that didn’t take long. The island was only three blocks wide. We made our way over to the bay and walked another ten blocks south to get to the restaurant Michael wanted to try. We walked past the amusement park and the water slides and at least three miniature golf courses. Beach Haven was teeming with families, little kids, flashing lights, and ringing bells. The music from the carousel could be heard for blocks. We walked past at least ten kids playing Skee-Ball. The restaurant wasn’t right on the strip, so by the time we reached it, the streets had quieted down quite a bit. We could still look behind us and see the lights on the top of the Ferris wheel but the street in front of us was quiet. It was a small street with three or four seafood restaurants facing the bay. Michael made us walk by each restaurant and look inside before picking one. He made his choice based on which hostess he thought was the most attractive. The place he chose was pricy and crowded but Michael was able to get us a table. Sometimes, he just got the job done.

  “You get her number too?” I asked after the hostess showed us to our table and started walking away. Michael didn’t say anything. He just smiled a big goofy smile.

  “I’m not sitting next to Michael,” Jared said before we sat down. “I want to be able to smell my food.” I don’t even think he was kidding anymore. Our table was in the back corner of the restaurant, only a few feet away from the railing separating the restaurant from the bay. From our table, we could sit and eat and look at the reflection of the stars rippling in the water. When the wind shifted just right, the smell of Michael’s cologne would be mercifully replaced by the salty smell of the bay. It was just starting to get dark when we ordered our drinks. I was sitting with my back to the wall. Michael was on my left-hand side with his back to the water and facing the entrance of the restaurant. Jared was on my right-hand side, his back to the door, facing the water. I had a straight view of most of the restaurant. While I’d have to strain to see the entrance, I could see all of the seating area and could make out about half of the bar. The room was in high spirits. The light outside was fading quickly. The room was full of the sounds of glasses clinking, silverware rapping against plates, and pointless vacation chatter. We ordered our food, fish, clams, crab claws. We ignored the prices and just let loose. I’m glad we did, since it was the last meal that the three of us would ever have together. Besides, we never did pay the bill.

  When we got our drinks, Michael lifted his glass and said, “So, boys, what should we drink to?”

  “World peace,” I offered, and we all laughed. It was an old joke, older than we were. I’d heard my parents say it. We tried to avoid talking about the War but our conversation kept circling back to it. It always did. Each of us told the others about rumors we’d heard—recent victories, recent defeats, people we knew who’d been promoted up the ranks, people we knew who’d been killed. We didn’t talk about why we fought. We’d had that conversation too many times already. It never went anywhere. We’d all heard the theories, some theories more than others. In one, there were originally five groups fighting each other. We were the only two left. In another, we had once been slaves and our enemy the slave masters. When we revolted, we won our freedom and they let us go. The problem was that as soon as we left, they turned around and began enslaving other people. So we came back to fight them once and for all, to end their reign, to keep the world free. That’s the version we heard the most—probably because it was the one where we were the most heroic. We all believed that someday we’d be told the whole story. The rumor was that if you rose high enough in the ranks, they told you everything. Sometimes that was the only reason I cared about being promoted.

  The food came and we just kept talking. The talk slowly turned from the War to us reminiscing about the good times we’d had when we were young and carefree. Even with the War hanging over our heads, when we were seventeen we felt like we’d be seventeen forever. Those were some of the best times of my life. Then, one at a time, we turned eighteen.

  When we were about halfway through our meal, she walked in. Michael had been watching the traffic going in and out of the restaurant since the minute we sat down, hoping he could get two girls’ phone numbers before we even got to the bar. He noticed her right away. She was hard to forget. “Hey, your little friend is here,” he said to me.

  “What are you talking about?” I asked. It took me a few seconds before it dawned on me. Michael was lifting his hand to wave her over to our table when my reflexes kicked in. I grabbed his hand before he was able to get it above his shoulder and slammed it down into the table. It made a loud banging sound against the wood. A few of the people at the surrounding tables turned and glared at us.

  “Jesus Christ, what the fuck was that for?” Michael asked, twisting his wrist, checking to see if I had broken something.

  “No waving,” I ordered. “Answer my question. Who is my little friend?” I didn’t dare look for myself.

  “That hot Asian woman from the bar last night,” Michael replied. “What the fuck’s your problem? Did you strike out that bad?”

  “Has she seen us?” I asked, keeping my voice quiet. My gut was talking to me again. I was determined to listen to it this time. This was wrong. There were no coincidences, not in our line of work.

  “I don’t know,” Michael answered. His voice dropped, following my lead. “I can’t really tell. If she has, she’s not acting like she has.”

  “Act like you haven’t seen her,” I said under my breath. “Better yet, act like you don’t even recognize her.” It was another order. I didn’t pretend that it wasn’t.

  “Seriously, Joe, what’s going on here?” Jared asked.

  I began shaking my head, tr
ying to decipher what this could all mean. “Bad feelings,” I replied. “I just got a bad vibe from her, that’s all. She was asking me a lot of questions.”

  “Questions about what?” Jared pressed. It didn’t take him long to become deadly serious. It never did.

  “About Brooklyn,” I replied. The word immediately resonated with both my friends.

  “What about Brooklyn?” Jared pressed further. He leaned back in his chair, faking a smile in case people were watching us. We all began acting as casual as possible. Only our words were full of panic. We just had to hope that no one was listening.

  “Nothing specific. She was smooth about it. That’s what worries me. She kept asking me about how much time I spent in New York and then she just slipped in how much she loved Brooklyn and asked me if I’d ever been there.”

  “Well, that doesn’t tell us much,” Michael replied. “Sounds like normal conversation to me.”

  “Yeah, it sounded that way to me too. But it didn’t feel normal.” I looked at Michael again. “What’s she doing now?” Michael was the only one who could watch her without it being obvious that we’d spotted her.

  “She’s sitting at the bar. She ordered a drink.”

  “What’s she drinking?” It was an important question. If she was drinking alcohol, then we would know that I was overreacting. If she were on the job, she’d stay sober.

  “Clear drink. Regular glass. Lime,” Michael replied. “Could be gin or vodka. Could be club soda.” Michael knew the score too.

  “Why didn’t you say something last night?” Jared asked.

  “Because last night, it didn’t feel right. Tonight, two nights in a row—tonight it feels dangerous. What’s she doing, Michael?”

  “Not much, just sitting there, nursing her drink. A couple times, though, she’s made eye contact with the big black dude in the corner.”

  “You ever see him before?” I asked Michael.

  “Nope. First time. Can you make him out?”