Lori Armstrong - No Mercy

“ Months? Since before Dad died?”

“Yeah. Right after Doc told us about Grandpa.” He paused. “With all the people dying in her life… Ma can’t handle stuff like that. No one but me really knew that Gramps took care of her more than she took care of him. And when he couldn’t anymore, she… had to find someone else who could.”

“Why couldn’t you be the one she leaned on when Grandpa got sick?”

His soft brown eyes were a mixture of bitterness and sorrow. “Because she still sees me as a little kid.”

Oh damn. My heart crumbled, my stomach lurched, my eyes stung. Damn my sister. Did Hope have any idea how badly she’d hurt her son by turning away from him? To a strange man? When Levi needed her?

I chugged the beer. Angrily chucked the spent can behind me in the truck bed and opened the second one. “I understand why she might’ve been hesitant to tell me at first. But I’ve been home for well over a month. Seen her every damn day. Why hasn’t she mentioned it?”

“You ain’t missing much, believe me. Grandpa would’ve hated him.”

“Is that why hasn’t she brought this Theo guy around to meet me?”

“Yeah. She’s afraid of what you’ll think of him.”

“What’s he do?”

“He teaches summer classes at the rec center on Lakota culture.”

“Is he Indian?”

“Some kind. I have to go to them classes because I failed social studies this year. He’s teaching that old shit that nobody cares about. He totally creeps me out.”

“Why?”

“Besides the fact that he’s doing it with my mom? After he spends the night, Mom acts all giggly and shit. It’s sick.”

That’d creep me out, too. “So, Theo was the guy she was dancing with a little while ago?” Levi nodded. No wonder she’d been plastered to him. I couldn’t believe she hadn’t told me. I couldn’t believe my powers of observation were so piss-poor I hadn’t noticed she was mooning around in love.

“It kinda surprised me they were dancing in public. They ain’t exactly been telling anyone they’re together.”

At least I wasn’t the only one in the dark.

“Can I ask you something, Aunt Mercy?”

“Shoot.”

“Do you like being in the army? I mean, I know you gotta like it some because you been in it for so long.”

“You asking if I had it to do over again if I’d join up?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

Talk about a loaded question. Hope hated my military service. The guns. The potential for killing. But this wasn’t about Hope. I wouldn’t blow the first real connection with my nephew and lie to him because his mother would want me to.

“Yes, I would. Even though we’re at war and the chances of getting stationed in Iraq or Afghanistan after enlistment are pretty much guaranteed, I can’t imagine what my life would’ve been like without the army.”

“So’s it true what Mom said? You selling the ranch? Going back to being a soldier?”

“I’ll never be the soldier I was.” I drained my beer. My grimace had little to do with the tart taste of the barley and hops.

His head whipped toward me. “Whaddya mean?”

“Look. If I tell you this, swear you won’t tell your mom. Or anyone else. This is top-secret stuff.”

“I swear.”

With the complete absence of street- and yard lights, the sky was a swath of pure black punctuated with silver dots. It never ceased to amaze me it was the same sky I’d seen on the other side of the world. “The reason I didn’t come back until after Dad died was because I was in the hospital.”

“Why? What happened?”

“Shrapnel injury.”

“Holy shit! Where?”

“Iraq.”

“No. I meant where on your body did you get hit?”

“Oh. In the leg.” I wasn’t ready to talk about my eye to anyone.

“Cool! Can I see it?” Guilt distorted his face. “I mean, not cool that you were hurt-”

“It’s okay. I know what you meant.”

The wavering tent walls of the military hospital in Balad flashed in my mind. I’d waited damn near a day for treatment since my injuries weren’t life threatening. As I writhed in pain, I wondered if the injured Iraqi on the cot next to me had spent the day executing American soldiers. In those hours I basted in heat and hatred, I realized the antiseptic scents never masked the odors of blood, urine, death, and despair. And my utter sense of hopelessness expanded to near hysteria when they’d finally tracked me down amid the hundreds of injured soldiers to give me the message my father was dead.

The band belted out a countrified version of “Satisfaction.” Car doors slammed and people shouted, yet silence hummed between us. I spied a young mother pacing in the shadows of the building, trying to soothe a screaming baby wearing nothing but a diaper and tears.

“So how come you don’t want no one to know? Shee. You’re like… a hero! They would’ve had a parade for you and stuff.”

I didn’t answer. I wondered if he’d come to the right conclusion without my having to explain.

“You didn’t want none of that, did you? Not because Grandpa had just died either.”

Surprisingly astute kid. “No.”

Cricket chirps rose and fell.

“Can I ask you something else?”

“Sure.”

“Have you ever killed anyone?”

My natural inclination was to lie. Yet, if he was serious about the military, he deserved to know killing was part of the job. “Yeah.” I yanked the flask from my boot and emptied it in my mouth. “Why?”

“Just curious.”

“Come on, Levi, that’s crap. Tell me why.”

He didn’t look at me. Instead, he picked at a gummy chunk of unknown origin imbedded in the tailgate. “Mom tells me you’ve liked to shoot stuff since you were little.”

“Lots of people hunt,” I said cautiously.

“She wasn’t talking about hunting. She was talking about killing. In cold blood.”

I didn’t point out that Hope had no room to be judgmental when talking about killing.

He blurted, “Did you really shoot your dog when you were kids?”

Whoo-yeah. Hope had a high opinion of me.

It’d been a long time since I’d thought of Rufus, our Australian blue heeler.

That brutally hot afternoon became so clear in my mind I could almost smell the cherry Kool-Aid. Dad was working second shift. Sophie had gone home. None of the ranch hands were around. Just Hope and me and a lazy summer day.

We were swinging on the porch when we heard the most godawful howling. We followed the yelps to the end of the driveway and found Rufus cowering in the ditch.

He’d been hit by a car, back legs broken, hips crushed. He couldn’t even drag himself out of the gully.

Hope raced to pick him up. Happy as Rufus seemed to see her, in his paralyzed state he couldn’t even wag his fluffy tail.

I’d stopped her. “Don’t touch him.”

She wailed, “But we have to help!”

The insistent cawing of black crows brought my attention to the cloudless blue sky and the bluish-black wings of the birds circling above us. Nature knew. I knew. Nothing would help poor Rufus.

“Call Daddy,” Hope begged me over Rufus’s howls. “He’ll tell you what to do. He’ll send Doc Kroger. Hurry!”

The vet was too busy to waste time on a lost cause. My stomach churned the Kool-Aid into battery acid. I knew what Dad would’ve done. No one liked putting down an animal, but it was a harsh reality of ranch life.

My heart pounded. My palms dripped sweat. I’d made myself look at Rufus, the cattle dog my mom loved. Blood poured out his muzzle. Diarrhea matted the black-and-white fur on his rear haunches, proving he’d lost control of his bowels.

I had no choice. “Stay here with him for a minute, okay?”