Chris Ryan - Osama

‘Hi,’ she whispered.

She wasn’t one for make-up. Her clear, delicately freckled skin had a beautiful, natural glow to it. Today, though, Joe noticed she was wearing lip gloss and mascara. She had on slim jeans and a halterneck top that clung slightly to her small breasts – the kind of clothes she normally wore on a night out, not at ten o’clock on a Wednesday morning. Some of the lads used to tell Joe that she looked like something out of the Corrs; no doubt they said other things behind his back.

‘Hi,’ he replied.

Caitlin stepped back so he could cross the threshold. Only when he had shut the door behind him did she wrap her arms around his neck and give him a brief, awkward hug, before standing back again and brushing her fingertips against the wall. ‘I redecorated,’ she said.

Joe blinked. The walls were powder blue, though what colour they’d been before, he had no idea. ‘Right,’ he replied.

‘Conor’s in his room. I said he didn’t have to go to school…’

Joe glanced up the stairs. His boy was only nine years old. Or was it ten? He realized, in a moment of guilt, that he’d had a birthday in April that Joe hadn’t even acknowledged. Conor was a good kid, at least that’s what his teachers said. Privately, Joe wished he would spend a little less time with his nose in a book, or at a screen playing games. When Joe was Conor’s age, he’d spent every spare hour out of doors, getting muddy, playing imaginary versions of the war games that would become his life. Conor just didn’t seem interested in stuff like that.

‘He’s been looking forward to seeing you,’ Caitlin said.

Joe dropped his bag on the hallway floor. When he looked at Caitlin again, he saw that her eyes were brimming with tears. ‘What’s the matter?’ he asked.

Caitlin wiped the tears from her eyes. She looked angry with herself for crying. ‘Nothing,’ she said.

‘Christ, Caitlin, it’s been a long couple of—’

‘Two months,’ she interrupted, her voice cracking. ‘Two months, Joe.’

‘Since what?’

‘Since I heard from you.’

Silence.

‘Right.’

‘Conor’s been asking every day when he’s going to see his dad. When he didn’t get a birthday letter from you, he asked me if you were…’ The tears had reappeared; she wiped them away again, this time smearing mascara over her stricken face. ‘Sorry… I’m sorry… I wasn’t going to…’

‘I’m going to get cleaned up,’ Joe said. He pushed past her, but then felt her hand grab his wrist.

‘I’ve missed you so much, Joe,’ she whispered. ‘We both have.’ She hugged him again, this time resting her head against his chest. Joe breathed in her perfume and allowed the warmth from her body to saturate his. In his six months away he had forgotten how good it felt.

‘I really need to wash,’ he said. Caitlin separated herself from him and squeezed his hand. He headed up the stairs.

Conor’s room was at the top of the staircase on the right. The door, which had a tattered Spider-Man poster pinned to it, was closed. Joe put his ear to it and heard the beeping of his son’s DS. He tried to force his face into a look of pleasure. It didn’t come naturally. He was about to put his hand to the doorknob when he sensed that he was being watched. Looking over his shoulder, he saw Caitlin at the bottom of the stairs, staring up with swollen eyes. Joe lowered his hand, turned away and walked across the tiny landing into the double bedroom.

Thick carpet. Flowery curtains. Neat bedspread. It couldn’t have been more different from the Portakabin he’d been sharing with Ricky and JJ in Bagram, and Joe didn’t even feel he belonged in this room. Like he dirtied it. He immediately returned to the landing, and from there went into the bathroom. He stripped naked, dumping his clothes on the ceramic tiles. Caitlin had laid out wash things for him: toothbrush, razor, shaving gel. She was a lot less keen on his beard than the ruperts were. Joe didn’t bother with the gel. He started hacking at his matted beard with the razor. Clumps of hair fell into the apricot-coloured basin; the blade became dull after about fifteen swipes. He changed it, and continued to swipe at his face until he felt the blunt steel against his skin.

It took five minutes and three changes of blade to remove the beard. By the time he’d thrown the razor into the hair-filled basin, his face was bleeding in several places. Joe didn’t care. He stepped over the edge of the bath, pulled the opaque, floral shower curtain closed and turned on the water, maximum temperature. It was scalding, but Joe didn’t flinch as he held his face up to the shower head and allowed it to burn and soak him. He didn’t move for a minute. When he finally looked down, he saw that he was standing in an inch of dirty water, and still his skin wasn’t clean. He checked the thermostat, wanting to turn the heat higher. When a sharp twist confirmed that the water was as hot as it could be, he slammed his fist in anger against the wall tiles next to him. How the hell could he wash off six months of shit and death without…

Now the water was freezing. His eyes were closed. He opened them to see that he was sitting in the bath, the shower pouring from a height over his head. The water that had collected in the bath was clean now, save for a layer of gritty silt sitting along the enamel. He had no memory of how he’d got down here, or how long he had been sitting.

But it wasn’t that which scared him the most. What scared him were the shadows behind the shower curtain.

Two people. One standing further back than the other.

Joe slowed down his breathing to stop the panic rising in his chest, and moved his right hand to where the shower curtain was stuck to the inside of the bath. He carefully scrunched it in his palm and, with a sudden yank, ripped down the whole curtain, jumping to his feet at the same time.

A scream. Caitlin had her hand to her mouth, and little Conor, his russet hair scruffy and his face pale, edged backwards in alarm. Joe stared at them, naked and confused, as Caitlin ushered their son out of the bathroom before turning off the shower.

Silence. Joe looked around the room, but couldn’t bring himself to catch Caitlin’s eye.

‘You’ve been in here over an hour, honey,’ she said. Her voice was full of concern.

Joe looked down at his naked body, at the scars on his chest and the blisters on his feet. ‘I was dirty.’

Caitlin looked like she wanted to say something else but was too nervous to do so. Joe stepped out of the bath. There was a white towel hanging on the back of the door. He wrapped it round his waist and walked into their bedroom, where he sat on the edge of the bed, staring at the striped wallpaper, and at a small picture Conor had drawn about a year ago, mounted in a cheap glass frame. It was a childishly drawn picture of Joe, dressed in what Conor called his ‘army clothes’ and wearing a Tommy Atkins hat with a strap under the chin that made him look like something out of the First World War. Not a laser marker or a flashbang in sight.

After waiting outside for a minute or so, Caitlin entered the room. She stood with her back to the closed door, as if wary of intruding.

‘Why did you pull the shower curtain off like that?’ she asked.

Joe sniffed. ‘I thought you were…’

‘What?’

Yeah, Joe thought to himself. What? ‘Nothing,’ he said.

‘Come on, honey, what did you… ’

‘Leave it, all right?’

Silence.

‘I heard about Ricky,’ she said.

No surprise there. Nothing travelled faster than gossip among the Regiment wives and girlfriends. Caitlin sounded frail as she said it. She’d been fond of Ricky. He used to tease her, and her face would light up every time he did it.