Doug Allyn - The Best American Mystery Stories 2015

“No.”

“Why not?”

Keith shifted uncomfortably in his seat. Finally, some sign they were getting somewhere.

“Well,” he said, “like I said, I didn’t really think it was a problem until September. Probably late September. That’s only, what, five, six weeks ago.”

“But those were five or six weeks you weren’t sure you could do your job.”

“Well, I only got like three assignments during that time.”

“Still, what if you’d found yourself in a situation where you were told to take the shot? Did you have a plan for that?”

“No.”

“So what happened yesterday...”

“That wasn’t planned.”

She didn’t say anything, watching him.

Eventually the silence became too much for him. He said, “Most of those weeks were when things were going bad with April. That’s part of this. I don’t know how, but...”

He trailed off.

For a moment Barbara didn’t respond. She wasn’t sure what April had to do with this, but he obviously needed to talk about her.

So she said, “Tell me about your relationship with her.”

She moved in four weeks after our first date. So I guess you could say things were going good. I guess she wouldn’t have moved in if she hadn’t been living at home, but there weren’t any problems once she did. We still got along great. She cooked every night I was home and insisted on chipping in with the bills even though I said she didn’t have to. She never complained about my hours and she didn’t worry about me getting shot, or if she did she didn’t show it. Living with her was easy. I loved it.

I loved her.

That lasted... oh, I don’t know how long. When I look back now, I’m not sure when the trouble started. I think of times when she seemed happy and I wonder if she really was. But I think what happened is, the trouble started when I met her friend Cory.

We met him and his wife for dinner at a restaurant. I got the feeling he didn’t like me right away. There was something in his eyes when April introduced us. I don’t know if he has some secret crush on her, or maybe it’s a protective older-brother kind of thing; he’s like fifteen years older than her. He was in the army, although I didn’t know that till he said so. Maybe he knew I was a Marine and that was the reason he acted like he did.

Actually, the way he acted, April might have told him I was a sniper in Iraq. When he asked if I was there, and what I did, he didn’t look surprised when I told him.

He said, “I was there too, back in ’ninety-one. Twenty-fourth Infantry. Right out in front.”

And then he just sort of looked at me, glaring at me.

I said, “Hot as hell there.”

He said, “You got that right.”

There was some more silence.

The girls seemed to get that something was going on between us. Cory’s wife, Jessica, broke in and said to me, “You’re a policeman now, right? That’s how you two met.”

I said, “Yes.”

April smiled and said, “He fell in love with me through his rifle scope.”

Jessica rolled her eyes and smiled, loving it. “Oh my God. I’ve heard of love at first sight, but that’s awesome!”

Cory said, “I can’t believe there’s a lot of work for a police sniper.”

I said, “There isn’t. I’m on regular patrol most of the time.”

He nodded, looking like he had something else to say but he was keeping it to himself. I knew exactly what he had to say. That sort of made me regret answering his question. It felt like I’d tried to defend myself, even though I knew I hadn’t.

He and I didn’t talk to each other much during dinner. The girls chattered the whole time, acting like there weren’t any hard feelings between Cory and me. But afterward, when we were driving home, April asked me about it right away.

She said, “Was that an army thing? That vibe between you and Cory?”

I said, “Maybe. Sometimes guys who were in different branches of the service sort of look down their noses at each other. A rivalry kind of thing. But Cory’s deal probably has more to do with me being a sniper in Iraq.”

“Why?”

“Because he was general infantry. ‘Right out in front,’ you heard him say. That was a dig at snipers. We aren’t out in front, so we don’t get shot at as much.”

“You don’t?”

“Not like them. We stay hidden. That’s the whole point of sniping — not being seen. Taking out the target and no one even knowing where the bullet came from.”

April was confused. “So... what? He thinks he’s braver than you?”

“I don’t know if that’s it. It’s more like general infantry thinks it’s not fair that we don’t take the same risks as them. We take other risks, but they don’t think about that. And they think it’s wrong somehow, the way we sneak up on the enemy and take them out. It’s not sporting.”

“That’s crazy.”

“It’s how they think.”

She didn’t ask me about it again for... it must have been a month. Then one night we were lying in bed and she said out of the blue, “What was it like being a sniper in Iraq?”

I said, “I already told you about that.” Meaning the little bit I’d said driving home from the restaurant that night. We hadn’t talked about it before or since.

She said, “You weren’t very specific.”

“Well, it’s sort of like hunting.”

“Only hunting people.”

“Yeah.”

She fell quiet. I lay there in the dark, wondering if she was going to ask for more details. I hoped she wouldn’t.

Then she said, “Were they shooting at you, the people you shot?”

“Some of them.”

“But not all.”

“They all would have, if they could have.”

“The ones who couldn’t... is it because they didn’t have guns?”

I turned my head toward her in the darkness. “Why do you want to know about this stuff?”

“I just want to understand what it was like for you there.”

“It was hot. And dirty. And dangerous. A lot of people died. But the media didn’t get it right. The Iraqis didn’t hate us as much as the news made it sound.”

“So you were shooting regular soldiers?”

“There weren’t any regular soldiers. Not like you’re thinking of, guys with colored uniforms that are easy to spot. These were insurgents. And yes, most of my targets had guns. Once in a blue moon we’d go out looking for a high-value target, some big terrorist leader. I got a couple of those. They didn’t have guns in their hands when I got them, but they probably had a pistol on them somewhere, and if they didn’t you can be sure they had an AK-47 in the next room.”

“Is it hard shooting someone like that? I mean when you have time to think about it, not just in the heat of the moment?”

Right then I knew where these questions were coming from. She’d been talking to Cory. He’d laid out the rank and file’s opinion of snipers for her.

I said, “You mean am I a cold-blooded bastard?”

“I didn’t say that.”

I wasn’t going to say anything more. But then I realized if I didn’t, she’d think a cold-blooded bastard was exactly what I was.

So I said, “All the worst things soldiers do happen in the heat of battle. Taking time to think is good, when you have time to do it. It keeps innocent people from getting killed.”

“So police snipers... Is doing it for the police the same as doing it in Iraq?”

“It’s easier. And not as many people have a problem with it. Criminals are the only people who get shot by police snipers. People don’t mind that so much. Especially since I’m never going to shoot anybody unless they’re an imminent danger to someone else.”

She stayed quiet, but I felt compelled to add, “Anyway, I’ve never had to shoot anyone yet. Hostage situations are so rare. Most of what I do is surveillance, watching the team do raids and providing security for visiting ambassadors, stuff like that.”