Brendan DuBois: Dead of Night

‘M’man Samuel, good to see you,’ he said. ‘I’ve been meanin’ to look you up, but I had a shitload of things to do once I got back here, after the armistice broke down. You look pretty good.’

I gave his strong hand a firm squeeze, and he paid me the compliment of not trying to squeeze back. ‘Thanks, Charlie,’ I said. ‘You’re looking good yourself. Thanks for getting everybody out.’

‘Thanks for the warning,’ he said. Then he shook his head. ‘Too bad about Sanjay, though.’

Peter started up the Land Cruiser. ‘You did your very best, Charlie. Sometimes you can’t save ‘em all.’

‘Yeah, that’s the hell of it,’ Charlie said, snapping his seat belt shut. ‘Sometimes the ones worth saving you can’t, and the ones that ain’t worth keepin’ alive make it until they’re ninety or so.’

Miriam said, ‘It’s nice at least for us four to be together again, don’t you think?’

Charlie looked out at the other vehicles gathering in the hospital parking lot. ‘Where’s Karen? In another Toyota?’

Peter said, ‘If so, it’s one in California. She resigned her UN contract and headed back home. Can’t really blame her, can you?’

Out by the tent a cluster of uniformed men and one woman was standing. The militia negotiation team. It was hard to tell what was on their faces, but I could make out Gary just fine. I guess it was a bad idea but I couldn’t resist. I gave him a very cheerful wave as Peter put the Land Cruiser in drive and lined us up behind another UN vehicle. Gary didn’t wave back, but he did lower his head and talk to the militia woman. Oh well. So much for a defiant gesture.

Charlie shifted in his seat. ‘California. Nice safe place, so long as you live in one of the right cities. I hope she’s OK.’

‘Knowing Karen, she’ll be just fine,’ Miriam said.

Charlie turned his head. ‘What does that mean?’

Miriam slipped her hand into mine. ‘It means nothing. Nothing at all.’

As we drove along the state road, Peter said, ‘Now, this is what I call traveling in style. I wish we’d had this kind of set-up a couple of weeks ago. Nobody would have troubled us, not at all.’

‘Ain’t that the truth,’ Charlie said.

Even with Miriam’s hand held in mine, I was still nervous, a trembling anxiety of anticipation, like lying awake in bed at five a.m. on December 25th as a child, wondering what awaits you downstairs in the dark rooms. Charlie and Peter were right: it certainly was a pleasure to be traveling in style. We were in a convoy of about a dozen vehicles, with a couple of APCs up front and another two in the rear, providing security. There were a half-dozen white Land Cruisers, just like the one we were in, and two open-bed tractor-trailer trucks that were carrying a bulldozer and an excavator. Flanking our progress on both sides were two helicopters—gunships, it looked like—and as we went through the countryside I could sometimes spot people emerging from their homes and trailers, looking at us as we went by.

‘What do you think the militia are doing, back at the hospital?’ I asked.

Peter said, ‘Probably hoping that in all the commotion they can scarper out and go home. If you’re right, Samuel, and Site A is where you think it is, then the generals at The Hague are going to have a rough time of it.’

Miriam said, ‘Maybe the armistice talks will break down for a long while. Have you thought about that?’

Peter kept on looking straight ahead, at the rear of another Land Cruiser. ‘Most of the militias in the other states have signed up. These guys were trying to play games, trying to get their leaders back. Fine. Let them play all the games they want. By tomorrow, once the media gets a hold of Site A, they’ll be even more isolated and marginalized. The armistice will fall into place by default.’

Then Peter spared me a quick glance, and I knew what he was thinking. So much more was at stake than the armistice, or the respective futures of the militias and the UN intervention. So much more.

The road rose up and curved to the left, and I caught a quick glimpse of a general store passing by on our right. I swiveled my head, peering at the innocent-looking building with its friendly front porch and inviting doorway. I must have shuddered or something, because Miriam leaned over and said, ‘You all right?’

‘Yeah,’ I said, turning my head even more as we raced by Coopers General Store. ‘Just got bad memories, that’s all.’

‘Of the store, that one there? Why?’

I turned around and looked at that beautiful smile, the concerned look in those sparkling blue eyes. ‘Had a bad meal there once, that’s why.’

The amazing thing, to me at least, was that it didn’t take long, not at all. After stopping at the earthen berm that was blocking the access road to the state park, a group of military engineers looked around, poking at the ground and checking for land mines or IEDs. When they gave the all-clear, the bulldozer revved up its diesel engine, backed off the trailer and then got to work, tearing apart the dirt and trees and brush as though they were made of polyester foam. While this was going on, we stood outside our Land Cruiser while APCs kept watch at both ends of the road, and soldiers — a mix of Hungarians and Ukrainians -patrolled the woods. I still felt jumpy: the memories of having been here a few days ago, on the run, trying to survive, trying hard not to get caught, came racing back.

Peter was leaning against the dirt fender of the Land Cruiser. ‘Sun feels good, doesn’t it?’

I did the same thing, trying not to think of the days I’d spent in that smelly and cold school bus, trying not to think of what was out there, waiting for us.

Peter said, ‘My dad told me once, in London, that there were never too many sunny days, and if you got one you should enjoy it for as long as possible. Back when he grew up, there was still a lot of coal being burned in and around London. Lots of cloudy days. Not a bad piece of advice, to enjoy those sunny days that come your way. Your dad ever give you advice, Samuel?’

‘Yeah, but I never listened to it,’ I said.

Miriam asked, ‘What kind of advice was that, then?’

‘Never to volunteer,’ I said.

Even Charlie, up at the front of the Land Cruiser, heard me, and they all had a good laugh at what I’d said.

A dozen or so meters away the bulldozer started back up again on the flatbed trailer and there were some yells. Charlie said to Peter, ‘Looks like it’s time to saddle up.’

‘We ride again,’ Peter said.

I opened the door for Miriam, and just like that she reached up and kissed me. Right on the lips.

‘I’ll remember that,’ I said.

‘Good,’ she said. I climbed in after her and got the door shut just as Peter put the Land Cruiser in gear and we rejoined the convoy.

The going was slower this time, since the soldiers in charge were keeping a close watch on our progress. The helicopters raced ahead and then came back, hovering overhead, at an altitude of what looked like under a hundred meters or so. APCs and a mine-clearing crew led the way, and armed soldiers were again flanking our sides out in the woods. The river came in view to the right, the one I had forded, and I kept looking around on the left, looking for a particular tree, a tree where I had found a volunteer like myself dangling in the breeze. But the SAR unit that had picked him up had done a good job: there was nothing left, no parachute, no parachute lines, nothing.

Miriam squeezed my hand. ‘What are you thinking?’

‘Truthfully?’

‘Of course truthfully.’

‘OK.’ I was going to say something snappy, like I’d been imagining her in a bubble bath, wearing nothing but a smile, but I decided that Charlie and Peter didn’t need to hear something like that. ‘I’m thinking that maybe Peter will be able to hide me if we get there and there’s no Site A. I imagine that general will be very unhappy.’