Elliot Ackerman - Dark at the Crossing

“What’s that?” asked Haris.

“Bring Daphne to Aleppo and back. The whole way. Afterward you’ll be able to run off with the Free Army, the Daesh, or anyone else you choose. Don’t abandon her.”

Haris promised.

“Good,” said Amir. “Let’s gather that five thousand.”

While they waited for Daphne to return, Amir changed into a sweater and khakis, then he called Marty. “Haris is the friend I mentioned to you,” Amir said into the phone. A long pause followed. “Just trust me, you’ll like him.” Another long pause. “Yes, two o’clock at the mall, by the ice rink.” Amir hung up and offered Haris a weak smile. “That’s settled,” he said.

Haris showered and dressed. Just as he stepped from the bedroom, Daphne returned. Cuffed around her wrists, two plastic bags hung heavy with groceries. She rested the bags on the floor, unpacking them into the small fridge.

“That’s quite a bit more than milk,” said Amir, digging for a cheerful voice.

“I thought I’d make you both breakfast.”

She turned on the hot plate, mixing batter for pancakes in a deep steel bowl. She laid eggs and orange juice across the counter. She knocked another hunk off her brick of chocolate. Haris and Amir again sat next to each other on the sofa. Amir switched on the BBC.

“Can’t we sit together without watching that thing?” said Daphne from the kitchen.

Her back was to Amir as she cooked, but he smiled at her anyway. “Of course,” he said and turned off the television.

She served up the food, not making any for herself. With a plate in each hand, she stood facing Amir and Haris. “Any more thoughts on how to get this money together?” she asked, holding out their breakfast as if it were contingent upon their answer.

“We’re meeting Marty this afternoon,” said Amir.

Daphne handed them both their plates.

“What time are we meeting him?” she asked.

Amir, who’d just cut his first bite of pancake, paused, holding his fork level with his face. “You should go to the hospital to check up on your friend Saied. Also, it’d be better if just Haris and I went.”

“Why would that be better?” asked Daphne, narrowing her eyes on Amir.

“You know why,” he said and then turned to Haris. “Marty has a thing for Daphne.”

“I don’t see what that has to do with anything,” she said.

“He’s smitten with you and you hate him,” said Amir. “You think he’s a pariah, a disgusting human being. You’ve said all this. I don’t want any distractions.”

Daphne dropped the matter.

Haris finished his plate, and she took it to the kitchen, serving seconds. “I don’t see our car parked out front,” she remarked over her shoulder.

“I left it at the mall last night,” said Amir. “We’re meeting Marty there.”

Daphne brought Haris’s plate, piled with more food than his first helping. As she passed it to Haris, her hand brushed his shoulder. Amir stared into his breakfast, finishing his last forkful of pancake, refusing to look at them.

“Last night’s rain has left a beautiful day,” said Daphne. “You two should walk to the mall. Everyone is out — Turks, Syrians, everyone. They’re all in the park enjoying the weather.”

Amir sat, unmoving, his plate empty. “No thanks,” he said. “I’d rather take a cab.”

Haris didn’t need to ask which one was Marty. The American man-child towered in the center of Sanko Park’s ice rink. He wore jeans over his skates, their bottoms frayed. His outsize hockey jersey — UMass Minutemen — added to his outsize shoulders. The few other players on the ice sported a smattered assortment of equipment: a skateboard helmet, a boxer’s red Everlast groin protector, a pair of padded gloves. They stood in a line, facing an empty goal. Amir and Haris stood just behind the rink boards. Marty tossed a puck in the air, catching it in his left hand as he passed on some last instruction in Turkish.

“Tamam?” he asked the first player in line, a university-age boy.

“Okay,” he replied through a thick accent.

Marty dropped the puck in front of him.

“Go!”

His shout broke sharp as a bullwhip. The boy sprawled into his skating stance, chopping down the ice. His hockey stick was too small, causing him to hunch deeply over it. He was outfitted with a single elbow pad, and his only other piece of protective equipment was a pair of thick oven mitts that served as hockey gloves. He wore jeans over his skates, just like Marty, but his weren’t the wide, thick-bladed hockey skates Marty wore. They were delicate, made of cream-colored vinyl, the type used by figure skaters.

“Quick-stick! Quick-stick!” shouted Marty. He skated backward, weaving his body along the ice, paralleling the first player, who bore down on the goal and, through his cumbersome, thick oven mitts, batted at the puck. As the first player adjusted his grip, he forgot to skate, drifting across the rink.

“Line it up! Line it up!”

Marty winced, burying his head into his shoulders as if he were watching the last play in a desperately fought game, or a car crash.

The boy continued to hack his skates into the ice, nearly plowing head over shoulders, but using his stick as a crutch he kept upright.

“Shot! Shot! Shot!” squealed Marty, pumping his fist.

The boy startled. With his stick barely in his hands, he swung at the puck, looking not at the goal but at Marty. Puck met stick. Then a bone-snapping crack. The skater followed through with his shot, so far through that his bicycling legs came up over his head as he flopped to his back. The puck sailed upward, ricocheting off the top of a rink board, arcing high into the air. Then it shuttled down, right toward Amir and Haris.

Amir dove out of the way, falling to his knees, but Haris stood, gazing up, arms outstretched. He almost made the catch, but the puck struck his hands with force, slipping through his grip and knocking against his head. He picked the puck up from the ground and rubbed his fingers through his hair, where a welt already spread.

Marty sidled up to the boards. “Nice catch, almost,” he said to Haris.

As Amir stood from his knees, Marty caught a glimpse of him on the floor. “Didn’t see you there,” he said.

Amir brushed the legs of his trousers. “This is my friend Haris. The one I mentioned to you.”

Haris handed back the puck.

“Thanks, bud,” said Marty. He glanced over his shoulder, to where the first player had joined his teammates. “Murat!”

From the back of the group, a big Turkish kid with a thick mat of stubble and a Gretzky jersey confidently skated forward. “Let’s finish up with high-knee-crouch drills,” said Marty, “ten reps down and back.” Murat barked some orders at the team. Nobody did anything. Marty demonstrated, running on his toes, pumping his knees toward his chest, then springing into a crouched-attack position. Slowly, and with some grumbling, the group did the same, making their way across the rink. Marty turned to Haris and Amir. “They need some more work before we give shoot-out drills another try.”

Marty glided off the ice. Haris and Amir followed him to a bench, where he changed out of his skates and slid a beat-up pair of Docksides onto his bare feet.

“Team’s looking better,” said Amir as the three sat next to each other.

“A little more practice, a few more players, we’ll be getting some games going soon,” said Marty. “You skate?” he asked Haris.

“Afraid not.”

“Too bad,” he replied, cramming a pair of thick striped hockey socks into his bag, tugging its zipper shut.

“Marty is the founder of Antep’s first intramural ice hockey league,” said Amir.