Chapter 12 – Lost Sanity

My feet felt oddly disconnected as I plodded up the stairs of the CTA 146 bus heading north.  It was pretty much completely full, and I had to stand there holding the bar for a couple of stops before there was a seat available.  At the next stop, a bunch more people got on again, and I could barely see anything except asses.  A little girl nearly fell in front of me as she tripped over people’s feet, and her father leaned down to pick her up and hold her to his chest.  After a couple more stops, they also found seats right at the back.

She was an African-American girl of about four years old, and her head was covered with a hat that looked like it had been cut from one of those fuzzy bathroom rugs in bright pink.  There were two long pieces of fuzzy fabric that I figured were supposed to form a scarf, but instead of wrapping around her neck, they just hung down on her shoulders.  At the end of them were felt pieces made to look like an animal’s face.  It was obviously warm and looked both ridiculous and adorably cute all at the same time.

What the fuck did I do?

More people crowded on, and the driver yelled at everyone to step toward the back of the bus to make more room.  A couple in Muslim garb slipped past some of the other people standing in the middle of the aisle and moved near the back door to my right.  She wore a black dress, and her head was covered in bright blue fabric.  He was in a button-down white shirt with a high collar, and his beard was dark and full.

I wasn’t so far gone as to believe that the pair were Al Qaida  sympathizers or insurgents just because of the way they were dressed or what holy book they happened to read on which day and in which building.  Usually my reaction was no more than a slight flinch if they got too close, and then I would be silently berating myself for a couple minutes about being stupid.

This time was a little different.

I reached up and rubbed my hand over my face to rid myself of the sweat forming on my forehead.  My eyes looked back towards the other end of the bus, but the hairs on the back of my neck continued to stand up and tickle at the inside of my head.  My bladder felt the need to empty itself, and when I closed my eyes it all came back.

Middle of the afternoon, just east of base but right along the border.  Insurgents had been taking potshots at the base, and we’d already had one suicide bomber blown to bits near the motor pool.

Send in the snipers.

We’re tasked with taking out the guys hiding in the hills, but the day’s been a wash.  No people, no shooting.

“Where are you going, LT?”

“Thirty seconds, Private,” I respond.  “Nature calls.”

He laughs nervously, and I move around the end of the pale beige building.  I flip my rifle over to my back and release my dick from my fatigues.  Something doesn’t feel right, but I shake off the feeling, and I sigh as a steady stream wets the sand in front of me.

Shots.

Screams.

The perimeter alarm begins to blare.

Trying to get my rifle back around my shoulder while simultaneously getting my dick into my pants.  I stumble backwards, right myself, and then aim my weapon as I move around the building.

Bodies everywhere.

Ortega, Matthews, Davis, Ryans – all on the ground, none moving.

Pain in the back of my head, and the sand rushes up to connect with my face.

My eyes flew open, and I had to blink several times to get myself back into the present.  The bus was even more crowded than before, and the Muslim couple had moved closer to me.  My chest tightened as I tried to take a calming breath and failed.

“She’s dead.”

The guy across from me looked up and narrowed his eyes a little, but I ignored him.

The bus stopped again, and though I hoped the couple might get off at this stop, they didn’t.  Instead, a guy in a camouflage-colored coat stepped on, and I felt myself tense.  It wasn’t desert camo, at least, but for some reason it still set my heart beating faster.  I looked away quickly and crossed my arms in front of myself.  As I closed my eyes and gripped my biceps with my fingers, I could feel Bridgett’s phantom fingers run down the side of my face, cooling my heated skin when I was sick.

“Stop it.”

But it didn’t stop.

The rumbling of the seat below me felt like the aftershocks of bombs going off around me.  The sound of the bus against the street as it took off again was transformed to tank movements on grimy sand.  The bus lurched to a stop, and I felt myself bump into the woman next to me on the bench seat.  Again, my muscles tensed, and the butt end of my weapon dug into my back.  I considered pulling it out of my waistband.

Of course, everyone would have been able to see it then – not such a great move.

Was it?

I closed my eyes again, and various visions of high school shootings and gunmen from rooftops invaded my head.  Despite the carnage of the scenes played for everyone’s viewing in the media, my mind found peace with the idea.  There was always the same ending to the instigator of that kind of violence.

End being the focus.

“Tired.”

Tired of playing this role, tired of just moving through the city like I was some kind of god or demon here to bring Rinaldo Moretti’s version of justice to those who crossed my path.  None of it even mattered to me – all I got out of it was a wad of cash and a twisted idea of loyalty to someone who told me I did a good job and occasionally called me “son.”

When I opened my eyes, the Muslim woman was looking at me.  My already tense body coiled, and my hand slipped down to the end of the seat – closer to my weapon.  I had seven rounds loaded and two more clips on me.  My mind counted how many people I could take out with what I had.  I could easily build a barrier of bodies around myself.

How would that look to the woman who was eyeing me?  Would she try to come at me?  Would she throw herself in front of her husband or he in front of her?

It wouldn’t make any difference.  They would both die.  So would the guy wearing that stupid camo coat and the plethora of oblivious teens with their earbuds shoved into their ears and their electronic devices shoved in their faces.  They had no idea what was going on around them, and it was about time for someone to wake them all up.

I couldn’t save those in my unit – couldn’t protect them.  There was nothing I could do now – no one to save, no one to protect.  The deaths would be meaningless and senseless – every last one of them.

All deaths were.

My fingers reached behind my back and touched the warm handle of my Beretta.  It felt good.  I maneuvered the weapon around to my front, though still underneath my jacket.

My mind continued to swim around me, but there wasn’t any war going on inside.  Even when I tried to come up with shit I might regret not knowing or not doing, I couldn’t come up with much.  I wished I had a pizza for lunch instead of the damn hotdog I’d grabbed from a cart.  I wished I’d seen that new GI Joe movie that was supposed to come out soon – the previews looked good, and I had always liked GI Joe.

My head moved up slowly, and I opened my eyes.

There really wasn’t any reason to delay.

“It’s decided.”

This was how it was going to end.

I looked around from right to left, starting with the Muslim couple.  My eyes traversed the teens, the camo-coated guy, a woman with a Macy’s shopping bag, and the guy holding his little girl.

The little girl’s eyes left her father and focused on me.  Our gazes locked on each other, and the fuzz of the pink hat blew around in the wind from the bus doors as they opened and closed at the next stop.  My heart beat louder in my chest, and I could feel the blood flowing rapidly through my veins.  I didn’t know how long she and I just looked at each other.  I only knew that she would be collateral damage in my half-assed plan.

The doors of the bus opened, and the fuzzy hat blew around in the cool breeze again.  I shoved off the seat, pushed my gun into the front waistband of my pants, and got the fuck off the bus.

I was far past my own stop – up north on Michigan Avenue near the John Hancock Observatory.  I crossed the street but didn’t bother to get on another bus – it seemed risky.  My feet carried me past the Water Works and the Columbia sportswear store.  I went by Tiffany’s and Co and tried not to think of my date with Bridgett.

The smell of tomato sauce and cheese dragged me into a nearby pizzeria, where I ordered a cheese stuffed pizza with extra sauce, ate half of it, and then leaned back and wondered if my stomach was going to explode.

I walked back home and dropped down to the floor as Odin came up to me and whined.  He sniffed at my hands, and I swear he knew what I had done.

“I shouldn’t have done it.  I don’t even know why I did it.”

My throat tightened, choking off my words.

“I could have taken a piss on the other side of the building where I might have seen them coming up.  If I had, I could have taken them out from there – lots of cover.”

Dizziness tried to knock me further to the ground, but I fought my way back to my feet.  Maybe I was dehydrated – my throat was certainly dry.  After guzzling a bottle of water, I decided to take Odin outside.  He wagged his tail at me, and I felt like a total schmuck for not even thinking about what would happen to him if I was gone.  I rubbed his shaggy head and attached the leash to his collar.

The weather was about the perfect temperature for his coat, and he seemed pretty thrilled when I didn’t steer us towards the park but headed out down Wacker and towards Navy Pier.  It was a good distance, but Odin loved to walk out by the lake.

He moved towards a group of seagulls, and I ran with him so he could chase them.  My feet pounded the ground, and my head filled with memories.

Heavy artillery fire and an explosion.  I can barely lift my head at this point, but I want to know what’s going on outside.  Something big.  Something noisy.

I can only hope whatever it is will finally end me.

There is shouting, the sound of feet running, and the added sound of a helicopter way too close to the ground.

More explosions, more shouting – this time in English, but I assume that is nothing more than a dream – another hallucination.

I can’t even pretend I still have hope.

Tired from the run, we walked back to the apartment.  I fed Odin and sat down at my computer to check email.

Maybe if I just kept myself occupied with the mundane, I could manage to pull out of this.

“You killed her.  She fucking trusted you – depended on you.”

“Shut up.”

Email never changed.

Some attorney in the UK was sure I was the long lost relative of some Irish land baron and would like to send me a lot of money.

The Art Institute had free admission to Chicago residents to the Picasso exhibit on Monday.

The place where I just had dinner wants me to save ten bucks on my next visit.

Nothing interesting, so I closed it and sat on the couch for a while, flipping through channels.  It didn’t work, of course.  I even tried some pay-per-view-porn, but it did nothing for me.  My head was pounding too much.

“Better off with a hooker; they’re just not better off with you.”

“Shut up.”

I had to do something to clear my head, so I grabbed Odin’s leash and led him back outside and over to the dog run.

The sun was beginning to fade behind the buildings, but there was still plenty of daylight and lots of people around.  The kids on the playground were loud, but all seemed to be having fun.  The damn parking garage door sang out to all around that a car was about to exit, and I tensed at the blaring noise.  Shaking my head to clear it, I sat numbly on the bench and let Odin do his thing.

My head was still throbbing, and I rubbed my fingers over my temples.  When I brought them back down again, I saw a spatter of blood on my thumb.

“Is it hers?  His?”

I rubbed at it and then laughed at myself.

“Out, out, damn spot!”

“Bleep!  Bleep!  Bleep!”

My arms tightened around my body, and I doubled over a bit.  I hadn’t realized it before, but the sound was just a little too close to the perimeter alarm that blared in the middle of the night, signifying that someone had breached the exterior of our base.  It was usually a false alarm, but it still woke everyone up.

“Too tired.  Need sleep.”

Odin ran up and slobbered on my leg.

“Disgusting,” I told him, but I rubbed his head anyway.  With our connection reaffirmed, he ran over to a yippie terrier and chased it around a tree with funky orange bark.

The damn garage door behind me went up again, accompanied by the detestable and continuous warning sounds.  My back and shoulders tensed, and my heart rate increased.

My mind continued to flash back and forth – the Iraqi desert, Bridgett’s body on the floor of my boss’s office building, Lia’s moans as I slid inside of her, and the taste of sand.

It was too much…just too much.

“Bleep!  Bleep!  Bleep!”

“Motherfucker!” I growled low as the sound from behind me made my teeth clench.  My right index finger gripped back against my palm, letting me know what my body wanted.

The woman who apparently owned the yippie terrier glanced over at me dubiously.  My eyes met hers, and I held her gaze until she looked away.  She quickly moved herself and her dog to the other side of the small park.

“Like that’s gonna help you.”

Thirty seconds after it stopped, the blaring, beeping sound began again.

I capitulated to the growing need inside of me.

Whistling for Odin, I snapped his leash back on his collar and marched across the park to my apartment building.  Odin whined at me and actually pulled back a bit at his leash, which he never did.  I glanced back at him, and he nearly cowered.

I didn’t have time for that, though.  I had other things to do, so I hauled him to the building against his will.

“Come on, come on, come on,” I muttered as the elevator took forever to get to my floor.  I pressed the button several dozen times, but it didn’t seem to help.  As soon as the doors opened, I hauled Odin down the hallway and into my apartment.  I released his leash, filled his water dish, and then turned to something far more desirable.

In my bedroom closet, way in the back, were my desert fatigues.  I hadn’t worn them since my forced retirement, but they still fit pretty well.  I pulled the dog tags that sat at the bottom of the ceramic dish on my dresser over my head, and then I turned back to the closet.

Odin whined from the doorway.

I pulled my Barrett rifle out of its duffle bag, assembled it, and opened up my balcony door.  I knelt down on the ground and opened up the bipod to stabilize the weapon and then lay down behind it.  With my feet sticking out through the balcony rails on one side, I took careful aim across the park through the scope.  I placed the cross hairs right at the light next to the door and waited.

It was only a minute or two before the light started to blink, the door started to open, and the bleep bleep bleep warning signal screeched across the area.

“You are going to crack someday, aren’t you, Lieutenant?”

“Sure am.”

I fired.

The light exploded, but the noise continued.  In a smooth arch, I moved my aim and fired at a box to the left of the door, which sent shrapnel around the sidewalk but still didn’t end the noise.  There was another small electric box up near the corner of the garage door, and my third shot destroyed it and left the park in blessed electronic silence.

The people noise, however, increased significantly.

There was screaming from around the park, people rushing out of the Mexican restaurant at the end of the strip mall, and barking dogs from the dog run.  There was a row of windows in the red brick building that housed the offending garage, and I blew them out one by one.  The glass fell to the sidewalk and shattered further as spent cases began to cover my balcony.

The parents of children on the playground wrapped their arms around their offspring and ducked under slides and swings.  Owners tried to leash their dogs and get out of the open.

I switched to a new magazine and then kept firing.

My ears were ringing, and I could hear Odin barking from the room behind me, but I shut out everything I could.  The remaining windows in the building shattered as I fired repeatedly.  It was just me, the trigger, and the recoil of the weapon against my shoulder.

I wanted more, though.

The crosshairs found one of the restaurant patrons, and I focused right above her eye.

“You don’t even know her.”

I shook my head, closed my eyes tightly, and tried to catch my breath.

“And you’re fucking talking to yourself!” I spat back.  I looked down the scope again, but the woman had disappeared inside.  Refocusing, the crosshairs found the woman with the terrier.  She had scooped up the small dog and was running across the park with a couple other screamers.  I was pretty sure I could take them both out in one shot.

“Why?  What’s the fucking purpose?”

“Shut up!”

My hands started to shake, and sweat poured from my forehead into my eyes.  I hadn’t put on a bandana to keep it away, and my accuracy was going to suffer.  The shaking was totally fucking me up when it came to placing the crosshair over my target, and when I fired, I missed completely.

Sirens.

“Waited too fucking long.”

I let go for a moment, wiped sweat and whatever out of my eyes, shook my hands, and took a deep breath.

“You can do this shit.  You’re good at this shit.”

As I glanced away from the scope and down the side of the building, I could see multiple people in flak jackets and helmets beginning to evacuate the park and surround my apartment building.  I could have gone over and down the side of the building at that point, but figured it was probably too late, so I went back to firing.

Seven cars lost tires, but nothing was as satisfying as the parking garage door.  I switched to my last magazine and shifted my aim to the right.  The SWAT team hadn’t surrounded that area yet, and there were lots of bystanders around.  If I killed one of them, they were probably going to locate their own sniper to take me out.  I could hear a helicopter in the distance and figured that’s where he’d be.  It was either that or open up fire on the SWAT guys, but the helmets made it more difficult.

I blew out the windows of the residential building on the right side of the park and then focused on someone standing half way down the stairs leading to North Columbia Drive.  The crosshairs found where an ear was hidden underneath dark, silken hair.

Beautiful hair.

She turned, and the fading sun glittered off the necklace around her throat.  It was a simple, silver chain with a large, round pendant of some sort.  No wait, not a pendant – it was a…a…

“A quarter.”

My finger stopped moving.  My breath stopped.  Hell, my heart might have stopped beating at that point.

“No fucking way.”

Odin barked, yelped, and then went silent.

The noise from the screaming people below was overshadowed by the noise from behind me.  Their words meant little, even though I knew they were likely screaming at me to let go of the weapon and stop trying to blow up the fucking neighborhood.

Whatever.

I couldn’t take my eyes from the shining quarter necklace and the familiar face above it.

“Lia.”

“Release the weapon now!”

It had to be a hallucination.

There was no way – no way she could possibly be here.

Absolutely impossible.

“Release your weapon now, or I will be forced to fire!”

Fatigue covered me.  I couldn’t fight it anymore.  My hands moved to the ground below the gun, and I pushed back away from it even as I kept my eye on the scope.  I had already dropped my hand from the trigger, but nothing was making any sense to me in the slow motion events to follow.

I didn’t want to be there, and I didn’t want to be doing what I was doing.  I never wanted any of it to come to this.  Rinaldo wouldn’t like it – this wasn’t something he would approve of at all, and I couldn’t take it back now.

The figure in the crosshairs turned, held her hand up to shade her eyes, and looked up towards me.  The same eyes, the same swishing motion of her hair as she turned, and the same curve of her bottom lip as her teeth sank into it.

Then she was gone.

My hands were wrenched behind me, and I was abruptly facedown on the balcony floor, my cheek scraping on the concrete.  Immediately, I could hear the muffled, distant-memory sound of gunfire and explosions.  I could taste the sand and feel it in my lungs.

“Please…no – please don’t kill me!  I have a wife!  Her name’s Marie, and my daughters, Evelyn and Jennie…”

A muffled click, and when I turn towards the sound, someone grabs my head and pushes it down again.

“Kill me!  I don’t even have a fucking family!  Just kill me!”

I didn’t move, didn’t resist.  I barely felt their hands on me.

“Kill me,” I whispered.  “Kill me, please…just kill me.”

More voices joined the conglomerate around me.  There was a new set of hands holding one of my shoulders down.  Radios crackled, and the sound of a helicopter overhead made me try to lift my head to see what kind.  Police?  Traffic?  Military?  Was there a sniper inside, as I suspected, ready to end me?

The gunfire in my head continued, occasionally causing me to flinch.  Whenever I did that, the two people holding my body to the ground leaned harder against me, though I wasn’t resisting.  My head dropped back to the ground, and I could see out over the edge of the balcony towards the park, which was now devoid of people.  There was no one there at all now – not a woman, a man, or even a dog.

“Odin?”

I tried to get my head up enough to look into the apartment, but I was shoved back down.

“Odin!”

I heard nothing in response.

My chest started to seize up, and I couldn’t breathe.  He had been barking, something he almost never did, but was now silent.  Where was he?  What did they do to him?  Did he go after them in order to protect me?

“No…no…”

Odin…God, no…Odin…

I squeezed my eyes shut.  Someone was holding the back of my neck, and I could taste sand in my mouth.  I could feel the wire wrapped around my wrists as it cut into my skin, and I could hear desert winds blowing around me.

“Not real.”

Forcing air into my lungs, I traded not breathing for hyperventilating.  I glanced over my shoulder and saw four men around me, holding me to the ground as cuffs were placed around my wrists.  Another man near the sliding glass door held a shotgun at my head.

“Where’s my…where’s my dog?  Odin!”

No one replied.  No one said a word.

The dizziness in my head threatened to end my consciousness as they hauled me to my feet.  I stumbled as I stared towards the stairs where the figure with the quarter-themed necklace had been, but there was no one there now except a man with a rifle and a SWAT uniform.

“He’s got dog tags.”

The chain around my neck is tightened, cutting off most of my airflow.  When he shakes it, I feel the skin from the base of my throat scraped clean as my tags jingle in his grasp.

“You think this means something to me?  To us?  You are nothing!  They are nothing!  You have been here how many months?  Do you even know?  There is no rescue for you - they care nothing for you!  One of your own men told us where you were!”

The private had betrayed me.

“Doesn’t mean anything.”

“Lieutenant?”

My head turned towards the sound – a reflexive action.  I didn’t know the man standing in front of me with the round face, blue uniform, and flak jacket.  I’d never seen him before.

“Where’s Odin?” I asked.

“I’m going to read you your rights,” the man said.

The familiar words flowed from his mouth, and I was reminded of a thousand movies and television shows where similar words were spoken.

“Do you understand these rights?”

“There was a girl down there,” I told him.  “Did you see her?  She had a quarter around her neck.”

“He’s gone, sir.”

“Let’s just get him in.”

I was pushed through the opening and back into the apartment, through the bedroom, and into the living room.  My breath caught in my chest as I saw the pile of white fur near the couch, but before I could react to the sight, Odin’s muzzled head came up and his tail began to thump against the floor.  An officer had a leash around his neck and kept him from coming closer to me.

I gasped out a breath and nearly fell in relief as I was escorted across the room, through the open door, and into the hallway.  The elevators were blocked open down at the end of the hall, and there was an officer arguing with a woman near the stairway.

Not a woman – the woman.

Lia stood with her hands on her hips and her hair pulled up into one of those ridiculous, lumpy buns at the top of her head.  Strands fell all around her neck and moved with her as she turned to look towards me.

Her mouth opened, and she tried to take a step forward.  The officer blocked her path, so we just continued to look at each other.

I remembered everything I thought about while driving back to the cabin after dropping her off at the bus stop.  This was exactly why I didn’t want to bring her into my life, but here she was anyway – watching me get dragged to jail.  She was damn lucky I didn’t shoot her.

My stomach tightened at the thought.

The officers on either side of my body urged me forward towards the elevators.  It was the closest to her I would get.

“Evan?”  My name was a plea on her tongue.

I could only stare at her in return.

“What…what happened?” she asked, as if I would have an answer that made any sense.

I didn’t.  I probably never would.

I turned away from her as they started to shove me into the elevator.  There certainly wasn’t going to be any kind of understandable reason for anything I did.  I couldn’t even understand it myself, so how would anyone else?  They’d be better off talking to the dog.

“Lia!”  I turned back to Lia and caught her eyes with mine.  “Take Odin – please.  Please take him with you – make sure he’s okay.  Please?  Will you?  Please?”

“I will,” she said quietly.

“Let her?” I begged the guy holding my left arm.  “Let her take my dog, okay?”

He said nothing.

“What are you going to do with him?” I demanded as I was shoved towards the elevator.  “Let her take him!  Please!”

“It’s all good, Lieutenant,” the round-faced officer said as he came up in front of me.  “The dog’s fine, and after a little processing, we’ll make sure he ends up in the young lady’s care.  All right?”

I nodded.

My eyes met Lia’s again, and I saw a single tear escape her lashes and roll down her cheek.  The need to wipe away the tear was overwhelming, but I couldn’t move.

“Sorry,” I whispered.

Her teeth dug into her bottom lip, and more tears flowed as she whispered my name again.

“I’ll take care of Odin,” she told me.  “I’ll…I’ll figure it out.  You just need…you need…”

Her voice trailed off, and I had to give her a half smile for the effort.  I didn’t need anything other than what Moretti had said he would do – I needed to be put down.

They were supposed to take me out.  Why did I stop firing?  If I hadn’t stopped, they would have ended me.  Glancing back at Lia again gave me the answer – I couldn’t continue knowing she was in the area.

There was nothing else to be done, and no way were my usual tactics going to be able to keep me from thinking about her constantly now.  I had seen her again, no longer just a memory, and I could feel myself drawn to her presence.  Even as the police officers blocked us from actually coming into physical contact with one another, it felt as though we were touching.

I didn’t need to touch her – I could feel her from across the hall.

I had felt her all along; from the time she boarded the bus to see her mother until the moment our eyes met in the hallway.  I might have found some ways to push her to the back of my mind, but I knew she was always there.  It was like she was inside of me, and there was no way she was going away, no matter where I ended up.

I would be the death of her, quite possibly in a very literal sense.

There was no way I could let that happen.  I couldn’t allow her to become a part of my fucked up life without her ending up just like Bridgett – either with my bullet or someone else’s.  I wasn’t going to allow that, because…because…

Because Rinaldo Moretti was wrong about me.

I knew exactly what he had meant – I felt it.

Looking at her one final time, I soaked in everything about her that I could.  My mind captured her long, dark hair, eyes glistening with tears, the shining quarter hanging around her neck, and committed it all to permanent memory.  I knew this would be the end of it, and that was what was best for her.  I knew it with all my warm, beating heart.  The only thing left was to find a new way to get her out of my head.

Prison seemed as good a distraction as anything.

So I let them haul me out.

Cuffs around my wrists.

And remained otherwise occupied.