Chapter Four
“No! You are not allowed to fuckin’ fall out here! Keep moving, or we’re gonna get lit the fuck up!”
Jesus Christ, I’m not gonna make it.
Jesse, dripping with sweat, dehydrated and exhausted, wearing full combat gear, struggled up what had to be the incline from hell. The late-summer heat beat down on him, making his one hundred pounds of weapons and ammo feel like a thousand.
“Get your fuckin’ fat ass up, you worthless piece of shit!”
Jesse clutched his weapon and scanned the nearby forests and cliffs, wincing at the noise they were making. If they hadn’t before, the enemy most certainly knew they were there now. He glanced toward Watkins, a guy in their unit who’d collapsed to his knees, whining and complaining about not being able to go on. Soldiers from both theirs and the outgoing units surrounded him, kicking him and screaming at him to get up.
Get up, man. Get up.
Watkins finally staggered to his feet, bruised, his face streaked with tears. He was prodded back into line, and the group started off again, hiking in single file along the edge of a narrow spur, about twenty feet in between each man.
As they walked, Jesse noticed Riley drop back behind Watkins, leaning forward to talk earnestly to him. Jesse stepped to the side to let them go by, not wanting Riley to be left exposed by his apparent distraction and lack of situational awareness. As they passed him, Jesse heard Riley muttering, “Left, right. Left, right. Now deep breath in through your nose, blow it out your mouth. Keep your breathing steady, and it won’t be so hard. You can do it. Left, right...”
Jesse shook his head. Riley would be the first one to call an asshole an asshole, and accompany that with a punch to the face, but put an underdog in his path—well, the dude just couldn’t help himself. By the time they reached the base of the terraced Afghan village, Watkins was looking at Riley with something akin to hero worship.
“You’re stuck with him now, Estes,” Enriquez muttered under his breath to Riley as he walked over to lean against a tree next to him and Jesse. They sucked down some tepid water from their CamelBaks and caught their breaths, and Enriquez lit up a smoke. “He’s in love.”
Riley shrugged. “He’s just a scared kid. He’ll toughen up.”
Jesse snorted. Kid. He was probably older than Riley, who at nineteen was one of the youngest guys in the platoon.
“You’re gonna get yourself killed doing shit like that.” The gravelly voice came from off to the side, and they all swiveled their heads to look at the speaker, a private first class from the outgoing unit. He was lean, rangy, his dark eyes holding a faint emptiness around the edges, like he’d seen too much. “That dude’s a weak link, and bein’ around him out here ain’t nothin’ but bad news.”
“He’s my teammate,” Riley said evenly. “And all he needed was a little help.”
“Havin’ to carry someone ain’t just ‘a little help,’ man,” the guy retorted. “Havin’ to prod a weak and whiny ass up a hill. You weren’t payin’ attention to your surroundings, and lemme tell you something about these fuckin’ mountains—you never hear it comin’.”
Jesse scanned the jagged ridges and cliffs above them and suppressed a shudder. He wondered how many Taliban had them in their sights right at that moment, concealed behind sheltering rock or towering cedar trees, weapons trained on them. He suddenly felt as vulnerable as an eggshell.
“One minute we were walkin’,” the soldier continued, and Jesse saw by the tape on his uniform that his name was Parker, “and the next minute, my buddy’s brains were sprayin’ out the back of his head. Heard the gunshot a split second later.” He paused to let that sink in. “Every moment could be your last, and you won’t even know it.”
Jesse and his teammates were silent, and Enriquez had frozen with his cigarette halfway to his mouth.
When Riley spoke, his voice was soft. “So you’re saying it’s every man for himself up here? That goes against everything we were trained for, everything the Army stands for.”
“I ain’t sayin’ that,” Parker replied, his voice equally soft. “I’m sayin’ weakness has no place up here. Weakness will not survive this Valley. A guy willin’ to let a little physical pain take over, he’s the one only thinkin’ of himself. He’s the selfish asshole, puttin’ himself above everybody else.”
Riley looked at the ground, subdued.
“If he ain’t gonna walk for you, he sure as shit ain’t gonna die for you. Think about that.” Parker stared hard at each of them, then turned around and strode away.
Nobody said anything, and Enriquez finished his smoke and stubbed it out against a nearby tree trunk before the platoon assembled once again to make the climb up into the village proper.
The wheat terraces were steep, with “stairs” cut out of rock leading up the mountainside at what had to be at least a seventy-degree angle. Jesse pushed himself to keep up, Parker’s words ringing in his ears, determined not to be the one slowing everyone down and putting them in danger. He was breathing hard, dripping sweat, his body armor and ammo dragging at him, the gun he carried a reassuring weight as they got closer to the heart of the village.
Jesse glanced around and saw in his peripheral vision that Watkins was literally taking the last few yards on his hands and knees, his face bright red, a mix of saliva and puke coming out as he coughed. But he’d made it, and he’d kept up. Riley tapped his fist on Watkins’ helmet in a “way to go” gesture. The outgoing guys weren’t even breathing hard, and they grinned at each other.
“Nice day for a little stroll, eh?”
“Walk in the park, man. Walk in the park.”
Jesse tried not to glare at them as he drank some more water, and his sudden suspicion was confirmed when the first guy said, “We usually don’t make this whole climb all in one day. This was just for you.”
“Trying to smoke our asses, motherfuckers?” Riley grated, his voice guttural with exertion, his face glistening with sweat and streaked with dirt.
“And fuck if y’all cherries ain’t weaker than shit.”
Jesse tensed, waiting for the Riley explosion, but Riley just snorted, recognizing the banter for what it was...letting off steam. The other men had been up here for a year without women, without Internet—hell, without fucking running water.
Failing to get a rise out of Riley, they shrugged and turned to business.
“The elder in this village is a cagey bastard. Don’t trust him.”
“Is he Taliban?” Jesse asked.
Parker barked out a laugh. “Depends on what day you ask. If it’s HA day, fuck no, he’s not. Any other time, yep. Don’t ever assume it’s completely safe to come in here, even if he promises it is.”
“In fact, I don’t like this,” someone else muttered.
“Why, too quiet?” Riley asked astutely, tightening his grip on his weapon.
“Yeah. All the women and children are being kept inside,” Parker answered, sweeping his eyes over the houses in the village and the shadowed forest. “Usually this place is swarming with activity. Keep alert.”
A wave of adrenaline moved through Jesse, snapping him out of his exhausted daze. He scanned the area thoroughly. Nothing seemed out of place, the wind in the trees and the yammering of monkeys off in the distance the only sound.
Their shoulder mics crackled. “Be advised, we’ve picked up enemy chatter about our troop movements, and ‘being ready.’”
“Okay, contact is likely.” Parker’s voice was calm, steady. “Pull back, and keep your wits about you, your eyes peeled. If we’re lucky, we get to take some of them out.”
“If we’re lucky?” Watkins squeaked, and Parker turned a gimlet stare on him, making Watkins flinch.
“Yeah. What exactly do you think we do up here, asshole? We ain’t like the Fobbits down at the cushy air base at Bagram, with their fuckin’ coffee shops, pizza parlors and shit. We patrol, kick shit over and make the roaches scurry so we can squash ’em.”
Watkins swallowed hard, and Parker went on, “It’s them or us, cherry. Them or us. Let’s move out.”
A sense of urgency grew as the squad turned to head back to the outpost. The veterans set a brisk pace along the road, their faces hard, no-nonsense. Jesse’s adrenaline ramped up even higher at the tension he could feel radiating off of them, his sweat suddenly feeling cold as ice on his skin.
“Contact west!”
Before the words even died away, there came a faint staccato tapping, like someone pounding on a piece of metal with a hammer. Branches over their heads shredded, and tree trunks splintered. All the men jumped off the trail into the grove as a withering hail of bullets suddenly rained down on them from the ridgeline above.
“Take cover,” Parker yelled. “Spur to the west. Light it up!”
Jesse and Riley threw themselves behind a rock formation several feet away and started hammering the cliffs with deadly bursts from their weapons. The guys from the outgoing unit were like wraiths as they fought, their movements crisp and precise, a well-rehearsed combat ballet.
The gunfire died away as the Taliban faded back to where they’d come from, the ambush over as quickly as it had occurred. A small element of men, headed up by their lieutenant, charged after them. Jesse didn’t even have time to process his intense feeling of relief that the worst was over when suddenly Watkins screamed, “I’ve been shot!”
Smitty, their platoon medic, dashed over to where Watkins sat on the ground, his back to a tree trunk, hand clapped to his cheek and blood welling through his fingers. Jesse stood frozen in horror, thinking Watkins had taken a bullet to the face, but Smitty briefly checked him out, then handed him a thick piece of gauze. Watkins looked like he was hyperventilating as he pressed it to the bloody cut.
Parker spat on the ground in disgust. “Piece of ricochet or something gave the widdle baby a widdle owie. Jesus. Might as well shoot him now and save the Taliban the trouble.”
Riley pursed his lips. “Tell me something, Parker,” he said, his voice granite. “Are we gonna turn into total fuckin’ pricks like you by the time we leave here?”
Jesse tensed as the taller man turned his cold eyes in Riley’s direction. The two of them stared at each other for a breathless moment before Parker turned away, not even bothering with a reply.
“Shit. That guy is like, I don’t know, a burned-out ghost or something,” Riley muttered. “There’s nothing left, is there?”
“Yeah, and you just had to call him a prick,” Jesse retorted, pissed at Watkins for scaring them all and Riley for trying to provoke Parker. “That dude could wipe the fuckin’ ground with us, so I’m sitting here wondering whether you’re brave or just stupid.”
Riley shook his head and gave Jesse a weak grin. “Definitely stupid. But letting him disrespect one of our brothers right to our fuckin’ faces? No way. My dad taught me better than that. Didn’t yours?”
Shame burned a bitter path through Jesse as he pictured his quiet, dignified father. “Yeah,” he said through stiff lips, thinking how much he still had to learn about brotherhood and loyalty, “of course he did.”
“Hey.” Riley elbowed his ribs. “At least we survived our first firefight. Fuck, yeah.” He swayed a little on his feet.
Jesse looked more closely at him, noticing with sudden horror that Riley had blood on his right shoulder, and it was dripping off the ends of his fingers.
“Medic!” he bellowed, and everyone snapped their heads toward him, following his line of sight to Riley. Loud exclamations, and Smitty appeared next to him, gloving up quickly. He eased Riley’s BDU jacket off and probed at the wound. Riley grew even paler, but he didn’t say a word, though an occasional hiss escaped him.
“Nasty, but just a flesh wound,” Smitty finally grunted, relief in his voice. “Nothing’s embedded. Fucking lucky bastard.”
Riley managed a wink as Smitty handed him a fentanyl lollipop to suck on while he cleaned and bandaged the wound, joking with Riley about having a sexy scar to impress the ladies with, trying to keep his mind off things.
By the time he was done, the small group who’d chased the enemy fighters reappeared, dragging a body with them. They laid the dead insurgent by the side of the road for the villagers to find and bury.
“Dude was gut-shot,” Jesse heard Enriquez say. “We followed his blood trail up into the rocks. Died right in front of my goddamned eyes.”
As everyone wearily shouldered their rucksacks to hit the trail back toward the outpost, Jesse sidled up to Riley.
“You weren’t gonna say anything about getting hurt?” he asked quietly. “You were just gonna stand there and bleed?”
Riley grunted, his eyes a little glassy from the fentanyl. “It hurt like a bitch, man. And for a minute I just wanted to enjoy the pain, you know?” His voice was slurred. “It meant I was still alive.” He gestured at the body. “Unlike that poor bastard.”
Jesse glanced toward the dead fighter, most likely a young man just like them, a young man pointed in a certain direction and told to kill the ones he considered the enemy. He couldn’t imagine what that must’ve been like, wounded, nowhere to go, desperately crawling, realizing that the rest of your life could be measured in seconds as booted feet pounded toward you...
He shuddered. The thought of that would give him nightmares if he wasn’t careful, so he buried his feelings deep down. Right now he had a job to do.
A few days later, during a short ceremony, the outgoing unit’s guidon was lowered and theirs unsheathed and raised in its place. Then the other men climbed aboard a series of Chinooks and flew away, never to return.
Jesse watched them go, the phosphorus smoke from the enemy’s “goodbye” mortars wafting overhead.
The Valley of Death was all theirs.
* * *
Trevor struggled up from sleep and grabbed for the phone on the nightstand, fumbling at the Talk button in the dark.
“Riley?” he whispered, throwing the covers back with his other hand and climbing out of bed, glancing at Carl. The phone hadn’t woken him, so Trevor snagged his robe from the bottom of the king-size bed and pulled it on as he headed into the kitchen.
“Hey, Dad!”
Riley sounded like he was speaking in a tunnel, and there was a weird lag to his words, but Trevor wanted to weep with relief at hearing his voice for the first time since Riley had broken the news from Italy that his company was finally shipping out to Afghanistan.
“You got—there—okay?” Trevor didn’t know what he could and couldn’t say over the phone, so he played it safe.
“Yes, we’re fine,” Riley assured him. “It’s—well, it’s something else here, Dad. Definitely another world.” Trevor listened with fascination as Riley told him about the Spartan conditions he was living in, the terraced villages and interesting people. It was obvious Riley was doing his best to keep it light.
“So good to get my once-a-month shower,” he finally said with a sigh. “It’s amazing how much we take for granted back home, like hot water, toilets, Internet.”
“No toilets?” Trevor was appalled.
Riley laughed. “Nah, we have these tubes stuck in the ground that we piss in, and if we need to—well, they’re pretty much just a piece of wood over a bucket, and every now and then we burn the—geez, you don’t want to know about the burn-shitters, Dad.”
“I want to know everything,” Trevor insisted. “What are you doing over there? What’s your job?” Trevor put a kettle of water on the stove to boil, flipping the burner to high, the gas flame clicking before whooshing to life.
Dead air, and Trevor gripped the phone, wondering if the call had been lost. Then the end of Riley’s sentence as the lag in the connection caught up to his words, “—playing with guns, just the usual.” Trevor could hear the forced lightness in Riley’s voice, and Trevor knew he most likely couldn’t answer those sorts of questions.
“Well,” he said, striving for a neutral topic, “how’s the food?”
Riley snorted. “Lots of MREs, food in an envelope that’s just so delicious. Gotta love food that looks like dog food, smells like dog food, tastes like dog food.” Trevor could almost hear Riley shudder.
They chuckled together, and Riley asked, “So how’s Carl and the wedding plans?”
Trevor had been relieved when Riley seemed truly happy about his and Carl’s engagement. He was so lucky, to have found a man that his son liked and could get along with, and Riley’s approval put the crowning touch on Trevor’s joy.
“Carl’s fine. As far as wedding stuff, well, I’m basically just nodding and smiling,” Trevor said drily. “He knows what he wants, and apparently he knows what I want, too.”
Riley laughed. “I’m sure it’s hard to be in love with someone so anal. No pun intended.”
Trevor felt his ears go hot. “Riley James Estes!”
“Couldn’t resist,” came Riley’s unrepentant voice. “But it’s your wedding, too, Dad. Are you really happy with everything?”
Ah, son, I know you don’t give a crap about all this shit. But thanks for asking.
“It doesn’t matter to me, Riles, what the party is like,” he said gently. “I just want to marry him. I’d be happy with a simple ceremony at the courthouse, but since we have to go to Boston anyway—well, if he’s happy, I’m happy.”
“Maybe by the time I get back, Colorado will have marriage equality,” Riley said, “so you could just do it in our backyard. That’d be nice.”
Trevor thought about Carl’s elaborate plans—a carriage ride through Boston Commons, top hats and tails, a string quartet—and winced. Barefoot in their backyard next to the waterfall, the smell of hibiscus in the summer air, white fairy lights twinkling, his son looking on with pride as Trevor married the man he loved...now that would be Trevor’s idea of heaven.
“Well, it’s important to Carl, so it’s important to me,” Trevor said firmly, and another voice came on the line as someone apparently leaned in close to Riley and spoke to him.
“Hey, Estes, five minutes.”
“Got it, thanks.”
“How’s that arm doing, man?”
“It’s fine. Hey, lemme finish talking to my dad, okay? Catch up to you later.”
Trevor’s ears pricked up. “What happened to your arm?” A long silence, and Trevor could hear Riley breathing on the other end, so he knew the call was still connected.
“Riley?”
“Look, Dad, I’m okay. You’re talking to me, so you know I’m fine, right?”
Trevor clenched his hand tighter around the phone, his heart starting to pound. “Riley—”
Riley sighed in resignation before muttering, “I, uh, got grazed by a bullet the other day.”
“Jesus!” Trevor burst out, and Riley shushed him.
“It was just a scratch, Dad. A ricochet, probably. That’s all.”
“That’s all? You got shot and that’s all?” Trevor shouted. “Were you even going to tell me?”
Silence again.
“Riley—”
“Dad. Listen to me. Calm down and listen to me. A bullet grazed my arm, but I’m fine. I promise you, I’m fine. I didn’t even need any stitches.”
Trevor’s breathing was harsh, fast, and he almost dropped the phone when he suddenly felt strong arms wrap around his waist from behind.
“I’m in a war zone, Dad. I’m here doing my job, what I volunteered to do. Bullets are an occupational hazard, unfortunately.”
“Don’t joke about this, Riles. Don’t you dare—”
Carl tightened his arms, and started a soothing circle on Trevor’s abdomen with his palm. “Breathe, honey.”
“I’m not joking. It’s true, a fact of life over here. I can’t say more than that, and no, I wasn’t planning to tell you about it because there’s nothing you can do from there except worry. Just like you’re doing now.” Riley took a deep breath and burst out, “Fuck, I’m gonna kill that fucking Cohen. I’m sorry, Dad. I’m so sorry to scare you.”
Trevor closed his eyes, and pulled every ounce of his composure around him. He leaned back against Carl’s warmth, and fought to keep his voice steady as he said, “No. Don’t worry about me, son. It’s my job to worry about you, and all I want you to do is just concentrate on keeping yourself safe over there. You hear me?”
“Yes, sir,” Riley said, his voice husky. “And I’ve got to go. I’ll call you in a month, okay?”
“Okay.” For a few more precious seconds he just listened to Riley breathe over the crackling line. “Love you, son.”
“Love you, Dad.”
Then a soft click, and the static of a broken connection. Trevor clutched the phone to his chest, blinking back tears. Carl pried the handset from his clenched fingers and turned Trevor to face him, wrapping him up in his arms.
“What happened?” he whispered into Trevor’s hair, smoothing his hand up and down Trevor’s back. Trevor told him, and Carl made sympathetic noises as he listened, gently pushing Trevor back when the teakettle gave a shrill whistle.
“Go sit down, and I’ll bring you your tea,” he urged, and Trevor gratefully sank onto one of the dining room chairs, his legs trembling from a combination of paralyzing fear and profound relief.
Carl poured them each a mug of the chamomile tea, and sat down next to Trevor, their knees touching. They sipped in silence for a few moments before Carl said softly, “Talk to me, Trev.”
Trevor put down his mug and buried his face in his hands. “He was shot, hurt, and I didn’t even know it, Carl! I was just going on about my life and my baby had a bullet in him! What if he—”
Carl reached out and rubbed Trevor’s knee. “But he’s okay, Trev. He’s okay, though.” Trevor shuddered, and Carl murmured, “Focus on that, honey. Not on the ‘what-ifs.’ You just spoke to him. You know he’s okay.”
Carl kept up the soothing touch. “You’ve got to trust in him,” he said reasonably. “Trust in the training he’s received, the leadership, the men around him. What else can you do? You’re going to drive yourself crazy if you start ‘what-ifing.’”
Trevor took a deep breath and just barely restrained himself from snapping, “Easier said than fucking done, Carl.” Instead he muttered, “I’ll try. But I just received a hell of a shock.”
“I know.” Carl patted his knee again. “But it’s over. And now you need to put it behind you and focus on the positives, not dwell on the negatives. I don’t want to see you wallowing in this, Trev. For your sake.”
Carl stood up, and took their half-empty mugs to the sink, then held out his hand. “Let’s try and get a little more sleep. We have a couple of hours yet.”
Trevor let Carl lead him to the bedroom, and they took off their robes and slid into bed, the sheets still warm. Carl spooned up to Trevor’s back and held him close, and soon Trevor could hear his breathing deepen as Carl drifted off to sleep while his own mind raced.
Shot. How close had the bullet come to Riley’s neck, or the artery in his arm? Had the medic had to dig the projectile out, or had it been a true graze? Had he lost a lot of blood, been in a lot of pain? The worst part was not knowing, not being able to process any of the true facts or information. His imagination was running wild, and Trevor wanted to pound his fist on the mattress in frustration.
Carl must have felt his distress even in his sleep, because he shifted and tightened his arms, sighing into Trevor’s neck. Trevor swallowed, biting hard on his lip to hold back the tears that were threatening to overflow. Carl was right, and so was Riley. There was nothing Trevor could do about anything, and worrying and what-ifing was going to drive him crazy. He could pray, though, and while it had been years since Trevor had thought about any kind of higher power, he bowed his head and closed his eyes, praying fervently to a God he hoped was listening.