He closed his eyes and saw it again. The gun, the way the light reflected off its polished metal, and then another flash of light, this one much brighter. It came from the muzzle and then scorched into him, a searing, blinding white pain. His thigh felt like it had been simultaneously beaten by a club and pierced by a hot poker, his body collapsing onto itself as he helplessly watched the face of his attacker, that hulking slab of red-faced aggression, those widened eyelids exposing the whites of hateful, beady eyes. Lips curled back to reveal a yellowish mangle of teeth. And then he saw another flash, the gun recoiling hard, its hot gasses ejecting another empty cartridge.

Another flash, everything dark now except for the pulsing light of the gun. Everything hot and numb. And quiet. Almost peaceful.

He lay on his back, motionless, as the air and blood drained from his body.

* * *

Matthias opened his eyes and fixed his gaze to the perforated ceiling tiles of a twentieth-floor office in the downtown mental health center. Underneath the peaceful droning of the building’s central air conditioning, he could hear the frantic honking of Washington’s rush-hour road-ragers. And then the monotone calm of Dr. Smyth’s voice.

“Are you back with us now?”

Matthias wasn’t sure. He sat up and took inventory of the damage, how his body spread out safely across the doctor’s leather chaise lounge. He was still in one piece, and in civilian clothes with no holes. No burn marks around where the hot lead entered him, nor dark red stains where his life had exited.

There wasn’t a deranged gunman standing at his feet, but the good doctor sitting in some European minimalist chair, legs crossed, hand thoughtfully to his chin. The other hand was moving a pen briskly across a small sketchpad. “Matthias?” he said, still writing. “Where are you now?”

Matthias took a deep breath, wiped the sweat from his brow. His hand was shaky. His chest, tight.

“I know it’s scary to go back there,” the doctor said as he finally looked up, his pen falling flat on the notepad. “Your body is reliving the encounter.”

That’s what he called it. The encounter, Matthias’ brief run-in with death. He’d had others during his time in the military. Many of them much worse than his latest “encounter.” Like his convoy driving through a crop of IEDs, a sniper’s two-inch miss, a precision blow from a chunk of shrapnel. Burn marks, heat stroke, a fat-tail scorpion in his cot. He’d been shot at more times than he’d like to remember. But he’d never felt this shaken up by it. And never had his body been so affected this long after the event. The fear. The adrenaline. And most recently, the couch-locking depression that had brought his life to a halt.

He felt powerless and weak. And he hated himself for it.

“There is trauma,” Dr. Smyth said. “Mentally, and physically. And it manifests itself deep inside.” The doctor grabbed hold of the skin on his own arm, pinching it between his fingers and holding it out for Matthias. “It’s in your tissue, in here. On a molecular level.” He let go of his arm. “And it’s in the deepest parts of your brain. It needs to come out. Do you understand?”

Matthias really didn’t understand any of it. He’d never been scared like this—so shaky and weak at just the slightest hint of a flashback. The imagery coming alive again in his mind, the smells so vivid. Gun smoke and burnt flesh.

The doctor’s office was suddenly filled with that same stench.

“Matthias?”

“Yeah,” he said, choking on the dry, smoke-filled air. He coughed against it, wiping his forehead again. The room was so hot. “Yes.” He tried to muster up some more strength in his voice, trying not to scream obscenities at himself, in his head.

“It needs to come out, Matthias.”

“I know, but it’s like . . .” He tried for the right words, staring up at the ceiling and then back down to the calm, open face of the doctor. “I feel like the more I relive it, the worse it gets.”

“That’s because you’re not reliving it properly.”

“No shit.” He wiped his face again.

“You’re not doing it in a controlled, therapeutic way.”

“Yeah. . .”

“Would you like something?”

“What? What do you mean? No. No pills. I don’t want any more pills.”

The doctor smiled. “I meant, a glass of water? Anything?”

What Matthias needed was to quit being such a baby, to get over this before, dear God, his father in heaven noticed. It made him sick to his stomach when he thought about that, about what Dad, his lifelong drill instructor, probably thought of him now. Through the droning air vents and the honking of rush-hour traffic, Matthias could almost hear the quiet disappointment. He could see him now, his father’s stoic face turning away, not out of anger, but disgust.

Stretched out on this stupid little couch, Matthias wasn’t a soldier, but a patient. A head case. And a potential burden on society if he couldn’t straighten up and grow a set. He wouldn’t be able to work like this. At least, not the kind of work he was born to do.

He knew guys who went down this same road. PTSD, the self-medicating, the falling through the cracks of society. He knew former soldiers, completely broke, hitchhiking to someplace warm. Florida. California. Finding some place in the weeds to camp out. A hobo jungle. Collecting bottles and cans by day for refund money. And by night, getting as fucked up as possible on whatever substances they could find or afford. Crack. Malt liquor. Glue. Gas. Whatever did the job of slowly killing them, of finishing the job of some terrorist who might still be alive and killing someplace around the world.

It was better than remembering. Anything was better than that.

“On the scale of things, Matthias, you’re not that bad off. You’re really quite lucky, actually.”

“Lucky?”

“Quite lucky. For one, you’re still here talking to me.”

Matthias nodded with a slight hesitation. It was true. He was alive.

Great.

“But lucky, also, biologically speaking.”

“How’s that?”

“Your brain.”

“Oh. Well, I have my doubts about that, but go ahead.”

“Your ability to process trauma.”

“My what?” Matthias laughed. Dr. Smyth was good for one now and then.

“It’s actually rather remarkable,” the doctor continued. “You’ve progressed extremely quickly, worked through the experience faster than most.”

Yes, they’d done their tests, their lab rat evaluations. He’d put his head through their scanning machines, and his mind through Dr. Smyth’s therapy. The meditation exercises. The de-programming. And through it all, he couldn’t deny that there had been at least some improvement.

It had been two solid months of intense work, starting after he was released from the hospital. Physical health was their first priority, healing his wounds, two bullets’ worth, a temporarily collapsed lung and bum leg. He’d gone through the physiotherapy and the pain meds, and at the same time the little congratulatory parties his DARC Ops boys held for him every time he made progress—sometimes even sneaking in a beer or two. He’d gone through the nurses’ well-wishes and flirty smiles, all of it, mostly, in one big medicated haze.

But after the shock and novelty wore off, and after all the drugs, it was just him, alone in his apartment with the lights on at all hours. Closet doors and shower curtains always wide open. All hiding spots rigorously checked. All weapons locked and loaded—including a double-barrel shotgun resting against the wall by the door. It would be in his sweaty hands at the first sign of trouble. The sound of footsteps in the hall. The garbage truck at 5:20 a.m. Pizza delivery to a nearby apartment. That fucking noisy janitor and all those tools and keys and metal, everything jingling when he walked, like he was strapped with a whole arsenal of killing instruments.

Sometimes it was just the smallest, dumbest thing. The sound of a closed car door would spring him out of bed, rushing to the window to carefully and very slightly split the blinds with two shaky fingers, all so he could peek down at the parking lot, at some poor little elderly couple shuffling back home from church.

“Matthias? Where are you?”

“Right here,” said Matthias, though he knew it was debatable.

Dr. Smyth, certainly, was still there, scribbling down little bits of whatever on his notepad, resting his chin on his hand, index finger up along the side of his face.

“I’m here,” said Matthias. “I’m with you.”

“Listen . . . I know it looks bleak. But you’re going to be alright.”

“Yeah.”

“Like I said, you’re far along in this. You’re past the worst of it, and now you’re on your way out. We’re well past the numbness, past the terror. Right? And now we’re processing. And you’re being very brave. You need to recognize that.”

Matthias had been nodding, recognizing. He was being “here.”

“Of course we’ll hit some rough spots, sure, and that can be very uncomfortable, but we’re getting through it. Aren’t we?”

“I just want to stop thinking about it. I want to stop feeling like this.”

“You can’t do that yet. That’s shutting down.”

He’d mentioned that a lot. Shutting down. It was Matthias’ go-to defense mechanism, something that was learned and ingrained during his active duty. In that environment, how could he not shut down certain facets of his mind? His emotions? It was trained into him, to shut down and turn off and operate. A hardwired defense strategy against the horrors of battle. But now he was being asked to open up and to feel, to let open all that scar tissue. He was being asked to bleed. It was exhausting.

“We have to relive your trauma in a healthy, controlled way, for it to really be gone.”

“Yeah,” said Matthias. “I know.”

“Let’s stop talking about this.” Dr. Smyth tossed his notepad aside. “You’re getting tired of it. I’m burning you out.”

“No, I’m fine.”

“Yes, yes, getting burnt out. Let’s talk about something fun. Okay?”

Matthias smiled half-heartedly as he tried to imagine what fun topic Dr. Smyth could drum up on the spot. Sports chat? Freud? Some hot date he’d had?

“This biker tour,” Dr. Smyth said. “Tell me about that. I hear you’re about to embark on a cross-country, uh, biker tour.”

“Bike tour.”

“How far are you riding?”

“Just to New Orleans. Some of the guys are from all over, but we’re riding down together from D.C.”

“You sure you’re ready for that?”

Matthias sat up and placed his feet on the faux-wood floor and said, “Yep.”

“You’re sure you can handle it?”

“Huh?”

“I mean, physically. From your injuries. You must be in good enough shape if you can ride that far. I know guys half your age, without the battle scars, who’d probably cry after the second day.”

“It takes some getting used to. But before, well, before my injury, I’ve had a lot of time in the saddle.”

“It’s all about the . . .” The doctor grabbed his own little ass. “All about the rear end, huh?”

Matthias laughed, feeling a little embarrassed for the skinny, prematurely geriatric-looking doctor.

“I mean, you’re in pretty good shape.”

“Thanks,” said Matthias. “Yeah, it helps to have some muscle tone, and flexibility, and experience riding those long days. It’ll be a good test for my rehab.”

“Mentally, too. Not to get into it again. But, I just wanted to say that I think it’s a marvelous idea. You need a change of scenery. A challenge, something to occupy your mind.”

He could envision it already, the shimmering-hot blacktop. The constant, throaty roar of his Ducati sport bike. Fresh air. Country. The escape. It was part of a cross-country ride for veterans, something he’d been planning for years. What was not planned was getting gunned down in a Washington D.C. hospital, and the subsequent arduous recovery. And the after-effects, beyond the partial leg and blown-out lungs. He’d never had a “mental disorder” before. It scared him, more than he wanted to admit.

“You’ll be fine out there,” the doctor said, standing and walking toward the door. “You’ll make it.”

“Thanks.” Matthias joined him at the doorway, giving him a good firm handshake. “If war amps can do it, guys without arms. . . then there’s no reason why I can’t.”

“Like I said, you’re lucky.”

Yes, lucky. It had to be at least a little bit true. Even if it was said by a therapist.