One September Morning (7 page)

Forty-two Miles Away
Flint

D
amn technology.

You can order groceries online, send a message to a friend on the other side of the planet, or buy a song through your computer, but now that he really needs his laptop to work it keeps freezing up on him, when he’s thousands of miles from home with no malls or Apple Stores where he can slap down his credit card and purchase a replacement.

Dave Flint runs two fingers along the seam of his open laptop, wiping the powder and grit of sand out of the crevice. He was working outside under a tent when the Sharqi started blowing with a violent burst that sent sand and debris and anything that wasn’t anchored whipping through the air. Now the screen is frozen and his final story from Iraq isn’t transmitting back to his editor in Seattle as it should be. If that’s not enough bad luck, his flight home that’s scheduled to leave at noon, just eleven hours away, is probably going to be cancelled due to the sand storm spewing a wall of sand and dust into the air. Nobody can get in or out during one of these storms; Sharqis have been known to last for days this time of year.

Just his luck.

He’s been embedded with the 121st Airborne Division since July, and though he didn’t really want the assignment in the first place, it provided him with his first chance to file breaking stories—pieces printed above the fold, nearly every other day—as well as an opportunity to step away from his life in Seattle, a rote routine coordination of job, girlfriend, online gaming, and late-night drinking. Not a horrible life by any means, but one that will definitely require some fine-tuning when he returns home. It’s time to make some adjustments, shake things up a bit.

He’s already broached the topic of change with Delilah during their few spare phone calls, his attempt to seed their inevitable parting but, typical of Delilah, she only picks up what she wants to hear. And right now all she seems to want to hear is the “C” word. Commitment…it’s the bane of Flint’s relationships. Nothing can make him feel like he’s looking down the dark barrel of the rifle of unhappiness quite like the prospect of having to sign on with one person for a lifetime. Not that he’s ever cheated on Delilah or any of his girlfriends before that. He’s a monogamous guy, just not ready to sign it all away for eternity.

Why do women want the big commitment? They want you to promise something that no person in their right mind can truly guarantee. Forever and always…like those songs played at friends’ weddings, right around the time when Flint grabs a glass of scotch and heads out to the terrace to join the cigar smokers. He hates the smell of old stogies but even the scent of burning rubbish is preferable to the glaze in a woman’s eyes when she’s smitten with the notion of idyllic love.

Yes, he’s going to have to end it with Delilah. Even if it means ending up a lonely old crone, as Fanteen always threatens.

Flint leans forward and blows dust from the keyboard, then tries turning the laptop on one more time. At last, an Internet connection. His fingers moving deftly over the keyboard, he e-mails the piece to the
Seattle Trib,
and it uploads quickly. Done.

He lets out a grunt of relief, then lets his eyes scan headlines on the server’s homepage. John Stanton’s name catches his eye, and he clicks on the link to find just a few lines of copy, reporting that John was killed by a sniper’s bullet just outside Fallujah. He was with Camp Desert Mission, a Forward Operation Base some forty miles west of Baghdad.

Shit.

John Stanton can’t be gone. He’s one of those guys you expect to see going on forever, charging through life with voracity and determination just as he’d charged through linebackers on a football field.

Flint knew Stanton through Abby Fitzgerald, one of his suitemates in college back in New York. Ancient history, but they were good friends back in the day. For a time, Flint and Abby had a little flirtation going, but Abby fell hard when she met John Stanton, her Scarlet Knight. Suddenly Abby was a football fan, coaxing them on a road trip to see a Rutgers game. It was a beautiful fall weekend and they had papers due back at the Wag, but who could stand to hole up in the library all weekend when you could kill yourself late Sunday night? Abby, Fanteen, Hitch, and him—they’d been inseparable until John came along and stole Abby’s heart. Once she got an eyeful of him in a football uniform, Abby never looked twice at anyone on campus, Flint included. If anyone was destined for a happily-ever-after, it was John and Abby.

And now this.

It sucked. It was the shorthand of the newsroom: shit happens.

Hopefully, you can find some meaning along the way before everything goes bad.

Flint searches for more information about the incident with John, but so far details are sparse.

When was Abby and John’s wedding? He counts back to a year ago June when they walked together under the crossed swords of John’s fellow soldiers. It was the last time they’d all been together, Abby and Hitch and Fanteen and him. Fanteen was pregnant with her second, and Hitch kept joking about how he was going to quit his job and become a househusband. Flint had brought Delilah to the wedding, and Abby had joked that she wanted an invitation to
their
wedding. Ha-ha. Again, the commitment thing. Delilah had loved hearing that, though she was still waiting. Waiting for Flint to become the marrying kind? Waiting for freakin’ Godot.

John’s death here in Iraq is going to be a huge story. The guy was already considered a hero. One of the best college running backs this decade, and then a star player for the Seattle Seahawks who left a promising career in the NFL to enlist in the army with his brother. And now that John had made the ultimate sacrifice, well, the media is going to go wild.

“Can you say ‘feeding frenzy’?” he mutters.

Will Abby give him an exclusive interview? Is he slimy enough to ask?

Any reporter worth his salt would have been on the phone already, but Flint is still unsure. Abby was his friend. She
is
his friend, unless you factor in the fact that they haven’t had any contact beyond joke e-mails for the past year. Is he a scumbag for thinking about swooping in on her? It reminds him of the joke: When you X-ray the chest of a reporter, is there any dark spot for a heart?

On the other hand, shouldn’t he e-mail and offer his help? Abby is his friend, and she could use someone from the inside to help her field the media. He’d like to help, and it looks like he’s stuck here for at least another day or two with this wind storm brewing. On second thought, the wind storm is going to keep other reporters from flying in. He opens his mail files to send Abby an e-mail.

In the meantime, he can always join a convoy heading over to Camp Desert Mission and see what’s what. Stanton’s brother, Noah, is stationed there, too, a medic, the report says. Maybe Noah wants to talk. He scrolls through his address book and clicks on Abby’s name. He’ll offer to help, and if it delays his return to Seattle, he can tell Delilah it’s business.

Which it is.

Sort of.

Fort Lewis
Abby

“W
hat time did it happen?” Abby asks. “I don’t have that information,” Sgt. Jason Palumbo answers, thoughtfully tapping one finger against the rim of his mug of tea.

Having spent the past few hours in her kitchen with him, Abby no longer finds him intimidating. The sergeant is the messenger, her only line of access to John’s whereabouts, and oddly she feels compelled to hold on to this man as if he offered a lifeline.

“We do know that he was shot during a warehouse raid, sometime yesterday,” he adds.

“Yesterday…” Abby says.

“And their day is our night. They’re eleven hours ahead,” Suz reminds her, dumping the wet coffee grounds so that she can start a fresh pot. “What time did you have that dream?”

“In the middle of the night. Though it wasn’t so much a dream.” Abby bites her lower lip. “It felt like he was right here with me. His side of the bed was even warm.” She hugs herself and closes her eyes, trapped between the memory and the raw pain of here and now. She has said too much, exposed an open wound. “I know it sounds crazy.”

Suz leans back and fingers the charm strung around her neck, a golden “S” that was a gift from her husband. “Honey, when you look up crazy in the dictionary my picture’s printed there. What did John say to you?”

“He just said my name, over and over.” Abby rakes one hand through her dark hair and holds it in a knot at the back of her neck, remembering. “At one point, the room was rocking and rumbling. The pictures and bowls on my bureau were shaking. Did we have an earthquake last night?”

“Not that I know of, but then I’ve been known to sleep through tornadoes.” Suz turns to Sgt. Palumbo. “You read about anything rocking the Richter scale, Sarge?”

“Nothing that I’ve heard about,” he says. The casualty assistance officer does not strike Abby as a man who believes in the supernatural, though Abby doesn’t sense that he’s judging her. Instead, she perceives concern, sympathy. And she’s come to appreciate that tiny spot on his chin where he nicked himself shaving. Against the smooth fabric and shiny buttons of his dress uniform, it’s nice to know he’s a human being.

“Well, I say it’s all more than a coincidence, you seeing him in your dream and now this.” Suz punctuates the end of her sentence with the whirring bean grinder, then dumps the fresh-ground coffee into the filter. “Quite a coinkeedink, if you ask me. I wonder what he was trying to tell you.”

“I don’t know.”
Was there a message?
Abby wonders, feeling revived by the earthy smell of ground coffee beans.
Or was John just making one last connection, saying good-bye?
She presses her lips together to ward off tears. And here she was thinking she’d gone beyond tears to numb denial.

“I didn’t hear Scott’s voice when he was killed,” Suz says, leaning against the kitchen counter. “I sure would have liked to. Could’ve used a few tips on how to get the car started on wet days, where to reinvest his four-oh-one-K.”

Pressing a napkin to her eyes, Abby feels comforted by her friend’s ramble.

Beyond the kitchen, her house is swollen with people who’ve brought casseroles, cold cuts, and fruit, flowers and deepest regrets. Glancing out at them from the arched kitchen entry, watching two women move respectfully past her Monet print, Abby has the feeling that her entire life is being turned inside out, giving all the world a view of the snags and broken fibers she has held in her pocket all these years. It’s a raw, vulnerable feeling only somewhat softened by the warm support of the military community, which she did not fully embrace in her time here at Fort Lewis. John was the one who dove in willy-nilly, and now Abby, a more private person, is being forced to open up and let strangers in.

You’re going to love the Northwest,
John told her when they first learned of his assignment at Fort Lewis.
It’s a beautiful slice of the planet.

And Abby was beginning to share his love for all the green grass and trees, the more mellow pace in which people took the time to look you in the eyes. She didn’t mind trading the East Coast humidity for the dry air, even if it meant skies were gray for much of the year. They had met back east while John was at Rutgers and Abby attended Wagner College on Staten Island. Geographically challenged from the start, the logistics of their relationship only got worse as John signed on to play football with the Seattle Seahawks while Abby remained in the dorms on Grymes Hill to finish her senior year at Wagner. New York to Seattle, tough commute.

Abby presses her palms to the familiar kitchen table. This place became her home in the past year.
Their home.
Although she stopped making three-egg omelets and buying green salads that wilted in the refrigerator, she still considers herself part of a couple, half of a whole.

And now the other half is gone.

The sergeant holds up two pamphlets and then places them on the kitchen table. “I’ll leave these here for you to go through when things quiet down. They’ve got everything you’ll need to know about benefits, burial, and setting up the funeral.”

A funeral. She’s supposed to bury her husband. It all seems incongruous. “I’m having trouble processing at the moment,” Abby says flatly.

“And that’s no surprise.” Suz places a fresh mug of coffee in front of her, tips some cream from a small pitcher into it, stirs for her.

Abby wonders who had the presence of mind to bring cream. She and John are strictly one percent milk people.

John
was
. Would she ever get used to saying that?

“We can handle all the arrangements for you, Abby,” he is saying. “As much as you like.”

As her CAO, Sgt. Palumbo has already explained many of these things for Abby, but although she has been sitting politely and trying to listen, she feels as if she’s playing a role, pretending to be herself in her own home while friends and strangers pass through the kitchen extending regrets and condolences. Now that the initial shock has worn thin, she’s operating on autopilot, going through all the motions of talking and breathing though her mind is a million miles away fighting the information that John is gone. She cannot believe it. It seems ludicrous that such information could simply be passed to Sgt. Palumbo to pass on to her. Maybe the information is wrong. “Can I ask you…” She lifts her face to the sergeant. “Has the army ever made a mistake in something like this? I mean, maybe they’ve got the wrong guy.”

He sighs. “I’ve never heard of it happening. At least, not in our lifetime. When John’s remains arrive at Dover Air Force Base, they’ll run tests to verify his identity.”

“Oh.” She would like to hang her hopes on the delusion that a huge mistake was made, and she would if she could just get rid of this sick feeling in her stomach.

“Have you thought about a final resting place?” the sergeant asked.

A grave. Abby shakes her head. “John wanted to be cremated,” she said. “We both do.” At least they had discussed that much at the funeral of one of John’s college teammates who had died in an accident. The kid’s parents had made the unfortunate choice to have the casket open, and the body laid out in a bed of satin looked nothing like the vibrant defensive end who had helped the Scarlet Knights to victory. “No open coffin,” John said. “That’s just creepy. And burn what’s left of me. Ashes to ashes.”

“Cremation is a viable option,” Sgt. Palumbo says, “but you don’t need to make any decisions right now. Sleep on it. Discuss the possibilities with family if you like, and I’ll be here to assist you when the time comes.”

“And you know I’ll help, too.” Suz reaches across the table and squeezes Abby’s wrist. “I’ve been through it before.” The tip of Suz’s nose turns bright red and tears shine in her eyes.

Abby places a hand over Suz’s and nods. The wounds are still fresh from Scott’s death and now Suz is here to suffer again. It’s so wrong.

Sgt. Palumbo excuses himself to talk to someone in the living room, and Abby takes a deep breath.

“This is surreal. These people in my house. All the food and conversation. It seems festive, and maybe that’s not wrong. John would hate for anyone to wax morose over him.”

“At least you’ve got Sharice. She’s quite the diplomat,” Suz says, and they both glance out toward the living room. Although Abby cannot see her mother-in-law she can hear her remarking on how she’s going to extract the secret recipe for someone’s sour cream noodle casserole.

“Sharice is so good with things like this,” Abby says. She had long admired her mother-in-law’s ability to hostess with charm and grace.

“And she’s all-army. She really knows the culture. She and Madison were a tremendous help when we lost Scott.”

Over on the rocking chair, John’s teenage sister Madison holds Sofia in her lap, reading
The Very Noisy Morning
for the umpteenth time. How good of Madison to entertain Sofia when she herself is hurting. She and John were close.

“Yes, Noah will be home just as soon as they can get him the flights back,” Sharice is saying. “Certainly in time for the funeral. It will be good to see him.”

Abby’s mouth puckers involuntarily. “Thank God Noah didn’t get taken out, too. At least he’ll have some answers when he gets here, some specifics of what happened to John.”

“I’m sure he will, sweetie,” Suz says.

“As if that matters. I mean, if he’s really gone, knowing the details isn’t going to bring him back. I’m sorry, my mind isn’t working properly anymore.”

“No need to apologize. You’re not supposed to be sweet and rational right now. You’re supposed to throw up your arms and holler and blubber. Let it go like an elephant trumpeting over the savannah.” Her arms flailing, Suz lets out a wild, bestial howl.

Silence falls over the house. A moment later two women peek into the kitchen. “Everything okay in here?” a woman with short-cropped black hair asks cautiously.

“We’re just mad as hell,” Suz answers. “But all things considered…” She shrugs. “Whatcha gonna do?”

“It’s a difficult time,” says the woman with black hair.

“I am so sorry for your loss,” the other woman says, crossing to Abby. Her startlingly blue eyes shine with compassion, and Abby realizes it’s Peri Corbett, from across the way. “Please let me know if there’s anything I can do for you.”

“I will,” Abby promises, warmed by the genuine sincerity of the people who’ve dropped everything to come to her house this afternoon.

“I got a fresh pot of coffee here,” Suz says. “Can I get you a cup, Peri?”

As normal chatter resumes, Suz serves up two mugs, then heads out to the living room with the coffeepot in hand. She passes Sharice under the arch, offering a refill.

“No, thanks.” Sharice shakes her head briskly. “Any more coffee and I’ll be bouncing from wall to wall.” She places her mug in the sink and then turns to Abby, who can sense her mother-in-law gearing up for an important question.

Abby glances up at her, encouragingly.

“I want you to know,” Sharice says confidentially, “Jim just got a call from his C.O., who says there’s a good possibility that John will be honored posthumously. There’s talk that the president might even attend his funeral.”

Abby feels her lips shaping an “O” of surprise, but she cannot form a response.

“That would be wonderful,” Peri says, “and well-deserved. After all, he is a hero. He made the ultimate sacrifice for his country.” The woman with the dark hair sniffs, and suddenly her eyes are glossy with tears, her nose red. Without a word she grabs two tissues and blots at her eyes.

“What happened?” Suz returns with the empty coffeepot. “Did I miss something?”

“John’s going to get some medals,” says the woman with dark hair. “He’s a national hero.”

Why?
Abby wants to ask.
Because he used to be a football player?
She turns away from everyone, looking down at the table. John used to sit in this chair. When he wasn’t deployed, he ate breakfast here. They dined at this table, sometimes by candlelight. She presses one palm flat against the wood, knowing that John would not want to be favored. Suz’s husband, Scott, also lost his life in Iraq, but there was no talk of the president attending his funeral. Why do they want to make a fuss over John?

“I don’t see that we have any choice now,” Sharice says. Leaning against the counter, she lifts her chin and stares off with a lofty expression, as if she can see destiny shining in the distance. “We’re going to have to bury him at Arlington Cemetery.”

With those words, Abby feels control slip through her fingers like white sand drizzling onto the beach. Having grown up in Sterling, Virginia, she was well aware of the national cemetery at the edge of Washington, D.C., its white-studded hillsides reserved for veterans and the historically famous. Heroes and presidents and Supreme Court justices. It hardly seemed a fitting place for the man she loved, the man who’d written of his doubts recently, of the futility of war, the darkness in taking another man’s life.