Chapter Two
Three months later.
Steve is waking up from bed earlier than what he is used to. It is still dark. His eyes are not used to moving around in the early morning darkness. He leans to kiss his wife on the cheek, she moves a little, but is not waken up.
He gets dressed, bumping into things only slightly, and then sneaks out of the room and goes into the hallway. He quietly shuts the master bedroom’s door with a light creak and click. He leans into his kids’ room. They are both sleeping deeply, not aware of their father. He goes to close the door and waves lightly toward them blowing them each a kiss.
It is now morning, the regular part of morning for the family, and the alarm goes off. Steve’s wife wakes up, turns off the alarm, and goes to wake up Steve, but she only sees a light imprint of where he slept the night before; he isn’t there.
She goes into the kitchen, nobody is there. She starts to let the worry take over her face. Her eyes dart across the rooms looking for her husband somewhere in the house.
She runs to the front window. Steve’s truck is not there. She runs to the kid’s bedroom, they are sound asleep. From the kids bedroom, she hears the kitchen door open.
She runs in and sees Steve wide eyed and cheerful. He is smiling, and carrying food from a their favorite local diner.
At first she is shocked, but as the reality that everything is all right sinks in, she also smiles back.
Steve sets the food on the kitchen table, and walks toward his wife, and hugs her.
Steve “You didn’t think I forgot your birthday did you?”
His wife’s smile grows to almost uncontrollable wideness.
“No, No, of course not. Thank you, honey. What did you get?”
She walks over to the food and starts taking it out of the take home bags, and sets it up to eat.
Steve smiles kindly and says, “Only your favorite. I’ll go get the kids.”
His wife walks over to a kitchen cabinet and take some cups out.
“Sounds wonderful. Thank you for this day! A wonderful surprise, Stevie.”
The kids on one side and Steve and his wife on the other are all sitting in the kitchen around the table eating breakfast together. They are laughing about a cartoon one of the boys is talking about.
After the boy ends his story, Steve’s wife looks over and asks, “So how much vacation do you have left?”
Steve ponders for a moment. He takes a bite and after chewing a bit, he takes a drink of his milk and says, “Well, it started two weeks ago Friday, and it is Wednesday now, so about half a week left.”
She smiles and nods understanding how much more is left, but still asks, “Why did you take a vacation anyways, honey?”
Steve takes another bite giving himself some time to think and finally says after a good wait, “Things are so hectic at work with the hour cuts and lay offs, I felt it is better for me avoid work for awhile and still be able to get full day’s pay. You know, get my vacation while it lasts, and spend time with you all at the same time.”
Steve tries to give a smile, but something inside keeps him from giving her a comforting smile.
His wife senses the tenseness in his voice, and pushes on wanting more.
“What are you going to do when they do lay you off?”
Steve takes a quick bite this time almost out of anger trying to avoid a discussion on the topic.
Finally, he is able to give what looks like an honest smile and says, “Let’s not talk about this now, babe, it’s your birthday. We’ll worry about this tomorrow.”
His wife can see her husband is trying to make it a fun day and agrees with a kind smile.
“All right. Good. Happy Birthday, babe!”
The boys can’t help but jump in and say, “Happy Birthday, Mommy!”
Later that night, everyone has gone to sleep except Steve who is in bed, but can’t seem close his eyes. His mind races.
He goes to sneak out of the room, and shuts the bedroom door behind him with only a light click. Steve walks into the dark,poorly lit living room, only being illuminated by the computer in the back by the front window.
He gets onto the computer, and opens something about a job he has been accepted as an employee for. Steve rubs his head furiously trying to massage the migraine and stress away. It only feeds the anger and with that Steve shuts the computer screen off and stares out the front window admiring his neighborhood’s night lights and quietness.
The next morning, his wife wakes up from the alarm as usual, she leans over to wake her husband up, but once again he is gone.
She is not as worried, and instead casually takes a shower.
Next, she goes to wake the kids up, and makes everyone breakfast.
After breakfast, she sends the kids off to school.
Usually, Steve doesn’t miss breakfast, but it has happened once or twice before.
She decides to call Steve, just to see how he is doing. She calls and only gets the machine.
She calls again and gets the machine, again. Now, she starts to worry. She sits down at the table in the nearest chair to stop herself from collapsing onto the ground.
She happens to see the computer screen off in the living room. She goes over to the computer and pushes the button. The screen takes only a few seconds to warm up. When it comes on, she can clearly see a page from her husband’s e-mail. It is an acceptance letter to a job in Iraq for oil transportation.
She starts to cry and falls to the ground looking up at the sky hoping Steve would appear in front of her and tell her this is not the choice he made.
“No, Steve, no. It’s not worth it! Nooo!!”
In Iraq.
Five months later.
Oil is being loaded into the delivery trucks near a refinery. The last truck is filled, the cap is closed, and the truck drives away.
Steve is driving the last truck in the line. He has much more facial hair, and his hair is longer than he has ever kept it in his life. He has a dark tan from the sun, and he seems relaxed. He looks up at his sun visor which has a picture of his family. He smiles, puts two of his fingers on his lips and kisses them. Then he moves his fingers over his family’s faces and pushes his fingers lovingly down over them.
He gets a call on the radio and picks up. Steve jokes with the other guy on the line.
“So Clint, is it going to be a hot one today?”
Clint tries to hold back the laughter before the joke, “No, today is nice and cool, only 125 degrees today.”
They both blow up in laughter.
“So how much longer do you have, Clint?”
“Until I go back to America?”
“Yeah, how much longer?”
“2 months next week. How bout you?”
“Too long to count, but I know it’s worth it.”
“Well, today, you had to go to the Clarington site, how is it? I haven’t got to see it, yet.”
“It’s nice. A lot more controlled than most of the sites. But I guess we have to chalk it up to the facility being built only 2 months ago. Road in is terrible though, needs a good pave.”
“Yeah, it looks like we have been in Iraq so long that they are starting to finally become more efficient, sort of.”
Steve takes a moment to chuckle and then adds, “Who knows what they have planned?”
Clint snorts a small laugh, “Yeah, who knows?”
Time passes to about mid-day. The sun is high in the sky beating the Earth so hard it causes heat shivers all across the horizon.
Steve is driving down a well paved road toward his delivery destination, Clarington.
He exits and gets onto a small feeder road. This road is pot holey and bumpy. Steve goes to hit the reset button on his trip meter.
Steve smiles grimly and adds, “All right. Only 15 kilometers to go.”
Some time goes by. Steve looks at his speedometer and sees his pace has slowed to about 30 kilometers an hour. The road is so horrible that he has only gone about five kilometers out of the fifteen minutes of travel. Steve looks directly at his wife in the picture.
“You would think that with such an advanced facility they would fix the only road going to it.”
He smiles to himself.
The dial changes to six km and then an explosion is felt in the back left side of Steve’s tanker. It hits the back of his truck underneath the back three tires of the trailer. This lifts the truck awkwardly and jack knifes it.
The front and the trailer of the truck flip sideways. The glass breaks and the truck engine starts to smoke.
Steve is tilted sideways and now has blood dripping from a cut on the right side of his face along the chin and cheek when his face slid against the shattered glass of the windshield; smoke from the engine starts to come in through the vents.
Steve looks at the picture of his family; he snatchs it quickly and jams it in his company shirt pocket. He hears noises coming from outside just beyond his truck. People are yelling, but he can’t understand the language; not American.
He goes to unbuckle his seat belt and climbs out of the top of the truck. He is struggling to get out, when finally he gets enough room to stand up and jump sideways off truck. When Steve hits the ground, he has to bend his knees. When he finally stands up off the ground, he goes to look around and realizes he is faced with four, possibly Iraqi, people with guns pointed at him.
(From now on if any Arabic speaker talks, they will be speaking only their native language only.)
One of the terrorists shouts at Steve, “Get down.”
Another sticks their gun against his cut cheek, “Now! Get down!”
Steve goes and puts his hands on his head.
The two other terrorists each grab one of his arms and they all run into the ditch. One of the Iraqis points their gun at Steve as he lies on the ground with his stomach face down. Steve keeps his hands on his head.
One of the terrorists who pulled Steve in toward him aims a gun at his head and pushes it against his face making the point clearer to Steve.
He adds a few words giving Steve another chance to understand, “Don’t move, don’t move or I will shoot you!”
Steve lies of the ground confused, wondering what they are waiting for, and why his is being held captive.
The terrorist who first pointed his gun at Steve asks the other one who pushed his gun into Steve’s bloody cheek, “Why hasn’t the oil tanker blown up, it should have blown up from the explosion!?”
He, too, looks on with curiosity as to why it hasn’t blown up still, “Just wait. They always blow up!”
He smiles looking toward his comrades.
Steve not fully understanding his predicament speaks up and asks, “What is going on?”
The first two terrorists who pulled Steve away intially yell at him in unison, “Shut Up!! Don’t say anything!”
One of the two, yelling at Steve, joins the other terrorist, who jabbed Steve’s check, and pushes his gun into Steve’s temple almost bruising his tanned skin instantly.
Five to ten minutes have passed, the fire around the truck is dying. The tanker is no longer on fire except for just one tire. The first two terrorists Steve first dealt with, who also look to be in charge cooperatively, go up to the trailer to check it out.
They try to understand why it is not on fire still, or exploding. They go to the bottom by the back tires of the truck. They look over where their road side bomb hit. From the looks of it, the bomb destroyed everything in the back side of the trailer carrying the tanker. But the container that holds the oil, it seems impenetrable by the explosion.
The first terrorist asks, “What is this, Abdul?”
Abdul feels around the tanker where the explosion and fire blackened it and says unsure, “I don’t know Khalid.”
They both walk to the other side, now away from everyone, to the top of the truck. Abdul knocks on the top of the truck. There is no way to tell if there is oil inside. Khalid goes to open the cap of the oil truck. Abdul looking both surprised and upset goes to stop him.
Abdul with his hand over the cap looks into his comrades eyes and asks worryingly, “What are you going to do Khalid?”
Khalid smiles triumphantly and says as loud as he can hoping his other comrades and their new captive can hear it clearly, “I going to get rid of what they want, the precious oil.”
He pushes Abdul’s hand away and opens the cap. They both jump back waiting for the black gold to pour out.
Instead of oil, water comes out of the tanker’s opening, and out with the water come twelve black boxes about the size of lunch boxes. Both Khalid an Abdul look at each other curiously.
Abdul just stares in astonishment, and then finally asks, “What could they be?”
Khalid gets even more excited, “I don’t know Abdul. We should take these and the American back with us.”
Abdul stammers, but is still able to get the words out, “That is not smart, we do not know what is in those boxes. If they will kill us, or the people who own them will kill us. We have won for today. Let’s just leave them all and the American to die in the heat of Iraq.”
Khalid wasn’t listening, he was already moving toward the boxes with his gun tightly in grip, “There is something in these boxes that needs to be known. They are worth something. Maybe we can get money for them Abdul.”
Abdul tries one more last time to persuade Khalid, “We shouldn’t do this.”
Khalid grabs Abdul’s shoulder tightly out of frustration and walks him toward the boxes, surprising Abdul.
Khalid pushes Abdul’s shoulder making him stumble toward the boxes.
“Just do it!! Call Mikal and Zamir over! Let’s go! We are wasting too much time already, Abdul!!”
Abdul doesn’t fight it, “Ok!”
Abdul calls to his two other comrades and they come to help carry the boxes.
Mikal and Zamir come over with Steve, he is walking with his hands on his head still. They point their guns at Steve and then Zamir pulls Steve’s hands down aggressively.
Steve complies kind of understanding what is next. Mikal points down toward the boxes. Steve picks up three, but Zamir points back down and again Steve adds three more to the stack. Zamir and Mikal pick up the other six, three to a person.
Mikal is a bit surprised.
“These a very heavy.”
Zamir winces from the weight, “How is the American holding six right now?”
Steve sees the boxes and is bewildered by what they are.
Steve (whispering to himself) “What the hell?”
All four of the terrorists, plus Steve, walk through the desert away from the truck that is on its side. Steve’s life.
Steve walks with his hands hanging low trying not to drop the boxes for fear of what might be in them. Zamir and Mikal walk on either side of Steve struggling to hold their three, but still moving faster than Steve. Khalid and Abdul follow behind the front three and point their guns at Steve.
After some walking, nearly an hour, Steve can start to feel his hands slipping and his mouth already thirsting for water. The numbness in his arms starts to sting and tire his grip.
After coming over a slight hill, they are able to see a rock cave in the distance. Steve focuses his grip and walks in the front with Zamir and Mikal slowly trailing behind him with their three black boxes in hand.
Once Steve walks into the cave ahead of the others, he is hit in the back of the head by the butt of Kahlid’s gun. Steve crumbles to the ground dropping the boxes and making metal clanging sounds as they hit the ground of the rocky cave. Khalid picks up one of the scattered black boxes and runs back towards Steve laying on the ground trying to ease the pain and dizziness.
Steve is rolling around when all of a sudden, he can see Kahlid just inches away from his face, looking directly into his eyes while shaking the heavy black box with one hand and yelling at him in Arabic.
Khalid “What is this? What do you think you are doing bringing this poison to our country? Answer me, don’t ignore me! Speak up, now.”
Khalid drops the box back on the ground and walks away.
Through Steve’s blurred and aching eyes he can not see much, and in his ears he can only hear Arabic gibberish and echoing pains. The hit on the back of his head begins to hurt so much more that it causes him to pass out unexpectedly.
One week later, Steve is sitting in the chair helplessly slouched on the table over with visible injuries on his face and body. His hands are tied uncomfortably tight behind his back.
Khalid and Abdul are in the middle of an argument over what they should do with their unknown boxes and if Steve will really ever give them any useful information.
Steve gains enough energy to talk back, “What are you saying? I’m just an oil driver. I don’t know what that is! Enough already! Cut me free!”
Khalid is furiously pointing at the black box in his hand ignoring Steve’s incomprehensible words. During this time, Abdul is standing behind Steve pulling him up everytime he falls over from exhaustion. Mikal and Zamir lay the other boxes on the table in front of Steve, stacked like a pyramid.
Khalid continues to shout at him. It sounds to Steve like there is never a breath between Kahlid’s sentences.
“How long have you been in our country you piece of shit? You don’t even know a bit of our language, how come?”
Khalid gets tired of his silence and staring, he hits Steve in the face with the chamber of the gun causing his skin around his left eye to bleed slightly.
He goes to hit him again, but Steve lays his face on the table edge, close to to where black boxes are resting in front of him. He is now in a comatose state.
Khalid just gets more infuriated, and out of indignation goes to hit Steve again, but with the butt of his gun instead.
Abdul is disgusted by this point and goes to stop Khalid.
Khalid out of surprise of his comrade’s behavior, “What are you doing Abdul? He is a piece a crap foreigner bringing horrible things and war to our country.”
Abdul smiles gently to ease the anger of his colleague and says, “Don’t worry, we’ll get the Americans back in a more persuadable manner.”
Khalid smiles largely. Abdul quickly lets his smile grow even larger.
Khalid leans down to whisper into Steve’s ear. Steve can only opens his eyes while laying his head on the table. He starts to feel his cold adversary’s warm breath on his neck as Khalid speaks his mother tongue closely into his left ear, “Justice will come for you soon.”
Atrishna Agathon 