I look away before he looks over. I’m surprised that he hasn’t come over here. My mind moves on to a conversation I once had with a homeless man who seemed too well spoken and put together to be doing what he was doing. He even had an Ivy League education. So what was he doing, begging on the subway? Being the best he could be, he claimed. His brother had shot himself decades earlier. A veteran back from the war, he had sat him, the younger brother, down and claimed that no good could come of any works of man. That all religions, when they were taught as pure as their founders intended, wanted man to stay in this backwards manner because to become too smart was to court even worse evil than they had ever tried to stop. The homeless man—though at that time he was going to college in the Ivy League—claimed that this was not so, that there were ways to get around this, to help others. The older brother, his eyes vacant, shook his head slowly. There was a palatable disappointment in his eyes.
Over the course of the next week, the younger brother tried to out argue his brother. What of the hard sciences? Or Medicine? Surely one could do some good for humanity, take away its pain without contributing to the wore parts of humanity?
The brother shook his head.
Surely there was a way through religion or other charitable works that would do good?
Again the older brother shook his head.
But why this defeatism? They younger brother inquired. After all, he was in college and there was nothing but the wide open world waiting for him to come and change it.
The older brother sensed this and laughed.
The younger brother, hot and angry at this point, asked why would something like war, which was obviously an extreme method of human expression, be the reason the big brother was giving up on humanity.
The big brother laughed and said that logically humans were hopeless. That war was merely one expression of hatred that it was capable of. Why try and help this? The choice, then, for the rational was to kill as many humans as possible, to become a terrorist, an insurrectionist. But since this method, to the big brother at least, was something that would only cause him to cause harm again, he was against it for himself, but that only left one other choice.
What was that? Asked the younger brother.
The big brother pulled out a gun and shot himself in front of his sibling.
The younger brother tried to muscle on in the face of this logic. He even attempted to talk to his professors about what his brother said, but they all took it as the ravings of a madman—after all he’d killed himself, hadn’t he?—and told him to avoid such lines of thinking. Of course, the younger brother didn’t understand, and wondered if his older brother had merely peeled back a layer from life that was, at this moment, unknown to the younger brother. He simply did not understand why suicide was accepted as an act that allowed others to wholly disregard what one said. None of that made sense. While on the other hand a mass murderer’s words would be hung upon in many ways.
But the younger brother, still somewhat enthralled by the hallowed halls of his Ivy League college, and still hoping that people who commanded glittery hallways and cars had some sense or wisdom, decided to take their word for it and simply read as much as he could so that perhaps he could one day properly refute his older brother.
And so he continued and succeed. Graduate school, then the finance industry. He had it all. But he was reading. And perhaps that was his mistake, or his key to freedom. He still wasn’t sure. But one day he came to the same conclusion that his older brother had. And there was no way to get out of the trap. He rifled through more philosophers and still found nothing to help him get out.
Finally he sold off all that he had, and consigned himself to a life of absolute passivity. Being homeless was the only way to do this. He was no misanthrope, and so he wanted to be around humans. But he understood that if they didn’t want to give him anything, he would die. And that’s what he accepted.
He told me this in that subway car. In concise English. Smiling his teeth slowly rotting. He had nothing and didn’t care. But that’s what he saw as the only way. He had considered a life of charity, but realized that it would only serve to help cover up the system he saw as evil. Same with medicine or any other route he could think of. Being homeless he could be a parasite, and slowly help to leech the system.
Before that day I had never talked to a crazy man.
“You’re a thinker. Or dreamer...”
I turn to see Khalid kneeling next to me. The guards are beating up another prisoner. It is the one who had grabbed the guard from me. Though I feel somewhat sorry, I can’t help but feel that he deserves it on some level. That thought troubles me. Here I was being held against my own will and I was siding with those who were keeping me?
“Oh?” I say, not sure how to react to that.
“But are you on our side?” he says and leans in.
He smells clean, and so does his breath.
“Our?”
With his head he indicates around.
“All of you are together?” I ask.
“We’re against them.”
I nod my head, trying to be as noncommittal as possible.
“Are you against America?” he asks, piercing me with a stare.
How does one claim to be against an entire peoples? “No,” I say. “I’m for justice.” I wonder why I answered like that, and wonder if what I’d said makes any sense.
He nods his head and appears to think.
“Where are you from?” I ask.
“Saudi Arabia,” he says. “They arrested me three times. In Iraq, then in Afghanistan. When they found me in Pakistan, they knew not to let me go.” He grins. Proud.
I don’t like him, though I know that’s not entirely reasonable.
“Is that a fact?” I ask.
“You?” he asks.
“I was arrested here,” I say. I allow a scream to take my attention and I break the stranglehold of his stare and look to see the guards playing with a knife on a man’s belly.
“I can’t stand them,” I say.
“They are cowards,” says Khalid.
A few seconds later I am snatched up and dragged to my cell. Khalid tries to mouth something to me, but I couldn’t make out what he was trying to say.
A few hours later, pacing my cell, I fight off the easy liquid of sleep. I don’t want to give them the satisfaction. But I am at a loss for what I am going to say next. Another session of questions, and with my body weakening, I am not going to be able to hold out.
I hear yelling, and possible shots. I wonder if perhaps another prisoner is trying to escape. If so, why? It seems hopeless to try and escape from the inside here.
That’s when I hear a strange vibration, and everything goes black.
I wake up, covered in dust and on an incline of rubble. I see what appears to be a plane flying. I realize that I’m cold.
I’m within my head, a loud piercing whine has taken over and pushes out the sounds of the real world. Slowly the sound of screams and sirens and yells filter into my mind. I’m still in my cell, but the wall with the bars is ripped away. The floor beneath my feet is half rubble. I look up to see sheared concrete and steel fingers sticking out. Rebar. But there’re also a few bloodied hands and corpses sticking out. One cell over, now with the wall between us torn down, lies the crumpled pile of a man in an orange jumpsuit. He’s still, the only movement is an ever enlarging pool of blood in which he lay.
I can hear the building groan. Vibrations which send a shiver up my body. I move away from the new edge. Smoke still hangs around the neighborhood, so all I can see are small fires—possibly cars alight in the street below—and the facades of brick and glass buildings moving in in and out of the smoke.
Besides the handful of yells, some car alarms now, and the building shutting its weight, the neighborhood is quiet. There’s now a strong smell of plastic explosives: something like burned plastic and styrofoam with that very specific compound smell of C4. We’ve been hit, but
by whom and how did they know to hit this very building?
I try to formulate some thoughts, but my mind’s still rattled, still more concerned about the pain in my body, the damage done by the concussion wave. I’ve another strong desire: to sleep.
But no. This is what would get me caught. Here’s my opportunity to get out, to possibly find my wife. My heart sinks. Is she here? I shudder. There’s no way to find out. I’ll have to leave, then come back, or look for a list on the Internet.
I crawl over my glass door, half torn to shreds, and under the caved-in roof. Soon I’m in what seems to be a series of blown open cells. Prisoners are strewn everywhere. I remember Khalid. He may have been a bad guy, but he seemed to have some sense in him. I turn over a few bodies. The sound of sirens is louder now. I will have to leave and come back later. This is my only choice.
I walk into the room where Behemoth and a the writers had taunted me. I see nothing. I walk over to the couch. On the other side, crawled into fetal positions are the two writers. Each sucks his thumb. They’re naked, for some reason. I shake one.
“You okay?”
The man cowers away from me when he recognizes my face.
I roll my eyes. “I’m not going to hurt you, I just want to see if you’re good. No cuts?”
He whimpers, and though I can appreciate that this fool who was only a few hours ago mocking me is now in pain, I don’t feel as good as I should. I check the other writer and he seems to be in the same state.
A noise, like someone sneaking, startles me. I look up and in the shadows of a slanted beam and rebar, I’m sure I see Behemoth and the woman. They fade out. Is he cackling?
“Friend.”
It’s Khalid’s hand on my shoulder.
“Hi,” I say. “We should leave.” He has a 9mm handgun in his hand. He looks over at the two writers and gives me an exquisite look.
I shrug. “They’re nothing. Let’s leave.” I take a step and jump when I hear a shot. I turn to see that Khalid has shot the writer, the darker one, who is now twitching and spilling brains and blood onto the floor.
“Let’s go,” says Khalid.
I follow him. We find an incline that requires us to go down facing the rubble. I’m fatigued, but I’m elated that I’m going to leave this place. Walking past the bloodied shoe of a two year old, I wonder at what price of freedom.
Just as the sirens grow deafening, and the helicopters add to the cacophony, I find myself touching down on solid ground. There are a few onlookers.
Khalid looks around. I do too. The buildings around us are scarred enough that the neighbors aren’t peering through windows. A few meters away from us, on the road, is a large crater. Sewage is flowing into the street. I gag as the smell of concentrated shit hits my face.
“Come,” says Khalid.
I follow him again because I have no plan. We make our way to an open manhole and disappear. My feet touch down into a slimy gruel. I haven’t time to react to the stench of sewage here, stronger because there’s no outside air to filter it through. I vomit.
When I’m done, I put up my shirt over my face and try my hardest to breathe through my mouth. It doesn’t help.
Somehow, Khalid has a flashlight. I’m thinking he has planned all of this. That me giving him this phone was the reason for this destruction as well as my freedom. As we trudge up the sewage pipe, I try not to slip on the slimy pieces of shit underfoot, and I definitely try to not think about the fact that I’m trudging through millions of people’s piles of shit. Up ahead I see a light.
We come to a door, with a lock on the floor beside it that has only recently been cut off. Khalid opens it and walks through.
A subway hurtles past us. I place my hands over my ears. The heart beat sound of large metal drums beating dissipates into a distant rattle.
“Be careful,” Khalid says and points to the third rail.
We walk onto the tracks and reach another door. The rails start to shake. I see the light. We’re on the tracks and there’s no where to go if a train comes back. Khalid knocks furiously on the metal door. It doesn’t budge. A train, on the other set of tracks squeals by, coming to a halt cutting off our open door. I watch the passengers in the highlighted car, reading, most paying no attention to the others, some paying too much attention to the others. Can they see us?
The tracks start to shake more. The light grows stronger.
“Uh,” I say. I wonder if I can lie down in the middle, and if this will save me.
The train’s hurtling at us. I can barely hear Khalid kicking at the door. And instead of at least lying down, I star at the light, and the hear the horn, and I think that I should perhaps lie down. But right now that seems foolish, but which is more foolish? To be dragged or possibly die or to simply die. I’m not sure and I feel a tug when the train is but a few feet away. I’m frozen solid, but a small voice yells and I leap up. The door is open and Khalid pulls me in as the train speeds by.
There’s a man in a blue MTA suit. He nods at us while holding his nose.
Throwing each of us a bag of clothes, he hands a map and two metro cards to Khalid. We dress up as homeless men, and walk up to find ourselves on the 42th street 4 train platform. We head north. People give us a wide berth and try their hardest not to look at us.
Twenty minutes later we’re in the Bronx and Khalid takes us to a street with a series of auto shops. The man who owns it doesn’t speak to us. Khalid walks in as if he knows where and we move to the back, where a room is kept with blankets on the floor. We shower, then I collapse when I’m certain that we haven’t been followed.
How I know that, I’m not certain. The room’s dark, smells of powdered concrete and firewood smoke. I’m tired, but too wired to sleep, my eyes burning dry.
Khalid goes to sleep on the other side of the room. He rustles then falls into a cycle of snores and lip smacking. He sounds gentle. The crack underneath the door whistles with shadows moving by. If Khalid trusts these men, then I should too. But I still can’t sleep. I’m thinking of the next step needed to find my wife. They took my wife. That hits me harder than it did before. Perhaps when I don’t have to worry about my own skin being pulled back, or not think on pain, perhaps that’s when I’m the least selfish. But there’s no getting any plan down. My mind’s in a virtual comma. I listen again, as a helicopter chops air in the distance. It could be any number of reasons. It doesn’t have to be for me. But that’s bullshit, and I know it. I’m at best an accomplice to a terrorist attack. They pull all the stops for terrorists, even if they do little damage compared to other things in a society. I learned that from someone high up in a crime division. They hardly do anything for a murder, hardly even call forensics—unless it’s someone important—but when there’s even the hint of a terror attack, then it’s all out, an entire team on standby. Something about that gets my blood boiling. The blanket feels warm. Toasty. I close my eyes. I fall into my bed, the weight growing heavier and heavier. Sleep. Precious sleep.
I wake up to find that I’m in the same room. It’s night time and outside the window—this one’s barred too, though now it’s something that makes me feel safe—there’s a scuffle and some yelling. It’s a Dominican-tinged-English speaking woman. Big, from the sound of her booming voice, and she’s yelling at a man who’s giving it back just as good as he’s getting it. They’re yelling about his cheating, from what I gather. Some soft spoken bystanders try to say some consoling words, but it’s no use. The two are loud and they get back to yelling and scuffling. I fight down my impulse to help them out. But then this world is bad enough without people trying to disappear into the shadows. I move to get up, but the street falls silent. I close my eyes and go to back sleep.
When I awake, the horns and the backing up beeps of trucks and the expansive breathing of the city tells me it’s daytime. I rub my eyes. My head’s still groggy, but I force myself up. There’s enough light trickling in to see that Khalid is gone. I step out and see that the hallway has a tarp
on one end and a door on the other. I sneak a peek around the tarp. It’s an auto shop with a trio of men in overalls talking around a desk. There are three cars, sedans, of makes I’ve never seen, in various states of repair. I notice that there’s a pile of springs, thin in a corner. Leaned next to the cars are larger thicker springs. First I think that they’re off-roading enthusiasts. Then I think that that’s not it. My gut reacts by sending heat up to my heart. But my mind’s too groggy to know why. I smell food. Turning, I walk to the door and knock.
“Come in.”
Inside, there’s a large room, like I’ve seen in the military before. There’s a kitchen on one end, benches and long tables in the middle, and makeshift closest made of clothe and worn down 2x4s on the other end.
Khalid’s at the kitchen.
“Breakfast,” he says and points to the eggs he has on a frying pan.
A helicopter flies above. I jump. I feel embarrassed but see that Khalid’s frozen in place too. I grin. He raises his eyebrows and lets out a sigh.
“You used to this?” I ask. I’m not sure why I’m asking.
He glances over. His eyes cutting through me. Though I’ve been in testosterone-addled areas and I know how to hold my own. So I stare back and don’t flinch or look down, as much as I may want to do so.
“Being hunted?” Khalid says. “This your first time?”
I nod. Where is his accent from? It’s very confused. There are too many vowels that sound English, ones that sound German, and others that sound African, while his consonants sound both Spanish and Arabic. I’ve heard him speak Arabic, but that’s the only part which makes sense.
“You’ll get used to it... Only the brave get caught,” he says, looking me over before returning to the eggs.
There’s a lot you can tell in the way a man reacts to knowing that someone else knows less than they do about a specific situation. This attitude of his, I appreciate.
The Labyrinth of Souls Page 10