“It’s hard,” I said, “but I’m dealing with it.”
“I, uh, I’m really sorry about everything that happened,” he said.
“Don’t you want to get a coffee?” I asked.
“No, that’s okay.”
“Okay.” We were quiet for a minute, neither of us sure where to go next. Finally I asked him to tell me his version of what had happened the day Pat was killed, and he did. It sounded a bit recited and was the same general story the military had fed us. I moved on.
“So what are you going to do now?” I asked.
He told me that he’d be leaving the military, that he might go back to school. His life had changed considerably, and I actually felt a little sorry for him. We finished our stilted conversation and walked toward the parking lot. I could tell there was something more he wanted to say.
“Tell Kevin…” He wasn’t able to finish his sentence, and started to cry.
I was devastated by the loss of Pat, and here I was, talking to one of the guys partially responsible for his death. I wanted to be angry at him, but as he started to cry, I wasn’t angry at all. I saw the pain clearly on his face. I reached over and hugged him.
I wouldn’t pass his message to Kevin, though. In fact, I’d planned the meeting while Kevin was out of town, knowing how angry he’d be if he knew I was meeting with Greg. Sometimes I wished I could feel angrier, like Kevin did. Anger can be a useful emotion. It can help you get out of bed in the morning; it can help you seek and achieve justice. But for better or for worse, it wasn’t the way I was wired. I had always had a hard time being angry with people, because I was usually able to imagine their state of mind, even if I disagreed with it or if it had hurt me. It might have been different if I’d felt Pat had been killed on purpose. But in Greg’s case, I felt more than anything that he’d been a scared kid with a gun, and things had gone horribly wrong. My life had changed irrevocably that day, but so had his.
Regardless of how I felt about Greg, a shameful cover-up had taken place, and Pat had died violently. I kept picturing Greg’s “fire” order, the bullets penetrating Pat’s skull. I shook my head to dislodge the image. This wasn’t what I wanted. I wanted to remember him full of life. I wanted back the picture of the last time I’d seen him. After I’d decided to call in sick that last day, we lounged in bed; then I dropped him and Kevin off at Fort Lewis to catch their flight and drove home with a heavy heart. Almost immediately after I walked in the door, Pat called to say their flight had been delayed by a couple of hours, so I turned around and met him at a Starbucks near Fort Lewis. When I dropped him off the second time, he turned back to give one last little wave good-bye. I couldn’t find that picture in my head anymore. Instead, images of his last minutes on earth followed me across the country to New York.
* * *
The day of my dinner with Kelly and her friends, a couple of forensic experts contacted Dannie and offered to review Pat’s autopsy report. I wanted to advance our search for the truth, but I was also suspicious. Since Pat’s death, it seemed like hordes of people had descended to offer their assistance when really they were looking to capitalize in some way on Pat’s name or image. Reporters, writers, lawyers, filmmakers—everybody wanted in on the Tillman story. It had made me deeply mistrustful and guarded, and I felt the seriousness of my role as the guardian of Pat’s legacy each day. He’d trusted me, and I was extremely protective of him. I was afraid that his autopsy was going to get out somehow, or that photos were going to leak and show up on the Internet. I didn’t want that for my sake and Pat’s family’s sake, but I especially didn’t want it for Pat’s sake. I was figuring it all out as I went, and after some deliberation, I declined to give the forensic experts authorization unless they agreed to sign a nondisclosure agreement.
Alex was an enormous help during this period, fielding calls for me and generally doing whatever he could to protect me. But still, the stream of attorneys, investigators, and journalists, the long calls with Dannie, and the painful paperwork wore on me, slowing down my express train. I wanted them to all go away. Pat was gone, and I needed to focus on accepting a life without him. I kept Pat’s good-bye letter to me in a drawer in my bed stand, and on a nearly nightly basis, I would take it out of its envelope and let him tell me to live. He wouldn’t want to see me stuck. He wanted me to have a life.
It would be easier to have a life if I could soak up a little sunshine, I reasoned. February in New York City is cold—much colder than in Washington—so when Maura invited me to go to the Caribbean with her and a group of other women, I accepted. We stayed in a beautiful house overlooking the beach, lounged in the sun all day, then danced all night. One night we met a group of young guys, and we danced with them for hours, saying little more over the pulsing music than “Sure, I’ll have another Pacifico.” I felt light—lighter than I’d felt in a long, long time.
I returned home to find a uniformed officer at my door who wanted to brief me about the next level of investigations into Pat’s death—hearings before Congress. My first thought was Oh god, I hope none of my neighbors saw him. I didn’t want them to ask questions about why a military officer would be waiting to talk to me. I wanted to be their young blonde neighbor who worked in the media and danced on the beach—not a tragic widow mired in investigations.
* * *
Pat’s entire family flew to DC for the congressional hearing, and I met them there. I didn’t welcome the scrutiny the hearing had brought back to my life, the constant calls from reporters. I resented the hearings; I resented that I had to be there and listen to people who didn’t know Pat talk about him all day. I resented that I was trying to move on with my life and yet the whole lurid affair kept pulling me back to a dark and foggy place. Then I felt guilty for being resentful, and the horrible cycle continued.
I sat behind Kevin as he made the opening statement. He was trying to move forward with his life, too. I hadn’t seen him in months. He was living in Phoenix now, working with a friend and trying to find meaning in the leftover scraps of his life. Since we’d vacated our cottage in University Place, we’d talked on the phone occasionally, but not much. The time difference between New York and Phoenix, my demanding job, and busy schedules could all be blamed, but really I think we just needed some space. Our time together after Pat had died had been intense and sad, and it was hard to look at each other and not be reminded of that difficult period. But though seeing him now was still hard, those feelings were nothing compared to the pride I felt watching him speak. Kevin had as much of an aversion to the spotlight as I did—if not more—so I knew how much it must have taken for him to sit down in front of the microphone and cameras.
“After the truth of Pat’s death was partially revealed,” he said, “Pat was no longer of use as a sales asset and became strictly the Army’s problem. They were now left with the task of briefing our family and answering our questions. With any luck, our family would sink quietly into our grief, and the whole unsavory episode would be swept under the rug. However, they miscalculated our family’s reaction.”
Kevin went on eloquently, and it pained me when he spoke about Pat. “The fact that the Army,” he said, “and what appears to be others, attempted to hijack his virtue and his legacy is simply horrific. The least this country can do for him in return is to uncover who is responsible for his death, who lied and who covered it up, and who instigated those lies and benefited from them. Then ensure that justice is meted out to the culpable.”
Congressman Henry Waxman headed the committee sponsoring the hearing, and as the hearing closed, he said, “What we have is a very clear, deliberate abuse intentionally done. Why is it so hard to find out who did it?” My sentiments exactly.
When I got back to New York, I called my sister, Christine—who had been watching on C-SPAN at home—to debrief the whole experience. “I can’t believe this is my life,” I told her, repeating what had become my mantra lately. When all this crap was over, I’d be able to rebuild my life.
But was it ever going to be over? We’d learned there was going to be another hearing several months later. I’d have to sit in the hearing room again. I’d have to listen again to details from Pat’s autopsy report, to accounts of the days following his death. There was nothing that I wanted less. I could always count on Christine to echo my feelings, usually saying, “I can’t believe it’s your life, either. This is crazy, it’s like you live in a movie.” This time, though, she didn’t keep to the script. She was quiet a moment.
“But, Marie, it is your life,” she finally said. “So what are you going to do?”
I didn’t say anything. I think I’d been waiting for her to ask me that simple question, but I didn’t know how to answer right then.
* * *
I’d grown to dread looking in the mirror. I don’t consider myself a particularly vain person, but was annoyed that my skin was in a constant angry state of pimpled imperfection, and my hair was falling out in clumps. I had circles under my eyes, because I often spent nights trying to prop myself up to reduce the acid reflux that jarred me awake. Less coffee, I vowed. More disturbing to me was that I had no energy. I was completely zapped by the end of the day and often crawled into bed before nine p.m. More exercise, I promised. I always felt better when I exercised. I didn’t think I had a major disease or anything, but couldn’t figure out what the problem was. Here I had a new life, an active life, and I was generally taking care of myself. I couldn’t understand why I looked and felt like such crap.
One morning I was flipping through a magazine and ran across an article about a yoga studio and wellness spa not too far from my apartment. I went online to do a little more research and was quickly impressed by their philosophy of wholeness and integration. They touted a multidiscipline approach to whole health as the “key to achieving sustainable transformation.” The site promised “a total overhaul.” A mind, body, spirit transformation. I pulled on some sweats, threw my hair into a ponytail, and walked the eight blocks to check it out. I pushed open the doors and aromatherapy and soft music swept me up. I immediately felt better. I looked at the menu of programs they provided, and stopped at 6-WEEK TOTAL BODY TRANSFORMATION. I didn’t think six weeks was enough, but it was a start and I was desperate. I plunked down the two thousand dollars for the total body transformation, rationalizing that a month’s rent was a reasonable price for the promise of serenity. I scheduled appointments with a nutritionist, an acupuncturist, and a masseuse and signed up for a yoga class. I left feeling more hopeful than I had in a while.
Two days later, I returned for my first acupuncture appointment. I was a little squeamish about someone poking me with needles, but willing to give it a try. Lucy, petite with long dark hair and delicate hands, was just what I needed. In our first meeting, she asked me all kinds of questions about my diet, exercise, energy levels, stress. I told her about my skin, fatigue, and hair loss, but I didn’t say a word about the real loss I had suffered. That didn’t have anything to do with this, I thought. Right after Pat died, I wondered if people could tell just by looking at me that I felt completely altered. I’d thought it must be visible to everyone I came in contact with. Now was different, though. I was out and about in the world. I was working hard, making friends, exercising. Something was wrong, I was sure, but it wasn’t grief that was causing my health problems.
“City life can be hectic,” Lucy said, “and it sounds like you’re pretty busy traveling with your job. Do you have a lot of stress in your life?”
“Just your basic work-related stuff,” I said.
Lucy looked at my tongue.
“Your liver is sluggish,” she said. She squinted at my skin. “You should avoid dairy to clear that up.”
She asked me to lie down on the table, then put tiny needles into my feet, hands, belly, and forehead, explaining as she went what each was supposed to do. Her soft voice soothed my nerves as she talked about what it was like growing up as a Chinese American, and how she got into acupuncture. I relaxed into her gentle care. Before I left, she placed small silver balls at pressure points on my ears and told me to press gently down on them throughout the week. I didn’t notice an immediate change but felt just a bit better as I walked home.
I spent the next six weeks immersed in taking care of myself. I read everything I could about alternative healing and Eastern medicine and quickly became a convert. An on-again, off-again vegetarian since the age of twelve, I cut meat out of my diet, stocking my refrigerator with veggies and fruit. And I looked forward to my time with Lucy every week.
“How was your week?” she asked at our second appointment, as she would at all the appointments that followed. “Was it a good week, or a stressful week?”
“Nothing unusual,” I answered, but then I remembered a tense conversation I’d had earlier that day about the investigations. As Lucy gently poked my arms and legs, as we talked about restaurants and movies, I found myself thinking about the hearing. I’d lived in a state of chaos for two years, I realized, so long that it had become my normal, but there was nothing normal about it. Though what was going on would have been obvious to anyone who knew my story, that was the first moment that I connected the physical maladies I’d been experiencing to the stress of the past two years.
When I saw Lucy the next week, I let it drop that I’d been married.
“My husband was killed in Afghanistan,” I said.
“Mmmm,” Lucy said, and continued gently about her work before saying softly, “I’m sorry to hear that.” She left for a moment to dim the lights further, then said, “How long ago?”
“About two years,” I said.
Lucy prodded the conversation as gently as she prodded my body, not asking for more than I wanted to say. But I explained everything to her anyway. I told her about the never-ending investigations and hearings that had worn my fragile state of mind completely thin. I told her about how deeply I felt the responsibility of making the right decisions for Pat’s legacy. I told her how I dreamed about him often, and how in my dreams, he was usually mad at me—either for not living, or for having fun to the extent that I forgot about him. That day and in the weeks after, when I’d lay on the table, tears would roll down my face as she gently poked me with needles and rubbed my temples.
Touch, I realized through my sessions with Lucy, had been a huge void in my life. I’d heard of the practice of massaging preemie babies because of how crucial human touch is to development, but I’d never thought to apply it to myself. With Pat, I’d taken for granted that I would get cuddled, my hair would be mussed, and I’d receive countless subtle hugs and squeezes. Now it wasn’t like I was going to go around hugging my girlfriends all the time, and I didn’t even have that many in New York. With Lucy, and with the spa’s masseuse, I was paying for the privilege of being touched and cared for. It didn’t feel sad or pathetic, though. It felt empowering. I was learning to take care of myself.
* * *
Sunday is my favorite day. Every Sunday in New York, I would brew a big pot of strong coffee, make scrambled eggs, and read through the entire newspaper. It would sometimes be hours before I got out of my pajamas or ran a brush through my hair, and I loved it. One Sunday, I was sitting at my breakfast nook with my favorite mug and the New York Times when the phone rang. I saw from the caller ID that it was Dannie. I was about to hit the talk button, then hesitated. I knew how the conversation would go. We’d go over new details she’d discovered in the mounds of testimony and volumes of documents that might help provide a clue to who should be held responsible for the cover-up. I’d hang up the phone and notice new knots in my neck and shoulders, and I’d work on loosening my tightened jaw. Then I’d spend the rest of the day in a funk, too restless to be in my apartment but too sad to leave it.
I didn’t want that today—at least, not yet. I needed more time. I needed to take some modicum of control over a completely insane situation.
I wouldn’t run from what Dannie wanted to talk about. I’d call her back. But there
was no reason I couldn’t call her a little later. I let the call go through to voice mail and went back to reading the paper.
Chapter Seven
I entered a restaurant near Madison Square Garden and found my friend Carolyn at the bar. She was like a cool younger aunt, whisking into town from Phoenix with concert tickets at just the right time. She was always so put together, and fit right in with the upscale after-work crowd. Her shoulder-length dark hair was neatly in place, her shirt crisply professional. She has light blue eyes and, despite the Arizona sun, porcelain skin. I, on the other hand, was a bit disheveled. A steady rain had fallen most of the day and had revealed the natural curl of my blown-straight hair. I felt dingy and out of place.
She smiled and waved to me. She had coaxed me into coming out. She’d said she had an extra ticket to a show, but it was extra because she’d bought it for me.
It was a U2 concert, part of their Vertigo tour. I wasn’t really expecting much. I liked their music but had never seen them in concert. Carolyn was a huge U2 fan. She worked in marketing for a major resort in Phoenix, and she helped with the Pat Tillman Foundation. She was currently taking time off from everything and contemplating a job change. She joked about turning into a groupie and following U2 around the East Coast.
We made our way from the restaurant through the crowds of people and dutifully waited in the long security line to get into the Garden. By the time we got to our seats, it was already a few minutes past the scheduled showtime. When the lights went down, and that U2 concert started up—loud, beautiful, with millions of lights, like the Manhattan skyline—it was like the first time I had heard music at all.
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