How did he get here?
He stops in his tracks, but even though he’s five paces out in front, Brandon seems to sense it, turns, walks back to Jessup. “Come on,” he says.
“This isn’t what we talked about.”
“Of course it is,” Brandon says. “Smoke and mirrors, Jessup. Smoke and mirrors.” He smiles, a cat with feathers in his teeth.
STANDOFF
The protesters are booing, chanting, making noise. Jessup looks at his sister. She’s scared. He reaches out, chucks her chin, gives her a smile. Be brave, little one. She tries to smile back.
Chief Harris is waiting by the gate. He hands the papers to Earl, who glances at them and then, theatrically, crumples them up and drops the papers to the ground.
“This is private land. You aren’t welcome here.”
The cameras crowd in close, reporters thrusting microphones in.
“We have legal authority—”
Earl cuts him off. It’s clear from Chief Harris’s face that he’s not a man used to being interrupted. “Not here you don’t. Get off my land.”
Jessup sees that Jewel is holding her father’s hand now, that she’s half tucked behind his body, and it makes him nervous. By his count, there are twenty police officers of one kind or another milling around the gate, a couple of more standing across the road on the edge of the farmer’s field, behind the protesters. All of the cops have handguns, but there are at least eight geared up like soldiers in Afghanistan, holding M16 rifles that trickled down from the military. Jessup figures those are the cops from the SWAT truck. You can smell the macho in the air. Nothing’s happened and it’s already a disaster. Too many people, too much anger.
He wants Jewel gone. There’s no need for her to be here. Wishes she were back home, in her own bed, reading that book she likes, warm and safe under her covers. Wishes he were back home, too, or somewhere else, with Deanne. Anywhere else. He slides over to his mom.
“Get Jewel out of here,” he says. “You too. Both of you get out of here.” She starts to protest, but before he can say anything else to his mom, Brandon Rogers grabs his arm.
“Come on,” he says, pulling him to the pickup truck on the right. Tells the three men inside to hop down, then tells Jessup to climb up, follows right behind. It’s just him and Jessup up there. A stage.
As soon as Chief Harris spots Jessup, he points. “You, son. If you don’t comply with this warrant. Bring out your truck, son, or we’ll have to arrest you.”
“He’s not your son,” somebody shouts. It takes Jessup a moment to realize that it was David John. He’s not used to his stepfather raising his voice. But despite his outburst, David John looks shaky, Jessup’s mom and Jewel standing behind him. Why doesn’t his mom leave with Jewel? She’s clearly terrified.
“Now, Chief Harris, you have to understand, this is private property.” Brandon is all smiles as he calls out over the crowd. The protesters have quieted down, watching, but the cops are definitely on edge. Brandon doesn’t care: he’s playing to the cameras, and Jessup can see that the reporters are thrilled. This is going to look good on television. He thinks of the Bundy standoff, Waco, Ruby Ridge, Charlottesville, the way events can spiral out of control, and the way, too, that Brandon is right: this is going to be the moment that makes him a star, that turns him into the face of the movement. He’s got everything choreographed, down to the pickup truck backed up near the gate serving as a stage so that he can make sure there’s a clear sight line for the cameras. Everything here is going to make Brandon Rogers look good.
And it might be this that bothers him the most about Brandon: Jessup doesn’t know what Brandon truly believes in. Jessup can swear that he loves football and Jesus and, yes, Deanne, and he can swear that he’ll do anything to protect his family, but he wonders if Brandon believes in anything other than himself.
“This is church land, and you can’t just roll up here and do what you want. We’re tired of the government deciding they can push around law-abiding citizens,” Brandon says. “That’s why I’m calling for a rally on the Cortaca pedestrian mall, tomorrow night at seven o’clock. A rally for white rights. Chief Harris, you and your fascist tactics are not welcome here, and we respectfully ask that you put your guns away and go home before somebody gets hurt.”
To Chief Harris’s credit, he stays calm. “We have reason to believe a crime occurred, and we have a warrant that allows us to search the property for a specific truck. This isn’t about the church, Mr. Rogers. This is about the rule of law. And as for the guns, I think you might want to tell your men to lay down their weapons.”
“Oh,” Earl says, “I don’t think so. We’re on private property. Second Amendment rights apply to all of us.”
SACRIFICIAL LAMB
Jessup is uncomfortable in the bed of the pickup truck. He doesn’t know where to stand and starts to move to climb down, but Brandon grabs him. “You stay here,” he says through clenched teeth. “Don’t move.”
Jessup stands back up. He knows that Brandon and Earl want him to look square at Chief Harris, but he can’t keep his eyes from lowering. All he can think about is Deanne watching this at home.
Uncle Earl is still prattling about the Second Amendment, but then he looks over to Brandon. Brandon’s quiet for a second. Jessup sees him looking across the road. There are a few cops standing off the asphalt at the edge of the plowed field, one and a half, two football fields of open land, and then a small rise filled thick by trees.
But Brandon recovers quickly. Stands next to Jessup, reaches behind him and grabs his jacket, holding him still, pinning him in place. It makes Jessup acutely aware that Earl’s jacket is too small on him.
Chief Harris doesn’t flinch. “We’re here to serve a legally enforceable warrant, and I’m asking you to have your men put down their weapons.”
Brandon takes charge again. “You can dress it up all you want, Chief Harris,” Brandon says, “but the truth is you’re coming in here with a SWAT team, with assault rifles and the full force and weight of the government behind you. Any violence that occurs here is on you and these protesters assembling unlawfully, blocking a public road. In fact, given the aggressiveness of these protesters and that our congregation is here peacefully, praising Jesus on a Sunday morning, shouldn’t you be doing your job and arresting them for blocking the road? Because if you aren’t going to do your job, I think it’s completely reasonable that the members of our church have firearms, so they can protect themselves from these—”
Brandon spins, slams into Jessup. Their feet tangle up, and Jessup goes down like he’s been tackled, Brandon on top of him. When he falls, Jessup smacks his elbow hard against the wall of the truck bed. He closes his eyes and turns his head as a shower of glass falls over him, the rear window of the truck shattered.
He processes falling and hitting the bed of the truck before he processes the sounds that accompanied Brandon’s flailing, the glass breaking: three gunshots.
DAMAGE CONTROL
He’s down in the bed of the truck with Brandon, but he hears Jewel’s high scream, men yelling, a shotgun blast and at least two rifles chattering, could be more—he can’t tell where any of it is coming from, only that he’s sure he hasn’t been shot—and Chief Harris shouting, “Stand down! Stand down!”
Even before the firing has stopped, before Chief Harris yells the command, Jessup is pushing Brandon off his body, scrambling over the side of the truck and jumping to the ground, shouting, “Jewel!”
It’s pure chaos. Protesters screaming and running, somebody down in the road with a woman next to them, wailing, cops pointing pistols, the White America Militia at the gate already lowering their rifles, dropping to their knees, one of them—Brody Ellis, Jessup thinks, going by size alone—lying on his back, his face a smeared crater of blood, police officers in body armor running forward with M16s at their shoulders, others holding pi
stols raised, panic the only common element between the protesters, the church militia, and the police, Chief Harris continuing to yell, other cops joining in, drop your weapons, drop your weapons, on the ground, on the ground, but Jessup doesn’t care, barely hears any of it, doesn’t do more than take it all in with a quick look. The only thing he cares about is his family, and as soon as his feet hit the ground he’s sprinting, looking for them.
What he sees is Jewel lying still on the ground with David John’s body covering her, his body a shelter for hers, his mother right next to the two of them, on her side, crying, hysterical, reaching toward their daughter. For a frantic moment, Jessup is panicked—why isn’t Jewel moving?—but then he sees her eyes open, sees her looking at him: she’s fine, just scared.
“Are you okay?” he screams it, tries to calm himself down, catch his breath. A deliberate turn inward, not trying to make it worse for Jewel than it is already. Quieter. “Are you okay?”
There’s yelling all over the place. He risks a glance back, sees the White America Militia members being shoved to the ground, separated from their weapons, the Cortaca cops and cops from the sheriff’s department moving forward, aggressive containment now.
“We’re fine, we’re fine,” David John says. He is spooked in a way that Jessup has never seen. “Are you okay?” David John asks. “You went down and . . .”
David John stops, gulps air.
Jessup looks at his stepfather. Is he . . . ? He is. He’s crying. David John gets off Jewel, sits on the ground and buries his head in his hands. Jessup’s mom gets to her feet, and Jessup reaches down and picks Jewel up. All of this takes five, ten seconds at most, and it’s like being in the calm of the eye of the hurricane. He hears somebody screaming for an ambulance, two cops climbing up into the truck where he was standing with Brandon. Sees the line of men at the gate, guns on the ground, being shoved to their stomachs, hands on their heads with pistols and shotguns and M16s pointed in their faces, Brody Ellis bloodied and on his back, not moving, no point in offering medical help.
As he takes this in, he sees three cops in military body armor and carrying assault rifles barging toward him, fingers on their triggers.
“Down! Down! Down!” one of them screams, and Jessup complies. As he sinks to his knees, he sees the cameras trained on him, one of the reporters standing there with her mouth hanging open.
ECNALUBMA
The shouting and screaming continues for another couple of minutes, but Jessup is ordered to lie still. He’s on his stomach, his hands behind his head. Jewel is between him and his mother, David John on the other side of his mother, same position as Jessup. They are all supplicants. There is only one cop watching them, pistol drawn, steady aim at Jessup.
Jewel is crying.
“Hey,” he says. “It’s okay. It’s okay.”
He can hear the sound of sirens in the distance. More cop cars. The first of the ambulances on their way.
Brandon Rogers, it turns out, is a screamer. One of the cops from the sheriff’s office comes over to talk to the Cortaca cop holding the pistol on Jessup and his family, says it’s just Brandon’s shoulder. Not bad for a gunshot wound. He’ll be fine. Shame it wasn’t a gut shot. Worse for others: the militia member flat on his back at the gate with the bloody face, and the protester prone on the road, different sides, both equally dead. A couple of protesters wounded, but there’s a lot going on and the cops are talking to each other, not Jessup, so it’s hard to tell.
Jessup risks raising his head a bit. He can’t see much, but he does have a clear view across the road. Sees two of the cops in SWAT gear standing together and looking across the field toward the woods on the hill, gesturing. Jessup tries to piece it together, understand where the first shots came from.
David John says, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Cindy, I’m so sorry,” his voice breaking, the voice of a man who is broken. “I would never do anything to put you or the kids in . . . I’m sorry. I’m just so, so sorry.” Jessup’s mom risks reaching out, touching his hand, before the cop yells at her to put her hands back on her head and for all four of them to stay quiet.
Over the next five minutes, Chief Harris directs things. The men at the gate are all handcuffed and shuffled off across the road into the open field, their weapons collected and put in the trunk of one of the cruisers. Four cops are sent down the drive to stop congregants from coming out, trying to control the scene. There are, it turns out, three people who are shot besides Brandon and the two dead people. All three of them are protesters. One of them looks bad, shot in the stomach, but the other two seem minor, one in the lower leg, one in the thigh. The first ambulance comes screaming in, and the cops have already started triage. Brandon is not the top of the list. The EMTs are directed to the wounded protesters. Brandon can wait.
Finally, Chief Harris comes over with Earl to where Jessup is on the ground, tells Jessup and his family to get up. He motions for the cop to holster his pistol. High alert over. Turns to talk to Earl, who is asking something, pleading. Chief Harris looks shaken.
Jewel is still crying, more softly now, but with a sniffle, and once she’s on her feet she turns to her parents. David John lifts her into his arm. She wraps her legs around him like she’s a little kid again, and their mom swoops in, sandwiching Jewel between them.
Jessup stands there, alone.
AFTER ACTION REPORT
Earl comes over. “Why don’t you head back to my house? For right now, the stuff with that Corson kid is the last thing they care about.”
Jessup looks over Earl’s shoulder. The body in the middle of the road and the body by the gate are still there. He’s glad there are enough people milling around so that Jewel can’t see. The EMTs already have one of the injured protesters on a gurney, an oxygen mask on her face, and one, two, three, and up into the back of the ambulance at the same time as a second ambulance comes in, sirens just one more thing to pierce the early afternoon.
The reporter for Fox News comes over trailing a cameraman, but one of the body-armored cops stops the reporter, says in no uncertain language to get out of the way.
Jessup’s mom reaches out, touches the side of his neck. He flinches. “Ow,” he says.
“You’re bleeding.”
He reaches up, touches it himself. Broken glass from where the rear window in the truck shattered. Safety glass, but still enough to leave little cuts. Feels like a sunburn. “It’s nothing,” he says.
His mom is suddenly shaking. “You could have been killed,” she says.
Earl starts shooing them. “But he wasn’t. Go on now. Head into the house.”
David John’s face is ashen. He’s still holding Jewel. “This is my fault,” he says. He has his hands tight around his daughter, as if he’s worried she’ll be pulled from him.
Earl shakes his head. “You didn’t have anything to do with this. Some crazy person out there with a gun—”
David John is come to Jesus cutting Earl off. “It’s my fault. I shouldn’t have asked you for help. But I wanted to keep Jessup safe. Keep my family safe. My fault. I should have pushed back when you said we needed Brandon. If Brandon wouldn’t have turned this into something big . . .” His voice is losing steam now. “I was trying to do the right thing by my family, but this, this . . . I made a mistake. This isn’t the right place for us,” he says, his voice so quiet now that Jessup isn’t sure he catches the words completely.
His stepfather sounds lost. He is lost, Jessup realizes; David John has always used family and church as his compass, and the one might not survive the other.
David John figuring this out is too little, too late, Jessup thinks sourly, and he’s immediately overcome with a sense of shame at how angry he is at David John. At Earl and Brandon and all of this, all of the things that he has never had any control over, but at David John especially. And shame because he’s never questioned David John directly, ne
ver asked him how he could hold this hatred inside of him, how he could believe it would come with no cost to the people he loved. How could he fail to understand the sacrifice?
Sacrifice. The word rattles in him.
Earl’s gentle in response to David John. “Go on to the house, now. Go on.”
Sacrifice.
David John turns and starts walking to the house, Jessup’s mom going with him.
Jessup doesn’t move. He’s thinking about what Brandon said last night, in his casual aside about meeting with Wyatt: that Wyatt “does his duty. Understands sacrifice.”
Jessup takes one more look before he turns toward the house. There are two cops in the pickup truck where he and Brandon were standing. They’re kneeling, so he can only see the top of their torsos, ostensibly giving Brandon first aid until another ambulance gets here. He looks past the truck to the field, where he sees several of the geared-up SWAT cops walking toward the trees, pointing, still holding their M16s. But he’s not interested in the cops; he’s looking at the edge of the field, where the land humps up and the trees are thick. Even though it’s November, it’s the kind of place where you can see out but people can’t see in.
He thinks about sitting in the woods yesterday morning, staring across the field at the buck, taking his time and pulling the trigger. The hill across the open field, choked with trees, would be a good spot to hunt from, Jessup thinks.
MILLING
There are crowds of congregants in the parking lot, in front of the barn, milling near the entrance to the social hall. Mostly men, some wives, but all of them look concerned. There’s a small group of Cortaca police officers standing at the exit of the parking lot, blocking off the driveway. They look menacing, out of place with their body armor and M16s. The congregants are dressed for church, winter coats covering a mix of suits and jeans with button-downs, women in dresses, here and there a few younger kids running around, oblivious to the concerns of their parents.
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