What follows is more of a blur than I’m ready to admit, but once the plane touches down at our new destination at the asscrack of dawn, at least I have something to concentrate on. The situation is a mess but not beyond saving; sending us in is kind of overkill, and it doesn’t take long to coordinate. A part of me is screaming to kick in doors and bash in the next insurgent’s head I can find, but I’m not stupid enough to go for that. I’m aware that I’m under scrutiny right now, so I do what every responsible leader in my situation would do—I coordinate, plot, and plan, and then let my people do their thing. I know it must send up some red flags with them that I’m watching the proceedings from the forward position where the four drone pilots are busy doing the groundwork, but the last thing I need is that my inability to focus on shit right now gets anyone killed.
Three days later, we’re done. The mission is a success, casualties on our side are minimal, and my soldiers have earned themselves some extended R&R, seeing as their time off before this op was cut criminally short. I find myself back in Major Slater’s office, just in time to get an update from my mother as Colonel Peters marches in, keeping himself in the background while the woman who gave birth to me tells me that three days from now she will lay to rest the other human being she let loose on this world. I can tell that she picks up on how tense I am—having the man in the room who is running all the ops in this region doesn’t bode well—and signs off before I can make any assurances about my presence. I already have the flight manifests in my hands; if I catch the next cargo transport, I stand a chance in making the three connecting flights I need to get there on time. The plane leaves in an hour, so I have about forty-five minutes to negotiate what suddenly feels like a prison sentence to me.
Everything inside of me screams to get in the colonel’s face, but like the good little soldier I am, I stand there and wait for my superior officer to tell me that I don’t get the first unscheduled leave I’ve requested in my entire military career. I wouldn’t go so far as to call Peters a good man, but he’s not an asshole. I can tell that he’s about as pleased as I am with what he’s going to tell me.
“Miller, we can’t let you take off on a whim,” he says, letting me have it right then and there.
“It’s not a whim, sir,” I tell him, trying very hard—and likely failing—not to grit my teeth and press the words out between them. “It’s my brother’s funeral.”
Of course he knows that, and he also knows that he has no legal grounds to deny me my request. That means he’s getting pressured from higher up not to grant what is a very standard bereavement leave request.
“Son, I know—” he starts, but cuts off when he catches my glare. I know I’m treading on thin ice there, but I also know I have a stellar track record, and likely an entire folder of additional notes that are blacked out because he lacks security clearance to read them. That should tell him enough about me and what I’m capable of, but I know it’s not required—I’ve cultivated a certain reputation while I’ve been stationed here, and while it may come as a surprise to some that I would request leave for family matters, I’m not the kind of guy you deny such a request. He’s also smart enough to think that if he reasons with me, it won’t end up with me shot and him dead. “Here are your orders for the next mission. I’m sorry to inform you that under current parameters, there is no time to grant you leave.”
I’m tempted to do something incredibly stupid but instead look through the folder. No shit, the mission is time sensitive—but also requires some recon and groundwork. Two minutes, and I know I will sit on that plane when it takes off. “You don’t need me to get this started,” I tell him as I go over the missive once more. “First Sergeant McGillis can brief the men, and I will leave orders for Lieutenants Atkins and Moore to get things started. By the time we get the recon intel, I will be back to coordinate the strike myself. Moore is overdue for a promotion. This is his perfect opportunity to prove himself.”
I can tell that the colonel is displeased—but only on the outside. The almost imperceptive nod he gives me lets me know that yes, that’s my way out. I wonder for a moment if he thinks he can groom me for further climbing the ladder. I have absolutely no intention to go that route since I’m exactly where I’ve always wanted to be—in charge of good men, but still close enough that I see some combat action if I want to. And sometimes more than I could have asked for, but I doubt the good colonel knows about that.
Some more hemming and hawing ensues but I was right—at the last minute, my duffle bag and I board the plane, and because it’s full of cargo and carries no other human passengers, I get to hitch a ride in the cockpit, shooting the shit with the pilots for hours, but my mind isn’t in it. Grief is finally catching up with me, but I don’t allow myself to more than passingly touch the subject in my own mind. The last thing I need is to lose it in transit.
Two more hops, and I’m back on US soil. I’m jet lag’s punching bag by the time I make it to the base locker that serves as my “home” these days. Ten minutes later, my duffle is repacked and I’m hitching a ride to the next airport—civilian this time. I’m still in my ACUs when I hit the terminal, garnering a few stares from a bunch of polo-shirt-wearing assholes who don’t get how ridiculous they look with their collars turned up. They’re in the line next to mine, and wouldn’t you know it, they make a fuss at check-in as well. I do my best to ignore them; else, I’d have to put my fist through one of their faces, and I don’t have the time to deal with security right now. The woman at the counter keeps eyeing her colleague’s ordeal, and she looks quite happy to see me, traveling light with only my duffle.
“Coming home for a visit?” she asks nicely as she types in my details.
I nod and do my best to give her a sincere smile, although it feels like the fakest of masks to me. It’s telling how off my game I am when her smile falters in turn, but she remains exceptionally nice as she hands me my ticket and wishes me a good day.
Wouldn’t you know it, I’m on the same flight as the prep squad and get to enjoy another thirty minutes of their scrutiny before boarding. Lexington has an airport, but I missed the last direct flight so I’m flying into Pittsburgh and taking a rental car. I shouldn’t be driving right now, but then my brain on autopilot is still superior to most people’s fresh and rested reflexes. Once I’m off the plane, I angle for the car rental booth—only to find the idiots are trying to beat me there. It’s six in the morning and the lone woman at the counter draws up short as she sees us hustle toward her. Her panicked look increases when the most obnoxious of the bunch calls ahead that he needs her fastest car, and stat. How he wants to cram the five of them into it I have no clue, and don’t ask. I don’t need to, as the moment she reads the name on my uniform, her face lights up, and she’s already scrambling for a clipboard on her desk as I come to a halt in front of her. She seems innately pleased to have a good reason to deal with me first and let the idiots wait another ten minutes.
“Captain Miller? I have the Chevrolet Corvette Coupe you reserved right here,” she enthuses. “If you’ll just fill out this form, please? I’ll escort you to your car at once.”
Under different circumstances, I would have told her I could find the car myself, but since she’s already getting ready to close down the booth for a quick break, I hold my tongue, quite amused at the fit the idiots are about to throw. The woman nicely informs them that they will have to wait for her return, or maybe one of the other rental services will be happy to accommodate their wishes? As soon as I hand her back the form, she’s out of her seat and sashaying down the hallway to the exit in front of me, and I get to enjoy the view on top of the special treatment. Just my luck that today of all days a nicely rounded ass doesn’t do a thing for me. Once we’re outside in the early morning cold, her demeanor cools off a little, but her smile lets me know that she loves the Corvette, too, and wouldn’t mind extending her momentary break. I decline as nicely as I can, and when she still doesn’t get the hint, I can either insu
lt her or be honest. This once, option two works best, so I go for it. Her face falls as she hears those words I never thought I’d utter—“I’m on my way to my brother’s funeral”—but at least I’m in the Corvette, peeling out of the parking lot, moments later.
I’ve never actually owned a car. Never needed to as I’ve always had too much to do and no places to go where I’d need one. But whenever the possibility presents itself, I love to get myself something new and unreasonably fast. It’s not like I get much of a chance to spend my overinflated paychecks on anything else. I drive fast but not excessively over the speed limit. I have no intentions of causing a reenactment of First Blood. Even so, I make good headway and arrive at my mother’s doorstep at just after nine in the morning.
I’ve only been to the house once before, last time I was Stateside for more than a few days. She bought the house when it became clear that Raleigh had settled in Lexington, West Virginia, for good, accepting a new position at a biotech company that everyone knows is a front only. I’m certain she knows why he did it, although neither of us ever breathed a word of it to her. On the outside, it was a good career move on his part, becoming project leader of his own research branch, in charge of a good hundred people—not unlike what I officially do for the army.
I grab my duffle and walk up the few steps to the front porch, letting myself inside with the spare set of keys she made me take with me last time I was here. The house feels as empty and impersonal as I remember it. It’s not like she hasn’t decorated it with the appropriate amount of mementos and personal items; it’s just not her. I know that if she went with what actually suited her, she’d be living in a high-rise apartment, all walls painted a stark white, huge windows open to let in the light, with a single photograph of my brother and me on her glass-and-aluminum desk. The warm colors, the drapes, the fucking plush pillows on the overstuffed couch—that’s not her. That’s what she perceives is appropriate for an upper middle-class professional, fitting in with her peers.
“Mother?” I call out, not because I expect I’d startle her otherwise—although startling her would be foolish as I know she keeps enough guns hidden in the house to make this the perfect getaway she suspects I may need one day, and knows how to use them well—but because it’s what you do when you invade a relative’s house. I don’t get an answer so I go looking for her, first in the den, then through the hallway toward the back of the house. I find her in the kitchen—the most homey room of the house. I suspect she modeled it after a picture she found in a magazine, or some stupid movie set. She’s standing at the counter, next to the coffee machine, clutching an empty mug while she stares out into the back yard, unmoving. I realize I’m wrong a few seconds later—her shoulders are shaking ever so slightly. My mother is crying, silently. I’ve never seen her cry, or even show anywhere near that kind of emotion. I’m suddenly at a loss for what to do, and I sound like a five-year-old when I softly call out, “Mom?”
I can tell that she hears me this time because she goes perfectly still before she puts the coffee cup down with precision, but she hesitates midway as she turns to face me, only now realizing that her cheeks are stained with tears, I think. The utter confusion on her face is too much for me, making something deep inside me break—that has been cracked and ready to shatter ever since that first call from her. I ignore decades worth of learned behavior and cross the room in a few quick strides so I can wrap my arms around her and let her cry against my shoulder. It’s weird as hell, but at the same time feels like the most natural thing to do—a son comforting his mother on the worst day of her life.
I’ve always known that my mother is different from other kids’ moms. I must have been three or four years old—one of my earliest memories—when she sat me down and explained to me that she has what is clinically described as antisocial personality disorder. I didn’t understand what that meant at the time, but it was never cause for alarm for me. So what if when Raleigh and I goofed around and I ended up with a scraped knee she didn’t coddle and comfort me, but simply cleaned the wound and lectured me about actions and consequences? She wasn’t wrong, and not getting chided constantly for being a rambunctious little asshole wasn’t the worst lot in the world. I always preferred being treated like an adult. The first time I realized just how different she acted was at my aunt’s funeral—her sister’s—and the entire extended family that I’d never met before was howling theatrically all over the place while she was the silent pillar on which the surf broke. She gave what everyone agreed was the perfect eulogy speech but left me rather conflicted. I hadn’t known my aunt at all so I had no skin in the game that day. It was on the drive home when I asked her why she’s been lying to everyone the entire day, after telling me over and over that I always had to tell the truth. My question made her pause and think how best to explain, leaving my father to respond, “Because your mother is a damn psycho, and people don’t deal well with her brand of honesty.” They got divorced five years later, once she deemed us boys both mature enough that it wouldn’t hamper our development to grow up in a house divided. To this day I don’t understand why she didn’t leave him sooner—or married him in the first place. It may be weird to say so of your own mother, but I never got the sense that she was particularly interested in sexual gratification, and looking back, all she seemed to ever want from him was his sperm to conceive her two perfect little monsters.
I’ve never gotten confirmation for this, but I know that while she’s on the far end of the spectrum, I’m a long shot from the other end as well. Raleigh not so much, but he’s always been more like our dad—much to my mother’s occasional dismay, but it made it easier for him to fit in. A lot of my behavior, particularly in early childhood, can be chalked up to simple imitation, but I’ve long since outgrown the need for her approval by acting in what I perceived was the right way. I couldn’t do what I do if I was a sensitive, empathetic human being, plain and simple. Yet I feel pain and grief, loss and worry all right—which I know she doesn’t. Or so I thought—and so did she, I’m sure—until today.
But then losing a child is the worst thing any parent can go through, and apparently, it’s just as bad for someone who usually doesn’t go through the same motions as everyone else.
She lets me hold her for just over a minute—which is the longest physical contact I remember having with my mother in my entire life—before she pulls away to give me a critical once-over. Her eyes are still red but she has calmed down now, enough so that her analytical mind is back in the driver’s seat. “You need to shower and shave. We’re leaving in thirty minutes. You can’t go to the funeral like this. You reek like a changing room at a gym that has lost its license over hygienic misconduct.”
I allow myself the hint of a smile as I turn to do as instructed. There’s no sense in arguing, and besides, she’s right. I’m not surprised to find new utensils and full bottles of shaving cream and body wash in the upstairs bathroom. My mother knew that I was coming—and likely terribly pressed for time—so she made sure that everything I’d need would be available. Just as I know that my favorite sandwich is already waiting in the fridge downstairs, neatly wrapped should I not have time to enjoy it lounging in one of the chairs at the kitchen counter. I go about the motions with quick precision, and exactly twenty-five minutes later I’m ready. I pass another round of scrutiny, but I know I clean up well and the seat of my dress blues is as good as it will get. Being young, fit, and coming straight out of weeks with just enough food to force my body into diving into its fat storage helps. I usually don’t mind getting all dolled up on the very few occasions I need to, but today I feel like I’m wearing a gimp suit. I’ve considered going for civilian dress, but I know I won’t be the only active service member there today, and besides, finding a well-fitting suit on short notice is a bitch. My brother would laugh at how I fidget in the polyester nightmare that is the suit jacket, and that thought makes me both happy and sad. He may be gone, but he will be with me forever.
; “We should go,” my mother advises. It’s as much of an advisement as an order from a superior officer. I turn to leave but she holds me back, her hand lightly touching my coat sleeve. That in and of itself makes me pause, but so does the somber look on her face. “I know that this is difficult for you today, and I wish there was a way to make this easier. I can’t, and that is something we both have to deal with. But no child deserves to be told what I said to you when you informed me that you’d decided to make war your profession. I’m truly sorry for having said that. I wish I could take it back, but alas, that’s impossible. I hope you know that it was borne simply of my own selfish misgivings, and that I never laid any actual blame at your feet.”
I don’t know what to reply, but I can tell that it’s not necessary. My mother operates under the notion that she herself is the one who has to absolve herself of guilt, not anyone else for that matter. She precedes me through the door, trusting that I will lock it behind us. She looks a little out of place beside the red Corvette parked in the driveway next to the silver Audi that she drives herself—tall, willowy, but also vulnerable going on frail in the demure black dress and coat. I get the door for her, not quite sure if I should beat myself up over my suddenly rather foolish choice of transportation. She doesn’t comment on it, seeming lost in thought as we head toward the cemetery. Because it was all up to her—and she couldn’t have been certain that I would manage to attend—my mother chose the kind of funeral she’d want for herself: no viewing, no wake or long ceremony, just a brief social gathering and a few words spoken at the gravesite. Since there is no coffin—just a hermetically sealed urn that I’m sure she had to fight to be allowed to bury wherever she saw fit—that may make things easier, or at least less confusing. Close family is just the two of us, and considering her current state I’m not sure that she bothered inviting extended family that she doesn’t want to see on a good day, let alone one like this. I’m certain my brother wouldn’t mind either way; we only talked once about funeral arrangements at the end of a long night of drinking—back when that still did a number on me—and in not-quite jest he made me swear to dump his ashes into the ocean, or drag them up onto the highest mountain I could find and commit him to the winds. Since back then he was certain I wouldn’t get to cash in on that, and that there was a big chance they’d never get my body back, I didn’t really take him seriously. One more way in which I’m failing him, it seems.
Beyond Green Fields (Book 1): Beginnings [A Post-Apocalyptic Anthology] Page 10