by A. T Brennan
She was still hurt by his reaction, and while she was a little disappointed he hadn’t called she wasn’t surprised. She’d made quite the scene as she’d rushed out of his apartment that morning, and she didn’t blame him for thinking she was a bit of a mess. If his arm had healed properly then he would have no reason to call her, and she’d done a pretty good job on his stitches.
She had one more day of her rotation and then she would be off work for ten days, and she had no idea what to do with herself.
She wasn’t poor. She didn’t make a lot of money but she lived simply. She had no debt and she didn’t spend a lot so she had quite a bit in savings and could do something, go somewhere, but she didn’t know what to do or where to go.
Instead she would just stay home, as usual, and take each day as it came and try to figure out something to do to pass the time.
It was a lonely life, but it was the way it would always be.
* * *
Tyler walked around the dark building only half paying attention.
It was three in the morning and he was on a string of night shifts at his job. Walking around a building that was half-built in the middle of the day could be tedious, but doing it at night was boring as hell. There was nothing to see, and he’d walked this same loop hundreds of times in the last few days.
He really only had to do his rounds once every hour, but he was bored sitting at the security desk. He’d finished the book he’d brought, and he was sick of playing games on his phone. He wasn’t all that big on social media, so other than looking up random things on the internet his phone was pretty useless when he had no one to call or text.
It was his third day at the site, and it was different from his usual assignments. It was an office building that was under construction, unlike the usual sites where it was some building being built from the ground up. During the day there were still people working in the building, but at night there was supposed to be no access.
He had no idea what they did or what their business was, just that he was there alone from eight p.m. until eight a.m.
He didn’t mind the overnights. He had no trouble switching his days and nights, and he did get a premium for working the nights so that was a bonus. He didn’t even mind the twelve hour shifts. The job wasn’t bad, but he was preoccupied, and that didn’t help when all he had to do for twelve hours was wander around an empty building and think.
His sister had sent him a text around dinner time asking him to call her. He hadn’t talked to her in months. She’d reached out to him a few times, but he’d always just texted her and told her he was busy. He knew why she was calling, and he knew what she wanted to talk to him about.
It was their parent’s fortieth anniversary next week, and Olivia wanted him to come to their party.
She’d invited him every year since he’d left the military and he’d never gone. The first year he’d been in rough shape and hadn’t been able to handle it. After he’d been discharged he’d gone to live with Olivia and her family and he’d stayed for seven months before he’d left. Rick, his brother-in-law, had been about to kick him out anyway, so he’d just left before he’d had to ask.
The next three years he’d avoided the parties. If it had just been his sister and her family he might have been able to handle it, he would only be disappointing seven people, but these parties were always big affairs and there could be upward of fifty people there. That many strangers and family members was too much and he just couldn’t face them.
He still didn’t like crowds. For the first few years loud noises had startled him and crowds had stifled him. He was better now. He still startled easily, but as long as the sound didn’t mimic a gun or an explosion then he didn’t get triggered. Being around too many people made him anxious, and he didn’t want to have to explain to people that he was a security guard, he was still single and he wasn’t doing anything with his life.
His parents had tried to be supportive. They’d been proud of him when he’d enlisted, but when he’d gone on his first tour his mother had nearly fallen apart. When he’d been injured they’d assumed he’d quit and have a normal life, but when he’d stayed in they’d been a lot less proud and a lot less supportive.
He’d moved pretty much every year he’d been in. He’d done two postings overseas, one in Hawaii and the other in Japan, and he’d missed everything. The only event he’d made it home for in twelve years was his sister’s wedding because she’d asked him to, and she’d asked that he wear his uniform.
When he’d been discharged he’d moved back to his hometown and his parents had thought that after a year he’d be back on his feet and he would be fine. They thought he’d get the good job and meet the good woman and have the good life and give them more grandchildren, but after a year he’d still been so sensitive to loud noises that someone setting off fireworks down the street on Memorial Day had triggered such a strong flashback he’d almost hit his then five-year-old nephew when he’d come up to him in the middle of the flashback.
That was the first and last family barbecue he’d gone to since he’d been discharged, and other than seeing his sister and occasionally seeing her kids he’d kept away from everyone. He talked to his parents twice a month on the phone to reassure them that he was still alive and was planning on staying that way, and he went over to see them once every few months or so, but that was it. That was all he could handle, and he didn’t want to have the same conversation with his sister that they had every time she invited him to something and he told her he couldn’t go.
He was so deep in thought he almost didn’t hear the sound of breaking glass in the distance. He paused mid-step, unsure if he’d heard anything at all, and a moment later he heard something different. It sounded like metal garbage cans hitting each other.
He lifted his flashlight and headed to the back of the building. They didn’t let them carry weapons at his company so all he had was a radio and a flashlight, and the radio only worked if there was another guy on the job to answer it at the desk. He was working solo so the radio was of no use to him unless he threw it at someone, so he’d left it on the desk.
He heard another sound, almost like something metal hitting a chain link fence, and quickened his pace. It was outside the building, but it was close enough it sounded like it was in the parking lot.
He pushed open the back door and stepped out into the back lot.
The scene that greeted him was not what he would have ever expected, not in a million years.
He’d thought it would be kids messing around, or taggers trying to leave their mark on the building. He’d never thought he’d walk out to see two men holding guns to the head of another man who was kneeling on the ground.
In five years he hadn’t seen a single gun. In the last three weeks he’d seen three, and he froze.
“Hey!” one of the men shouted as he turned to look at him. As soon as Tyler saw the gun swing toward him he reacted.
The door slammed closed behind him just as he was turning to duck back into the building and he was left with two choices—left or right.
To the left there was nothing except a wall, and to the right there was a line of dumpsters. His first instinct should have been to duck behind the dumpsters, but his training had taught him to never corner himself if he was weaponless.
Shooting a gun wasn’t as easy as people in the movies made it look. Hitting a stationary target when you were calm was hard enough, but hitting a moving target when your adrenaline was pumping was nearly impossible for the average person. Unless these men were snipers then he would have a much better chance running from them.
He darted to the left, running as fast as he could as he hugged the wall.
He heard shots—two loud cracks, but he didn’t hear any popping or indication that they’d hit the wall. That meant they probably weren’t shooting at him.
He tossed a look over his shoulder as he ran, and saw that those two shots hadn’t been at him, they’d been at the
man who had been kneeling, and was now lying on the ground.
They’d executed him.
Tyler fought to keep his focus and tried to stay in the moment. He had to keep his head or they would kill him.
The men were now moving toward him, running full-out as they leveled their guns at him, and he picked up his pace.
He had a good lead on them, and shooting while running was pretty much impossible, even for a marksman. Even if they shot at him they would have a one in a million chance of actually hitting him, but he still needed to get back into the building.
He could feel the heat of the sun on his skin, smell sand and gun oil, but he pushed past it. He couldn’t give in, not now. He had to stay in the present. He had to stay focused.
He shook his head and started counting his steps as he ran, his eyes focused on the side door. It was a hundred paces in front of him and the key was on his belt. He made sure he didn’t stare at the door as he ran, he didn’t want to get tunnel vision and lose his situational awareness. Instead he focused on each step. On pulling the key ring off his belt, and on trying to find the side door key as he ran.
He heard four shots go off and there were four popping sounds as the bullets imbedded in the wall behind him.
One, two, three, four. He counted his steps as he desperately looked at the keys in his hand. The front door had a blue ring, the back door had a green ring and the side doors had yellow rings, but there were two doors, one on each side and they didn’t take the same key. The door was right there, less than five feet away, he just had to get there and unlock it.
Suddenly there was the crack of a gun going off. Almost instantly the wall in front of him seemed to explode as fragments of the concrete came loose and rained down around him. They were shooting in front of him now, trying to force him to slow down.
Instinctively he hit the ground, barely noticing as the rough pavement bit into his skin and tore at his clothes as he rolled a few times. The door was there, he just had to get to the door.
He jumped up and leapt at the door, praying he wasn’t trying to out leap a bullet because he knew that was one race he would lose.
He almost slammed into the side door and focused on his breathing as he jammed the yellow ringed key in his hand into the lock.
Miraculously it turned, and even as he was pulling the heavy metal door open there was another crack and then a blinding flash of light as pain exploded in his head.
He had just enough wits left about him to fall into the building and the heavy door slammed closed behind him.
He just lay on the cold ground, gasping and trying to focus on what had just happened. He tried not to pass out as he struggled to block out the flashbacks and keep his mind blank.
The cascade of memories and sensations was overwhelming, and it took everything he had to keep himself from giving in to it and letting it all take over.
It took a long time, but eventually he was able to focus and pull himself back into reality.
It took him even longer to sit up and pull out his phone.
Numbly he called his supervisor and told him what happened and he was told to get to the desk, sit down and wait for the police.
That was simple. He could do that.
He made his way to the lobby and looked around. The front of the building was all glass, but he knew it was bulletproof. Even if those men were stupid enough to try and shoot at him through the glass it wouldn’t break. Thankfully they were nowhere in sight.
He sat down and stared at his phone. He still didn’t feel any pain, but he smelled blood. That was strange.
He reached back and touched the back of his head, surprised when he felt something tacky and sticky on his hand. He pulled his hand away and looked at it. Blood. There was blood on his hand.
He looked down at his body and saw that his pants were ripped, the knee of his good leg was raw and bleeding and the top of his left wrist was bloody. His clothes were torn and dirty but the layers had held up pretty well and only those parts of him seemed hurt.
Those injuries were from when he’d hit the ground and rolled on the pavement, but how had he hurt his head?
That’s when it dawned on him.
He’d been hit with a ricochet.
The bullet had hit the door and the light he’d seen had been the flash from the metal-on-metal contact. The pain had been from when the bullet had ricocheted and grazed the back of his head.
He’d almost been shot in the head. A few millimeters closer and he would have been shot, not just grazed.
His skin went cold and he began to shake. His body didn’t feel like his own, and it was as though his vision was closing in on him. His chest grew tight, he couldn’t breathe in or out as his lungs burned and felt as though they were being crushed.
He was having a panic attack.
Desperately he looked around. He had to ground himself or he would lose control. He searched for five things that he could see.
He could see his phone and the lamp on the desk. He could see the useless radio next to the lamp. There was his book on the desk, and his bag was on the floor.
His breathing relaxed a bit. His chest started to open up and the shimmering in his vision began to fade. Now he had to find four things he could touch.
He reached out and touched the desk—that was one. He reached down and touched the chair he was sitting on—that was two. He grabbed the spare flashlight that was on the desk in front of him and reached under his shirt and pulled out his dog tags—three and four.
His heartbeat wasn’t thundering in his ears anymore and his hands had stopped shaking. Now he needed to find three things he could hear. He closed his eyes and listened. His foot was tapping on the ground, there was the crackle of the static coming from the useless radio, and the lamp on the desk was humming softly.
Now he was able to pull in a full breath and he was calmer, he was more in control. Now he had to find two things he could smell. He could smell blood and the half cup of coffee on the desk.
He was almost himself. He was almost in complete control. Now he had think of one absolute truth.
“I’m alive.” he said to himself in a strained voice. “I’m still alive.”
* * *
The next five hours passed in a blur. Tyler couldn’t really remember a single moment of them, but he had an idea of what had happened.
The cops had come and processed the scene. They hadn’t made him go back to the lot to see the dead man, but they’d told him they would take him to get medical attention after taking his statement. He refused to go to the hospital and he’d been treated by a medic on scene. Afterward he’d gone to the police station to give his statement. He’d talked to a sketch artist, but hadn’t really been all that much of a help since he couldn’t really remember what the men looked like. He’d looked through mugshots and then one of the officers had given him a card, told him to call if he remembered anything and warned him not to leave the city before driving him home.
It wasn’t even nine in the morning and he was both wired and exhausted. He wanted to sleep. His body wanted to shut down, but he was afraid of what would happen if he did fall asleep. Instead he did what he always did when he wanted to hide from life—he worked out. It was dangerous and was stupid of him to be lifting weights and running to and from the gym in his state, but it exhausted his body and kept his mind focused.
When he was done he came home, forced himself to eat something, and then took a long shower, not caring when he opened up the cuts on his arm and leg with the hot water. When he was out and dried off he fell into bed, praying that sheer exhaustion would keep the memories at bay.
Chapter Eight
Kenzie was finished. It was seven o’clock and she was officially done with work for ten days. As she walked down to the parking lot she checked her phone to see if Melissa had texted her, and was surprised to see a voicemail.
The call had come in about an hour ago, and it wasn’t a number she recognized. She just cal
led her system and pressed one and then six to listen to the message.
“Kenzie, something happened. I didn’t know who else to call. I…I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have bothered you. Forget it.”
She recognized the voice right away. It was Tyler, but his usual cockiness and arrogance was gone and he sounded broken, there was no other way to describe it.
Between the cryptic message and his voice it was obvious that he was in trouble. She paused as she looked at her phone for a moment and then called him back. She was still hurt, but she wasn’t about to turn her back on him if he was reaching out for help.
“Hello?”
“Tyler?” she asked as she reached the parking lot and headed toward her car. “Are you alright?”
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have called you. It’s not your problem,” he said in a strained voice. Something was very wrong.
“What’s not my problem? Did something happen?”
“I shouldn’t be bothering you.”
“Tyler,” she said in a gentle voice. “If you need someone then I’m here. Do you want me to come over?”
“Yes.” His voice was so quiet she almost didn’t hear him.
“Give me an hour, okay? I just got off work and I have to change before I come over. Is that okay?”
“Yeah, no problem.” His voice was so flat it was almost frightening.
“Okay. I’ll see you in an hour.”
“Kay.”
The connection went dead and she hurried up to her car. Something was horribly wrong.
* * *
It took her just over forty minutes to get home, jump into a quick shower, put on a pair of yoga pants and a slightly loose and long sweater, grab some leftover pizza that was in her fridge, and drive over to his house.