On Hurricane Island

by Ellen Meeropol

  “They’re for your own safety. Confusion and disorientation are common after head injury. Now, rest,” she commands as she leaves the room.

  The restraints are just for show. They don’t mean anything. “Trust me,” the Regional Chief promised on the phone, “and everything will be fine.”

  Tobias will play along but he doesn’t trust JR or anyone, not completely. No way he’s going to let the DC guys scapegoat him for this mess. JR claims they transferred him to Portland for the expert neurosurgeon, but the doc says that the injury was minor. Tobias suspects they want him away from his people. Sure, the doc is first-rate. His brain is working good as new under all the wrapped, white gauze. And the ribs will heal, no biggie. Even his leg—it makes him queasy to look at those pins sticking through the bones—will mend. The hard part is being cut off from the action. Especially since rumor has it that JR himself is in New York for the press conference. That’s great, because he’ll get to see the fruits of Tobias’s planning first hand.

  Luckily, Tobias is first-rate at his job too. He’s still officially in charge and he has all the bases covered. So he’s expecting it when the nurse sticks her head back in.

  “You’ve got a visitor,” she says. “Ten-minute limit.”

  Stanley Mason’s eyes widen when he sees the bandages and metal contraptions, but Tobias waves his hand dismissively, as much as the restraints will allow.

  “I’m fine,” Tobias says. “What about you? Are you on board?”

  “As long as you do what you promised, about getting me into the Bureau.”

  “Soon as this job is done. Are you sure you understand your assignment?”

  Mason grins. “You bet.”

  “There’ll be heavy security,” Tobias says. “Take the letter from my top drawer. It will get you in, but you’ll have to get yourself out. There’ll be back stairs, behind the stage.”

  His head throbs. Tobias hates relying on the sergeant for such an important assignment, but his personnel choices are severely limited. At least Mason will get the job done. He hopes.

  “Bring me the disk tomorrow.” Tobias gestures the sergeant to leave and closes his eyes. He pushes the pain med button pinned to the blanket and soon he’s floating again. There are clouds. Funny that the Cohen bitch studies them. He has always dreamt of leaning out of an airplane and touching them. One of these days, when the torture device comes off his leg, maybe he’ll do just that. He’ll learn to sky dive. Once the DVD is in his hands, once Henry and the three bitches are paid back, he can do anything.

  Gandalf climbs the stairs from the subway. She is grateful that Austin and Norah went ahead early and astounded that she is holding hands with Jess in public and not feeling overwhelmed with awkwardness. Then she laughs at herself. After being held naked for who-knows-how-many strangers to gawk at on the surveillance system, she may never worry about exposure again.

  No, that’s not entirely true. There is the DVD Henry plans to show at the press conference in less than an hour. She wonders if she is naked and breastless on the section he plans to show, or modestly wrapped in the blanket. She touches the scab across her cheek and pictures her scraped knees under her slacks; she does not look her best in any case. How absurd to worry about vanity at a time like this. She squeezes Jess’s hand and leans closer.

  “I’m not sure I can do this,” she murmurs, stepping over a downed branch on the sidewalk.

  “Don’t lose courage now, sweetheart.”

  They turn the corner onto Court Street, and Gandalf stops. The district office is four, five blocks away but the crowds are already visible. Television trucks block traffic and uniformed police hold people back behind striped sawhorse barriers.

  Jess checks the directions Evelina texted and leads Gandalf past a caravan of SWAT Team vans into an alley. They avoid a deep puddle and give their names to the armed guard with a clipboard at the side door. “Elevator to the fourth floor,” he says. “Auditorium on the left.”

  “SWAT Teams? Auditorium?” Gandalf whispers to Jess when they’re inside.

  Jess squeezes her hand. “Primetime, sweetheart.”

  Upstairs there are more guards, and then they are inside the auditorium. The front dozen rows are crowded with people adjusting television cameras and recorders; fleece-covered microphones hang in the air from metal pole extensions. Flanking the doors, burly men in suits talk into tiny microphones attached with twisty cord to earbuds.

  The auditorium doors open, and people flood in. They fill the room with loud voices and storm clouds of anticipation. They are just concerned citizens, Gandalf tells herself. Harmless civilians with press passes or other official identification.

  A large woman with owl glasses steps forward and takes Gandalf’s elbow.

  “Dr. Cohen? I’m Evelina Carter. Thank you so much for doing this.”

  Reluctantly, Gandalf releases Jess’s hand and lets herself be escorted onto the stage, where metal folding chairs are arranged in a semi-circle behind a large wooden podium. Evelina points to the empty seat between Austin and Norah, who holds a black cane. Henry, looking pale and anxious, studies a paper in his hand. On a wheeled cart behind the curtain on the other end of the stage, a large flat-screen monitor glows blue.

  Gandalf points to Norah’s cane. “You doing okay?”

  “Better. Thanks to antibiotics and painkillers. You?”

  “Scared to death.” Gandalf looks out at the crush of reporters and photographers, searching for Jess. She locates her sitting next to Catherine, who Jess met briefly at the airport, and a young woman with matching dusty brown hair. Lissa.

  Gandalf meets Jess’s gaze. She has not yet found the right time to tell Jess about Ahmed’s email, about Ahmed. Tonight, when this is over, she will explain.

  Will this ever be over?

  She looks at her notes. Her usual method of banishing stage fright, a combination of physics mnemonics and mathematical equations, fails her. She lowers her hand, letting it drift until it touches Norah’s arm. She remembers to breathe.

  The buzzing quiets as Evelina steps up to the podium and taps the microphone for attention. Gandalf barely registers the congresswoman’s introductory remarks. She turns to watch Henry walk to the podium. He clears his throat and looks down at his papers.

  Austin’s shout breaks the silence. “No!” She stands and points towards the shadowy off-stage area to their right. “Stop him.”

  Henry swivels around to face the man squatting at the DVD player. The man jumps up and turns, holding a disk in one hand and a gun in the other. Under his gray sweatshirt hood, his face is vaguely familiar.

  “Mason?” Henry shouts.

  For a split second they all stand frozen. Then things happen all at once. The shooter points his gun at Henry. Austin tackles the shooter who fires twice. Two police officers run from the other side of the stage. More shots explode. Norah, Evelina, and Gandalf dive from their chairs onto the floor. Gandalf covers her head with her arms. Screams from the audience bounce off the walls. A gun skittles across the worn wooden planks. Henry collapses onto the floor. The stage fills with SWAT team officers with bulletproof vests, guns and shields, poker faces.

  When it’s quiet, Gandalf combat crawls to Henry, lying behind the podium.

  “Henry?” Gandalf touches his shoulder.

  He lifts his head. “Is it over?”

  Gandalf peers around the podium. The shooter is holding his shoulder, where a red stain seeps through his sweatshirt. Cops flank him, pinning his arms behind his back.

  “Yes,” Gandalf says. “I think so.”

  It takes a few minutes for the SWAT team to drag the shooter away and escort the speakers off stage to a small room with sofas. Henry refuses the ambulance. “I’m fine,” he insists. “Just let our families know we’re okay. They’ll be frantic.”

  Evelina joins them, waving the disk. “Who was that guy?” she asks.

  “Stanley Mason,” Henry says. “An army sergeant assigned to the facility. Sent by
Tobias, no doubt.”

  “Do you remember Mason?” Austin asks Gandalf. “He was one of the guys who picked you up at JFK.”

  Not Blue Eyes; that was Cyrus. So Mason is Troll, with the gravelly voice. She nods. “At least they got him.”

  “There’ll be others,” Norah says.

  “Smarter ones,” Henry adds.

  “Listen,” Evelina says. “Maybe we should postpone the press conference.”

  The three women exchange glances, then look at Henry. He shakes his head.

  “No,” Gandalf says. “We want to do this, today.”

  “Before they send someone else to stop us,” Norah says.

  They return to their semicircle of chairs, with SWAT team members visible in the wings. The audience takes a long time to quiet. This time, Evelina introduces Gandalf first.

  Standing at the podium, Gandalf looks out at the crowd of reporters and elected officials and citizens. The audience seems even larger than before and it pulses with anticipation, turbulent and electric. She finds Jess in the crowd and touches her gold wizard charm. She feels Austin and Norah and Henry sitting strong behind her.

  “My name,” she begins, “is Gandalf Cohen. Four days ago federal agents kidnapped me at JFK Airport and transported me against my will to Hurricane Island.”

  THE END

  BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

  Ellen Meeropol’s characters live on the fault lines of political turmoil and human connection. She is the author of one previous novel, House Arrest (Red Hen Press, 2011). A literary late bloomer, she began seriously writing fiction in her fifties. Her short fiction and essays have been published in Bridges, DoveTales, Pedestal, The Rumpus, Portland Magazine, Beyond the Margins, The Drum, and The Writer’s Chronicle. A former pediatric nurse practitioner and part-time bookseller, Ellen holds an MFA in Creative Writing from the Stonecoast program at the University of Southern Maine. She lives in Western Massachusetts.