Dead Americans

by Ben Peek

  Wayne didn’t know from just where in the Middle East they originated. It could have been Afghanistan, Iran, or Pakistan; he wouldn’t know unless they announced it. Identically shaped, they were thickset men just under six feet. The first man, wearing a blue turban, had a face that had been horribly scarred by acne. The second man, in a white turban, had thick eyebrows and moustache, and a short neck, as if he were missing vertebrae. Both wore grey suits, with red handkerchiefs in their pockets.

  Red.

  Nothing to worry about, Wayne told himself, his grip tightening on the box. Nothing.

  Their gaze fell on Wayne.

  He smiled politely in return. Red. Why did he care? He didn’t. Yet Welles’ egg sat in his brain, connecting with the colour as if it was an answer to a question that had plagued him since his birth.

  The two men made their way up the street, their gaze never leaving him. Wayne told himself that he had nothing to worry about—nothing—but the Welles egg fractured and its fluid began to seep out, sending a small wet curling finger of fear through him. He tried to ignore it. He had the shotgun: its very design and purpose to protect its owner. There was nothing to worry about. Nothing at all.

  The pedestrian light changed.

  Crossing, Wayne quickened his pace. At the end of the road, glancing behind him, seeing them following—redredredredred—he dropped his cigarette and began weaving through people. His thick hands bent the corners of the shotgun box, as dampness began to trickle down his spine. Behind him, the two Middle Eastern men quickened their pace.

  Ahead, the pedestrian light was red. Red. Christ. He knew that if he waited, it would bring the two Middle Eastern men up beside him. Good. No. No, it wasn’t good. The shotgun box dug into his palm in demand. He wanted to rip the lid off and load it. But he wouldn’t. He would feel safer if he did—he should—but he wouldn’t. He couldn’t open the box, not here, not in the middle of the street.

  Wayne left the Avenue of Americas.

  He turned sharply, making his way towards Park Avenue using 6th Street. Quickly, he worked his way through the people, pushing past them, telling himself—lying, he was lying—that he was heading down to the street early only because it was quicker to the Waldorf and it was going to rain. That was all. It had nothing to do with the two men. Nothing.

  He glanced over his shoulder, searching for their turbans. Nothing.

  He was a fool, an idiot. His grasp relaxed. He blamed Welles entirely, even though the fault lay within him. He had allowed the tiny doubts and fears to flood over him and force him to react in a fearful, suspicious way. An Un-American way.

  Walking up to the front of the Waldorf, Wayne greeted the doorman in a short, terse greeting.

  “Sir?” the short man said.

  “Yeah?”

  “There are two men waving at you, sir.”

  Bending the box with his grip, Wayne turned. There, at the bottom of the steps, were the two men, their red handkerchiefs brightly displayed. The colour was all that he could focus on, all that mattered, and his hand, bending the box, came into contact with the stock of the shotgun . . . Then, and only then, did Wayne realize that they were holding a pad of paper out to him.

  “Please,” the blue turbaned man said. “We were told we could find you here.”

  Wordlessly, grinding his teeth, Wayne laid the pad across the crushed shotgun box, and signed his name.

  He wanted to call Welles and attack him over the phone, but he didn’t. He knew that if he did, the other man would simply deny it and chuckle down the line at the success of his private joke. But the next time he saw Welles . . . well, that was another question, and another time.

  Placing the shotgun box on the coffee table, Wayne kicked off his boots, and dropped his hat down on the chair. A moment later, he picked it up and tossed it onto the table with the shotgun, then sat down and pulled the phone towards him. There was a line of lightening outside the window, followed by the sound of rain smacking against the glass in a hard rhythm. At least he had avoided the storm. That was one thing. Dialling room service, he ordered a steak and potatoes dinner, then hung up, picked up the receiver again, and called his wife.

  Esperanza answered on the third ring. Her sweet voice reached him with the faint trace of static, “Hola.”

  “Howdy.”

  “John! Es tan bueno oír de usted. He estado preocupado.”

  “Worried?” Wayne frowned into the phone. “What’ve you got to be worried ‘bout?”

  “Oí ese Joseph Stalin—”

  “You ain’t been talking to Welles have you?”

  “Orson? No. No, un periodista llamó esta mañana, lo buscando.”

  “Reporters,” Wayne repeated sourly. He pulled out his cigarette packet and shook one of the slender white sticks into his mouth. “There ain’t nothing to worry about, love. Welles is just playing some sort of joke. Probably like that radio play stunt of his.”

  “Ah, bien. El periodista no pensó era un chiste. Quizá debe ser usted un poco más cuidadoso?”

  Tiny spark of fire, a burst of smoke around the mouthpiece. “I’m always careful.”

  “Bien, quizá usted puede ser un poco menos crítico del Comunismo?”

  “I ain’t going to be quiet with my opinion just cause of some story,” he replied immediately. “This is America and I got the freedom to say whatever I want.”

  “John.”

  “Don’t John me like that. I’m right, and you know it.” He drew a long, satisfied lung full of smoke—his first since meeting Welles. “People ought to be free to say whatever it is they happen to be thinking, no matter what other people think. That’s what being American is all about. And don’t you say you don’t think that, ‘cause I know a girl on this phone that damn well stuck up for her right to say whatever she feels, and that’s why she’s an American too.”

  “Acabo de preocupar es todo.”

  “There ain’t nothing wrong with worrying—ah, Christ, that’s the door. My food. Hold a sec.” Wayne placed the receiver down and, as he walked to the door, pulled his jacket off and tossed it onto another chair. He opened the door, and said, “On the phone to the wife—”

  The world stopped.

  In the hallway stood a silver cart with his dinner, but behind the cart stood two white men. The left man—the blond one—wore the uniform of the Waldorf, but was obviously too big for it, while the second man—dark haired—wore casual brown pants, a white shirt, and a thick jacket. But it was not the strangeness of their dress, or the cold look on their faces that caused Wayne’s heart to skip one of its life securing beats.

  The men held small silver pistols with thick silencers at the end.

  Welles’ egg shattered.

  “Shit.”

  Wayne had no time to move. It was a blink to take in the scene, and in that blink, the whispered spit of the bullet sounded and pain burst in his chest. Blood blossomed—his cigarette tumbled—then blood blossomed again. He stumbled backwards. He screamed—or did he? His perception swam through the pain wracking his body. Had he called out to Esperanza?

  His voice failed to call out as the two men entered his room. One closed the door softly, and another stalked in squeaky shoes across the floor. Wayne tried to push himself up, to lurch towards the shotgun, to grab anything. Yes, it was unloaded, but just grabbing it would buy him precious moments. Outside the rain was falling harder against the windows, it’s tempo matching his pulse as he moved across the floor, pounding, pounding, urging him on, pounding the beat of life for everyone as he pulled himself up against the table and reached for the box—

  There was the whispering spit of a bullet again, and pain in his back.

  Wayne crumbled onto the carpet, the box out of his reach. Groaning, he rolled himself over so that he could face his assassins, and meet his death.

  The dark haired man crouched down in front of him. “Well, goddamn,
John Wayne, dead at my hands. Who would’ve thought?”

  “You god . . . damned . . . snake . . .” he muttered harshly, spitting blood.

  “You don’t die like your films,” the man continued, taping the silver, silenced end of the gun against Wayne’s head. “Shame. My folks love them. Real American they say. But look how you die, man, all covered in blood like you’re just anybody.”

  His vision was slipping, turning grey, but he spat out, “Traitor!”

  “It isn’t that simple,” the man replied, softly and with contempt. “But if it makes you feel any better, Stalin’s money will be going straight back into the economy.”

  Wayne’s right fist connected solidly against the man’s face and a loud, bony crack followed. A bullet sliced into his arm, snapping Wayne’s vision back into focus. The blond assassin was taking aim; Wayne dragged his companion in front of him—the man, dazed, his noise crumpled, offered no resistance. On the floor, his pistol lay like a silver dollar.

  The whispering spit again, and the dark haired assassin jerked, moaning loudly.

  Wayne grabbed the fallen pistol and brought it up.

  The shots caught the blond man in the chest and pitched him backwards. Wayne, his vision dimming again, pushed the dark haired assassin away, intent on shooting him too, but there was no need. The man’s eyes were wide and his lips bubbled with blood: his breath sounded in shallow gasps as if he were asking God how the world he had been so sure of had failed so suddenly?

  “Yeah,” Wayne muttered faintly, “I got that question.”

  Orson Welles stood in the waiting room of the New York-Presbyterian Hospital. It was different from how he last remembered it, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on what that difference was. It just felt wrong. In fact, everything of late felt wrong. But then why should it feel right? He was standing in the horrible, antiseptic smelling white waiting room of the emergency ward, waiting for the Doctor, fearing the worse, and feeling responsible.

  The Doctor emerged from behind the white doors. He was a narrow, white man, with short grey hair. In a quiet, serious voice, he said, “I’m sorry. I really am. It’s just that he’s lost too much blood, and one of the bullets struck a vital organ—”

  “When?” Welles asked, his voice sounding as if someone else had spoken it. Why didn’t he feel anything? Shock. It must be shock. “When did it happen?”

  “Ten minutes ago.” The Doctor paused. After a moment, his carefully constructed façade broke and disbelief slithered across his face. “I did not think it was possible for him to . . . I just didn’t think he would. He was so strong—a healthy, vital man, in every aspect. I just—I just can’t come to terms with what I know.”

  “Doctor,” Welles interrupted kindly. “He was just a man.”

  “He seemed more, somehow.”

  “The lie of the screen.”

  “Don’t you have anything to say?”

  “No,” Welles replied softly. “What does it matter what any of us say, now?”

  Octavia E. Butler

  (a remix)

  1.

  I was eleven when you gave me the knife.

  The day was cold, grey: the end of winter, but early enough that my final year in St. Mary’s Sanctuary was a long way from completion. Despite that, on the day that I met you I was thinking about how good it would be to no longer have to walk past the fences that ran outside the school in thick, sandy brick; how I would not have to see the white guards who scanned the bags of all the coloured kids thoroughly every morning; and how I would not have to sit in the back corner of the classroom, friendless and ostracized. The contraction between these thoughts and the fact that the corridors I walked through were empty and I was early, again, did not escape me either. Soon, you would tell me that was how you knew my uncle was staying with me. It was a lie, of course: you knew because you were me.

  I pushed open the blue metal door to the classroom and saw you standing in front of a map of the world. At first, I thought that you were a relief teacher, and if not that, a rich mother. I did not suspect otherwise: you were not black, you were not tall, and you did not have the thick, black curly hair that I had. You were white, of medium height, and with close cropped hair that might have been black if it had grown out. In short, you were as physically removed from me as you could have been. You were right not to tell me that this was me, that I was staring at my own future self. You were right to start our conversation by saying, “The infected areas are coloured red, right? It has been a while since I’ve seen one.”

  The class had put the map on the wall in the previous week. It was a flat world, its spherical dimensions opened for autopsy, and spotted with red throughout to represent outbreaks of the Alrea virus.

  “There is a theory,” you said, still having not turned from the map, “that the virus is proof of alien life.”

  I did not have a reply for that.

  “It’s in this country already.” You turned now to face me, revealing a smooth face that was neither youthful, nor old; but rather, one that was curiously still, like a mask. “It’s in New Orleans, brought over by Baker Thomas. Right now, he lives in a small community of infected—the number is fifteen, if I remember right. It isn’t difficult for him to hide, but in ten years, it will be impossible to keep his community a secret and he’ll have to take action. Just like you will with your uncle, Octavia.”

  There had been no movement towards me and I had plenty of distance from you, but I felt threatened. You tried to alleviate that by telling me that was how you knew I was early to school; that you knew I did not want to spend the fifty minutes alone with him that I would normally relish after Mother left for her work. I enjoyed that time when he wasn’t there, but with him there, you knew that if I stayed, he would step closer to me and touch me. You knew that his eyes had a hungry glint that I had not yet properly identified, but was unsettled by. His presence was like a heavy weight around me when I stepped into the house and you knew that I had taken to locking the bathroom door after he had arrived. You should not have known, but you did.

  You smiled, faintly. “On the weekend, he will take you and your mother to a dog fight. Two nights after that, he will come for you.”

  “Why?”

  Your faint smile turned sad. “I wish I could explain it to you. I really do. But all I can do is tell you that this will happen. Don’t let him touch you. Don’t let anyone touch you if you can help it.”

  It was then that you put the knife on the table.

  “Don’t forget this, yeah?”

  It was straight and sharp and the handle was made from hard plastic. It was not a kitchen knife: it had been designed to hurt someone, to kill, if used correctly. It was a horrifying gift to me, and when the door to the classroom opened, I grabbed it and pushed it quickly into the bag at my feet before it was seen. I was horrified, yet comforted, and the confused emotions were still at play in my mind when you began walking to the door, nodding at the small white girl who entered.

  I would have to die before I saw you again.

  2.

  On the day of the dog fight, my uncle drove my mother and I to Jersey. My mother agreed, despite her abhorrence to violence, because she could not deny her brother anything.

  His name was Robert, but he liked to be called Rob. Mother called him Robbie, the only one who ever did. He was tall, dark, and good looking, the organic farms he worked on paying him well in both money and lifestyle. He was paid so well, in fact, that in the seasonal breaks he could travel as he pleased and, every year, he would spend at least a month with his sister. Whenever this happened, however, all the rules that I lived by during the rest of the year were suspended. An intelligent, insightful woman, it was always disturbing to watch my mother purchase alcohol and junk food before his arrival and, after, allow us to be taken out to events that she otherwise would have scorned and ignored. Often, the events were loud, violent, and unsui
table for her demeanour and my age, but she would listen to no comment that said so. Even after her brother had pushed open the door to the bathroom I was in by “accident,” as he said, apologizing with a smile and a stare as he leaned on the doorframe, she could see no fault in him.

  The dog fights that he took us to were in a rundown neighbourhood dominated by overgrown yellow grass lawns and houses made from brick and fibro. They had been erected cheaply and would last for years, but were reliant on city generators for electricity and heat, which most of the inhabitants could not afford. They could not afford the private solar generators that would alleviate this, either; of course, having those required the rewiring of their old houses, most of which were cheaper to demolish and rebuild.

  The families living in these neighbourhoods were mostly black and Hispanic and my mother noted that as we left the gated community she lived in miles behind.

  “You act like you haven’t seen that before,” my uncle said. “Like we didn’t grow up in a neighbourhood just like this.”

  My mother: intelligent, proud, a lecturer at Engelman, a private college. Her disposable income rivalled many couples and never did she or I want for anything. But she had grown up so poor that only a brief influx of government scholarships and luck had given her opportunities her parents could not have.

  In her brother’s truck, she said, “Doesn’t it seem like it’s getting worse?”

  “Not really,” he replied. “We had a Hispanic President five years ago, ninety-five percent of the population is bilingual, there’s a public health care program. When we were kids there were private health funds we couldn’t afford and a lot more segregation through economics.”

  “But the problem is still there. It has just become easier to deal with because there have been changes. There are not slaves—”