Duty Recall

by Scott A Meehan

  “I'll leave the two of you alone; to let you celebrate this moment,” he added, a bit envious.

  Dr. Meyers left the room, glancing back over his should for a brief moment and then moved swiftly away.

  * * *

  Sitting alone in his office, Dr. Meyers was looking over a large file. He had just opened his file cabinet, marked, “recent,” pulled out a folder with the name, Lieutenant David Allan, plopped it on his desk in front of him, and then began pouring over his notes.

  Everything about Sherry, her personality, looks, and stamina, had intrigued him. He was impressed by the way she handled herself throughout the three-month ordeal. I'm going to really miss that woman, he thought.

  Another bit of intrigue that captured his attention was the information he gathered from Major Allan during several of their “skull” sessions.

  He began reading the content from his interviews:

  Allan: We were in Iraq to drive out Saddam for his alleged role in the 911 attacks, Lieutenant, Allan had answered.

  Me: What were the 911 attacks again?

  Allan: That's when commercial airliners were commandeered by terrorists and then flown into the Trade Center Towers in York City and the Pentagon in D.C.

  Me: This was in 2001?

  Allan: Yes sir, 2001.

  Me: Iraq was responsible for planning these attacks?

  Allan: Depends on who you ask. Our President, George Bush, was convinced that Saddam Hussein was involved though.

  Me: George Bush was still president in 2001?

  Allan: No, no, sorry. His son was. George W.

  Dr. Meyers continued to read back over his recorded conversations and jotted down more notes. “Fascinating stuff,” he said aloud to himself.

  Me: You mentioned the name, Osama Bin Laden. Who is he?

  Allan: He is the one that everybody claims is responsible for the 9/11 attacks. He was hiding in Afghanistan so we began our combat operations there first.

  Me: You say 'claims?'

  Allan: Sir?

  Me: You said claimed it was this Bin Laden person. Was it him or not?

  Allan: Again, depends on who you talk to. Me personally? I believe that the operation was far too sophisticated to be organized and carried out by this 'goat herder.

  Me: He was a goat herder?

  Allan: No, not really. He is just a terrorist.

  After 90 minutes of reading and scribbling notes, Dr. Meyers neatly placed the documents back into the folder, looked it over a few seconds, and then placed it into a different filing cabinet marked, SECRET.

  * * *

  Major Garret began a long conversation with Sherry as David watched. I get to go home! he thought to himself. But what will happen when I get there? David's thoughts tossed like ocean waves crashing against the shore, repeatedly with varying degrees of intensity. Did I tell Dr. Meyers too much? Does he even believe me or think I'm crazy? David was ready for home, no matter what loomed ahead.

  * * *

  “DAAADY!” Both Robby and Jenny bounded from the front porch, David's mother in tow. They all ran up to Lieutenant David Allan as he slowly stepped out of the passenger side of their Plymouth Minivan.

  David responded by holding out his arms unable to contain a flashy big smile. “Heey, come here you t…thump. They already dove into their father's waiting arms, nearly knocking him for a loop.

  “Be careful, you two!” Sherry started, but David was already holding onto them as if they were long lost children, embracing them more so then he remembered doing before…many years before.

  “Look at your head,” David said to Robby while rubbing the top of it.

  “He got his head shaved to be 'hardcore' just for you,” Sherry added.

  “Daddy, you know what? I can ride a bike now, wanna see?” Jenny said excitedly.

  “Yeah, show daddy how you ride, Jenny,” Sherry said.

  “Show daddy your new dance too!” Robby added as they both started laughing.

  “Okay, I want to see both!” David said, full of excitement.

  David's mother waited for the appropriate time before she stepped in for her set of hugs.

  “We were all surely praying for you!” Mary told him.

  As if on cue, Jenny and Robby already had their bikes ready in the front yard when David stood talking with his mother.

  “Daddy, look!” Jenny was riding fast with Robby right behind her. She had her tongue curled in determination, eyes focused on the road ahead of her.

  “Alright, girl! You go!”

  “Now do your dance!” Robby shouted.

  Jenny placed one hand on her hip as if she was prepared to scold a spoiled brat, held out her other hand like she was about to thumb a ride, and then began circling her lower torso as if she had a hoola hoop around her waist.

  Everybody laughed with her.

  “Cool dance, girl! Let's go inside.”

  The small family reunion was not entirely like David remembered but he recalled that Jenny did learn to ride a bike while he was away and that she had demonstrated both her new bike riding skills and her dancing gig.

  The house seemed to be set up the way he remembered, yellow ribbons tied around the two trees in the front yard and all six of the front porch columns wrapped in yellow ribbon. Inside looked the same as he remembered also. The formal dining room was immediately to the left just before entering the family room.

  There was the easy chair against the wall facing in the direction of the fireplace at the far end of the room against the back. He had almost forgotten about this house on Arrow Ridge way, just off Bingham Drive where they spent a year before moving to on-post housing. It was a quaint 3-bedroom house with a nice large front porch containing swings.

  Normal daily living seemed to be playing out the way he remembered, running a normal course with dinner preparation, eating, cleaning up, wrestling with the kids, watching a little TV, and reading to the kids before bed and so forth.

  David could not help but wonder how things would turn out that night in bed with Sherry after everything was settled. It would be the first time in his new state…his life in a new dimension.

  When the time did come, Sherry placed her hand lovingly on his face. “I really missed you, honey!”

  They looked into each other's eyes for a brief moment before moving their lips towards each other. It was just as he remembered…soft and sweet. Feeling the very real sensation of her touch, he relished their passionate kissing with every passing second.

  This is no dream! David understood. The reality of their expressed love engulfed his whole being. Dream or otherwise, David felt like he was in paradise.

  5. Back in the Saddle

  David pondered his surrounding conditions, concentrating on the sights, places, and people around him, wondering—wondering about his current state of mind. At times, he was confused whether or not the “real memories” verses the “perceived,” would direct his course of action and potentially change the course of history.

  Some aspects of his current journey did not appear to be heading in the exact direction as he remembered. This became evident almost immediately after coming out of his 3-month coma when told of the events concerning his return home from Desert Storm. That account of the mine exploding beneath their Humvee resulting in the death of SSG Schmidt, simply did not take place.

  After being medically cleared for duty, David returned to his unit. On his first day back to duty, he was greeted by officers and soldiers alike in the surreal sense of having known them as they were in 1991.

  “Good morning, sir!” SSG Broom said while standing up with an extended hand.

  “Good morning, Sergeant Broom!” David countered.

  Before he could say anything else, a voice echoed down the hall. “Is that Lieutenant Allan I hear?” COL. Smith shouted.

  “Yesssir, it is!” SSG Broom shouted back.

  David heard the footsteps clumping down the old linoleum floor, approaching closer and closer. In seco
nds, Colonel (COL.) Smith entered the S2 office, followed by Major Serko and a few others.

  “Good to see ya, LT!” COL Smith said with an extended hand, just like SSG Broom. The others in similar fashion followed him. The hallway began to fill with other smiling faces, all of whom David remembered, if not by name, certainly by facial recognition. “How are you feeling?”

  “I feel great, sir and I'm ready to drive on!” David answered enthusiastically, in an attempt to hide his tangled state of mind.

  As the chatter continued, David observed keenly and absorb everyone and everything. The old two-story chipped-painted, white wooden, building right off All American freeway and Gruber Road was the same as he remembered. He vaguely recalled the sharp left turn onto 9th street.

  His office looked the same as he remembered; in fact, he was not too surprised to find out that he was slotted to replace CPT (Dead) Ringer as the 8th PSYOP Battalion S-2, the staff code for the head security/intelligence section.

  As time went on his memory expanded to personal interests, such as his fondness for baseball. Watching the teams perform the way he remembered before, he already knew who was going to make the MLB playoffs and who would win the World Series. This fact, he kept to himself, at least for the time being. The opportunity would come for making the right predictions without bringing too much suspicion on him. He would wait on that.

  For that matter, he could use the same strategy to predict the Super Bowl opponents and the victors. He remembered all of them from MLB and the NFL. Choosing the right winner would indicate if he indeed was going through some time passage with similar results.

  Then there was another factor, one that would have a total different outcome than previous times. Hmm, think of the great opportunity to bring in substantial supplemental income. Do I dare try it? David thought.

  Besides the World Series and the Super Bowl, he thought of the stocks that did well through the early and mid '90s, like Dell Computer and American Online. Pursuing these thoughts carefully, as to not draw attention, he decided to go forward with the idea just to see how it would play out for the time being.

  Placing wages that derived from a normal family budget would have to be done slowly, carefully, and deliberately, without drawing any attention from Sherry. If his plan worked, there would be no way to explain why a Second Lieutenant could suddenly afford to live in a mansion or own a Mercedes.

  Another thought crossed David's mind, one requiring considerate calculation in terms of his role as an intelligence officer in the U.S. Army. David assumed that the catastrophic events that took place the first time around would happen again…unless he could stop them.

  Trying to recollect the events he came up with the tragic memories of Hurricane Andrew's destruction on Homestead, Florida in '92; the failed and costly mission for U.S. Army Rangers and Delta Force soldiers in Somalia during the '93 timeframe; the unsuccessful attempt to destroy the World Trade Center, at least the first attempt in '93; and the bombing in Oklahoma City in '95.

  David tried to piece together the specifics leading to these events based on the information released after the facts. Could I prevent such events? he wondered. Maybe God was giving him another chance to prevent, fix, or correct something. Would he even want to step in to prevent them? Couldn't that prevent him from ever learning the truth about the crash in 2003? Maybe I don't want to know. Maybe it would mean the end for me, he pondered. There was so much to think about.

  * * *

  The summer of 1991 came and went much as David remembered it. There was the travel to Salem, Virginia, Sherry's hometown. He would go to his own place of birth, Baltimore, Maryland, with a side trip to Gettysburg so that the kids could experience a taste of history.

  They even stopped and visited the small town of Schuylkill Haven, Pennsylvania to visit an old Army friend from the eighties, Mark Voydik and his family. Mark was the same old muscle-bound wrestler that he remembered. Together, both families went fishing, an event that David recalls vividly because it was the first fish that Jennifer ever caught. History repeated itself in this situation as well.

  Disney World, Epcot, and a trip to his grandmother's mobile home in Venice, Florida rounded out the traveling for the summer. Both of Sherry's sisters got married in Lakeland, Florida during the summer so the theme park adventure's coincided with the weddings. Fort Bragg celebrated the 4th of July with concerts and fireworks. Lee Greenwood would sing his “God Bless the USA” hit song to the cheering throng. Yes, everything was on the same course of world history that he remembered.

  Other events that came back to life included the change-of-command between his old commander, Col. Smith to the new one, LTC Vincent. David liked Col. Smith. He was the one who gave him his present position as the S2. They served together during Desert Storm and David recalls the time he had to flush his eyes with water when gasoline from a generator splashed into his face while on his way to the front. Now David wondered if that event ever took place.

  Sherry struggled a bit, trying to find the right teaching gig somewhere in Cumberland County. She had a job teaching kindergarten in the town of Spring Lake, just outside of the post but the school had to let one of the kindergarten teachers go because of cuts. The school decided to keep the woman who screamed at the kids all day because of her minority status and the quota's that the county had to keep. Sherry was livid when she discovered the reason for her dismissal.

  The most devastating event was when Sherry's mom went into a coma during the month of August. Mary was scheduled to have a simple shoulder operation followed by a period of recuperation at David's home in Fayetteville.

  Remembering that she would indeed slip into a coma in post-op because of an aneurysm, David strongly suggested that she put off surgery until another time and he gave numerous reasons, short of telling the whole family that she would slip into a coma during post-op, why she should not have the surgery. Mary went through with the surgery anyway and everything took place just as it had before.

  Sherry took this very hard. David remembered this as well. Could he have stopped it? What if they listened to him and did not go through with the surgery? Would the coma come in a different way, maybe while on the road? David could not bear the thought that he may have been able to prevent his mother-in-law's death.

  Sherry's family, consisting of her father, who was a diabetic-related amputee, her brother, Jess, and her three sisters made the correct decision to remove any life-support from Mary. They each said their good-bye's in their own terms and waited for the worse.

  What David purposely neglected to tell everyone was that she would go on to live for another four months, still in a coma, before dying of pneumonia just before Christmas. It was a dreadful thought and he forced out of his mind. Let the events run its course. How could I possibly stop the results now? He wondered.

  * * *

  Organization Day activities included an evening at the club wearing Dress Blues and was supposed to be a celebrated occasion, but David could tell that Sherry was still troubled deep down by her mother's condition. This was to be expected and yet she still displayed an exuberant disposition to all of those officers and wives around her throughout the evening. She held on to David tightly as if she was grasping onto a life that she did not want to slip away while on the dance floor during the ballads.

  “Do you think Doctor Meyers could or even would look into my mother's condition? He did wonders for you, I think.” Sherry said between drinks.

  “Well, I'm not sure if he could but I can look into the matter.”

  “Would you please? That would be such a load off my mind, knowing that at least we tried.”

  “Sure thing, honey. I'll try to contact him when I get into the office on Monday morning and see what I can find out.”

  “Thanks so much, dear.” Sherry took a sip from her champagne glass, watching David in the process. Her eyes, transfixed on David's, sparkled from the reflective overhead lights above the shining rim. Her spirits were li
fted.

  “I love you, Sherry.” David placed his hands across the table in front of him and Sherry reached down her left hand to squeeze his for a few seconds and then left her palm on top of his hand.

  During a break period, while many of the women disappeared to the powder room or outside for a smoke break, LTC Vincent sat down next to David.

  “I heard about everything you have been through and what your wife is going through now.”

  “Yes sir, it has been a difficult year.”

  “Well, you have my support and I intend to keep you as my 'TWO.'

  David beamed. “Thank you, sir. I certainly appreciate that opportunity!”

  “If there is anything that I or my wife, Sabrina, can do, never hesitate to ask.”

  “Yes sir! Thanks again! I really appreciate that.”

  LTC Vincent started to get up and move onto something else, but then turned around and continued speaking.

  “I've been told that you can provide good intelligence with uncanny accuracy.”

  David was startled. “Well, I don't know sir, I mean I submit my reports based on the trends and analysis that I receive over the net, but I don't know how accurate it turns out to be.”

  “You mean you haven't received any feedback about your input?”

  “Well, yes sir. I've been told that I give good information and that I'm doing a good job; to keep up the good work.”

  LTC Vincent chuckled. “Yes indeed. You give very good information. Your analytical assessment concerning the dismantling of the U.S.S.R and the failed coup attempt prior to any of it taking place was spot on!”

  “I was just making a prediction based on the 'reading of the tea leaves,' sir.”