Into the Sun

by Deni Ellis Béchard

  Most of those who told stories about him had never spoken with him and didn’t try to resolve the contradictions. In Afghanistan, telling conflicting stories about someone wasn’t unusual. That was the nature of the war. Every project was successful. Every project was a failure. Everyone had done something amazing. Everyone was going nowhere.

  Through stories, Justin finally belonged among the expats who gave the scene its color: not the legit correspondents and humanitarian workers so much as the errant visionaries — those who were unemployed and inserted themselves into the activities of others, showing up to events until someone hired them or they established, just by being here, the credentials to be the journalist, activist, or expert they’d dreamed of when they’d cobbled their funds together for a plane ticket.

  Expats ran the gamut. Mackenzie Gray was a Wall Street bond trader who came with twenty grand in camera gear but no training and hired the best fixers to get him through police roadblocks so he could (lacking an agency to file with) post firefight images on social media. Rebecca Henley was a gasket tester in an Alabama Honda factory who, the day after she got her black belt, moved here with the dream of starting training camps that would teach girls how to gouge the eyes and break the arms of men — though, as Tam joked, her students would debilitate their aggressors only to be stoned by their communities. Sierra Light, née MacCarthy, intended to teach yoga to imprisoned Taliban and explained to us that crystals could cure them of fundamentalism, an energetic imbalance.

  Alex Hilfar, a Kiwi, bragged about crossing Afghanistan on his motorcycle and getting shot at by Taliban when he ignored checkpoints. A broken body-armor plate that he claimed had saved his life hung in his room, painted with a skull by a Kabul street artist whose graffiti he’d seen on the Green Zone wall. We all knew his Facebook “saddle selfies” — riding in Paktia, Wardak, or some increasingly perilous area, the washed-out landscape unfurling beyond his leather jacket — matched with an apocryphal post: Returning from having watched a Taliban explosives expert assemble IEDs! Unfortunately, he wouldn’t let me film for fear of being recognized. What a great story it would have been!

  Whitney Weissbrot had written an Afghanistan novel based on interviews, without ever having been here. Her publisher suggested she visit for credibility’s sake before the release, and she’d chartered an armored SUV whereas most foreigners got around in private taxis, ordinary Toyotas that cost five dollars per trip. She’d mortgaged her condo to afford a month here and hung out with the types of people she’d interviewed in the US — those who spent their stays locked in NGO or government compounds. She posted on Facebook hundreds of photos taken through bulletproof glass.

  Pascal Boulay, a Belgian novelist, lived in a defunct kitchen behind a journo house and said he was writing about the American occupation. Another day composing my great American novel, he posted on Facebook. The comments that followed teased him, asking how a Belgian could do this. He let them pile up and responded with his standard pile driver: Come on, guys, two words — Sergio Leone.

  Atul Green, an Indian-American, had a YouTube channel, Atul in Kabul: yolo in the capital, that featured interviews about cultural change with bearded men in shops or pretty university girls who worked as NGO secretaries (a detail we knew but he didn’t divulge, giving the impression he courted them on the street), or that involved close-ups of him consuming Afghan dishes like mantu and bolani. At a party he missed, other expats mocked him and played the bolani webcast. Tam counted the seconds Atul allocated to speaking and to chewing potato-filled flatbread. The ratio was one to four. The video, everyone agreed, was of a guy chewing.

  Anders Jameson was as swarthy as the average Afghan, since his mother was Balinese. He planned to journey overland with refugees to the Mediterranean, where they paid traffickers to strand them on rocky Greek isles so that, if they didn’t die of dehydration, they’d be incarcerated by the coast guard, processed, and released into Europe. He studied Dari, claiming he’d pass as an Afghan — a popular assertion among expats, even the blond ones saying, “I could be Nuristani if I were a bit shorter or not so well-fed.” For most of the expats, their only hope for anonymity was to pass as Nuristanis.

  And there was Tam, with her poppy tattoos. Before we began dating, I heard people describe them, swearing they even framed her pubis. Expats debated what justified a poppy. “I mean, if she stumbles on a funeral in Balkh, does she add a poppy?” “What if she sees a bus fall into a raging river, but the dead are never recovered? Does she read the news and cover herself in poppies?” “And what if she sees dead bodies on TV? That doesn’t happen often.” The few times people teased her, she retorted with brutal stories: an embed on which ISAF soldiers mowed down five teenaged insurgents with rusted rifles; eight civilians torn apart when a bicycle IED detonated in a market; three US soldiers killed by a roadside bomb; and a man she’d dated, a photojournalist, shot in Oruzgan. He’d been there to document life-saving techniques the Afghan National Army was learning in order to decrease casualties. The soldiers used seek-and-destroy tactics, baiting the Taliban by driving around, and one of their Ford Rangers had been hit by an RPG. After a firefight, the insurgents escaped, leaving two of their dead. He videotaped all of it as well as the treatment of the wounded soldiers. He then slung his camera over his shoulder and had just texted her when a soldier shot him in the back of the neck. Tam rode her motorcycle to Oruzgan and composed a photo-essay showing the journey of his body through Afghanistan and back to his family in Delaware. In her absence, people questioned the size of his poppy, or said things like, “He’d only been here a week. He was just a fling.” But they said it quietly since every expat who died here — even a neophyte — became a part of this place and its history.

  There were so many characters living in rundown hotels with foreign mercenaries and businessmen, or in decrepit houses dating back to Kabul’s heyday in the sixties — so many writers scraping by with online articles, dating transients in the NGO community, behaving like celebrities for their courage and rarity, even the most humble and hardworking of them radiating a sense of importance, careening like Gatsby’s guests toward the next party.

  And then there were the soldiers of fortune, military gone mercenary, mocked and avoided. One once approached me, a wiry, acne-scarred man with black stubble on his face and scalp. Proudly, he told me he’d been in the news for a video of a security crew partying — drugs and alcohol, in one case consumed while poured down an unidentified ass crack — that brought unwanted attention to his embassy employers. I asked if he’d had to leave the country, but he explained that the media had simply moved on. He had a new job, pretty much the same thing, but for an NGO. When he asked me back to his place, I declined.

  All expats shared more than we liked to admit: a sense of addiction, an uncertainty about what we’d do if we went home, and a feeling of being awakened — our senses jolted into acuity each time we went outside, perceiving every detail in the street. We felt close to the world’s brilliant core — not shielded, not squinting at screens. Our Facebook and Twitter feeds read like dispatches, and when we heard the resonant thud of a car bomb across the city, we knew we were minutes away from an event the rest of the planet would see on the news.

  We were also fabricators, everyone caught in the freedom of invention, believing in the characters we saw emerging on our social media feeds. War is a collision of fictions, everyone involved — whether military or aid organization — declaring that their actions have profound impact and purpose. NATO tweets @ISAFmedia, @IJC_Press, and @ResoluteSupport described a stable Afghanistan with rock concerts and social service projects, and, in the years to come, as if by familiarity, their statements escalated into a Twitter war with the Taliban: The outcome is inevitable. Question is how much longer will terrorists put innocent Afghans in harm’s way? A Taliban spokesman tweeted back: I dnt knw.u hve bn pttng thm n ‘harm’s way’ fr da pst 10 yrs. Razd whole vllgs n mrkts.n stil hv da nrve t
o talk bout ‘harm’s way.’ When Taliban spokesman @zabihmujahid accidentally activated his geo-location, he was mocked for being in Sindh province, in Pakistan, closer to India than to Afghanistan. Tweets asked if he was getting in some beach time, if the war was too hot for him. But the Taliban themselves used geo-location to their benefit, creating fake profiles of buxom, scantily clad women who befriended horny NATO soldiers so they could gather location information from their feeds to mount attacks.

  When Justin and Alexandra died in the car bomb, @jihad_noorudin tweeted, 2 mr infdls elimnatd by brv mujahid. Allah wl mk us vctorius. NATO tweeted condolences for the families of humanitarian workers. We all read these, knowing how our deaths would sound on either side of this war of fabulation, and that we needed our own fictions — not just of all we’d accomplished but of everything we would achieve — to give us courage. We contrived public missions as covers for our own obsessions and narcissism, or to hide the wounds that drove us here.

  I was no different. Dressing like a Hazara man and walking the streets was not a feat, but perceiving myself differently was — a labor illuminated by Justin’s long, pontifical notes. It was better to enter the crucible and find a purpose — even if this meant becoming one of Kabul’s mocked characters — than it would be to vanish from the pageant without leaving a myth.

  As I wrote my tale about Justin and Clay, I let myself invent, fracturing the narrative, shifting the pieces, mixing them, interleafing my past and theirs, seeing myself through a prism. I felt as if all the books I’d loved had been incinerated in that car, as if American literature itself had come to an end. Its romantic, exaggerated stories of courage wandered into a place where they didn’t belong, where they made no sense, only to burn away, to dissolve like smoke beneath the sun.

  JUSTIN

  Justin was sure to arrive first. To be the one waiting at the bar made him feel less like someone who’d just moved here. Johnny Cash strummed and proclaimed in the speakers. Three white men, bearded and tanned and wearing jeans, drank beer. He tested his voice, trying to hum, and his vocal cords gave a faint breathy rasp, like radio static.

  As Westerners and a few Afghans came in, their expressions changed. They’d passed the guard booth, followed the driveway that wove between concrete blast walls, and now, inside the warm restaurant, with its wooden tables and polished bar, they paused. Some lost their vulnerability, inhaled and smiled. Others bustled in, dramatically brisk and nonchalant, demonstrating that living in a war zone had no effect on them.

  Clay pressed open the door, neither entering tentatively nor hurrying through. He was darker than Justin remembered, his cheekbones running to a strong ridge below his temples. He was unshaved, and his hair, cut close, showed his squarish skull, its deep forehead and hard brow line. Faint scars on his cheeks, maybe from shrapnel or fistfights, lent him a warrior’s demeanor, like African scarifications. His ease began to erode, as if he preferred the outside.

  He turned to Justin and extended his hand.

  Justin.

  How are you, Clay?

  I have no complaints.

  Take a seat. Justin preferred to direct. Idris was at the end of the bar, a grammar workbook and a plate of spaghetti in front of him. Justin wanted time alone with Clay. They ordered steaks — listed on the menu as Nebraska beef.

  So, your mother told me you quit the army to do security.

  Clay’s eyes were still, neutral maybe, but as Justin spoke, they grew colder, their stare making him feel as if they were an inch away, as if they could peel back his skin.

  Security’s a great gig. With the civilian surge, there’s money in protecting expats. The company I work for provides armored SUVs and guards, and installs safe rooms. But I do the K&R.

  K&R?

  Kidnapping and ransom. Kidnappers almost always target rich Afghans. Foreigners are a headache. You take an expat, and you have American Special Ops storming your hideout, but they don’t worry about Afghans. So I track down kidnapped people. It’s extremely lucrative.

  We’ve been working on a hard case — a businessman, guy named Ashraf Tarzi. He has a theological degree in Qu’ranic studies and runs his businesses along very strict lines. Very fair. Gives to the poor. People like him. He was expected to run for parliament. The family has been waiting weeks for word of ransom, but there’s been nothing.

  What will you do? Justin asked, his voice hoarse again.

  For this one, I need to hire a hardworking young Afghan who has contacts.

  Justin coughed. His throat had improved, but it constricted now. He steadied himself against the bar, his skin both warm and cold, night air seeming to linger in his clothes. Whatever weight-room muscle he’d put on felt like lead.

  As a coughing fit doubled Justin over, Clay explained that nearly everyone who moved here got a respiratory infection, especially in the winter.

  Justin cleared his throat, bringing up acrid phlegm.

  Bathroom’s that way. Clay pointed.

  The waitress, a young blonde with lean Eastern European features, arrived with their ten-ounce sirloins and baked potatoes.

  Justin locked the bathroom door and stood at the mirror. He’d learned to measure his moods by his reflection, the prosthetic eye a counterpoint to whatever he felt. He slowed his breathing. He’d been apprehensive because of what happened with Elle, and he also felt guilty whenever he spoke to soldiers and veterans. He knew he shouldn’t: Clay was the reason Justin hadn’t enlisted and Justin was serving nonetheless. He’d come tonight to forgive him.

  When he returned to the table, Clay was starting in on a fresh beer. Idris was eating, angled away. There was something odd about how they sat, positioned like two people deliberately ignoring each other. Clay hadn’t touched his steak.

  Hanging in there? Clay asked, and lifted his beer for a toast.

  Justin took his water and clinked it.

  To old times, he said.

  Clay’s eyebrows shot up. Hell. Okay, man. To old times.

  He drank and laughed, and then forked a chunk of meat into his mouth.

  So why did you leave the military? Justin asked. You were perfect for it. That’s all we ever talked about.

  Clay’s smile was already fading. He took another bite, breathing hard through his nose as he chewed.

  That’s all I knew about.

  Is security or whatever — K&R — satisfying?

  I can support my mother. That’s been satisfying. She’s finishing a master’s degree in psychology. She doesn’t have to waste her life scrubbing toilets for rich people.

  Justin picked at the cooked edges of the steak. It was good, salted and grilled, but he had a hard time getting it down, his throat pulsing like a wound.

  Anyway, what about you? Clay asked. What have you been up to?

  Justin described his studies: undergraduate at Louisiana State, two master’s degrees, and a nearly completed doctorate.

  I never saw you as that type, Clay told him.

  What else was I supposed to do? Get a job on the shrimp boats?

  I figured you for the high life — a businessman, a stockbroker, a New York financier.

  I was idealistic. Justin planted his elbows on either side of his plate. His anger toward Clay bothered him. He suddenly felt incapable of forgiving him without being certain that the shooting was about Elle. Maybe Clay hadn’t known, and his violence had grown from his jealousy of Justin’s place in the world.

  So you enjoying this adventure? Clay asked. That’s what a stint in Kabul is for most people. A way to prove something. Self-realization and bragging rights all on the same junket. There are tours and there is tourism.

  Justin could no longer eat, his throat too raw. His anger and discomfort felt like fever, a visit to a place he’d never wanted to return to. I think I have to go, he said.

  Kabul, Clay told him. It’ll pass. You�
��ll get used to being here.

  Idris went to get the car. Clay and Justin walked out beneath the flat, smogged-up sky.

  They shook hands.

  Great to see you, man, Clay said. Maybe we’ll cross paths again.

  Maybe, Justin replied.

  But then again, it’s a big city, and everyone’s busy.

  Idris pulled up and Justin got in. As they neared the staggered concrete blast walls, he glanced back. Clay was staring, one eye slightly squinting, his nostrils pinched and his lips a firm line. He looked as if he were taking aim.

  CLAY

  From the moment Clay began speaking with Justin, he felt encumbered, the way he had in army training, treading water with clothes on. His brain worked best when he let it be: he knew things suddenly, or reacted, sensing a shift, a person about to appear, a deer crossing the forest, or out there, in the soundless sun-broken ranges, another man. By all standards, this made him lucky. It had saved his ass more times than he could count. Some men talked about angels or guardians, God and that stuff, but Clay’s gut kept him safe. The truth was simple: he didn’t spend much time thinking, so his head wasn’t too busy to hear.

  But as he sat next to Justin, all he did was think, the kind of thinking that got men killed. Justin had always had this effect on him.

  When Justin hurried to the bathroom, Clay was relieved. His head calmed, and he took a drink. Then he caught the Afghan boy studying him.

  What is it, kid?

  The boy was tall and thin, with the fine features of someone who didn’t see a square meal every day.