Certain Jeopardy

by Jeff Struecker

  J.J. knew Paul regretted not earning his Ranger tab, and he walked softly around the issue. Although Paul was stronger and just as determined, he lacked endurance—the ability to shut out the pain and press forward. He possessed enormous courage, but courage wasn’t enough to be a Ranger.

  “Look out now,” J.J. said. “You’re about to be passed.”

  “Ain’t gonna … happen.”

  The distance between them had closed to three yards. J.J.’s heart threatened to pop out of his chest, but he kept up the assault. “Do you prefer that I pass on the left or the right?”

  “I prefer quiet.”

  “Sorry, I didn’t realize you were meditating.”

  Paul’s legs began to move faster as he rose from the seat, usinghis weight to drive the pedals down. The fight was against the grade and gravity. The path started as a shallow slope but grew more intense with each mile. Five miles in, J.J. felt as if he were riding up Mount McKinley. He had two advantages: First, he was smaller, so simple physics said he had to do less work to reach the top. Second, he had the mental ability to block out pain—which was good since every joint in his body complained and every muscle was ablaze.

  Fifty yards from the crest of the trail, J.J. poured what little energy he had left into the race and shot past Paul. He tried to offer a smart-aleck remark as he passed, but that required wasting a precious breath. Paul reached the peak thirty seconds later, sucking air by the barrelful. J.J. tried to appear nonchalant about the climb, but he couldn’t maintain the act. He too was drawing air in noisy wheezes.

  “I … thought I had … you this time.” Paul leaned over the handlebars as if studying his front tire. “At least it was close.”

  “Well, I stopped for lunch back there.”

  “Yeah, right. Lunch. I’m going to beat you someday. You know that. It’s as certain as the sunrise.”

  “Never going to happen. I have a reputation to protect.” J.J. hoped the trembling in his legs wasn’t obvious.

  “It’s not a fair race. I’m older than you.”

  J.J. faced his brother. “No you’re not, we’re the same age. That’s why they call us twins.” “I’m twenty-two minutes older. Besides, it’s not the years; it’s the mileage.” “Oh, is that what it is? You got twenty-two minutes more of hard life than me?”

  “Okay, smart guy, I’m going to come over there and pummel you.”

  J.J. laughed. “It’s a good five feet between us. Think you can make the distance?”

  Paul shook his head. “No, but give me a couple of minutes … days … weeks … then I’ll show you who the real man is. In the meantime, I’ll just add it to my list.”

  “What’s that bring me to?”

  Paul straightened and stretched his back. “I think you’re up to thirty-five pummelings, fourteen poundings, and three kicks in the seat of the pants.”

  “A man could get hurt enduring that kind of beating. Good thing you’re in no hurry.”

  “I’m a patient man and—”

  The chirping of a cell phone interrupted. J.J. pulled the device from the pocket of his jersey and glanced at its face. 8035559115.

  “Creditor track you down?” Paul asked.

  “We gotta go.”

  “There’s no rush. I need a few more minutes to rest.”

  “Sorry, bro. No can do. We have to leave now.” He turned his bike around. “Why does it have to be today?” He caught Paul staring at him. “What?”

  “You’re being called up?”

  “I’m wanted at the base. I’ve got an hour to get there. You’re going to have to drop me off.” He watched his brother open his mouth to speak, then close it. He’d been in the Army long enough to know what the call meant. J.J. also knew his brother was too much of a professional to ask.

  “At least it’s all downhill from here.”

  J.J. started down the slope, moving as fast as was wise. A serious spill now could mean an injury. And this wasn’t the time for injuries.

  CHAPTER 4

  PETE RASOR STRUGGLED TO seem interested. It had been an hour-long effort, a marathon torture session he knew wouldn’t end before dinner.

  “I’m thinking of rose-colored gowns for the bridesmaids. What do you think, honey?” The question came from Samantha Whitmire, soon to be Samantha Rasor, who sat to his left at the dining room table. Her mother, Ruby, sat to his right. He was surrounded.

  “Rose or pink?” Pete asked. “They’re pretty much the same, aren’t they?”

  “Not at all, Petey. Rose is darker, prettier.”

  He hated being called Petey, and Samantha knew it. “Rose is fine with me.” His eyes drifted to the television that had been left on. Every time he visited Samantha’s mother’s home, the television was on, and if it was daytime, then he could bet heavy money that it had been tuned to a soap opera.

  “Look, I know this is hard for you, sweetheart, but we do have to make decisions about the wedding. Please try to pay attention.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Don’t ‘yes, ma’am’ me. I’m your fiancée, not your commanding officer.”

  “Yes, ma’am … I mean, you’re right.”

  His future mother-in-law joined in. “What I want to know is what kind of tux you’re going to wear. I think tails are nice.”

  Pete glanced at the woman. Was she kidding? Or maybe she’d gone senile since the last time they had this discussion. “I’ll be wearing my dress uniform, Mrs. Whitmire.”

  “I had so hoped you would change your mind. And I’ve told you to call me Mom.”

  “We’ve already decided that the base chaplain will perform the wedding. My uniform is the appropriate thing to wear.”

  “But it’s so ugly—olive green with all those colored pins.”

  Pete tried not to bite through his lip. “The dress uniform is blue, not green. It looks sharp. The best uniform in the military.”

  “But don’t you think a tux would be—”

  “Leave it alone, mother,” Samantha snapped. “We can talk about it later.”

  “What’s to talk about? Military wedding means military dress uniform.”

  Ruby’s brow creased. “That’s why I think a civil ceremony would be better. Besides, Samantha tells me—”

  “Mother!”

  Pete studied them. “What?”

  “Nothing.” Samantha’s dismissal came too fast.

  “It doesn’t sound like nothing. What were you going to say … Mom?”

  “Sam just mentioned that she felt you’d be leaving the Army soon.”

  “Is that so?” He turned to Samantha. “When did I say I was leaving the Army? This is my career. You know that.”

  She redirected her gaze to the pad of paper on which she had been documenting wedding plans. “Honey, it’s just that I don’t like to be separated from you. And at some point we’ll be starting a family, and with children involved it would be better if you were a civilian.”

  “I grew up in an Army family, and I turned out all right. Good enough for you to accept my proposal.”

  “I know, but I don’t want our children to have to go through all that.”

  “What did I go through? My father was strict but fair. I had a great childhood.”

  Samantha frowned. “You know what I mean.”

  “No, I don’t. Why don’t you tell me?”

  “It’s just … the Army interferes with our life. Who knows where they’re likely to send you? And I’m left home to worry. I can’t even plan my own wedding without consulting the Army.”

  “Your wedding? I thought it was our wedding.”

  “Of course it is. I didn’t mean it like that.”

  Ruby spoke up. “A girl dreams of the perfect wedding. It’s her day. Surely you understand that.”

  “And what about the groom? He’s just decoration?”

  “Now you’re being ridiculous.” Samantha began to tear up.

  Pete stiffened. Crying was unfair; it changed all the rules. No mat
ter what he said now it would be wrong, and in the end he would be responsible for putting a damper on her “special day.”

  “Maybe we should talk about the flowers,” Ruby suggested.

  “I don’t feel like talking anymore.” Samantha rose and moved from the dinning room table to the living room, plopping down on a well-worn sofa.

  The one thing the Army didn’t teach me was how to deal with women. Pete slipped from his chair and joined her. At least Ruby had the good manners to go to the kitchen and wash some clean dishes.

  “Samantha, don’t be this way. This is supposed to be the greatest day of our lives. I know there’s a lot of planning to do and a bunch of expectations, but we’ll get through it.”

  “I know.” She lowered her voice. “Mom is putting a lot of pressure on me. Not to mention my sister and my aunt. Everyone seems to know what I want better than I do.”

  “I know what I want: you.” He kissed her on the forehead.

  She smiled. “I love you more than anything, but I do want you to think about what I said about the Army.”

  “I could ask the same of you.”

  A tinny rendition of a Rolling Stones tune erupted from his pocket. He retrieved the cell phone and saw the string of numbers.

  “Uh-oh. You’re not going to like this.”

  CHAPTER 5

  ADRIANO SANTI WAVED ONE more time as he watched the helicopter rise into the cerulean sky, point its nose toward Caracas, and thunder off. The rotor blast mussed Santi’s hair, something he couldn’t abide. The moment the craft began to move away, he removed a comb from his suit coat and ran it through his black and gray hair until every strand rested in its proper place. Returning the comb, he brushed the dust from his handmade suit. Despite the aircraft’s assault on his fastidiousness, he remained in place until the helicopter reached altitude, carrying his president back to the palace.

  Santi had his own palace, this ten-thousand-square-foot hacienda in the Cordillera de la Costa Mountains. It had been in the family for two generations before passing to him. His wealth, drawn from oil interests, allowed him to renovate it to his tastes. And he had expensive tastes.

  With the president of Venezuela on his way, Santi strode across the manicured lawn and into the white courtyard fronting the mansion. A fountain with a marble representation of the Roman goddess Fortuna greeted him with calming, quiet bubbles. He stopped and studied the statue for a moment. He had seen it countless times, but given the gambit he was currently undertaking, the thinly garbed statue took on a new meaning. Fortuna, goddess of fortune and fate. He had the previous quality in abundance and hoped the latter would not turn against him.

  He moved to his spacious office and took a seat behind his handcrafted Honduran mahogany desk. He had barely settled in when a servant in a white coat appeared and set a cup of thick, rich coffee before him then silently slipped from the room. No words were exchanged.

  Four days were all that remained. Ninety-six hours and the operation would begin. He sipped the Ethiopian coffee then looked at his phone, a wasted gesture. His team would not call on the phone, even though it was a secure line. Word would come by personal messenger.

  Setting the cup aside, Santi pulled close a file that rested on his desk and opened it: a security report on the movements of the president of the United States. A routine document. His trip to Australia held nothing of concern for the foreign minister. On the other hand, the American president’s planned trip to Brazil next month provided greater interest. He opened another file. The document inside revealed a rising discontent in Cuba and with Fidel’s successor, Raul Castro. This was to be expected. Latinos were a hot-blooded people, and protesting against their leaders was a heritage. Santi knew that as well as anyone, having served Hugo Chavez for many years. He had seen and heard his share of angry citizens.

  He rose and moved to a window overlooking the dense forest that surrounded his compound. There was work to be done— letters to be dictated and reports to review. But his mind was anchored four days in the future.

  * * *

  REUBEN ESTEVEZ STOOD BY the grave, his arm around his wife, Estella. He crossed himself with his right hand as the priest, robed in white with a purple stole, finished his prayer. The priest, a young man of thirty, continued to speak, with an older priest standing by his side. Reuben didn’t hear the words. His ears were filled with the sharp report of a gunshot, a sound he heard every hour of every day since it first assaulted his ears three days before.

  Three days. Such a short time had passed with excruciating slowness. Minutes stumbled by like hours, especially at night. The dark of evenings served as an amplifier that magnified each piercing stab, heating every emotion to a molten mass of pain—fury, regret, guilt, and despair. Three days and nights, and he had slept less than a dozen hours the entire time.

  Sleep doesn’t come to a man who finds his sixteen-year-old son dead in an alley, holes in his forehead, chest, and abdomen. Such a sight branded the brain, infecting the memory until every neuron became tainted with the image.

  Estella raised a handkerchief to her nose. He pulled her tight. Without his support she would have crumbled to the moist ground the moment the service began. She barely spoke these days. Her voice would return, he told himself, but his heart held doubts. Tears flowed from a bottomless reservoir. Reuben could not comfort her; he could not comfort himself. He spent hours holding her, communication riding on waves of silence and through empty eyes.

  Reuben was a quiet man, a sensitive man, a man content to serve others and share a laugh with the customers who patronized his small restaurant in the eastern part of the city. Many of those stood behind him now, silently offering prayers to God and willing their strength to the man they called friend.

  The priest’s words continued to hum in his ears but failed to become packets of meaningful communication. To Reuben it was little more than the buzzing of a bee.

  Someone touched Reuben on the shoulder. He turned and saw the gray eyes of the old priest who had stood by his young charge. The man’s eyes held the images of a thousand tragedies. “The Lord bless you and keep you, my son.”

  Reuben nodded but couldn’t form words. Others stepped forward and spoke soft sentences of grief and support. Estella offered the families their gratitude, proving again that she was the sturdier of the two. Reuben struggled to stay strong enough to support his wife. Anything else would tax him beyond his power.

  A few moments later only Reuben and Estella stood at the edge of the grave. A short movement to his right caught his attention. A glance showed three men waiting to lower the casket and fill the hole.

  “We must go. The men are waiting.”

  Estella raised the handkerchief again. “I know. Just a moment or two longer.”

  He tightened his arm around her. “Another moment then.”

  “Why our boy?”

  “I don’t know. Why anyone’s boy?”

  “They killed me when they killed him.”

  Reuben nodded. They had only the one son—only Ricardo, and no parent ever had a better child. “It should be me in the grave. Had I known, I would have taken out the garbage.” He lowered his head. “To be killed doing something so simple, so insignificant.” He wanted nothing more than to straddle the casket, to be lowered into the grave with his son and let the men cover him over. His own death seemed so inviting.

  “It was his job, husband. You did nothing wrong.”

  “Still I wish to God it were me in that box.”

  Estella didn’t respond. She didn’t need to. He knew she wished for the same thing, not because she hated him that much, but because she loved Ricardo that much more. He would be hurt if she felt any other way.

  Five minutes later Reuben Estevez led his wife from the grave and into a dark gray future. Their reason for living would be in the ground soon.

  CHAPTER 6

  LUCY MEDINA LAUGHED AS she watched her husband tuck the Nerf football under his arm, struggling toward an imagin
ary goal line and besieged by three tiny players who grabbed his legs and held on to his trousers. Weighed down by five-year-old Maria, six-year-old Matteo, and eight-year-old Jose Jr., Jose Medina staggered a few steps then crashed to the ground like a fallen redwood, careful not to squish any of his children. The kids cried, “Tackle!”

  Maria jumped to her feet and shouted to Lucy, “Did you see, Mother? Did you see?”

  Lucy rose from the picnic table and applauded. “Good job, children. Your father had it coming.”

  Maria clapped her hands and jumped. “We tackled you, Daddy. We tackled you.”

  Jose said something that made the kids squeal. A moment later the four were wrestling in the grass.

  It’s going to take me a week to get out the grass stains. Lucy chuckled. “Get him, kids. Make him take us out for ice cream.”

  “Ice cream! Ice cream!” The three children chanted in unison and attacked again.

  A smooth breeze wafted through her black hair, carrying the sweetness of mowed grass mixed with the aroma of hot dogs roasting on one of the park’s barbecues. The day was perfect, with a high sun shimmering through a clear sky—a great day for a family picnic. There had been too few of these.

  She rubbed a hand over her belly and felt her unborn child kick. Lucy was thirty-two, married, with three children and one on the way. Her sister called her “the baby factory.” She once told Lucy, “You should have married a Navy man. They ship out for six months at a time.” But having babies fit nicely with Lucy’s ideal for life, and the man who made her life perfect lay on his back in the grass getting the stuffing beat out of him by his own children.

  Lucy watched the hubbub, the earlier smile still etched on her face. But the grin dissolved as the football-turned-wrestling match came to a sudden stop. Jose stood and removed his cell phone. The kids were still chanting, “Ice cream.” She saw him look at the caller ID. He didn’t open the clamshell device; he just stared for long moments. His shoulders slumped and he raised his eyes to meet hers.