Captured(8)

I’m marched about three hundred yards from the hut where Barrett and I are being held, shoved through a doorway, stumble on rubble and bits of broken wood. The ceiling is so low I almost have to duck. It’s dark, a single boarded-up window shedding light, a clear plastic bottle hanging from a hole in the roof acting as a makeshift light bulb. There’s a battered couch on one wall, on which sit four men with rifles between their knees. Three wear turbans; one is bareheaded. There is a chair in the center of the room, facing a video camera mounted on a tripod. I can’t help digging my feet in as I realize what’s about to happen. The butt of the rifle hits my wounded shoulder, sending a lance of agony through me, eroding my ability to resist. So far we’ve just been shut in that hut and starved. Something tells me the fun’s about to begin.

A hand grabs my arm, spins me, and shoves me into the chair. A space of ten seconds, and then the rifle butt crashes against my cheekbone, cracking it, splitting the skin. A fist against my wounded shoulder again. A fist to the stomach.

A long and thorough working-over, leaving me bloody and breathless with pain. Then, absurdly, they clean me up. Wipe the blood from my face, give me a sip of brackish water and a piece of bread. The bareheaded man shoulders his rifle and moves behind the camera, turns it on, focuses it on me.

“Name,” he growls.

“Corporal Derek Allen West. United States Marine Corps.” I rattle off my serial number and fall silent.

I tense, brace, expecting a full interrogation or more blows, but instead I’m merely led back to the hut, accompanied by two of the men. They shove me inside, follow behind, and grab Barrett by the arms, dragging him to his feet.

I lunge after them, cursing at them. He can’t handle much more. If they beat him, he won’t survive. I’m stopped by a rifle butt to the forehead, dropping me in my tracks. I see stars, head throbbing, but I scramble to my feet, blinking blood away, reaching for Tom.

Something cold and round touches my forehead, and a hand grips my shoulder blade, shoves me backward. “Shut up,” a voice growls in thickly accented English, “or we kill. Not you. Kill him.”

I go still, wipe my eyes with the back of my hand, and see that they have Barrett on his knees in the dirt outside the hut, an AK pointed at the back of his head.

Barrett is barely able to stay upright on his own, but he blinks and peers at me. Sweat beads on his forehead, drips down his pale face. “Stand…down,” he says, panting for breath.

I sink to my haunches, then to my ass.

They haul him away.

I wait where I sit, bleeding from the skull, aching all over. Time is hard to measure, but it feels like twenty minutes before they drag Tom back to me. He’s unconscious, his face a wreck. His stomach leaks bright red blood. They toss him at me, a heavy, bloody weight crashing against me. I take his weight, roll him onto his back. His shirt is dark and wet, caked with days-old dirt and dried blood, sticking to him. He moans, coughs.

Blinks his eyes open, finds me. “Letter?”

I stick my hand in his BDU pants pocket, find the crumpled, folded envelope. “Here it is. You gonna open it yet or what?”

He grunts, winces, and lets out a long moan. Breathes as deeply as he can, then licks his lips. “Read it.”

“Sure thing, buddy.” I sit cross-legged beside him and unfold the envelope.

I leave bloody fingerprint stains on the dirty white envelope, slide a finger under the flap. I wipe my hands on my pants in a futile attempt to get them cleaner than they are. My hands shake. I withdraw two pieces of thrice-folded paper. Yellow legal pad paper with blue lines. Neat, looping, feminine handwriting.

“‘Thomas, my love,’” I read. Clear my throat and glance at him. “You’d better f*ckin’ appreciate this shit, man.”

“Shut up and read.” A hint of a smirk ghosts across his lips. “Been…saving this letter since we got back from…from leave. She gave it to me just before—gah, it hurts, man—just before I got on the plane. Been waiting.”

“Why?” I ask.

“’Cause I always knew. I knew I wasn’t making it home this time. Always had a feeling.”

“That’s stupid.” I refuse to look at him. “You’re making it home. We both are. The boys are coming for us. You know they are. All these f*ckers are dead — they just don’t know it yet. You just gotta hold on.”

“Don’t be a dumbass, D. You know better. Just read me my—my goddamn letter.” He closes his eyes, breathes in slowly. Lets it out. “Just read it. Please.”

“‘Thomas, my love,’” I read again. “You’re lying next to me, sleeping. There’s so much I wish I could say to you, but I know time is short. You ship out tomorrow. Again….’”

I read the letter to him slowly, scanning ahead. He keeps his eyes closed, listening. Soaking in each word. Fuck me. The raw love that bleeds through the words of that letter burns into me. The love makes my stomach twist, makes my eyes sting. It’s so sweet and f*cking romantic it’s sick. And here the guy’s dying. It should be me. He should get to go home to the girl. Not die here on the floor of some f*cking hut in goddamn Afghanistan. And for what? What are we accomplishing here? I don’t even know. I signed up to fight. To accomplish something. To serve my country. I signed up because I didn’t know what else to do with my life. I signed up because a recruiter came to my high school in his dress uniform and looked so cool it made me want to be like him. Seemed like a better life than building houses with my dad in Bumf*ck, Iowa. Yet here I am, a POW in Bumf*ck, Afghanistan, with a dying buddy lying in the dirt next to me. And I can’t remember why I’m here. What I was supposed to be fighting for.