Friday, October 31, 2008

The Persuing Front

The building continued to creak as the sun began to creep through the cracks in the boarded up windows, the sunlight silently protesting the cold. This year’s winter had been nothing impressive to the locals of Chicago, but for anyone from Texas the cold was depressing and heavy. Brick walls and tall steel rimmed windows housed a small population of refugees from Texas. Political prisoners targeted for assassination by the militias. Rob massaged his forehead with one hand, not putting down his pen. His brow had a permanent tension that had settled in over the past three years. He looked up to see James walking away with his wiry frame shrugging on an old surplus coat, headed up to the second floor to light up the fires for breakfast.
Rob put his pen down and leaned back in his chair “There’s nothing else to do tonight, but I have an appointment this morning” he thought. His smile was genuine but he could not wipe the tension out of his brow. He slapped the desk proclaiming his business of the night finished and rose to meet James upstairs for breakfast.

James was always pleasant in the morning. What Rob appreciated most about James was that his pleasantness was mostly quiet and peaceful, not the loud cheeriness that hinders some morning people from fitting in with those who are not. Rob sat down in the kitchen and waited for James to make his way over with his breakfast.

“The radio said that the Texas Investigation Agency has stricken the first names from the official murder lists last night. Over five hundred names have been erased from the list, and those people are welcome back into the country. Do you want coffee?”

“Yes I do, thank you James. Did they list any of the names? “

“Yeah some, neither one of us will be welcomed back. But I recognized a few from this building.”

“Well that’s good, maybe sometime soon we’ll get the welcome back huh?”

James had a long narrow face with thick dark facial hair that rarely stayed clean shaven. His face is to bony to be beautiful but he had a smile that was infectious and a great cheerful laugh. He smiled at rob and turned to get his coffee.

After eating a small greasy breakfast and a cup of coffee Rob began to make his way to the large double doors at the front of the old warehouse. The guards would stop him to chat as usual.
He stood just inside the door and chatted about whether or not some of the people in building 110 would be heading back to Texas. Rob stood stamping his feet and stuffing his hands as far down into his coat pockets as they would go. After about five minutes he told them he had to meet his wife and headed out into the cold morning at 7:23 in the morning February 20th.

He turned left out of the front doors and headed towards a local bakery he and his wife had been visiting since they arrived in Chicago. The owners were friendly locals who had both lived in Chicago their entire lives. They were both beautiful and pleasant. Both of their families had lived in Chicago for generations and they spoke everyday about how blessed they were to have no connections with the troubles. They also treated Rob and Rachel incredibly nice and gave them free coffee when they ordered pastries.

Rob had walked thirty yards when a cab pulled past him from behind and stopped next to the curb in front him to let the fare out. The door opened and a beautiful young woman stepped out with a number of bags. Rob smiled as he passed her and she flashed and incredible smile back at him and said, “Good Morning”.

“Good Morning.”

Rob passed her but as soon as she gathered all her bags she quickly caught up to Rob and began to pass him. He could hear her approaching; her heels struck the sidewalk with a rhythm that Rob had always found pleasant. Other people were beginning to crowd the street. He heard the rhythm of her heels change as she weave around people making their way to work. Her heels were sounding right behind him as he rounded the corner fifty yards from building 110. As he rounded the corner the beautiful woman hurried around him on his right. As she passed him her long brown hair flew back in his face. He closed his eyes, but he could smell whatever expensive product she used. It reminded him of Rachel, and that he hadn’t bathed in a while. He opened his eyes to find the young woman speeding by him.

Suddenly, the world grew silent and slow. He saw the back of the young woman’s head, just behind her left ear begin to blossom into a terrible rose of red and grey. Her beautiful hair disappeared as the rose bloomed fuller and fuller. He felt the rose cover his face and dampen his coat and shirt. As the rose fell out of view to his right he felt his neck constrict in sickening tightness and simultaneously open up. He saw street scene begin to ascend to the sky in front of him. A blinding light flashed as he felt his chest cave in below his coat. The world jolted to a halt as his knees hit the ground.

I think I’ve been shot he thought. The first thought in long moments woke his mind to the situation. The world still moved as if through deep water, but his mind progressed with a steady clarity he felt should be strange. I’m not going to make it to breakfast. My wife won’t know that I couldn’t help me. I won’t see her again. No one will see the poor beautiful woman again. He look over to see her laying on the ground next him, her head now a destroyed empty shell with all of its life spilled on the ground all about them. He reached out the move one of her bags closer to her body, but he felt himself lean against the building next to him. His back hit the frame of a door way and he began to notice the people in the streets running away from him.

I guess this is the last?

I don’t know if this is it, but it must be close.

How unfair for her, glancing at the body next to him

And for Rachel he thought.

“I should cry for her”, these were his last thoughts as he slowly blacked out.






Sometime later Rob began to hear gunshots. He heard them intermixed with two female voices. He could still feel himself slouched against the side of the building. He thought he opened his eyes, but still couldn’t see anything right away. As he kept trying to blink his vision slowly returned like a windshield losing its frost from a heater.

He could see one young woman kneeling down in front of him looking down at him. She was covered in blood and holding something over his neck. He could see her face. She had blue eyes and brown hair. She kept looking from his neck to his eyes as if she were looking for something she couldn’t quite see in them. He moved his eyes to other girl who was kneeling by his feet and was holding something tight around his abdomen. All he could see were her strong looking arms and the black curly hair on top of her head.

Rob felt a hand press against his cheek and heard the other woman’s voice grow louder. He slowly moved his eyes to look up at her. She was looking at him, looking for something from him but he didn’t know what. He felt disappointed in himself that he couldn’t help her. He didn’t think he could speak and strangely he didn’t want to try.

The gunshots were growing louder. The two women became frenzied and began to speak more quickly. He still couldn’t make out what they were saying, they sounded as if they were speaking with a towel stuffed in their mouths. The brown haired girl moved around to his back and keeping pressure on his neck positioned her arms under his. The black hair girl tied something down around his chest and moved to pick up his ankles.

They began to move him into the nearest storefront door. From what he could see it was some kind of electronics store, a cell phone store maybe. As his body straightened out he could feel his shoulder tighten and his neck open up. The pain was incredible but he still couldn’t make a sound. He could only endure as he body stiffened in silent protest.

At first the two young women were moving cautiously slow. Suddenly gunshots began to ring out as if they were right outside. Rob could hear them echoing hollowly down the street and fade away underneath the el train. He could see the dust and cement fragments on the ground begin to skip and dance with bullets. The young women abandoned caution and began to lunge with his stiff body into the store front.

Suddenly all the sound was sucked out of the air. Rob could feel the suction trying to rip out his ear drums. He felt the vacuum lift his body, and the two young women through the store front window. He didn’t feel the window shatter around him, but as he traveled through the window frame he could see the shards of glass slowly rotating in the air next to his face like asteroids in a suspended orbit around his face.

Sound returned to him with a roaring attack. Three more explosions rocked the building around them immediately after the first one. As loud as the roar of the explosions were, the silence that followed was so intense he could feel it weighing down on his body crushing his chest. He was lying on his back behind the counter of the store. The brown hair woman was stirring three feet away from him. She was lying on her stomach and trying to pull her splayed out arms and legs into her body like a frightened turtle. He saw her raise her head and look at him. When she saw him looking at her he lifted his hand to wave, as soon as he tried his chest exploded with pain and his body went rigid again.

He saw her begin to stretch out her limbs, her left hand pressed to the glass littered floor of the store and her right hand with a bloody torn shirt began to extend towards him. Her right knee drew up to push her in his direction. Her terrified unblinking eyes never left his as she slithered across the floor in his direction. When she reached him she lifted his torso into her lap and leaning against the wall behind the counter she began to put pressure on the wound in his neck again.

His head against her chest he could hear her heart beat, quick and rhythmic. He lay there listening. The gun shots were still ringing through the streets but the sounded different. They had a reciprocal quality to them, not just a massacre anymore.

He could hear more rustling debris in the store on the other side of the counter. He could feel the young woman’s chest vibrate with urgent cries.

“Amanda! Amanda! Are you ok!? Where are you!? Come behind the counter!?”

Amanda’s voice returned to her from the other side of the counter each word tracking her progress towards the wall opposite where Rob and Anna were sitting, “I need you to stay where you are Anna ok, just stay with the patient alright.”

“Are you ok, are you hurt!?”

A pause accentuated by rustling debris stretched out before Amanda began to answer.

“Anna, sweet heart I’m gonna get to where I can see you and help you as long as I can alright, but I need you to promise…

Rob could feel Anna’s heart rate begin to grow heavier and frantic, “Amanda! Get over here! What’s wrong? Why won’t you come to me, I need you right now! Amanda!” He could feel her tears begin to fall on his temple and streak down his cheeks.

He saw a face appear around the corner of the counter and smile at them both. Her black curly hair was frazzled and she had blood trickling out of her nose, ears, and mouth. She had a strong square face with short black curly hair, dark eyes, and a comforting smile had she not had two of her teeth knocked out and blood stained teeth. She continued over Anna’s screaming, “I need you to promise that you will stay with the patient Anna”.

Anna was struggling to speak through her sobs and her words sounded stained and drawn out. “Don’t say that! What are you saying!? Why won’t you come over here?”

“Anna I can see that your leg is broken just below the knee from here, ok. You need to stay there, and he needs you to stay there.” As she spoke Amanda began to push herself away from them towards the opposite wall. She had sat up and was pushing herself backwards on her bottom continuing to face them as she slowly slid through the rubble.

“Anna your doing so good darling, you’re doing fine, you just stay with him and keep your leg immobilized until help arrives.”

Anna’s voice had fallen to a strained whisper, “Why do you keep saying these things, why won’t you come to me?” As Amanda kept sliding away from them her legs came into view. He could feel Anna’s heart stop for a moment through her chest. He felt her chest heave as she threw her head back against the wall. Her chest was jumping sporadically gasping for air. Her hand clinched his shift on his chest so hard that two buttons ripped off and he could feel the stress in his chest wound, the hand on his neck wound remained extraordinarily calm with consistent pressure.

He still couldn’t move or speak but he could see what was left of Amanda’s legs. Her left leg was missing from mid thigh down and was grossly charred. The right leg was severely mangled below the knee and was being useless dragged across the floor by a slight remnant of skin. The left leg was swelling noticeable and the right leg was bleeding freely leaving large paint brush streaks across the floor.

Anna’s head came back down and he could hear her voice reverberate in his ear a deep primal groan of despair.

Amanda made it the far wall and propped herself up facing them. “Anna darling, you need to stay with him. He’s the only one here you can do anything for.” Amanda smiled and continued, “I don’t feel anything Anna, there’s no pain.”

Anna’s voice caught and she choked on words she couldn’t get out. Rob couldn’t get anything to work in his head, he saw everything but couldn’t react, he just lay watching Amanda feeling Anna.

“You’re going to be fine Anna, help will come soon and you’re gonna be alright, you’ll need to look after him for a while ok.” Amanda’s voice began grow softer and her eyes more distant.

“You’ll be needed around here after this ok, you’ve got to keep going, keep helping people”.

Anna’s sobs were now consistent and heavy, rocking his head back and forth on her chest.

Amanda’s smile began to waver and her stare fixated on something just to the right of their heads and on the other side of the store wall.

“I don’t feel nothing, I’m fine…you’ll be fine…I love you Anna, and you need to keep…stay with him, and keep…you’ll be…” Amanda’s head to the left against the wall but her body stayed upright, her star now far off past anything Rob could think of.

Anna groaned and cried heavily soaking his hair and face in her tears. He could feel her heart steady into a long enduring pace for mourning. He lay in her arms staring at Amanda and wondering where his wife was. The slow rocking of Anna’s heaving body was calming. His thought’s lost all sequence as he lay there and he slowly lost conscious again.


Rob woke slowly. Although he couldn’t tell how he arrived he knew immediately that he was in a hospital bed. He thought,” This is where I would be after what happened. How did I survive? How close was I to dying?”

He lay there as the memories began to order themselves into a chain of events. Once they started he wished they hadn’t. The young woman’s head exploding on to his face. Shot in the neck, then again in the chest. Waking up to the women kneeling over him. The explosions. Watching Amanda die. Feeling Anna’s stress and anguish through the back of his neck and head. He was surprised at how much he remembered. The events, and the two women’s’ names.

It was day outside his window and all he could see were two trees and a little bit of blue sky. He wanted to know what happened. “Where is my wife?” he thought. “How long have I been here?”

He was going to continue with the self questioning when the door to his room slowly opened.
Slowly around the door a young woman peered in. Anna, he recognized her hair and eyes. They looked at each other for a moment. It was the first time they had looked each other coherently in the eyes. They were awkward. Like walking in on a relative’s friend dressing and then meeting them later. Their experience together had been to intimate to allow for common introductions now.

Rob spoke and found his voice strained and barely more than a whisper. She saw his mouth move but couldn’t hear him and waited for him to motion her in before she fully entered the room. She limped across the room with crutches and a cast on her foot. She leaned her crutches against his bed and stood by his feet facing him propped up on number of pillows looking at her. She was plain in most of her features, altogether unremarkable, except for the shape of her eyes. Their color was an ordinary blue, but they were beautifully shaped like slender almonds. For the first time he considered what he must look like to her.

“How do I look?” his voice softly grated.

She immediately looked away with a smile and starting to cry she turned back to him and said,
“You shouldn’t try to speak.”

“I shouldn’t be alive”

“No you shouldn’t. The wound in your neck missed your carotid artery by a hair, and the wound in your chest nicked your heart. You had a lot of internal bleeding, you should have died. We also pulled about a pound of shrapnel and glass out your legs and ass too. No one here knows how you survived, you shouldn’t have.” Her voice shook and lost some of its pleasantness.

“Huh. Are you ok, are you being treated here?”

“Yes, I also work here, I’m a paramedic”

They paused for a few minutes and just considered each other.

“You saved my life, you and your friend.” She looked away and wiped fresh tears from her face. When she turned back to him her chin was crumpled and quivering.

“Thank you”, he finished.

She looked at him sternly for a minute. Her face contorted almost to anger and her body became rigid and posture distant. She asked as she started to weep, “Are you a good man?”

She stood there facing him, trembling, openly hurting and gripping the foot of his bed. He was struck for the first time since being shot with overwhelming emotion. He felt sad and guilty for her, guilty to be alive.

“I try to be.”
She choked for a minute then wiped her face again. Still looking at him sternly she said, “You had better try real hard to be a good man.”

“I will. I’m sorry”, he whispered.

She stood there and watched him melt into crying motionlessly.

“It’s better for you not to talk too much, I should go.”

She quickly turned and headed for the door. He tried to ask if she knew anything about his wife, but whether she heard him or not, she walked out the door and closed it behind her.

*This isn't finished but I thought I'd post what I had.