Authors: R.D. Power
The whole fight took only sixty-seven seconds. None of the three laid a hand on him.
Dominic, in shock over Robert’s ruthless efficiency, stood frozen for a minute, then he turned to run. Robert picked up the gun and warned, “Take one more step, and I’ll drop you!”
Dominic stopped and petitioned Bill: “Help!”
Robert looked around at Bill, who was holding a gun, but not pointing it; he saw Kristen approaching. Bill told Robert to drop the gun. Robert threw the gun aside. Then he walked up to Dominic, seized him by the throat, and lifted him off the ground, the fence supporting his weight. Dominic couldn’t breathe.
“Laugh now, ball-licking ass-rammer!” Robert challenged.
Kristen urged, “Bobby, stop it! Let go of his neck. He can’t breathe.”
“That’s the idea. Look at the fucker squirm. Feels awesome, doesn’t it?”
“Let go of him,” insisted the inspector.
“No!” screamed Robert. “He deserves to die! He can’t just get away with ruining my life. That fucking airline pilot got away with it. Not this time!”
Striding to his side, Kristen pleaded, “Let him go. You’re not a murderer!”
“Yes I am!”
“This is not you! You’re a good man. Only the best could have done what you did. Don’t throw everything away for him. He’s not worth it. You’d spend the rest of your life in jail!”
“The rest of my life … If I really did something so special, would they put me in jail for killing one measly crook?”
“You know the answer to that question. You know murder is wrong. It would ruin your life; it would ruin your soul!” She grasped his elbow and entreated with passion, “
Please let him go
!”
Deep within him, his conscience was telling him the same thing. In his mind, he saw his mother and sister crying, and his father shaking his head over what he was doing. There was also the police officer standing behind him with his gun drawn. He lowered his head, released his grip, and dropped the frightened man, who fell to the ground clutching his throat and gasping for air. Bill put his gun away and came up to Robert to put on handcuffs. He didn’t resist. Bill checked on the three prone men.
“They’re alive. If I meant to kill them, they’d be dead,” Robert said.
“But you did mean to kill Dominic,” Bill asserted.
“He deserves to die as much as anyone I killed in Iraq. I can’t stand the thought that he’ll just get away with what he did to me.”
“I want him charged with attempted murder!” squeaked Dominic. Robert went for him again, handcuffed and all, ready to kick him to death, but Kristen stood in his way. He backed down.
Kristen addressed herself to Dominic. “If you have him charged, he’ll come back to get you when he gets out, and I won’t stop him,” she pointed out. “You’ll spend every waking minute looking over your shoulder.”
Bill told Dominic to see to his unconscious entourage and led Robert to his car. Kristen followed.
“Hold it,” Dominic said. “If I don’t press charges, will you agree to leave me alone?”
Kristen looked at Robert imploringly. “Yes,” he replied caustically.
“Then I won’t press charges,” Dominic said.
As Bill put Robert in the car, he said, “I can still charge you with attempted murder and assault, you know.”
“No, Dad, please,” Kristen begged. “He stopped. He let him go.” Bill started the car and drove off.
“Do I have your word this feud with Dominic is over?”
“Yes,” Robert promised.
Bill drove for a few minutes without saying anything. Finally, he said, “I’m releasing you, but only because of what you did for your country.”
“Thank you, Dad,” Kristen said. “Come home with us please, Bobby.”
“No, Kristen. We’ve been through this. Let me out here, Mr. Taylor. I need to be alone.” He stopped the car, helped Robert out and took off the handcuffs. “Goodbye, Mr. Taylor. Goodbye, Kristen.” It sounded final.
The Taylors drove away, Bill worried about what the embittered, dangerous man might do next, and Kristen looking at him receding as the distance between them grew, fearing it would be the last she would ever see of him. Her sole hope lay with fate.
•
Upon returning to the United States, Robert had called the Twins to ask about signing with the team. They suggested he follow his plan to go to university so they could assess his prospects. He wrote letters to the three universities that had granted him baseball scholarships, asking for another chance. He didn’t mention his injured hand. All three said yes, though baseball scholarships depended on his performance, and he chose Berkeley.
Unbeknownst to Kristen, he stayed with Kim and his son over the summer. He walked up to her door and stood there a few moments to muster his courage. He rang the bell. Kim answered and immediately rushed out to hug him. After a moment, she said, “Thank God you’re okay … You are okay?”
He nodded, but she saw the truth in his eyes, dark semicircles below underscoring the sorrow within. She touched his face gently and kissed his cheek. “Come in. It’s been the better part of two years. I tried to reach you, but never could. Why didn’t you call or write?”
“I’m sorry. It’s complicated. I wanted to. I’m not sure I know myself.”
“Kristen told me you were the other soldier who got the UN arms inspectors out. Is it true?”
“Yes, but I have to keep it quiet. I just want to forget the whole thing.”
Kim hugged him again. “I’m so proud of you. Can we at least tell our son?”
“When he gets older, and we can trust him to keep a secret.”
“Brian,” she called. “There’s someone very special here to see you.” The cute little toddler scurried up to his mother and stood behind her legs, head jutting out looking up at the tall stranger. Robert stood next to Kim, as afraid of his son as his son was of him. Seeing how Brian had grown and knowing he’d missed most of his son’s life thus far, Robert felt empty inside. “Brian, this man is your father. He’s your daddy. Can you give him hugs and kisses?” He clung to his mother’s leg. “Don’t worry,” she told Robert. “He’ll come around. Just give him some time.”
After almost a week at Kim’s, the three went out to the backyard as the weather at last turned clement. Kim was showing Robert her new Stewartia tree when they heard a splash. He ran over and saw Brian in the pool, so he jumped in fully clothed to rescue his son. Standing in the pool holding the boy in his arms, he was shaking. He embraced Brian, kissed his head and began to cry.
“He’s okay, Bob,” reassured Kim. “He can swim. Let him go. Really, he’ll be fine.”
It took about a minute, but Robert finally let go, and off Brian went to the deep end, swimming like a pro. Robert stayed within an arm’s length the whole time.
“You know you’re not to jump in when Mommy or Daddy isn’t there. Never do that again, all right?” said Kim. He nodded and swam off. Robert got out, sloshed to the deck, and removed sneakers, socks, shorts, and shirt, and went in to change.
He came out again a few minutes later and sat next to Kim, watching Brian swim. He was embarrassed about the incident. “It never occurred to me such a small boy could swim. I must have looked pretty foolish.”
“You were trying to protect your child. That’s what fathers do.”
Feeling he needed to excuse himself for crying, he admitted, “I thought—now that I’m here, he’s going to drown for sure.”
“Oh, Bob, how can you think that?” She held his hand. “Brian won’t die because you love him. You must know there can’t be a cause and effect relationship between your love and anyone’s death. It’s not your fault your family died, Bob. It was their time or just bad luck. They didn’t die because you loved them.”
Brian got out of the pool and for the first time climbed onto his father’s lap, seeking warmth and protection. Robert put his arms around his son and leaned his head over to provide both. It was the beginning of love for father and son. This little being, a lost part of himself restored to him, was helping to reawaken in him hope for the future, and a willingness to entertain the possibility of love without fear of loss. Looking at his delightful, innocent, vivacious child, how could he, how could anyone, doubt that life was worthwhile, and that love was indispensable to it? Robert no longer doubted this, but still couldn’t help asking himself,
What if he dies?
Kim was, of course, curious about his experience in Iraq and asked about it, but he was chary of details. He had nightmares every night, sometimes waking up screaming. For that reason, and because of the possibility he had HIV, he declined her invitation to sleep with her. Kim did her best to comfort him. Sometimes she’d hear him weeping in the bathroom, where he’d go to hide his tears from Kim and Brian. She would leave him to grieve, but condole with him when he came out and invite him to talk about it. He never said much.
Brian asked his mother one August morning, “Why Daddy cwying? Is he huwt?” This would have been difficult to explain to an adult, never mind a toddler, though it helped that he gave every indication of taking after his father in intelligence.
“Yes, Brian,” she began as she picked him up and sat him on her lap, “he is hurt. You see, he went away to do something very important for you and me and a lot of other people. Some very bad men were going to do something awful that would have hurt millions of people. That’s more people than you’ve ever seen! We had to send some brave men to stop them, and your daddy was one of them.”
“Did the bad men huwt Daddy?”
“Yes they did.”
“Wherwe?”
“He’s hurt in a lot of places: his hands, his face, his chest; but mostly he’s hurt inside.”
“He has a tummy ache?”
“No, it’s more like he’s sad.”
“Why?”
“Well, sometimes a good man like Daddy has to do bad things to stop bad men. Whenever a good man does bad things, it makes him sad.”
“Is dat why Daddy scweams?”
“Partly. And Daddy saw a lot of scary things that the bad men did, so he’s having nightmares. Now, I don’t want you to worry about the bad guys coming here, okay? Your daddy got them all.”
He nodded and went to the bathroom door, knocked and said, “Daddy, let me in.”
“Not right now, little fella,” answered the weeping man. His next HIV test was looming, and the stress was overwhelming.
“I want to kiss you bettew.”
Robert opened the door and saw Brian holding out his arms to be picked up. Robert did his son’s bidding. Brian kissed him on his hands, cheek and chest, and on his stomach for his inside. He hugged his child and cried some more.
That night, Robert went through his trunk. He took out his baseball mitt and put it on his hand. As he opened and closed it and punched the pocket, he reflected on what might have been, what would have been if not for his awful luck. With tears in his eyes, he put the glove back and sorted through the disarrayed remnants of his dead family. Oh, the irretrievable loss! Still bedeviling him a dozen years later. What might have been, what would have been were it not for his awful luck. He slammed the lid down and kicked the trunk. He was tired of the sinking feeling he got every time he opened it. The last thing he needed was to dwell on his family’s tragedy with the horrendous memories from Iraq weighing him down.
He looked at the trunk with hatred and made a decision. After dashing upstairs to get a garbage bag, he returned to his trunk and opened it. He began by stuffing his old clothes into the garbage bag: no loss there. Next he put in the glove. That was harder, but it was a price he was willing to pay to put his past behind him. The first keepsake he lifted out of the trunk was his mother’s Olympic medal. With tears in his eyes, he dropped it into the garbage bag, but then a wave of anguish overcame him, and he said, “What am I doing?” He recovered the medal and held it close to his heart. He wanted to stop grieving over his family, but throwing away all he had of them was not the answer.
Back upstairs he went to join Brian and Kim, who were watching TV. As he sat staring at his son, the answer hit him: his keepsakes weren’t all that was left of his family. Kristen had said it years earlier: look what they left for the world. Himself. And now his son. He asked Kim for a lock of his son’s hair for a keepsake. She smiled and immediately complied. He ran down to the cellar to put it in his trunk. Now he could regard the trunk with equanimity, for henceforth it held not only treasured memories of his old life, but the promise of new life and hope for the future. He would leave the trunk at Kim’s for now, but would come back for it.
The HIV test later that week came back negative, so it was all but certain he didn’t have HIV. (The Iraqi guard had returned with a sedative instead of the HIV solution the interrogator had ordered.) Hopping back up on the fence of agnosticism, Robert privately whispered a prayer of thanks, just in case. That evening he told Kim of the needle—she was horrified and wept for him—and the good news on the test and asked if her invitation to sleep with her was still open. Saying nothing, she took off his clothes and hers, and the two went to bed.
By the time he left for Berkeley in late August, he’d become so attached to his son it was hard to say goodbye. And Kim: How comforting it had been to wake up beside her for those difficult weeks of recuperating from his experience in Iraq. How understanding she had been of his nightmares. How naturally she made him feel good about himself again. How wonderful she was in bed.
What an amazing woman she is
, he thought.
If only she were ten years younger.
How safe and secure she felt waking up next to this fine man for those summer weeks. How special it was to see her son playing with his father. How thrilling it was to be so intimate with a real hero. She asked if he “might consider staying, you know, for Brian,” but to him that was tantamount to giving up his lifelong dream. He said no. Kim intended to visit him at regular intervals for Brian to see his dad, and for her to see what might develop with him.
Robert struggled with his vendetta against Dominic throughout the summer. Notwithstanding his promise to the Taylors, his knowledge of the consequences and the self-loathing he came to feel while he was strangling Dominic, his thirst for vengeance repeatedly demanded slaking. He borrowed Kim’s car a few times in July and early August and parked near Dominic’s place, hoping for an opportunity to attack. Fortunately, Dominic, afraid of his arch-rival, had removed himself from the country for an extended holiday on the Riviera. Bill had phoned to suggest he leave for the time being.