The Heart You Carry Home (30 page)

“I promised her I'd help you,” Reno said, wheezing. The whistle blew and two hoplites yanked them apart.

Ben hoped Reno's loss meant that he'd be taken away in the truck, but that didn't happen. Instead, the hoplites lined up the remaining twelve contenders and began patrolling the ranks, drill sergeant–style. When they'd reached the far end of the line, Bull nudged Ben. “Your girl spent the night with Reno,” he said through clenched teeth. “You know that, right?”

It took a massive amount of self-control for Ben not to grab Bull by the shoulders, but he couldn't keep from turning to look at him.

“Eyes ahead!” snarled one of the hoplites, prodding Ben with the Taser.

“You don't believe me?” Bull whispered. “They danced all night, pressed up close, like. It's disgusting. Reno and King're the same age.”

Reno was at the end of the line and Ben couldn't get a good look at his face without moving. It couldn't be true. Bull was messing with him. But who knew what had happened on the road? Becca was angry and hurt. She might have done something to try to hurt him back. He shook his head as though to physically shake off his doubt. It was hard. So goddamned hard. He wanted to throttle Bull, and Reno, and the CO. He was succumbing to the stress of things, to the unreality, the uncertainty, the exhaustion. It was so much like the war.

That realization snapped Ben back to attention. The CO knew that every vet here was vulnerable to these feelings. He was using this knowledge to manipulate them. It was as brilliant as it was terrifying.

Two hoplites unrolled a set of building plans on the hood of one of the flatbeds. The CO stood up in the open Jeep and cleared his throat. “Build it!” he pronounced.

The men looked at the CO dumbly, awaiting further instructions.

“I said, build it!”

Ben jumped into action. The CO was looking for a leader and that's what Ben would be. He proposed a plan to divide up the work. The men shifted, obviously irritated by Ben's sudden decisiveness. But the CO was still watching, and under his gaze, Ben knew, the men could not protest. Their reflexes hadn't been quick enough; they'd lost this part of the challenge and the most they could do now was prove themselves to be strong, efficient workers.

The teams followed the plans until a coffin-shaped structure began to rise from the ground. Soon it was waist-high, then chest-high. The hoplites pulled ladders from the trucks, and the men kept on building. All the while, the CO watched. It was too dark to make out his face, but his shadowed figure was as large and imposing as a mountain. All of this was part of the CO's plan, Ben kept thinking. But what that plan was—what they were building for him—he couldn't begin to know.

B
ECCA HAD MADE
up her mind to find Ben on her own. She needed a better view of those woods, so she headed back through the graveyard and up the ridge. It was steep and she spent half an hour navigating dense thistle bushes and avoiding shaky rocks. Her hands were covered in scrapes and dust by the time she reached the top, and she turned her stinging palms to the wind for relief. Kleos was spread out below in the floodlights' glare. The woods where the guard had stopped her a few hours before were dark. The ghost town sagged on the opposite slope, as though at any moment the whole hillside and everything on it would slide into the river and be swept away.

Becca squinted across the water, trying to make out the Death Star, but it was too dark. Her instincts urged her to run: skid down the ridge, swim the river, jump into her car, and be gone. She thought of how the driver's seat had molded to her body. She felt her foot against the gas, the car's heavy motor at her command. It would be so easy. To run. Right now. Finish this evacuation before things got worse. Except Ben had her keys.

She looked back the way she'd come. It was always a mistake, looking back. Races were won by going forward.

Something scraped in the brush. Some desert rodent—or maybe a snake? Becca had not considered the possibility of snakes. She'd been so worried about tripping over the flora that she hadn't even considered the fauna. A dozen yards below her, a weak spot of light punctured the darkness. Had one of the guards followed her? Was a Taser headed her way, or, worse, a rifle? Heart throbbing, she crouched down and tried to be still. The light snapped off, and now the scraping sound grew louder. And then, suddenly, a silvery trunk sprouted before her, like a tree growing in time-lapse film.

“Jesus, Jacob!” Becca stood up and picked her way toward the boy. “Does Lucy know where you are?”

“She thinks I'm with Mom.”

“And your mom?”

“She thinks I'm with Lucy.”

“Jesus,” she repeated. “So you're following me for fun?”

“No. I found them,” he said. “Your friends.” His lips spread into a triumphant smile. His eyes flashed silver, just like his ridiculous jacket.

“Do you ever take that thing off?” she asked and Jacob shook his head. He looked at her imploringly. “All right,” she said with a final glance at the ghost town. “Show me the way.”

Halfway back to Kleos, Jacob turned left and headed to the woods. They'd been moving quickly, but now Jacob slowed. Soon he stopped walking entirely.

“What's the matter?” Becca asked. He did not answer, and when she repeated the question, his face was tight with fear. At once she understood. The child hadn't found some secret route through the woods. He was leading them blind.

“I wanted to help you,” he murmured, hunching into the protective shell of his jacket. “I wanted to find Ben.”

“I know,” she said and looked around, trying to get a sense of where they might be. “You like Ben, huh?”

Jacob nodded. “He gets mad sometimes, but he doesn't mean it.”

The words of an abused wife. But it was also comforting to hear. It meant Ben had been likable. And he'd saved the boy from the river, which meant he'd been selfless. She allowed herself to feel the faint warmth of hope.

They started walking again, creeping carefully in case guards were patrolling the trees.

“Becca?” Jacob's voice was a mere peep. He looked very small beside her, like an armadillo in his silver jacket. But an armadillo had a hard shell. Becca shuddered to think of the boy on the receiving end of a Taser or bullet. “Why did you run away from Ben?” he whispered. Becca hesitated before she answered and kept walking.

“We had a fight.”

“A bad fight?”

“Yes.”

“He misses you.”

“I know,” she said. And then, “You said Ben got mad sometimes?” She felt crummy using a child for this type of reconnaissance, but she needed to know.

“Yes . . . but he told Aunt Lucy that he was going to get better, no matter what.”

Jacob sounded so hopeful. It made her sad. It made her own hopeful feelings seem naive.

“Listen,” he whispered and tugged her hand. Voices and lights filtered through the trees. They crept forward, pausing to listen after each step.

At first, when Becca heard the scream, she thought they'd been spotted. When the second scream cut through the trees like a terrible birdcall, she knew it had nothing to do with them. They hurried forward.
You're going the wrong way,
she thought.
You're going toward the trouble.
But she kept moving nonetheless. The clearing came up so quickly that she almost ran straight into it. She caught herself and pressed against a tree trunk, pushing Jacob behind her. Before them sat a large hogan with two guards stationed at the door. A truck was just pulling up. Becca motioned for Jacob to stay put and crept closer.

“Dropped them off,” the driver was saying to the guards. “How many are left?”

“Not many,” replied one.

The driver nodded. “So I wait?”

Another horrible scream cut through the trees, and the guards stiffened. The three men glanced at one another nervously, as though to say,
It'll all be over soon.

T
HEY'D BEEN IN
the hogan for hours now, the same one where they'd been branded. They were naked, but the wood-burning stove had turned the room into a furnace. At first, Ben had found the nakedness jarring. He tried not to gawk at the bellies that drooped like half-full flour sacks over pubic bones, at the sagging buttocks, stretch marks, wrinkles, and liver spots. He felt hyperaware of his own muscular body, his youth. Not that he was faring much better than the others in the heat. After each trial, a hoplite stoked the fire, and the flames would lick the stove's open mouth. Ben's hair was matted to his head, and his eyes stung. The hogan stank of vomit. He'd shut his eyes during the last trial—the poor vet crawling on the ground trying to find his way out—but the CO had ordered Ben to look.

After completing the wooden structure, the twelve remaining men had been marched back to the hogan. And the final round of contests began. Early on, Ben had set his thoughts on Becca as a way to ignore the heat and his aching body and the extreme tiredness he felt from so much physical exertion and almost no food. And as he stood in that sweltering room—because they were not allowed to sit down—and watched each man pass through the particular crucible that the CO had constructed for him, Ben tried to picture Becca's face. He tried to feel her like cool air, to lose himself in the sound of her voice. But even she had faded away under the stress and noise and awful things that transpired here. In some ways, this part of the competition was the most like Iraq, only without Iraq's boredom. This was Iraq distilled and it was pure poison. Tears slipped down Ben's face as he watched the other men struggle and scream. Or maybe it was just sweat. Maybe, watching grown men be reduced in this way, he was too embarrassed even to cry.

There weren't many left now. Twelve had been whittled down to three: Bull, Reno, and himself. It was Reno's turn and as he approached the CO, he glanced at Ben. What message was he trying to send? Reno looked sad, almost apologetic. As though he were saying,
I did my best to help you, but now you're on your own.
It struck Ben that he and Reno together might be able to take the CO and Bull. They might even be able to wrestle the guns away from the guards outside. But this realization—and his acceptance of Reno's help—had come too late. Because Reno was now drinking from the cup of dark liquid that the CO had given to each of the previous vets.

“Keep it down,” the CO ordered. “You must keep it down. Or maybe a nonbeliever like yourself lacks the stomach for this?” Reno swallowed and the CO nodded approvingly. “I don't know why you've chosen to come into the fold after all these years, but I give you credit for making it this far.” Reno mumbled something that might have been
Fuck you
. Then, for a few minutes, nothing occurred. Reno sat back, his face calm, almost serene. It had happened exactly this way with each man. The reprieve didn't last. Sure enough, Reno clutched his stomach and moaned. He staggered and moaned again. He fell to his knees, and suddenly, he was vomiting into a bucket, liquid spewing out of him like a faucet. Ben and Bull looked away.

“You must bear witness to this man as he purges his pain,” the CO ordered. “This is the start of his catharsis. He will be asked to confront the terror that lives inside of him and expel it—if he is strong enough to do so.”

Ben forced himself to look at Reno, who continued to retch. “Get up,” the CO said, and Reno staggered to his feet. The room began to fill with sounds, faint at first, but steadily growing. Ben heard feet crashing through brush and a man's heavy breath. He heard branches and leaves snap and a machete hacking through foliage. The breathing grew more insistent, became peppered with grunts. This was the sound of a man running from something. His own heart began to pound, as it had during the other trials. His body tensed with dread.
This isn't for you,
he reminded himself.
This is for Reno.
And in fact, Reno was stumbling around as if he were trying to escape the noise. He pushed at invisible walls, swatted invisible insects. And then the hogan was full of color. Images of dense jungle burst to life in 360 degrees. The more Reno thrashed, the more the movie images jerked, almost like the pictures were responding to his movements. Ben felt as though he were watching the scene through Reno's eyes, sharing his frantic, drug-induced delirium.

Meanwhile, the CO had donned a mask: the visage of a woman with slit-like eyes and blood-red lips. He removed his robe, revealing his belly, white in the firelight. As he walked to Reno, Reno backed into the wall. The jungle images played over his naked body. “Whaddya want?” Reno whimpered and pushed his hands out in front of him in a pathetic attempt to protect himself. The CO walked closer. He held an M16 and touched Reno three times with the weapon: on his chest, shoulder, and side.

“Do you know this gun?” he asked, his voice slightly muffled inside the mask. “Do you recognize it?”

Reno shook his head.

“It's not your gun?” the CO said.

Reno leaned forward as though to inspect the weapon.

“It's your gun, isn't it,” the CO said, and this time Reno nodded. “And do you remember what you did with this gun, Reno?”

The walls flashed with explosions. There were men on the ground, groaning. A soldier with a severed leg crawled around the perimeter of the hogan as a Vietnamese aggressor stalked him with a knife. Reno watched, gasping as the distance closed between the two men. He turned and turned until he collapsed from dizziness and confusion. The CO placed the gun on the floor, and Reno grabbed it. The sound of recorded gunfire exploded throughout the hogan, and Reno began to slither across the hut, holding the gun in his armpit. When he'd reached the opposite wall he stood and pointed the weapon first at Ben, then at Bull. Both men ducked. The CO shouted at them to stand straight and still. They obeyed, holding their breath. And then Reno pointed the gun at the CO.