by Arnaldo Luis Colón Vargas
Everyone is laughing. Giggling. Not in a nice way. Their mouths and teeth grow larger as their eyes shrink into almost nothing. I move back as far as I can from them, only a few inches. My back presses against the metal door of the Humvee.
They giggle louder.
Corporal Vargas is in the seat in front of me. I can’t see him but I hear him laughing like the others. Wong, the other specialist, is across from me on the other side of a pile of tactical gear. He’s laughing so hard tears from his closed eyes run down his dusty face. PFC Doyle is driving. His giggling is the loudest. His mouth is the biggest. What’s left of his tiny eyes look back at me.
Look at the road is what I want to say, but something else comes out instead and they laugh louder. Their mouths grow wide, out to their shoulders. I know that’s impossible, but it’s what happens.
A loud boom bursts in my ears. The Humvee flies through the air. Everything flies through the air. Pieces of everything, even us.
I taste metal. I smell fire. I see nothing.
I’m upside down, but then I’m on my feet. Did I fall out?
Everything around me is black smoke and fire, even Doyle. I call out to Corporal Vargas. I don’t see the others. I don’t see the Humvee. I don’t see the buildings that were just there. It’s just desert sand and smoke and fire and Doyle’s giant white toothy grin welded to what’s left of his face forever.
Something moves under the sand in front of me. I jump back.
I hope it’s not one of those spiders again. I hate spiders.
Hairy legs reach out. They’re the size of my foot, then my leg. It thrusts out, pushing a shower of sand into the air. The spider’s color is the same as the desert’s. It stands on its four rear legs and raises its front four, challenging me, the red fangs on its jaws above my head, growing. I don’t see its eyes. It smells of smoke, stale sweat, and death.
I can’t move.
I hear my name from behind me. I turn and see my sister Jenny in the distance. She’s wearing a long black dress. She looks sad and confused. She’s not supposed to be here.
I want to warn her about the spider, but when I turn it’s gone. Jenny says my name again and then she’s right in front of me.
Her eyes are different. They’re bigger and redder and wet. She’s waiting on me for something. She wants me to do something, but I don’t know what it is.
A loud thumping noise comes from my left. I turn in time to see a flock of birds fly into an invisible wall.
Thump, thump, thump, thump, thump!
I hear my name again and look at Jenny. It’s her voice that calls out to me but her mouth doesn’t move. I can barely see her mouth. All I see are her giant sad eyes. They’re pitch black, but that’s not right. They’re supposed to be blue.
I see my reflection in them. I don’t look like myself, but I know it’s me. The face is swollen and disfigured. The mouth is crooked. The skin is gray. It’s not my face, but I’ve seen it before. It was in a movie. Men and elves were fighting an army of orcs attacking a white city.
The captain of the orcs, that was his face. That’s my face. I’m the captain of the orcs.
Thump, thump, thump!
More birds hit the wall, but this time to my rear. Maybe it’s a different wall. Maybe there are more walls, all invisible.
I see an overturned vehicle on fire, but it’s not the Humvee. It’s a brown SUV. It looks familiar, but I can’t remember. Not brown, maroon. Dad said it was maroon. Dad. Mom.
Jenny’s gone. The spider’s gone. Even Doyle’s gone.
It’s just me now, with the smoke and the fire, and the dying birds.
I am alone inside a box of sand and death.
***
Jennifer paced from one side of the small office to the other. Her heart beat too fast for her to relax enough to sit. She hadn’t just traveled six thousand miles to sit in a chair in an empty office that seemed to grow smaller by the second, like a shrinking box, increasing the density of the anxiety smothering her.
A short woman appeared in the doorway wearing a white lab coat over olive drab scrubs.
“Hello. I’m sorry to have kept you waiting. I wasn’t expecting you to be in this early. Yesterday must have been a very long day for you.”
Jennifer had seen the woman in the pictures she studied in the office while she waited and had assumed it was the doctor’s daughter, or young wife. There was something different about her in person, though. Her eyes were tired and small wrinkles appeared on the corners of the mouth as she smiled politely.
“Yes. I couldn’t sleep anyway,” Jennifer said.
The doctor extended her hand. “Doctor Francisco de Soto. You can call me Laura.”
That was the name they’d given her when she checked in at the hospital’s front desk, Doctor Francisco De Soto. She thought it would be a man. Nobody thought to mention the doctor’s first name was Laura and not Francisco.
“Please sit. We have much to discuss.”
Jennifer maneuvered to a chair in front of the desk. “I tried to see my brother yesterday evening, but they said I had to talk to you first.”
“Um, yes.” The doctor sat and adjusted herself to look squarely at Jennifer. “I think it’s important that you understand everything that’s going on before you see him. What have you been told so far?”
“Not much. I know he was in an accident, an explosion I think. They said he needed to have surgery.” Jennifer wanted to keep calm but her voice broke anyway. “They said he was here, and that he was still alive.” She stopped to collect herself, closed her eyes, took a deep breath, let it out. “They said there were complications, but that I could come see him, to help him recover. I left work. Left my kids with their dad and his mother to come here, but I don’t know what I can do. I’ve barely left Arizona my whole life. I don’t know what I’m doing in Germany. I just know I’m all he has left.”
“I see.” The doctor sighed. “Your brother is recovering well from the surgery. The vehicle he was in was struck by an explosive device. One soldier was killed. Two others along with your brother were critically wounded. I was called in to assess them for PTSD, but what I found in your brother’s case was,” she paused, “more complicated.”
“What do you mean?” Jennifer’s voice was so quiet she could barely hear it herself.
“I’m afraid I’ve had to diagnose Specialist Bloom with schizophrenia.” The doctor paused there, letting Jennifer absorb the weight of her words. “It was likely aggravated by the incident, but I suspect it was there before. Symptoms develop gradually. Sometimes it doesn’t manifest until a person is in their twenties or thirties.”
Jennifer closed her eyes. She hadn’t seen Eric in over a year, but her mind raced on its own through her memories of him, looking for signs she could have missed.
Eric had been a mostly happy child, until he wasn’t. Until he shut down after the accident. He was almost thirteen and she was already seventeen when their parents died. Their SUV ran off the road. That’s all they knew. Eric hadn’t cried. Not once. He barely spoke. It was like he hid in his own world.
Had she missed the signs? Should she have tried harder to talk to him? She thought of herself back then, of the teenager she’d been. She tried to remember what had seemed important to her at seventeen, but couldn’t. Had she been too preoccupied with her own pain? People didn’t know how to be with her then. Even the friends that came to offer comfort were oddly quiet, so afraid to say the wrong thing they said almost nothing. She had tried to talk to Eric about it, to see if he felt that same isolation. He didn’t seem to understand the question. He just shook his head and locked himself in his room.
“So, now that we know he has this schizophrenia, what do we do so he can get better?” Jennifer willed herself back to the present. Eric needed her now.
“Unfortunately, there is no cure for this illness, but there are treatment options. Many people learn to cope with this condition and go on to live otherwise normal lives.”
“You said many people. What happens to the rest?”
The doctor put up her hands and looked Jennifer in her eyes.
“It’s far too early to worry about that. Sometimes people are just better off institutionalized because they’re a threat to themselves and others. Many don’t have families or they just lose hope. The good news is your brother has been responding well so far. He’s already taking sedatives and those are helping. As far as prescribing any antipsychotics, I recommend against it for now, especially when he’s still recovering from surgery. Since he’s regained consciousness we’ve been discussing his dreams and visions. I’ve asked him to keep a journal of them whenever he feels up to it. This should help keep him grounded so he can learn to tell the difference between reality and hallucination. That’s going to be key for him to be able to interact well with other people again.”
Jennifer took a deep breath. She thought of Steven, her husband. What would he think about this? She would have to call him today. Their lives won’t be what they thought, what they planned. They would have to find a way to explain it to Emily so that it made sense to her three-year-old mind. Her baby brother Jason wouldn’t understand anything yet, not for a while. What would Steven’s mother think? She had accepted Jennifer as a true daughter since she didn’t have a mom of her own anymore, and Jennifer would always be grateful. She was also a very protective grandmother, barely disguising her resentment every time Jennifer was late to come home because of a work meeting or any of a dozen other things that came up outside the house. Now Eric would need some of her time and attention too.
A hundred other thoughts floated around her head, threatening to form questions Jennifer wasn’t sure she wanted answers to yet. Questions about money, home care, her family’s safety, Eric’s. The children were so vulnerable, and not just their bodies. She wouldn’t put them at risk, but Eric needed protection too. He had no one else. He wouldn’t hurt them. Would he?
Stop thinking that, Jennifer!
“What can I do?” Jenniffer wondered if her voice sounded as exhausted as she felt.
“Just be there for him now.” The doctor’s voice was soft, but steady. To Jennifer it seemed there was some gratitude in it as well, like until that moment the doctor wasn’t sure if she’d be willing to help. “He just needs to know he’s not alone. He needs to want to come back. If he can see that there’s hope, then there’s a good chance he won’t give in to the despair. It’ll take discipline, for both of you. It’s going to hurt to see him like that, and he’s going to suffer setbacks, even after he makes progress. Don’t give up on him. If he can find his way back to you, then he can learn to find his way back to the rest of the world.”
***
I’m lying on my cot. It’s hot, like it always is during the day. Not much choice when you’re scheduled for a night patrol, though. I need to try to get some rest, but there’s no way to get comfortable in the cruel heat.
I notice I’m wearing my flak jacket and boots on my cot. Did I fall asleep like that again?
There’s nobody else in the tent. All the other cots are empty except for some tactical gear. They better get some rest soon before the patrol.
I’m tired and it’s difficult to move, but it’s stupid to wear so much on the cot when it’s so hot. I strain to sit up and reach across to pull on the Velcro flap. I pull, but it fights me and closes itself. I try again and the same thing happens. I feel something pushing against my chest, forcing me back down. I’m tired and I want to let it, but it’s so hot.
I fight harder to take the flak jacket off. I hear a weird laugh, like mean giggling. I look over to the bunk next to me. Doyle’s sitting on it, all black and charred except for the giant white toothy grin that’s wider than his face.
Eric!
It’s not Doyle’s voice. It’s Jenny’s. I think I dragged her back in here again. She’s not supposed to be here.
Eric!
The invisible force pushes me down on the cot. I’m too tired to fight it. I can hear Jenny, but I can’t see her. I feel hands squeezing my shoulders. They’re holding me down. The force starts to take shape. It’s a shadow, then a form.
I see her. It’s Jenny. She’s leaning over me. Her face comes into focus. She’s been crying. She smiles at me, though.
“Hey there,” she says.
“Hey there,” I say.
I’m not in a tent anymore. It’s a bright room, a hospital. I’m on a hospital bed. There are tubes sticking out of me. I’m only wearing a robe, no flak jacket or boots. My body relaxes and so does Jenny’s grip.
“You’re really here,” I say.
“Yes, yes I am. I’m going to stay with you for a while until you get better. Then I’m going to take you home. Would you like that?”
“Yes.” I try to smile but only the right corner of my mouth moves.
I reach up to my face, but I don’t feel it. What I feel instead is rough but soft along the surface. Bandages, stacked thick, a good half inch above where my face should be.
I feel a finger poking my right cheek. It’s Jenny’s.
“There you are,” she whispers.
She used to wake me up like that when we were little. She would say I had chubby cheeks when I was a baby. I’m no baby now, though.
I remember. The explosion happened. Then I was in the hospital. I couldn’t remember how I got there. When I tried I started to remember other things, too many things. Some of them couldn’t have happened the way I remember. Others I know are real, but I wish they weren’t. They all feel the same. When I dream my memories mix with other things and I can’t tell which is which.
Now Jenny’s here. Is she trapped too? Does she see the birds and the smoke and the burnt Doyle? I don’t want her to. These things are not nice to see. My right eye gets wet. I don’t feel my left one.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “I’m sorry I’m just a crazy baby orc.”
She puts her hand on my cheek. Her eyes are wet too.
“It’s okay,” she says. “It’s going to be okay.”
She doesn’t understand. She can’t. I don’t have the energy to explain. I’d probably just confuse her more if I tried. I’m a stupid orc. Stupid, ugly, crazy orc in a box. Now I’ve dragged her into it too.
Except, I’m not alone in the box anymore. That’s the real Jenny. She’s the same but different. She’s tired and dirty and bigger than I remember. I wouldn’t imagine her like that.
I reach up and grab the hand that’s on my cheek. It squeezes back and Jenny smiles.
She’s real. She’s real and she’s with me.
The room is off balance. I only see out of my right eye. My left eye is under the cocoon of bandages. Maybe I’ll have a butterfly face.
I sense someone else in the room, someone on my left. I can’t see him, but I know it’s Doyle. He’s there, but he’s not there. His real charred body is in another box somewhere and his soul is in Heaven. At least that’s what I hope. Jenny doesn’t see him, but she’s in here with me.
If there’s a way in, there has to be a way out.
There’s a way out of the box.
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Arnaldo Luis Colón Vargas was an artillery officer in the USMC for nine years on active duty and a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom. Since leaving the corps he has worked as a Project Manager, Program Manager, and led a Project Management Office (PMO) in the telecommunications and software industries. He is currently a consultant and digital nomad.
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