Redemption

It wasn't always like this. I wasn't always the irreproachable wretch of a man that you trample and spit upon today. I wasn't always overlooked.

Believe it or not, I was once an endeared member of this fickle battlefield where we bleed our corpses dry. I was once looked upon with the same type of quiet admiration that only idealized notions and imaginative reflection would illicit. Yes, you could even say that I was once considered a hero. Once proudly touted alongside the likes of greats, now only extraneously mentioned in an extended passing breath. You were the ones that held my head up so long ago and continue to drown me in the depths of my torment. To you I owe my fame. To you I owe the destiny that stalks my blistered finger. To you I owe the countless nights of redemption.

I glance at my watch. It's 3:00 a.m. and all I can think of is my sole passenger, my one escape. I have collapsed into the frigid seat of a skeleton of an early-model Ford, parked alone, in a desolate part of Chicago. A dusty powder has begun to float across the cluttered parking lot and scatter a sugary topping among the many strewn-about rusted relics. A flickering streetlamp dangles from the corner of the lot, straining a faded light across the shattered windshield of my dented tomb and filters a few pale rays inside, scarcely revealing the tattered upholstery and bouncing a faint glimmer off a single shiny bullet, sitting square on the battered dashboard. No matter how obscure my surroundings have become I have always been able to catch the sparkle from that bullet, my north star.

I take a hit from the thinly rolled joint that lay in my ashtray and the golden ember cherry glows just a little bit brighter. Through the euphoric smog I can see a few of the meager possessions I had been dealt on my path. Next to me in the passenger seat lays a half empty flask of whiskey, a pristine U.S. medal of honor, and the greasy 9mm handgun I’ve held from the beginning. I had begun to write a note a couple of days ago, but soon came to the realization that such a feat would only prove to perpetuate my distorted conception of life. Tommy and Seth didn't get a chance to write their goodbyes, so why the fuck should anyone else?

A cascade of tears begins to stream down my leather-topped façade and fall across my bruised chin, like a polluted river, into my lap. For the past 31 tortuous years of my life the events of that balmy March night have haunted my every waking thought. The second I returned home from that carnage, I found myself chained inside a sadistic theatre where only one movie has ever played. My eyes quaked as the lights fell on and the reel began to roll once again.

I was stationed at a small, fairly well fortified base just inside a dense jungle. I was only two measly fucking months away from making my way back home to Chicago! My tour of duty lasted two years and although the first year of my service there was quite extraordinary, to say the least, the last 10 months seemed to go by with a much greater sense of purpose. The fighting had hit a lull and although we all knew that we lingered just beyond deaths chill clutch, we were beginning to see ourselves for not what we were, but what we would become. I had become especially close to two of my fellow privates, Tommy Jensen and Seth Berger. We were all pretty young and idealistic and I think we all reminded each other of our friends back home. Simply, we kept each other sane.

The night in question had begun as any other would. Tommy, Seth and I as we always did, volunteered to provide first shift perimeter patrol guard. Although this assignment carried some of the heaviest risks since it exposed us to enemy cover, conversely it gave us a taste of that sweet freedom we so sorely missed. Besides, we figured, if they really wanted to eliminate us we could either wait for them at camp or catch them while we were on guard, on our own terms. We felt as if we possessed some invisible cloak that somehow shielded us from the innumerable atrocities occurring right in front of our eyes. We believed in some respect that we were invincible.

We followed one another in V formation. Seth and I fell back as Tommy led our team through the dense trees and shrubs. We were about halfway through our trek when I heard what could be described as only a deafening whisper, a whoosh. Seth and I were stalking Tommy from about 15 yards behind when we both suddenly stopped and dropped to the ground, on our stomachs instantaneously. Oddly, Tommy did not respond to the sound. He stood complacent for about a second, and fell backward, completely limp, collapsing onto his back. A sniper had fired a single shot straight through his fucking head. Blood erupted from his wound like a geyser and soaked his entire upper body in seconds. I could see him struggle a few gargled gasps. His eyes began to twitch madly, from one corner to the other, until suddenly he let out one last desperate gasp for life and his eyes rolled gently into the back of his head and his body fell silent.

I was completely paralyzed with fear at this point. I had seen people die, but never someone that meant so much to me. Never someone so close to me that I could see him pass beyond these shackles of earthly bondage and still feel the breeze of his last depraved breathe.

Upon seeing this, Seth jumped from his position with his assault rifle drawn and furiously dashed towards the direction from where the bullet came. He shot wildly into the darkness of the jungle, emitting a horridly shrieking scream that still echoes through the confines of my mind. Seth only made it a few steps before his body became a bullet-riddled piñata. Crimson matter spewed in every direction as the bullets ripped through his flesh and covered my face with his sticky paint. His body dropped to the ground without a whimper.

Any idealistic notion of fairness in this world died the exact second my eye caught his body return to the earth. His soul had left him before his shell had even met the ground. My body became detached from my mind. I could only observe the impossible dream unfolding in front of my scorched eyes.

I remember hearing the squish-squash of the soldiers' boots getting closer as they trotted along the muddy turf. They were only seconds away. My mind raced between its own indecision to run and inform the camp and to stay and fight to a certain death. I had to make an instant decision, yet my mind couldn’t focus beyond the potential future that I would be sacrificing. So I closed my eyes and continued to lie in the mud, a ghost of myself, among friends.

I could make out a number of soldiers as they approached the scene. They shouted things back and forth for a while as they jabbed their rifles into our sides and deliberately circled our bodies. One of the bastards laughed as he kicked me in the ribs. The piercing jolt shot through my body and as I struggled to contain my howling whimper a splash of what I hoped was spit splattered across my face and slid down, coming to a stop along the crease of my parched lips. My escalating rage dribbled beads of indecision across my entire body and I could feel the blood coarse through my veins and rush to my head as I held my breath and attempted to remain as limp as possible.

The last thought that I can recall to this day is the wet, cold, doglike nose of one of their rifles jammed into the back of my neck, awaiting the owners command. Everything from that moment on remains lost in an obscure haze, locked away deep inside a padded room somewhere in my subconscious.

The next vivid memory I have is waking up in a helicopter, strapped to a gurney, being transported to get medical attention. One of the few survivors from the camp found me on a reconnaissance mission later the next day, unconscious and clinging to a fading glimpse of life. I was shot in the left arm, a minor injury, but it required surgery and I needed a transfusion, so they returned me to the U.S.

By the time I had fully physically recovered from my wound, somehow the tale of exactly what had happened on that night had become so distorted and misstated that I unknowingly stumbled into the spotlight of courageous eminence through my own auspicious cowardice. I was awarded the Medal of Honor by the President only a few months after my return home.

Everyone had this stereotypical mold of what a true American patriot was supposed to be. Immediately after returning home from the war, I was supposed to get a solid job, marry a beautiful woman, start a wonderful family and buy a new house. The entire time pretending that two months ago I wasn’t lying in a smoldering jungle, covered in mud, wiping chunks of my two best friends’ brains off my fucking face.

I wasn't a man. I was an ideal, an unquestioned machination.

Who would ever believe me if I told them that I wasn't who they said I was? They didn't need to know such things; they didn't want to know such things. They didn't need someone throwing a wrinkle into their otherwise pristine, prepackaged life.

Instead of speaking, I listened. I listened to the voices of Tommy and Seth and they drew me farther and farther into the bleak, spiraling oblivion of myself.

Throughout the past 31 years I've been diagnosed. Re-diagnosed. Misdiagnosed. Admitted. Released. Poked. Prodded. Observed. Medicated. Counseled. Remembered and forgotten.

And yet, through this entire sham of a life I've never once been acknowledged. Never once been inquired as to why. Yet, there is no why but now. There is no greater salvation than the present.

I'm not the one that is ill. I live. The person that expects, awaits what has been chosen for them, is truly ill. And now, I intend to be the one that chooses. Choose what is real, and the only thing real is now.

It's 3:30 a.m. I take a final hit from the engaging joint and the cloud of sweet smoke slowly embraces my mind and slithers through the tunnels of my blackened lungs. I flick the roach through a hole in the windshield, collapse into my seat and slowly release a cloud of vaporous illusions from my soul into the world. I down the remainder of my flask and shudder as the poison dulls my butchered flesh. I run my fingers across my Medal of Honor and lovingly place it in my front pocket. The final bullet has levied its verdict and I load it into my 9mm. My final appointment awaits me.

The driver door flies off its hinge and lands into a clump of snow as I kick it open. I step into the blustery night and walk to the back of the car. My watch reads 3:33 a.m. It's time for me to finally earn my medal.

I kiss the cold steel of my 9mm as I traversed the planes of my endless thoughts and final accusations. The wind howled as I cocked the gun into position.

"This one’s for Tommy and Seth." I whispered.

It's here I stand on the brink of an enlightened age, alone, in the frigid depths of my own despair, just one stretch away from reaching the inviting sun of my journey.

I reach down and with a creak the trunk flips open.

Kenny Chen.

"I hope it wasn't too cold in there."

The sixth and final disciple of evil was finally within my grasp. The past six years has yielded a bloody harvest from the spiteful seeds, the other five bullets, all recovered from the sterile chamber of my gun on that night so long ago. Soon, all six will have discovered the soil they were destined to settle.

"You thought you could get away with it didn't you, you bastard! You thought you didn't leave anyone behind! You’ve been living my life, you’ve been living a lie!"

Completely naked, scrunched into a tight fetal position with his arms and legs tied behind his back with an extension cord, Kenny remained silent due to the duct tape wrapped around his head, covering his mouth. His body shivered and danced fervently, his skin was beginning to form a light blue tint and tiny icicles lined the corner of his nostrils. I almost felt sorry for the bastard, but quickly brushed away any apprehensive notions when I began to hear the derisive laughter from the murderers of that night escalate through my head.

"It's time for me to do, what I should've done 31 years ago."

His desperate eyes never left my hand of righteousness and seemed to quiver as I brought the gun to a stand, straight against his forehead. He shut his eyes and his entire body grew tense.

"Open your eyes you fucking coward and face the destiny you've drawn!"

My finger twitched as it squeezed the trigger closer.

"Endure my pain!"

The deafening bullet ignited with a battering ferocity and ripped through Kenny's head, splattering a mist of his life across my right arm. The gun dropped from my hand, landing in a pool of his blood.

I stand completely still for the first time in years, waiting for the voices to end and the silence to finally begin. Waiting for that elusive sense of achievement I've sought for so long, to wash the pain away.

Nothing. Nothing but the same unquenchable thirst for peace.

How many more years, how many more days, and how many more moments must I stay enraptured in this filthy, unexplainable desire for contentment? It has taken me so long to complete my mission and manifest my revenge. But now, with my blindfold rattled free, I can see my nose has brought me on a redundant journey, chasing the stench of a decomposed beast that’s been strapped to my back from the beginning. All that’s left for me to feast upon is the wilted bones of an elusive ghost that continues to speak to me from its transparent perch.

With a sigh, I fell backward into a drift of snow and buttoned my jacket a little closer. I reached into my pocket, drew my medal, and hesitantly placed it around my neck, for the first time in 31 years.

The snowflakes carelessly floated back and forth as they careened downward, end over end, blanketing my corpse. An icy chill began to wash across my body and numb my extremities. The desolate streetlamp cast a foreboding shadow across the gritty, concrete palace walls that surrounded me and its flickering breath’s fell contingent with the ebb and flow of my icy heartbeat. Directly underneath the streetlamp sat a beaten, old telephone booth, covered in an abstract soup of etched telephone numbers and swirling, psychedelic graffiti. The grimy phone hung off the hook, seductively staggering back and forth in the wind like a drunken pendulum, occasionally emitting an incomprehensible mutter covered in static. My eyes turned and met once again with the beckoning gleam of the sparkling night sky and began to achingly drift away, into the obscure jungles, rejoining Tommy and Seth in the relentless pursuit to conquer the adversarial mortality that will forever threaten our harmonious reality of hope.

Nothing could awaken me from my blissful sleep. Nothing but the sweet kiss of fate. The cold embrace of inevitability. The bitter release of my final, vacant, desperate breath of desire.