A Battle Raging (7 page)

She led the way further to another area just past the kitchen that had a formal dining table and chairs. Deep cherry wood, nicely carved pieces. There was a space where the chair had been removed, obviously to make room for his wheelchair.

"Give me your jacket, and make yourself at home."

He started to say he would just keep the jacket on but she seemed insistent as she walked up to him and waited. He eased out of the denim, and handed
it to her, thankful that the black V-neck sweater he had worn wasn't one of his holey ones. At least he was "coordinated" with black jeans and black sneakers.

"OK, now for the hat," she said with her hand out.
Again, protesting seemed futile. He pulled off the knit pullover hat and gave it to her.

"I'll put these in the closet," she said, walking through the living room to the foyer. It gave him time to pat his hair down.

When she came back, she grabbed two plates from the kitchen along with paper napkins and placed one set in front of him, the other in the seat adjacent to his at the head of the table.

"Are you thirsty? I have wine, water or soda."

She was good at this hostess stuff.

He knew what he shouldn't do but he found himself asking
"What kind of wine?"

Alcohol was not wise
considering the anti-depressants he was on. The usual Corona he enjoyed didn't do anything but give him a slight buzz but that was as far he would go. Definitely not wine. But today he felt like bending a few rules.

"
Just burgundy Pinot Noir today. Is that OK?"

"Yeah,
I'll have a glass."

Soon, she set a full wine glass next to his plate.

"I didn't think we'd need utensils. Just hands on."

He had to admit the "burger" looked good topped with
all the rabbit food and a little dressing. It smelled spicy and pungent. Zucchini. Blue cheese. Squash. Topped and bottomed with hamburger buns. At least it didn't look too bad.

He picked up the sandwich and bit into it and found his mouth full of varying flavors that his tongue immediately appreciated.
He'd been too quick to dismiss what he'd sized up as a lame vegetarian substitute to good ole fashioned meat. He could admit he had been wrong.

Without any fanfare, he finished the burger off within four bites. Then felt self-conscious as she looked on with a smile.

"Again, I'm impressed. Want another one?"

To his shame, he nodded. What was wrong with him
? He had better manners than this.

She rose, took his empty plate to the kitchen and within a couple of minutes had another burger in front of him. This time he slowed his motions, took time to savor it. Then reluctantly took a sip of the burgundy. It went down
full and strong, washing his palate. Merging with the other flavors. Creating a sensation that he hadn't felt in a long time. A damn long time. Practically a lifetime…or a whole other life…ago.

He had to take it slow, to keep the alcoh
ol from overwhelming his system that even now was calling for more. He took another sip. It was like coming home to something he'd been missing for so long.

He sneaked a peek at her. She was taking a deep bite. Most women when they were eating in front of men seemed self-conscious, taking small, delicate bites, dabbing at their mouths. She didn't seem to care that he was watching her. And for some reason, he was enjoying her motions. Even when she took a long sip, draining a quarter of the glass with one swallow. He appreciated a thirsty woman. To be honest, he appreciated nearly everything about her.

He forced his eyes away from the swell of her shirt. The sheer whiteness of the material didn't totally hide the white of her bra. He could see the lacy edge and the darker shadow of her skin. He felt a warmth surging in his stomach trying to move south. It'd been a long time since… The last few years he'd stopped even thinking about it. The few times he'd tried had been disastrous. He'd thought his body had gone into deep hibernation. Now sitting there he realized that it had fooled him. It was always at the edge of awakening and he fought that it was awakening now. But this wasn't the time or place for it to come back to life.

He raised the glass, drained it.

"So, you're ready now?" she asked.

Considering his previous thoughts,
the question made him blink. And then he came to his senses.

"Yeah, show me
the way."

She stood,
started walking toward a door even further past the dining area.

"It's just through this door.  I keep an easel and some supplies
in here. There's a window for light. If you need sounds, there's a radio. It's set to a soft jazz station right now but feel free to change it, find something that will inspire you."

There wasn't a
jazz chord in this world or the next that could inspire him to confront the demons he was being asked to do. Even as he followed her, just turning the chair's wheels seemed to take everything out of him. His body suddenly felt drained of energy yet his heart was racing. He felt it pumping hard in his chest.

Just when he didn't think he could
push on, she opened the door and stood back to let him pass through.

The room
was as she described. A small setup with an easel, a large window looking out on what appeared to be a back garden. Shelves lined the back wall and held tubes of paints, brushes of various sizes and a few unmarked boxes. At the edge of the middle shelf sat a retro lilac-colored dial radio.

She came in behind him, walked to the shelf, pulled down one of the boxes. She opened it and handed him a medium length piece of charcoal.

"Thank you…Ms. Temple," he said, wondering at the sudden need to be formal with her. Maybe because of his inappropriate thoughts earlier.

"Since we've
broken bread together, you can call me Maya. Well, at least while we're here anyway. I'll just leave you for a while, let you get your thoughts together. If you need anything just shout out."

He nodded
to her as she left the room. He settled before the easel, staring blankly at the empty paper that waited for him. He sat there, seconds ticking into minutes, unable to focus. She was expecting something, anything. She was expecting too much. You couldn't ask a man to bare his soul, to call up his demons and expect him to exorcise all the shit he was feeling just like that. He felt a momentary anger at both her and Dr. Madison.

They couldn't even begin to understand. They hadn't been there.

But he had. And the memories wouldn't go away.

How c
ould putting a memory on canvas expunge it, make it stop haunting him?

His hand shook as he lifted it
, holding the piece of charcoal between his fingers. He touched the edge of it to the paper, drew a shaky line. After a few seconds, he lowered his arm, defeated in his first attempt.

He closed his eyes and let the darkness draw him in.
Unexpectedly, an unusual lethargy began dragging him into the abyss between consciousness and slumber. Even as he went deeper, he realized something was wrong. It was the wine. Had to be. He should never have drunk that glass. Not with the meds he was taking.

Silence. And then
shouts…and gunfire…

Eisenberg was yelling something, but the words were lost in the barrage of ammo he was letting off in the direction of the assault. Zach tried to rise from his prone position but couldn't. He had been shot, that much he knew. Shouldn't he be feeling some pain? But there was nothing. His legs and back wouldn't obey him, no matter how hard he tried to move. He laid there wondering how fucked he was. And where was Clarence? He saw Eisenberg hovering over him, but couldn't see or hear Clarence. Was he OK?

Other shouts
were coming through the outer door now. More gun volleys. The sounds of M27s. Good, the Calvary had arrived. Lex, Yancy and the others would finish off the rest of the Taliban motherfuckers. How many of them were there?

His face felt wet; he brushed fingers against his cheek and they came away with blood. He could smell the metallic tinge in the blasting heat.
Why was there blood on his face when he'd been shot from the back? He started to crane his neck, to turn his head just inside the hall to something he hadn't noticed before.

A large hole where a face used to be, oozing brain and blood. Who the hell…?

A hand on his shoulder. Was the dead man reaching for him?

In a panic, h
e moved to throw off the hand. It was so soft…

"Get off me!" he yelled.

His voice seemed to come
from a distance. He heard the fear in its timbre. Felt the dead man's hand in his grip, and he tightened…"

"Zach, stop! You're hurting me!"

The woman's voice also came from far away. And yet it was near.

He opened his eyes and looked straight into Maya's. He had a
stranglehold on her hand. She was on her knees desperately trying to pull his fingers apart, to free herself from his grip.

The panic in her voice and eyes brought him back to full consciousness.
Guilt and regret immediately flooded him. He'd never hurt a woman before. Had never meant to, especially not now. Not her.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry,
I'm so sorry," he said remorsefully as he released her.

She stood, rubbing at her injured hand, staring at him as though he had morphed into a monster. Which, he guessed he had.

"I didn't mean to hurt you, Maya. Honest to God…I was having a nightmare…or maybe it was a flashback…I don't know…"

The thunder in her eyes ebbed a bit as she
seemed to absorb his words. After all, she had witnessed firsthand the demons he was trying to hold at bay.

"
What happened? One moment, I walk into the room to see how you're doing. I find you slumped over and I thought something might be wrong. I didn't mean to startle you…"

"No
, it wasn't you. Not exactly. I…was back in Afghanistan. I know this sounds strange, but you see I go there almost every night now. This is how this…" nodding toward his motionless legs…"happened."

The pity that shown from her eyes immediately made him regret
his candor. He didn't want her pity.

"I'm so sorry," she practically stammered. "I didn't know you had been in the war.
I just figured your pain came from something more personal."

Pity in the voice as well.

"Look, nothing's happening here for me. I think I should just drop the class. I don't care about any refund. I just need to leave."

The hardening of her face surprised him.

"You know what, I'm going to sound insensitive right now, but I don't care," she said, the pity replaced by angry fire. As much as he hated her pity, he resented her anger. What the hell did she have to be angry about? He was the one sitting here in a chair.

"You don't want to get well," she continued.

"And you don't know what the fuck you're talking about! What the hell do you know what any of us have gone through, what we see when we close our eyes?! Nothing! You play around with your crayons and paints and think you hold the answer to the world's problems? Well guess what lady, you don't know shit!"

"Feel better?" she said, the fire a blazing inferno in those eyes now.

Even in his pique, he couldn't help notice how beautiful she was in her conflagration.

"You're right, I don't know what it's like to be wounded in
battle," she said. "But I do know how it feels to have lost someone to that stupid war!"

He was taken aback by that revelation.
It hadn't occurred to him that she had lost anyone in the war. At that moment he realized it put a whole new perspective to her eagerness to help him.

"I'm sorry," he said, and he truly was. Because along with the anger, he cou
ld see the pain that was there.

"Who…I mean who did you lose?"

She closed her eyes, fighting her own memories. "My twin brother, Mark."

Shit. A twin. He'd known one other person who had lost a twin sibling. The acquaintance, a man, had confessed over a couple of beers the tear in his soul…that's how he'd put it, a tear in his soul…he'd felt afte
r losing his twin brother in a car accident.

"Mark was Air Force. Had only been in Iraq a few months when his plane was shot down. He and two other airmen died
on impact. Losing him like that nearly killed my mother."

She paused, then said, "But it caught up with her. Pancreatic cancer took her a couple of years later. That was three years ago."

A tear, then another trailed from her eyes. She swiped at them impatiently.

"If Mark had come home, even in a chair, we would've
just been glad. We were damn lucky to even get his body back. I know one thing about my brother. If he'd survived, he would have done anything this side of heaven and hell to get better. He wouldn't have settled just learning to live with his pain; he would have done everything in his power to kick its ass."