The Country of Ice Cream Star (73 page)

I never see the bullet strike her. She running, then she flail down hard. Ain’t think, I dive to her. I get a clumsy hold, and stagger back. A bullet clip my sleeve, then we be in the tunnel’s hiding. Yo, I weaken in relief, when I see she injure in her thigh. Ain’t murder wounds, is nothing.

I hoist her better in my arms. She clutching my hair, is lost all sense. But I unmind this, nor I feel her weight. I go sprint through the overpass darkness. Jump unthinking over a roo lain dead, and in the farther night, can see a tower building, sweet with walls.

Building broken on one flank. My boots crunch bright across its ruin. Get to its door, and scramble in with gladness flushing through my blood like water. First Runner pull my hair to agonies, yank my head in angles. But I can almost laugh, how pain be nothing. How we live to feel good pain.

I settle behind a fatly desk and rest First Runner down. Child sobbing, crush both hands up to her mouth, as I tear off my jacket. Wrap its sleeve around her thigh, pull tight. Hold this with knee. First Runner start to fight me, but her hands be weak. Be small. I pin them with my other knee.

All I see to use be laces in First Runner’s shoes. So be longer minutes while I pull these, and she fight, and I tie different knots around. At last, it holding right. Cut deep into her flesh, but it ain’t bleeding more. Is bone. Ya, First Runner hush. Is only panting, staring to my face. She watch my face like it the only thing she ain’t fear.

I smile. Say in my unheard voice,
You bone, my ten. It be no harm
.

She hitch her breath and nod. When I loose her hands, she rub her dripping nose, still staring to me. I say,
Now be no distance. We be right
.

I lift her across my shoulder, so her head hang down behind my back, legs kicking loose in front. Can feel her gather breath, cry out pain. But I unmind this, be no time. I get her weight correct, and stride back to the awful night.

Next journey be no matter. Road ain’t got no trenches, and is thick with helpful trees. Trot to a tree with breathless force, lean to its trunk and rest. Earth trembling softer now, and every jolt be sweet reminder that we leave the war behind. Is even calm enough to feel some vanity that we survive. And we surviving still – dodge to another tree, and vanish to its trunk. Rest and breathe, ain’t lose my strength. It all be wolfen done. Can live, and we deserve this life. First Runner holding to my waist, got back her sense. Is smart. Can live.

Come to the tunnel’s road with sudden panic, that it close with bombs. But the hole be clear. Is perfect in a patch of naked street. Must only cross this space. Before this final risk, I resting longer to a building side. Watch everything and breathe my strength. Stroke on First Runner’s back. A wind begun, and moving branches sketch in corner-eye. Keep flinching to a motion, and it be a waggling arm of pine. Ya, when I try to bring Kalash to aiming pose, is useless sweat. First Runner’s legs be there and there.

Yo, I lose my last impatience. Step out perilous to the moon.

And a roo step instant from a building side where he been waring. Raise his gun in aim.

I weaken sudden, lose my breath. Almost drop First Runner, and must grab her. Got no sense to think.

But he ain’t shoot. Roo yell out to my deafness. Jerk his rifle.

I take a breath, but feel no air. My legs gone queery, need to sit. Roo jerk his rifle again. Shout his mouth.

And I call rooish
,
Got sick enfant here. Ain’t shoot
.

Can see, this Russian speech take him in puzzling. He ease his gun. I smile to this, as my mind lose its telligence. Can think no complications, so I only roo,
Be gratty
. I nod to the tunnel’s hole.

Then I step forward, concentrate on only walking my weaken legs. Smile foolish, and I muttern roo,
Be gratty, brother. Be gratty
.

Roo be a dark-fur child, most like Bashir. Can be sixteen, is small. Last I see him, he let down his gun. He watch with troubling eyes. And, steppen-step, we sink into the blackness. Lose from sight.

Scarce remember this tunnel walk. Been black, it been exhaustion. Been minutes where I known I cannot walk no more. And I walk on. Then another minute so, another, through an hour. Past Pentagon, the tunnel flooding nasty to my ankles. Know this be mally, but be weak to fear. The water be only another tired weight that drag my feet.

Felt when I begin, I never lasting to the tunnel’s end. So I decide on Farragut exit. We come out on the Mall; hope soldiers be retreating from the bridge. If they already gone, I bring First Runner to the White House. Ain’t no hope, but it be warm. Is food.

And I step forward and step forward. Try every means to do this easier, but it be the same. Shift First Runner – but then I only frighten how she flopping loose. I touch her bandage, but feel nothing with my frozen hand. Be dark, be deaf. And be no help. Step forward and step forward.

Yo, at Foggy Bottom shelter, where I pause to check, she living. But at Farragut, she be dead.

Ain’t comprehend at first. Be resting on the Farragut ledge in its good light, watch gratty to her bandage thigh. It show no extra blood. On a neatly bed beside, a soldier lying dead, but this ain’t fear me somehow. His stiff face seem to care as I lean down to small First Runner’s face.

Ain’t no breath. And when I feel her throat, ain’t beat. Be thick and cold.

Then I look down at myself, and find her blood.

I carry her to the White House. Gone stupid in despair, and only remember how a Lowell child bring back from dying once. He
drowning in an icen pond, and they go soak him in warm water. He live again, spit out his drown.

Mall be empty, ain’t no child. Nor be thousand footprints – we come early somehow, though it seem I struggle through all hours. And I bring her to my room, Queen’s Bedroom of this empty mansion. Run a heaten bath. I rest her in this water in her clothes. Talk thoughtless to her stillness. The water pinken slow, and she lie dead.

Then, soggen how she be, I carry her to my bed. Yo, always in my injure mind, I know that Mamadou coming. Remember how he said First Runner been his only person left. How I said, ‘Thought I been yours,’ and he look to me seriose. And I feel her blood gone cold, gone sticky on my legs, my belly. Cannot meet him so. It be too much.

I tear these clothes away. Wash at the sink with wetten towel, scrubbing hasty at my skin. Be three towels red before I done. Yo, in this, my ears begin to hear. Ring shrill inside, but through this ring, I hear the water’s push.

Got no other clothes, so I put on Maria dress. Clad the grandy coat the Commandant given me in better time. Put on heely boots – walk clumsy but they got no blood.

Last before I leave, I go back to First Runner. Lean by her and say soft, ‘You good. Ain’t nothing harm you more.’ Words feel insulting once they said, but cannot think no other words. So I only kiss her brow. Pull blankets on her smallness, cover up her terrify eyes.

Then I sling Kalash again, and go back to the night.

73

OF MY LAST WAR

As I cross the empty mall its snow, I gone in stranger minds. Be thinking blind of Pasha. How we find him in that burning house. He run, and Driver shoot at him. Roo wheel back with his pistol, and I walk up, terrify and bold. I hold his gun nose to my chest. He look at me, besweaten scary, and all children love each other. He let go his gun.

The vampire live.

And then he killing Deema and Karim, shoot Mamadou. But he saving me away, all children love each other. Or he need myself to get him food, the vampire live. And on our journey walk, he want to murder the Armies, but he lose this chance. These Armies must be shot by Soledad, while she weep desperate lost.

The vampire live. I braving poisons for his life. He cannot die. He hold my hand like animoses, every day I been a god – and rid me, when his chance become. All children die who love each other, but the vampire live.

He tell me we can win at Quantico. Promise me the cure.

I come to the bridge, and still its length be empty. Only movement be at Arlington, flashes where bombs strike the land. Explosions sounding far, it almost be a comfort noise. Yo, a smutten mist drift toward, across the river’s blackish shine, and I be gripping Kalash like I prepare to fight this distance. Be thinking how Pasha been fourteen,
and watch his burning city. How I kill him with this gun he given me. He kill myself. All children love each other when they dead.

I grip Kalash and grip Kalash. Cold deaden in my face, my hands. I watch the flashing hill and my nose run with cold, but I ain’t crying. I ain’t remember life, I only know this night that cannot be. This sky that kill its earth. And first, it only be a petty strangeness when the soldiers come.

Bridge be a milen length, and they show first as squirming dots, a dirty bothering in my sight. But they running quick, and soon I see them individual. No flashes chase them. Cannot feel they flee from nothing special. They cross this snowen path through air like running be a pleasure game.

Get briefer panic, they be roos. But their disorder fleeing, ya their every looks, show they ours. Yo, then ain’t nothing I can do. Must wait, cannot change anything. So I stand helpless, furiose, as the first soldiers come.

Quanticos–Marianos all wear dapple clothes for war. This end of the bridge, they mostly walking, lost their fear. But they spread apart in darkness, cannot see their faces right. So I take off my coat. Bare myself in Maria finery. Stand middy to the bridge, and I stare desperate for my Mamadou. For Crow. For any penal who will tell me word.

Soldiers come in threes and twos. Some talking in a fever haste, some staring grim to nothing. One child pass me weeping, while another soldier yelling to him, threaten a fist into his face. And their numbers ever thicken, until the bridgen height be dark across with struggling children. Yo, now I standing in Maria dress, each person stare. But all be Quanticos with hostile eyes. Be strangers.

One officer come with scary looks, say, ‘Ma’am, you need some help?’ I ask him hoarse for Mamadou, penals, but he only say, ‘You’re not going to know until tomorrow, serious. You got to come with us.’ But I rid him with some lie about Patricia fetching me. Turn back to watching all wrong faces, rubbing my icen arms.

This waiting lengthen to impossibilities. Every child who pass
me, my eyes catching to him hungry, then fall away in cheaten grief. Once a gait, a flashen face, be Mamadou in my eyes, and I call out, run toward. But he turn and be a stranger flinching from my savage looks. Then I go furiose against all penals, how they never come. Try seeking Taco – be luckier to seek a child I wanting less. But the soldiers only clutter my sight with needless faces, until each child seem like a separate insult. Is like each say in passing,
Mamadou dead
.

In this, bombs scarcen fewer. Hush away and leave their bruisen haze unmeaning to the sky. Be only pittering guns, sound harmless in their quietness. And here the coming soldiers start to thin. Be twos and ones. Some carry injure children, slung on backs, or held between two people. Be their familiar cries and mutterings, scarce in growing night. And then the forward bridge be bare of life. Be only one last soldier come alone. He stumble as he pass, look superstitious dread at me. Break to a limping run, and his steps eager to a final hush.

The bridge be empty. Gunfire only be a memory of noise that yearn in mind. Night can hear again, the breeze and river like a rougher silence. On Arlington shore, some trees be burning. Arlington House got a pinkish glare that dull and sharpen in moods of smoke.

I stare, and conscience whisper to me, I must leave. The Russians come. But I stand trembling in the cold, glare furiose at that far hill. My blood be one red wound.

And time bleed into my despair. The bridge be empty dumb, its snow all eaten gray with footprints. I look back to the Mall sometimes, but this bring me angry, thinking how I walk here, still with hope.

When the first explosion come nearby, I startle vicious. Turn quick and see a goliath orange bloom of fire and smoke. Only then I comprehend, it be the District burning. This be fires set by Marines. Ya, this explosion growing into roar, all ammonition bursting wild. Feed red into the ashen smoke, that pump into the air like flowing water, sprinkle its blacken flecks. Another explosion burst, bloom
huge. Be like a fire monster lift its head, look hungry to the city. Ya, the horizon gleam mysteriose and reddish to the north. Fire rushing like a second river flowing dry and restless toward. The city lose its air in roar, like breathing out its life.

Then it comprehend, I be the only living child in Washington. Others all creep off in darkness. Their city burn behind, and Ice Cream Star remain in careless witness.

When the gunfire come again, I be unheeding in my trance. Accustom to this noise, become like birden voice in woods. Only slow, my conscience wake. Gunfire come from Arlington – and I squint back in worry, scout for Russians on the bridge. But it be clear.

Then my worst madness rise. I gaze along this bandon bridge, and think how Mamadou be a genius. I think, guns be himself, he fighting still. Ain’t dead for nothing. Penals do some vally desperations, then they coming here. I grab him in my arms, and be all victories farouche.

Ain’t know how long this ravish unsense live. I stand and heed the burning city, the guns beyond the water. Magine how the NewKing come across the bridge, all penals by. Be Crow with mally noise, my Taco. If tunnels burn, can swim the river out. Still can be right.

And this hope live, while fires grow brazen around, the air be sweaten warm. Continue while the gunfire thinning slow, come seldom. Die to nothing.

Arlington be silent. Nor the bridge change in its white unlife. The river pass, and I breathe in the hating stank of smoke, and start to weep. Weep at the uncaring hill, the bridge that will not bring them back. Weep at the muzzy stars, mind gone in thousand hysterias of grief.

And my weeping die – like all my bell and wolfen children – and my heart go clear in pain. Heart fill me like a knife. I wipe my tears on my rough coatsleeve, look toward Arlington’s shore. Fire on the hill be gone, and it be only ugly white.