The Disappearance of Grace (27 page)

Chapter 82

THEY RESCUED US, OF COURSE. The Italian police in cooperation with United States Marines assigned to the US Embassy building under direct order from Ambassador Graham. Hakeemullah was shot dead on the spot and his entire gang of three Taliban co-conspirators rounded up and incarcerated in a military prison in Milan where they presently await questioning. Our precise location came on a tip from an island fisherman who repeatedly viewed the suspicious foreigners moving in and out of the building on many occasions, but mostly at night. When he witnessed them carting a body—my body—into the building, he became convinced that they were indeed up to no good.

I came to in the same hospital in Venice where Hakeemullah snatched me up less than twenty-four hours before. As seems to be the case whenever I wake up from a bout of blindness and the exhaustion it brings on (or vice versa), I can see again. That was three days ago, and I haven't suffered even a hint of blindness since then.

Grace shares the bed beside me and she continues to sleep off the effects of her four-day/four-night nightmare. Other than the red paint Hakeemullah applied to her legs, probably to somehow symbolically mimic the cruelties brought upon his own son's legs by the bombardment, my fiancée is unhurt and unwounded. But she does bear the scars of her emotional struggle, much of which come from those few moments we shared inside that small room together with Hakeemullah holding a knife against her neck. In the end, what happened in Venice was not motivated by terror, not motivated by a war neither one of us started or wanted. It was not motivated by the shootout that came about between the soldiers under my command and the still armed elders of the village. Some of the Tajik men died and some of my men died. It was motivated by the loss of his child and nothing more. In the end, Hakeemullah lost his life and perhaps that's the way he wanted it. To lose his earthly life and spend eternity in paradise with his beloved Aziz. Perhaps that is why he never left Venice with Grace.

* * *

Grace and I are released at the end of the third day and are put up by the embassy in a hotel that overlooks the Grand Canal. We purchase a couple of bottles of wine, some cheese and bread, and we spend the night holding one another. We try and make love but we are too exhausted. Later that night when we both seem to wake up at the same time, I get up and open the windows just enough to allow the full moonlight to pour into the room, along with the cool air. Once more we try and make love, and this time we don't stop. We make love until the dawn, until our bodies are covered in moisture and we are worn out. Then we sleep until noon.

When Detective Carbone calls and leaves a message asking us to meet him for a debriefing along with several military types, I let the request go unanswered. Instead, I kneel down alongside the bed and take hold of Grace's hand. She slides up a little onto the soft pillows, runs her open hand through her thick dark hair. Already tears are forming in her eyes. In my left hand I hold her diamond ring. Slipping it onto her ring finger, I say, “Will you marry me?”

A tear rolls down her right cheek.

“Yes. I do. Yes.”

I press my face into her neck then, and together we listen to sounds of the boats on the canal, and water lapping up against the stone banks, and we breathe in the scent of Venice and begin to live again, starting with that very moment in time.

We. Live.

EPILOGUE

“Feel this one,” my fiancée tells me. Her voice is insistent yet somehow lighter than I've heard it since before I went to war. All around me in this open café, I hear the sounds of voices, the clatter of plates on the metal tables, the clinking of wine glasses, the unhurried laughs of the lovers and friends who come to this place to fall in love, or fall in love again.

I hold out my hand, palm up. Grace sets something inside it.

“Now don't cheat,” she insists.

My eyes are already closed. But I try and shut them tighter. As if it's possible for my lids to come down any harder than they already have. I close up the fingers on my hand, make a fist around the object.

“Well,” Grace says, “let's have it.”

I feel a solid metal band. It's cold in my warm palm. There's no stone attached to it. It's just a plain ring.

“Couldn't you come up with something harder than this, Grace?” I say, not without a laugh.

“Hey, it's not the object I'm trying to get you to see,” she says. “It's what the object means.”

“I see,” I say.

“No you don't see,” she says. “How can you? Your eyes are closed.”

“That they are. But you wouldn't believe what I see when my eyes are closed.”

“What do you see?”

“You. Me. In bed. The windows open, the breeze blowing on our pale skin.”

“You can open them now, Romeo. Or should I say, Casanova?”

I do it. I also open my hand and reveal a gold band. A wedding band. My eyes fill.

“Go ahead,” Grace whispers, her voice choking. “Read the inscription.”

I hold the ring up to my face so that I can read what's been inscribed in the band's interior. I see, “My Love. My Life. My Heart.”

“It's too early to wear this.”

Grace reaches across the table, takes hold of my free hand, squeezes it.

“You've earned the right. We. Us. We've earned the right to be married before a priest or a judge tells us it's so. Screw the rules.”

“I guess we've always been married. Even when we were apart.”

Grace exhales a breath, and once more, paints a smile on her face. This smile is different. It carries with it a different message.

“Now
feel
this, Captain,” she says, once more reaching out for my hand. “Gently,” she adds, placing my hand on her flat belly. “What do you feel?”

A single tear falls down my face. I feel Grace and what's now growing inside my Grace.

“I'm home, Grace,” I whisper. “I'm finally home and healing.”

We sit like that for a while. In silence. Not needing to speak. Needing only to feel one another's hands. One another's presence. One another's heartbeats. We don't dare release our hold on one another. Not even to steal a drink of our wine.

It begins to rain.

I can hear the sound of the raindrops falling on the canvas awning above us, and against the stone cobbles of the open square. I can only imagine the heavy raindrops making thousands of small splashes and explosions in the water that's collected in the stone fountain.

“Nicky,” Grace asks after a time, as though she is reading my mind. “Why do we have to fight in wars?”

I exhale a breath.

“Why do we have to love?”

“Will you ever go back to the wars, Nick?”

Flashing inside my brain, the image of a hill in a valley surrounded by crystal clear blue sky. The sound of screaming jet engines breaking the silence. Then two explosions that rattle the earth. Then I see a shattered village, and the face of a dead boy. Standing not far away from him, on the opposite side of the stone well, a bearded and robed elder. An entire lineup of robed elders. I see them raise up the weapons hidden beneath their robes. Coming from behind me, the clatter of automatic weapons sighting in on their target, followed by an explosion of rounds, and the dropping of bodies. I see the elders collapse and drop beside him, all of them dead before they hit the earth. I see myself falling to my knees, make out the sound of the bodies of my men falling dead-weight to the gravel-covered Tajik earth. See myself screaming, “Stop! Stop! Make it Stop!” I see myself collapsing to the same gravelly earth that a little boy shares only a few feet away from me, his heart as still and as dead as mine. I see it all as clear as I see this ring in my hand and if I had my way, I would erase it from my memory banks forever and ever. But I can't. I can only create new memories and try and put behind me the old ones. Because the truth is this: We killed them all. Rather, my men, under my command, killed them. Every last one of them. After the bombs fell on the village, the elders tried to ambush us. All twelve of them who were left alive after the attack by the Warthog. But my men got the jump on them and they killed them all, but not until six out of eight men under my command were also shot dead on the spot. It was an execution on both sides. A bloodbath. And it did not have to happen.

“I'm making my own separate peace now,” I say after a slow beat. “My wars are over. I can give you that. I want to give you that, Grace. I want to give our precious child that.”

I stare into her eyes, take in her black hair, her thick lips, her slightly blushed cheeks. I see tears begin to slowly fall down those cheeks and I want to swallow them. Swim in them.

Behind us, a little boy has begun to kick a soccer ball in the square. He's kicking the ball against the fountain, in the pouring rain. Some of the people who occupy the surrounding tables take notice of him, and they begin to laugh and smile.

Grace turns and eyes the little boy. He's dressed in a button-down shirt, short pants and black shoes with white ankle socks. A little boy who's just gotten out of school for the day and who now wants to play in the rain.

Grace turns back to me.

“Well,” she says, “shall we?”

I toss a twenty Euro note onto the table and together we stand, head out from under the awning and into the rainy square. As if anticipating us, the little boy kicks the ball to me and I kick it to Grace. She laughs and kicks the ball back to the little boy and the rain begins to soak her thick hair and the black turtleneck sweater she wears. It begins to soak my leather coat and coat my cropped hair. The rain runs down my face, mixes with my tears. I look up at the sky and I see the clouds and the raindrops falling from them. Every one of them is for Grace and for me and for our child to be. I let the rain soak my face. I let the raindrops fall into my open eyes and seep into my mouth.

I see now. I see with full clarity. I see the meaning of it all.

I see my life flash before my eyes like a lightning strike off in a distant horizon. I am haunted by its fleeting essence. I tremble at the thought of losing this moment forever. But then, it is already gone.

Lowering my head, I lock eyes with my Grace, standing in the rain in the open square. She tosses me a smile. I toss her one back. We're learning how to love one another again. We're learning to love. We're making progress.

Real progress.

Making my way to her, I hold out my hand. She takes it in hers as she bids the now rain-soaked little boy a heartfelt goodbye. Together, we head out across the square towards the stony banks of the canal that will lead us back to our hotel. I feel her hand in mine and I hold it tight. I hold onto my Grace like she is the last breath in my lungs and just as precious.

Over my left shoulder, just beyond the corner of an old brick building, the Grand Canal appears for us. The boats and gondolas bob in its never-still wake. The dark water flows in from the sea through these channels and feeder canals like blood through our arteries and veins. And it is eternal. But for us, it is what we have now, for our memories, for when we no longer have one another. It is what we have for a moment, for all our spent yesterdays and for all our borrowed tomorrows.

It is all that we have.

And it is nothing.

But it is everything.

THE END

Also by Vincent Zandri

Scream Catcher

Prologue

Sweeny's Boxing Gym

Lake George, New York

Tuesday, August 15, 6:10 A.M.

The man is hiding. Has been for a long time now, since his life—his physical body—became reduced to a shadowy reflection of his own fear. A fear so real, so palpable and heavy, it seems like there are times it might be possible for him to unzip it like you would a second skin and maybe hang it up on a sixpenny nail to dry. If only that were possible.

But his fear is more than skin deep. It is an internal demon and it is lodged inside bone and flesh like a cancer. It is what he has in the place of a soul. Rather, it is what has replaced his soul. Only when he least expected it did it reveal its beastly head of pale white skin, black eyes and fang-like teeth before entering into his body and holding him hostage.

Ever since that day he has since been trying his best to purge the demon from his body. But he does not use a priest for his exorcist. He does not use a shaman. He does not use a psychiatrist. He does not use God.

Instead, he uses only physical exertion.

He attempts to push the fear out through his ribs by improving his physical body with exercise. Grueling exercise on a daily basis. Running, lifting, boxing, stretching, sweating, groaning, pushing, pulling, crying, bleeding, sucking air and, on occasion, passing out.

It's bad that those closest to him no longer trust him. It's worse that he no longer trusts himself. And a man who cannot trust himself can never know what it is to truly love or be truly loved in return.

Yet, he lives and carries on as if today—this
very
moment in time—will be the end of something bad and the beginning of a new life free of the demon.