Brotherhood of Fire

by N. C. Reed

  “Thank you, Mrs. Sanders,” Samantha lowered her pants leg. “And for opening your home to me,” the shy girl looked at the floor.

  “You're always welcome here dear,” Patricia told her honestly. “Don't let my tantrum get to you. I've had a rough day myself, though I hazard not so bad as yours.”

  “Your son saved me, Mrs. Sanders,” Samantha looked up at her and Patricia saw the warning signs at once. “When I…when I couldn't make it, he carried me. If not for him, I'd still be there. I am so sorry for the man that died, I am, but. . .I can't be sorry they came and got us. They were about. . .I mean they were going…” She broke down finally, unable to finish, tears flowing freely.

  “It's all right, child,” Patricia told her gently, hugging her close. “If anyone deserves to cry today I'd say you're one of them. It's all right now, though.”

  “My parents,” Samantha sobbed. “They were in Nashville,” she looked up at Patricia. “Do you think they're all right?” she asked.

  “I don't know, Samantha,” Patricia replied honestly. “I would hope, and I would pray so, but I don't know. You can stay here as long as it's needful. If we hear from or about your parents then we 'll try and get you to them. Until then, just think of this as home, okay?”

  “Thank you,” the girl nodded. “So very much.”

  “You're welcome, sweetie,” Patricia smiled ever so slightly for the first time in what seemed like forever. “You're welcome.”

  -

  “You sure you don't mind?” Clay asked his nephew. “You gotta be tired too.”

  “I'm good,” Gordy shook his head. “Younger than you so I'm more resilient,” he grinned weakly and Clay chuckled as he mock slapped his nephew.

  “I appreciate it,” he told him. Clay had just asked his nephew for a favor.

  “I 'll get on it right now,” Gordy promised and went to do just that. Clay watched him going for a minute and then ventured over to the main house on what he had started thinking of as the 'Troy Compound'. Several people were gathered around the table, though of his original crew only Jose Juarez was among them.

  “Everyone is racked out, boss,” Juarez reported. “I'm just hanging out. I can't sleep anyway,” he shrugged.

  “Me either,” Clay sympathized. “What's going on around here?” he asked as he took an empty chair. Martina Sanchez placed a steaming cup of coffee in his hands before returning to where Jose was sitting.

  “We've got the two women you brought in set up,” Martina told him. “Even managed to find that soldier girl two bras,” she snorted, giving Juarez a mock glare. “I have noted that it seems you are mostly bringing women here to live,” she went on, clearly amused rather than angry. “I have also noted that three of the four have large boobs. I sense a pattern developing among you.”

  “Just luck of the draw,” Clay said without thinking and Martina burst out laughing. Realizing what he'd said, Clay joined her as did Jose Juarez.

  “Sorry,” Clay told her as he got his breath back. “That wasn't how I meant it. With Amy, there wasn't anywhere else to go. Tully asked to come here as a former soldier, and the Walters girl is almost family to my outfit,” he nodded his head toward his father's farm. “I assume that the veterinarian. . .Terri? Right? Wasn't well endowed then?”

  “You mean you didn't look?” Martina asked, eyebrows raised.

  “I live with a possessive, touchy redhead,” Clay reminded her. “I don't ever look.”

  “So, I should die my hair and be more touchy, then. Eh?” she eyed Jose with the raised eyebrows.

  “Ahora mamacita, ya sabes que tengo ojos sólo para ti, mi corazón,” Jose said smoothly as he kissed her cheek. “Your worries are foolish and will make your hair gray before its time.”

  “Says the man who can't, and I quote from our first date, 'resist a great pair of boobs', unquote,” Martina shot back, elbowing him in the chest even as she settled into his lap.

  “Well, you have a great pair so what can I say?”

  “Jose!” she scolded. “Stop saying things like that out here in front of everyone!”

  “What? You were talking about them!” Juarez tried to look innocent but failed miserably.

  “Not mine!” Martina elbowed him again, harder this time. “Just in general!”

  Clay just shook his head at their antics, knowing that it was good for them. Bleeding off stress like that was good for Jose and would help his and Martina's relationship.

  “There you are,” he heard a familiar voice behind him and smiled as he turned to see Lainie, bundled against the cold, coming inside.

  “I thought I told you I have abandonment issues,” the 'touchy' redhead sounded put out as she settled in beside him. “Yet I wake up alone in a cold house.”

  “I put a blanket over you!” Clay protested as he offered her his cup.

  “Oh, well,” Lainie rolled her eyes. “He put a blanket over me, Martina. That makes it all better, doesn't it?”

  “Oh of course, of course, amiga” Martina brought Lainie her own cup and then refreshed everyone's cup before returning to the table. “Clearly a cosmopolitan kind of man, throwing blankets at women,” she teased as she sat back down.

  “I didn't throw it at her,” Clay objected. “I draped it over her!”

  “Like she was furniture, then,” Martina sighed theatrically.

  “You are not going to win this one, amigo,” Juarez told him. “Better to just admit you are wrong and try not to do it again,” he advised.

  “Now there is a well-trained man,” Lainie saluted Martina with her cup. “Well done!”

  “It's been a labor of love,” Martina sighed again.

  “What do we do now?” Juarez asked into the silence as the fun exchange came to an end.

  “We toast a good man, salute an empty chair, we bury our friend and . . . and we move on. As best we can,” Clay told him. It was what was expected.

  “It will be strange, not having him here,” Martina nodded.

  “Indeed, it will,” Juarez noted. “Of all of us, I always thought…” he trailed off, not wanting to finish.

  “I know,” Clay agreed. “Me too.”

  “We should go and see him,” Juarez stood, allowing Martina to take his seat. Clay rose as well.

  “We 'll be back,” he promised Lainie. The two women watched them go and Martina looked at Lainie.

  “There will be a celebration tonight,” Martina told her.

  “Celebration?”

  “They will drink too much,” Martina nodded. “Tell stories of their friend. Of each other. Of places they have been, things they have done and had hoped to do again. Many things.” Her voice sounded distant. Detached.

  “What do we need to do?” Lainie asked.

  “We will not be invited, chiquita,” Martina told her gently. “This will be a warrior's funeral. There is no place for us there.”

  -

  “And this was what he wanted, you're sure?” Jake asked as he helped Gordy finish.

  “Positive,” the teen nodded. “This is exactly what he wanted.”

  “Okay then,” Jake shrugged and continued to pile up wood. “I hate it about big man, I swear I do,” he added after a moment. “He seemed like a hell of a good guy.”

  “He was,” Gordy nodded. “He really was.”

  “How you doing' with all this, kid?” Jake asked, eyeing him carefully.

  “What you mean?” Gordy asked without slowing in his work.

  “With all of this,” Jake waved his arm around. “You went with 'em, didn't you?”

  “Yeah, but I didn't do nothing,” Gordy shrugged.

  “I smell bullshit, boy,” Jake told him. “And I ain't asking you what you did. I'm just asking how you are. That's all.” The concern in his voice was evident.

  “I'm okay,” Gordy shrugged again. “I liked Bear just fine, I did. But the others,” he shook his head. “They're close, man. I'm talking close, too. I don't know how they're gonna deal, exactly.”

&
nbsp; “You're looking at it,” Jake told him, stopping to eye the project they'd been working on.

  “What?” Gordy did stop now and look at Jake.

  “This is a funeral pyre, kid,” Jake pointed to the construct the two of them had put together. “And that's a council fire,” he pointed to a circle of hay bales around a tee-pee of four-foot logs. “They're gonna have themselves a warrior's funeral tonight, and celebrate the passing of their friend into another realm.”

  “How do you know that?” Gordy asked. “Uncle Clay tell you?”

  “I didn't always intend to be a mechanic, kid,” Jake said wistfully. “History is full of stuff like this. Stories about men like Clay and the others. Men who live on the edge and rarely come away from it. I bet Barnes was laughing when he got hit, wasn't he?” Jake looked at Gordy.

  “I don't honestly know,” Gordy replied. “I was driving so I had to get the rig going.”

  “Have fun?” Jake asked him.

  “Well...” Gordy hesitated.

  “It's okay, kiddo,” Jake said easily. “Ain't nothing wrong with it. It don't make you bad that you enjoyed it. Adrenaline gets to pumping', it does that too ya.”

  “I guess,” Gordy shrugged. Truthfully, he hadn't thought about it much. He had shot one man, though he hadn't known who it was. A man that was an active enemy with gun in hand. Gordy didn't regret doing it and didn't agonize over it. It was what it was.

  “You sure you're okay?” Jake's voice broke Gordy's train of thought and he looked over at the larger man.

  “Yeah, man. I'm fine.”

  -

  “Thank you, Gordy,” Clay said as he and the rest gathered around the already burning fire. “I appreciate it.”

  “Welcome,” Gordy nodded. He started to leave but Tandi Maseo grabbed his arm and stopped him.

  “Where you going?” he asked. “You were with us. Popped a tango right before he grabbed that hot little blonde and carried her out,” he told the others. “And drives like a bat outta hell,” he chuckled. “You got a seat here, kid.”

  “He's right,” Jose Juarez nodded. “You walk the walk, kid. Pull up a bale and have a seat. We 'll tell you all about ole Bear.”

  “Are you sure?” Gordy asked, hesitating. “I'm not-”

  “Yeah, you are,” Clay nodded his agreement. “You deserve to be here, Gordy, or else none of these guys would have mentioned it. So, have a seat, have a drink,” he offered up a bottle of Jack Daniels Black Label, “and listen while we remember Big Bear, John Barnes.”

  -

  “. . .with a towel and nothing else!” Laughter howled around the fire as Mitchell Nolan regaled a tale of how he had 'gotten' Barnes once while on R & R.

  From between the buildings, about fifty or so yards away, several people stood watching.

  “So, what is the purpose of this, exactly?” Robert asked, taking a break from walking the patrol around the farm.

  “This is John Barnes' funeral,” Martina Sanchez said softly from where she was leaning against the building.

  “What?” Robert turned to look at her. “But. . .shouldn't we all be there too?”

  “No, this is for them,” she shook her head slowly. “There's no place for us out there.”

  “My son is out there!” Robert exclaimed.

  “He earned the right to be there,” Tully nodded.

  “Aren't you a soldier?” Robert asked her. “Why aren't you with them, then?” he asked when she nodded.

  “Because I haven't earned that right.”

  “I thought you had been in combat, too,” Beverly Jackson's voice was gentle.

  “Not like they have,” Tully shook her head. “They're very different, even compared to other special forces. They have their own ways.”

  “I don't see wh-” Robert cut himself off as Clay got up from the fire.

  “So now,” Clay looked at the men around the circle who also slowly stood. “We say good-bye. We say good-bye to our friend, our comrade, our brother. We hoist one last cup in his honor,” he lifted a metal cup as he spoke, the rest following suit.

  “To John the Big Bear,” Clay drained his.

  “Big Bear,” the others repeated, draining their own.

  Leaving his cup behind, Clay led the small procession to where Barnes' body lay. Taking his knife, Clay made a cut on his hand and passed the knife to Jody Thompson, who similarly cut his own hand before passing it down the line. As each man's hand filled with blood, they left a bloody hand print somewhere on their comrade's body, then returned to the fire.

  “And so, we say farewell,” Clay picked up a small torch. Once again, the others followed suit. Clay led them to where John Barnes' body was setting high on the pyre Gordy and Jake had built for him.

  “Good-bye, my friend,” his voice sounded so terribly sad. “I shall surely miss your presence. May every happiness that eluded you here be waiting for you there.” With that he tossed the torch onto the pyre. The oil soaked logs immediately caught flame.

  Slowly the others circled the pyre, adding their own torches in different places, with different eulogies.

  “That may be the saddest thing I've ever seen,” Lainie said softly.

  “We shouldn't be seeing it at all,” Tully agreed. “If they were still deployed it would just be them. It's only because of where we are that we're seeing it now.”

  “How is it you know so much about this?” Robert had to ask.

  “I met one of their units in Iraq, back in 2013,” she said simply.

  “Doing what?” he almost challenged.

  “Dismantling a building full of explosives where two hundred Iraqi children were being held hostage by ISIS militants,” her reply was as emotionless as it was descriptive.

  “What?”

  “The CTG were working behind enemy lines and had eliminated the ISIS battalion that was holding the children, but the bomb was more than they could handle,” Tully shrugged. “So, I was dropped in by helicopter to take the bomb apart. It wasn't safe to move the children until I could dismantle the arming device. First time I was wounded in fact.”

  “Wounded?”

  “Sniper hit my leg while I was working to follow the wiring from a false trigger to the real thing. Hurt like a bitch, too.”

  “I imagine,” Beverly Jackson commented. “I'm glad you made it out.”

  “Two of them didn't,” Tully nodded, her gaze vacant as she recalled the event. “They went after the sniper so I could keep working. They got him, but he was wearing a bomb of his own that triggered the building they were in. Brought the whole thing down on them.”

  “You've seen this before,” Lainie stated rather than asked and Tully nodded slowly.

  “Yes,” was all she said. “I need to walk. I need the exercise. Please excuse me.” She was gone before anyone could object.

  “What's her issue?” Robert asked.

  “Sometimes I have a hard time seeing you as Clayton's brother,” Martina Sanchez told him softly. “You have the tact of a rhinoceros in heat, you know that?” With that she departed as well.

  “What did I do?” Robert asked the others, genuinely puzzled.

  “Robert, do you ever really listen to the way you say things?” Lainie asked him. “It was like you were challenging everything she said,” she nodded in the direction Tully had gone. “And you stand here almost in derision because they're doing something you don't understand,” she pointed toward Clay and the others. “I don't think you really mean it like that, at least I hope not, but it does come across that way.”

  “Last night you were blaming Clay because your daughter had ran off to town to do something stupid,” Lainie went on, past caring at this point. “Blamed him for 'abandoning' someone that he has no ties to and no obligation toward. He went anyway, and his friends went with him,” she pointed to the funeral pyre. “He lost one of the best friends he's ever had saving your reckless and irresponsible daughter, and now you're standing here in derision because you don't understand how the
y choose to say good-bye. You really are a piece of work, you know that? No wonder Clay thought about staying in Africa.”

  Robert instantly began to object but then caught himself, studying what he was about to say as well as what he had said before.

  “You're right,” he nodded. “I didn't realize. But last night. . .that's not fair,” he objected. “I was worried about my daughter!”

  “That's right,” Lainie nodded. “Your daughter. That you failed to educate well enough that she would know better than to do something so stupidly suicidal, and yet who did you lay the blame on? Not her, not you and not your wife. Clayton. You blamed your brother for not rescuing her friend. Even after he told you he didn't think it could be done, and that they would suffer loss doing it. You don't care even now that a good man died over her stupidity, do you?”

  “You can't expect me to think more of someone I barely know than my own daughter,” Robert objected.

  “I can expect you to take responsibility for your daughter's behavior, though,” Lainie wasn't backing down. “Why was it necessary for Clay and his friends to go into that danger to start with?”

  “To rescue Abby,” Robert said, his voice smaller, softer than before.

  “Didn't Clay tell her that going was too risky? That there was no way to do what she wanted done without someone dying? Maybe even her friend?”

  “Yes,” Robert nodded.

  “So, can you at least acknowledge that it's your daughter's fault that Clayton has lost one of the best friends he ever had? Certainly, more of a brother to him than you've been lately, wouldn't you say? I didn't see you offering to ride into town to save your own daughter you claim to care so much about. Your son did, though,” Lainie looked to where Gordy was still standing with the others. “You did that much right at least. God knows how.”

  Robert didn't respond to that last set of statements as he reflected on what Lainie had said. Part of him wanted to be angry at her for telling him off, but. . .he deserved it. He really did. For the first time in he couldn't recall how long, he realized he had it coming. He had been an ass to his brother even while Clay was fighting to protect everyone. Working himself into a frenzy to protect them all. He looked out at the collection of men, all of whom were embracing his son as if he were one of them.