State of Lies

by Siri Mitchell

  Gilman Street probably was one of the safest places we could have been that night. We were surrounded by people. There were policemen posted at every block. And I’d brought Alice too. But still, anxious to return to Jim and June’s, I tried to keep Sam moving down the sidewalk.

  One of the houses on the block had set up a haunted house in their front yard.

  “I want to do it!” Sam was hopping with excitement and there was a manic gleam in his eyes. I shouldn’t have let him start sampling the treats he’d been collecting.

  I tightened my grip on his hand. “No.”

  It seemed fairly innocuous. It had been set up in one of those long, narrow tents used at outdoor markets. There were multiple windows on both sides, which gave tantalizing glimpses of purple lights and bloody handprints. Eerie music wafted from the tent, and somewhere a fog machine was billowing vast amounts of creepiness.

  “Can I go alone?”

  “Absolutely not.” I tried to keep walking.

  He dug his heels into the sidewalk. “Please, Mom!”

  “No.” There was no way I was letting go of him.

  “Everyone is going by themselves.”

  He had a point. But it was a flimsy one: nobody else had me as their mother.

  “Please, Mom! I promise I won’t be scared.”

  “I already said no.”

  We watched a pair of dinosaurs come out. Several Disney princesses. A pirate and a mummy ran past. A father in a Dracula cape strolled by.

  Alice yanked on the leash.

  I yanked right back.

  A miniature Michelin Man, encased in rings of long white balloons, tottered along beside his mother.

  Sam tugged on my hand. When I looked down at him, he was waving at someone.

  I followed his gaze.

  “Look, Mom! Granddad!”

  74

  What! Where?

  Sam was jumping up and down, hand extended toward the Dracula that had passed us earlier.

  He bent down toward Sam with a flourish of his cape and—

  “No! Sam!” I tried to pull him away, tried to hide him behind me, but my father already had a grip on his other hand.

  He looked at me over Sam’s head. “You’re hard to find, Peach.” He wasn’t smiling. Beneath his stage makeup taut lines stretched between his brow. His eyes swept the street ahead as he pulled us away toward a house on the other side of the street.

  I tried to calm my fear. “We were just headed home. Do you want to come back with us? June said she’d have cupcakes waiting.” Chris was out there somewhere. He said he would be following me. If we turned around, then it might bring us closer to him. Once he saw my father, he could arrest him and it would all be over.

  He gestured with his chin toward the driveway. “How would you like to visit a secret hideout, Sam?”

  He glanced up at me. “Can Mom and Alice come too?”

  I gripped his hand even tighter. “You’re not going anywhere without me, sweetie.” Where was Chris? “But I really think we should go home, Dad. Sam’s getting tired.”

  “No, I’m not!”

  My father put his arm around my shoulders, enveloping me with his cape, as we skirted a candy line and blended with the shadows. He maneuvered us down the driveway and into the backyard. “There’s a secret path to get there too. This way.”

  I didn’t want to go anywhere with him. But the FBI was tracking my phone and they had me wired. Chris was on my tail. Only a minute more? Or maybe two?

  At the oakleaf hydrangeas that seemed to delineate the property line, my father paused. “No need for a phone where we’re going, Peach.”

  “I don’t know what you’re—”

  “Give me your phone.”

  Considering the way he’d co-opted me into his spy network without asking, I decided not to press him. I dug it out from underneath Sam’s candy and handed it to him.

  He tossed it into one of the bushes.

  We skulked across the next backyard, then down another driveway, leaving Halloween behind us.

  The FBI had lost the ability to geo-track my phone, but I was still wired. “Where are you taking us?”

  He shot a look at me over his shoulder and then reached back to grab me by the elbow. “Just keep up.” Shedding the noise and the crowds, we stepped into relative peace. We were on one of the streets that didn’t have sidewalks. It didn’t even appear to have very many streetlights. It was narrower, less polished than the streets around it.

  “Granddad?”

  He grunted.

  “I’m scared.”

  I squeezed Sam’s hand. So was I.

  * * *

  My father led us to an old bungalow, built well back on the property. A dead willow oak leaned toward it, the moonlight filtering downward through its bare branches. The lawn was a battleground of insurgent kudzu and brambles; the shutters had tilted. At some point in the recent past, a hefty branch had splintered off from the tree and fallen through the top of a screened porch.

  I pulled Alice with us down a front walkway made of paving stones that were sinking into the yard. We filed past parallel rows of boxwoods that had grown way beyond the bounds of clipped propriety.

  In front of us, a storm door hung permanently open, providing easy access to the front door. My father put a hand to it. Pushed.

  It swung halfway open and refused to budge any more.

  He pushed Sam through and went in behind him.

  As I began to slip through the door, Alice sat down on the top step, unwilling to go inside.

  I tugged at her.

  She wasn’t having it.

  I couldn’t wait for her, so I dropped the leash and went inside. As I disappeared into the gloom, she must have thought better of staying out there alone. She scrambled in after me. The clicking of her toenails on the scarred hardwood floors echoed through the dark.

  Where was Sam?

  I’d entered a living room that had a gaping fireplace surrounded by built-in bookshelves. Walking farther into the house, I passed a pair of waist-high shelves marking off what must have once been a dining room.

  “Mommy?”

  Sam!

  The dining room, in contrast to the living room, was bathed in pale, ethereal moonlight. It streamed in through a big bay window that took up the long side of the wall. And there, beneath it, sat Sam. I knelt beside my son, drawing him into my arms.

  Alice padded over to lick his face.

  “Are you okay?” Not waiting for him to answer, I held him away from me so I could see him. I positioned him in a splash of moonlight and smoothed an unruly lock of hair back across his forehead. “Are you all right?” I cupped his thin shoulders and drew him toward me in a hug. I wanted to fold him up and fit him back into my womb where nobody could ever harm him or steal him away again.

  Ahead of us, somewhere, the floor creaked.

  Alice barked, ears drawn back.

  I straightened and placed myself in front of Sam.

  My father emerged from a darkened doorway. He’d shed his cape.

  I stood my ground. “Why are we here, in this falling-down house?” There weren’t that many abandoned houses in the neighborhood. Hopefully that would give the FBI a clue.

  My mother, dressed as Elvira, joined him. “We need Sean. We know he’s alive. Where is he?”

  We need? We know? Was my mother involved in all of this too?

  “Grandma?” Sam grabbed my hand as his small, high voice pierced the gloom. “My daddy’s dead.” He stepped out from behind me. “He died. He’s in the wormhole.”

  My mother’s brow furrowed, marring her smooth, perfect complexion. “What?”

  Sam eyed me. Glanced toward the ground. “He’s in the wormhole.”

  I took over for him, bluffing for our lives. “I don’t understand what you’re asking. You think Sean is alive?”

  They said nothing.

  “Dad? You’re the one who identified the body. You’re the one who had him cremated. Yo
u both stood beside me at the funeral.” If I could convince them that I thought Sean was dead, then maybe they would leave Sam and me alone.

  How long had it been? Five minutes? Ten? Had Chris not seen us leave Gilman Street? I had to proceed as if he hadn’t. As far as I knew, we were on our own.

  Somewhere in the house, beneath us, something squeaked.

  Beside me, Alice’s ears lifted.

  “Things weren’t what they seemed. There was no body. Sean’s alive. I know he is.”

  I said nothing.

  “I need you to get him to come here. Tonight. Now.”

  “Sean’s dead. He died in a car accident. I don’t know what’s going on, but I do know I can’t speak to someone who’s dead.”

  My mother and father exchanged a glance. I hoped that meant their certainty was wavering.

  Alice got to her feet with a whine. Then she started digging at the floor.

  I moved to grab her collar.

  75

  “Why is she doing that?” My father was not amused.

  “I don’t know.” Not for certain. But the last time Alice did that, it turned out Sean had been in our crawl space.

  “Get her to stop.”

  “Alice!”

  Alice lifted her head, tail wagging, ears cocked.

  I motioned for her to sit.

  “Sean might be dead, but he left some notes behind, Dad. He wrote everything down. All of it.” Rage—hot and violent—burned in my gut. “I know what happened in the desert.” The FBI might not know where I was, but I was wired and they were still listening. They needed to hear my father admit to what he’d done.

  His glance was colored by surprise. But he recovered. “What happened back then doesn’t concern you.”

  “That’s what they tried to tell Sean, isn’t it? Why, Dad?”

  “Everything I did, I did for the love of my country. Period. No matter what anyone told you, they’ll never be able to say that I wasn’t an honorable man.”

  “But, Dad, you—”

  “Listen. Out there that night in the desert? I was just obeying orders. I was supposed to scout in front of the lines, report back any resistance, and keep going. We didn’t encounter any resistance, so I kept going. Later that night, an order came to pause and regroup, but the message was garbled and it completely contradicted everything we’d been told at the start of the mission. So I can forgive myself for being suspicious.”

  “You disobeyed an order.”

  He licked his bottom lip. “There was a storm. We were in the desert. The comms weren’t good, so I can cut myself some slack for that. My men were counting on me. Only I drove us straight into a minefield.” He paused, eyes gazing out through the window. And then he refocused back on me. “When I saw those Russians surround us, I thought for sure we were done. I assumed they were Republican Guard. That’s why I went out there by myself. Figured they might shoot me. But if they did, at least it would give the rest of the men some warning. Maybe some of them would be able to get away.”

  “Dad, why didn’t you just—”

  But he wasn’t listening to me anymore. “Of course the Russian’s offer was completely unexpected, and how could I not take it? It’s not like people didn’t know they armed the Iraqis. Not like we didn’t know they advised them. Were they supposed to be actively fighting us? No. Would my battalion commander have liked to have known they were? Sure. It might have turned the whole thing into World War III. But that Russian swore up and down they were the only unit there. And he told me he’d show us their position so long as we destroyed it and they could get out without anyone knowing they’d been there. We were rolling over everybody; Iraq was collapsing. It was clear that we would win, so there was no point in fighting them. Why create an international incident for nothing?”

  Beside me in the dark, Sam wrapped his arms around my leg.

  “So think about it. In exchange for letting them go, I’d get safe passage through the minefield. I’d get the location of their position, and I’d be able to destroy it as well as get credit for creating that breach. And I knew that would make everyone forget that we hadn’t fallen back like we were supposed to.” He blinked. Looked at me. “You would have agreed to it too.” He shrugged. “I figured it was pretty fair. They were on the losing side. He knew it, I knew it. Just a matter of time. He got the better end of the bargain. I thought so then, still think so now. And after Desert Sabre wrapped up, the war in Bosnia started. I think I was home for three months? Six? Something like that. Talked everything out with Mary Grace.”

  So my mother did know.

  “She’s the smart one. We figured I’d made the best of a bad situation. Then I ran into that Russian again in Bosnia. The Russians were all over the place. And they had all the intel. He shared some with me. I figured it was his way of paying me back for that favor I’d done him in the desert. He owed me one. Think he even said that. I said thanks, put it to work for me. But then I ran into him again.”

  I closed my eyes. I knew everything he was going to say.

  “And he had some more information. And another favor to ask.” He eyed my mother. “That’s the one that made Mary Grace crazy. She swore up and down that I’d live to regret it. But by the time I talked to her, the deed was already done.”

  My mother’s lips tightened.

  He sighed. “That’s the point when things started to change. Before that, the Russian gave me information like it was a gift. Know what I mean? After that, it was more transactional. And eventually, once I got to the Pentagon, the Russians assigned me to Hoffman. But it never involved life and death. It never involved the men.”

  My mother linked her arm through his.

  “I promised your mother, swore to her, that I’d get out just as soon as I hit twenty years and retire. I would have, but they made me a general at year nineteen. So what could I do?” He looked straight at me. “I really need you to understand I’m not a traitor.”

  “But, Dad—”

  “Sometimes the people at the Pentagon or the Kremlin just don’t understand the way things look on the ground.”

  “But Bosnia, Dad. You gave the Russians details on convoy movements, didn’t you?”

  “We all did. So they could hand them off to the Serbs.”

  “You must have figured out that the Serbs were using them to target people and not to allow them safe passage.”

  “After the first few times that thought did cross my mind. But what could I do about it? I wasn’t responsible for the Serbs’ actions.”

  “But people died. Allies died.”

  “Sometimes in war, people get hurt.”

  “They didn’t just get hurt. They got killed. And what about us? What about Sam and me? You almost got us killed. The Russians blew up our house.”

  “That wasn’t me. That was Hoffman’s doing. He arranged it. And it wasn’t supposed to happen like that. It didn’t seem like anyone was there. It was just that we wanted Sean to come out of hiding. He was the only one who knew about everything. Hoffman thought if he saw how serious we were, he’d contact us. It wasn’t meant to hurt you.” His gaze dropped toward the floor.

  “All these years. How did you get away with it?”

  “It was always a little tricky when I had to renew my security clearance. They ask a question about collusion, see my heart rate skyrocket. I explain about how many times I worked with Russians over the years. Just remind people of what they already know. I say, ‘It just makes me nervous because someone looking at this could think I was a spy or something.’ They laugh. I laugh.” He stared out the window into the night. “In this business, you tell the truth as much as you can.”

  76

  In the empty shell of that old, abandoned house, his words loomed large. But I couldn’t let them stand unchallenged.

  “You could have gotten out. You could have told them no.”

  “I did get out. But then defense companies put me on their boards of directors. And I started consulting.
The companies kept my security clearance active. People wanted me to talk to them at their conferences and they wanted me to talk on their news shows, and all of a sudden I had this whole other career. But Hoffman was always there, asking for things.” He glanced over at my mother.

  “So when I found out that your Sean was uncovering my trail, who else could I talk to about it but Hoffman? I knew what kind of man Sean was. If the DoD hadn’t given him a different job, he would have discovered everything. Then he would have told someone about it.”

  “So you’re the one who got him transferred out?”

  “That was me. Wasn’t difficult to do. I still have some clout at the Pentagon.” One side of his mouth lifted in a smile. “None of it’s ever really been hard.” He squared his shoulders, looked me straight in the eye. “Truth is, everyone wanted a hero, Peach.” He shrugged. “I just gave them what they were looking for, that’s all.”

  My mother stepped toward me, arm outstretched. “Your daddy never did any of it for the money.”

  They really didn’t get it. Maybe it came from years of justifying their behavior. “Do you remember Sergeant Ornofo?”

  “Ornofo?”

  “Or Sergeant Abbott? Sergeant Wallace?”

  “Yeah. Sure. E Company. They were with me in Desert Sabre.”

  “Now they’re all dead.”

  “Oh. Well, I’m sorry to hear that.”

  “They’re dead because they talked to me. About you. They were all murdered in the past two weeks.”

  “No.” He shook his head. “No. I never—” He held up a hand. “I never—I never ordered anything like that. It wasn’t me.”

  “You know what they said about you? They said you were good people. They said you knew how to take care of your troops.”

  “I didn’t think . . . I mean . . . who would have known that . . .”

  “Is that how you take care of your troops? You get them killed?”

  My mother grabbed my arm. “Don’t talk to your father that way!”

  I pulled it from her. “Don’t you get it? Let me explain it to you. Your husband betrayed our country. He raised me to tell the truth and be nice to people and keep my integrity, but you know what? He never did any of those things himself!”