Come Back To Me

by Melissa Foster

  Alice was in the front door and on Tess’s heels in seconds. “Tess? What the hell’s wrong? Are you sick?” She looked Tess up and down. “I’ve been calling you all day. When you didn’t come to work, I got worried,” she sat next to Tess on the couch. “What is it? The flu?”

  Tess shook her head, turning away from Alice’s frustration. Thoughts of Beau brought fresh tears.

  Alice tucked her silky blonde hair behind her ear, “Tess?”

  Tess turned toward Alice and tried to speak, “They…” The words stuck in her throat like peanut butter. She handed Alice Mr. Fulan’s crumpled business card, which she’d held in her hand since he’d left the night before, his home phone number scribbled across the top.

  “What’s thi—” it took a moment for Alice to understand. “Oh, my God, Tess, what’s happened?”

  Tess tried to explain. She opened her mouth to speak, her voice absorbed by her sobs.

  “I’m so sorry,” Alice awkwardly pulled Tess into an embrace, patting her back as if she’d just gotten a good grade on a paper. She pushed back quickly, “Why didn’t you call me? What happened?”

  Tess didn’t answer.

  “What can I do?” Organization, that’s what Alice was good at.

  Tess shrugged.

  “Did you call his parents?” Alice asked, the gears of her mind in motion.

  Tess shook her head, “Couldn’t.”

  Alice was on her feet in seconds heading toward the front door, “Be right back.” She whipped out her cell phone and called Mr. Fulan, walking outside so Tess wouldn’t have to endure the hurt all over again. She returned to Tess’s side ten minutes later and whispered. “I’m so sorry.”

  Tess stared straight ahead, her eyes vacant, her body numb.

  ***

  For two days, Alice milled around the house, cooking food Tess would not eat, trying to engage Tess in conversation, and working very diligently to lift Tess’s spirits. Alice was not known for her warmth, and Tess was grateful for Alice’s lack of skill in that area. She didn’t have the energy to be coddled—her being there was more than Tess could handle. She lay in silence for two days, finally asking Alice to leave, “I just need some space.”

  Kevin had stopped by a few times. He cut the grass and tried to comfort Tess, his own private pain hovering like a dark cloud.

  Iraq

  The sun shone brightly in the clear sky, filling the tent with a heat so dry that as quickly as sweat poured off Suha, it immediately dried up. Suha focused on the task at hand, rousing the injured man.

  She wiped his brow with a damp rag and spoke softly, “Wake up, Jameel.” Suha was surprised when the word rolled off her lips. The Arabic word, Jameel, translated to beautiful male in English. She sat next to the man that she’d dragged to safety, the man she’d monitored throughout the long nights, dressing his wounds, and had come to care for. His dark hair, the color of stones in a riverbed, not quite brown and not quite black, had grown in the passing weeks, sticking out in odd places. It was much less coarse than the hair of local men. Suha tried to attribute his peaceful look to his medications, but something told her that the man who lay before her was not a mean-spirited man. She was not afraid of this man. Suha thought of her kind father, grateful that he’d insisted on schooling her in English. A woman in the medical field would need such knowledge, he’d told her. She’d spent years studying her father’s library of English dictionaries and learning to translate medical books. The memory warmed her. She wished she could see her father once again, thank him, hear his voice. The American’s eyes fluttered.

  Hope soared through Suha. She asked him to open his eyes, told him that he was safe.

  He moaned.

  Samira rushed to Suha’s side.

  Suha reached for the American’s hand, urging him to open his eyes. He moaned again. She wiped his face with a cloth, hoping to revive him.

  ***

  Sounds washed over Beau. Pain coursed through every inch of his flesh. He tried to open his eyes. His eyelids were too heavy. He wiggled his toes, sending searing pains through his calves and thighs. He listened, trying to figure out where he was, trying to remember how he had gotten there. His mind was too foggy, he could not focus. He felt a hand on his wrist and heard the softly-spoken words that accompanied the tender touch. Damn, how he wished he could understand what was being said. He tried to speak, but his voice failed him.

  Suha spoke excitedly, her heart racing. “Jameel, please. Open your eyes,” she pleaded.

  His eyelids fluttered. Beau’s mind drifted in and out of fogginess. He’d heard a woman’s voice, but it was not Tess. Tess. The thought of her made his heart beat faster. He felt a warm hand caress his own. He tried to lift his index finger.

  Samira felt the slight pressure of the movement. “Suha!” she called and held his hand as if it were a delicate piece of art.

  He moved his index finger slowly around her palm. The message he drew was lost on Samira. He could hear the Arabic words flow from her mouth, and his heart sank. He wasn’t home.

  “Yes, Jameel,” Suha said. “That’s it, my son. Move your fingers. I knew you were in there.” Tears brimmed in her eyes.

  Zeid approached his mother from behind. His high-pitched voice carried anger, though his Arabic words were cautious, “Why are you helping this ugly soldier? Father would be angry.”

  Suha glared at him, and he shrank away. She turned back to Beau. His left eye, the side that had taken the brunt of his fall, was still swollen shut, the muscles pulsated beneath the swollen flesh. “Jameel, wake up,” she said.

  Beau tried to open his eyes, but his left eye hurt too badly. To his surprise, his right eye opened, just a slit. He could not make out the blurred images before him. He closed his eye again and felt Suha’s warm, capable hand on his head, lifting the back of his neck off of the blankets.

  “You must drink,” she said. She injected water into his mouth using a syringe without the needle. Pain followed the water down his throat. He was eager to drink. He tightened his fingers around Samira’s small hand.

  “More, Suha,” Samira urged.

  Suha quickly reloaded the syringe and dripped more water into his mouth. She repeated the effort five times, until he loosened his grip and the weight of his head became apparent in Suha’s hand. “Good,” she praised him.

  The taste of metal lingered on his tongue. He opened his eye again. The face of the older woman slowly became clearer, as if he were looking through aged, thick glass. The woman whose voice had pulled him from the trenches of the blackened void in which his mind swam, the voice he’d held onto to keep himself from the grip of death, the woman who’d saved him, looked back at him. Her dark eyes held too many feelings to decipher: fear, hope, fatigue?

  She smiled, exposing large, yellow teeth, bringing happiness to her otherwise wrinkled and strained features. Her thick black eyebrows rose with her smile, and the darkened hair above her lip, that on any other women would look manly and harsh, looked appropriate on her, softened her in some way.

  Beau tried to smile, his lips lifted on the right side, still too swollen on the left to move.

  Suha spoke to Samira in rushed Arabic. Samira hurried out of the shelter with Zeid in tow, careful not to wake Athra and Edham, asleep on blankets on the other side of the small tent. Suha pushed Beau’s hair from his forehead, gently wiping the thick beads of sweat that had repeatedly formed.

  “You are alive,” she said in English with both confidence and surprise.

  Beau’s words pushed from his mouth, a long, low, convoluted breath, “’Hank you.” Tears welled under his closed left lid and pooled in his right eye. He wanted desperately to touch his chest pocket. He needed the security of seeing Tess’s face, the photo he carried. His left arm wore a heavy splint and makeshift cast, his right too pain-stricken to move, he repetitively shifted his gaze between Suha and his chest.

  Suha watched his eye with pain in her heart. She knew what he wanted. She had found a ph
oto and a pocket watch, both battered but intact. It was as if his body and clothing had been ravaged, but the photo and watch had been somehow protected. Suha had wrapped the photo of the beautiful girl with wet hair and soulful eyes, and the watch, with the touching inscription that she was glad to have been able to understand, in a piece of cloth, and tucked it underneath the edge of his blankets. Suha believed the power of those items would bring him strength. She withdrew the wrapped items.

  “This is what you wish? No?”

  The tears on his cheeks were her answer. “Tess,” he breathed.

  Iraq

  Tess shuffled through her days like a zombie on an automated track: moving from the couch, to the den to check Skype (just in case Beau found his way to a computer), to the kitchen, bathroom, and then back again. In the kitchen, she went through the motions of preparing food, because she knew she should, and would later toss it aside, untouched save for a nibble or two.

  Without Alice and Kevin to contend with, long afternoons pressed into evenings unnoticed except for the two lights that were switched on and Tess’s changing out of her sweat pants and into a pair of pajama pants. She’d taken to wearing Beau’s shirts, relishing the smell of him that lingered on his clothing. Tonight Beau’s blue turtleneck was the shirt of choice. It hung loosely around her body, which had become slighter with each passing day. She stared blankly at the blinking lights on her answering machine, lacking both the energy and the desire to listen to the messages. She heard a key in her front door and stared in its direction with wonder. Suddenly her eyes flew open wide and she ran to the door. Beau! She knew Mr. Fulan had been wrong! She flung the door open with a broad, hopeful smile.

  “Hey there!” Kevin mistook her enthusiasm.

  Tess’s heart sank. The first thing Tess noticed was the You hunt your way, I’ll hunt mine t-shirt he wore beneath his open sweatshirt. Beau had had that shirt specially made, with a picture of a bow and arrow, Kevin’s hunting weapon of choice, next to You hunt your way, and a picture of a camera next to I’ll hunt mine. Tess felt sick to her stomach. “Kevin,” she said, just above a whisper.

  “Thanks for the warm welcome,” he said following her. The pungent odor of rotting food filled his nostrils. The house was a wreck, littered with dirty dishes, uneaten food, and half-empty glasses on the coffee table, without coasters. Tess was not a complete neat freak, but coasters and dirty dishes were her pet peeves.

  Tess burrowed into the couch.

  “How’re you doing, Tess?” Kevin went to the kitchen.

  Tess didn’t respond.

  Kevin set down the grocery bag that he’d been carrying and methodically began cleaning the dishes. He called out to Tess, “I’ve been trying to call you, but you never answer the phone.”

  “How’d you get a key?” Tess asked without turning around.

  “The key? Beau gave it to me before he left, you know, in case you needed anything while he was gone.”

  Tess nodded, touched by the thoughtfulness of her husband.

  Kevin strode from room to room, picking up dishes piled with stale food and wiping away weeks’ worth of dust. When he reached the den, he stopped in his tracks. Stacks of unopened mail covered the desk. A mound of covers and bed pillows was piled on the couch next to Tess’s laptop, which displayed the light blue Skype welcome page. Kevin took a deep breath and returned to Tess’s side.

  She stared at the television, her body slumped to one side.

  “Tess, I know it’s hard. He was my best friend, too,” Kevin began, “but you can’t stop living your life. Beau wouldn’t want you to do that.”

  “How can you tell me what Beau would have wanted?” She turned toward him, her voice rising, “Beau wouldn’t have wanted you to give up on him. He’s coming back. He wasn’t on that helicopter.” She turned back toward the television with a loud, “Sheesh!”

  Kevin shook his head and gently placed his hand on her back, “Tess, I couldn’t believe it either, at first, but you know what they said.”

  Tess’s chest tightened. She closed her eyes, listening with weary resignation as Kevin reminded her about the helicopter crash, the bodies instantly cremated. They’d found Beau’s duffle bag, remnants of his photography equipment. The sickening smell of musk returned to the room. Her throat constricted. Tears burned her eyes. “He’s not gone, Kevin. He’s coming back.”

  Kevin shook his head. “Oh, Tess,” he said and pulled her into his chest, one hand on the back of her head. He held her there until tears sprang from her eyes, and she sobbed like a hurt child. “It’s gonna be okay, Tess,” he reassured her. “It’s gonna be okay.”

  Tess caught her breath and pulled back from him. “It’s not okay, Kevin.” Her body trembled. Her voice filled with venom. “He’s out there somewhere,” she stood. “They didn’t find him because he wasn’t on the helicopter.”

  “They found his stuff, Tess,” he tried.

  “Who cares?” she yelled. “So what! They found his duffle? Big deal. He could have left it there by accident, or…or…maybe the pilot was taking it somewhere for him!” Even as she screamed, she knew Beau would never leave his equipment. Tess crossed her arms over her trembling body and stared at Kevin, daring him to disbelieve.

  Kevin wanted to argue the point, to make her see that Beau was really gone, but Beau had once likened arguing with Tess to arguing with a bull while you were wearing red—she wouldn’t back down.

  Tess paced the living room while Kevin went to straighten up the den. He folded the blankets that were heaped together and peeked back at Tess. He quickly clicked on the Skype Communication History and a new window opened. One line was duplicated all the way down the page and for several additional pages: Call to: BethesdaShooter, no answer. Kevin checked the dates and times of the communication attempts. Although it had been four weeks since Beau’s disappearance, Tess’s calls to Beau hadn’t diminished in frequency. Tess was far worse off than he’d thought.

  ***

  “Tess?” Kevin stood beside the answering machine.

  She turned from her perch on the couch.

  “You have twenty-two new messages. Don’t you think we should check those?” he asked.

  Tess shrugged.

  “Want me to take it into another room and check them, just in case there’s something important?”

  Tess shrugged.

  “Have you talked to Alice lately?” he asked.

  Tess shook her head.

  Kevin carried the answering machine into the den and shut the door, bracing himself for what was likely to be a barrage of sympathy calls. Besides several calls from Beau’s parents and Alice, they were mostly sympathy calls from friends and Beau’s clients, interspersed with a handful of solicitations. Mr. Fulan had called several times.

  Kevin returned to an empty living room. He found Tess upstairs, curled up on her bed.

  “Tess?”

  She didn’t respond.

  He sat next to her on the bed.

  Tess closed her eyes and let her body relax.

  “Do you need to talk to somebody?”

  Tess shook her head.

  “Okay, but if you change your mind, I’m here.”

  She fell asleep almost instantly.

  ***

  While Tess slept, Kevin returned the phone calls. He was glad to have a moment to himself. He hadn’t realized how difficult it would be to appear strong for Tess. He clenched his eyes against the tears that had been waiting to fall and took a deep breath. He’d purposely saved the call to Alice for last. He had known Alice for as many years as he’d known Tess, surely she’d know what to do to pull Tess out of her depression. As he dialed her number, he thought of her lean physique, her blond hair that he’d so often wanted to touch. If it weren’t for her holier-than-thou persona, he might have even tried. His purposeful glances had always gone unnoticed, and flirting? He wasn’t sure Alice was even capable of such a thing. In fact, he wondered if she were asexual. Alice may have all the warmth of a co
ld fish, but Tess needed help, and who knew Tess better than Alice?

  “No coasters?” Tess was worse off than Alice had feared. The Skype records were a bit obsessive, but she’d seen Tess’s relentless ability to track down anyone and anything first hand, working side-by-side. She could not be dissuaded by a stern secretary or evasive assistant, and never walked away from a potential new client. She always reached her prey. This time her prey was Beau. Tess may be in denial, but wouldn’t most wives be if their husband’s body was never found? Alice was sure Tess could work through those feelings with some help. The messy house was out of the ordinary, and she didn’t blame Tess for not answering the phone or opening her mail. After all, her entire life had just been turned upside down. It was the lack of coasters that sent red warnings flashing before Alice. At first, she’d thought Tess’s compulsive need for coasters was driven by her love of collecting them. She’d since learned that she’d had it backwards; Tess’s collection was driven by her obsession, a compulsive need to have coasters used at all times. Alice was sure it was a control issue, but who was she to judge? Tess’s coaster rule had become second nature for Alice. She’d bring a client coffee in one hand, and a coaster would surely be in the other. She kept a stack of them in each room of their office, and had even gotten used to using them in her own home. The lack of coasters, to Alice, indicated that this was far more than simply denial. She needed to assess Tess with her own two eyes.

  ***

  To anyone else, Kevin’s soft blond hair and hazel eyes coupled with his sweet demeanor might qualify him as handsome—a good catch even—but to Alice, he was just Kevin. Although, she had to admit, it had been ages since she’d felt a spark of anything other than disdain for any man. Men had one purpose in her life, and beyond that, they were simply bodies that took up air and space.

  “Hey, Kev,” she smiled and walked past him, surveying Tess’s house. “Wow, the place looks great. I assume this is thanks to you,” she said.