by Wm. Barnard
“That’s good. Hopefully they’ll be safe now,” I said, leaning forward.
Appearing to be twice the age of Akiki, our driver Kikongo had remained relatively quiet the entire trip, but now felt the need to chime in. “The problem is, most of the villagers don’t trust the Ugandan military, either. It’s not as bad as it was, but for many years there was widespread abuse. The people in this area have a very long memory.”
His comment sounded like it came from personal experience and made me slump back into my seat.
About twenty minutes outside of the village on the way to Gulu, our driver’s hat blew off, causing him to slow down so he could turn around and retrieve it. Realizing this was good time to take a pit stop, we all piled out of the jeep so we could relieve ourselves while Kigongo drove back up about a hundred yards where the hat lay in the middle of the road.
Standing several feet from me, Bob jerked his neck upward when we heard a faint whistling sound dropping from the treetops.
THE NEXT THING I KNEW, I was waking up in medical clinic in Juba. Tilting my head to the side, I found Bob lying bare-chested on a cot beside me, his neck and shoulder covered in bandages that were encrusted with blood.
“Bob?” I grunted, struggling to get my bearings straight.
“He’s asleep. He just passed out when they were sewing him up,” Kikongo said, standing at the other side of the room. “They were able to stop the bleeding and said he will be fine now.”
“Did we get attacked?”
“Yes. A mortar landed right near you in the woods. The shrapnel tore up his shoulder and it barely missed the carotid artery in his neck,” he said, moving closer to my cot. “The doctor told me you both have busted ear drums. You were bleeding out of one of them, which is why you have a bandage on your head.”
“Is that why I feel dizzy and my ears are ringing?”
“I’m sure it is. The doctor gave you medicine for the pain and to help prevent any nausea.”
“What about, um…” I said trying to remember the name of our other guide.
“Akiki is getting stitches right now to stop his bleeding, but he needs surgery immediately and they cannot do that here. He’s in really bad shape.”
“Oh, man.”
“I hope Bob will not get angry with me, but I had to trade his camera equipment to pay the clinic.”
“Don’t worry about it. I’m sure he’ll understand.”
“My company is sending one of their tour planes tomorrow morning to fly all of you back to Kampala and then you can catch a flight back home.”
“Thank you, Kikongo.”
“There’s something you should know. Bob must have known the mortar was coming in because I saw him dive on top of you right before the blast. I think because he’s such a large man that he must have knocked you out when he landed on you. He was bleeding all over the place, but he still carried you and Akiki to the jeep. So really, you should be thanking Bob,” he said before turning and leaving the room.
WE TRAVELED FOR OVER THIRTEEN hours straight, and as the initial shock of what had happened began to wear off, I had more time to digest what Kikongo had told me.
While words are inadequate to describe what it’s like to discover that someone personally risked their life to save yours, staring at Bob as he slept next to me on the plane caused an immense sense of pride to well up within me, knowing that I had such a friend.
After landing safely in Paris, a cab escorted us to the famous Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital. X-rays revealed shrapnel embedded deeply in Bob’s shoulder and the doctor made arrangements for surgery within the next hour. As the nurses prepared to wheel him away on a gurney, I leaned over and grabbed Bob by the arm.
“Kikongo told me what you did back by the road,” I said.
“Did what?”
“How you threw yourself on me and saved my life.”
“I’ve wanted to tackle you for a long time, Zach.” Bob smiled.
“I’m sure you have. But seriously,” I said and looked him in the eyes. “I know this is kinda awkward for you, but I want to thank you.”
“It’s not awkward at all Zach. You’re my boy. I’d do it again in a heartbeat.”
The male nurse undoubtedly had no idea what we were saying and shot me an impatient look, so I quickly said, “Hey, I’ll be here when you get out.”
“Just tell them I like my morphine black. No sugar, no cream,” he winked at me as they began to roll him down the corridor. Turning the other way, I walked toward the exit to grab some breakfast.
Four hours after I learned that the surgery was a success, I called Bob’s wife Cheryl as he had instructed me and finally gave her the brief details of what had happened in Uganda.
Before handing the phone to him, I tried to get her to calm down, but finally gave in and said, “Look Cheryl, he’s awake now so you can talk to him yourself.”
“Honey, slow down already. Listen to me. This is why I didn’t call you earlier…” Bob tried to interject.
From ten feet away, I could hear her interrupt him through the receiver and Bob rolled his eyes at me. Figuring this would be a good time to walk down the hall to the water fountain, I left the room so Bob could defuse the situation with his wife. When I returned to the room, I stayed by the door to let him wrap up the call.
“Look, I told you. We’re just a little banged up, but we’re fine. Nothing to worry about. We’re out of the woods now and we’ll be home in few days at the most. I’m not going to miss seeing little Scotty’s first steps, trust me.”
Sensing that I could hear him from the doorway, Bob tried to lighten the mood.
“Now honey, you know you don’t have to worry about me since I have the strength of ten men. You should, however, be worried about Zach. He’s always been a little frail, you know.”
Grabbing the plastic rod that held the dividing sheet, I zipped it back so I could face Bob.
“Ha! Now Cheryl knows for sure that you’re indulging in the fruit of Europe’s best pharmacy,” I yelled loud enough so she could hear me.
Bob sneered before continuing, “You see? Zach’s fine. I’m fine. Now make sure you give Scotty a big hug from Daddy and tell everyone we appreciate their positive thoughts and prayers. I love you, baby, and I’ll see you soon.”
Cheryl must have finally relented, acknowledging we were no longer in any danger and allowing Bob to get off the phone. As soon as he hung up, his head dropped slightly, and he let his tongue hang out of his mouth. Relieved that he could stop putting on a front, Bob grunted, “Ugh. I feel like a run-over dog.”
While it may have seemed odd to some when Bob used his sense of humor to make light of serious situations, I knew he had to be shaken by the thought that he came close to never seeing his family again.
Before speaking again, he slowly exhaled. “Man, we got lucky, Zach.”
“Yeah, I know you’re right. And I know I should just be grateful that we escaped with our lives, but I’m still super disappointed that we didn’t even get our story,” I said, smacking my lips.
“I hear you. I took a ton of great photos. I was also looking forward to blowing up that picture of that crazy aircraft, but now they’re all gone.”
“When you were going under the knife, I went down to a small café and did a little research. There’ve been rumors that in exchange for the large amounts of financial aid from China, the Ugandan government has been allowing the Chinese to conduct military operations and test secret aircraft.”
“Man, now that would have been a great story to come across if we could’ve confirmed that photo.”
“Tell me about it,” I said, shaking my head.
He paused as he winced in pain. “Well… there will be other stories. I just thank God that we got out of there.”
“I’m pretty sure God got out of there a long time ago.”
RIGHT BEFORE SUNRISE AS I enjoyed a Vicodin induced deep sleep, the uninterrupted alarm of Bob’s heart monitor blared loud enough
to wake me up in time to witness a flurry of nurses and doctors converge into our room. Despite not speaking French, I could still discern that his condition was dire from the tone and speed of the head doctor’s voice.
The next sound confirmed my worst fear.
Ka-thump.
The distinctive noise of a defibrillator trying to revive Bob almost caused my own heart to stop beating. Now frozen with fear, I watched the feet of the nurses shuffle quickly around his bed. Over the next ten minutes, I periodically held my breath, hoping I would soon hear intermittent beeps from the monitor indicating a resuscitated heart.
As the voices hushed, I knew the results before the doctor stepped around the divider and stood next to my rollaway bed.
“I am sorry monsieur, but we could not save your friend.”
“What? Why? I thought they said everything was okay,” I muttered in shock.
“There will have to be an autopsy to say for certain, but most likely his heart seized up because it was unable to fight off the staph infection,” he said solemnly. Not knowing what else to say, he bowed his head, turned quietly and walked away as I stared blankly where he had just stood.
While I had heard the doctor clearly and now listened to nurses clicking off equipment, I kept trying to deny that this was real. Part of me wanted to get up and see if I could somehow wake him. Instead I lay paralyzed, only moving my hand on to the painful lump in my throat when I heard them wheel his corpse out of the room.
Now conceding that I would never see my friend again, my whole body began to shudder. Thinking about his young son and what I would say to Cheryl, I closed my eyes, pulling the pillow up over my face to soak up the steady stream of tears.
CHAPTER 2
Essence Magazine occupies the entire twenty-fourth floor of a newly built high rise overlooking downtown San Diego and her famous harbor. The complete building has the appearance of being constructed completely of glass and from my office window you can see all the way south to the beaches of Tijuana. While starting my day to such a majestic vista usually left me feeling inspired, the view had no effect on my somber mood when I returned to my workplace a week after Bob’s funeral.
Deep in mourning, Bob’s wife Cheryl still declined to speak with me as she had convinced herself that I somehow manipulated Bob into taking the trip to Africa and held me responsible for the death of her husband.
Fortunately, Essence’s senior editor, Harry Edwards was sensitive to my emotional stress level and suggested I take on some more lighthearted subjects. I had agreed in hopes that these diversions would help take my mind off recent events, but daily reminders, like walking by Bob’s vacant desk, continued to confront me.
I found concentrating for long periods of time extremely difficult and for the first time in my career struggled daily with writers block. My efforts felt almost robotic as I approached assignments on hot air balloon racing and an ex-football star’s new wine making business. The stories were so crummy that the magazine declined to run them.
Naturally Harry had begun to wonder when I’d come out of my mental funk and be ready to take on some stories of more substance. When he called me into his office a few weeks after I had returned from Africa, I could already sense what he wanted.
“Look, Zach, I know you lost all the photos from your Africa trip, but do you think a story is salvageable? I’m not trying to rush you, but…” Harry subtly stopped to wipe the lenses of his designer frames.
“Geez, I don’t know, Harry. I really hadn’t wanted to even think about it. But I guess I could try…” I said, hoping he would realize I was just trying to appease him.
“Like I said, when you’re ready; I’m confident some good could come out of all this, especially if you write about what you went there for,” Harry said, leaning back against his giant red leather chair with his arms now resting on his protruding waistline.
Not knowing if Harry even recognized he was contradicting himself, I pinched the end of my cropped hair behind my ear nervously and said, “Well, we did see something crazy over there and Bob actually took a photo of it, but…”
Only at this moment did I realize that I hadn’t even talked with anyone else about the strange aircraft Bob and I had seen.
Harry waited for me to continue, but got impatient. “Well, what was it?”
Exhaling a big breath, I finally confessed. “Well, you’re not gonna believe this, but we saw something like a U.F.O. I think it could be some aircraft the Chinese are testing.”
“Zach, I need something tangible here. Not some wild theories with absolutely no photos to back it up. Even if you had some photo, you know we stay away from any of that paranormal garbage. Surely you got to have something…”
“Yeah, I know. I don’t know why I even mentioned it. It was just so strange,” I said, staring at the back of his computer monitor.
Pulling his chair closer, he looked down at the papers covering his antique mahogany desk and paused to choose his words carefully. “Look, you know the bosses will always try to see a return on their investment. If you are unable to produce a story about the L.R.A, I can live with it. You put your butt on the line over there and we appreciate that. You just let me know when you’re ready.”
“Okay. I will,” I said, consciously looking away from Harry. Maybe I should explain to Harry that I have already tried to sit down several times and write the story, I thought. Instead, I stood up quickly and rushed out of his office.
While I understood Harry had a job to do, it still irked me that they were trying to work me for a story that got my friend killed. Unfortunately, it had only caused me to start dwelling again on all the depressing things I had seen and experienced lately.
For the most part of my career, with the exception of my recent assignment in Uganda, I had been able to detach myself from the suffering of those I wrote about. Even though this caused me to feel somewhat shallow at times, it was the only way I had thought I could stay objective as a journalist.
In the same way, I now wished I could simply disconnect from my emotions. My remedy was the same thing I had been doing every evening after work for the last two weeks; I grabbed my jacket and headed over to Murphy’s Pub.
THE FAMOUS BLUES SONG, “STORMY Monday,” appropriately greeted me as I walked through the side door and down the short corridor leading into the dark tavern.
“Hey Zach, you’re starting early today?” yelled Jim Murphy as he washed some shot glasses from the end of the bar. A brother of the owner, Jim had managed the place ever since I had started frequenting the pub several years ago.
“What kind of beer you drinking today?” he asked.
“Actually Jim, set me up with a couple shots of tequila.”
“Wow! What’s the occasion?” Jim reached on the top shelf for a decorative bottle holding the golden liquor.
“Nothing. Just want something different,” I said, not wanting to get into why I had shown up midday. Normally a place where I came to relax and enjoy the company of friends, Murphy’s had now become merely a source of refuge. Setting up at the bar seemed to be the only time of the day I was able to dull my heartache, even if it was for only a few hours.
Setting down two shot glasses in front of me, Jim asked, “When’s Johnny getting back from his surfing trip to Indonesia?”
“Supposedly late Sunday night.”
I downed one shot with ease, but the second one caused me to cough. I slapped my chest before wheezing, “I think now I’m ready for some beer. Pour me a pitcher of Bass, Jim. I’m gonna rack up some balls over at the closest table.”
The fluorescent light hanging over the pool table advertising the “King of Beers” made it the brightest place in the otherwise dimly lit pub. While the State had outlawed smoking from bars and restaurants over a decade ago, the residual smoke of previous years had permanently penetrated the walls and carpet, now blending with the perfect complement of stale beer.
I moved over to practice various bank shots on the ra
gged green felt for half an hour before my friend Todd Gilmore arrived.
Sporting the usual untucked Zane’s Electrician uniform shirt and faded blue jeans, his brown curly hair hung from the edges of a Padres baseball cap. Certain that I had never met a genuinely nicer guy, I had my theory confirmed when Todd changed out the circuit breakers on my house a few months back, charging me a twelve pack of beer.
I hadn’t seen Todd in the last couple of weeks around the pub and his presence helped briefly lift my spirits.
“Hey, you up for a game? I got another pitcher on the way,” I shouted at him.
“Definitely,” Todd said, pulling up a stool next to the pool table.
“Johnny’s coming back this weekend, huh?”
“That’s the story I heard,” I said.
“You know, you hear a ton of people claim they’re gonna start living life to the fullest after going through a tough ordeal, but Johnny really has stuck to that mantra after he beat throat cancer.”
“Yeah, you gotta give it to him. This is like his third surf vacation this year,” I said, focusing on the cue ball before smacking it.
“I’m glad that he got to get down there. I’d love to be able to take off and just surf for a couple of months.”
“I was just thinking about how simple life was back in school when I surfed every morning and worked nights as a bellman.”
“Life definitely seemed easier when we were younger,” Todd said, chuckling.
Jim brought us a new pitcher and another mug. As I poured Todd a beer, I said, “Well, word on the street is that you’re going to be jumping into the fire soon.”
Todd flashed a huge smile while eyeing his options on the pool table. “Yeah, after I finish up coaching Little League, Jenny and I are getting hitched up next June. Looks like we are actually gonna get to Maui for our honeymoon.”
He glanced at his watch and said, “She should be here soon.”
