Whisper

by Tal Bauer

  For the first time since he’d joined the Army, he didn’t believe in the mission. Didn’t care about his team, either. The bonds between him and his unit were a tattered mess. The mission rang hollow to him. Zahawi’s words, his interrogation, kept replaying in his mind.

  He’d thought Zahawi’s question about the US invading Iraq was insane, was ridiculous and naive. No way would the US entrench itself in a two-front war. No way.

  But here they were. Practicing for an invasion.

  How had Zahawi’s trembling lips foretold the future of American foreign policy?

  Was everything a giant circle? One big Möbius strip, taking him looping like a roller coaster, around and around and around again? Was it prophecy? Destiny? Or a hideous cosmic joke?

  He just wanted to go home. Back to Kris, make the long drive north to Falls Church and let himself into Kris’s apartment. Plant himself face-first in their bed and wake up curled around Kris.

  Something, somewhere, must have shown. He’d lived his life never letting anything slip, not ever, but after Afghanistan, and Kris, and Zahawi, he wasn’t so good at keeping everything hidden anymore.

  Maybe he should have been mad about that. Mad about his past becoming his present and his secrets becoming known. A petty part of him sometimes lashed out at Kris in his thoughts. If it weren’t for you, in Afghanistan, being so fucking perfect, being like pomegranates and honey for my soul. If it weren’t for your take-no-prisoners attitude and your fucking amazing brain, the way you knew your shit and made everyone respect you. If it weren’t for the fact that you’re perfect, in every way. And I’m so fucking lucky you even look at me. If it weren’t for all of that.

  His sergeant was slowly turning purple. David hadn’t responded to him. “I’ve heard things about you, Haddad,” his sergeant hissed. “Heard you like to suck cock. Is that why you’re a Goddamn disgrace? That why my men can’t stand you? I get more complaints about you than every other soldier put together. I don’t have time to make you a man, turn you into what you need to be.” His sergeant looked him up and down, like Paul had once looked at Zahawi. “Get your shit together, Haddad. I have exactly no room for fuckups.”

  The “or else” hovered unspoken between them. Dishonorable discharge seemed to burn into his forehead. Almost half his life had been given to the Army. Would that be his grand exit?

  Would he even care anymore, if it was?

  They finished processing the gear and checking out for the weekend. David ignored the stares, the snorts, the barely concealed ill humor sent his way. He hopped into his truck and hit the road.

  Hands shaking, he grabbed his phone. He nearly cracked the case, nearly shattered the screen. His vision blurred, rage distorting the edges. His foot floored the gas. His engine roared.

  The phone connected after three rings. “Captain Palmer.”

  “Captain. It’s Haddad.”

  “Haddad?” Shock colored his former captain’s voice. “Uhh… what’s up?”

  “You free? Can I buy you a beer?”

  Palmer’s silence was heavy.

  “I need your advice, sir,” David breathed. His voice shook. “I need your help.”

  “I’ll be at the Liberty Bell at eighteen-thirty.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  David had shredded his napkin and the label on his beer by the time Palmer sat down across from him, exactly at eighteen-thirty at the Liberty Bell bar off base. Palmer took in the mountain of shredded paper, the nearly empty beer bottle. David called for another round.

  “I need to talk to Sean,” David said quietly. “And ask his advice from Captain Palmer.” He looked up, through his eyelashes. He was asking to talk off the record, keep whatever was said between them out of the Army. Don’t ask, Don’t Tell hovered over him like the sword of Damocles.

  Palmer had kept his secret in Afghanistan. Had covered for one of their former team members when he’d gotten drunk and stupid with a sailor once, four years back.

  Two moments in his history with Palmer. Was it enough to trust him?

  “You in some trouble about you and your CIA friend?”

  The waitress brought over two fresh beers. David grabbed his, downed a long draught. He picked at the label as he set it down. Nodded. “That, and some other bullshit. My new sergeant is an ass.” He took a deep breath. “He said he heard things.”

  “Shit.” Palmer glared.

  “You think one of the guys?”

  “Maybe. Someone said something, someone joked around. I’m sure they didn’t mean it. But who knows who heard?” Palmer screwed up his face. “No one cared, though. I mean, yeah, we all saw.”

  Fuck. David buried his face in his hands and groaned.

  “C’mon, Haddad, you can’t be like what you two were and not have guys talking. You were fucking crazy about—” Palmer’s jaw snapped shut. “You were head over heels,” he finished. “It was obvious.” He took a drink, watching David. “Is it still going?”

  David nodded. He batted his beer bottle back and forth, sliding it across the table. He’d just handed Palmer the ammunition to drum him out of the Army.

  “Serious?”

  “I think so.”

  “He going to Iraq, too?”

  “I don’t— I don’t know.” Panic, the same panic that lived in his guts, that crawled up his ribs, rose inside him. Another war was around the corner and he was lined up to go. How long would he be gone this time? Separated from Kris, back in the Middle East, in the middle of everything he’d run from. In the middle of a reality that had stopped making sense.

  “You guys aren’t going to try what you did last time again, are you?” Palmer snorted. “I don’t think that’s really going to work. Iraq is gonna be a whole lot bigger than Afghanistan. Too many people will be eyes on.”

  David shook his head. He scrubbed his hand over his face again. “I don’t know what to do,” he confessed. He felt like vomiting.

  Palmer stared at him. “What do you want most in the world, man?”

  Kris. I want Kris.

  Did that make him a shitty person? Was he turning his back on his brothers, on the military, on his nation? The nation that had adopted him, had taken a broken, lost boy in and made him a man? Was he giving up, turning away when his country needed him?

  Palmer leaned across the table. “By your silence, I think I can guess your answer. Look…” His eyes darted around the bar. “There’s this friend I have. Buddy from ROTC. He hated the Army. Did the whole thing for college money. As soon as he could, he popped smoke and got out. He landed at this real crazy company. Under the radar. They do secret squirrel shit. Work with the CIA, DIA, NSA, you name it. Called Blackcreek.” Palmer jerked his chin toward David. “I think you should give them a call.”

  “Thank you,” David whispered. “Thank you, Captain.”

  “Be careful.” Palmer eyeballed him, not blinking. “Be real careful, Haddad.”

  Washington DC

  February 8, 2003

  “You brownnosing little shit.” Kris chuckled, throwing his balled-up napkin across the table at Dan. Dan batted it away easily.

  Dan was back from Islamabad, rotating through on a four-day, in-person briefing with the director before flying back to Pakistan. He’d flown in for the secretary of state’s presentation to the UN, and to watch it with the director, too.

  “Look at you, in with the big boys now. Moving on up in the world. Making waves with the White House. Riding the gay fame card.” Kris smirked.

  Dan pretended to bow. “I learned what not to do from watching you.” He tried to smile. “How are you doing?”

  Shrugging, Kris sighed, deflating against his chair. He toyed with the remains of their bruschetta. “It’s the first time they’ve let me out to see the sun, so I suppose that’s something.”

  “Oh, stop.”

  “Bitching out the VP was great for my career. I recommend everyone do it. Everyone. You’ll rocket your way along the career ladder. There’s no
faster ride in the CIA.”

  “You mean plummet, right? Straight to the basement?”

  “At Mach ten.”

  Dan sipped his wine, a light white, and stared at Kris. “I’m sorry—”

  Kris waved him off. “Don’t. Stop.” He stared out over DC, over the bustle of the Capitol. He’d come into the city to meet Dan. “I never got a chance to thank you for taking over in Thailand. After I pulled out. I heard they stopped everything after seven weeks. You must have had something to do with that. And with closing that place down.”

  Dan looked away.

  “I can’t even imagine what it was like after we left. With Paul and Dennis, and Ryan in charge? Jesus…”

  Dan spun his wine glass. “You guys did the right thing. Leaving, when you did.”

  “I’m just glad it finally ended. Zahawi didn’t reveal anything, did he? In those seven weeks?”

  Dan peered at him. “Not a thing,” he said carefully. “Everything he gave, he gave to you.”

  “Do you ever think about blowing the whole thing open? Calling the Times or the Journal or the Post? Do one of those tell-alls?”

  “Go to prison?” Dan snorted. “They’d lock you up and throw away the key.”

  Kris shrugged. He watched the cars roll by, the blacked-out SUVs. Watched the flag flap over the Capitol. Cold sunlight fell, turning the city a banal smear of gray. “Would it be worth it, though?”

  “You would be the one to make that call?” Dan stared at him, eyes narrowed. “Out of the whole government, out of the whole world, you’d be the one to decide what is and isn’t worth it? Which lives are worth saving? What costs are too high?”

  Vibrating in Kris’s pocket made him jump before he could answer. He pulled out his phone. No one called him anymore, except for David. He was the CIA pariah. He didn’t usually get calls in the middle of the day. “David?”

  “I’m on my way.”

  “Here? Now?” There was something off in David’s voice, something wrong. “What happened? I thought you were going back to the field.”

  “Not anymore. In fact, not ever again.” A car door slammed over the phone line. “I resigned. I quit. I couldn’t—” His voice broke off.

  “Oh my God…” Kris’s jaw dropped. His gaze darted from the bruschetta to his wine glass, up to Dan, across to the Capitol. “What now?”

  The worst of the CIA and a Special Forces soldier who’d quit. They were certainly a power couple on their way up in the world.

  “I got the number of a contractor. I’m going to try to call them.”

  Dan stared at Kris, frowning.

  “Call me when you get closer. I’m in a meeting right now, but I’ll be home soon.”

  David grunted and hung up.

  Dan’s frown turned to a smile. “Your lover from Afghanistan? David Haddad? The Special Forces soldier who was glued to your side, closer than your own shadow?”

  “He’s not Special Forces anymore. He just resigned.”

  “It’s hard to be gay in the military.”

  Kris blinked. “You?”

  “Navy intelligence. Before joining the CIA.” Dan shrugged. “I wanted to get out of where I was. So. What now? He’s picked you over the military, huh?”

  “I…” The air fled Kris’s lungs. “That’s not what it was.”

  “I’d have done the exact same thing. If I were him.”

  The burn was back, the same burn he’d felt in Pakistan when Dan had confessed he’d wanted Kris, had wanted more between them before David and before Afghanistan. He thought Dan would have moved on now that Kris was the CIA’s worst and Dan was on the path to becoming Director Thatcher’s new star. “Dan—”

  “I know.” Dan held up his hands. “I’m just saying. I’m glad he recognizes what he’s got. What’s the plan?”

  “He said something about a contractor—”

  “Call George,” Dan interrupted.

  “George does not want to talk to me. He doesn’t want to see me. His last words to me in Pakistan? ‘Take your bleeding heart crusade somewhere else’!”

  “If you’re not calling him, I’m calling him. He’s here in DC. Getting promoted to the head of the Middle East division.”

  “Jesus Christ. What about Ryan?”

  “Ryan is getting a bump up, too. Chief of station in Afghanistan. But George is going to be in charge of us all, soon. And he knows the head of the contractor that gets all the CIA business. Blackcreek. They’re everywhere we are. You want him with you, right?”

  Kris waited on the stairs to his apartment, huddled in a pair of sweats and a hoodie David had left at his place last month. The temperature had dropped when the sun set. He rocked back and forth, chewing on his upper lip and flicking a marker against his thigh.

  “Fucking Caldera,” George said, picking up on the fourth ring. “I thought they fired you.”

  “You can’t fire the gays, don’t you know that?”

  George didn’t laugh.

  “George… I’m calling for a favor.”

  “I figured as much. I just don’t know why you think I’d be willing to even take your call, much less give you anything.”

  “You’re still on the line, aren’t you?”

  Silence.

  “It’s David. David Haddad—”

  “I know who he is.”

  “He’s left the Army. He was told to look at this contractor.”

  George’s voice changed. Lost the hard edge and turned almost thoughtful. “Blackcreek. They’re hiring everyone they can right now. Especially former Special Forces, and especially Arabic speakers.”

  “Can you get him a CIA contract? If he’s hired? Can you—” Kris exhaled, looking at the floor. Can you please keep him near me? He was close to begging, close to groveling. Asking the powerful for a token of grace for him and David. Shame bent his back. He couldn’t sit straight.

  “Have Haddad call this number tomorrow.”

  Kris wrote the number on his arm. “Thank you. Thank you, George.”

  A heavy sigh. “Caldera… Try and stay out of your own way, okay?”

  The line clicked.

  Snowflakes drifted in front of Kris’s face. He burrowed into David’s hoodie. Any minute. Any minute, and David would be there. Would be home.

  Finally, David’s truck lumbered into his apartment parking lot. Twin headlights bounced over the speedbumps, slowed in front of his building. The door opened.

  He’d recognize that shape, the slope of those shoulders, anywhere.

  David jogged to him and wrapped his arms all the way around Kris. He loved it, loved how David’s arms could completely encircle him. David buried his face in Kris’s neck and breathed him in.

  Behind David, the truck idled. Kris spotted boxes in the truck bed, duffels stuffed in the cab. “You brought everything?”

  “I’m never going back.” David’s gaze slid sideways. “I can find my own place. I’ll start looking tomorrow. We didn’t talk about this, and I’m not trying to—”

  Kris squeezed his hand. “Stay here. Stay with me.” It would be cramped, but they’d make it work. Maybe they’d get something bigger, together. The thought stole his breath. They could live together.

  “You sure?” Hope shone from David’s eyes.

  “I’ll have to tell all my other boyfriends to stay away.” Kris sniffed, lifting his chin. He tried to look playful in David’s hoodie.

  David took both of Kris’s hands. The snow kept falling. “I don’t have anyone else. It’s just you.”

  Was this the conversation? They’d never discussed it. Kris was too busy during the week with war preparations, being the CIA’s doom and gloom pariah, and keeping an eye on the Bin Laden cables, to do anything other than go home and crash. Sometimes he fell asleep in his clothes. There hadn’t been anyone else, not since David came into his life. There hadn’t been anyone else since September 10, 2001.

  He didn’t want anyone else.

  “It’s only you, David.�
� Snow stung the backs of his hands. “I want you to move in with me. I want you to stay. For as long as you want. And I hope that’s a long time.”

  David nodded. Flakes stuck to his eyelashes, the corners of his lips as he smiled. “I think it will be.”

  They kissed until the snow burned their cheeks and Kris started shivering, despite David’s arms around him. David made him go inside, and he ran bags and boxes from his truck to Kris’s living room, seven trips in all.

  Half of Kris’s studio filled up with David’s stuff. Snow melted onto the carpet. Kris didn’t care.

  He pulled David to his bed. “Welcome home.”

  They came together, and apart, in pieces. Clothes fell away, and then more, the last barriers separating them from joining completely. Kris imagined turning his chest inside out, placing his heart outside his body for David to hold. He felt David’s trembles as their skin brushed together. He felt like a naked star, like every one of his dreams was laid bare for David.

  Kris’s body burned as David made love to him. His bones scorched him from the inside, and he felt David in every cell of his being. David hovered over him, his hands mapping Kris’s body, his eyes memorizing every expression. He drank in each of Kris’s moans, his sighs. He kissed every gasp that fell from Kris’s lips.

  David’s lips found a home on his neck, spent hours lingering at his jaw and below his ear. His breath branded Kris, exhales matching the tides of their bodies. “Kris,” David breathed, chanting his name. “Kris… I love you. I love you.” His buried his face in Kris’s neck, pressed his lips to Kris’s collarbone. “Ya hayati, ya habib alby.” My life, love of my heart. He gasped. “Ashokrulillah, Kris...” Praise Allah for you.

  Kris grabbed his head, fingers digging into his scalp, sliding through his hair. All the parts of David, all the pieces that made him the man Kris loved, were tumbling within him, slipping inside of his soul. Vows of love in Arabic and English, prayers to Allah, Kris’s name, the name of his lover, a man. David shuddered, his body quaking in Kris’s arms. Who was David when he bared everything?