Sworn Enemies, Secret Lovers

by Eve Rabi

  “Megan, don’t!” he says, his voice anxious.

  As I walk backwards, I cover him with my rifle. “Rory!”

  “Here!” Rory shouts. “Here, Megan, here!”

  I take two more steps backwards and see Rory for the first time in sixty days. I manage a smile while I throw the keys at his outstretched hands. “Move Rory!”

  Suddenly, to my horror, Bilal appears behind Reed. I can take him down, but I will probably hit Reed, and I don’t want to.

  “Get down, Reed!” I shout.

  Luckily, Rory now has the second rifle.

  “Don’t shoot Reed!” I yell at Rory.

  Rory hesitates for a second, then fires at the ceiling. Everyone ducks as cement and mortar rains down on us.

  Rory and I walk backward, then turn and bolt out of the house.

  The bright sunlight literally blinds us. Both of us stumble and crash to the ground.

  Rory’s on his feet first. “C’mon Megan!”

  I get up but stumble again. I’ve underestimated my injuries. Fuck!

  When bullets whistle around us, I stay down.

  “Go, Rory!” I yell. “Get help, go!”

  “No, Trust! You come too!”

  “Go, Captain!” I beg as I crawl forward. “I’ll cover you. Run, please … run!”

  He looks at me, then behind me, then turns and runs ahead.

  Shrouded in defeat, I watch him run off. At least he will tell people about me and what I’m really going through.

  I turn around and fire, but my rifle jams. Fuck!

  To add to my horror, about ten militants, all armed, stampede towards me. No time for a malfunction drill.

  When they realize I’m unable to fire, they stop and fire past me.

  I whirl around to look at Rory. His upright body is jerking around.

  “No!” I scream as he falls. “No!”

  When I turn my head again, I connect with the barrel of a rifle and everything goes black.

  ***

  My eyes flicker open. In my cell are seven insurgents, all in animated conversation.

  I quickly shut my eyes and pretend to be unconscious. When they eventually leave my room, I open them again and look into Reed’s face. Above his left eyebrow is a wound dressing. Fuck!

  He looks at me with hooded eyes. Guess he has a right to be pissed.

  “Sorry,” I mumble.

  His jutting jaw makes a grinding sound. I’m relieved when he storms out of my cell.

  I exhale loudly and look at the ceiling. Rory.

  Images of his body jerking around come flooding back. Oh God. Oh God! His wife, his daughter …

  I shove the knuckles of both hands into my mouth to prevent myself from screaming. It’s all my fault. Why the hell did I try to be a hero? How could I have led him to his death? I stare at a spot on the ceiling as tears course down my cheeks for Rory, his wife, his baby.

  The seven militants, now appearing to be in a frenzy, return to my room. I scream as Nazim grabs my arm, hoists me up, and shoves me out of the room. The other militants follow, their excitement tangible. They’re either going to cut my throat or make me face a firing squad for trying to escape.

  Terror seizes me and I find it hard to even walk. Nazim pokes me in the back with his rifle so I have to keep moving.

  Suddenly, Reed appears. He takes one look at the situation and grows furious. Grabbing my arm, he argues in Arabic with the men. I’m relieved and hopeful.

  As he argues, Reed’s angry face turns red and his eyes grow dark, and I’m surprised to see how aggressive he’s become.

  Just then, Shariff appears with his deputy, Omar, in tow.

  “You gave me your word,” Reed says accusingly to Shariff.

  Shariff nods affably. “Yes.”

  Suddenly, it dawns on me that Reed and Shariff may be related.

  Reed gestures wildly. “Then why …?”

  Shariff looks questioningly at Omar.

  Omar goes off on a tangent. His aggression really scares me, even though I try for a poker face.

  “That doesn’t matter,” Reed says. “Tonight, she goes.”

  What does that mean? Tonight she goes …

  Goes … home? A spark of hope ignites in me. Maybe tonight I go home!

  Shariff nods at Reed.

  Reed grabs my arm and almost drags me back to my room.

  “Thanks,” I say in a meek voice.

  “Save it!” he says and storms off.

  I sit on my mattress, my breath coming out in spurts.

  Once again, Reed has saved my life.

  ***

  It’s around midnight when I’m awakened by Reed.

  In his hand is a black scarf.

  “Get up and turn around,” he says.

  Sleepily, I stumble up and peer at him. “Why?”

  “Turn the fuck around!”

  I turn around.

  When he blindfolds me, I grow concerned. “Wha…?”

  “Shut up!” He produces cable ties and secures my hands. “Walk,” he says, and grabs my elbow.

  “Where are we going?”

  Silence.

  “Reed? Where …?”

  “Shut up, Megan! Open your mouth and I’ll kill you myself.”

  “Oh, okay.” My voice is timid. Why is he so angry?”

  As we walk, I hear the voices of two other men. I feel the night air and I hear crickets – so I assume we’re outside the farmhouse. Reed ushers me into what feels like the back seat of a four-wheel drive. He sits next to me while two other militants sit in front.

  As we drive, I’m flung around. Safety belt – it would be a damned good idea right now. Each time I fall, Reed helps me up.

  “You okay?” Reed asks.

  “No,” I reply.

  “Mfff!”

  Finally, after driving for what feels like hours, we stop. With Reed’s help, I alight from the vehicle. Grasping my elbow, he steers me down a long flight of stairs. The men follow as we move along. A door opens and I hear more voices. Unfamiliar voices, some abrupt, some friendly.

  “Mind the step,” Reed says. Too late. I trip and land on my ass.

  He helps me up. “Sorry.” His voice is kinder.

  Then he removes my blindfold and hacks at the cable ties around my hands with a knife.

  Blinded by the bright lights, I close and open my eyes several times until they adjust.

  It takes me a moment to realize I’m in one of Saddam's palatial bunkers. How can I not? His initials are decoratively carved on every wall and every marble column. On just about every wall is a portrait of Saddam in different dress – casual, regal, official …

  Fascinated, I spin around to take in my new surroundings. How the hell did our bunker-busting bombs miss this one? Thought we got them all. Well, we didn’t find the weapons of mass destruction, and we didn’t find this bunker turned jihadist hideout.

  This place is similar to his other palaces – imperial iridescent domes, shiny marble floors, heavy brocade drapes, grape-cluster chandeliers that sparkle like diamonds and probably cost as much as my house in Miami, and lots of marble columns.

  A gigantic water fountain dominates the entrance, where a giant statue of Saddam tips a staff (similar to Moses’ in the Bible) which pours out water.

  Mini atriums with colorful blooms and shrubs give the bunker an outdoorsy feel, and it’s easy to forget you’re almost underground. The words that come to mind – opulent and extravagant.

  And vulgar, overdone, over-the-top, garish – but hey, we’re talking bad-ass Saddam here. The same asshole who built looming, intimidating statues of himself throughout Iraq to scare the crap out of his poor subjects and elicit submission.

  The contrast has me in awe – Iraqi people living in poverty and squalor, queuing for petrol for hours, getting only eight hours of electricity a day, while probably just a few feet away sits a palace like something out of a Grimm’s fairy tale.

  But notions of a fairy tale are quickly dispel
led when I see guards patrolling the place with AK-47s.

  The bunker is surprisingly intact – not in any way damaged by the bombings.

  I turn to Reed. “Why am I …?”

  He doesn’t answer; he just steers me forward. We stop when we come across a large, open area which houses about thirty beds in neat rows, all filled with injured men. Injured militants, judging by the rifles next to each bed. Like a hospital ward, only here an injured person can easily trip over an AK-47 and kaboom! he’s got his seventy-two virgins.

  One of the men from the bunker motions us down another flight of stairs.

  We enter a dimly-lit dungeon. Well, it looks like a dungeon to me. Three cells with iron bars all around, with only a mattress each.

  A bracket on the wall holds an array of tools which sends a shiver down my spine. Torture tools.

  My heart drops six feet when I notice the padding on the walls. Sound-proofing. I could scream and scream and no one would hear me.

  My shoulders are heavy with disappointment as I turn my neck slowly to look at Reed.

  He squirms under my gaze. Finally he says, “Wait here,” and leaves.

  About ten minutes later, he returns. “Come with me,” he says.

  I follow him.

  We walk back into the bunker, past the ward of patients, then stop outside a room.

  “Get in,” he says when he unlocks the door. “This is your room.”

  With the trepidation I usually experience when I’m about to enter a public toilet, I gingerly push open the door with my index finger and gasp.

  The room appears like it’s out of the set of an Arabian Nights scene. Plush and fantasy-like, decorated in shocking pinks and reds!

  A king-size bed occupies one side of the double bedroom, while a chaise lounge (which is red and cerise, and matches the red and cerise drapes and the red and cerise bed linen) occupies the other.

  Everything in the room is various hues of shocking pink and red. Even the lampshades and carpets are red and pink. Ish. Not to be outdone, the furniture fights for attention with its ornate carvings, gilded finishes, and bulkiness, and it probably costs more than a rap artist’s luxury car.

  I turn to Reed. “Did you say …?”

  He nods.

  “Really? Wow!” I pinch my cheek, then my arm. “Wow!”

  Something that looks suspiciously like a smile hovers over his lips. “There’s a bathroom.”

  “Bathroom?”

  He jerks his head towards a built-in mirrored closet.

  “You’ve got to be kidding!” I dash to open it.

  A milk-white bathroom with the ugliest gold-plated faucets I’ve ever seen and a gigantic spa-bath twinkles invitingly. “Oh … my … God!”

  “And … no Nazim or Bilal here,” he says softly.

  I turn my whole body to look at him.

  “You’re safe here, Megan.”

  He’s doing it again – he’s using that kind, compassionate voice on me. The one that usually brings a frog to my throat and blurs my vision. From experience though, I know it’s fleeting.

  Considering I tried to escape and that they wanted to waste me early on, I’d say “luck” is putting it mildly.

  “It took a lot to get you here, Megan. So, any tricks and you’ll go back to the farmhouse, hear?”

  I nod several times and walk towards what looks like an inter-leading door. It’s locked. Wonder who’s on the other side?

  “You’re safe now, so I’m leaving,” Reed says.

  “Leaving?” Fear surges through me.

  “Yes. Goodbye Megan, and good luck.”

  “But … but … but …” I crack my knuckles. “How will I …? What about …?”

  “You’ll be okay. Shariff gave me his word. Goodbye, Megan.” He turns to leave.

  “His word, Reed? You saw what happened when you turned your –”

  “Megan.” He stops and slowly turns around. “Megan, I have a life. I can’t stay here. This is not my battle – not my wound.”

  I stare at him. “Then … why did you come here in the first place? I mean, I really appreciate all you’ve done for me and like, I don’t know how I would have survived if it wasn’t for you, but, I have questions. Tons of them. I don’t know the answers and it’s … it’s stressful. I live in fear that tomorrow, for some reason, they’ll kill me. Ever lived in a state of stress, Reed? Know how it feels?”

  A flicker of what I think is concern crosses his face.

  “Give me answers. Please. It’s the least you can do for me.”

  He slouches back, and in a voice heavy with resignation he says, “Okay. What do you want to know?”

  “Honest answers?”

  “Mmm. O … kay.”

  “How did you get involved in all of this?”

  He hesitates, then says, “Well, Shariff told me that a few soldiers – American soldiers – were injured and in need of medical attention. I refused at first, and I have to tell you, I regret that. Deeply. Anyway, I heard that …” He runs his hand over his face and shakes his head. “You know, Megan, I shouldn’t be telling you this. You’re probably going to relay this information when you’re out of here and have me thrown in jail again.”

  Again? “No, no, no, I won’t do that. You’ve helped me so much. I so appreciate your humaneness, Reed. Please, tell me.”

  “Okay, one by one the soldiers died, and I felt increasingly guilty. Then I heard about this female soldier who was about to die and I …” he shrugs. “You know the rest.”

  I nod.

  “Guess I’m a doctor first.”

  “So, you’re not an insurgent?”

  “No! Absolutely not. But they have my sympathies. I understand them, and I’ll help them too. I’m no saint. I too have issues.”

  I nod. “Why aren’t they letting me go?”

  “Look, you’re a soldier, an American soldier. They want to use you to deliver the speeches, and you probably will be released in time if you cooperate.”

  “When?”

  He shrugs. “I don’t have all the answers. Just do as they say. You’re here, which means they’re not planning to kill you anytime soon. In the farmhouse, it was a different story.”

  “Okay, but can you stay longer? Please?”

  “No. Sorry.”

  “I guess your family … they need you, right?”

  He doesn’t answer.

  For a few moments, I study the carpet in silence, feeling abandoned and a little sad.

  “Take care, Megan, and please, when you’re out of here, quit the Army. You’re not soldier material. You’re a cry-baby, and way too soft.” He smiles.

  “I am?”

  “Yes. I mean, at the farmhouse – you should have shot me and the guys behind me. Your hesitation, Rory’s hesitation … it cost him his life.”

  “I’m humane. Like you, I guess.”

  “Yes. Sometimes, it works against you.” He turns and walks towards the door.

  “Reed!”

  He stops and turns around.

  “If ever … say I don’t leave here alive; will you please find a way to tell someone that … that I was forced to deliver those inflammatory speeches? Please? I ask only that of you.”

  “Yes. But, don’t think that way. You’re going home.”

  He turns and walks out of the room, out of my life. When I hear the door lock, a feeling of desolation descends upon me.

  As vulnerable as I’m feeling right now, I force myself to stay positive. I’m in a palace after all. This room may have been decorated by a blind person, but it’s five-star comfort. And … there is no Nazim and Bilal here.

  Also, I have my own bathroom. I can have a bath. Bath salts – maybe there are some around. I dash to the bathroom and open a cabinet. I find bubble bath in a Grecian-type urn. Awesome!

  I fill up the spa, throw in some bath foam, and grin as I slowly sink into it. Heaven. My little heaven in war-torn Iraq. If I was one to keep a gratitude journal, I would mention this
bath in glowing terms.

  As I lie soaking, I think about Reed and post-mortem our conversation. He said something about being in jail before, and that he has issues – it doesn’t make sense. Am I really too soft?

  “You’re not soldier material.” What an insult. Cry-baby, my ass.

  When I leave the bath, my skin is wrinkled, and I’m so exhausted I can barely dry myself. I slide under the fifty-thousand-or-so-thread-count covers and fall asleep. Immediately. Something to do with not having to worry if Nazim or Bilal visiting me tonight.

  Chapter Seven

  I’m rudely awakened by a slap in the face. “What the fuck?!” I jump up and gape at the woman who slapped me, the woman who now screams at me in Arabic. My eyes are focused on the guard behind her. He has an AK-47 and a smile that tells me it’ll make his day if I make one wrong move.

  He produces shackles with which he roughly secures my legs. Roomy shackles that allow for shuffling, but they bite into my ankles as I totter.

  Shackles or no shackles, I’m too slow for her. She shoves me and I stumble into the door. To avoid more shoving, I scramble up and hurry forward.

  “You work here now,” she says, and points to the room that resembles a ward.

  I’m going to be a slave in a jihadist hospital – scary. Think about it – an American soldier, female at that, in a room full of Muslim extremists, in Iraq. Every jihadist’s dream, every infidel’s nightmare. It’s like putting a kitten in a room full of hungry Rottweilers.

  It’s scary to think that any of these men can knife me or shoot me right now. The others will probably pat him on the back or shake his hand.

  I try not to make eye contact with anyone. I just follow the angry woman’s orders.

  Even though my feet are shackled, I’m expected to be everywhere at once. Fetch this, do this, do that …

  After an hour in the ward with no incidents, I relax a little. The men are more curious than anything about me. I suspect they are aware that I’m delivering all those speeches only because I’m forced to.

  Anyway, working in the ward is way better than being locked up in a cell with no one to talk to.

  As the day progresses, I learn that Bitchface is called Shaida. She’s the head nurse, and from what I see, she pretty much runs this hospital.