On the billboard, some cruel asshole played the last act in the game, when the last Astro hitter, Evan Gattis, swung too soon on a snoozer fastball, and struck out, ending the game without a single run for the Astros. The whish and the bellow of the umpire's call, "YOU'RE OUT!" from the megatron was chased by a roaring chorus of boos and jeers.
Karen threw her arms up, jeering along with the crowd. Finished, she turned to Jonny and said, "We should probably get going." She gestured toward the exit at the end of their row in the stands.
Jonny looked at the neon exit sign. "Might as well stay and enjoy ourselves, traffic is going to be a mess now anyhow. He leaned back, wishing he had another beer, glancing around to see if there was a walking vendor nearby.
Out on the field the players had all finally retreated to their dugouts and below into the locker rooms. On the giant digital billboard, they were showing more of the games highlights.
Karen touched his arm. "That's not what I meant. It's a Friday game, which means its Family Night, and they always have a--"
It was too late.
High above them, Minute Maid Park's massive two hundred and two-foot-high retractable roof groaned and hummed and began opening. A strong breeze from outside started coursing through the stadium, bringing with it fresh un-air-conditioned air hinting of salt from the Gulf. The size of the dome was enough to mesmerize. Nearly everyone in the stadium stopped and stared upward to watch this simple yet monstrous feat of engineering.
With the dome wide open, revealing the black night sky, the lights in the Park dimmed low.
"What's going on?" Jonny asked, curious and wide eyed with excitement.
"Firewor--" she started to yell.
But she was drowned out by the announcer, booming again from the well over four hundred speakers around the park. "Welcome Astro fans, boys and girls, people of all ages, Minute Maid Park in association with Federal Credit Union and Gringo's Mexican Kitchen eatery, are pleased to present to you our Family Night fireworks show!"
Fireworks?
Screaming up into the night's sky, the first firework rocketed and detonated in a bursting crackle of red sparkles.
Oohs and aahhs rolled throughout the crowd.
From his seat, Jonny winced, grabbing hold of the armrests.
More screaming rockets popped up into the blackness above them, booming and crackling in near deafening explosions of color and sound. Blues and more reds and even yellows and whites. Blooming out like wildflowers in the sky, all sparkling and raining out in shapes of orbs and streams.
With each explosion, Jonny flinched and squeezed his wooden armrests. Not wanting to, his reaction was involuntary. Lord knows all he wanted was to smile and laugh like the other men and women and kids in the crowd. He wanted to be just as jubilant and innocent of the truth those sounds bring. With each pop and crackle, showering white and lighting up the night, memories, feelings resurfaced. Unwanted images he thought he had buried when he got out. Smells of refuse and sand and the dingy tang of oil and lubricate, the stuff he'd used on 50-cals and M4s and SAWs and 9mms.
More explosions.
More showers of crackling light.
Boom.
Boom.
Boom.
And though he fought to suppress the urge, he jerked and spasmed with each roaring detonation. Fidgeting with his nails on the wood. Grinding his teeth. Trying to breathe against the pounding of his heart. Jonny licked his lips, so dry, so parched, sticking together with a gummy film. God, when was the last time he had any water? So dry here. So hot. So very hot.
More and more screaming into the night.
Rocketing upwards.
Booming.
Booming.
Booming.
Raining crackles of red, white, and blues, showering with the stink of sulfur and sweat down into the crowd of cheering, laughing, smiling, faceless, people, eclipsed by the shadow of night and the lightning flash of each eruption, surging with applause and glee.
Boom.
Boom.
Boom.
Where was he now? Still in the ballpark?
No...where? Dry heat surrounded him.
The whip of sand scraping his exposed face.
Driving fast down a pothole riddled road.
Was this Route Tampa?
Part of him knew it wasn't real. Couldn't be. He was home with Karen, but Karen and home also felt incredibly far, far away. As if his astral self was torn from his physical body, drifting back in time. Back to Iraq. Back in the oven heat and coarse sand grating against his flesh. Scratching up his goggles. Ruining his gloves soaked in oil. And angry horrid fists of protesting robed men, of dirty hollow faces of skeleton children. Of mothers strapped with bombs, tears pouring out their exposed eyes.
"Don't do it!" he screamed.
Boom.
Boom.
Boom.
Jonny rocked in his seat, back and forth, back and forth.
"Billings, you okay up there?" he yelled to no one. But in his mind, he could see her astral glow, like a dimmed living photograph. She sat there looking down at him from the gunner's seat, eyes unblinking and wide, red pooling down her chin strap. Staring at him and he at her. Frozen forever in that horrible moment.
"BILLINGS!"
Someone had him now. Touching his arm. Jonny looked down. It was a petite hand, not his own, but he recognized it.
"Come on, Jonny, let's go. It's okay. Follow me." It was Karen's voice calling to him.
Jonny blinked and the Humvee he was sitting in was gone. He was in a wooden chair in a stadium. People were looking back at him, people with skull faces glancing sideways and murmuring to each other. He looked at Karen, unsure what had happened, or what was going on. Cold sweat clung to his body, soaking into his t-shirt. Running down his hair, stinging his eyes.
High above, more deafening booms bloomed into the night's sky.
Showering.
Raining whites, reds, and blues.
Jonny flinched with each, wiping away his sweat and wet face on his sleeve.
Was he crying?
BOOM.
BOOM.
BOOM.
Slowly he was up on unsteady legs, and walking, being led by Karen's gentle touch. Ignoring, or as much as he could, the snickering whispers of nearby orange clad Astro fans. They reached the end and he wondered why his face was so wet.
Jonny touched his cheek, tracing the river of woe.
He had been crying.
At the exit, he turned back. He could only imagine what those people were saying about him. Calling him a freak or weirdo or pussy. Couldn't handle a few fireworks. Hell, babies like fireworks. What a pussy he was. Weak. Worthless pussy.
3
Karen guided him up the concrete steps and into the cold air-conditioned circled corridors of Minute Maid Park's passageway that fed to each corner and level of the stadium. Here it was quieter. And a more manageable place.
"I'm sorry," she said. "I tried--"
Jonny waved her off, bracing his weight on his knees, breathing, struggling to get his head clear. A group of men walked by, all buddies no doubt. They glanced at him, muttering between themselves, curious or amused, he didn't know. He turned to Karen. "Not your fault. Let's just get home. I'm okay now. Let's just go home." Home, imagined or physical, was still a manifested idea for him. Wood and brick could offer little protection for the demons and memories that haunted him, like a nightmare except he wasn't asleep, and Jonny knew it. Creature of habit, as they say. When you're overwhelmed, you think of home. Even if home isn't really all that safe.
"Okay, you want me to drive?" she asked, leading the way towards the lobby.
"I'll be okay to drive. It was just..."
"I know. Again, I'm really sorry, Jonny."
"Not your fault."
"I know, just..."
"Yeah."
Jonny brought her close to him as they continued down toward the lobby, neither wanting or willing to talk. They descende
d the wide sets of stairs and went out the wall of glass doors. Traffic was already starting to pick up. Crossing the street quickly, he could hear the fading rockets and booms, now muffled and manageable with some distance. Here the explosions were just fireworks, what it was supposed to be, fun colorful blooms of sparkles and aahhs. Whereas in the stadium, gripped in his seat, the booms had been near deafening, forcing him down into himself, recalling things he simply would rather had left unsaid.
Karen glanced down the street. People were running, shouting.
"Bars are still open." Jonny winked at her, and nudged her to keep going.
Working through the parking lot, it didn't take them long to find the Jeep Cherokee Jonny had purchased on his first month back from deployment. It was hard to miss. Large and ugly faded green, military green Jonny had said. Band stickers on the back and side windows, NIN, Nirvana, TOOL, Megadeth, and Slayer. Large thick treaded tires that forced the body high off the ground. Karen had been quick to joke that the Jeep felt like something regurgitated from the late 80s and early 90s.
Jonny didn't care. Maybe it was a good thing to have something that reminded him of the past, something before he enlisted, before the Army. Something to remind him that pre-war Jonny was more than a glimmer. He'd been real, once.
"You sure you don't want me to drive?" she asked again.
Jonny nodded. I'm fine, really."
High above them the Friday Night Family Fireworks show was brought to its bright orange, red, white, green conclusion in a conglomerate of orbs and streamers screaming and arching away from the dome. Jonny looked up and watched, feeling Karen's gaze on him, seeing if he really was okay. He'd met Karen before his last deployment and she had stayed with him faithfully through it all. She was very proud of him, he knew, and only wanted what was best.
"I'm fine, trust me," he said, still staring up into the crackling night's sky.
Somewhere far off, someone was yelling. A woman by the sound of it, shrill and panicked.
Jonny, opening the Jeep's driver's side door, stopped and listened.
Karen was doing the same, her hand on the door handle.
"What was that?" she asked.
Jonny listened.
Nothing.
No follow up or sirens or anything.
"It's Friday night, maybe someone had too much to drink and is messing around." Jonny shrugged and jumped behind the wheel.
Karen followed suit, climbing into the passenger side, quickly reaching and locking her door.
Jonny suppressed a smile and fired up the engine, listening to it purr, or gurgle as Karen was apt to point out. He shifted into drive and was about to press down on the accelerator.
Rushing past the Jeep, a crowd of people blurred by.
Jonny watched, his foot posed. One of the group looked back, a woman, her face an unmistakable expression of terror, the likes he had not seen in some time, not since the war.
Shortly after, a police cruiser went by in pursuit.
"What the hell is going on?" Karen whispered.
They both watched as the group darted through the parking lot and crossed the street on the main road. The Houston Police car jumped the curb after them, sirens blaring.
"Not sure," Jonny said, pulling out of the parking spot and turning in the opposite direction. "But the police have it handled."
"Yeah, a little aggressively, if you ask me." Karen sat back in her seat, pulling out her phone, opening some social media app. Clicking with her thumbs.
Jonny navigated them through Washington Avenue, miraculously finding an entrance ramp to I-45 without having to consult the GPS. He'd only been living in Houston for a few months, but already he dreaded driving downtown. The streets were always under construction, poorly signed detours and highway ramps and one-way streets made it more difficult than was necessary. When he'd been able to find his way, though, there was a lot of architectural things he found enjoyable and neat to look at. Besides Minute Maid Park and the JP Morgan Chase Building, there were older structures, the Sam Houston Hotel and Wortham Theater, the Hyatt Regency that towered above the Zoo, the Sacred Heart. The Bob Lanier Public Works Building reminded him of something from a 1960s movie, but his favorite building was the gothic Christ Church Cathedral. The old chapel felt incredibly too close to the interstate, and just across from it, a giant looming neon crucifix belonging to St. Joseph Hospital, juxtaposing, or so Jonny thought, archaism versus modern religion.
All of it brewed from the same place though, didn't it? Fear of the unknown.
Passing over a bridge, leaving downtown and all its sights, Jonny took the exit heading south towards Galveston. Karen was still on her phone, playing on Facebook or Twitter.
Glancing at her and back on the road, Jonny reached over and turned on the radio, tuning into KPFH 90.1. He couldn't remember when he first heard of the station. He knew they were the only progressively liberal talk radio in the city, the rest being conservative. Not that he considered himself to be either liberal or conservative, but there was a unique charm with KPFH. During the week, in the evenings the channel hosted a gambit of culturally minded shows; one day it was ecology, where they discussed environmental issues. The next day would be about children and education. Another day they hosted Doctor Robert Muhammad and his "Connect the Dots" show discussing Pan-Africanism and African American Muslim issues, both abroad and nationally and locally. Thursdays and Fridays also had their own differing political shows, but his favorite of all was the Friday night Prison Show. Here all kinds of people would call in, mostly those with someone they know or love behind bars up in Huntsville Penitentiary, a few hours north of Houston.
The host of the show, Craig Wade or whoever was covering the show and events, ran his hour or so of air time smoothly. Callers would call in and just talk. Either directly addressed to Craig, if that was the guy's name, Jonny couldn't remember, or they'd just...talk, talk as if having a conversation face to face with whomever they knew on the inside, the inmate they wanted to reach out to. The assumption was that on the inside the inmates were tuning in too. Mothers, girlfriends, baby mamas, wives, dads, grandparents, friends, they would call in and talk about mostly meaningless stuff, about birthday parties and family get-togethers, what was going on with Memaw's hip surgery or how Uncle Carl was doing with his new job. Meaningless except to the people listening. And most called without a single ounce of complaint, as if they've already been there and done that, and no longer saw any point to being angry. Better to just act normally, if only for a minute at a time on air. Sometimes a girlfriend would start crying. Overwhelmed and not knowing what kind of reaction that stirred for her bo on the inside unable to comfort her, to touch her.
Jonny knew well enough what that feeling of helplessness could do to a man. He'd met Karen before his last deployment. And there had been a few emotional calls. She tried to control whatever was going on with her, he knew, but sometimes things got to be too much. He supposed he liked the show because he knew what it was like, and though unfortunate for these people, they reminded him of what he and Karen had gone through, they weren't alone. There are others still going through that kind of forced separation, and forced geniality and calmness.
Tonight though, something was different.
Jonny glanced at Karen in the passenger seat, still absorbed in whatever she was reading on Facebook. He reached over and turned the volume up.
"...my daughter heard from some fella that works in the Wall Unit that there was some sort of riot. Now listen, every time I try calling up there to speak with someone I keep getting disconnected. And now I'm hearing rumors--Lord, I hope Jesse is okay..." Some woman had called in, near frantic, talking between gulps of air.
Craig, or whoever the host was tonight, took another caller.
"--lock down, that's what I heard. Fires on some of the levels and now there's these guards in full SWAT gear heading in, I ain't never seen nothing like this before..." The caller started talking with someone off the radio.
Mumbling, his voice higher now, as if what he was seeing or being told was something he was struggling to believe. The line went dead a moment later.
The host of the Prison Show tried to resume control, but the calls of frantic and concerned family members and wives and girlfriends and mothers and aunts and uncles and fathers were near constant. Craig obviously wanted to resolve any kind of speculation, but was having a hard-enough time keeping himself from working up into a panic.
Another caller.
"--medical, that's what Bailey told me, she works as a nurse there. She told me some kind of fever had started in the units and the Warden refused them proper medical treatment. Warden don't care. No one does. They lock them up, out of sight out of mind, you dig, and then they toss away the key and somehow, magically, you've lost what made you a human being. Now you're an inmate, a number, and numbers don't get the same kind of care. Catch a cold, get the flu...sorry, now Warden and them guards are reaping what they've sowed..."
Static.
"Did the last caller just suggest that the riots started because the inmates weren't getting proper medical treatment? What a total load of bull--"
Craig cut off the last caller, apologizing for the language, and switched to a different line.
"--No one knows what's going on. Definitely some sort of riot. The reasons why, we can only guess. I just pray everyone is safe..."
"--Jesus, what are you people talking about? These are criminals; this isn't a children's ward or something. These people aren't special or handicapped. They are criminals..."
Jonny listened, guiding the Jeep between traffic, trying to escape the worse of it which seemed to be piled near the exits leading to the medical district. He drummed on the steering wheel. "Wow, Karen are you listening to this? Somethings going on up in Huntsville Prison."
Karen didn't look away from her phone, the screen brightly lit in the darkness of the Jeep's cab. "Huh?" she mumbled.
"Riots," Jonny said, "at the prison."
Karen frowned, but said nothing.
Planet of the Dead Page 2
