Poked (A Standalone Romance) (A Savery Brother Book)

by Naomi Niles

  I took a last, foul-tasting sip of my drink and said in a quiet voice, “I’ll think about it.”

  Renee looked disappointed, but under the circumstances I suspected she knew that was the best she could hope for. “Thanks,” she said. “That’s all I ask.”

  We left the apartment and caught the train to 66th Street to the studio where Renee worked, navigating our way through traffic and around scaffolding. Construction workers in yellow hard hats seemed to outnumber pedestrians, standing under their blue tarps with coffee in hand to escape the summer heat. One of them whistled at us as we walked past, and I gave him the finger, but Renee merely smiled.

  “Amazing, isn’t it?” she said as we stepped through the door into the relative calm of the studio with its polished wood floors. “There are so many things to see and explore in the city on a summer morning. I’ve lived here for about two years, and I still don’t know the names of about half the things I see on our morning walks.” She motioned through the window to a bed of yellow flowers standing in a windowsill over the dumpster. “What are those called? I still don’t know. And the bird that flew past us as we were coming out of the subway?”

  “That was a crow,” I replied.

  “Yes, but why did it have a knife in its beak?”

  I smiled in spite of myself. Though I loved to give Renee a hard time about her unquenchable enthusiasm for life in the city and her tireless curiosity, she was one of the only things keeping me from outright despair. During the few years we had lived apart after college, I had sunk into a deep depression, sitting naked on my bed eating Top Ramen as I stared out the window of my Cincinnati apartment. That might have gone on indefinitely if she hadn’t talked me into joining her in Manhattan. For that reason alone, I felt I owed it to her to give her new boyfriend a chance.

  As soon as yoga ended at 11:00am, I took a taxi down to the Bugle’s office. I found the team gathered around a table in the newsroom with a TV overhead turned to CNN, which was showing helicopter footage of the recent oil spill disaster in the Gulf.

  Evan, the news editor, stood watching the TV with a look of intense fascination. A passionate and charismatic young man with a scruffy beard and a thick head of dark hair, he had effectively taken control of the website shortly after graduating from Columbia a few years back.

  “The important thing about the disaster in Galveston,” he said, never taking his eyes off the screen even for a moment, “is the political angle. How is this affecting the president’s chances of reelection?”

  “It’s his Katrina,” said Karen, the features editor, peering sharply at him from behind her beetle-like black glasses.

  “Yes, let’s go with that,” said Evan, rubbing his hands together. “Just as importantly, how is this playing in the heartland? One of the quirks of our political system over the past twenty years is that a president can’t expect much support from Americans of the opposite party. They’ll say he’s doing a bad job no matter what he does. But in a highly polarized environment like ours, a president only faces real trouble if he starts losing the support of his own party. We’ll want to interview some of the men and women who voted for him and find out whether they’re having buyer’s remorse.”

  “My family back in Ohio voted for him,” I said. “Half of them support him passionately, and the other half aren’t too happy about it. My cousins think he should have been out there helping with the recovery weeks ago. It’s created a rift in the family.”

  “Any of them who would be willing to be interviewed on the record?” asked Evan. “I’m thinking of doing a major feature on the political fallout from the hurricane, in which case we could use an inset article reporting dissatisfaction among his base.”

  “I’ll call them,” I said. “It wouldn’t be too hard to dredge up some quotes.”

  “Fantastic.” Turning to Karen, he said, “And I would like you to be in charge of putting that feature together.”

  “Consider it done,” said Karen, setting down her pen and folding her hands together.

  On the screen above us, the news shifted to a report on Navy SEALs committing atrocities in the remote mountainous regions of Afghanistan. A middle-aged reporter stood in the desert with microphone in hand, his expression tense and sober.

  “Local villagers and Afghani officials allege that the SEAL team stationed here has shown a, quote, ‘complete and total disregard for human life,’ indiscriminately killing women and children,” he said. “During a recent firefight between Islamist radicals and members of SEAL Team 6 flying in Chinook attack helicopters, the Chinook reportedly fired a furious fusillade of bullets that killed up to a dozen children, who were then hastily buried by the military in an adjoining ravine.”

  The reporter then interviewed an elderly villager, who recounted in broken English what she had allegedly witnessed during the firefight. “Bullets were flying everywhere,” she said. “They made no effort to separate the good from the bad. If they were in the way, they just killed them.”

  My blood froze at what I was hearing, at the thought of all those dead children killed because they had been in the wrong place at the wrong time. We were supposed to be over there protecting the innocent, and yet every day brought new reports of weddings being bombed and parents having to bury their own daughters.

  “What are we even doing in Afghanistan?” I said aloud, rather more heatedly than I had intended. “It’s the longest war we’ve ever fought, and what do we have to show for it?”

  “Trillions of dollars wasted and thousands of dead soldiers and Afghanis,” said Karen, shaking her head.

  “This seems like it would be a pretty big deal,” said Evan. “Remember Abu Ghraib? If our boys are really committing atrocities in Afghanistan, then that’s something our readers are going to want to know about.”

  “But Abu Ghraib was different,” I replied. “Those were intentional atrocities approved at the highest levels of government. This sounds like it was more careless or accidental.”

  “Seems like there’s been a whole lot of carelessness since the inauguration, wouldn’t you say?” said Evan. He motioned back to the TV, which was once again showing footage of Galveston’s flooded streets.

  Evan had a way of drawing out the contrasts in our perspectives even when we were in general agreement. It wasn’t often that I found myself defending the U. S. government or military, but it seemed unfair to accuse them of deliberately killing civilians in this instance. Evan’s reflexive anti-Americanism had been a source of tension between us ever since I signed on to work at the Bugle; he was forever trying to portray the country and its leaders in the worst possible light, when often the reality was more nuanced than that.

  The meeting ended, and the other reporters returned to their desks in the main office. By the time I reached my own desk, Karen was already seated and phoning our representative to schedule an interview. I had only just sat down when I heard Evan call my name.

  “Kelli,” he said, “come here for a sec. I need to talk to you.”

  Karen grimaced and made a slashing motion across her neck with one finger. I followed him back into the office with a feeling of worry and trepidation.

  “Look, I don’t want to argue,” he said, pulling up a swivel chair and sitting down across from me with his knuckles pressed against his chin. “I realize we have differences of opinion when it comes to United States foreign policy, and that’s fine.”

  “I don’t know if I’d call them differences,” I said. “I think we largely agree, though I like to leave the conversation open to perspectives that you might not hear in a typical newsroom. I spent my teen years in the Rust Belt, and I guess in some ways I still think like someone who lives there.”

  “You know I respect that about you,” Evan replied. “When we were discussing whether to hire you, that was probably the number one quality you had in your favor, was your willingness to play devil’s advocate and to voice perspectives that you might not even necessarily agree with, but that you
knew we would be hearing from our critics. Not every newsroom in this city has a moderate-to-conservative journalist who’s willing to challenge the party line. I like it. It keeps things fresh.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “Though I’m not sure I would call myself a conservative…”

  “Dammit, Kelli, do you have to challenge everything I say?!” He laughed.

  Feeling a bit more reassured, I asked him, “What did you want to talk to me about?”

  Evan reached into his satchel. “Would you like a granola bar? It’s getting to be that time of day with me.” I shook my head. He unwrapped his granola bar and bit into it with a pensive expression. “So here’s what’s going on. I have a feeling this will be right in your wheelhouse. Last night, I spoke on the phone with an old buddy of mine from back home, Mohamed Armstrong. He’s mixed race, a practicing Muslim, and a decorated sergeant leading a team of SEALs in the Congo.”

  “Sounds like someone we should be writing a feature about,” I said, my brows raised. “Like I already have so many questions.”

  “He’s a pretty fascinating guy, though I admit to being a little biased because we grew up together. His entire career has been a rebuke to the conventional wisdom of what a sergeant looks like and how the army operates. Maybe someday we’ll do a report on him, but that’s not what I called you in here to talk about.”

  I leaned forward with my chin in my hands. “I’m listening.”

  “We got to talking about the allegations of atrocities being committed by SEALs in Afghanistan, and he predicted that’s all we would see on the news for the next couple weeks. I don’t know about that—the Gulf hurricane is a pretty big deal—but he was right about how the media was going to portray it.”

  “It’s hard to portray kids being blown up in a positive light,” I pointed out.

  “I get that. But like you said a minute ago, this seems like a case of incompetence rather than malice. I realize that’s not much comfort to the parents of the kids who died…” He cast his eyes down reflectively as his voice trailed off.

  “And what was your friend’s take—what’s his name? Mohamed?”

  “Sergeant Mohamed Armstrong. He maintains that the situation isn’t as black-and-white as it’s being portrayed and that the Navy is in danger of being scapegoated when it was just trying to do its job. That’s where I saw an opportunity. Since every paper and website in this city, except maybe the Post, is going to be investigating these SEALs with the intention of digging up some dirt on them, I thought we could stand out by taking a different approach.”

  “How?” I asked.

  Evan stretched his arms and flexed his fingers bracingly. “Well, Mohamed suggested that we send one of our reporters to the Congo, embed them among the SEALs and spend a few weeks getting to know them. I think most Americans don’t have any clue what actually goes on in the Navy and military, beyond just a vague idea that they work out and blow things up real good. We have a chance to correct that with some in-depth reporting that will, hopefully, present a corrective to some of the angry things being written about them in other media.”

  “And you want me to be the one to go over there?” I asked him.

  “If you want to,” said Evan. He leaned back in his chair and studied my face, as if assessing my level of enthusiasm. There wasn’t much. “Frankly, I can’t think of anyone else on our team who would be better suited to a story like this one. Didn’t you say you grew up in East Africa?”

  “I spent a few years there. My dad was a Marine stationed in Somalia. Me and my sister lived on the army base.”

  “See? So you know all about it.”

  I did. And I also knew I didn’t ever want to go back there, not for any reason.

  But Evan was adamant about it. “Mohamed Armstrong is one of the bravest men I’ve ever met,” he said. “Not just in terms of the fighting he’s done, but the bigotry and hatred he faced on his way through the ranks is just incredible. You’ll have his full support, and he’ll make sure that you’re treated well while you’re there. The Bugle will cover the cost of your flight, and your meals and board while you’re there.”

  I looked up at him in surprise. “Then everything’s been arranged?”

  Evan shrugged mildly. “The only thing we’re waiting on is you. I’m not going to force you to go, but I also don’t know anyone on this team who will portray the SEALs with the same level of sensitivity and empathy that you have. Certainly not Karen, who thinks the military is an irredeemable tool of patriarchal oppression. Not Randy, whose understanding of warfare mostly comes from reading Game of Thrones. Frankly this job was made for you, and I would be disappointed if I had to hand it over to someone else.”

  He rose from the table, slinging his satchel over his shoulders. “So, think it over, will you? And get back to me within a day or two. Your flight leaves for London on Saturday, whether you’re on it or not.”

  He walked out and left me sitting there alone in the office. I had an enormous decision to make, and I wanted to text my sister and ask her what she thought of it, but I knew she would be in class for at least the next hour. My stomach rumbled loudly, and I began to wish I had accepted that granola bar when he offered it.

  Evan was right about there being no one in the office better suited for this assignment. Not because I was especially brilliant, but because my own experience living with SEALS overseas had trained me to see the world through a SEAL’s eyes. Yet it was that same experience that made me wary of ever returning to Africa. I could still feel the acrid sting of burning smoke in my nostrils, could hear the loud rat-a-tat of machinegun fire. Sometimes I could still hear it in my sleep.

  Renee had been younger than me when we lived there, and she hadn’t been affected by it in the same way that I had. She had managed to escape Africa with her bright spirits intact. I hadn’t been so lucky. Friends told me I had a warped and cynical view of humanity, but they had all grown up in America and none of them had seen the things I had seen. If they had, they would know the truth that I knew: that safety is an illusion and no one can be trusted, not even your best friend.

  Chapter Three

  Zack

  Morning PT was always the most grueling part of my day. Every morning as I lay out on the Grinder, a long strip of black asphalt, I experienced a moment where I wondered why I had signed up for this and whether there was any way to get out of it. After running a mile in full gear through the jungle, I could see why most recruits dropped out on their first day of training. Not one in a hundred people had the stamina to do this even once, let alone every day—the pull-ups, the sit-ups, the laps, the runs.

  After spending half of the last month worrying about what I would do once I left the SEALs, here I was wishing I was back home again sipping orange juice in my mom’s kitchen. Half an hour into our training, sweat was oozing from every pore of my body. My bones ached so much I could hardly breathe.

  This was what Sergeant Armstrong warned us on the first day of training. “The only thing that will get you through this,” he had said, and he looked at me as he said it, “is an iron will. You must make the commitment in your own heart that you are not giving up, no matter how hard it gets.”

  Now as I staggered back to the mess hall in the scorching summer heat, the sergeant glowered at me disapprovingly. “You alright, Savery?” he asked. “You don’t look like you’re feeling too well.”

  “I’ll feel a lot better once I get some food in me, believe me,” I replied.

  The sergeant joined the back of the line and followed us into the relative cool of the dining room. “You know I always thought we let y’all go home for too long,” he said. “You get home, you kick off your boots, start to relax a little; then before you know it, you’ve been living off Coke and Five Guys, and you haven’t worked out in three weeks. You think I don’t know, but I do.”

  My buddy Chuck Howell, a lean young man with a scruffy red beard and a tattoo of Lady Liberty on his left arm, muttered a few choice words un
der his breath. When we got back to the table with our lunch and the sergeant was out of earshot, he said to me in a low voice, “He acts like he had a camera pointed at our houses. Yeah, I went home for a month, but I certainly wasn’t eating Five Guys.”

  Carson came over and pulled up a chair beside me. He’d gotten a turkey sandwich, a chicken salad with croutons, cranberries and balsamic vinaigrette, some salted crackers, and orange juice. “You guys been following the news for the last week?” he asked.

  Chuck shook his head. “No, man, I had better things to do while I was home than to sit around watching TV. What’s up?”

  Carson spoke as if he thought the whole thing was a joke. “Apparently the lamestream media’s throwing a hissy fit because a couple of ten-year-old girls got killed in Afghanistan. If they didn’t want to become missile fodder, they should’ve moved out of the way, or moved to a different country.”

  A few of the guys laughed, but Chuck didn’t look amused. “Maybe it’s true the media shouldn’t be making hay about it,” he said gruffly, leveling his eyes at Carson. “But that doesn’t mean we should make sport of them girls’ deaths. Any civilian’s death is a tragedy, especially if they were just children. That doesn’t change just because we were the ones who killed them.”

  Carson rolled his eyes, looking to the rest of the table for support. “Oh, go cry me a river,” he said. “War’s a dirty game, and we’re not going win it if we have to stop and inspect every goddamned, gutless terrorist who might be hiding some nine-year-old girl in their goddamn robes. And I guarantee you about half of them are,” he added, waving his fork in the air.

  Carson was beginning to grate on my nerves. I wished he would shut up and keep eating. Sometimes I got the feeling he liked being flagrantly offensive because he knew it got a rise out of Chuck, or because he knew he could get away with saying things here he could never say back home. Either way, I tried to tell myself he didn’t really mean it, that he was just pulling our legs.