The snow was stained with blood as the field ran down to the river. Yesterday, no one would have seen the blood midst the stubble of the field, but snow fell overnight. Weatherman said six to eight inches, drifts to twelve. Ben Weasley, moving his tractor from one of his fields to another along the road, saw it. He turned into one of his neighbor’s places down the road and called the sheriff. Ten minutes later the sheriff and his deputy were at the scene. They followed the trail, cursing every time their feet sunk into a ditch or gully. “It’s human alright,” the sheriff said, “You can tell by the drag marks.”
“Bet they was hoping, snow’d go on, cover the whole thing,” the deputy said, “Give ‘em more running time.”
There was more blood on the riverbank. The two poked around the shallows, but the current, moving fast at that corner covered all traces. “Damn to hell, now’s the hard part, got figure out who’s gone missin’. Hope nobody local.”
“And don’t forget,” the deputy added, “Who wanted him, or her, to go missin’.”
* * *
The wind ponies of her mind go to places she does not want to go. Olivia fears the thoughts ill formed, yet foreboding, of Jimmy’s absence. Her man is a man of habit. He goes out at 8 to do his jobs. He comes home at 6 for his dinner. They watch television. They go to bed at 9. Last night he did not come home He did not call. He always calls when he will be late. She would have gone out to look for him, but the snow: last night she tried at 8, a curtain of white, at 12, a curtain of night white, at 2 white out.
Olivia drifted into a snowy slumber in early morning thinking about Jimmy and his new nightmares, shadows of those that haunted him when he first returned. He called them, “frightened phantoms.” Always running at him.
This morning at 8 he is not home. At 9 she calls the sheriff. He is not in his office. She leaves a message.
* * *
Who has the right to live among us and who must die? It is a judgment reserved to God. By implication, the judgment is often usurped by the individual. It was I who judged Jimmy 10 years ago. To those who knew him in Kansas he was an upstanding man of good habit and character, a good tradesman, a good husband, a pretty good half back for his high school football team. He and Olivia were planning to have children.
Jimmy served in Iraq as a platoon leader for two years and received the Silver Star. In Iraq, he left villages shattered, silhouettes of mud huts with empty windows framing the sky. In Iraq he left nightmares that became shadows, shadows that returned to their cradles and birthed misshapen new ones. In Iraq he left sand littered with bodies, arms, legs, and broken dolls. My name is Basmina, I am the survivor of one of those villages.
Townsend Walker draws inspiration from cemeteries, foreign places, violence, and strong women. He has written a collection of short stories, “3 Women, 4 Towns, 5 Bodies & other stories,” (Deeds Publishing,2018), a novella, “La Ronde,” (Truth Serum Press, 2015) and over one hundred short stories and poems published in literary journals. His website is: https://www.townsendwalker.com
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