Flowers from Afghanistan Read online

“On?”

  “On whether you can wait for me to finish basic training.”

  She unwrapped herself from my arm, like removing last year’s worn jacket. “What did you go and do?”

  I straightened the rearview mirror. “Joined the Army.” I was afraid to look at her, afraid to see disappointment, or worse, nothing.

  She pulled my jacket around her shoulders as if she were chilled, glanced at the leather sleeves, the felt front with the orange letter G embroidered on the front. She pulled off my prized jacket and laid it in my lap. “Why did you kiss me if you’re leaving?”

  I twisted around in the seat so I could see her better. “Wait for me, Soph. I know other guys want to date you, and we’ve only been seeing each other a month…” My heart willed the answer, but uncertainty clouded her eyes.

  She reached across and played with the sleeve of my jacket, examining the lining as if the answer lay stitched in secret code. “I never wanted to date a military guy. My dad died serving in the military. You know that?”

  “Just wait for me through Basic Training. Give me that much. When I come home on leave, if you still feel the same, we’ll call it quits.”

  Sophie took my jacket and slipped it back over her shoulders. “Only until the end of Basic.” Her teasing voice faltered just a little.

  I wrapped my arms around her. My right index finger traced letters on her back.

  “What are you writing?”

  My self-conscious laugh echoed off the windshield. “It’s a secr—”

  “Incoming! Incoming!” The warning horn echoed off my tent walls, tearing my glazed eyes and numb thoughts from the windshield of the past. I jumped, stiffened for a moment, moved to my feet, and leaned toward the computer monitor.

  Sophie’s eyes searched the room. “What’s happening?”

  I grabbed my stuff. “Gonna find out.”

  “Be careful.”

  “Gotta go.” I closed my laptop.

  Guys piled into the hallway. Everyone pulled on his gear. Travis ran out the door. Two minutes later he reappeared, slowly dragged his feet in the gravel, helmet in hand.

  “It was a false alarm?”

  “Yeah, an initial sweep of the area revealed no breach of the perimeter. Someone in the tower accidentally hit the button to the new system. I guess they weren’t familiar with it yet.”

  I wandered back into my room, shook off the adrenaline rush and hung my stuff back on the wall. I slumped down on my bed, grabbed a flavored sports drink and took a big gulp. Lifting the laptop’s cover, I found Sophie was still online. I hit the video button, and her face came into view.

  She turned away, trying to hide her swollen eyes and runny nose.

  My heart pinched, a pain that betrayed my outward calm. Give me a year. I’ll fix all of this, and we can pick up the pieces and go on. My throat constricted at the desperate but unspoken words.

  She dabbed at her mascara-ringed eyes. “You had to get offline so fast, and the thing said ‘incoming.’”

  “It was nothing. Someone hit the wrong button.” I tried to laugh, but it came off as a nervous cough.

  “All I could think about was how awful our last video call was, and if anything happened to you, I couldn’t stand myself.” Sophie wadded the tissue into a little ball, gripped it tight in her fist. She leaned closer to the monitor.

  Despite the intensity of the moment, I had an eerie disconnected feeling. While Sophie spoke, I soaked up her face and mannerisms. How much time did I spend back home paying this close attention to her? Her words vibrated from the monitor, words that brought me back to the present.

  “I’m sorry for being so short-tempered with you. I’ve been frustrated a lot lately, furious at God for allowing Little Mac to die. Angry, even at Little Mac, for leaving.”

  “Don’t apologize, Sophie. I never meant to hurt you, and I have. I’ve probably hurt you worse than anyone in my life, and I don’t deserve you.” Would she accept my words and let us heal?

  Time would prove this.

  How I wished I could bend time to my will.

  9

  The nerve-jangling beep of the alarm clock thrust me into consciousness. I rolled over and smacked the clock until I was sure it was dead and scrubbed my hands with the ever-present bottle of hand sanitizer. I hated the sharp alcohol odor of the stuff. I banged on Travis’s door as I passed. “Come on. Breakfast.”

  I heard him scrambling around behind the door. I was so hungry I kept walking. He’d catch up eventually. The greasy smell of bacon and the mellow aroma of coffee welcomed me to the DFAC. I grabbed a tray loaded with eggs and an extra biscuit and slid into my usual seat.

  “Your turn to pick up Afghan Uniformed Police students.” Glenn took a swig of coffee, a wicked gleam in his eyes. He took extreme pleasure in seeing me gobble down my breakfast.

  Eggs steamed on my plate. So much for enjoying them. I cut into the fried eggs with the side of my fork and shoveled them into my mouth. Chewing rapidly, I washed the whole thing down with a half pint of chocolate milk. I folded the bacon into a napkin and tucked into my pants pocket, a snack for Phoenix. As I stood, Stockton passed behind me. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed him looking at our group. He hesitated for a moment as if waiting to be invited to sit down.

  Glenn pushed a forkful of eggs into his mouth and looked away.

  Travis jumped to his feet. “Want some company picking up those students?”

  “Sure,” I said, glancing over my shoulder at Stockton.

  He turned slowly and sat at the next row of tables by himself. Part of me felt sorry for him. I had dealt with his type before. Seemed there was always one in every workplace. Some know-it-all who wanted to be respected by their peers. They never saw that the thing they craved most they were throwing away with both hands.

  I dumped my trash and hurried to the door.

  Travis was hot on my heels.

  “You sure left the DFAC in a rush,” I said.

  “Stockton. No one wants to be around him. He’s nothing but trouble.” Travis spit on the gravel at our feet. “I can’t stand even to breathe the same air he does.”

  We hiked down to the gate to pick up the students. Camp Paradise was humming.

  “It feels good to be part of something bigger than myself,” I said.

  “I forgot to tell you. Yesterday we got some good news. Some of our students from the last graduating class put their training to use.”

  “What happened?” I yelled over the grinding engine noise of a Buffalo vehicle powering past me. It threw dirt into the air, covering me with yet another layer of grime.

  “Our graduates apprehended a couple of local criminals, using the techniques we taught them.”

  Warm pride flooded my chest.

  On the other side of the gate, students milled around, anxious to get started. Dressed in native garb, they would change into uniforms once inside the camp. To travel outside the gate in a police uniform with no weapon would be to invite trouble. Taliban were none too happy we were training local police to keep order in the country once ISAF troops pulled out.

  I approached the sergeant. “McCann here to pick up AUP students.”

  An MRAP passed, and all I could see was the man’s mouth moving.

  I cupped my hands around my mouth and shouted, “What?”

  Sergeant shouted above the roar of the vehicle. “I said, we’ve got a guy with hashish on him. Found it on him when we were checking them in this morning.”

  “A student?”

  “Yes.”

  A growl of frustration escaped my lips. “Can’t things go smoothly just this once?” I shouted back above the noise. “We’ve briefed the students about drugs. They know it’s not acceptable.”

  The sergeant nodded. “I know. We found it concealed inside a flap in his wallet.”

  I kicked at a big chunk of gravel. The MRAP finally pulled through the gate, and we were able to talk at a tolerable level. “Look, we told them plainly the rules o
f the academy and what we expect of them.”

  He put a hand up. “I’ll get the supervisor. Let me see what I can do.” He turned to walk away. “Sorry about this.”

  “Don’t apologize. What can you do?”

  Twenty minutes later, I stood, watching the sun climb higher in the sky. A trickle of sweat rolled down between my shoulder blades. I wiped my damp forehead with the back of my hand. The sergeant was talking on the phone to the immediate supervisor.

  Travis had been waiting patiently to the side, but even he’d had enough. He ambled over. “What’s taking so long?”

  “They found hashish on a student. I’m trying to have him removed so we can continue to class.”

  The sergeant motioned to me. He hung up the phone and pointed to the offending student. “We’ll get his information, remove him from camp, and place him on a permanent no-entry watch.”

  Tension drained out of my shoulders. “Thanks, Sergeant.”

  “Just doing my job.”

  “All right, let’s get these guys checked in before we lose any more time.” Travis turned to the interpreter and let him know we’d be moving on to class.

  The sergeant glanced past me. His face tightened. “Looks like we have someone else coming to give their two cents.”

  “There a problem here?” The whiny voice was unmistakable.

  I spun on my heel. “No worries, Lieutenant. Just picking up AUP students.”

  Travis whipped his head around, and he studied Stockton.

  I couldn’t tell if he wanted to punch him or was going to be sick.

  Stockton’s forehead wrinkled. “I heard a student was put on no-entry watch.”

  “That’s right,” Travis said. “We had a student with hashish on him.”

  I didn’t say a word, just kept my eyes fixed on the gate. I hoped Stockton would give up and go away.

  “Sergeant!” Stockton would keep shaking things until he caused a problem.

  The sergeant stopped beside us. “Yes, sir?”

  I ground my teeth until my jaw ached. The morning was turning into a circus.

  “Get your supervisor on the phone,” Stockton snapped. “I have seventy-one students on the roster and seventy-one will show up for class.”

  I stepped closer to Stockton and lowered my voice, allowing him to save face. “Look, we got two different stories from this guy. First, he said he found it on a prisoner and was turning it in. Then he changed his story and said another officer gave it to him to be destroyed.”

  Stockton sneered. “I don’t care if he said aliens dropped it from the mother ship. I want him re-instated.”

  I met Stockton’s eyes. “When we brief students, we tell them, very clearly, what we expect of them. These students have been told they’ll be expelled from the academy and sent back to their posts if they violate the rules.”

  Stockton turned sideways to me. “I’m up for promotion,” he whispered in a menacing tone. “I will have my quota. I will not have some contractor come along and tell me how to do my job.”

  “I thought we were doing this for the Afghan people.”

  “What?” Stockton thundered.

  “This training is valuable,” I said, trying to keep my voice even.

  Stockton raised his voice another few decibels. Passing soldiers slowed down to look, probably wondering what was going on. “Valuable? Look around you. What do you see? I’ll tell you what I see. Sand and more sand. Roads so dangerous you can’t drive them without risk of being blown sky-high by an IED, and Taliban rule by fear. Do you honestly think your effort will improve anything in this country?” The sneer on his face went all the way to his soul.

  I stepped closer and pushed the limits of his personal space. I wished he’d take a swing at me, and I’d have a valid reason to bloody his face. “I’m not naive enough to believe I can rewrite a country’s history. Things were bad before we came, and they’ll likely be bad when we pull out. There’s one thing I know. What I do matters to the students and interpreters. Rasool has a wife and three boys to support. Nazarullah is married. Ahmed is engaged. How will they provide for their families if we don’t give them the tools? Don’t you get it? The world doesn’t revolve around Lieutenant Stockton. Your biggest problem is a promotion? How’d you like to try and raise a family under these conditions?” I had just moved my name from Stockton’s annoying list to the side that said ‘enemy,’ but I didn’t care. I gave it my parting shot. “Most of these guys have never even been through a police academy. They’ll likely never get another chance to take any classes once we leave their country. Don’t you think we owe it to them to hold Kandahar Training Center to a high standard? Something they can be proud of accomplishing?”

  Stockton stopped listening. He stalked over to the sergeant’s station.

  Travis sidled up. “What did you say to him?”

  “That we owed it to the students to enforce our rules.” I ground my fist into my empty hand, wishing it could have been Stockton’s face. Any sympathy I felt toward him at breakfast had vanished like wisps of morning clouds, burned away by the desert sun.

  “Release that student to attend class and get me Colonel Smith on the phone,” Stockton ordered. He turned and directed a heated glare my way.

  I lost this round. Would there be any wins with Stockton? I called to Rasool, our interpreter. “Tell the students to gather their things. We’re heading to class.”

  Rasool paused. He looked confused. “And the one they found with hashish?”

  I was sickened by the words coming out of my mouth. “Him, too,” I said.

  Rasool frowned at me for a moment, but he gathered the students for the walk to the academy.

  As we traveled down the gravel path, I mulled over the morning’s events. The decision went against everything I stood for. We could make a difference in Afghanistan, given the time and resources. First, we needed to build a model based on truth and integrity. How could I instill trust among students who knew I just broke the academy rules by allowing that student in? This spiraled out of control and it wasn’t the first time academy rules had been undermined. The only thing I had control over were my own actions. In light of that, reluctantly, I knew what I had to do.

  Once the students were seated, I turned the class over to Travis.

  “I’m going to step down as a trainer.”

  Travis’s face fell. “What?”

  “We won’t have any level of respect from the students once they find out we broke our own rules. I’ll be worthless as an instructor,” I said. “How does anyone accomplish anything here with this kind of inconsistency?”

  “Can’t you just let it slide this once? This is nothing new. Stockton comes up with a new problem every week. We’re just trying to survive him being here.”

  “Let it slide? Are you kidding me? I thought I knew you better than that, or at least I thought your work ethic was better than that.”

  “Is one student really worth fighting over? How about your job? What will you tell Sophie?”

  “Will Sophie be happy to hear I’m coming home? Of course, but what would she say if she found out I stayed and compromised my values? I know what she’d tell me to do.” I shook my head, gathered the materials, and handed them to Travis. I addressed the class. “Today Mr. Blackburn will go over first-aid techniques with you.”

  Travis exchanged places with me.

  “I’ll stay and help you finish today’s lesson, but then I’m going back to our tent to submit a letter of resignation,” I spoke so only Travis could hear.

  His gaze burned into my side, disappointment in his stare.

  At lunch, I skipped the DFAC and instead sat alone at my computer.

  I began my letter.

  This morning at 0730 hrs. I was at the front gate escorting students to the classroom when the guards found hashish on one of the students.

  I was about to give up everything I’d come there to accomplish, but if I stayed, I’d be giving up something even more va
luable. My integrity. We had to be seen as truthful by our students. We should be setting the example, and we’d failed.

  My fingers clicked keys on the keyboard. I finished the narrative of the day’s events and closed my letter.

  I have pride in the police profession and feel that we are not making a difference in this mission if we allow the rules to go unpunished. If the Afghan people, especially the police, are to take over this country, then they should be held to certain standards. Because of this incident, I have decided to resign my position with WinCorp. I have never quit anything before in my life. It’s a hard decision to make, but I do not feel I can remain here.

  Sincerely,

  Mac McCann, Police Trainer

  My fingers hovered over the “Enter” key. I glanced around the tent. I hadn’t even unpacked all my gear yet. I was only beginning to have an impact on the students. I’d be leaving Travis and Glenn, and I hadn’t found camaraderie like that since I was in the Army.

  The locals wanted to be allowed to raise their families and make a decent living. They wanted a stable country in which to raise their children. With that thought, Bashir’s green eyes haunted me. What kind of future would he have if no one stepped in? So many thoughts crowded my mind. I took a deep breath and clicked “Send.”

  Had I just become the most recent in a long line of people who failed the boy?

  10

  Sophie wouldn’t be waiting as long as she thought for me to come home, but she didn’t know that yet.

  Another day marked off the calendar with a black slash, and I still hadn’t told her I’d resigned. No sense in doing it until my travel orders came through. I think I was in denial. Telling Sophie would make it real.

  Phoenix squeezed in under my legs, tongue hanging out. He planted his paws on me and tried to climb into my lap. He was growing so fast.

  “How will I get you home?” I ruffled the fur on his neck. There was no way I would leave him. If I couldn’t do anything positive for the Afghans, at least I’d rescue my dog. He had worked his way into a permanent place in my heart. Every day I expected to be called into Colonel Mark Smith’s office to explain why I had a dog. I knew better than to think the little guy was quiet during the times I was absent from the tent.