Page 62 of Hero Hair
Chapter Eighteen
Macs
Here’s the thing, when you have something you care about you want to keep that thing next to you at all moments. You want to protect it. You want to shrink it and put it in your pocket incased in a steel bubble. And any time you want, you can put your hand in your pocket and feel it there. It’s reassuring. When the thing you care about is a person, you can’t keep them in your pocket. You can’t keep them at home either. The key is under my doormat, but Teala’s car is gone. I curse at the top of my fucking lungs.
A woman is the very last thing I need to worry about right now, but wouldn’t you know, she’s the fucking first—the only thing I can think of after the fucking terror attacks erupted. It’s war. We’re going to war. Not the kind of war you see on the news in far off deserts with a definitive line between good and bad, either.
When we got to work, we were introduced to intel that warned of terror attacks that would span the whole fucking planet. By the time the intel reached us, the first attacks were already happening. Widespread. Death. Destruction. Life-altering, world changing attacks on humanity. They aren’t concepts that are unfamiliar to me. IED explosives, car bombs, suicide vests, M4 wielding bad guys spraying metal into crowds of innocents, but the spotty footage of the terror was something I will carry with me until the day I die. I watched it happen on US soil. I heard the screams of civilians crying for help. They were confused and rightly so.
Multiple bombs in San Diego alone. Two at shopping malls affected so many of the guys that after the reports came in everyone dispersed. It’s fucking melee. Cell towers are down and traffic is unlike anything I’ve ever seen. I wanted to take a motherfucking chopper to my house, but those were all being used, go figure. They sent us to check on our loved ones, because even in my line of work family comes first, but I know we’ll be shipping out to spots around the United States to protect our citizens from the monster that lurks within.
That’s the worst part. The terrorists weren’t obvious. They were neighbors, friends, unsuspecting men and women who planned this for God knows how long and by what means. For them to skirt our intel and pull off a feat at this scale, means there were some big financiers behind this. People who pose as our friends. The death toll was in the hundreds of thousands when I left our compound to find Teala. Tahoe and a few of the other single guys stayed back to formulate plans and get everything ready. The confusion isn’t something I’m used to. No one ever thought it would happen here. In the land of the free and the home of the brave. Tactics will have to change. Everything we knew about being SEALs will be turned on its head.
I listen to the scratchy radio in my car as I speed toward her yoga studio using back roads. I dial her at least five times as I go. Her cell is going straight to voicemail and the studio line beeps back at me in a busy signal. The news anchor has replaced the radio DJs and they’re reporting on the attacks. They list the US cities first, and I match them to the corresponding states and realize I don’t think any states were left untouched. They move on to the international attacks, and I find myself gritting my teeth and surrendering to the pure rage coursing through my veins.
Some get scared. Hell, I saw fucking terror on several of my brothers’ faces. Others process things of this magnitude in a more ambiguous manner. They’re methodical. Tell them what to do and they’ll do it.
The news anchor does a recap that’s meant to be swift, but it’s anything but. “Sixteen elementary schools, fifty-five shopping malls, four theme parks, one hundred multi-level parking garages, three cruise ships, eight beaches, two hundred and still counting restaurants, commuter trains, airports, and tourist destinations.”
I have to switch it off. It’s all information I know and hearing it twice gives me the equivalent of rage goosebumps. I swerve in and out of traffic and cars stopped lining the highway. They’re either afraid to continue or they’re so absorbed in the news anchor’s words they can’t focus on driving as well. It makes for a trip longer than it should be.
When I finally pull into the parking lot, my satellite phone rings on my passenger seat. Thank God for technology. I answer with a swift, “Newstead.” And listen to Moose rattle on about our plans. He’s calling me from his car and tells me that Smith’s girlfriend was likely affected by the attack at the mall here in San Diego. My stomach goes sour and I find it hard to reply to that. It’s my biggest concern. I reached my parents earlier and they reassured me that our family was safe. Logically I know Teala is only one of three places, but not knowing is driving me fucking batty. Hearing about Smith’s girlfriend only adds to that anxiety. I ask if our hospital was affected, and he confirms it hasn’t been hit, but it will be overloaded and understaffed. I rattle off a few things I need from my cage to complete my go bag, and he agrees to get them for me if he gets back to base before I do. He asks if I’m going to Teala’s, and he knows, because everyone fucking knows without me saying a thing. I’m in love with her and I never told another soul. I didn’t even tell Teala. I roar out a string of swear words that would make my grandmother roll in her grave and wish him luck. I don’t answer his question about where I’m going. There’s no need.
The door to her studio is locked when I get there, but I spotted her car in the parking lot from the street. She’s here. Teala is somewhere and all of a sudden this fucking plaza doesn’t feel safe. It feels like a trap. Real life feels like a trap. My gaze scans the parking lot as I’m comforted by the weight of my weapons on my hips. People are erratic. There’s no way to judge a person when the state of panic is so severe that no one is thinking clearly.
It’s hysteria and the fact it isn’t just confined to one shopping plaza makes it all the worse. This is happening all over the world. It’s only a matter of time before the president hands down the order for martial law. Our entire country has already been declared in a State of Emergency. I shiver. I won’t be here by then. My steel ball in my pocket will be rolling around all on her own. I bang on the glass of her window, peering in. She has to be inside there. She wouldn’t be dumb enough to go anywhere else. The attacks hadn’t stopped when I left work. The larger attacks were fading, but the smaller ones in grocery stores and gyms were gaining momentum.
I see Teala’s terrified face peek from the corner of the yoga room. My heart hammers out a staccato similar to when I’m getting ready to kill someone. It feels the same. It confuses me even further. I can forget everything else for the moment by the sheer look of relief that washes over her face when she sees it’s me.
She unlocks the door and pulls me inside and she’s folded around me in her next breath. I lock the door because she failed to and relish the weight of her in my arms.
“You’re okay,” I whisper into her hair.
Teala pulls away to look at me. “What’s happening, Macs? What the fuck is happening out there? It’s not real, right?”
Tears streak down her cheeks and her eyes are wild. Like a wild animal trapped in a cage. That’s what she reminds me of and I feel guilty for thinking it, but I’m too glad she’s unharmed to worry about the train of my thoughts.
I swallow down my vanity and prepare to be the person who tells her it’s real life and everything she’s hearing is truth. “Teala, I’m going to find the people who did this.” That’s a truth I can give her.
“Oh my gosh. I can’t believe this is real. I can’t get ahold of my mom, Macs. I have no idea if she’s okay. The mall. Carina went to the mall. I don’t know if my friends are okay. The phones aren’t working!”
Her lips are trembling, and that’s all I need in the way of invitation. I kiss her, pulling her to me and slanting my mouth over hers. She responds immediately and this is a place where we’re okay. Nothing else matters for the seconds or minutes when we live inside this show of emotion. An emotion that isn’t anger or rage, or fear. It’s the purest thing I’ve ever experienced.
“It’s going to be okay. Everyone is okay,” I whisper against her breaths.
There’s so much death in the air that a body count won’t be readily available for weeks, maybe even months. Smith’s girlfriend is Carina. Fuck. I slide the satellite phone out of my pocket.
“Call your mom,” I say, extending it to her.
Her eyes light up. “I need to go to her,” she wails.
I shake my head. “You can’t drive out there, Teala. It’s not safe.”
Nothing is safe. How will I protect her when I leave? I wonder if she could fit in my dead hooker bag. I’d give her food and water and take her with me wherever I went.
“I have to. She’s by herself, Macs. She’s probably freaking out. What if she’s driving to me right now? How are the roads?”
She’s pacing with the phone pressed to her hear. I notice she knows the number by heart and doesn’t need to check her own phone.
