American flag flapping on a pole indicated someone was there.
Nate killed the motor and swung his legs out of the Jeep. He looked at the house through squinted eyes, trying to remember the last time he’d been there. And wondering why it seemed so lifeless. He slipped off his shoulder harness and holster, and bundled it under the front seat.
Before he reached the front steps, the interior door opened and Nate’s father stood behind the storm door with a scowl on his face.
All he said was, “You.”
“Hey, Tech Sarge,” Nate said, hesitating on the porch. “Are you going to let me in?”
Although his father was still tall and wide-shouldered, his body looked ravaged and sunken-in. His thin, pale hair was wispy, and his eyes looked out of deep sockets like dull chunks of basalt.
“I’m thinking,” his father said.
“Where’s Dalisay and the girls?” Nate asked, when his father finally stepped aside and let him enter.
“Around,” Technical Sergeant Gordon “Gordo” Romanowski growled.
“Is there coffee? I’ve been driving all night.”
“In the kitchen.”
Nate paused for a moment, then said, “It’s okay, I’ll get it myself.”
“You know where the cups are.”
The interior of the house hadn’t changed much, Nate noted. Despite the mountain location and the three- hundred-plus days of sunshine in Colorado, it was designed to be dark inside. The shaded windows were small, and the corners were lit with dim lamps. The wall of framed photographs of Gordo Romanowski in exotic locales was as it had always been, but there had been a few changes. As Nate poured a cup of coffee, he studied the photos.
Gordo, Nate’s mother, and five-year-old Nate in Turkey. Gordo with a forty-pound tuna off the coast of Baja, Mexico. Gordo in full dress in his tech sergeant’s uniform.
What was missing, Nate observed, was his Academy entrance photograph. And a shot of him with his first falcon. In their place were photos of Dalisay when Gordo first met her in the Philippines, and another of Gordo, Dalisay, and their two infant daughters. The girls were striking miniatures of Dalisay: petite, dark hair, big eyes, caramel skin. Because it was Colorado Springs and therefore a military town, Nate assumed Asian wives and children weren’t unusual at all in the community. But Nate had never met his stepmother or half sisters.
“You look fit,” Gordo said.
“Wild game meat and clean living,” Nate replied.
Gordo snorted with doubt and disapproval. “Why are you here, anyway? Why now, after all these years?”
Nate sipped the strong coffee and met the glare of his father with his own. “That’s why I called. I wanted to touch base.”
“What’s that mean?” His father was uncomfortable, and looked away.
“I wanted to see you one last time,” Nate said.
“Shit,” Gordo said, and groaned.
They sat in overstuffed chairs on opposite ends of the coffee table. Gordo seemed stiff and edgy. Nate put his cup down on a coaster and sat back.
“So Dalisay and your girls… they’re still with you, right?”
Gordo nodded.
“What, they’re at school? Dalisay is working?”
“Let’s not talk about them.”
Nate shook his head, puzzled. He swiveled his head around. A stack of children’s books was on the floor by the bookcase next to a plastic milk crate of Barbie dolls and accessories. The refrigerator in the kitchen was cluttered with school photos and a Polaroid shot of a grinning seven-year-old girl labeled “Melia’s first checkup: no cavities!” It was dated from August, two months prior. In the photo, Melia boasted a perfectly symmetric row of Chiclets-like teeth.
“Why in the hell did you come here?” Gordo asked, pain in his face.
“I told you.”
His father said, “Do you know how many times men have come to this house asking if I’d heard from you? Special agents from the FBI? Pentagon brass? Even detectives from the Montana and Wyoming DCI?”
Nate hadn’t thought about it, but it made sense.
“I had to tell them I hadn’t heard a damned word from you in twelve years. That the last time we talked, you called me from who-the-fuck-knows-where saying you’d left the service and had decided to drop out of the world and become a fucking anarchist.”
“I don’t think I said that, exactly,” Nate said.
“You might as well have.” Gordo leaned forward in his chair and gripped his knees as if to squeeze the life out of them. “Do you have any idea what it’s like to live in a patriotic military town when your only son is a goddamned traitor to his country?” The last words were shouted out.
Nate said, “I’m no traitor. Who told you that?”
“Nobody in so many words,” Gordo said. “But I didn’t just fall off the turnip truck. I looked it up: you didn’t get a proper discharge back in 2001. You just fucking left. That’s AWOL in my book, son. And when you just vanish and all I know about it is that officers and federal agents come here asking about you, it ain’t too hard to figure out.
“And if there’s another story,” his father said, “it hasn’t come to light. I just figure you’re ashamed of yourself, and you ought to be. Because you brought shame on the uniform and the country. And you brought shame on me.”
Nate let the words hang there for a minute without responding. Then he said, “There’s another story. Or at least a different version.”
“Well, then spill it out,” Gordo croaked.
Nate stood up slowly, taking in his father. The man was exercised, and tiny beads of sweat dotted his upper lip. His eyes were haunted. Then he looked again at the children’s books, the photos on the refrigerator, the small stack of unopened mail on the kitchen counter.
He said, “When was the last time you saw Dalisay and the girls? I’m guessing two or three days, judging by the mail.”
Gordo’s face twitched as if slapped. It wasn’t a reaction Nate had seen much in his life growing up with his father.
“They’ve taken them, haven’t they?” Nate said. “They’ve got them somewhere. And they told you that if I showed up, you should let them know right away or you won’t see them again. Is that about right, Dad?”
His father sat as if frozen, but his tortured eyes gave Nate the answer he sought.
“Did you call them when you saw me outside? Are they on their way now?”
Gordo’s eyes flashed with defiance. “No.”
“To do this to a man like you,” Nate said, shaking his head, feeling his stomach clench. “A man who spent his life serving his country. That should tell you all you need to know about who I’m dealing with.”
Gordo Romanowski’s face twitched again.
“If I told you what happened,” Nate said, “it would be like putting a death sentence on you, like the one that’s on me. So I’m not saying another word.
“What you need to know, Dad, is I haven’t been in contact because I wanted to protect you and your new family. I don’t care if you believe me right now, but I think if you dig deep, you will.”
Nate took his cup to the sink, returned and gripped his father on the shoulder, and said, “Take care of Dalisay and those girls. Tell them not to be too ashamed of their older half brother. I’m out of here.”
As he opened the front door, Gordo asked softly, “Where are you going?”
Nate turned. “That’s what they want to know, isn’t it? Tell them I wouldn’t tell you. Which I won’t.”
Gordo blinked slowly. Nate could only imagine the torture he was in.
“Give me ten minutes to get back to the highway,” Nate said. “Then do what you need to do to get them back.”
