Cells

Cells

         I’ve been obsessed with death today. It’s day sixty-seven of our incarceration. Well, my incarceration. Daniel has been here sixty-four days. I was asleep the night they brought him in. In the morning I found him in the lower bunk with a broken jaw and dried blood staining his ear. He’s lost all hearing in that ear. The guards usually make a point of beating that side of his head. They tend to attack my knees. He is asleep in the corner. His knees pulled up to his chest. Hector is pacing in the next cell. Though I haven’t mentioned it, I think they are both aware that the men in the other cells have been systematically disappearing over the last few days. It appears we are next.

         We aren’t soldiers. We were businessmen. Turmoil may bring tragedy, but it also brings opportunity. Business opportunity. We are capitalists. That’s all. When they question us, we genuinely don’t know what they are talking about. And not just because the translator can barely speak English. Hector was a banker before he was abducted on the road leading to the airport. He had the air of someone important, but it doesn’t seem to have helped him at all in here. He has eight grown children. But that doesn’t appear to have helped either. He paces. He mumbles to himself. He argues with no one there. He wags his flaccid penis at me. I might consider taking him up on the offer, but for the fact that he is obviously not committed to the moment, and it would require my effort just to get him excited, leaves me rather uninterested. If you want me, show me. I still have my dignity. Beside he smells of feces and urine. I think he’s lost it.

         Daniel was a contract truck driver. Not a large man. A quiet man, made more so by the experience. We communicate mostly through the looks of fear, or hunger, or sadness he gives me. He will just stare at me. I nod to acknowledge his pain, or fear or hunger or sadness, and he is appeased for a while just knowing that I understand. Then he sits in the corner and rocks until he falls asleep again.

         My interest in this whole affair extends only as far as my personal involvement. My incarceration. I have no religious feelings either way. I have no political interests. I find the entire conflict incredibly juvenile and absurd. But my views are irrelevant. We have been reduced to marketing fodder. Internet beheadings designed to incite anger, and project power. I’ve been writing letters home to my wife, my sons, and my parents. They are all here to be found once this nightmare is over. The interpreter sneaks paper and bits of pencil to me and I only have to jack him off once in a while. But I fear we will not survive another cold night in these cells to write another letter.

         The guards return with black hoods over their faces. They bind our hands and ankles and lead the three of us into an open room. I catch a glimpse of one of the guards burning my letters. There is a video camera aimed at some sort of flag I don’t recognize. Daniel is forced to kneel before the camera and the guards pose behind him. One reads a statement addressing the camera. I don’t understand. He grabs the back of Daniels head and pulls it back sharply. In one swift move, he cuts Daniel’s throat deeply. In another he completely removes his head and holds it up for the camera. Hector collapses. The captor tosses the head which rolls over to my feet. It is as though Daniel is looking up at me for some sort of recognition, but I have none. His body is dragged to the side and the camera set for another take. An explosion rips through the building blowing away the walls and ceiling. Shrapnel rips through the guards, Hector and myself. I fall to the floor and as the warm blood pools around my body I see the American forces storm through the missing walls. I laugh so hard I die.

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