Another Five Years

Is This the World We Created...?

*September 2001*

DC was having a strangely warm fall that year. The lawn they were on was still a bright summer green and the sun was harsh enough that a canopy had been set up above the ceremony site. Dave, Jimmy, Nate, and Taylor stood at a distance, not wanting to attract any attention away from Anna, who sat stoically between her parents and Aaron's. Her black shift dress and heels made her look elegant and poised, though Dave knew it was just a fragile mask. He thought she looked a little like Jackie Kennedy with her oversized black-rimmed sunglasses that hid her green eyes and he absentmindedly turned to look up the hill where the eternal flame was, where Jackie herself had been buried just a few years prior. He wondered if Anna would someday be buried here as well, next to her husband.

A tall man in full Marine Corp dress blues marched to a stop just in front of Anna, then gently knelt down to her eye level. She raised her head, her jaw set and her lips in a thin line as she was handed the neatly folded flag that had been atop her husband's casket. Jimmy and Taylor turned away, unable to watch as the crowd around her broke down and she clutched the flag to her chest. The first rifle fire made Anna jump and her head snapped toward Dave, making sure he was still there. He held her stare, silently telling her that he wouldn't leave her, not now. He knew she would break down later, somewhere that she wasn't being watched and he resolved to be there with her when the time came. As the guns continued to fire their blank rounds, he thought back to the week before.

*   

"Dude, wake up," Taylor nudged Dave as he lay sound asleep on the couch in his LA crash pad.

"What," he muttered. It was barely six in the morning and they had just gotten home from the bar, but Taylor flopped onto the couch next to him and turned up the TV.

"Some shit's going down in New York."

They sat together on the couch, stunned by what was unfolding before them. Were they under attack? Was the west coast next? What the fuck was going on? Almost a half hour from the original hits in New York, Dave felt his stomach turn when the screen flashed to a familiar map of Washington DC.

"No...," he whispered, kneeling forward off of the couch to get closer to the screen. "No... no, no..." he held the sides of the tv, vaguely hearing Taylor get up to find a phone. A video of a burning building in the distance, flames, and smoke shooting into the air like some insane action film with a banner underneath proclaiming that The Pentagon had been hit.

Dave had been curled up on the couch for three hours in a state of shock, staring blankly at the TV while everyone around him made frantic phone calls. No one knew what was happening, no one knew what to do. So many people were dead, even more were dying and no one knew why. The entire country was at a standstill and there was no new information coming from the east coast. His mother had called, calmly and firmly telling Dave that she was on her way to an information center and would call him as soon as she knew anything. That was an hour ago and there was still no word. Anna should have made it out by now, she would have let someone know that she was okay... unless she wasn't. 

Taylor shuffled into the small living room, holding the cordless house phone and carefully set it next to him on the couch. "She left you a voicemail."

He slowly sat up and punched in the voicemail codes, not sure what to expect. The recording stated that she had left the message sometime last night, probably when he was out getting drunk with Taylor and Jordyn. 

Anna's voice was cheery, a stark contrast to how the world felt and sounded like at that moment. "Hey kitten, it's me. I just swung by the house and everything looks good. I ran the sprinklers in the back because it's still so fucking hot here. No mail and," -- her dog barked sharply making her gasp -- "Fuck, Scoots! I'm driving! Sorry, anyway, I have to take food to Aaron at work tomorrow, so if you call and I don't answer it's because our friendly war department has confiscated my phone, but I'll see you this weekend! Tell everyone hi for me. Later!"

Dave listed forward off of the couch, his knees hitting the hardwood floor with a sickening crack while he hid his face in his hands. Taylor quietly sat next to him on the living room floor, weaving his arms around his best friend's waist as he sobbed into his shoulder.

*

Dave spent the better part of two days in bed, ignoring any call that didn't come from his mother or sister, letting the food Taylor brought him go cold and stale on the dresser in his bedroom. There was no word from Anna or her family, no word from friends or anyone else he could think of back home. It had been thirty-four hours since her voicemail and time had run out on options. Now he was just waiting for the phone call. 

He thought about what he would wear to her service, she'd probably want him to wear jeans and his Motorhead shirt. Her mother would most likely ask him to play a song, which he'd turn down knowing there was no way he could get through it. Maybe he could record it and sit in the back and cry. That was a somewhat more dignified option. Too bad everything he had ever written about her was either full of angst and hostility or far too personal for her extended family to hear, especially at a funeral. He stared at the journal sitting neglected on his nightstand, feeling too exhausted to write anything of substance he chose to fall asleep again. She was there in his dreams, still alive.

A chair screeching on the kitchen floor beneath his bedroom jarred Dave from his sleep. The clock on his nightstand clicked over to 3:53 am as he rolled away from it to face the closed door. He listened to Taylor's voice, wondering who the hell he would be talking to at this hour and tried to go back to sleep. He could hear him walking up the stairs, another voice just behind his though a woman's this time. He felt anger flare in his chest at the thought of Taylor bringing home a girl when he was grieving in the room next to him and he bolted out of bed when he heard them speaking just outside his door.

He flung open the door, ready to unleash his wrath on Taylor and his poor unassuming one night stand, but found himself face to face with Anna. A stunned moment passed between the three of them on the upstairs landing, all of them wondering if maybe this was a dream. Maybe this whole entire nightmare was a dream and they would wake up and go about their lives as if nothing had happened. The arm she had raised to knock on his door dropped, yanking Dave from his stupor and he threw his arms around her. She smelled like stale perfume, smoke, coffee and cigarettes. Her hair was tangled and her clothes were torn, but she was breathing, holding him as tightly as he was her and crying just as hard.