Ok then, here we go. The third installment. I hope you're enjoying it! If you are, please do share it with friends.
The ceiling fan above his bed whirled with a consistent electrical drone, making more noise than any sort of breeze. The heat unbearable, six O’clock in the evening and the temperature still hung at around 95 degrees. Lying on his bed in his hotel room, sweating, he still had a couple of hours before he had to set out for his days work. He couldn’t believe what he was about to do. How had he gotten himself into this? I could die! They could take me hostage and demand ransom, then slit my throat when Mom and Dad couldn’t come up with the money. Jesus. Don’t think about it. Enjoy the down time.
And of course it was always in the down time that his thoughts returned home, to her.
It always baffled him, how entirely he missed her whenever he was away from her or her from him. Withdrawal - was the word that he heard resonate in his head. My body, heart and soul need her. She is my addiction. He had been in many relationships before her but none of them carried this degree of intensity.
He felt a complete rightness and security but also an underlying fear like the rush of being on some great precipice; sure footed yet millimeters from falling to your death. Of course it might be the fear of death that brought this thought to his mind. He thought about her laugh, her smile, and body. Oh he wanted her body, badly, even now. If he made it through this and got home it would be like it was every year.
The two of them would travel to some randomly selected place in celebration of her having completed yet another year. Soon enough they would be able to spend days on end most likely never leaving their bed accept perhaps to eat or recover on the beach. Soon enough. Be patient. Still he wanted very much to ring her and with a little luck she might just be up. Or she might be sleeping soundly trying to soak up as much sleep as possible. Fuck. He got up from the bed instead, wearing only his jeans and made his way to the bathroom. His body glistened from a mix of the humidity and sweat.
In the mirror his body looked thinner which he didn't mind at all. It always took him a full week to become accustomed to the local cuisine. The water from the tap ran refreshingly cold and he splashed his face and chest with it. Why these places don't have air conditioning is bloody ridiculous. Next time I'll have John book a room with AC.
Call her. Tell her you miss her.
He grabbed a beer from his stash in the mini-fridge. While taking a sip he thought it was pointless to drink because you sweat it out moments later, however it was cold and tasty. He took a second swig and lit a cigarette and began the routine of checking his gear. He enjoyed this routine of trying to envision what he might need, what he knew he wouldn't need and what might surprise him that he had had the where with all to pack. He gathered a few prime lenses, cleaning each one and its filter and laying them out on his bed to take visual stock. When he reached for his longest lenses anger rose in his throat.
A five thousand dollar lens; it was now not worth a single red cent. It had gotten smashed three days before and, though he should have been thankful it was only the lens that got damaged, it still felt like a grave sin that it should no longer capture life’s moments. He replaced it into its case, unable to throw it out and sipped the last of his beer.
The blackberry on the nightstand loudly buzzed to life with a phone call. Please be you. He grabbed up the phone, checking the caller ID, it's not you. Disappointed he answered it so, 'hello'.
The voice on the other end was loud and jovial 'my friend! It's me Sayid. I’m just making sure you are up! I shall be by to pick you up in an hour'. Sayid spoke with a thick Middle Eastern accent.
'Great, I'll be here. How much time will I have once we get there?' he asked Sayid. 'My friend, not very long at all, so be sure to be prepared. I'll see you shortly Habbibi'. The phone cut out.
The dread set in. He had known him for years and hired Sayid, as a sort of guide or inside guy to get him around town and also to get him into places a westerner could not go. Never did he imagine that he would have happened into such a situation. If his parents, friends or his girl knew what he was up to, there would be major repercussions. Not the repercussions he could ultimately face with what he was about to do but the loving kind.
Especially with his girl, she would almost undoubtedly slap him in the face and threaten leaving him, however it's sometimes easier to beg forgiveness then it is to ask permission. Besides with one shot he could stand to make some decent money not to mention getting closer to finally having one of his shots printed in National Geographic. One day.
I'm going to call her, I'll just shower first then I'll ring her, just to tell her I love her.
The cold shower felt amazing. Dressed and ready to be picked up, his gear packed and his passport and wallet locked away in his room’s safe. He had been told by a friend to, ‘always carry a jump drive with digital copies of all of your documents. It's easier to replace a jump drive then your passport. And people here will steal your documents because there's good money in it on the black market.’
Sayid was late, as always, so he cracked another beer wanting to numb his nerves. He grabbed his phone and rang his girl.
'Hey' she answered sounding groggy.
'I didn't wake you did I?' He knew he had. She was a dead give away.
'No. I was getting up anyway. How are you?'
Trying to sound totally relaxed he said 'good, I'm good. I was just really missing you and wanted to say hello'.
She made an endearing sigh. 'I miss you too!'
Knowing that she wasn't yet fully awake he decided to let her go, hoping she might get back to sleep.
'I just wanted to tell you that I love you kiddo.' He felt great saying it.
'I’ll see you soon right?' she asked.
'Yeah three days'. He said it quickly.
'I love you kid, can't wait to see you'. She said.
'Ok get some sleep you... bye'. He hung up the phone before she had finished saying goodbye. He was really rethinking this whole situation. The number of things that could go wrong was absurd. It all seemed too easy how he got here.
Sayid had a friend whose brother had martyred himself, only he had made such a mess killing hundreds of Jews and Christians that the leader of his extremist group felt great honor to have his younger brother in the ranks. The brilliance of the entire situation was the simple fact that no known photograph existed of this man, their leader. However many people in the news world had begun reporting that he was in fact fictitious. Even other extremist factions were working hard at discrediting his existence.
Pride is a dangerous affliction.
With all of these things happening in and around the same time the perfect climate was created for an eager photographer to ask the right question at the right time. Now he faced the realization that he would be in the presence of this man, this terrorist, risking god knows what for a single shot.
He figured Sayid’s friend would want something in return; money most likely and he figured he could pay him off for a few hundred dollars if not a grand.
His knee was bouncing nervously and his gut was screaming with alarm, which on any other day he would have followed, but the whole thing seemed too nicely gift wrapped to bail out of. This could be something huge and the greed did its job to quell his gut.
His phone rang almost vibrating off the desk. Sayid was downstairs. He grabbed his gear, pausing at the door to take a deep breath.
Sayid was waiting in the car parked on the roundabout outside of the hotel, The Ambassador. It was surrounded by lighted palm trees; thick ornate iron rod fencing and looked like it had been built for a prince a hundred years ago.
Sayid sat, smoking a cigarette, in a white 89 Benz convertible with the top up, the wailing of his music competing with the purr of his engine. Sayid watched him as he came out of the lobby walking hurriedly carrying a large back pack full of gear over his shoulder, sticks in hand. He raised the tripoded hand in a wave of sorts. Sayid took a drag, letting the smoke spill from his nose and ashed in the overflowing tray in the dash.
'Sayid! How are you?' He said getting into the car. Sayid had a different look about him, his usual smile absent, and his brow lowered almost menacing. The thought crossed his mind that almost all Middle Eastern people can go from looking like the sweetest people, salt-of-the-earth shirt off their backs, to plain right scary. He had learned this at a young age, his father Lebanese, was not one to piss off; though the kindest, loving soul he'd known.
Sayid flicked his smoke out the window. 'My friend if you think you are going to bring with you all this equipment you are dead wrong' Sayid spoke evenly and the choice of words did not go unnoticed.
'What the hell can I bring then?' he half snapped, solely due to nerves.
'Just your camera' said Sayid.
'Unbelievable!’ He sighed, though he quickly warmed up to the idea. Less gear felt safer and any ounce of that was needed. 'Okay' He said 'I guess I'll manage'
'You'll have to'
Sayid threw the car in gear and sped off into the cool night air, leaving the comfort of the gated hotel.
As they drove He noticed the city’s nightlife just waking up. The club scene happened late and thumped its bass till the black sky broke with the blue of dawn. He discretely watched Sayid driving with surgical precision through tight streets filled with mopeds and pedestrians. He thought about how much more relaxed driving was in down town Toronto. Or Montreal for that matter. He lit a smoke and tried again to relax, his hand trembling, betraying him.
'This is how it will work' Sayid said breaking the silence. 'I will drop you off at a specific location and leave you there where you will wait. You will be picked up by some of his men, they will bag you'.
He almost coughed on his exhale. 'Bag me?’ He asked.
Sayid stared at him dumbfounded. 'Yes! They certainly aren't going to take any chances letting you know where they are located'.
He felt foolish for asking and terrified that it might be a long ride to wherever they might take him, with a half suffocating dirty cloth bag over his head. But of course they have to 'bag' me, he thought. Remembering movies that he had seen in which the bad guys always used black burlap bags, which they would duct, tape tightly at the neck. Jesus Christ, I can't do this.
Sayid jerked the car down a narrow alley driving fast, the walls of the adjacent buildings close, so close he could touch them if he stuck his arm out of the window. 'Also, do not speak to them unless you are asked a direct question. You don't speak Arabic so answer them in French. This they will be able to understand. Take the pictures, no more than a dozen. He will tell you what he wants. Once you are done they will bag you once more and deliver you back to where I am to drop you off and I will return' Sayid said over annunciating all his words. 'When you sell the picture you will give me ten thousand dollars, this money is for my friend who got you this meeting'.
'Ten grand!' I don't think I'll get half of that for these shots' he lied, knowing that they would net him much more though he knew not how much exactly.
Sayid sighed, now frustrated, then continued with raised volume. 'Ten thousand whether you get that or not or they'll be consequences.’
The whole thing was now right out of control. He could feel his hand trembling but didn't dare to look at it. Seeing his own fear realized physically would be too much.
'Sayid, I'm starting to rethink this'.
Sayid lit another cigarette letting his words hand in the air.
'Habbibi, I'm afraid there is no turning back now' he said a hint of his gentler self returning, almost apologetically. 'You'll be quite fine, and you will tell me all about it when I pick you up.' Sayid smiled at him broadly now.
His cell phone rang. The ring tone was an Arabic song. Sayid answered it, agreed a few times and hung up.
‘We are almost there.’
Sayid veered the car onto a different street, the city and its parties now in the distance. The houses and store fronts all low and stacked on top of each other. Random whinny music from old radios doppled by from open windows. Still the streets crowded with people, so many people seemingly all the time. What were they all doing? What were their lives like? The urge to capture them flooded him and he realized he needed to get just his camera out and the best zoom he had. Swapping out the 50mm prime for a 24-200mm; onerously ignoring his quaking hands.
Sayid slowed the car and turned down an alleyway stopping just at its threshold.
'Here we are. Good luck Habbibi'. Sayid shook his hand firmly.
He tried to smile in return but failed and, taking a deep breath as if he were about to swim to some outrageous depth, flung the door open and got out.
He watched the old Benz speed off, leaving him alone in a dark alley.
You are fucking crazy.
He stood for what seemed like an eternity, his senses heightened, three minutes in reality. Scanning the surrounding buildings he noticed a faded MacDonald’s billboard painted on the side of one of them. How strange with it's Arabic writing.
He lit a cigarette.
Smoking nervously, he jumped at the slightest sound, constantly looking up and down the alleyway fully expecting to be mugged before the real bad guys even got there. Shouting he heard in the distance set the hairs on the back of his neck on end. He had finished his cigarette, thought about smoking another but didn't, and instead he thumbed the focusing ring of his cameras lens.
Shit I forgot my flash!! If the lights low I'll just have to use-- god damn it! He was without his tripod as well. It would be impossible to hold the frame steadily enough. The shots would be garbage, blurred; ruined, this whole mess entirely moot.
Suddenly the sound of a speeding car ricocheted off the walls. He turned and saw a black Range Rover, the windows so tinted that at first it appeared to not have windows at all, bouncing through the alleyway. The fear dried his throat. It pulled up twenty feet away and he instinctually put his hands, which had ceased their shaking, in the air. Three men jumped out, all wearing something to cover their faces. One of them was shouting and pointing, wanting he thought, to have him turn around. He did just that, hands still raised above his head. He looked down the alleyway and saw a stray dog pissing on the wall - the world went black.
He had expected to be thrown into the trunk but thankfully Range Rovers don't have conventional trunks. Instead he was seated between two of the men, comfortable enough. He could feel the vehicle speeding down the streets, the driver honking the horn every few seconds. He had been thoroughly padded down after having his head put into a bag. They found his cigarettes, one of the men looked through the pack suspiciously, then took one for himself when he was satisfied that they were in fact just smokes. They found the jump drive and his Blackberry, which were simply tossed on the ground. The man who tossed them moaned something in Arabic about being able to find them here when he got dropped off to the other men.
The vehicle turned sharply left.
Then right.
So many turns that had he been trying to keep track of the route he would have failed magnanimously. He was clutching his camera to protect it and so that it might protect him. He wondered if the men were armed. He hadn't seen any weapons but was sure they had something that fired bullets and took lives. His face was sweating and the exhale of his own breath was making him feel light headed.
Closter phobia.
Don't let the thought exist, make it different.
He wanted to be at home, in his living room doing nothing with his girl. He vowed to call her the second he got back to the hotel.
He remembered that his phone was in his pocket and he prayed it wouldn't go off. Should have left it.
The vehicle swerved hard and didn't come out of it.
We're crashing.
I'm going to be in an accident with three extremists and a bag over my head. They'll find me and inform my loved ones that I had probably been kidnapped by terrorist; they'll never know this was a decision that I made. But the crash didn't happen, the Rover didn't roll but they were still banking hard - were driving in circles!!
Is this to fully confuse me?
Finally they came out of the hard loops and he and his two new friends all went flying to the other side of the truck. He gripped his camera tight, breathing laboriously, face hot and eyes shut fearfully. Seconds later the vehicle came to a stop, the doors opened and he was pulled out.
He was lead for a while, having to trust whoever was leading him. When they stopped he was pushed back but landed in a chair. The bag came off, the fresh air like a cold shower. He could barely see anything at first but slowly his sight found him.
He was baffled.
The room he was in was beautiful, the walls cover in fantastical paintings. The ceilings of the room vaulted and painted as well. It was not what he had imagined.
Never assume he heard echo in his mind.
On the floor ahead of him about ten feet away, giant, colorful pillows created a sitting area. He was impressed and thankful that the room was well lit. A man entered, face covered like his escorts. He barked something in Arabic.
'Je ne comprant pas.' he answered like Sayid had told him.
The covered face man then switched to French, telling him that his leader would enter with one other man and the two would stand against the far wall and that only three pictures should be taken. The man asked him if he understood and he responded by nodding his head yes. The man with the covered face left the room.
Quickly he pulled the lens cap off and checked his meter and framing. As he found it a bearded man with very intense presence, dressed in a long shirt and a plain vest, entered the room with a young man almost the same age as He. The leader carried a framed picture of a man that looked younger than the other. The face looked terribly familiar. He had seen it on the news countless times.
Oh my God.
It was he that killed the hundreds of Christians and Jews.
Hatred breeds hatred.
The bearded leader spoke with a booming voice. He wasn't speaking to everyone though it sounded as he might be, but he spoke in French and spoke directly to Him. The leader declared that he should feel blessed that he had been allowed to be the photographer to take such an important photograph; important to their cause, the family of the Martyr and to the pages of history. He listened carefully, the leaders French was Parisian and quite different from the Quebecois slang he was brought up with. He made every effort to listen without expression. Thoughts of hatred and the possibility that they might also want financial restitution from these photographs filled his head.
Would they threaten my life?
Or the lives of my family?
Could they track me down in Toronto and take my girl from our home?
Rip her from her bed while she rests? Take her away, torture her, beat her to within inches of her last breath?
All for money. How much might they want? Fifty grand? A hundred? A million? He thought he might vomit in that moment. He realized he hadn't been listening at all. Hadn't been blinking or breathing. He felt moisture drip and slide down his body, his shirt no doubt stained dark with nervous sweat. He would regret this decision forever. The leader still spoke but He could not hear words, his ears burned with white guilt keeping the audible at bay.
Snap out of it man.
Everything stopped. The leader looked to him, waiting. What had been asked? What do I say? He nodded, the only thing he could think to do.
'New York Times' the leader said to him then turned his focus, switched to Arabic and started barking at his men.
The leader with the framed portrait in hand and the young man took up position standing before the painted wall. There the leader placed a hand on the young mans shoulder as the two shared in the holding of the portrait. Instinct took over. He worked methodically framing, metering, double checking his focus and firing. Re-framing, metering, focusing and firing. He lost track of how many shots he had taken but wanted one more from a lower angle. The leader though was done with it and was moving away when He said, 's'il te plait! Encore une fois'. Without wasting time for an answer he got low, really low on his side so that he almost laid down, to frame the shot.
The leader perhaps envisioning the result stepped back slowly and repositioned himself.
Frame, meter, focus, fire. Got it.
He checked the playback quickly and liked what he saw. Standing back up the leader and his men were milling about and the framed portrait was taken away by one of his men and another of his men approached Him, burlap bag in hand. He stared at the leader who nodded at him and He found himself nodding back. Then the world went black again and he was lead out of the room just as crazed shouting filled it. He was pushed from the room and fell to the floor in the hall the bag slipping off enough that he could see somewhat. He was alone. Gunfire rang out, rapid machine gun fire that sounded like a choir or steel snare drums being played, over a symphony of screams and frantic yelling. He jumped to his feet and ran down the hall a ways before seeing two men with vicious machine guns in their hands that seemed to not notice him at all. He pressed himself against the wall when they approached and stayed glued to it well after they had past.
What is going on?
Run!
He didn't hear it but he felt the pressure of it on his ear drums as if he were in a plane climbing far too fast. It threw him several feet slamming him hard on the Marble floor. When he opened his eyes, grey, was all he could see. He chocked a cough and spat an amuse bouche of concrete dust, high explosive and blood. It was exaggeratedly quite, he wondered if he might be dead. Panicked, he searched himself for wounds. He seemed fine but could not explain the amount of blood all over him.
Your camera! He looked it over, found it intact, wiped the lens clean and turned it on.
Get out of this building. He got up feeling somehow fine.
Move. He stumblingly jogged down the hall trying different doors eventually finding one that opened into an alleyway. He followed it to the street, the scene before him stopping him dead in his tracks.
The street itself chard, people moving rudderless, some bloody and injured others crying and screaming. A bellow of angry black smoke rushed skyward from what might have been a car. Its front half plowed into what was once a building, now a horizontal crater. Bodies were strewn about in the blackened carcass of what remained of the edifice. This was the room he had just been in. His eyes searched the bodies.
There he was. The bearded leader, a pool of blood collected from his shredded shoulder, his arm nowhere in sight. His face blackened, the beard half burnt off -dead.
He found frame and fired, the shutter going off in rapid succession. He moved himself closer to the dead men and fired countless frames, wiping his lens as often as he could remember to do so. He moved quickly back out of the chard structure and shot as wide as he could fitting as much as he could into his lens. He turned and captured the scene surrounding the epicenter of the blast. Injured faces fearful and screaming. A thin man, shirt torn half off by the force of the blast stood blatting cries of sorrow for the little girl he carried in his arms; her little inners dangling out of her stomach and over his wrist. The lens protected Him and made it all make-believe. He fired more frames, random shots, in the last one people were pointing up to the roof top of a nearby building he swung himself in that direction never dropping the viewfinder from his eye and began firing anew.
There on the rooftop above a fade ad for MacDonald’s a man pulled a rocket launcher onto his shoulder and took aim.
A rocket launcher.
His body was already on the move before his brain could relay the message. He heard the sound of its death flight, screaming towards its target. He ran faster then he knew he could and dove a round a corner for protection. This time he heard the explosion and saw the street fill with dust. The ground began to rumble, he peered around the wall to see what it was.
A tank? An earth quake?
The rest of the building, the one he had just been in, was crumbling in on itself. He wiped his lens and fired frame after frame until the dust rushed towards him and choked the air out of his lungs. He pushed himself up and moved away from the scene fighting the crowds rushing towards it. When he was well enough away he stopped, struggled to breathe, and finally he vomited until his stomach wretched.
He wiped his mouth with his sleeve, still doubled over when He heard a car horn honking in long intervals.
He looked up. It was Sayid.
طفل
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