“The testament to my martyrdom is already in the news,” Abdullereda told him. “They know I was the captain. It’s in all the papers, but you know I am not dead as they think. I did not crash the airplane. I slew the dog Christian that was my first officer and took the airplane,” he did not mind stretching the truth for his son a little bit. Abdullereda had a lot to make up for in his son’s eyes.
“What then father, what then?” the boy pleaded.
“Allah be praised it is paradise itself to hear you call me father!” Abdullereda said with tears in his eyes. “I have commandeered the aircraft for the jihad; but my mission is not complete until I take down Zion itself!”
“My father the lion of Islam will strike at the heart of Zion itself!” Abdulla rejoiced.
“My son, I will,” Abdullereda said with heartfelt emotion. “All I ask is that you forgive me. Let me hear it with my mortal ears before I enter into martyrdom.”
“Father with all my heart I forgive you! I celebrate you! Your name will be on my lips with pride!”
Tearfully father and son parted. Abdullereda threw himself into his work. He had sinned enough. His son ensured that his heart yearned for martyrdom. To redeem himself in his son’s eyes was a greater gift to Abdullereda than any harem or hoard of gold.
CHAPTER 12: Idyll
Jeremiah Slade was tired. The long flight from Kuwait City to Paris and then Paris to Washington D.C. took more out of him than the mission. He wondered how the airline pilots did it day after day, month after month, year after year.
He pulled into driveway of the turn-of-the-century Victorian outside of Langley, Virginia in his decade-plus silver Jaguar XK. It was used of course, very used, just like the house, but it was Slade’s. It was a reminder to him of good advice about open windows.
In front of him was the lifestyle the CIA recruiter reminded him about so long ago. Slade didn’t regret the lifestyle; he embraced it. He was a man who always wanted responsibility and this fit to overflowing.
Throwing his bag over his shoulder, Slade climbed the steps to Victorian farmhouse with a picturesque round tower complete with witch’s hat. The broad wrap-around porch shielded the front rooms from the harsh eastern winters.
The residual tension of his mission washed away under the eaves of the house — which was not the source of agent Wilson’s concern either — like the Jag, Slade bought the house cheap and brought back to life through years of labor. It served its purpose.
Before Slade could reach the front door it opened of its own accord. Helen, his cousin, appeared in a comfortable print dress and apron, as if from the set of “Leave it to Beaver” or “The Andy Griffith Show.” She smiled and greeted Slade at the door with a hug, sliding her shoulder under his arm and snuggling closely. She gave him a long, appreciative squeeze and led him into the house.
“Hello Jeremiah, how was the trip?” she asked, her bright blue eyes smiling beneath tousled blonde hair. She was the only person in the world, his parents included, who called him Jeremiah. She’d been through so much he let her have that.
“Boring but productive,” he answered. As far as Helen was concerned, Slade worked for the government at the State Department; a logical follow on from his military time. She had no idea his business was as dangerous as it was violent; but then, Helen didn’t care. She owed Slade; at least in her mind she did. One night, thirteen years ago she returned home from a weekend visit to the nursing home where her mother lived to find that her husband had left her.
He was gone with all the furniture — even the baby’s crib. Their six kids, ages four to six months, were sitting on the bare living room floor huddled in a blanket, watching a small twelve inch black and white TV — dad had taken the big color TV with him. Helen couldn’t be shocked, she couldn’t panic, not in front of her children, three from their marriage and three adopted from her sister, who succumbed to breast cancer, but all of them were her kids. They didn’t realize what had just happened. Helen insulated them from the travesty and dealt with it privately. She was Mom.
At least the bastard left the food in the refrigerator and pantry. It was a good thing. She soon found that he cleared out the bank account and hadn’t paid the bills in months.
An eviction notice was posted on her door the next morning. The power was shut off. The water was shut off, and Helen had to sneak buckets of water from the neighbor’s hose. She wasn’t working, she’d barely recovered from a hysterectomy a few months before.
Helen was destitute with six children.
Helen had literally no one to turn to. Her father was dead; her mother was in a nursing home, her sister’s husband had remarried and they hadn’t spoken in two years. All she could think of was to call her cousin Jeremiah. They’d been close. Secretly, she’d always regretted they were cousins, especially when he went into the military like her father did. Helen didn’t want a great career or to party; she wanted what her mother had: to raise a family, live in a comfortable house and be a wife to a steady, caring man.
That dream ended that snowy day when her husband left her in Duluth, Minnesota. As proud as Helen was, she was desperate. She called Slade at midnight, having stared at the phone for days trying to get the courage to call.
He took emergency leave and showed up the next day. In an hour they were eating a family dinner at Perkins and then it was off to a comfortable hotel with a pool. The next day they flew to California, where Slade had just been assigned to Test Pilot School.
A few days later they picked out a cinder block house on base and moved in. Helen and her kids had a home again.
Slade took it all in stride, but Helen, whose empathy for people was a true gift, knew that the timing of her crisis was especially bad for Slade. Test Pilot School was a grueling year long program that demanded complete commitment, but Slade never said a thing about it.
Helen grew up in a military family. She knew the routine. She knew how military schools and assignments worked. She instinctively took on the role of running Slade’s household so that he could concentrate on his job. She made sure he was fed, his uniforms were always ready, and his house was clean, his coffee was fresh at four in the morning and that he had a gin and tonic when he returned at six in the evening; six, so that he could unwind with a drink but still have his regulation “Twelve hours; bottle to throttle.”
Helen took care of everything.
Slade was actually embarrassed by the effort Helen and the kids put forth to show their appreciation, but Helen sat him down and explained things to him.
“Jeremiah, when no one could or would help us you were there. You rescued us. You are supporting us; me, the kids, all of us. They have a roof over their heads and enough to eat; and they don’t have to worry about being abandoned anymore. We need to support you, and we will.”
It had been that way ever since.
Slade gave Helen and her kids a home. In return, Helen and the kids gave Jeremiah a family.
She was concerned, however, and she brushed his forelock of dark hair, just starting to get streaks of grey, saying, “You look tired. I know it’s hard on you over there. Why don’t you hop in the shower? I’ll have a drink waiting for you on the back porch.”
“That sounds like a good idea,” Slade sighed, heading to his bedroom. Slade slept on one side of the house in the guest bedroom off his office. It was purely practical. He didn’t need much. Helen had the master bedroom upstairs and the kids had the other upstairs bedrooms.
As he walked down the hall, the old oak floors creaking with every step, a chorus of, “Hello Uncle Slade!” greeted him — the kids, now ages thirteen to seventeen, wouldn’t think of calling call him Jeremiah. That was for their mom.