The American Mission by Matthew Palmer Read Free Book Online Page B

could see in the distance. He walked for hours under a desert sun that never moved from its midday high. Looking down at his feet, he saw a skeleton of a man wearing the rags of the rust-colored robe he had died in. The skull was bleached white, but shreds of desiccated flesh still clung to the arms and legs. The hands were stretched out in front with the fingers digging into the sand as though the man had been dragging himself across the desert when he had finally succumbed to the heat. More skeletons appeared, rising from the sand: men, women, smallchildren, and animals. He walked past them, intent on reaching the mountain that seemed to grow no closer.
    He knew without turning around that there were people behind him. For some reason, he did not dare look back, but he knew they were there. They were following him or he was leading them. It wasn’t clear which. Among them, he knew somehow, were friends, family, people he loved. Anah.
    A sandstorm rose up from the desert floor, obscuring his view of the mountain. The storm took shape and form, Janjaweed riders on horseback made up of swirling sands with long lances and banners blotting out the sun. He stood still and opened his arms, awaiting the embrace of death. If he could sacrifice himself, perhaps the
Janjaweed
would spare those behind him. Instead, the apparitions simply flowed over and past him, filling his mouth and nostrils with choking sand and dust, and forcing him to squeeze his eyes closed. He felt the winds whipping over his body as they passed. And he knew that those behind him were dead. He could not look back. There was no point now in marching to the mountain, and there was nowhere else to go.
    An insistent thumping sound filled his ears, starting low and building to an almost unbearable volume. He looked up and saw shadows sweeping through the sky like the blades of an enormous helicopter. The shadows grew larger and larger until they threatened to swallow the world.
    Alex awoke with a start, the sheets soaked with the kind of sweat usually reserved for victims of malaria or dengue fever.
    The air in his bedroom was thick and stale. The underpowered air conditioner had trouble keeping the temperature in the house below eighty. In the other rooms, ceiling fans helped to circulate the air, but Alex kept the one in his room turned off. The turning blades were evocative of helicopter rotors, and he knew from experience that they were potential triggers for panic attacks.
    He unwrapped the sticky sheets from his body and lifted the mosquito netting to get out of bed. He was always very careful to use nets at night. No sense adding malaria on top of the PTSD. The antimalarial drug Malarone that he took to ward off the endemic disease was bad enough. Nightmares and sleep disturbance were some of the side effects of the drug.
    Alex was still rubbing the sleep out of his eyes when he was tackled by a four-foot-eight dynamo who knocked him back on the bed and tangled him up in the mosquito netting.
    â€œGood morning, sugar,” Alex said.
    Anah’s smile immediately banished the gloomy residue of the dream. She was standing at the foot of the bed in a bright pink pajama top with matching cotton shorts. There was a strawberry embroidered on the top with SWEET THING written underneath. Alex’s housekeeper, Mrs. Mabinty, had fixed Anah’s hair in braided spikes with colored beads at the tips. Anah liked the way the beads clinked together when she ran. Her grin was so big that it seemed to reach all the way down to her toes, and Alex, as he did every morning, marveled at just how completely he loved her. She had big, beautiful eyes, and there was something in the set of her jaw that reminded him of her grandfather.
    â€œGood morning, Daddy. Are you ready for our workout?”
    â€œSure thing, baby. But there’s something I’ve gotta do first.”
    â€œWhat?”
    Alex hooked his left foot behind Anah’s leg and pulled her close