The two men managed to get from the parking garage and onto the streets easily enough. AJ waited until they were a few blocks away before he hailed a cab. It would take them part of the way there. He gave Brian quite a bit of credit for as calm as he stayed. They didn’t speak the entire time, but Brian stayed by his side and allowed him to lead.
Once the cab dropped them off, AJ took Brian’s hand and led him toward the Wal-Mart that was there. This was one of the last places that he wanted to go into – there were too many security cameras – but he needed too many things to hit up little marts. In front of the store, he used his good arm to hook Brian around the waist. “Stick close to me like glue. We need certain things and I need to make sure we stay out of sight of the cameras. I know I’m asking you to do this a lot today, but trust me on this, please. The less the cameras see, the better.”
“Ok, Alex.”
“Keep your head down. Chat a little if you want. Try to make it look like we’re any other couple walking through the store. We want as little attention as possible. You got any cash on hand?”
They moved in through the doors of the store, Brian’s arm moving around AJ’s waist so they were linked together. “A few hundred, maybe. I’ve got my cards in my wallet.”
AJ steered them toward the clothes first, grabbing a basket as he went, making him wince a little at the pull to his arm. He didn’t want to bother with a cart; it would just take up too much space. “No cards.” AJ said, making himself smile when he looked over at Brian. Image. It was all about image. “I don’t want our location to be traced. I’ve got about five hundred on my person, so that’ll get us a little ways. Later, I’ve got a plan to get a little more from one of my other accounts. Hopefully they won’t be able to trace that one.”
As they chatted he snagged a few sweaters off a rack. He didn’t bother asking Brian’s size; he already knew that. Next he grabbed four plain t-shirts. His arm throbbed dully, reminding him that he needed to hit the medication aisle. At the coat display he snagged two plain, warm winter coats and stocking caps and gloves.
He used the crowd around them to discreetly slip around a display and past a camera. He moved to the food. There, he grabbed only a few things, enough to get them something to eat for the night. The weight of those made his arm hurt. He would’ve switched arms, wrapping his bad one around Brian, but he didn’t think his bicep would take being pressed against Brian very well. Letting go wasn’t an option. He needed to keep Brian close so he could keep him away from cameras.
It took some tricky maneuvering but he managed to get them down by the electronics without going past a single camera. There he took out two prepaid phones. Lastly, he moved them toward the medication aisle.
Brian said nothing as AJ tossed in the strongest pain reliever he could find, some gauze, a couple ace wraps, some tweezers and then a small sewing kit on an end display. From there he went down the next aisle and grabbed some hair dye and hair clippers. By now the basket weight enough that it was making his arm throb. He felt a familiar sensation and would have cursed if he could’ve. He was bleeding again, dammit.
Now came the hard part. He needed to get them through the register without being seen. A quick scan showed him that the best place was one of the self-checkouts. He took Brian over there, watching around him. Dammit! There was no way to get past the one camera without being seen. AJ’s mind raced.
Just as they got to the camera, AJ dropped down to tie his shoe right before they’d be in the line of sight. It made his arm scream to move like that but he stayed there, waiting until a crowd started to move past. AJ stood back up and used them as cover to go past.
Somehow he got them through the register and checked out. He felt himself starting to sweat a little again at all the movement and his head spun slightly. He had maybe twenty minutes, max, before he’d start to pass out from movement and blood loss. They needed to move.
Outside, AJ quickened his pace, taking them from a stroll to a brisk walk. He was grateful for the snow that had started to fall and the slightly darkened evening sky. It would provide them with adequate cover and no one would question them moving quickly. Brian was still quiet as they went down a few blocks. AJ took them in a roundabout way, watching to make sure they weren’t being followed and that the place he was heading to wasn’t under surveillance. Only when he was sure that it was clear did he head into the apartment complex.
The place was a dive, there was no doubt about that. But it was the perfect cover. Now that he was in familiar territory, AJ moved with more purpose. He needed to get inside and get there fast. He headed straight to the apartment he needed. Up a staircase, then across the front balcony the apartment row shared.
At apartment 35 he stopped, raising his good hand to knock. He hated that he was leaning on Brian more, his body exhausted. Brian just tightened his grip and held him up.
When the door opened, a tall, black man stood there, eyes wide. He started with surprise only for a second before he stepped back and gestured them in. AJ hurried through the door, keeping Brian close to him.
The man snapped the door shut, doing up three deadbolts, the door lock and a chain. “Were you followed?” he demanded when he turned around. His expression was serious and his muscled body was set in rigid lines. He stood at six feet seven inches, towering over Brian and AJ both, and looked like he could squash them without a second thought. AJ felt Brian shy back a little, but AJ stood his ground. “No. No one.”
“Well, that’s something. Who is this?” With one hand he gestured to Brian, annoyance in his eyes. “You’ve never brought anyone here before. What the hell is going on?”
Brian lifted his chin, staring at the man before them with a look of annoyance and pride. At the moment, AJ didn’t have time to soothe ruffled feathers. “Brian, this is Marc. Marc, my boyfriend, Brian.”
The look Marc gave Brian was appraising. Brian returned the look. After a moment, Marc’s wide face split into a grin. “He looks like he’s tough enough.”
“Gee, thanks for your approval.” AJ said sarcastically before he started to sway. Even as Brian tried to steady him, Marc stepped forward to try and hold up his other side. “Shit, man, what the hell’s going on?”
AJ forced his mind to clear a little. He needed to sit. “Got shot in the arm. Nothing vital hit it just tore the flesh. We’ve been moving since then. Fuckers probably bleeding again.” He finally said.
In no time at all Marc had them in his kitchen, seated at the table as he moved around to gather things, cursing steadily all the while. Brian set their bags on the table and took the seat next to AJ’s. Together they got his coat off, revealing the bandage underneath. Sure enough it was bleeding again. AJ sighed and glared at it. They hadn’t hit a major vein, but he hadn’t been taking proper care of it either. There’d been no time and he had been too worried about caring for Brian.
When Marc came back in, he watched as Brian unwrapped AJ’s arm to reveal the wound beneath. “Shit, man. At least it’s just a flesh wound.” Marc swore when he saw the wound. It was thin, but it was long. “You know what we gotta do.”
“I know.” Again, AJ sighed.
As Marc left the room, Brian looked to his lover. “What is he talking about?”
“There’s no telling how well this would heal if I had to get stitches in it. Honestly, they’d probably get in my way, making it hard for my arm to function. They heal slower, too, but that’s just my opinion, and there’s the potential that they’d tear depending on what we do over the next few days. So he’s going to field treat it.”
His words didn’t make any sense to Brian; he could see that. But if possible he wanted to put off the explanation as long as he could. Brian was going to protest to it, loudly. He knew that. But he also knew that this was what was needed to do. The healing would be faster and he’d be able to use his arm better without worrying about tearing out stitches.
Marc came back into the kitchen, moving over to the stove. He used a match and lit one of the burners, getting the flame going. Then he laid a long, flat piece of metal over it. Once that was going he moved over to squat by AJ’s arm and check out the wound. Brian was holding pressure on it. When he saw what Marc was doing, he moved his hand, letting him see.
“You know, if you’d taken more time to apply pressure at the start, we wouldn’t have to do this. You could’ve just stitched it. It’s only about an inch and a half wide, maybe six inches long. We could probably still stitch it.” His friend told him practically. “Might sting, might throb for a while, but it’s slowed its bleeding enough that we could do it.”
“Stitches pull and tear. I’d risk opening it with the shit I’ve got to do. You know that, Marc.”
“Yeah.” The man stood up, flashing a smile that seemed all the whiter in his dark face. “Eşti nebun, prietenul meu. Absolutely crazy.”
To distract himself as he watched Marc move away, AJ looked at Brian and explained. “Marc grew up in Hungary. He speaks Romanian fluently and often likes to insult me with it.” He grinned. “His insults never faze me.”
“That is because your head is as hard as a rock.” Marc fired back. He had just tied a knot in a long strip of blanket that he’d brought with him. This he handed to Brian. “Put the knot in his mouth and wrap your hands around either end so you can hold it tightly in there. We don’t want him spitting it out.”
“Why?” Brian asked.
Marc raised an eyebrow. “So he doesn’t scream and send the neighbors in a panic and so he doesn’t bite off his own tongue.” He said it as if it should be obvious. To Brian, it wasn’t. Well, there was no more wasting time. AJ shifted so that his arms sat on the table. He looked over at Brian and gave him a weak smile. “He’s got to cauterize it, love.” He explained bluntly. Brian’s eyes grew wide. “I know, Bri, I know. But I can’t risk going to a hospital. Trust me, it’ll be fine. It just hurts like hell to do it.”
“I can’t hold this in and let someone burn you!” Brian exclaimed softly.
“It’s either that or give me a stick to bite and wait in the other room.” AJ’s answer wasn’t hard, but it wasn’t soft either. He didn’t have time to play around. “Because I’ve got to do this. Now, it would help me if you were here. It’d help if you did this for me. But if you can’t, I understand.”
Brian stared into his eyes for a long moment. Finally, he nodded. He rose from his chair and moved behind AJ, wrapping the strip around each fist until there was a long piece between them, the knot in the center. Then he moved it in front of AJ, situating it in his mouth. AJ wiggled his jaw until it was comfortable. He laid his arm out as best he could, gripping the end of the table, his eyes on Marc as Marc pulled the piece of metal off the open flame.
Gripping his other hand to the arm of the chair, AJ watched Marc bring the metal over, holding it above the wound in his bicep. “Brace, friend. This will hurt.” Marc muttered in Romanian. Then he pressed the metal into AJ’s skin.
AJ couldn’t stop the scream that tore out of his throat. Thank God it was muffled by the cloth. His arm twitched and he flung his head back against Brian’s shoulder, feeling his lover bend down to try to whisper in his ear. The piece of metal moved away, only to come back again a little further over. AJ brought his hand up, gripping at Brian’s arm, bracing on the muscles there as the metal seared his wound shut. The smell of burning flesh filled their noses.
It only took a short time and yet it seemed eternity before Marc took the metal away and tossed it into a bowl of water in the sink. His movements were practiced as he took out a jar of salve, applying it liberally over the burn mark. Once that was done he raided AJ’s bag and put some burn pads, a special kind of gauze that AJ had grabbed, over top of it. Once he had those taped down with medical tape, he stepped back to allow Brian to come forward.
Now that the gag was out of his mouth, AJ stretched his jaw to try and loosen it back up. Marc stuck a glass of whiskey in front of him and a couple pain pills. Grateful, AJ took them and downed half his drink in one shot, swallowing the pills with it. “Thanks, Marc.”
“Sure, sure. What else are friends for if not burning their friend’s skin?”
The attempt at humor fell slightly short. It was easy to see that Brian had almost reached the end of both his patience and his limit for stress. Seeing that, AJ sought to remedy it. “Well, one more thing might help, Marc. Think you could do an in and out job for me without anyone finding out what you’re doing?”
“Shit, man.” Marc rolled his eyes. He looked offended. “Who the hell you think you’re talking to here? How many times I do this shit for you? How many times I prove to you I’m a ghost, eh? What’s this job? I do it.”
“At the Paradise Hotel down on 34th there’s a room on the fifth floor, number 507, that I need you to get into. There’s a black duffel bag hidden inside the closet, you know the usual hiding spots in those places, and another bag in the ceiling of the bathroom. I need both. The floor is pretty heavily guarded. A pop group is staying on that floor, so there’s security everywhere and it is tight. I need you to get in and out without anyone realizing what you’re doing. If you’re caught by the guys shooting at me, or seen coming out with that stuff, they’ll either kill you or they’ll follow you here and kill us all.”
Marc didn’t even hesitate. “I’ll do it. That’s easy.”
Before the other man could move, AJ raised his good arm and held up one finger. “No bodies, Marc. Not a single one. I don’t want a single person on that floor hurt.”
Laughing, Marc headed toward the living room, snagging his coat off the couch. “You always bring fun with you, I’ll give you that much!” he called out. Then, just that quickly, he was out the door.
AJ took a deep breath. He pushed back from the table, moving over to flip all the locks on the door. Then he gestured for Brian to follow him. He knew the apartment well enough to navigate easily through it. Though, he thought to himself, it was more condo than apartment. They may have been in a slummy part of town the apartments were pretty decently sized.
He took Brian to the master bedroom, the only bedroom, and gestured for him to take a seat on the bed. “I’m sorry about all of this, Brian.” He said softly. He looked at his lover and wished that it hadn’t had to be like this. “I am so terribly sorry.”
“What on earth is going on, Alex? You said you’d explain when we got here. Why the hell did someone shoot you?”
This was going to be the moment of truth. “It’s a complicated answer. I have to go back, far back, for you to understand.”
“Tell me. I want to know.” Brian’s gaze firmed slightly. “I need to.”
AJ looked over to him. He saw the shock on Brian’s face, but he also saw that this was a question he wasn’t going to let go. To accept, he needed to understand. But this wasn’t something that AJ had ever shared with anyone before. To share it now, with someone who had come to mean so much to him, was going to be more difficult than Brian realized.
Nerves jangling, AJ pulled his pack of cigarettes from his back pocket. Somehow they hadn’t become too squished with the day’s events. He opened the door to the bathroom, going inside and propping himself up against the wall. It gave him a clear view to where Brian still sat on the bed. AJ didn’t say anything as he lit his cigarette, or even for the first few drags. But after he tapped his ashes into the sink the first time, he spoke, the words coming from that place deep inside of him that he had never showed to anyone.
“I was born here, in the United States, to an illegal immigrant that died in childbirth. I never knew who my mother was. Never had a picture of her. Nothing. The only home I had ever known was the orphanage I lived in. It wasn’t like the places you hear about in movies and horror stories. It wasn’t horrible. I was loved there and I loved them back. I had friends. It was a military orphanage, so we were raised to be patriotic. To respect our country. Something that they did, I think, because all of us were immigrant children. They wanted us loyal to the country we were in, not our homeland. But it wasn’t a brainwashing place, so don’t think that. It was just, home.
“I was about seven when the soldiers came one day. They visited occasionally from the base nearby and we were used to seeing them. But these soldiers moved with purpose. They came and observed us all when we played outside.”
Memories swamped AJ while he tapped his cigarette ash into the sink again.
“My teacher called me over and told me that these men were taking me with them. They’d told her that they found my father and he was thrilled to have found me. I was going to have a home. I was so ecstatic about it; I didn’t even bother to pack anything. I simply left with them. I had no idea what they were going to do.
“They took me to a plane, put me on it, and shipped me out with only one soldier to go with me. I was fascinated by the flight. Though I didn’t know where we landed at the time, I learned later it was in Scotland. I was young and stupid and trusting. They took me to this base hidden off in the hills. Then they took me back to this room where someone was waiting for me. He was kind looking. I remember thinking that.”
AJ tossed the end of his cigarette into the toilet, immediately lighting another one. He watched Brian’s face while telling his story, watching for the reactions that might be visible there.
“The man told me his name was Allan, and he asked me a few questions. He asked me about the United States. Asked me if I was loyal. I told him I was. He had me recite the things I’d learned. Well, I’d always had a quick mind, so I told him everything I knew about the United States. I recited the preamble to the constitution and even quoted parts of the constitution to him. I told him everything my teachers had taught me.
“When I was done, he asked me if I’d like to be a part of that country. To be a citizen, officially. I told him I would. He asked me if I wanted to help my new country. Of course, I did. ‘Would you do anything to help your country?’ he asked me. I said I would. And so it started.
“They trained me from that day forward. First they took me, broke me.” AJ had to pause for a moment to clear his throat. Here was where it started to get hard. “Not physically, so to speak, but mentally. They broke me down so they could build me back up from scratch. The things they did, I can’t share. I won’t.” He had to pause again to fight those memories back.
When he felt like he could speak again, he continued with his story. “Break me they did, make no mistake on that. Then, the training started. I learned combat. My mind was taught to see things others don’t. To notice that which other people pass by. I was taught languages and the accents to go with them. I went through fitness training to build my endurance. I was taught to withstand torture without giving up a shred of information.” AJ paused, locked eyes with Brian. “I was taught to kill.”
Shock had Brian’s eyes growing even wider. He couldn’t seem to form words, though his mouth gaped slightly. There was no moment of disbelief, not after the day they’d had. Not when he could see AJ’s face and see how deathly serious he was. Most especially because his mind was tying things together; AJ’s story now, mixed in with the things he’d been noticing lately. AJ’s scars, the way he’d taken that man down at the bar…
But AJ wasn’t done yet. “I have a wide range of skills. Hand to hand combat, knives, firearms, explosives, electronics, computers…the list goes on and on. I was one of the top ranking people. When my training was complete, they sent me on my first mission. I think I was twelve. I’d been trained not to question my orders, either, so I did exactly as I was told.
“There was a meeting of foreign dignitaries that week in France. I took a flight out there. Managed to infiltrate the hotel easily enough. In all the movies you see these complicated plots to sneak into rooms and guns with silencers or special poisons that no one can ever trace. The reality of it all is so much easier than you’d think. I’d done my homework on the man I was after, the Irish ambassador. Why I was to kill him, I didn’t know. But I did my job.”
AJ closed his eyes, unable to look at Brian, unable to watch as he said the hardest parts of his story. “I found out the man had a severe food allergy to onion. It was on all his paperwork for the hotel that nothing he was served was to have onion in it. So, I watched and saw that the guards went to take their own dinner when it was time for his. He had no wife with him, no one at all. He’d be alone in his room.
“I stole a kitchen uniform, looking just like any other young assistant, and when it came time to serve up the Ambassador’s food, I added onion extract to it. A lot. It was stew, he never even noticed. The tray was delivered by a bellhop and I slipped back out of the hotel. I went across the street where I could use my binoculars to watch. I watched as he took the food in his room. I watched as he ate it. And I watched as he collapsed with convulsions and fell to the floor. He was dead within minutes, but they didn’t find him till hours later.”
“I can’t believe this.” Brian murmured. His eyes looked almost a little wild. “I just can’t believe this. You…you’re telling me that you killed a man. Knowingly killed him to serve your country without knowing the reason why he had to die?”
“Yes.” There was no other answer AJ could give. When Brian stayed silent, AJ said “He was the first, but he wasn’t the last. I was twelve when I graduated from their program. After that mission, to prove I could do it, they let me make my own papers and they dropped me off on the shores of Florida. There, I followed my instructions and turned myself in to DSHS where I was placed with a home. With Denise. Since I made my own papers and altered my appearance, there was no way that any of them would ever recognize me. But I had an online account I was to access daily where they would keep in contact with me as needed.”
“So you decided to join a boy band….why? That puts your face everywhere, makes you so recognizable.”
The practical question showed AJ that some of Brian’s shock was wearing off. How he’d react when it was all said and done, that was still to be determined. But at least the shock wasn’t glazing his brain as much anymore. “Because the man I am now, even the boy I was when I joined, is totally different in looks from the boy I was at the training center. None of them would ever recognize me. This gave me not only the chance to make money, but easy access to every single country. A passport was part of our travel with the group. Being with you guys, it took me country to country.”
“So no one became suspicious as to why you were traveling all over the place at your age.” Brian said slowly.
“Exactly. I didn’t have to fake passports or ID’s or anything like that to get into a country. I have the capability, but with this I had a built in cover.” It sounded so cold and callous when he said it that way. This whole conversation sounded cold. It had been the one conversation that AJ had been putting off for so long. He’d known, back when Brian had noticed the gunshot scars on his body, that one day he would have to say something. But he’d always put it off.
He couldn’t help being afraid right then, looking at Brian and waiting for a reaction of some kind. Nothing in the world was more important to him than Brian.
Nerves jangled through him. Because of that, he started to talk again, needing to fill the silence, needing to finish his story. “Since right before the start of tour I haven’t done any jobs.” He said softly. “I…I couldn’t do it anymore. I couldn’t look at myself. I couldn’t look at you. So I took myself out of the business. I stopped checking in. I figured maybe, just maybe if I stopped, I might be able to get a real life with you. I might have the chance at being normal. Doing this shit, it eats away at your soul.”
He shuddered slightly as he looked down at the ground. “Before you, Bri, I felt like I was dead. Or a robot. I did what I was trained because it was all I knew. Because I felt like I was serving my country. But every life I took seemed to kill a little part of me. Meeting you, it put life where there wasn’t any before. The job became harder and harder to do. I’d come back and I’d climb in your arms and I’d hate myself for what I’d done. So…so I stopped.”
The room seemed to spin a little, making AJ sway. He didn’t see Brian get up but he felt him there, helping to hold him up. “You need to lie down.” Brian said softly. “Your body lost a lot of blood.”
“Water.” AJ told him. “A little food, a little water, and some sleep. I’ll be right as rain.”
Brian bustled him over to the bed, quickly turning the blankets down and tucking him in. It surprised AJ when he felt a gentle hand brush against his face. He looked up into the most beautiful blue eyes and wondered if he’d ever be able to look into them again. He was terrified Brian was going to leave.
“Stay here, I’ll go get you some food.” Brian told him. He stroked AJ’s cheek again, giving him one last look before he walked out of the room.
AJ laid there with tears pooling in his eyes. Had he lost the one person that made life worth living?