Love Thy Neighbor Read online

  “You’re carrying the U.S. mail, son,” the trainer had screamed. “That mail is the lifeblood of this country. What do you want to do, carry it in a paper sack?”

  Mel’s appreciation for the bag didn’t come until his first on-the-job dog attack. With leather an eighth of an inch thick, the bag was multi-purpose. When used as a shield, battering ram, or football sledge, the thick bag took the fight out of most dogs. Even the big nasty ones tended to give up after a well-placed smash to the snout, which was usually followed by a backward somersault and a canine whimper. For someone who had never been athletic, Mel was a natural at “smacking the livestock,” as they called it in unofficial postal vernacular.

  His technique was perfect, though there were few people analyzing postal dog defense in comparison to, say, a baseball swing. But if smacking the livestock did become a sport, Mel would be the Mickey Mantle of the leather bags. He kept his technique simple. He sunk his weight on his powerful short frame, lowered his center of gravity to canine level, and tightened the bag to his arm. From there, it was a matter of physics. Over the years, Mel had tamed every roughneck dog on his beat. And it earned him his position as the guest speaker at impromptu seminars on how to treat man’s best friend when they got unruly. The first time he showed his colleagues how to handle a beast, the monster had been a golden retriever who had nipped a neighbor’s son when he tried to touch its dish during dinner. But as time passed and the “training seminars” continued, the dogs got bigger and meaner. He was sure a few had been rabid. Not only did the dogs get larger, but so did the ante and the payoffs. For Mel, Raspberry was merely next on the list.

  The crowd got restless as Mel did a set of deep knee bends. “Come on, Mel,” an overweight coworker yelled over the still-barking dog. “Raspberry needs to eat.”

  Mel winked at the crowd and then nodded at Rob. “Let him go anytime you’re ready, Rob. Somebody start the clock when he does.”

  “I will count down from three,” the man with the wad of cash in his hands said.

  As Rob fumbled with the leash, Mel stared Raspberry in the eyes.

  “Come on, Raspberry. Come and get it.”

  The huge dog, free from its leash, lunged forward and leapt at Mel. The career postal employee sprang forward to meet the dog, the leather bag pounding into Raspberry’s sharp pearly whites. The dog spun around and landed on its paws. Raspberry snapped over his shoulder as he turned back around and Mel met the beast with a low crouch. The dog tried to bite the bag, failing to sink its teeth into the taut leather wall that Mel held tightly. Raspberry went high again, snapping inches from Mel’s face. The veteran postman held his position. The dog spun and Mel countered. Raspberry nipped at Mel’s boots, and Mel kicked the dog while smashing the bag into the canine with his thigh. The crowd went wild. Bets were doubled down. Raspberry was flinging saliva in all directions.

  With ten seconds left, Mel encouraged his adversary. “Come on, puppy. Come and get some meat.” The dog responded with another charge and Mel battered him back. As the crowd counted down, Mel gave Raspberry a lesson in postal dog law, successfully pinning the dog against the wheel of the trailer with the bag and all his strength.

  “Time’s up. Come get your dog, Rob.” Raspberry’s owner came over and attached the leash as Mel kept the beast trapped. Mel backed away with the bag between him and the dog, and Rob wrapped the chain around his arm several times.

  “Go get your meat,” Mel said to Raspberry, stepping to the side and pointing to the steak. The dog moved slowly past, as if he understood the fight was over and he had lost, and set his teeth into the thick piece of red meat.

  Mel walked up to the gang of men and collected the hundred bucks he had put on himself. It was just the start of the day.

  “Now get to work, everyone,” Mel yelled as he put the cash into his pocket. “I haven’t been late on deliveries in ten years and I’m not going to start today,” he added with pride.

  The large leather bag with the thick strap tugged on Mel’s shoulder. He slammed the sliding door on the truck closed and bounced the bag once with his whole body to balance the weight. He was thankful the holiday season was over. The cards, gifts, and packages of the “season of giving” added another twenty pounds to his average load. Twenty pounds. Not a lot of weight until you humped it five miles, up stairs, down driveways, around fences. For the soon-to-retire U.S. postman with a half million miles logged on two pairs of boots a year, Christmas was the season of joy and Advil.

  Ten years was a long time to do anything, twenty was an eternity, and thirty years at the Postal Service earned you a gold watch made in China and a free medical check-up from the neck up. Mel Edgewood had been dragging his heavy leather bag for forty-two years. At sixty-three, he was an old-timer. By his age most of the carriers had been put out to pasture; stuck pushing a knee-high pile of mail towards the first-stage sorting machine, sitting at a table in a windowless room trying to read addresses off shredded pieces of mail.

  Not Mel.

  As he told his wife, his boss, and the young waitress at the diner where he got his morning coffee — the day he couldn’t walk his route was the day he would quit.

  That day was approaching. Either God would take him, or his route would.

  Clark met Mel at the door. “Right on time as usual.”

  “I don’t like to be late.”

  “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you late, though ‘late’ is relative.”

  “I tried to make it to the same house within a five or ten minute window. Barring any mechanical difficulties, of course.”

  “Of course.”

  Mel dug into his leather bag, put some envelopes in a folded magazine, and handed them to Clark.

  “You moved back in already?”

  Clark looked at his postman suspiciously.

  “Where did you hear that?”

  “Oh, I have ears.”

  Clark considered the statement and shrugged his shoulders involuntarily. “I guess you do.”

  “There’s no guessing involved. I’m a mail carrier for the United States Postal Service. Believe it or not, we have our fingers on the pulse on American society. Do you know any other organization that touches virtually every American, every day of the week?”

  “I never thought about it,” Clark said, other questions churning in his mind.

  “Did you know that the mail carriers for the Postal Service are credited with saving more lives every year than firefighters? We know when people are home, when they are away. We know when an elderly woman who lives alone hasn’t picked up her mail. We make calls to the police, save people from burning buildings, perform CPR…”

  “The eyes and ears of the neighborhood.”

  “Among other things. Like delivering the mail. For less than fifty cents you can have a piece of paper picked up from your house and delivered to your grandmother’s house three thousand miles away. Three thousand miles for less than fifty cents. If there’s a better bargain out there, tell me what it is.”

  Clark suppressed the urge to tell Mel that you can do the same thing, for free, via email and it takes less than a second. Instead, he took the inquisitive approach. “Can I ask you a question or two?”

  “Shoot.”

  “What do you know about Nazim and Ariana across the street?”

  “Nice couple. His last name is Shinwari and hers is Amin. You know it always struck me as kind of strange that they didn’t have the same last name.”

  “Because they are Muslim?”

  “Exactly. To the average non-Muslim, the religion seems, shall we say, a bit sexist. With all those veils and all. You would think that the man would want the woman to take his name.”

  “Maybe, maybe not. In Korea the women keep their maiden names and the children also adopt it. Every culture is different.”

  “And I’m not claiming to be a religious or cultural expert. Just telling you what I see.”

  “What else?”

  “They get mail
from overseas occasionally, usually from Pakistan. They are pretty quiet. Keep to themselves. They have one daughter, and I don’t think I ever saw them with a visitor.”

  “That’s true. I think I saw Nazim’s brother once, but I am not sure.”

  “Some people like to keep to themselves. No crime in that. Hell, it would probably make the world a better place if a lot more people minded their own business.”

  “I know a few people who fall into that category.”

  “Everyone does.”

  “Out of curiosity, did they put a stop on their mail?”

  Mel Edgewood raised his eyebrow a little and smiled wryly. “I can’t give that information out. It could tell a potential thief that no one is home.”

  “Do I look like a potential thief?”

  Both men smiled and Clark continued with his line of questioning. “So you never saw anything that struck you as unusual?”

  “Not really. But, hey, I’m not a peeping Tom either. I guess the husband is a mechanic and occasionally they get an odd mail-order catalogue.”

  “Like what?”

  “I’m not sure I should be telling you. Mail is sacred,” Mel answered quietly, looking around as he did.

  Clark wasn’t sure if he was joking or not so he played it safe. “Mel, how long I have known you?”

  “Fifteen years, more or less.”

  “You can trust me.”

  Mel looked at Clark who smiled back. “Well, a couple of years ago I remember thinking that maybe Nazim was into farming.”

  “Farming?”

  “I remember delivering a few catalogues from John Deere and another one from Eggers. Big equipment catalogues. Not the kind of machines you would push around the back yard. Large-scale farming operations. I think it stood out in my mind for a couple of reasons. First off, they are Muslim and I don’t see many Muslim farmers here in the US. Secondly, they live in this neighborhood and sure as hell don’t have a back forty that I’m aware of. And, for whatever reason, they don’t receive much advertising mail. Maybe they don’t use junk-mail triggers like credit cards.”

  “I think we know they aren’t farmers. Hell, I’m not even sure that Nazim knows how to fix cars and he’s a mechanic.”

  “What do you think about him?” Mel asked.

  “Real quiet. I get the impression that he’s a man who doesn’t like to be told what to do.”

  “Short-tempered?”

  “Don’t know exactly what it is about him. You ever been near someone who you knew just wasn’t right, but couldn’t put your finger on it?”

  “Half of my coworkers.”

  “I don’t know if I should laugh or not.”

  “Go ahead. I do.” Mel straightened his winter postal hat and bounced the bag on his shoulder. “What are you looking for, Clark?”

  Clark explained the visit from the FBI and the call to the CIA. Mel listened staidly.

  “Not sure what to tell you, there. You could always dig around a little on your own. Hell, you could be a hero.”

  “I don’t want to be a hero. I just don’t want to be the guy standing around after the city has been leveled saying, ‘I wish I would have checked those neighbors out more carefully.’”

  “No, you wouldn’t be very popular. But then again, snooping on your neighbors, particularly helpful ones, well that’s not easy either. Leaves you feeling a little dirty. The kind of dirt that water and soap doesn’t wash off. You know, after 9/11 there was an idea bouncing around the bureaucracy on the other side of the Potomac about having postal mail carriers serve as spies on the general public.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “Not at all. The plan was nixed before it made the approval rounds but the effect was essentially the same. If we see something fishy on our routes we call the police and the postal inspection service.”

  “Should I feel better?”

  “You would if you saw me with a 120-pound Rhodesian Ridgeback.”

  Chapter 23

  The folding cots were pushed against the outside wall of the small room, snuggled into the four corners, leaving an open clover leaf shape in the middle of the floor. The green canvas on the cots was stretched tautly over their foldable wooden frames. The fabric was faded from its original shade of olive green, the hinges slightly rusted, the wood darkened with age. The stamp on the left leg of the frame was still legible, the black ink designed to endure rain and snow and incoming mortar rounds. Syed thought the U.S. Army surplus cots were appropriately ironic. Abu did not. He had spent the afternoon scraping away the reminder that he was sleeping in an infidel’s bed. When he finished carving, he swiped at the floor, pushing the splinters across the room. James Beach watched as his roommate turned over on his back.

  “Hey, Abu.”

  “What?”

  “How about keeping this place clean? There are four of us in this room.”

  Abu began cutting his nails with the same six-inch knife he had used to carve his cot.

  “You need to worry about yourself. Abu will worry about Abu,” he said without looking up.

  James stood from his cot and turned up the small space heater. Syed, feet hanging off the end of his cot, snored quietly along the far wall, farthest away from the door. With his boot, James pushed the wood splinters on the floor towards the bottom of Abu’s bed.

  Knife in his hand, Abu watched James. “You need to be careful, American.”

  “You keep calling me American. I keep telling you that I am both an American and I am a Muslim. A Muslim just like you. I pray five times a day, just like you. I fast during Ramadan, just like you. I embrace Allah and his one true messenger, Mohammed, just like you. I obey the pillars: Shahadah, Salah, Zakah, Sawm, Hajj. And I am willing to die for my cause, just like you.”

  Abu was unmoved. “We shall see if you are willing to die or not.”

  “Every committed Muslim has to answer that question for himself.”

  “But you were born a Christian, no?”

  “I was born a Christian, raised agnostic, and saved by Islam.”

  “Christians are weak in faith. It is our duty to show this to the world.”

  “Enough,” Karim said, pulling the pillow off his face. “You two are driving me crazy. Abu, pick up the wood shavings on the floor.”

  “I don’t have to listen to you.”

  The light from the small window high on the wall shone downward and hit Abu flush in the cheek. Karim looked at the scar on Abu’s face. “Just clean it up. This is my room too.”

  James Beach looked up at the metal roof and the four cinderblock walls. Beyond the small single window and the light bulb over the door, there was nothing. He got a case of the chills as the confining images of the room ran through his mind like a film through a broken projector. He shook his head to clear the haunting cobwebs of his past.

  Karim sat up in bed. “You feeling all right?”

  “Fine, just a case of the chills. It’s damp in here.”

  “We have a roof over our head, a heater in the corner, and people to talk to. It could be worse.”

  “Yes, it could be worse,” James agreed. Karim looked hard at the American. There was a certain understanding that they had both been to the same place. Not the same location, but through the same trials of the soul. Karim spoke, “I’m going to wash in the bathroom, wadu for the afternoon salah. When I get back, someone else can go. Ariana says only one person out of the room at a time.”

  “Why do you get to go first?” Abu asked.

  “Because I spoke first,” Karim answered. He stood, reached into the new duffle bag under his bed, and pulled out a plain white towel. As the door shut, Abu spoke to James.

  “So, what’s in the truck, infidel?”

  “Fuck you, Abu.”

  “Come on. You say we are in this together. Share with your Muslim brother.”

  “I was told not to say.”

  “By whom? Ariana? She is a Muslim woman. She is incapable of running an operation consi
sting of four Muslim men, even if one of them is American.”

  “I wouldn’t be so sure.”

  “Ok, don’t tell me what is in the truck. Tell me how many it can kill. Or do you not want to think that way, American?”

  James’ eyes penetrated Abu’s, hatred stirring in the American’s baby blues. “I’m not a scientist, I can’t answer that question.” James paused and ran both hands through his brown hair. His head dipped and then he continued, “I was told, if used correctly, the death toll could be over ten thousand.”

  Abu perked up. Syed magically sat up in his cot, his snoring cut off in mid-stream.

  “Ten thousand?”

  “What is it?”

  “Something perfectly legal and perfectly deadly.”

  The conversation paused. All three men were now sitting on their cots, their feet on the floor in the communal area in the middle of the room.

  “Ten thousand. More than three 9/11s,” Syed said to himself in wonderment.

  The three men looked at each other and smiled sinister grins, flashes of dimples and teeth pleased with the possibility of mass death. Each relished the moment for a minute, the individualistic bickering replaced by the brotherhood of a common goal.

  “So Syed, how long have you been here?” James asked.

  “We’re not supposed to talk about our lives.”

  “I told you what was in the truck.”

  “Technically, you didn’t tell us what was in the truck,” Abu chimed.

  Syed thought about the question and then answered. “I have been here a few weeks. But I first came to the U.S. as a high school exchange student.”

  “No kidding?”

  “Yes. I spent my junior year in high school in Michigan.”

  “And this time?”

  “Different name, different identity, different purpose.”

  “How did you get here?”

  “The long way. I flew from Karachi to Dubai and then took a flight from Dubai to Bangkok.”

  “Why Bangkok?”

  “Because that is where I was told to go. I got picked up at the airport by a guy on a tuk-tuk, one of those motorcycle-taxi things with four seats. He drove me to Khao Sahn road, the main backpacker area of town, and we stopped in the back of a small shop where a guy took my picture. I followed my guide out the back door of the shop, through some back alleys to a small hotel a block off Khao Sahn road. I waited there for three days, staying inside most of the time, just venturing out for food in the evening. Three days later someone knocked on my door and handed me a new American passport with my photo in it and a train ticket to Malaysia.”