Red Hats - Nicole Anderson Ellis

It didn’t feel like a stabbing. Not at first. At first, Wallace thought he was going to be sick. Like car sick, only the freeway was ruler straight, and the bus rode smooth. It was a fancy tour bus. Too fancy, his ex-wife would’ve said. But his daughter – Kim – he could tell she liked it. Plus, it’d been her idea. They’d both traded shifts to get the day off, and he’d got them two seats; and for one month and nearly an hour on the road, it felt like the best money he’d ever spent.
 
It’d been dark still when they gathered with the others in the parking lot of the Tuckabee First Baptist, waiting for the bus to arrive. 
 
“Colder than Pelosi’s pussy,” sniggered the head-to-toe cammo kid on Wallace’s right.  
 
“Ladies present,” someone called.   
 
“No offense,” the kid said, quieter. And then to Kim, “No offense.” She didn’t look up from her phone.
 
Paul McAfee from church was there, with his brother and nephew. And Buddy Gall, of Gall’s Tires, who’d brought his wife. But everyone else was a stranger, and more friendly toward Wallace. When they finally funneled into the warm interior of the Old Dominion coach, they introduced themselves, extending hands across the aisle, like they were excited to meet him. Like handshakes were okay again. He liked that. They congratulated him on his beautiful daughter, and him raising her right – “We need the kids or this won’t work.” – and Kim had played along, used to being taken for high school age. Wallace wondered if this was how people acted on cruise ships. Or in Lion’s Club.
 
A guy from Public Works had asked Wallace to join a hunt club once. Wallace’d blamed his then-wife for saying no.  “Got that honey-do list.” But truth was, Wallace hadn’t hunted since his dad passed, and hadn’t ever liked it anyway. The woods were fine. The tree stands. He’d liked that part. But his father was a talker, and more so when sipping Heaven Hill, and louder by the hour, and angry too, most times.  He’d get himself worked up about work, and Wallace’s mom; and, if they were out long enough, about Wallace too, for not being angry. “Where’s your fire, boy? You’re like a statue over there.”
 
Wallace was thinking about hunt club as the bus merged onto 81.  Wondering if their weekends felt like this; like something happening.
 
“Settle down,” called Buddy Gall from his seat behind the driver.  “Settle down.  We’ve got some plans for the ride up.”
 
Wallace’d first learned about the bus from a flier taped to the counter at Gall’s Tires, where he’d waited to hear the total after getting a flat on Thanksgiving day. He’d spent two hours waiting for the tow truck, but Kim was off eating with her boyfriend’s family, so he wasn’t late for anywhere. “Seriously?” the driver had asked him. “No spare?”
 
It cost close to a hundred fifty for the tow and the tire, so paying $25 each for bus tickets to some rally in Washington wasn’t happening. Even when Gall got off the phone, and tapped the flier. “Gonna be huge,” he’d said. “And about damn time.” 
 
After that, the rally seemed everywhere. On talk radio. On TV. A flier showed up on the corkboard at Public Works, though someone took it down that same day. Then, one night Kim stayed over at his place. She said she and her guy were through, though Wallace couldn’t tell how broke up about it she was. They were eating potpies in front of Hannity, and Kim said, “We should go. See the President.” And the very next day Wallace went back to Gall’s and wrote him another check.
 
The sun was glazing the pines down the freeway median when MacAfee had them stand up, one by one, and say their name, occupation and why they were there. Wallace had trouble focusing on the answers, with the buzzing in his ears. All nerves about what to say. And then it was Kim’s turn, and she stood beside him and said, “I’m Kim Carr. And I’m headed into the National Guard, so I can serve, like my grandfather.” And the whole bus loved it. They stomped their boots for her. No joke. And Wallace stared at his only child, his insides boggy with pride and with shame, for the not knowing this; and then the guy behind them stood. He was a veteran himself. Gulf War. And part of the 3% – which brought more hooting – on his way to defend the Constitution. Stop the Steal. And then it just kept on backward, and Wallace never had to speak after all.
 
When the introductions were over, Gall passed out lyrics for “My Country Tis of Thee.” Wallace hadn’t sung in years, except church hymns and not even that in a long, long while. It surprised him, how good it felt.  He wondered if they sang in hunt club. 
 
After the singing, Gall introduced a sheriff from Bedford County. “They beat our boys in the quarter finals last year, but we like him anyway.” The sheriff talked about bags full of ballots being carried in somewhere, but for a big man he spoke so softly Wallace had to work to hear. He really wanted to ask Kim about the National Guard, but she was staring up front; focused. Plus now Wallace’s stomach felt upset.
 
He’d gotten up early to microwave egg sandwiches, but they didn’t seem to agree with him. When the Sheriff finally sat, Wallace stepped three rows back to the water closet. It was occupied, so he stood, steadying himself on a headrest, feeling in the way. He could see that every seat was filled, which made for easy math. Wallace couldn’t say for certain what a nice bus cost for a day, but $100 a row was a lot of money. He wondered if Gall had charged himself. His friends.
 
By the time the bathroom door folded open, Wallace’s gut was complaining hard and certain, centering around one spot. He didn’t meet the gaze of the guy who said, “Sorry” on his way out; only noticing that he wore a pistol on his belt, and left a stink behind. Wallace struggled to slide the door shut, easing it back and forth and finally closed. With relief, he braced both palms against the back wall of the bus, faced into the shallow metal john, and let the nausea have full throttle. Bring ‘er back up and get this over. Only nothing came. Instead, the volume on the pain nudged up. Food poisoning, he thought. His ex had gotten it from a buffet on their honeymoon in Florida. Pain like to tear her in two.
 
Outside the plastic door, Wallace heard feedback from speakers.  A low gurgle of protest. Then a voice on a mic – “How bout now?” The pressure in Wallace became a blade.
 
After that, it seemed the gears of time froze up.  Wallace slid to sit, legs bent to fit on that small floor. The rim of the crapper pressed a trench against the side of his head. The bus braked and swayed. Shifting laughter and sharp voices passed under the door. Someone knocked a bit, but stopped.
 
Wallace had known pain. He’d dislocated a kneecap in 8th grade, and when they’d carried him off the field, they’d cheered in the bleachers. Once he’d broken a toe, but he’d been so wasted, the pain seemed like white noise. Like the hum at the waste water treatment plant. And then there’d been the divorce.  A deep cut.  Infected. If he was being honest, nowhere close to healed.
 
Someone banged again.
 
“Daddy?”
 
Wallace realized he’d been waiting; waiting for help to come. Slowly, he followed Kim’s instructions. Sit up. Unlock the door.
 
They got him out and back to his seat. Half the bus had kidney stone stories. Advice flowed down the aisle, with bottles of Advil, and water, and a plastic bag where Wallace quickly threw it all back up.
 
By then they were stop-and-go inside the beltway. Over the mic Gall directed folks to look left or right. Jefferson’s memorial. Lincoln’s. When someone spied the distant Capitol, they all boo’d. Then they weren’t getting any closer. Suggestions floated over the headrests. And through all of it, Wallace kept his eyes tight, his cheek against the cool window, his teeth holding in each moan. Now Kim squeezed his hand. “Daddy. Wake up,” she said. “It’s time.” As if he could sleep. As if he could go. Eyes still closed, he told her she had to represent.  He didn’t need to see her face to feel her gratitude at the generous lie: “I’ll be fine.”
 
The sudden silence was something, if not relief. The bus moved beneath him a bit – fits and starts – and then was still; just the vibration of the engine and the hush of the heat. Wallace knew that out in the cold Kim was standing with their gathered tribe, but he no longer cared if it was the promised million. It was a distant cousin of joy, being able to finally voice his agony aloud.
 
However much longer – minutes, hours – the driver found him. Half-masked, dark-skinned. The soft shaking. “Sir.” And then all of it. Cold air. Car door. Warm backseat. Cold air. Wheelchair. Warm air. White light through the veil of eyelids. He blinked open when they snapped elastic behind his ears. A masked woman pulled his wallet from his back pocket, found his county-issued insurance card, put a pen in his hand. Then he sat in the hot corner of a crowded room and the sound of the president’s voice came from a screen he couldn’t see, and Wallace knew Kim was out there, but he couldn’t be happy for her, or sad to miss it. 
 
He learned later, over a nine-month trickle of medical bills, that there’d been bloodwork and a CT, but only the morphine drip was worthy of notice in real time. When they finally pushed the needle, the pain just vanished. Gone, like it had never been.
 
Wallace thanked the nurse, who answered, “Keep your mask on, please.” He thanked the doctor, when she stopped in. He thanked the orderly who wheeled him to another half-curtained room. There weren’t any open beds, they said, and sure enough, now that he could see more than his own pain, the whole place seemed packed to the attic. They found a corner where they stuck him, beside another wheelchair, in sight of a TV. The man in the closest bed slept, but the wheelchair woman was awake. Watching.
 
“They’re attacking the capital,” she told him. “They tore out the fencing and now they’re breaking windows.” She shook her head. “Just look.” Wallace looked. He didn’t see Kim. Or Gall. But he saw a few people who might be the cammo kid. 
 
“Somebody died,” the woman said. “A girl.”
 
“Died?”
 
“Just watch. They’ll show it,” she said.
 
Wallace watched, but the opioids made it hard to hold.  Aft some point they came and wheeled the woman away. Wallace watched a reporter describe the shooting; pronounced dead on the scene. Wallace asked if they could switch to Fox news, but the channel stayed the same. They rolled a man in beside him. He had his knee bandaged and propped straight out; and a stars and bars patch on his vest; and he kept tucking his mask under his chin.
 
“Keep in on or we’ll put you outside,” the orderly said. “You know it’s cold out there.”
 
 “Sheep,” he called them. And the N-word. And then they wheeled him away.
 
“You okay,” asked the man in the bed, awake now. Wallace didn’t bother to wipe his tears.
 
“They killed my daughter,” he said. They were replaying the footage. All that wood paneling and marble. The sweep of a pale ponytail as she went down.
 
“They’ve lost their damn minds,” the man said.
 
Then someone in putty-colored scrubs walked over and unlocked Wallace’s wheels. He thought, “They’re putting me into the cold.”  But they only moved him to a loud hallway where someone else was crying, on some bench down the way.
 
Wallace’s pain blinked awake; just enough to bring him sober. So many faces. Each half-veiled, half-beat. Then a woman was coming through the double doors. Her mouth hidden by pale blue paper. Wallace knew those eyes. His wife. Ex-wife now, but still, she’d come. He felt happy, but just as quickly he figured it. If she’d come all that way it wasn’t for him. The tears came again, and quaked him. “Kimmy,” he wailed against the arms that wrapped him up.
 
“I’m here, Daddy,” she said.
 
“Kimmy?”
 
“I’m here.”
 
She squatted before him, trying to stay out of everyone’s way. He held her hands and looked at her.
 
“You’re not dead,” he said.
 
“Neither are you.”
 
He squeezed her fingers. He was crying again. Still.
 
“I thought they shot you.” 
 
“Nobody shot me, Daddy.”  She reached up and wiped his cheek. The sensation of skin – just knuckles across his face, but tender – jerked a half-sob. How long had it been since he’d been touched like that? At all?
 
“But…the Capitol.”
 
“You thought I was mixed up in that?” She half-laughed as she stood. “No Daddy.” She gazed down the hall toward the swinging doors, looking for a doctor, or a nurse, or the way out. He kept his eyes on her. He watched her shake her still-young head. Her voice came quiet through the paper mask. Sad, maybe. Or an anger that is mostly tired. She was speaking to herself more than to him. More than anyone. “God no,” she said. And then, “We need to find some way home.”