Tochka-U Delusion
(Signs of the Times is a work of fiction based on true events. Views expressed are the author’s own. Viewer discretion is advised.)
Abdul watches the snowfall through a paneless window. Swirls of snow cross the threshold and settle in a small pile inside. The fireplace is cold. Filled with jet-black charcoal.
He sits in a chair in the otherwise empty room. An ashtray is placed on his lap. A rollie dangles from the corner of his mouth. One of his hands is tucked into his gray and blue fatigues. The other hand hangs by his side as if a great weight is tied to his wrist dragging his body slowly to hell.
The door swings open. It is Mahir. He ducks into the room, closing the door behind him. He props his rifle next to the door frame. Abdul stares blankly at the snow.
“I thought you quit?” Mahir says.
“I’m on vacation,” Abdul says. He shifts his eyes to Mahir.
“5-star accommodations.”
Mahir turns to watch the snow.
“How warm is it back home?” Abdul asks.
“It is the perfect temperature.”
Abdul draws from the rollie. Ash rolls down his flak jacket and lands in the ashtray.
“What’s wrong, brother,” Mahir says to the room.
“You heard what they said about the train station.”
“Which one?”
“Kramatorsk.”
Mahir thinks about that name. What it means, where he’s heard it. The memory of his first train ride in Aleppo flashes before him.
Out the window, he sees a massive blue diesel with Arabic script running across the side. He starts to sweat. He swears he can see women and children boarding the train just outside the window of the hovel he’s in. He walks forward to the window.
Abdul says something. It is lost to the simoom swirling through Mahir’s eyes and the train station outside.
That’s when Mahir sees it. It’s him. The self. Younger. Childish. Holding mother’s hand. A smile. A giggle. His younger self looks to the sky, to God, to anything above the sandy winds.
Then a blast. An explosion. Entirely in Mahir’s eyes. See the flames swirling around his irises.
He blinks, turns away, and finds himself back in the room with his brother-in-arms, Abdul.
“What happened at Kramatorsk?”
“Did you hear anything I just said?”
“What happened at Kramatorsk?”
“The Ukrainians bombed their own civilians,” Abdul said. “A hundred dead. All waiting for a train.” He stamps the rollie into the ashtray.
“What?”
“Yeah.”
“That doesn’t make sense.”
“That’s what the Russian lieutenant said. That it was a provocation or something. They used Tochka-U rockets. That’s what the Ukrainians use.”
“Don’t we use them, too?”
They stared out the window again. The snow was still falling.
“Cigarette?”
Mahir nodded. Neither said anything more.
