Bin Laden’s Not Dead – By Godofwine
Weldon loaded a used plate and skillet into the dishwasher with the rest of the dirty dishes, loaded the soap tablet, started and then closed the machine. Heavy footsteps thudded up the porch stairs and a knock came soon after that.
He grabbed the blue dishtowel revealing the HK45C pistol underneath. He dried his hands, picked up the pistol, chambered a round, and made his way to the door with the gun behind his thigh.
He pushed the curtain aside a few inches and smiled.
“How the hell are you, Hayden?” he said, as he opened the door to his trailer and let the barrel-chested, balding man step inside the trailer.
“Obviously not as good as you, you muscle-bound son of a bitch,” Hayden said.
The older man stepped into the room, peered at his own middle, which had gone more to dough than he’d planned three years after retirement, and back at his friend.
“Have a seat,” Weldon said, pointing with his left hand to a small table with two chairs in the front room.
“You can put away the piece,” Hayden said, with a stoic face. “This is a friendly visit. Can’t say I blame you, though.”
Weldon ejected the round, caught it, flicked on the safety, and tucked the pistol into the small of his back.
“Still wearing shirts two sizes too small to impress the ladies? You even when you are home alone, huh? That’s dedication. What are you, 210, 215, now?” Hayden said, chuckling.
“220, but I took last week off, you asshole. Now you got me all self-conscious and shit. I’ll go out next week and hit it extra hard, but all of that extra working out is really going to get in the way of my yoga and Judge Judy,” Weldon said as at down and smiled at the old man.
“I remember you had damned near ever man at Camp Lejeune hating your guts,” Hayden said. “Those guys had to eat right and workout like mad men just to get even the tiniest bit of definition. Meanwhile, you ate like you didn’t give two shits, hardly ever lifted, and you were somehow cut like a damned Greek God.
“Hey Hayden, don’t judge me because I live my life right and they were slackers, even though I did eventually have to slow down on the pizza,” he said, a smug grin painted across his face.
“You even got me hating you right now a little bit, you son of a bitch. The same way that folks did back in the day. Retirement caught my ass in a damned hurry. But hell, I’m damned near ten years older than you,” he said, motioning to his midsection.
“Back in those days I had a system same as I do now, I must have heard it in a movie or something. ‘If you stay ready…”
“You don’t have to get ready,” the two men said in unison.
“Damned right.” Hayden said.
“I was already solid from playing football in high school before I joined The Corps. All I had to do was maintain it. For some damned reason I let a slick-talking prick in dress blues convince me to pick the Marines over the couple Division II scholarships I had. I could have gone to the league.”
“Linebacker, if I remember correctly. Right?
“Mm-hm,” Weldon nodded.
Look at you now. You could play linebacker for my Cowboys - or at least the Jaguars even now at the ripe old age of 45.”
At the last comment both men laughed.
“You want a beer?” Weldon said. He stood up and headed for the refrigerator.
“Yeah, whatever you got. I’m not picky.”
Weldon grabbed two Coronas from the refrigerator, sat down, and slid one across the table into Hayden’s weathered hands. They both plucked off the tops, held the bottles up in a toast.
“Semper Fi.” Hayden said.
“Hoo-rah,” Weldon returned.
Each man took a long drink and let out a long sigh a piece.
The older man looked at a Jacksonville Jaguars helmet in the center of the coffee table and continued.
“I don’t know how you do it, Weldon. You go from following one perennial loser in the Cleveland Browns, to dumping them after Modell moved the team to Baltimore, and then you go climbing aboard to ride or die with the Jacksonville freaking Jaguars,” Hayden said, laughing still. “You, are one huge glutton for punishment.”
“Thanks for giving me the reach around first. You tell me how good I look, then rag on my team? Way to start off the conversation. What’s next?” Weldon said, still laughing.
Weldon lifted the bottle to his lips, drained it, and pointed the mouth of the bottle at the older man across the table while holding the bottom between his thumb and forefinger like he was holding a pistol.
Hayden set down his beer on the table, held up his hands in mock surrender, a broad smile plastered on his face. “Please, don’t shoot.”
“Why are you here, Colonel?” Hayden said, as he pretended to hold the man at gunpoint.
“I just came to check on you. See if you’ve been holding up better than me,” the Colonel said, motioning to his middle.
A light switch flicked off inside the younger man, and without warning the smile evaporated as if it never existed. He then slammed the empty bottle on the table in anger.
“Stop bullshitting me. What the hell do you want with me, Hayden? How the hell did you even find me in the first place? I’m off the damned grid. The one bank account in my name that my retirement is sent to I haven’t used in years. This trailer isn’t even rented in my name.” Weldon’s coffee brown eyes locked onto the eyes of the older gentleman across the table like a magnet and leaned in as if drawn by them, and then his eyes softened.
“I gave my entire life to the Corps, Colonel. I’ve got no kids. Hardly have any family I am in contact with. I don’t have much of a life now without it.”
The two men sat silently for a moment as Weldon composed himself.
Twenty-five years, Hayden,” he said, with tears welling up in his eyes that he refused to give permission to fall. “Twenty-five years in The Corps and I don’t have a goddamned thing to show for it.”
Weldon lowered his gaze, and rubbed the perspiration that beaded on his brow backwards onto his bald head with both hands.
“You gave your life to The Corps, son. That you did. Men like us are just built differently, that’s all. In your time, you’ve brought more men to justice by way of your good shooting than most could even believe possible from one man. That’s something to be proud of. You are truly one of Uncle Sam’s misguided children. One of the best as far as I’m concerned.
“I’ve seen men deadly with their preferred weapon, but goddamn it if you aren’t lethal with every single one of them. Shit, there’d be stories or songs written about you if damned near all the work you put in wasn’t classified…”
“Enough with the stroke-off, Colonel. What brought you all the way into Medina goddamned Ohio, all…incognito?” he said, waving a hand at the Colonel’s WWE t-shirt and jeans.
“Honest?”
Weldon looked up, eyes widened, and held up his hands outstretched in an, ‘of course,’ gesture.
“Force Recon needs you one last time, son. I mean it. There aren’t many who can do what you do as good as you do it, and those who can don’t know the terrain and the layout as well as you do.”
The Colonel withdrew a manila envelope from the small of his back, opened it, and slid a picture across the table that stopped directly in front of Weldon.
“Osama bin Laden. So what? Seal Team 6 took him out May 2nd 2011. What the hell does this have to do with anything?”
The Colonel’s face drew even more solemn as he fished out another smaller picture from the envelope and slid it across the table. This time Weldon stopped it with a single finger halfway across the table and looked up blankly as the old man’s face was unfamiliar.
“Look again,” the Colonel growled.
As Weldon brought the picture closer, the light bulb in his head flickered several times before it shone bright in his eyes and his mouth fell open.
“That’s right, son. That’s Osama bin Laden. The REAL Osama bin Laden. He’s had his face surgically reconstructed. Whomever Seal Team 6 killed in 2011 must have been surgically altered to pass for him. A body double. But that second picture is him sure as shit,” he said, pointing to the picture. “That picture you’re holding was taken a week ago in Quetta, Western Pakistan, near the Afghanistan border. Our intel still places him there.”
Weldon slumped back into his chair stunned. He didn't know if he could handle re-opening the Pandora's Box he spent the last two years trying to shut.
“Colonel, I haven’t killed anyone in…,” his voice tailed off unable to say the words.
“Do you still keep sharp picking off chipmunks, groundhogs, rabbits, and shit like that?” the Colonel asked. “Because if you do, we can get right on this.”
Weldon stared down at the floor and slowly nodded, “If you stay ready…,” he mumbled, nibbling on a fingernail.
Nearly five minutes passed as neither man spoke, moved, or even seemed to breathe. Weldon sat in the chair, his elbows on his knees, with his head in his hands. The older man looked on giving his friend time to make the decision on his own.
Beneath him, Weldon’s chair creaked as he leaned back, breaking the silent tension in the room and in a low growl he said, “When do I go get that son of a bitch?”
The Colonel flashed a crooked smile, “The plane leaves at 0600.”
**
Easter Eggs
Easter Eggs
Weldon was named for noted Black author, songwriter, and early Civil Rights Activist James Weldon Johnson, and Hayden was named for famed Black poet Robert Hayden.
Inspiration
This was off the top of my head, honestly. The theme for an online contest was “The Conversation.” Most of my stories are narratives and not much dialogue but I wanted to switch it up this time. This one was almost entirely dialogue. The concept of bin Ladin still being alive just hit me like ACME Bricks. Because of the ambiguity from the US Government, and the fact that there were no pictures of bin Laden having been captured or killed, I considered this a slight possibility. With fiction, a slight possibility gives a writer all he needs.
Location
As Stephen King bases all of his movies in Maine or the New England area, I base mine in Ohio or Midwestern states. This one I based out of a trailer park in Medina, Ohio, the city I live in, that has a trailer park maybe 10 minutes from my home. I use character names from Black history as the characters in my stories so that at the end anyone who reads it can get a small lesson in Black history. It just makes it more interesting.
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