The Last Soldier

“Jesus Christ,” I said, “one hundred sixty-eight people pronounced dead. That’s sick, man, really sick.”

The Murrah Federal Building had been bombed just yesterday, and everybody was frantic. Teachers were crying and newspapers were passed around the school. Norman High School was usually a peaceful place, but not since yesterday. My small town of Norman, about twenty miles due south of Oklahoma City, was a ghost town. People inside their homes were watching their televisions intently to see what was going on. No one wanted to be out on the streets. “Still haven’t found out who did it,” I continued. “But whoever did is in some deep shit. I heard that Teresa’s dad was killed in the blast.”

I was very aggressive. I got jealous easily. It was just a characteristic I had developed over the years. My dad was one of the richest men in Norman because he had ties with the Leone Family Mafia.

“I know,” Skupin told me as we sat in our last class of the day. “They ought to fry that guy’s ass when they catch him.”

I cracked my knuckles. “If they catch him, you mean.”

Nick Skupin was probably my best friend. We’d been in every class together in high school all the way up to and through senior year. Nick came from a rich family, too. Suddenly, the bell rang, ending the school day.

Skupin and I walked to our cars. I had a nine-year-old Volvo and Skupin had a brand new BMW convertible that his rich father had bought him. I would have had a nice car like Nick’s, but my parents still didn’t trust my driving capabilities. My first car had been a really nice Jeep, but I had got in a car crash that almost killed the guy in the other car. Because of that accident, I’m not allowed to get a nice car.

While I wished for a new car again, Skupin and I said goodbye and took our separate routes home.

America had been sending troops into Iraq even after the war. The soldiers were sent to maintain order in the country. After the bombing in Oklahoma City, the troops cranked their enforcement up a notch. Sometimes “enforcement” got pretty nasty. My dad had always told me that he had been in Vietnam and had had a necklace of VC ears. I could tell when I was being fed a load of bullshit. When I got into my Volvo that day after school, I had no idea of the horrors waiting for me.

When I turned onto my street, I saw four squad cars parked next to my house. An ambulance was there too, and my house had been sealed off. I pulled up to a policeman and asked what was going on. “A murder,” he told me. “One person dead.”

I asked if I could be let through, but the policeman denied me access. The area around my house was sealed with police tape. When I told the policeman that my house was on the other side of the police tape, he let me through reluctantly. I saw my mother crying in front of the house and knew something was wrong. When I asked what was going on, she told me that my father had been shot and killed when someone broke into our house. I sat down on the step and cried.

My father’s death was just the beginning. There was no wake. What good was a wake if you had to look at a body with a giant hole in its head? My mom delivered the eulogy on the day of my father’s funeral, and I stayed out of school for the next week.

My life was a mess. I was almost nineteen and still in high school. My parents had thought it would be better for me to start school late so I would have an advantage over the other students, but I have the same level of intellect as any of them, so it sucked for my parents. And me. I had early acceptance to Rider, my second choice for college. But I hadn’t heard from my first choice yet. And now my father was dead.

By the time I returned to school, the police had found out who bombed the Murrah Federal Building. When I arrived back at school, everyone expressed their deepest sympathies. “Hey, man, sorry about your dad,” Nick told me.

He smelled like pot, as usual. I thought I would get a contact high, the smell was so strong, but that was just an urban legend, I knew. “Thanks, man,” I said back to him.

“Dude, Teresa’s in school today!”

“Seriously?”

“Yeah! I’m surprised you came to school, too!” Nick said.

“Yeah, but I get over stuff.”

“Dude, I’m having a party tonight. You want to come?”

“Yeah, sure thing, man.”

“Great.”

“Is Teresa...”

“No.”