Path of Jen: Bloodborne (6 page)

Jen looked around for another door or window.
There were no other doors aside from the garage door they had
arrived through. In fact, the garage was relatively bare except for
the car and the workbench. “Okay then…what else can I use?” she
wondered. Suddenly worried that the taxi driver might come back at
any minute, Jen hurried to the workbench and searched for more
tools. She found a flat metal tool with a tapered end and a handle.
It looked like a scraper or a poker of some kind. The end was
tapered but flat, like a stubby knife. The rest of the blade was
uniform thickness and width all the way to the handle. For some
reason the word “Chisel” came to mind, but she wasn’t sure if that
was right. She put it in her other pocket and kept looking. There
was nothing else.

Jen turned to the car and tried the
driver’
s door.
“It opened!"
She
looked in the door pocket and under the seat but there were only
cigarette butts and gum wrappers. She found nothing of use. She
stretched and leaned to reach the passenger side and opened the
glove box. It was empty. She looked under the passenger seat too.
“Nothing."
Jen climbed back out of the car and headed to the
door by the light switch.

She pulled out the chisel and looked at it
for a second. She put the tapered end in the space next to the door
latch and began working it back and forth, trying to get it far
enough in there to pry. She pulled out the wrench and began
whacking on the handle, trying to hammer the chisel deeper. Soon it
was solidly wedged in the door crack and Jen began prying on it to
force the door open. It didn’
t budge.
“Come on!” she yelled. She dropped her hands in anger and then
stepped back. She took a few calming breaths and looked for a
better way. “The hinges are on my side!" Jen yanked the chisel free
and started on the middle hinge. She used the tapered end again,
only this time instead of forcing it into the door crack she used
it to pry the hinge pins up and out. The first one was pretty easy
once she tapped the chisel under the head to get it started. The
second was a little harder for some reason, but it finally came
out. The last one was the worst. It was the bottom hinge and it
seemed welded in place. Jen tried everything she had done to get
the other two out, but this one didn’t want to budge. Finally, she
got angry and hit it as hard as she could with the wrench. That
must have knocked something loose because the next attempt with the
chisel popped the pin up and she was able to work it out with
little additional trouble.

Jen didn’t waste any time. She used the
chisel again to pry from the back of the door and swung it out and
free of the hinges. Once past the hinges and the door frame she
pulled it away from the latching mechanism and let it fall against
the wall. She ran out into the hall and as far from the garage as
possible. When she reached the end of the short hall, there was
another door.
“
Not
locked!
"
She opened it hesitantly, and found herself
at the back of an empty store front. Large windows facing the
street in front of her let in the evening light. It looked like no
one had been there in a long time.

Frightened but feeling energized by her
success so far, Jen raced to the front door and tried to push the
door open. It was locked. “Ugh!” she yelled. She raised the wrench
to strike one of the windows and hesitated.
“Won’t I get into
trouble for breaking a window?"
She immediately felt stupid for
worrying about the window when her life was in danger. “
Sorry, store guy,
” she said under her breath as she
swung the wrench at the tall window next to the door. There was a
loud “Crack!” but the window was still intact. She swung again with
all her might and this time the window shattered. The sound was
deafening, but she didn’t care. All she cared about was getting
out. Carefully avoiding the sharp glass still sticking out of the
window sill, Jen stepped out onto the sidewalk in front of the
shop.

Just then a vehicle came around the corner
and toward the shop. It was an old beat-up minivan. Jen could see
two men in the front seats. She put her head down and began walking
away from the store and the van. She dropped the wrench inside the
store when she broke the window, but she still held the chisel
tightly in her left hand. She tried to keep it hidden as she walked
quickly away. The van slowed in front of the shop for a second and
then raced toward her. Jen heard the van accelerating and ran as
fast as she could.

The van screeched to a stop next to her and
she heard the doors open as she ran by. Jen ducked into the first
alley and ran on. Ahead of her was an opening to another street.
She could hear the men behind her and she screamed, “Help me!” as
she ran. “Anyone! Please, help me!" She skidded and threw her body
weight to the left, trying to duck around the next corner as
quickly as possible. What felt like a hammer slammed into her right
shoulder and then held on as it dragged her spinning to the ground.
She heard the chisel clank against the pavement and go skidding
away from her. “No!” she shouted as she tried to break the
vice-like grasp someone had on her arm. “
Let me
go!
”

Jen felt hot breath on her neck and strong
arms wrapped around her tightly. She smelled leather, cigarettes
and spiced sweat as she struggled to get free. “Let go!” she yelled
again. “Help!”

The man holding her spoke calmly while he
regained his breath and tried to subdue her. He had a soft voice,
but he was squeezing her so tightly that it hurt.

“You’re hurting me!” she cried.

“Sh-sh-sh-sh,” he said. He spoke to the other
man in Farsi, and Jen could not understand any of it. She glimpsed
a thin man in his late twenties or early thirties, wearing a
Member’s Only jacket squatting next to her. He seemed to be
reaching out to her and then everything went dark.

Jen felt the cloth bag against her face. It
smelled of sour breath.
“Oh no!”
she thought.
“They’re
going to kill me!"
Images of prisoners in orange jump suits and
wearing black bags over their heads raced through her mind.
Jihadi’s dressed in black would make them kneel in the sand and
then dramatically pull the bags off of the prisoners’ heads. One of
the men dressed in black, usually one with a British accent, would
say something about western politics or policies and put a knife to
a prisoner’s throat. At the end of the video, the prisoners always
died in the most gruesome way.
“Is that what is happening to
me?”
Jen wondered. She began to hyperventilate.

She heard the man holding her speak again,
and the other man answered as if irritated. A hand grasped her left
shoulder and she felt a sharp prick. “Ow!” she yelled. A dull pain
spread through her shoulder and she suddenly felt hot. Then the
heat was slowly replaced with a cool, refreshing feeling. She felt
exhausted and began thinking of sleep. The strong arms that were
wrapped around her actually felt comforting. Her head felt funny
and her whole body began humming. Jen felt her body being lifted
off of the ground and she wondered if that was okay. She drifted
off to a place somewhere between sleep and waking. She was living
in a black room, surrounded by a constant humming, and nothing
mattered.

Fatima sat at the kitchen table crying into
her sleeve. Her husband, Mahmoud, stood frowning behind her with
his arms crossed, chewing on his bottom lip. “How could I have lost
her?” she said, barely above a whisper. “It is all my fault." She
choked and began sobbing again. Mahmoud put a large hand softly on
her shoulder.

“This was not your fault Fatima,” he said to
comfort her. “You could not have known she would wander." She
looked up at him with glistening eyes.

“But what if she did not? What if I moved
away from her?” she asked. “I mean it, husband! What if she tried
to keep up and I lost her?”

Mahmoud grunted and waved a hand to dismiss
her question. “Armand said she wandered off, just as you first
thought she must have. Stop questioning yourself. It is getting
tiresome." He looked at his watch and sighed. Jena’s father Najid,
Mahmoud’s younger brother, was still not home and it was nearly
midnight. He understood, of course. Losing a child in this way is
worse, in some ways, than losing them to death. At least when they
are killed you know their suffering is over.

Mahmoud gently lifted Fatima to her feet and
guided her to the bedroom. “Sleep, Fatima. There is nothing more
you can do tonight. I will wait up for Najid." He helped her lay on
the bed and carefully removed her slippers for her. He placed them
on the floor at the foot of the bed as he left the room and closed
the door.

Mahmoud returned to the kitchen and made a
pot of strong Texas coffee. “Texas coffee made with one hundred
percent Arabic beans,” he read aloud. He grunted as he scooped it
into the filter, adding two extra scoops. He expected to be up for
at least a few more hours. He pulled out a chair and sat at the
table quietly. Secretly he blamed himself for allowing Fatima to
take Jena to the bazaar without a proper man escorting them. He
should have been there to watch over his niece. Mahmoud held his
face in his hands and rested his elbows on the table. “Allahu
Akbar,” he said with conviction. “Allah save this child, or grant
me revenge on the men who took her."

Two hours later the front door opened.
Mahmoud wiped his tired eyes with the heels of his hands and stood
to greet his brother Najid. “Any word brother?” he asked.

Najid didn’t speak. He closed the door behind
him and shook his head sullenly. He looked utterly defeated.
Mahmoud stepped forward and held him a strong embrace. The two men
cried as they stood like that for several minutes. Finally, Najid
kissed his brother’s cheek and said he needed to go sleep. Mahmoud
let go and watched his brother walk up the stairs and into his
room. He walked to the table and picked up his new Texas coffee
cup. He stared at it for a moment and then took it to the sink. He
dumped the half-full cup out and set it in the bottom of the sink.
Silently, he walked down the hall and went to his own room to
sleep.

On the other side of the world Jena’s mother,
Fouzia, was boarding a flight to Iran. She was beyond tired after
working a double shift at the hospital and was barely holding it
together. When she finally settled into her seat, near the back of
the plane, she pulled out her phone and looked at the home screen.
Tears came unbidden and she dabbed at them with one of the tissues
she carried continuously since hearing the news. The picture was
one of her favorites. It was taken earlier in the summer by Najid.
The picture was of Jena, Sarah, and Fouzia in their front yard
before one of Jena’s overnights at Sarah’s house.
“She looked so
happy,”
Fouzia thought as she stared at her daughter’s smiling
face. Then reality came barging in and she was reminded that her
daughter was missing. She closed her eyes tightly and tried not to
picture her Little Bird scared, hurt and alone, or worse. The
images she most feared flooded her mind anyway and she felt like
screaming.

A gentle hand touched her shoulder and she
looked up, startled. The flight attendant pointed at Fouzia’s phone
and smiled apologetically. She was a pretty young woman with a
little too much makeup on, but with kind eyes and a winning smile.
Her name-tag said Melissa. Fouzia nodded and held the power button
down to power it off. She wiped her eyes again and placed the phone
in her purse. Melissa moved on to continue her pre-flight
checks.

Fouzia needed a distraction. She was
exhausted, but sleep would not come easy.
“
Besides,
”
she thought.
“Only
nightmares await me."
She pulled the newspaper she had
purchased out of her bag and began reading. The front page story
was about the landmark nuclear deal the US and its allies had made
with Iran. “How is it even possible?” she wondered aloud. “Don’t
they know who they are dealing with?" Fouzia watched the news and
knew the talks were underway, but she believed that the US
government would stand strong and deny any deal until Iran
denounced terrorism and stopped calling for the destruction of the
US and Israel. “At least we could have demanded the American
prisoners be released and force some reforms concerning women’s
rights." Fouzia put the paper down and closed her eyes. It was all
too much.
“Allah, how can you let these things happen? How can
you allow these evil men to be so hateful in your name? Help me
understand why my daughter is less important because she is a
girl."
Tears streamed down her face as she prayed silently.
“Forgive me, but I do not understand!"
Two words skittered
and coursed through her conscious mind:
“Masha’ Allah."
Stubbornly, Fouzia refused to acknowledge them.

Fouzia opened her eyes and looked out the
window. It was mid-afternoon and raining. The sky was overcast and
gray like her mood. Fouzia mentally recounted the last two days at
the hospital. She evaluated every case, recalled every patient, and
replayed each situation in as much detail as she could muster. She
carefully avoided the time surrounding the phone call from Najid.
Fouzia concentrated on her life as a doctor and pushed “Mother and
Wife” to the back of her mind. She just had to get through the next
few hours without breaking apart.

Jen awoke in a haze of subdued lights and
sounds. Her head throbbed and her body ached, but she couldn’t
remember why or how. She forced her heavy eyelids to open and the
lights became more vibrant and the hazy images became clearer. The
pounding in her head quickly gained momentum and she shut her eyes.
She groaned and tried to raise her hands to touch her head. Her
arms refused to obey. “What?” she said with a slur. Confusion set
in as she began to process sensory information.
“Am I
drunk?”
she thought.