Death Wish
Taco was an early riser. On most days he was up before the sun. His morning routine consisted of what he referred to as a “French whore shower”, a combination of a deodorant stick, a tooth brush, and a wet rag that in an early incarnation resembled a face cloth. Your face was the last place in the world you would touch with that cloth. The entire routine took less than two minutes.
“Bring on the next customer” he would sing as he exited McBath on his way to morning coffee.
To the people behind the counter, he could seem like a typical trucker. He disarmed people with a wink and a blink. He studied techniques to present a non-confrontational aura, the inquisitive tourista. “Can you tell me, dear madam, am I on the correct road to Denny’s” he joked as he placed his money on the counter. He answered his own question when the cash-out looked confused. “If this is Denny’s I can be anywhere!” He laughed. More importantly, she laughed.
As he walked toward his Transcraft Eagle, he read the mud flap for the umpteenth time. Intraax Air Ride. Teco was right, we couldn’t have fabricated a more appropriate name for this rig. “How best to put them off the scent? Hide in the wide open!” Teco would say.
They had assumed a last name, and a life story. The Haddad brothers, Teco and Taco. The “I can do” people team. They traveled about like a mobile terror squad. No one could ever be exactly certain if they were looking at a sanctioned special operations team or a pair of delivery guys. “Got to move them refrigerators, got to move them color t.v.’s”. Taco burst into a jingle as he passed groups of strangers that milled about the truck stop. More than half his vocabulary was displaced lyrics spoken with the intent of putting strangers at ease. THEY could be the special ops, he whispered to himself as he walked past.
Morning was news time and Taco was a news junky. He logged on and read e-mail, metro papers from six or more of the world’s biggest cities, and listened to the BBC while he read. Teco would be asleep for another thirty minutes or so. Taco liked his morning time, he could be at ease in his skin, quietly contemplating his next moves, communicating with his handler, taking care of business. Weaving a story of espionage in his mind, to terrorize and entertain.
He sent off a quick e-mail to someone at sover.net. Would that be as in Sovereign or as in Yankee Roots? He wondered to himself.
Vermont is Sovereign, at least Bernie thinks so, he quipped to himself.
The whole thing was meant to say “boo” as if woven in string lights on the floor.
The true situation was that if they had paid assassins wandering the world with garrotes disguised as jewelry, could we be any less active? But then, if we were, would ordinary people be left out in the cold? When war is waged by small teams operating anywhere, anytime, we’re all potential combatants. To not be, is a death wish.
Bob