Prayers for the assassin

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Strange to be lying in the parking lot of a looted Wal-Mart, one leg twisted under him as he stared up at the sky. Jason used to shop at Wal-Mart for jeans and DVDs and Frosted Flakes. Now he was dying here. Crows drifted down from the light poles, black wings fluttering across his field of vision. They seemed to be getting bigger every day. Bolder too. Dying wasn’t so bad. There had been pain at first, terrible pain, but not anymore. A blessing, because he wasn’t brave. He was scared of spiders and dentists and pretty girls, and most of all, being alone, but he wasn’t scared now. Dying in a holy war meant he would immediately enter Paradise. That’s what Trey had said, and he knew the Qur’an lots better than Jason. Trey said all that mattered was that Jason make his declaration of faith-there is no God but Allah, and Muhammad is his messenger-and everything would be taken care of.

Trey was already dead. Shot through the chest three weeks ago by a rebel sniper as they approached Newark. Jason had bent over him, held his hand, and begged him not to die, but Trey was gone, only his startled expression left behind. The sergeant had ordered the unit to keep moving, but Jason refused, said he wanted to make sure that Trey’s body was properly attended, and the sergeant, a former accountant for H & R Block, had given up and moved the platoon out. They were all new Muslims, just like Jason, and unsure of themselves. Jason had waited until the morgue detail had wrapped Trey’s body in white cloth, then helped them dig his grave. By the time he rejoined his unit, the sergeant was dead, and now Jason was dying, and there wasn’t enough white cloth left for all of them. Allah would understand.

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