I Shot a Man on Thursday...

But now it’s Tuesday and I’m at a flea market with my wife. It was a controlled pair to his chest like I had been taught. My instructors would have been proud. He’d lain alive at my feet longer then I would have thought. Pink froth coming from his lips and I couldn’t tear my eyes away.

“What do you want to do today?” she had asked. We’d been cooped up in the hotel room for two days straight now, enjoying our reunion after being apart for months, but now we were beginning to get cabin fever.

It started after we had been at the Flea Market only a few minutes, completely unexpected. We joined the crowds moving through the maze of tables full of junk. Walking from stall to stall, looking at what the vendors had to hawk today. Someone walked behind me and I jumped. I turned around and watched them go, a sinking feeling in the pit of my gut. My wife had bent to look at some things strewn on a blanket. I moved a few feet further to a fence and put it to my back, watching the crowd moving by. My breath began to quicken, my eyes darting from person to person as they walked past.

I was feeling closed in. I broke off from searching the people and hurriedly looked for exits. Too far away, I realized too late, I was exposed here. I snatched my eyes back to the throng of people streaming by. My hands twitched. They begged for my rifle. I craved it’s comforting weight in my hands, my thumb itching to stroke the safety. But I had nothing. Nothing I could defend myself with.

Too many! Too many people to watch and I was trying to watch them all. They walked in mass right at me while everything inside me screamed threat. My heart raced, sweat beading on

my face. I pressed my back further and further into the fence to gain all distance I could. I needed distance to create the time I needed to react. But I couldn’t get far enough.

My wife glanced up at me, confusion spreading across her face when she saw the rising panic in mine.

 “Are you ok?” she asked.

 I must have looked crazy. I felt crazy. What was going on? I had never felt this way before. Even in Afghanistan I had always been alert but relaxed. I had my rifle and 180 spare rounds on my chest. My brothers were all around me and we were battle hardened. There was nothing we couldn’t handle.

But here I was naked and alone. Vulnerable to the attack my brain was loudly insisting was imminent.

My wife drove us back to the hotel. Snatching quick glances at me, worried. I looked out the window, hands in my lap refusing the efforts to keep them from trembling. Sitting was hard. I needed to pace. She placed a timid hand on my arm.

I wanted to comfort her.

Tell her it was okay.

Tell her that I was okay.

But I couldn’t bring myself to do it.

What the hell was wrong with me?