Last Man Standing

14

Seven in the morning. Web knew this because the mantel clock was chiming when he lifted himself groggily off the basement floor. He rubbed at his back and neck; as he sat up, his foot hit one of the bottles of wine and it fell over and cracked slightly and Chianti leaked across the floor. Web threw the bottle away, grabbed some paper towels and cleaned up the spill. The wine stained his hands red, and for a dazed moment his sluggish mind told him he’d been shot in his sleep.

The noise outside the rear lower window made him race up the stairs and grab his pistol. Web went to the front door with the intent of circling around back and getting the drop on whoever was out there. Maybe it was just a stray dog or squirrel, but Web didn’t think so. Human feet trying their best to keep quiet just had a certain sound to them if you knew how to listen, and Web knew how to.

When he opened the door, the surge of people toward him almost caused Web to pull his gun and fire. The reporters were waving microphones and pens and sheets of paper and calling out questions so fast, they cumulatively appeared to be speaking Mandarin. They were screaming for him to look this way or that way so they could take his picture, film his video, as though he were some celebrity or, perhaps more apt, an animal in the zoo. Web looked past them to the street, where the media ships with their tall electronic masts now were docked outside his modest rancher. The two FBI agents assigned to watch over his house seemed to be attempting to hold back the masses but were clearly losing the battle.

“What the hell do you people want?” Web cried out.

One woman wearing a beige linen suit, her blond hair sculpted, pushed forward and planted her high-heeled feet on the brick stoop bare inches from Web. Her heavy perfume made Web’s empty stomach turn queasy. She said, “Is it true you’re claiming that you fell down right before the rest of your squad was killed but can’t explain why? And that’s why you survived?” The hike of her eyebrows signaled exactly what the woman thought of that preposterous story.

“I—”

Another reporter, a man, shoved his microphone near Web’s mouth. “There have been reports that you didn’t actually fire your weapon, that the gunfire stopped on its own somehow and that you were actually never in any danger. How do you respond to that?”

The questions kept coming as the bodies pressed closer. “Is it true that when you were at the Washington Field Office you were put on probation for a shooting infraction that resulted in the wounding of a suspect?”

Web said, “What the hell does that—”

Another woman elbowed him from the side. “I have it on good authority that the boy you ‘allegedly’ saved was actually an accomplice to this whole thing.”

Web stared at her. “An accomplice to what? To who?”

The woman gave him a penetrating look. “I was hoping you could answer that.”

Web slammed the door, raced to the kitchen, grabbed the keys for the Suburban and headed back out. He pushed through the crowd and looked at his fellow agents for help. They came forward, yanked and pulled on a few people, yet to Web it seemed their hearts clearly were not in it, and they refused to meet his gaze. So that’s how it’s going to be, Web thought.

The crowd suddenly surged closer, sealing off the path to his truck.

“Get out of my way,” Web yelled. He looked around. The entire neighborhood was out watching this. Men, women and children who were his friends or at least his acquaintances were staring at this spectacle with wide eyes, open mouths.

“Are you going to respond to Mrs. Patterson’s charges?”

Web stopped and looked at this questioner. It was the same reporter from the memorial service.

“Are you?” the man said grimly.

“I didn’t know Julie Patterson had the authority to bring charges,” said Web.

“She made it abundantly clear that you either acted with cowardice or were somehow involved. Paid off.”

“She didn’t know what she was saying. She’s just lost her husband and unborn child.”

“So you’re saying the charges are false?” the man persisted and pushed the microphone closer. Somebody jostled him from behind and his arm jerked forward and the microphone hit Web in the mouth, drawing blood. Before he knew it, Web’s fist had shot out and the man was lying on the ground holding his nose. He didn’t appear to be all that upset. In fact, he was screaming to his camera unit, “Did you get that? Did you get that?”

They all pressed forward more, and Web, being in the middle of this circle, was pushed around by the sheer weight of the crowd. Cameras were snapping in his face, blinding him. Fat video machines were feeding away, dozens of voices were jabbering at once. As the knot of people and machines jostled him around, Web’s feet got tangled in a cable and he went down. The crowd moved in, but he pushed his way back up. This was far past being out of control. Web felt a bony fist hit him in the back. When he turned, he recognized the attacker as a man who lived down the street and who had never cared much for Web as a neighbor or human being. Before Web could defend himself, the man ran off. As Web looked around, it was clear that the crowd was not filled just with reporters ravenous for a Pulitzer. This was a mob.

“Get the hell away from me,” Web screamed. He yelled at the two agents, “Are you guys going to help or not?”

“Somebody call the cops,” said the perfumed blonde, pointing at Web. “He just assaulted that poor man, we all saw it.” She bent down to help up her fellow reporter while a slew of cell phones appeared from out of pockets.

Web looked around at a level of chaos he had never before experienced, and he had seen more than most. But he had had enough of this. Web pulled his pistol. The FBI agents saw this and were suddenly interested once more. Web pointed the pistol straight up and fired four shots into the air. On all sides of him the mob now was in full retreat. Some dropped to the ground, crying out, pleading for him not to shoot them, that they were just doing their job, miserable though it might be. The perfumed blonde let her dear reporter friend drop back to the muddy earth and turned and ran for her life. Her heels sank in the soft grass and she ran right out of them. Her fleshy bottom made a nice target if Web had been so inclined. The reporter with the bloody nose was crawling on his belly shouting, “Are you getting this? Damn it, Seymour, are you getting this?” Neighbors swooped up their kids and fled to their homes. Web put his pistol away and walked to his Suburban. When the federal agents moved toward him, all he said was, “Don’t even think about it.” He climbed in the truck and started it up. He rolled down the window. “Thanks for the assist,” he told the two men, and then drove off.