If Thine Eye

It's funny: I came home from Kabul intact and immediately lost my left eye. Five days home, three days drunk, went through a red light. Two little girls and their mother died; I live with that. Thanks to a sympathetic jury, I did no jail time, just had to attend classes, pick up lots of trash and meet with a probation officer, a nice young woman, married, of course, so nothing to do but joke around and be respectful. A year later, with the government still trying to decide whether to pay for a new eye, I stumbled out of my overpriced Brooklyn efficiency and down three flights of stairs to check my mail. Instead of bills I found a plain envelope with no return address. I usually bin those but I was intrigued by the neat red lettering, spelling out my rank instead of abbreviating it: Airman First Class Frederick Charles. I used to be an aerial gunner; now I'm just Freddy. I opened it carefully and found that I had won some obscure sweepstakes I couldn't remember having entered; the first prize was an eye.

Two days after I called to accept my prize, I was reclining in the ocularist's chair, having my socket injected with goo so that the mold could be made. I was present for the painting of the iris, so it would match my remaining one; I was present, although I was told I didn't need to be, for the artificial veining of the prosthesis because I was curious. Then there it was, in my head, unable to see, of course, but more or less mobile (the surrounding tissues and muscles helped). It looked perfectly natural. I was afraid to ask just how I had come to win an artificial eye. What an odd prize; why me? -- and what about the fact that I'd entered no sweepstakes? Don't look a gift eye in the pupil, right?

After that I no longer got the fish-eye from strangers, but still I kept to myself, stayed away from booze, saw an inept therapist, did a bit of construction work, sent out resumes to anyone and everyone in a vain attempt to find a permanent job, thought about re-upping, thought about drinking, and lived another day, another week, another month, in a blur. Then one night, walking through a light drizzle, bringing home a loaf of bread from the corner store, I saw something.

What I saw was a large mauve and golden dragon munching on the leg of a maiden, right there in front of my building. I blinked. The dragon was still there, still munching, blood foaming at the corner of its jaw. There was something else weird about this; I closed my right eye and I could still see the dragon! When I closed my left eye and opened the right, the dragon was gone.

I kept my left eye shut and held my bag of bread out in front of me like a shield. I walked through the space the dragon had occupied, fumbled with the keypad until I managed, with one shaking hand, to enter my security code, and lurched into the building. I fell back against the security door and opened my left eye. On the stairway was a ghoul, with ichor dripping from open wounds, slobbering over what appeared to be a chewed-up human heart. I closed the eye. The ghoul was gone.

When I got to my room I locked and chained the door, shut the window, although it was midsummer, tossed the bread onto the ironing board that served as a kitchen counter, climbed into my loft bed and opened my left eye. I saw nothing. I opened my right eye. Nothing was amiss in the room... except me. My heart pounded. My head ached. I fell back against my pillow and slept in my damp clothes.

I awoke soaked with sweat. The room looked normal, if you call a shoebox normal. It was late; I had missed my chance to get day work. Sunlight flooded through the broken blinds. I had no idea what to do with my day. I had fired my therapist. I really wanted a drink.

Somehow I forced myself to leave the room. There was nothing frightening in the hallway. I crept down the stairs; nothing blocked my way except Mrs. Nagel in her bathrobe; sometimes she lets it fall open but this time she didn't. I descended to the front door, which I slowly opened. There was nothing waiting for me on the curb. I asked the corner store clerk if he'd seen any dragons. He hadn't.

I went to work the next day; everywhere I looked I saw horrific creatures devouring innocents. I couldn't work with one eye closed. I hammered my thumb, dropped a cinder block on my foot, endangered other workers, got cursed at. Walking back from the drop-off, I saw an AC-130, a Spectre, dropping its load on the block ahead of me. I ducked; the streets, which had been empty, were now full of screaming children, children missing limbs, children hunched over their dead siblings and parents. Suddenly I understood. "I'm sorry!" I screamed, but the vision would not vanish. A slavering beast lumbered toward me out of the rubble. I plucked the prosthetic eye out of my face and threw it at him. He melted away. My surroundings were restored. I could still hear screams, though; slowly I came to realize that they were my own: "Khayrakhei!" That's one of the many villages we'd bombed, just outside of Kabul. It seemed at the time that we were bombing apples, orchard after orchard, but they told us later it was full of civilians: women, children, old people. That's war. It happens. No biggie... unless it happens to you.

Mrs. Nagel kept me company while I waited for the ambulance, but I couldn't see whether her robe was open, as I had ripped out my right eye. She screamed when I bit into it, but the beast must be fed, and I am the beast.