Tony is cold, stripped of clothes, skin, nerves, stripped of layers, coatings, time. He is raw. He can hear the chanting in the valley, knows the attack will come. He hears the bugles, hears the sounds oozing from the earth, from the core, from hell. He cannot talk, cannot move toward the speakers, the bikes under the solitary elm. He thinks to tell them of his brother, how his brother once held a wounded friend whom a sniper killed, how his brother saw women, children, human shields, murdered, how his brother ... He cannot think, cannot talk of such things. He turns, looks at the fire, the glow of the coals, the occasional spurt of flame, the dark silhouettes sitting on logs, laughing. He hears Linda’s giggle. Big Bonnie rises, comes to the field, sees him, speaks but Tony doesn’t compreh
