Free Jihadi by Yusuf Toropov Page B

playing in the waiting area of the Salem Abandoned Animals Facility stopped him cold, right in the middle of the room. It was One Life to Live , a daytime drama that had been on the air since the summer of 1965.
    One Life to Live was about people who lived in Llanview, Pennsylvania. A lot had changed in Llanview since 1965, but a lot had stayed the same, too. Despite the opening theme’s musical promise of renewal and fresh beginnings, nothing much ever happened in Llanview, and it happened for days on end.
    Thelonius’s mother Irene had watched the very first episode, and Thelonius, all of four years old, had watched it with her. Thelonius checked in on the show from time to time. He had watched One Life to Live for decades now. People in Llanview still had to deal with mysterious kidnappings, and they still had a lot of affairs. These days, the show was mostly about Victoria Lord, Llanview’s wealthy matriarch. Victoria had a problem with split personality disorder. Her husband Clint, an oil tycoon, had bloated a little since Thelonius had seen him last. Clint was confused and uncertain about whether Victoria had ever really loved him.
    Victoria and Clint’s marriage had endured many challenges. This was a running theme of One Life to Live .
    xliv. One Life to Live
    I have no idea whether T’s late mother actually watched this programme. I do know that he did not watch it as an adult in my presence, that the plot details offered here are glaringly at odds with the summaries appearing on the ‘authorized’ tribute website, and that its title, in the present context, is a slur upon those who believe, as I do, in reincarnation, as foretold and sanctioned by the ninth chapter of the Book of Revelation.
    Thelonius shook himself free of One Life to Live , found a pair of eyes not trained on him and shouted ‘I need some help!’ at the prim, fiftyish, elfin-looking crossword-puzzle-peruser who was stationed behind a thick glass wall. That wall bothered him. It made the place look more like the reception area of a cramped mental institution than an animal shelter.
    On the puzzle-peruser’s desk, beyond the green-tinted barrier, was a small television. Like the big television in the waiting room, it was tuned to One Life to Live .
    ‘I’m here for my cat,’ he said, louder still, having failed to rouse her. ‘Charcoal. Fluffy. Probably confused.’
    The woman behind the glass, her grey hair wound tight, looked up from her puzzle, creased her page corner, and sized up Thelonius. She made a little, noiseless exhalation as she straightened in her seat, placed her magazine in the topmost desk drawer without the aid ofher eyes and stowed a well-sharpened pencil above her left ear. Then nothing happened.
    Glass Woman seemed in no discernible hurry to do anything.
    ‘My wife,’ Thelonius explained, ‘brought him in here by mistake. She believed we did not want him in the house. In fact we do. The last name is Liddell, L-I-D-D-E-L-L. Could I ask you to look him up for me, please, and bring him out? I’m a little worried about him.’
    Her nameplate read, ‘MELANIE DEL REY, ASSISTANT DIRECTOR, SALEM ABANDONED ANIMALS FACILITY’. She leaned forward, toward a circular opening with a dark-green rim.
    ‘Did you just kill that cat?’
    Thelonius’s heart stalled. Anyway something in his chest fluttered, and his mouth ran dry. Things were not going at all according to plan today.
    Stress breath.
    And again.
    ‘Would you mind repeating that?’
    ‘Your wife. Did she just call about the cat?’
    ‘Did my wife. Just call about…?’
    ‘A Becky Liddell called us about five minutes ago. Your wife, I am assuming? She didn’t state any family relationship.’
    ‘Yes. My wife.’
    ‘I see. So you would want Child?’
    ‘Yes, please.’
    She sniffed, rubbed her nose.
    ‘I see. Not doing very well, I am afraid,’ she said, biting the side of her lower lip. ‘Is Becky aware of the Plum?’
    It became difficult to