The Tarnished Shooter

by Charles James

  Just before Halloween, another recruit received a plastic pumpkin full of candy in the mail. Mail was always opened in the presence of a drill instructor just in case there was contraband. Once the drill instructor saw the pumpkin filled with candy, he thought it would be entertaining to make the private eat all the candy in front of the whole platoon and wash it down with Listerine—a not so tasty mouthwash. The punishment sent the whole platoon into a blaze of laughter. The recruit managed to chew up half the candy and drink a quarter of the bottle of mouthwash before he got sick. The drill instructor passed out the rest of the candy to the platoon.

  During hand to hand combat training we learned a technique for sentry removal. A recruit would approach another recruit from behind playing the sentry. He’d place a short piece of rubber hose around the throat cross armed and then pull him back causing the sentry to lose balance which increased the pressure on the hose around the sentry’s throat. The technique worked so well because it cut off the blood supply to the brain while also cutting off the air supply. The attacking recruit then dragged the sentry backwards for fifteen feet or until the sentry passed out. We had to practice on each other until we could do it with ease. I passed out within seconds after being dragged only a few feet. And I was able to do it to a big guy without much effort.

  We were also taught the chokehold that used the same principle by cutting off the blood supply to the brain while cutting off the air supply. It was a technique that worked fast and efficient, resulting in an opponent losing consciousness in only a few seconds.

  Hand to hand combat training was full contact which required us to knock our opponent unconscious while fighting in an outdoor ring. I remember being knocked out during pugil stick fighting. A pugil stick looks like a giant Q-tip and is held in two hands like a rifle. I had been ordered in the ring to fight a black recruit who out-weighed me by at least twenty pounds. In another fight my opponent had a pugel stick and I had a rubber knife—the object being to see who could destroy who first while learning lessons of close quarter combat. The knife fighter had to disarm the opponent then strike him in the knife kill zone. They were very intense fights.

  Routines were built into the training. Every night before we hit the rack we stood on top of our footlocker in our skivvies so we could be inspected. They looked for clean skivvies, toe jamb, and fingernails that needed trimming. As the drill instructor inspected us, we extended our arms turning our hands up then down again. If we didn’t have any problems we shouted, “Sir, no problems, Sir!” If we didn’t shout loud enough, we were made to get down and do some push-ups. Whenever we addressed a drill instructor the volume of our voice had to be loud, almost screaming with a self-assured answer or question.

  We slept with our rifles locked to our “racks”, the Marine word for beds. At first we trained with M-14 fully automatic rifles, then with M-16 fully automatic rifles. When we double-timed during physical fitness training, we sang little rhymes like, "If I die on the Russian front, bury me with a Russian cunt." Another little ditty went like this, "I want to be a recon ranger, I want to live a life of danger—Marine Corps—Marine Corps—my corps—your corps—our corps—one, two, three, and four—Marine Corps!”

  Everything was drilled into our minds while we were marching or running. I learned later from psychology books that repeating statements while marching or running is a powerful method for imbedding hypnotic suggestions, which I believe is why at the end of thirteen weeks most of us felt like programmed killers, with the guilt of killing eliminated from our minds, all for the good of the country.

  By the end of the thirteen weeks, we all thought like the rest of the Marines who were training us. The term, once a Marine always a Marine, is probably a true statement. We will never be able to forget what we learned. Those teachings are there consciously and subconsciously imbedded into the deepest recesses of our consciousness. There is nothing like having your brain handed back to you in a paper bag. At least that’s the way it felt to me. We had gone three months without a TV or radio to distract our train of thought. On Sundays, we did our laundry, scrubbing our utilities and skivvies by hand, then letting them air dry. Nothing was easy. We did everything the hard way. It was all part of the training to teach self-sufficiency and to gain a never-quit attitude.

  One of the last challenges we had to complete before graduating infantry training was to climb “mount motherfucker” carrying a fifty pound pack, our helmet, duce gear, and toting our M-16 rifle. The mountain looked and felt like it was an almost vertical climb some two-thousand feet up. The mountain climb was a true test of our physical fitness because we had to force-march a few miles to get to the mountain then climb the thing at almost double time. By the time we got to the mountain we were all feeling pretty cocky and had no doubt we could climb it. The drill instructors were happy everyone succeeded to the top.

  The day before we graduated from boot camp, we were told where we were going and what our military occupation would be if we completed the ordered schooling. I had scored high on the multiple electrical and mechanical tests and was headed for Marine Corps Engineer School at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina to attend electrical equipment repair specialist school. Everyone said, “Barker I didn’t know you were so fucking smart.”

  The training was to be an intensive sixteen week course learning how to repair radar and power generators. I would learn about electricity, electronics and diesel engines. I was glad I wasn't going to go to grunt school or any of the other combat arms like artillery or tanks. Those guys lived in tents and were constantly out in the field training. Infantry training in boot camp was enough snake infested backwoods tent-living for me. At least I could learn something I could use as a civilian, and besides, I always liked fooling around with electrical devices.

  The next day I flew out of San Diego, California with six-hundred dollars cash and proudly wearing a National Service Defense Medal for being a Vietnam-Era Marine and a sharpshooters badge on my winter dress green Marine Corps uniform. I was a seventeen-year-old lean green killing machine. That day would be the proudest moment of my life, nothing would ever compare to that accomplishment. We all learned we wouldn’t be going to Vietnam because after too many years of young men killing and dying, the war was finally winding down. Even though we were trained for jungle warfare, most of the Marines were already out of the Nam and most likely wouldn’t be going back.

  ****

  When I landed at my hometown airport, my mother, my buddy Clem’s dad, and my younger brothers were all there to greet me. They said I walked different and acted different. People stared at me when I went into the drug store to buy a pack of cigarettes and the girls at the checkout counter couldn't keep their eyes off of me. I felt like a changed person, for the better I didn't know, but something was different. I was so transformed; sometimes I didn’t even know who I really was, almost like I was in a play or a movie. I was different. I wanted to go out and kill something. It was hard to remember what I was like three months prior.

  I had fifteen days leave before I had to report to my next duty station.

  Clem had joined the Marines a month later than me and was in boot camp when I got home. I partied with my sister Joanna and her fiancé. He was an Army Vietnam veteran who had served three combat tours as a helicopter crew chief and door gunner. He never talked about the war or his experiences over there. He was into drugs like pot and pharmaceutical speed and he sometimes had a streak of rage. Once my sister and I rode along with him to his home town so he could pick up some drugs. I thought we were going to end up mangled and dead from a head on collision because he drove so aggressively. Joanna had met the guy at the county fair. I thought he was kind of a strange dude because he always seemed to have this faraway look in his eyes, as if he was in a trance remembering, or reliving something. He was a guy who saw a lot of combat and knew what the military and war did to transform boys into killers.

  He had a buddy named, Teddy Northland. Everyone called him Little-T,
on account of his size. He was at the most five-foot two inches, but a muscular guy, with a coiled up green snake tattooed over his entire back. What made him so interesting was that for his size he was a real strong and tough guy. He worked in the West Virginia coal mines before he decided to break out of that lifestyle to join the carnival. His shoulder length blond hair and chiseled face made him look like one of those little troll dolls that were so popular in the late sixties.

  Little-T lived like a Tasmanian devil; he went where ever he wanted to go and never worried about anything. He was a whirlwind of energy and fun to be with in a bar. One night out in our favorite hangout there was a fight at the far end of the bar. Little-T jumped up on the bar running it’s full length in cowboy boots kicking over mixed drinks and beer bottles to get to the guy who was getting his ass whipped by a couple of bikers. After Little-T pulled the two attacking bikers off, he punched them mercilessly until they ran out the door. Little-T easily made friends in the bar after that. I didn’t get along very well with my sister's fiancé, but I always got along with Little-T; he got to be like an older, but little brother to me.

  When I was home on leave, we had parties at the house like the days before I’d left, but they didn't seem the same. Maybe it was because Clem wasn’t around or maybe I had changed so much. The house was a mess and everyone seemed so lazy. It might have been that way before I left, but I hadn’t noticed it. I had spent the last three months making sure everything I wore was spotlessly cleaned and shined up. When I looked around at the way my family was living, it depressed and angered me. Their lack of motivation was easily noticed by me.

  I became the bad guy when I tried to get my younger brothers and sisters to clean the place up and live like they were proud of their home. I started dumping booze down the drain in attempts to stop all the drinking and stupid nonsense that was going on.

  Again Jenifer, and Jake, started talking to me about the weird things going on in the house. They said they saw weird faces looking at them through the vented openings in the bedroom doors. Tony swears the house was haunted. He said he saw unknown people in the house too. I never saw anything that I would have considered paranormal or spooky. I had developed such a keen sense of intuition, I think I would have picked up on some strange energies if they were there.

  But I do remember times after my father drowned, when I was in the house alone there seemed to be a suffocating energy to a point where I had to get out. Sometimes even the hair on the back of my neck stood up for no reason. I would go running down the stairs and fly out the back door. Once I was outside, I wondered why I had just run out. What was there to be afraid of? I thought maybe the house was the reason for all the bad luck that occurred since we’d moved in. If good things can happen, it makes sense that bad things could also happen. Negative energies could manifest just about anywhere. Memories of times passed made me think maybe I was the next one to die. My father’s death before his time instilled a time bomb mentality in me about my own demise. He died when he was becoming more successful. I feared if I ever got to be successful, it would be curtains for me too. Another thought I had was if my physical life wasn’t going to end, maybe it would be something else like my reputation or my freedom. When I was in that house alone, my mind was filled with self-defeating thoughts.

  Somehow Little-T had moved into the house along with other strays Ma had taken in. One was a chick Joanna had just met. After only a couple weeks she acted like she owned the place. A few weeks after she moved in, she was moved out. Her things were thrown outside in a pile. She had overstayed her welcome because of her attitude. Episodes like that made me think I didn't know whose house it was anymore, and when I tried to enforce some rules, everyone just ignored me or thought I was some kind of an asshole. And then Ma remarried. The guy had some issues. Not long after they were married he started threatening he was going to knock her teeth out. When Jack and I heard him say those kinds of things to her one night, we knew we had to put an end to it. We looked at each other, grabbed him by an arm, escorted him out the door, threw him in the lake and told him to get the fuck out and never come back. Nobody was ever going to threaten anyone in our family, least not some deranged man who thought he was going to threaten our mother and rule the roost.

  My brother, Leland, had gotten himself into a bit of a jam while I was at boot camp. He went with one of his buddies on a little shoplifting spree and ended up getting caught. He was still a juvenile and should have just gotten a slap on the back of his hand—“naughty boy!” Instead, the district attorney wanted to send his ass up the river for six months. He wanted to hang a contrived felony rap on Leland. You talk about a cheap shot! We couldn’t even believe it was legal to do such a thing. How a few pieces of worthless dime-store junk that would be forgotten in a week or two could carry such life changing power, was beyond logic. There was a bunch of legal hocus–pocus going on for a couple of months between social services, Leland’s lawyer, and the district attorney’s office.

  Leland ended up getting probation. He was assigned the same probation officer I had, Mr. J.B. Orlander. I always called him, Mr. Wonderful, because to me he thought he was God’s gift to the world. In my eyes he was a real prick who wanted to bury us boys because of our lost and reckless behavior. Leland lived on the chopping block just like I did, fearing he would get sent up to a state correctional institution for boys at the drop of a hat.

  It only took a couple months before Mr. Wonderful found a reason to revoke Leland’s probation and send him packing for a state school for boys to do a six month stretch. We knew what that place was like, having visited Clem when he was incarcerated there. Ma was pissed off because she was losing everyone either to the military or jail. Michelle, Leland’s girlfriend darned near had a nervous breakdown with thoughts of never seeing her beloved again. She cried he would end up lost to the corrections system which did nothing but chew up and spit out so many young lives.

  Then Tony got sent away for six months to a group home located in town. He was getting into trouble and social services determined he needed a controlled living environment with supervision. Tony was a kid who never hurt anyone, but didn’t have enough motivation or direction either. I don’t know if the mandated supervision did anything for him other than piss him off at government rules and regulations. We were all targets for nosey do-gooder social services workers or trigger happy cops looking to take us down.

  On my last Friday night home, Little-T was driving an old station wagon and Jack and I were passengers. Little-T was drunk and recklessly went cruising through a stop sign, T-boning a car also going through the intersection. The station wagon and the other car were just about totaled. Jack put his hands on the dash to brace himself for the crash and the force of the colliding cars was enough to break both of his wrists. He knocked out his two front teeth when his face went slamming into the dashboard. Little-T didn’t have a driver’s license. As Jack lay on the ground suffering from the pain, Little-T asked him if he would take the rap and say he was the one driving. I didn’t have a license so I couldn’t take the rap. Jack agreed. When the cops came and started asking questions it was Jack who took the heat for the accident. He ended up with both arms in a cast for six weeks and two busted teeth for our little drunken car ride. Plus numerous charges: driving under the influence of alcohol, failure to stop at a stop sign, excessive speed. The charges ended up costing him a pile of money for fines. Little-T promised to help Jack out with the fine money. It was things like taking the rap for each other that made us such a tight and dangerous bunch.

  Chapter 17

  I had to leave all that excitement behind and move on to Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. When I arrived at the Jacksonville, NC airport there were taxis lined up ready and waiting to take Marines onto the base.

  As I jumped in one of the taxis and stated my destination, I was lucky the driver knew right where to go. I had to show my military ID at the guard shack to get on base. Once on base my senses were taken over by
the sights, sounds, and smells of a huge war machine. Helicopter blades thumped against an evening sky. Diesel exhaust fumes filled the air currents as trucks and amphibious troop carriers maneuvered. Young Marines were everywhere saluting superior officers as they moved about the base. Everything was clean and orderly as if an obsessed team of maintenance personnel worked around the clock. I was now a part of it all. As much as I hated my father, I wish he could have seen me in my Marine Corps uniform. I’ll bet he would have bragged about me to all his buddies.

  I had to get another ride to an outpost on the base called Courthouse Bay where the engineering school was. The school would be my new home for at least four months. When I got to the barracks, a Marine on duty checked me in and assigned me a rack and a wall locker. The open barracks housed about eighty or ninety Marines. During the day, before and after classes, there seemed to be twenty different loud radios and tape players playing at the same time. The blacks, whites, Mexicans and Native Americans all shared the space and they all listened to their own kind of music. Usually there were five or six stereos within earshot, all competing to be heard. Everyone eyeballed the new Marines that arrived on an almost daily basis. I bunked near the other fourteen Marines who were going through electrical equipment repair school.

  I was the youngest in the class and probably the only one without a high school diploma. Some of the guys were college graduates—one even had a degree in physics. I thought it was exciting and I was told when we graduated from this school we would have our choice of overseas duty stations. I just hoped I had what it took to complete the course.

  In a couple of weeks the class was formed and we marched to class every day as the class leader, a PFC, called cadence. The class leader was a twenty-something kiss-ass who wanted to go to officer candidate school. He was all business and had already been promoted to a PFC when he graduated boot camp.