My instinct was to move away from the window, but I was drawn to the vision outside of it. The wind had kicked up, clearing patches in the smoke, just as it had back in ’44.
Through the hollows in the curling gray-white, I saw them. Poor wretched souls they were. Bodies toppled upon bodies in piles of anonymous death. Men dropped so rapidly that they still clutched their guns, eyes blank, staring at comrades who battled forward only to be cut down themselves a few feet farther on. The sand ran red with their life, terrible crimson rivers straight from hell.
And as the mist retreated, I saw their eyes. Eyes I’d never before seen in the visions. Open eyes, hundreds of them, all turned toward me. Unseeing, unmoving—but knowing. So knowing.
A low phht zinged past my face, close enough that I felt the air move and the heat of it. Phht—another. Phht—and another. I ducked down below the windowsill. Claire quickly moved beside me. I wanted to turn to her and explain. Whatever it was that she saw, it was not what she thought. It couldn’t be.
Yet the room glowed with the color of exploding armaments, the smell so strong I was beginning to gag.
I knew I should move, do something. Get Claire out of there. But I was frozen, afraid, and weak, just as I had been seventy years before. And just as I had done at eighteen, so I did at eighty-eight: I lay there, and I prayed for it to end.
Chapter 4
The memory of that morning was so vivid that I could still taste the salt of the sand in my mouth and feel the grit between my teeth. I lay on Omaha Beach, on June 6, 1944. I’d made it under the machine gun bunkers.
By then, five hundred men had already died so that some of us—the lucky few—could make it there to the overhang of the salt cliffs. In its shadow, we would be safe. When enough of us were there, we would climb up and over and overrun the gunners. More would die, but it was our best chance.
So I waited as instructed, gathering my breath in short, hurried gulps, not daring to look back down the beach toward the sea. I didn’t want to the see those left behind. Hearing them was bad enough.
I’d been there ten minutes when I saw, under the shadows of the cliffs, a man moving sideways toward me, crawling on his arms and knees. For one terrifying moment, I thought it was a Jerry bastard.
I struggled frantically with my gun, trying to heave it around and level it up before me, ready to fire. My hands shook so much that if it had been the enemy, I would have been dead.
Turned out it was our reedy platoon sergeant, Bill Black—an ex-jockey we called Blackey.
He took one look at me and whispered through gritted teeth, “Calm down, Baker.”
“How?” would have been my answer if I could have spoken, but my teeth were chattering too much. My body was rigid; the only part of me moving was my shaking hands, and I had no control over that. We’d fallen into hell, or more accurately, been offloaded into hell. And no amount of training could prepare a fresh-faced eighteen-year-old for this.
But I tried to follow Blackey’s orders, tried to still my hands, my jaw. Reaching for a chain around my neck, I pulled at the Saint Christopher’s medal my mother had given me the day we shipped out.
Then I took five deep breaths.
Between the second and the third, I felt my heart slow a little.
Somehow, by the fifth, I’d brought my panic under some kind of control.
Blackey saw it in my face—that I’d come back from the edge. And I’ve often wondered: if I’d succumbed to my hysteria… if he hadn’t picked me… if he had moved on to some other hapless soul… how would my life have turned out?
But I did calm down, and when he saw that I was quiet, he began to speak in a clear, frighteningly calm voice, his gaze never leaving my face. His dark brown eyes bored into me as each word left his mouth and sank into my brain.
“That’s right… Breathe, son. Okay? Good. Now listen, Baker. I need you to do something. It’s very important. Do you understand?”
My head nodded automatically. He was my superior; even if I didn’t agree, I would do whatever he commanded. They’d trained us well, and explained in detail what would happen if we disobeyed or abandoned our post in combat.
“Right. Now stay with me, Baker. For some reason, we can’t get through on the radios to the landing vessels.”
He paused, letting that sink in, though I couldn’t understand why he was telling me. I wasn’t a radio operator, so I couldn’t help him with that. I was still trying to comprehend why he was talking to me, thinking maybe he’d mistaken me for someone else. In fact, I was about to set him straight when he continued.
“I need you to go back down the beach, back to the landing crafts, and find Colonel Ryan. Tell him to stop the landings and to retreat. Able and Baker Companies and the 5th Rangers radioed us ten minutes ago. They’re inland and moving forward. They’re certain they can take this bluff from the rear. This beach assault is suicide. We need to send the landing troops back to avoid unacceptable casualties. Each minute we lose hundreds—in an hour, thousands.”
Then he raised his voice to almost a shout. “Understand, soldier?”
My head moved as if encased in Jell-O; I nodded before I fully understood his words, before it had sunk in that he wanted me to go back down that beach, face the gunfire and the grenades, crawl through the broken bodies, and do what—save the day?
I wouldn’t make it. I knew that in my heart. He was asking me to die. Sending me to die, when I’d only just made it here to safety. Here, where they’d told me to wait for the others. Here, where I wouldn’t die just yet—where I had a chance.
“Soldier! You understand? You go now. Every second counts.”
He reached out and tapped my helmet, as you might pat an obedient hound. “Good man, Baker.” Then, assured by my nodding, he was off, traveling back the way he had come.
And I was alone.
I swiveled my head around to look down the beach, through the smoke of the battle and the mist of the morning. The combination was so heavy that I could barely see twenty feet.
Then I turned back to look for Blackey, to tell him “no,” that I couldn’t do it. But he had already disappeared behind the curves of the dunes.
Panic overwhelmed me. With each beat of my heart, it spread through my body like an immobilizing poison. Every breath I took echoed in my head so loudly that I imagined the enemy would hear me, peer over the top of their dugout, and lay a stream of machine gun fire into my position.
I burrowed my cheek into the cool grains of sand and held it there. The sand formed a perfect pillow, calling to me like a siren to stay in the shadows, in the safety.
But there were men back there; “thousands,” Blackey had said, who needed me to go down the beach and send them back to safety. I was one man, and yet, somehow, this enormous responsibility had fallen upon me. Eighteen years old and asked to be a hero, when twelve months ago I had been nothing more than an insurance company clerk.
I rolled over and stood against the sandbank, propped straight up by my backpack. The sun was moving higher in the sky, lifting the gray cloak of mist, and the vista of the beach lay before me. Bodies in green and tan splattered with red dotted the cream landscape. Large crossed planks of wood and steel—“Rommel’s Asparagus” we called them—some with barbed wire, obstruction barriers against our landing parties, lay scattered along the beach like a giant game of jacks.
Even over the ceaseless gunfire, I could hear the moaning. Multitudes of injured and dying, sounding more like animals than men. Just listening to it was agonizing.
The unnaturalness of it all—me, on this foreign land, staring at this scene beyond anyone’s wildest imagination—overwhelmed me.
Every second counts.
I checked my gun, the feel of the cold metal in my palm really of little comfort. Much good the gun would do me. When the bullet came, I wouldn’t see it. It would hit me in the back of my head or my body. My only chance was to weave and crouch. And pray.
And that was a lot to remem
ber.
A hum, growing stronger every second, built in my head. Every breath I took sounded so loud it felt as if an airtight bubble had settled over my head. My heart banged into my ribs.
Thu-ump. Thu-ump. Thu-ump. It beat so hard it hurt.
I took a step. And then another. I twisted my head at an unnatural angle to peer up at the bunkers.
Thu-ump. Thu-ump.
I knew I couldn’t stop now. If I stopped, I wouldn’t have the strength—no, the courage—to keep going.
Another two steps and I’d left the shade. A few more, and I’d be in the line of sight of the gunners. The rushing of blood through my temples, now an accompaniment to my heart.
Thu-ump. Thu-ump.
Two more steps and I’d be there.
The kill zone.
Something took over at that point: legs that felt like jelly, muscles behaving like loose strings of fiber, were suddenly filled with steel. My body, pumping adrenaline, took off of its own accord, with me along for the ride. A silent, terrified passenger.
Without thinking, I ran left five paces. Then fell to the ground.
Breathe. Breathe.
Thu-ump. Thu-ump.
Then up again. Springing like a cat.
My legs pumping, driving into the sand.
Another five paces to the left. Then three to the right.
Longer strides, stretching. If they were scoping me, they couldn’t anticipate how far I would travel.
Then down. Flat on my stomach, near a barrier.
Breathe. Thu-ump. Breathe.
Mouth in the sand, eating grit, my body nestled against other bodies—dead, motionless, bloody bodies. Sucking in oxygen, as if I’d just surfaced from a deep-water dive.
God, my chest ached.
Don’t panic, Jack.
Thu-ump. Breathe!
And pray. Remember to pray.
God, please save me.
Tilting my head up from where I lay, I looked back up the beach. I’d only traveled fifteen feet. This zigzagging was getting me nowhere. I had to hurry. Get out of here. Keep moving. That’s what they’d drilled into us.
Breathe. Breathe. Breathe.
Stand up, Jack.
As I jumped up, I heard the zing. Then a sharp sting. It caught me in the right calf, sending me toppling over. It hurt for a second; then there was little pain. That shocked me more than the hit. When something enters your body at that speed, you expect something more. It just felt hot, like the worst bee sting you’ve ever had.
I lay facedown in the sand, waiting. Seconds became minutes of just breathing, containing the panic.
Nothing.
They hadn’t targeted me. It was a random bullet.
Slowly sliding my leg up along the sand, I reached around and touched the wound. There was an entry and an exit. That was good. Tentatively, I pushed my right foot into the sand, checking to see if it still had strength to bear me. It felt solid. It still didn’t hurt too badly, though it was beginning to throb, as if I’d banged it against the side of a door.
From my dropped position, I surveyed my immediate surroundings. Bodies of the fallen were everywhere. Now I was in the middle of it.
Three feet to my left, one poor fellow had lost half his head, the eyeball socket empty except for a dark red cave which I could see light shining through. The other eye stared at me—a gentle brown eye that had once looked upon the hills of California, or the Brooklyn Bridge, or the skyscrapers of Chicago, or even some small country town, a whistle-stop on the way to the city. That eye was seeing nothing ever again. It was a hideous, frightening sight, but I had to ignore my revulsion, or that would be me soon enough.
A black army boot lay on its own above the head, abandoned and missing its partner. It didn’t belong to the man with the eye. He still wore both of his.
What a strange place to kick off a boot, I thought, until I realized that within the boot nestled a foot and part of a leg. Above the bloodied calf, with its jagged white bone protruding through the torn and pulped muscle and sinew, was nothing. A quick scan revealed no owner nearby. Abandoned, forever lost to its owner who must have somehow staggered away. It left me with only one question. How far had he gotten?
Beyond these two horrors were many more bodies, more parts of bodies. It was a slaughterhouse gone crazy. Pieces of men thrown everywhere. I could hear some men farther away still alive, still calling for help or screaming in a hideous, hysterical pitch, but there was not a soul left alive near me.
The idea hit me like a chiming bell at the exact same moment a bullet whizzed past. It hit the sand inches from my face, flicking up sharp grains that stung my eyes.
I tried to dismiss the idea, but each time I did, my mind dragged it back and stubbornly held it before me. My instinct to survive just wouldn’t let it go.
If I stood up and kept running—no matter how much I zigzagged—those gunners would get me. No doubt in my mind. I might make it to the landing parties, but what would be left of me? The image of my leg or my arm lying somewhere farther down the beach, while I crawled away in agony, filled my imagination.
This injury, which I’d thought was a terrible piece of bad luck, was perhaps my salvation. Here was my plausible excuse.
It was, wasn’t it?
I took the story out for a spin—ran it through my mind. Backward. Forward. It was reasonable. Nobody could ever say any different. I was hit, and I blacked out. What happened after that, I couldn’t say.
If it weren’t for the other brave soldiers’ bodies falling on me, covering me, I would have died, too. I tried to get through, I would tell them. If it weren’t for that bullet…Yes, if the bullet hadn’t found me, I would have carried out my orders. I wanted to be a hero, but it was terrible bad luck. Blackey had said that the beach would shortly be ours. I only needed to wait it out.
Who would know?
Another bullet skimmed overhead, only inches away. That was all the encouragement I needed. Pushing my gun away, I crawled the few feet toward “One-Eye.” Stretching my neck up, just over his waist, I peered over. There was the owner of the boot. He hadn’t gotten very far. His body lay in a shallow trench at a crazy angle just a few feet away. Thank God his face was turned in the other direction.
With all the strength I could muster, I half-dived, half-crawled over One-Eye to land between the two bodies. Then I pulled One-Eye inward, trying to keep his face out of my sight. I couldn’t bear to look at his face for too long. I cursed the weight of the body. It was heavier than it looked. It only needed to be moved a foot at the most. The sand gave a little with the force of my tugging and that made the job of pulling it toward me easier.
Once he was in place, I turned my attention to the other body, grabbing it by the belt. This was more difficult because I couldn’t move around too much or I would dislodge One-Eye. But after several sharp tugs, I managed it.
Now I was sandwiched between the two, and all I needed was to snuggle beneath them and lay still. The overpowering smell of blood and gunpowder, combined with the exertion and the heat, made me feel sick. I turned my head into the sand and retched violently, as I’d never vomited before. The heaving didn’t stop until the only thing left in my stomach was bile, and still it came.
It surprised me how calm I had become. The thought of surviving was a balm to my terror. My leg, though, had started to throb and itch. I reached down to scratch at it, gritting my teeth against pain that was increasing with every second. Each movement I made was slow and careful, even though I wanted to scratch the hell out of it. I thought the bodies would provide protection, but I was uncertain how much.
Tears ran down my cheeks, as much as I tried to hold them back. I didn’t sob; they were silent tears. If I cried, my chest might heave, and I couldn’t risk the movement.
I closed my eyes in an effort to stem the flow. But with my eyes closed, my hearing became more acute. The whistling of the bullets, the punch and crack of the explosions in the distance, the shouts from both sides, th
e screaming of nearby men mortally wounded. Hell on Earth. Hell on Earth and beyond.
A string of bullets laced through One-Eye, the soft thwack sound and the slight jump of the body as each one found its mark. I was terrified. I wanted to jump up and run. But once it stopped, I realized no bullets had found me.
My heart took off again.
Thu-ump. Thu-ump. Thu-ump.
It beat so hard I thought it would lift me off the ground.
I held my body rigid, hardly daring to breathe. Playing dead was easier when death surrounded you.
I counted to one hundred, not breathing until I reached fifteen, and then each ten after that. Then I would take a shallow breath through my nose, just in case a sniper had seen me and was waiting for my movement. I imagined him patiently watching through his scope. When he saw no movement, he would blink and then swing his rifle to another unfortunate target.
After one hundred, I opened my eyes, the only part of my body I dared allow to move. Another minute passed as I lay there, breathing every count of ten, only my eyes moving as I scanned the immediate area.
I realized that when the bullets had struck my savior’s body, the force had moved him slightly off of me. My legs were now exposed. I needed to get him back over me, and again burrow myself into the cave created by the two corpses. So again, I began the strenuous process of moving the body. As I half-twisted around, pulling at the belt of One-Eye, prodding at him, trying to maneuver his body over mine, he came upon me—almost stepped on me.
I saw him at the same moment that he saw me.
Charlie O’Shea was in the 5th Ranger Battalion. I knew him because, in the previous week, we had shared training games with them. We weren’t friends, but we knew each other enough to nod and say hello. It had gotten around that he was one of the best lightweight boxers they had in the company. They’d said when he got home—if he got home—he had a future in the sport. World class, apparently.
Now Charlie O’Shea, champion boxer and soldier, was staring at me. He stood there, facing up the beach, his rifle clutched in his hands. His face, though, turned in my direction, revealing by just the lift of his eyebrow that he’d recognized me for sure.
From the Indie Side Page 20