One Man's War

by P. M. Kippert

  “Marshak!” he said. “Marshak!”

  Kafak tossed down his weapon and knelt on both knees beside Marshak. Marshak’s helmet was gone. So was part of his head. He’d taken a slug from the 20 mm gun. It had split his head like a meat cleaver, had cut his skull wide open. Kafak stared at him, wide-eyed. He couldn’t believe it, was the thing. All blood and brains and bone where once there had been a guy he knew. Kafak knelt there for what seemed a long time, hours maybe. But in only seconds a sergeant he didn’t know came over and genuflected next to Kafak.

  “That fella’s bought it, soldier,” he said to Kafak.

  “What?” Kafak said.

  “He a good friend of yours?”

  “What?”

  “This guy, he a friend of yours?”

  Kafak paused. He frowned. He stared at Marshak. Then he shook his head and picked up his gun.

  “Aw fuck,” he said. “Fucking motherfucker.”

  Kafak stood up and vaulted over the lip of the trench and moved forward with about half a dozen other guys. He didn’t know where they were going or what they’d been ordered to do. His first group was well out of sight by this time. He just followed these other guys and figured to do whatever it was they were supposed to do. After advancing about halfway to the farmhouse on their bellies, Kafak came to a tree with no leaves and only a few limbs. It had a nice thick trunk he could get behind, though. He rose up and peppered the farmhouse with his Thompson. He was screaming.

  “Motherfuckingsonsofbitchfuckingbastardmotherfuckingcocksuckers!”

  Guys around him were shouting as well. The same things. And all of them laying down a hard fire on the farmhouse. Tossing grenades. The Germans were giving as good as they were getting, but Kafak thought that at least a couple of the machine guns had been silenced. He still heard the hot sound of that 20 mm, though. Luckily, the 20 was firing at the trench line, trying to keep the rest of the Americans’ heads down, keep them trapped in the trench, while the machine guns mowed down the troops who had made it closer to the house. Kafak saw a few potato mashers flying through the air as well. The Germans must have had a radio inside that building because, all of a sudden, mortar shells started dropping. A spotter was walking them toward the trench line. It was dangerous because one wrong shot could have hit the German position itself, but they were desperate and knew they’d eventually be overrun without the artillery support. This way, they might still be overrun but they’d take a hell of a lot of folks with them. And if the mortar fire became effective enough, they might halt the Americans in their tracks.

  Kafak kept firing. It seemed hours. It definitely lasted at least a couple of minutes, which was a hell of a long time to be out here like he was, attacking a fortified position. Kafak was taking his chances all right. He didn’t care. He couldn’t think about anything but firing his gun. Not killing Germans, not taking the farmhouse, not staying alive. He thought about nothing but the mechanical act of firing his Thompson. He emptied two clips and had just put in a fresh one. He was still swearing, making up words as he went along. Just saying anything. Anything that came out. Because he wasn’t actually thinking about it. It was all reflex. Training. He just fired. The third clip must have been halfway gone as well when Kafak felt something smash him in the back and send him flying. He thought someone had come up behind him and slammed him across the back with a baseball bat. Some good hitter at that, too. He lay on the ground, feeling dazed and woozy.

  “What the fuck,” he said. A whisper to himself. He tried to look around but found it difficult to move his head. He lay facedown in the dirt. For a while he couldn’t hear anything, not even his own voice when he said, “What the fuck?” again, but he knew he had said it because he had said it and he could sort of hear it in his head, in his own mind, but not in his ears. Then, gradually, his hearing came back. Muted booms at first, as if he were listening from underwater. Then they grew more and more clear, well-defined. Pretty soon he heard them clearly, and then the small arms fire as well. The firefight, he understood, was still raging around him. He wondered what the hell had happened. He tried to look around again and did a little better this time. He saw his tommy gun. He’d dropped it when he catapulted through the air. It had leaped out of his hands and now lay maybe five yards away from him. He thought to crawl to it but couldn’t get his legs to move. He tried to push himself up with his arms, but the abrupt pain of that movement made him woozy again, and he dropped back down flat on the ground, panting for breath, fighting to keep conscious. He felt someone beside him rather than saw them. He hoped it wasn’t a German. Then he thought that was a stupid thing to think. Still, it might have been, he told himself. He felt hands on him, then a voice spoke.

  “Lie still, buddy. You been hit. You with me?”

  “I’m here,” Kafak said. “But where the fuck are we?”

  “You remember the farmhouse?” the guy asked.

  “Sure,” Kafak said. “How’d we do?”

  The guy started doing something to Kafak, but Kafak couldn’t really feel it, couldn’t tell what was happening.

  The guy said, “They’re clearing out the farmhouse now.”

  “We took it?” Kafak asked.

  “Yeah. A nice job, soldier.”

  “Sure,” Kafak said. “We’re making some fucking progress now, ain’t we?”

  The guy laughed, then said, “I’m going to give you morphine.”

  “Great,” Kafak said.

  “You’re gonna be all right, soldier.”

  “Easy for you to say,” Kafak said.

  “Just stay with me, pal.”

  “Sure,” Kafak said. “Why not?”

  His eyes were closed; he felt immensely tired.

  The guy told him, “You stay with me, you hear me, son?”

  “You ever been dead?” Kafak said then.

  “No,” the guy told him, “and you ain’t dying neither, soldier. That’s a goddamned order.”

  “All right, then,” Kafak said, a mumble.

  He smiled.

  And then he passed out.

  13

  Kafak once more awoke in a hospital bed.

  He lay on his stomach, and his jaw hurt from the way it pressed against the mattress beneath him. He realized there was no pillow. That was the first thing he realized. The second thing was that he couldn’t hear any bullets or bombs. He figured that meant he had to be somewhere safe or else in heaven. Or maybe hell. But no, he decided, hell would definitely have bullets and bombs going off. This had to be heaven.

  “Well, welcome back to the living, Private,” a voice said.

  It was a female voice. Sounded like an angel’s voice. Wait, though. She had said “the living” Kafak realized. That meant he wasn’t dead, after all.

  A sudden terror gripped him. He could barely keep his voice in check when he spoke.

  He said, “Am I crippled? What the fuck? What the fuck’s going on? Am I fucked up?”

  The nurse made soothing sounds.

  “Calm down, soldier,” she said. “Calm down. You’re all right. You’re going to be just fine.”

  “You mean I’m alive, but that’s not what I’m asking,” Kafak said. His voice still rising despite his best intentions. “What I’m asking is, am I gonna be a cripple?”

  “No, Private, no, you’re not crippled. In fact, they’ll probably send you back into combat in a few months’ time.”

  Kafak paused, digesting this. It took him more than a couple of moments. He filtered her words through his brain. His thought processes seemed sluggish, tortuous. Finally, he thought he understood. If they would be able to send him back into combat in a couple of months, that meant there would be no lasting damage. He’d be all right. He was OK. He laughed. Out loud.

  “Thank God,” he said.

  “Well,” the nurse told him, “I’ve never heard of anyone being so happy to know that they were going to be sent back into combat.”

  “Sure, you don’t understand,” Kafak said.
/>   “So tell me, soldier.”

  “It means I ain’t dead,” Kafak said.

  “That’s right,” the nurse told him. “Otherwise, you couldn’t be talking to me.”

  “Unless you were dead, too,” Kafak said. He frowned, thinking this one over. Then he added, “Maybe. I’m not really sure how all that stuff would work.”

  The nurse laughed.

  “Well,” she said, “I’m not dead, Private. Leastwise, not the last time I checked.”

  “Good. That’s good,” Kafak said.

  “Yes, I suppose it is. For the both of us.”

  “And that means, too,” Kafak said, “that I ain’t crippled up.”

  “No. You’re not, soldier.”

  “Thank God,” Kafak said again.

  “You get some rest now. The doctor will want to take a look at you in a bit. OK?”

  “Sure,” Kafak said. “Sure thing.”

  Everything was all right now.

  He fell asleep.

  He woke when he felt hands pressing on his back. No pain, just pressure.

  “Healing nicely,” he heard a voice say.

  This time a man’s voice. The same female voice replied, though.

  “I thought so, too.”

  “Hey,” Kafak said, his own words still dripping sleep, “what’s going on back there?”

  The male chuckled, and the female said, “He’s a lively one, Doctor. I’ve already found that out.”

  “Good,” the doctor said. “That shows his wounds haven’t affected him mentally.” He came around to stand where Kafak could see him. “I’m Dr. Gibbs,” he said. “I’ve been your surgeon, and I’m in charge of your case.” He waved a hand to the woman standing beside him. Kafak thought the girl beautiful. And not just because she was female. And not just because they had earlier determined that she was alive and that meant Kafak was alive as well. She was truly beautiful. Like a movie actress or something. The girl that played the ingenue. That sort of looker. Kafak fell halfway in love right then. The doctor introduced her. “This is Nurse Madeline Sullivan. She’s in charge of this ward, and I wouldn’t advise crossing her.”

  “Make life tough for me,” Sullivan said, “and I’ll smack you across the back.”

  “See what I mean?” Gibbs said, laughing.

  “I got wounded,” Kafak said then. Remembered.

  Gibbs stopped laughing.

  “You did,” he said. “Do you remember anything about it?”

  “We were taking a farmhouse near Cisterna, during the Breakout,” Kafak said. He frowned. “Something smacked me in the back.” He stopped frowning and looked at Nurse Sullivan. “Was that you?” he said.

  She laughed and the doctor laughed, too.

  “I can’t take credit for that one,” Sullivan told Kafak. “But just wait until the next time.”

  “He is a lively one, isn’t he?” Gibbs said.

  “He’s going to be just fine.”

  “You are,” Gibbs told Kafak. “That’s for sure.”

  “So how’s it look?” Kafak asked. “For real, I mean.”

  “Well,” Gibbs said, “you had a pretty big hole in your back. Shrapnel ripped you up pretty well. Most likely from a mortar shell. Could have been a couple of grenades as well. A pretty decent amount of shrapnel, though, so a pretty good explosion, I’d estimate. We had to remove the shrapnel, of course, and to do that, we had to cut away a good deal of your flesh at the site of the wound. A lot of that will grow back, but maybe not all of it. The muscles there were affected as well, but not so badly. All of that tissue will regenerate in time.”

  “And then I’ll be ready to be sent back for combat duty, huh?” Kafak said. He looked at the nurse and smiled.

  She smiled back. It beamed like a flare over a desolate landscape. Now he was all the way in love.

  She looked at the doctor.

  “I told him that when he was concerned he might have been negatively affected by the wound. It seemed the easiest and fastest way to alleviate his fears on that score.”

  “Really?” Gibbs said. He raised a brow. “Well, sending a guy back to combat hardly seems reassuring to me.”

  “It worked, though. Didn’t it, soldier?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Kafak said.

  Gibbs laughed, said, “Well, good enough, then. You rest easy, soldier. Catch up on your sleep. I know you can use it.”

  “Sure can, Doc. Thanks a lot.”

  Gibbs smiled and patted Kafak, gently, on the shoulder.

  “Certainly,” he said.

  He moved off, and Sullivan lingered behind just long enough to speak privately to Kafak.

  “By the way, soldier,” she said, leaning closer to his face so she could speak quietly, “I wouldn’t want it to get around the ward, but it’s not ‘ma’am.’ It’s ‘miss.’”

  “OK,” Kafak said, grinning like a damned fool.

  She smiled back, then said, “Of course, it’s First Lieutenant to you.”

  Kafak had been removed by the corpsmen to the aid station that had been set up for the Breakout. From there his wounds had been serious enough to have him evacuated to the 118th Station Hospital back in Naples.

  Dr. Gibbs visited every day at first, then every couple of days as Kafak got better. Nurse Sullivan came by every day, sometimes more than once. Sometimes it was other nurses and she came only once. But she saw him every day. He checked to see if this was some kind of special treatment. He hoped it was. He saw soon enough it was just a matter of her dedication. She saw every one of the patients on her ward at least once each day. It was her ward, and she made sure to run it efficiently.

  Radios played at the hospital during the afternoons and evenings. Not in the mornings or after ten at night, though. Those hours were for sleep. None of the guys seemed to have trouble sleeping through the music and news reports, though. Not here. Kafak surely didn’t. He listened to the swing music that played. He especially liked the stuff that Benny Goodman and Glenn Miller and Louis Armstrong did. He heard on the radio that the Third Division had taken Cisterna the day after he’d been wounded. Two days to take that fucking town, he thought, once the Breakout started. And after all those months of stalemate. Mired in the mud and rain and fucking cold. And then—boom! Just like that. Well, it took a lot of men, a lot of casualties. Kafak himself could attest to that much. He could only shake his head over it all. He heard with the rest of the guys in the hospital when General Mark Clark marched into Rome on June 4, 1944. All the guys in the ward cheered. Kafak cheered right along with them. The Germans had declared Rome an open city, so Clark marching in wasn’t as big a deal as it might have seemed. On the other hand, it was the first major Axis capital the Allies had taken. Everyone was arguing about who were the first guys into the city. Kafak thought that a stupid way to run a war. Only it didn’t surprise him any. One gung ho guy a few beds down from Kafak shouted, “On to Berlin!” Kafak recognized the guy. He’d been wounded in the first couple of hours of the Breakout. Hadn’t been on Anzio much longer before that, either. Kafak offered no reaction to his shout. Some of the other guys cheered. A few others catcalled. Arguments started, though nobody got out of their beds. After about a minute of yelling back and forth, Kafak shouted.

  He said, “Man on the end, let it go!”

  That ended it. Everybody laughed.

  Two days later, they heard about the invasion of northern France.

  “This war will be over soon,” Nurse Sullivan said to Kafak later. “Maybe you won’t be going back into combat after all.”

  She smiled. Kafak shrugged.

  “I feel pretty good,” he said. “I don’t figure you guys can keep me here much longer.”

  “Probably not,” she said. “But a few more weeks, anyhow. Maybe that’ll be enough to keep you out of combat. That’s the talk in the officers’ mess here, anyhow.”

  “From a lot of people who’ve never been in combat,” Kafak said.

  “And what does that mean?”

/>   “Nothing,” he said. “Nothing at all.”

  Kafak was still in the hospital on August 15 when the Third Division led the invasion of southern France. That news cheered him. He wondered if the war would truly be over before he was ready to go back. One part of him, maybe the largest part of him, if he were being honest with himself, hoped that it would be. He was sick of the mud and being shot at and the constant tension of being in a combat zone. Boredom and fear, in equal measures. Thinking nothing was ever going to happen and then everything happened. Knowing you could be picked off by a sniper at any second. Living through those barrages of explosions that shook the goddamned earth and rattled your fucking back teeth. Thinking they would never end. Praying just to get through it alive. To get through it without breaking, shattering your soul into a thousand little pieces you could never put back together again. No. He’d had enough of that to last him the rest of his life. On the other hand, there was another part of him that wanted to go back, that wanted to see his friends, wanted to support them, help them. Take what they were taking. Be by their sides when the shit went down. It was only right, he believed. That sort of thinking had been instilled in them all from almost the very first day of training, and it had all hit Kafak very deeply. He took it seriously. He genuinely believed in it. He didn’t want to let his buddies down. He wouldn’t. Not ever.

  One time Nurse Sullivan found him wide awake about one in the morning.

  “Can’t sleep, soldier?” she said.

  “Just thinking,” he told her.

  “Well, that’s never good.” She smiled. “Most soldiers use their time in the hospital to catch up on their sleep.”

  “I know,” Kafak said. “I know it. In the foxholes, you’re usually with just one other guy so you switch off, you know? Two hours on watch, two hours’ sleep. But with all the shit going on and worrying about being shot at every fucking second, it’s pretty hard to sleep at all, most times.” Kafak paused, considering what he had just said. Then he realized something, and his face went red, and he looked to Nurse Sullivan and spoke quickly. “I’m sorry,” he said.