“Rhymes says you got medals like Shooter,” Singer said, pausing the needle.
The laugh came deep from Bear’s belly. “Nothing like Shooter’s. Hell, there was nothing brave about what I did. Went out to get a guy. The guy was screaming and nobody doing nothing. What could I do? If I had to listen to that guy scream one more minute, I would’ve killed myself. So I went and got the guy, told him if he’d shut up I’d bring him in. If not . . . well, they gave me a Bronze Star for it, which made me laugh.”
“It sounds brave.”
“Shooter, he has a couple of Silvers Stars. I don’t know what else. Three Purple Hearts and he wants to go back. But they’re stalling him. Brave or crazy. I don’t know. I don’t like the guy, and he scares me a little, but if you’re in a firefight, it’s guys like him you want around you.”
Singer shifted the jacket, pulled the needle and thread through again. “You want to go back?”
“Hell, no. I ain’t crazy like Shooter. I want to go home, see my mama, hang with the guys, chase pussy.” He laughed, shallow from his throat. “Man, I’m finished with that stuff. Once was enough for me.”
Singer handed Bear the shirt and Bear took his off and put it on. “That looks better. One more?”
“Sure.”
“Singer?” Sergeant Royce’s voice.
“Yeah.”
Sergeant Royce walked over, slow, heavy steps, and held out a white envelope in a trembling hand. His eyes were puffy and bloodshot.
“Hey, Sarge,” Bear said.
“Whiskey ain’t helping?”
Sergeant Royce shoved the envelope at Singer, then dropped his hand to his side. Singer held it, reading the name, Jimmy Miller, above the unit address, as if it were new to him. It bore his brother’s initials and return address.
“It’s you, isn’t it?” Sergeant Royce asked.
“Yeah, it’s me.”
Jimmy Miller wasn’t the name anyone used. Maybe Sergeant Edwards had referred to him by it at their first meeting, but that same day Shooter had dubbed him Singer, and then out of deference to Shooter or for their own reasons they all took it up. By the end of week even Sergeant Edwards called him Singer, his old identity forgotten.
“Why mail now?” Singer asked.
“Came over last night with everything else. After we leave they have to forward it.” Sergeant Royce looked one way then walked off in the other direction.
“A love letter?” Bear asked.
“No.” Singer looked at the two pages of notebook paper with precise, tight script. He settled on the first sheet, his eyes scanning down the page. Before he reached the bottom he tore the sheets in pieces, then crumbled them into a ball and shoved them in his pocket.
“Bad news?”
“No, just bullshit. Someone thinks I ruined my life and wants to lecture me. You got that other patch you want sewed on?”
* * * * *
The call came suddenly, almost unexpectedly after so much waiting. Singer was nearly dozing, his mind wandering through past events, drifting so he could barely recall what he’d been thinking a moment before. Such were the volume and urgency of Sergeant Edwards’s first words that he sprang alert and was sitting up, aware of the rush of movement around him within those first few seconds.
“Let’s go. Downstairs now! Full gear and weapons. We’re moving out. Don’t leave anything. We’re not coming back.”
Before Singer had all his gear on, Rhymes was there, web gear, rucksack, and M79 in hand. “Ready?”
“Yeah. I think so.”
A blur of bodies rushed down the aisle. Singer saw rucks and rifles and faces that were difficult to read. He hurried beside Rhymes almost at a run, ignoring Sergeant Milner near the doorway, his squealing voice imploring them to go faster, and descended to the growing formation. Crowded into duce-and-a-half trucks with MP escorts, they sped across the base the short distance to adjacent Pope Air Force Base. Along the route soldiers stopped and watched the convoy pass, some pointing and saying something to the men beside them.
It might have been possible to still believe it was an exercise, even as they assembled on the air base tarmac in a formation larger than Singer had ever seen. Thousands of men in combat gear with banners waving was an impressive sight. If it was a show, it was a good one. The waiting line of C-141s with open doors and crews standing by could all be part of it. Singer imagined that some men, Sergeant Royce, Ghost, and even Trip still clung to that hope. Maybe everyone did except Shooter and him. Shooter definitely wanted to go. Singer went back and forth about it. Anxious to go now, and then wanting to wait until later when he might be more ready. Though Rhymes had told him you could never be ready.
Any doubts that this was real were lost when Air Force One landed and taxied up, and stopping near the group. The president descended the steps to a cluster of the top brass and other officials gathered at the bottom. Before ascending a flag-adorned stage, the president inspected the ranks, walking past Singer and led by a general wearing a helmet with a single star.
It was only Singer’s military training and his guess at the consequences that kept him from turning to Rhymes and Trip, who were on either side of him, and saying, “Holy shit. The president. Close enough to touch. Did you see that?”
The president took the podium at the center of the platform, a crowd of dignitaries and security behind him. He was a big man whose face by nature seemed to hold some sadness, or maybe it was the weight of office, or the things he knew but couldn’t share. Everyone had come, it seemed, to see them off, except the people they would really want to see before they left.
The day was overcast, but bright rather than dreary. It was warm enough, comfortable for a February day. The president’s voice carried well in the still air. Singer tried to listen carefully, but his mind wandered to imaginings of what might lie ahead. Afterward, the only phrase he could recall the president saying was: “I can’t tell you where you’re going, but it’s going to be hot in a few days.” For some reason, this stuck with him.
Later, as they filed to the plane, Bear said, “The man can’t tell us where the fuck we’re going like it’s some big secret. Shit, probably been in half the papers. You can bet Charlie knows we’re coming.”
It caused a few men around him, those who’d been to Nam before, to nod while pursing their lips. Sergeant Royce got on the plane looking pale and dry-lipped. He looked around as if wishing there was a stewardess so he could get a drink. Ghost showed up and took his place in line, though Bear had given even odds he wouldn’t. Red had popped some gum and was chewing vigorously, forsaking any talk of his hero on the occasion of this day.
“It makes no sense. All of us so short,” Trip said, moving toward a seat.
“Two months can be forever,” Bear said.
“They could extend us once we’re there,” Rhymes said.
“Goddamn it, they can’t do that,” Trip said, but Singer could hear the uncertainty in his voice.
Singer suspected they could and imagined they all knew it, but no one took up the argument. He stored his equipment as he saw Rhymes do and then settled in beside him.
“Well,” Rhymes said before pulling out a book. “You aren’t going alone.”
Singer kept quiet, not knowing how to say he was sorry that they had to go again, but happy he was going over with men he knew and liked, men who had survived and could show him how. Or how to tell of his guilt for his happiness at his good fortune that came at their expense, knowing it would mean little to any of them.
Words rose softly from a few rows ahead, gaining volume as the men nearby went silent. It was the first time Singer had heard Sergeant Prascanni sing the tune outside the shower. Today he sang slower, softer, giving the Italian words a mournful quality. Singer thought of lost love, though he had little experience in such things. Then the jet engines roared to life, and the song was lost or Sergeant Prascanni simply stopped singing.
Singer felt the rush of racing down the runway. The wheels
lost contact with the earth, and he was pushed back in his seat with the force of the steep climb, Italian words of love replaying in his mind.
Sometime in the night he awoke thinking he heard crying, but then thought it might just be the engine noise combined with Bear’s snoring. A soft whimpering within the engine drone. A quirk of C-141s or someone’s uncontained despair?
Could it really be that bad?
3
February 19, 1968
Vietnam
Singer and the rest of the fourth platoon moved west from the Americal Division’s base at Chu Lai where their C-141 from Fort Bragg had landed just two days before. They walked slowly in a staggered line across the grassy plain toward green mountains that loomed ahead.
Only a few hours earlier they had sat in low bleachers amid a sea of tents, listening to an Americal staff sergeant, a trim black man in a baseball hat and pressed fatigues, with a Combat Infantryman’s Badge above the left pocket but no paratrooper wings, who paced back and forth in front of the bleachers as he talked. His voice boomed, trailed off, and boomed again as he emphasized each point. The scene was more like a stateside training center than a combat zone.
“You men will forego usual in-country training,” the Americal sergeant said. “You will move north in a few days. Meantime, you’ll patrol here with Americal Division guides.” The sergeant stopped pacing and stood still near the center of the group.
“A Leg’s going to show us around,” Trip said.
Shooter looked to Sergeant Edwards, who raised no objection.
“Our guys know this area. You don’t,” the Americal sergeant said. “I know you all have been here before. You’ve done this. You know it.” The sergeant paused and looked across the group as if measuring his words.
“Most of it will be the same. We’ll do this patrol together then you’ll go north on your own.”
Singer watched the sergeant closely, trying to weigh and retain everything he said. Rhymes had said these first few weeks would be the most dangerous for a new guy. Next to him, Rhymes kneaded his hands and pushed the cuticles back on each finger. Trip had his elbows on his knees and his head bowed as if looking at the ground below the bleachers. Sweat beaded on his face. Bear leaned back, sprawling across the seat. Occasionally his eyes closed, opening again before he started snoring. Sergeant Royce looked off toward the mountains, or maybe it was the airfield and the flight path he was searching out. Stick sat on a lower bench next to Sergeant Prascanni, leaning toward the speaker. A few seats over, Shooter drew his knife across his arm then examined the hairless patch. If the talk was long, Shooter would have his entire arm shaved.
The Americal sergeant took a step closer and continued, nearly shouting the first word. “Here it’s mostly Viet Cong. You’ll find NVA up north where you’re going.”
Singer waited, expecting more exact information, but the sergeant never explained where exactly they were going though he talked as though he knew.
“Some booby traps will be new to you.” Then the Americal sergeant, with the aid of a buck sergeant, spent the next fifteen minutes demonstrating various booby traps. At the end of the demonstration the Americal sergeant introduced his assistant as the one who would accompany them on the patrol. He was a small blond kid with freckles and dark eyes, whose fatigues were neither clean nor pressed. That was the end of in-country training.
“That’s it?” Singer asked.
“What more do you want?” Rhymes asked.
“I don’t know. Just seems like there should be more?”
“You got everything you need,” Rhymes said, looking at Singer’s M16.
They walked from the training site along white-rock-lined paths, past gardens and neatly lettered signs. The low sandbag walls around tents and the occasional bunker were the only indications this was something other than a stateside camp. They locked and loaded before they left the front gate, which held a sign proclaiming the camp HOME OF THE AMERICAL DIVISION. Outside the gate, a group of Vietnamese women and children stood, some carrying buckets of Cokes, others with baskets of bananas or pineapples. A few held bundles of folded laundry that looked mostly like army fatigues. Beyond them was a sea of ramshackle shelters of cardboard and tin. Singer stared. These were the first Vietnamese he’d seen.
“How do you tell the good ones from the bad?” Singer asked.
“If they shoot at you, they’re bad.” Bear’s laugh rumbled from somewhere low in his big frame.
“Fuck, they let the VC hang out at the camp gate,” Trip said.
“Half of them working in the camp are probably VC,” Bear said.
“You think we’d be smarter,” Rhymes said.
“Helping the people, brother. Helping the people,” Bear said.
Kids trailed beside the patrol, holding out cans, the same red labels as home. “Coke, Coke. One dollar. You want?”
Some held out empty hands. “GIs numba one. Give me dollar.”
“Get the fuck out of here, you little pissants,” someone yelled.
“Fuck, give me the boonies,” Trip said.
After fifty yards, the last kid gave up and the patrol was alone. Well beyond the camp they left the dust of the dirt road, crossing onto a grassy plain, moving toward the rice fields to the west. Eventually they reached them and climbed up on the banks, moving in single file across an expansive checkerboard of dikes and green, unlike any green Singer had ever seen.
The sun beat down on the treeless plain and Singer’s shadow became a small oval at his feet. His body protested with streams of sweat. Heat rose up from the paddies in oppressive currents. The smell of decay hung in the air. Other smells drifted to him that he couldn’t identify, but he imagined they were familiar to all the second-tour guys.
While they were crossing the expanse of paddies, Rhymes asked from behind, “You okay?”
“Great,” Singer said, immediately feeling bad for the enthusiasm in his answer. He turned and looked at Rhymes, thinking he should say more, but then could think of nothing that wouldn’t sound stupid.
It was all new to him and held the excitement of discovery. He had never seen rice paddies before and thought he would always remember the green even though he wasn’t sure how to describe it. An artist would know the color. The mountains, the mosaic of greens and browns, were beautifully offset by the expanse of blue sky. The string of men leading them across the paddies, helmets bobbing, rifles sticking out to the sides, presented an image of adventure. He knew of danger that the dikes and brush-lines held, as well as the mountains beyond. At least, he’d been told of it in obscure terms. But without the real reference of experience, the prospect of danger didn’t diminish the excitement of it all. More likely, it added to it. He scanned the dikes that paralleled the one they walked on, wondering how many enemy soldiers could be hiding just on the other side of the dike ready to jump up, AKs blazing. He imagined charging toward it, firing his rifle, and felt a rush through his entire body.
After they left the paddies, they moved into a small village of scattered bamboo huts. A young girl came toward them, following a water buffalo, holding a rope tied to a ring in the buffalo’s nose. In her right hand she held a switch, with which she hit the buffalo’s rump. She took little notice of Singer or the other soldiers of the fourth platoon, as though patrols were a common thing. Chickens pecked at the ground, unbothered by the soldiers until Jammer ran up and kicked one and they all scattered, squawking as they fled.
Ahead, a white-haired man with a wrinkled, leathery face couched in front of the first hut, his legs like sticks, chopping wood with a short, odd-shaped knife. The old man looked up without breaking the rhythm of his strokes. Singer watched the man add more sticks to a growing pile, wondering if he might be the enemy. The platoon spread out through the village, the soldiers splitting up into groups of twos and threes, each heading for a different hut. The village and movement confused Singer and he stood there uncertain what to do.
“Singer!” Bear was heading towa
rd a hut by himself.
Singer looked back at Rhymes, who had been behind him, but Rhymes had already headed in the opposite direction with Red. The old man at the first hut was standing, his knife lying on the ground. A solder stood in front of him, his M16 pointed at his chest, while a second soldier pointed his M16 into the doorway of the hut and leaned in cautiously. Singer ran to catch up to Bear.
“Get out here!” Bear yelled into the dark doorway, sweeping the blackness with his rifle. “Out now!” He stepped back slowly, keeping his rifle pointed into the hut.
Singer brought his rifle up, feeling the touch of the trigger and pangs of fear that dampened his eagerness. A man shuffled out, head down, eyes on the ground, gnarled, weathered hands at his side. A woman, at least as old, followed behind him on unsteady legs. The couple stood together in front of the hut, leaning against each other as though holding each other up. The old woman was shaking. She glanced at Bear and then Singer and then to the old man, perhaps looking for some reassurance. The old man kept his eyes lowered as though studying the ground.
“Watch ’em,” Bear said, disappearing into the hut.
The voice that came from Bear and the heartlessness in his eyes were different from the man Singer knew at Fort Bragg. This Bear frightened him.
The old couple tottered before him. What kind of threat were they? Were these the VC the Americal Division sergeant talked about? How could anyone this old be dangerous? Still, he kept his weapon pointed at them, more afraid of what he might be expected to do than of the old couple. Singer ran a dry tongue across dry lips. He glanced quickly over his shoulder toward the other huts but there were no soldiers nearby, no one to help him. The old man and woman hadn’t moved. What was taking Bear so long? Would he look weak if he called to Bear?
The old woman continued to look around with darting eyes as though thinking about running if she were younger. The old man shuffled his feet then raised his face and caught her eye just briefly, then they both looked away. Singer saw it. A look of conspirators. Singer raised his rifle so it pointed at their chests.
Perfume River Nights Page 4