The Ghosts of My Lai

by JC Braswell

  “And how’s that?” Donovan removed his face from his hands and leaned back, defeated.

  “I ain’t the only innocent one left.” Jackson slumped next to Donovan. “Family had to eat somehow. Shit. I stole. I robbed. Even beat up a suit one time for fifty bucks. Ain’t something I’m proud about, but it’s something that I needed to do to make sure we had food on the table. It was that businessman that bit me in the ass. Wore a nice red silk tie and glasses. He smelled like money, kind of person my momma wanted me to be. Broke his jaw, so he had drink through a straw for the rest of his life. Ended up having criminal charges pressed against me for battery or something that your white man’s world says.”

  “I can’t see you being violent, well, at least not that way,” Donovan said, wiping away his tears. “No, not at all.”

  “Where I’m from, you’ve got to have a little payback in you. Still remember it all. That old-ass courtroom stunk like mildew. The desk was real old, like my grandfather used to make. Big man wearing that black robe sitting behind that desk, looking down at me like I was an animal, some sub-human. Talk about humiliating. First time I was really afraid in my life. I heard stories about my family being abused by the system, but all I could think about was how I’d disappointed my grandma. In the end, it was my grandma who saved my dumb ass. She got up there and pleaded with the judge while that suit I beat up stared at me. He looked kind of funny. His jaw wired shut with some type of weird contraption. Part of me felt guilty, the other part, not so much. I could tell that bastard had screwed someone over in the past, looking all spiffy and all. Maybe in one of those bank deals.” Jackson stared off for a second. “Didn’t matter. I was guilty from the second I entered that room.”

  “Well? How is it that you’re here?” Donovan regained his poise.

  “Judge gave me a choice. Said I could either go to jail or join the military. Wasn’t really a choice to be had.”

  “Really?”

  “Really.”

  “Don’t sell yourself short. There’s a good man inside of you,” Williams said, removing Anuska’s picture from his pocket.

  “What you got there?” Jackson asked.

  “Picture of Anuska’s family.”

  “Anuska’s family? His kids? He still has a picture of them?” Donovan asked, his eyebrows furrowed on obvious confusion.

  “Yeah. Why wouldn’t he?”

  “You don’t know? Damn, Chris. He told me hasn’t seen them in forever. His wife left with the kids a few years ago. Blamed it on old Anuska’s partying ways.”

  “He never told me.” Williams looked back at the picture.

  “Yeah, he still hurt real bad because of it. He tried to write letters but never got anything back. Not even from his kids. That’s a cold woman for you.”

  “Never would’ve thought the way he talked about them.” Williams’s lower back tingled. He glanced down the trail, noticing a bright patch of ground ahead, leading to what looked like another clearing. “Pity.”

  “That’s why he came. Told me when he had a few cold ones back at base. Just kinda came all out at once. Kids will never get to see Daddy again.” Jackson drifted for a moment. “So Chris. We all spilled our guts, and yet you remain a mystery. Tell us, man. We’re all going into the ground anyway.“

  “Nothing to be told.” Williams hesitated, watching as the midday haze seemed to grow thicker, swirling around his ankles below, stinking of burnt wood.

  “Come out with it. Do you good.” Jackson nudged him. “Need proof that the jungle wants you for a reason.”

  “Guys, I smell something up ahead.” Williams’s heart thumped twice. “Campfire.”

  “Simmons?” Donovan asked. “Bastard is still alive?”

  “There’s only one way to find out.” Williams readied his handgun and closed his eyes. He needed to focus. He needed to concentrate past the nausea, the fear. “And as you say, if we’re going to the ground, we’ll go out fighting.”

  Williams pushed himself off the rock. He slogged toward the gathering smoke and smell of charred wood, flanked by the river to his left. He saw the clearing ahead empty to a sea of saw grass. Maybe they’d found the plains. Maybe they’d actually escaped.

  “Chris, wait up.” Jackson rushed up behind him, but Williams would not have it, too overtaken with purpose to care. “Donovan has a gun, too.”

  “It’s got to be him,” Williams recited. He would give Simmons an ultimatum.

  Another waft of smoke filtered through the jungle, burning Williams’s nostrils and lungs, making it more difficult to breathe. He didn’t care. Simmons would hunt them if he lived. He needed to end it.

  “Wait up. Wait for me,” Donovan gasped from behind. Williams could barely see. The fog gathered to an almost opaque shield.

  “This needs to end,” Williams insisted. His eyes stung. The clearing bloomed with the early-afternoon light as he waved away the suffocating smoke. He expected to find a fire. What he found instead was inexplicable.

  “You ok, Cap? I think I can see...” Jackson’s voice trailed off.

  A crosswind blew from left to right, exposing the charred remains of what appeared to be a pig, but it wasn’t a pig.

  “Is that…?” Donovan turned his back to the forest. He refused to believe. Williams didn’t want to believe, either.

  “I think we found Simmons,” Williams said, approaching the carcass.

  The wounds, characteristic of a napalm drop or someone caught on the wrong end of a hot grenade, were different. Smoke poured from its open chest cavity. The arms and legs were severed at the joints, leaving cauterized stumps that bubbled with blood. Skin hung in tiny strips from the carcass like yellowed beef jerky.

  Then he saw it. A rectangular piece of white paper stuck in its eye socket. He didn’t need to inspect any further. It was the ace of spades.

  “That can’t be Simmons. Ain’t no way.” Jackson toed him with his boot.

  “Look. Bite marks.” Williams pointed to the crisp brown ligaments around the neck. “You can barely see them, but they’re there. No dog tags, either. Has to be Simmons.”

  “Poor bastard burned alive,” Jackson said.

  “I wouldn’t go calling him a poor bastard,” Williams said as he looked around the area. He swallowed as he realized the trail didn’t lead them to the plains. The clearing they saw atop the plateau was a red herring to fool them into marching deeper into the jungle.

  “You think the tiger got to Simmons then the VC found him?” Donovan asked.

  “I don’t know.” Williams glanced up at the clouds above. The answer was clearer than ever in a land that held so many secrets. “Maybe…maybe it’s more than the tiger.”

  “But we just saw it,” Donovan said, rubbing his stomach.

  “I know what we saw, but there’s something more to it. It’s like…it’s the one judging us. Like he’s our ghost and the jungle itself is letting her carry out our sentence.”

  “Please don’t start that spirit stuff again,” Donovan said, rubbing his stomach. The grimace on his face seemed a little more pronounced than earlier. “Not now.”

  “I know it sounds odd, but how else would you explain it? The sins of our past are catching up to us. How else would you explain how we were shot down over a jungle that wasn’t supposed to exist? Huh? Or how our boys were carried all that way. The only thing that’s adding up is that we’re facing something we can’t explain. I…I just don’t know.” Williams removed Garcia’s necklace from his pocket and staggered over to the river bank. “I just know it won’t let us go.”

  Jackson muttered a few incomprehensible words, but was lost back in his thoughts.

  “So you say the jungle won’t let us go because of our sins. Then why are you here? Jackson and I probably have it coming, but why you?” Donovan asked.

  “Remember what I just said about having no family?” He needed to come clean to prove his point.

  “Yeah.” Jackson said, looking over the football field-sized cleari
ng. The river flowed with energy and circled around the windswept field before disappearing back into another dense patch of foliage.

  “I had a fiancé. Had a baby on the way. We were supposed to be a family.”

  “Baby on the way?” Donovan asked, clutching his stomach.

  “Yeah.” His thoughts drifted to the night at the Fulcrum. “Never meant for it to end that way.”

  “Go on.”

  “We were out celebrating my birthday. My two buddies, knuckleheads, they’d just signed up to serve over here. So it was kind of our last hurrah.”

  “So you did a little partying that night?”

  “Unfortunately a little too much partying.”

  “Was she drinking? Did it cause her to lose the baby?” Jackson asked.

  “No, nothing like that.” Williams waved Jackson’s comments off, mesmerized by the ebb and flow of the river at it sloshed along the bank. “My two friends, they just kept egging me on, wanting me to drink more. She wanted to go. Thought that staying up too late would somehow harm the baby. I was being selfish. Refused to leave. The piano player…that damned piano player kept egging us on as well. Somewhere, deep in my heart, I knew they weren’t going to make it. I knew that it was going to be the last time we’d be together. That’s why I stayed, and that’s why I loved her. She was understanding to a fault.”

  Williams dipped his hands into the chilled river, rubbing Garcia’s dog tags clear of dirt before placing it back into his pocket.

  “What you getting at, Cap?” Jackson said.

  “We normally would’ve walked home, but her being pregnant, I thought it better to drive.” He bowed his head in shame and tossed his helmet to the ground, scooping water overtop his head. “There’s no way I could’ve seen that car coming. They died that night. Both of them.”

  “Damn, man. You were drunk?” Jackson asked.

  Williams paused, the memory ripped from the depths of his mind. He couldn’t even look at himself, his reflection undulating in its ripples, mocking him.

  “I can’t answer that.” He poured more water over his head.

  “Why not?”

  “Because I don’t know. I started drinking water before I left. I thought I was sober, just tired.” Williams stared at his distorted reflection. “I should’ve listened to her. I tried, boy did I ever try, to live a normal life. Too much guilt. Three months was too long. That’s when I signed up. They said I could be an officer like it was some type of award for graduating college. Said I would gain valuable leadership skills. I played along, acting like I was happy, but I didn’t come here to be a hero. I came here to forget, and, in a way, die.” He had cried his tears for her death. An empty spring remained, hollow and numb at the thought of her. “This is my punishment.”

  He glided his fingers along the water.

  “You were right, we all have our demons.” Jackson said.

  “I can’t even begin to imagine how you feel,” Donovan said from behind him. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe we are damned, as stupid as it sounds.”

  “You said it to me, so I’m gonna say it to you. You’re a good man, Cap,” Jackson said.

  As Williams focused on his reflection, her soft features emerged as he removed his hand. Strands of long brunette hair rippled with the reflection; the scent of vanilla overwhelmed the spiced jungle aroma. Her brilliant emerald eyes radiated across the water’s surface. It couldn’t be her. It couldn’t be Karen.

  Then her lips moved. In his head, he thought he heard her call his name.

  “No.” He turned away in disbelief. It was her haunting him. He forced himself to look back only to find his reflection staring back at him. He plunged his hands back into the water but she was gone.

  Where’d you go baby?

  “Chris, we should move.” Donovan’s words pulled him back to reality. “We chose to follow you because we believe in you, man. Hell, even if we’re going to the ground, we can’t give up. You said it best. We’re all sinners.”

  “God. My emotions are as screwed up as this damned weather.” Williams grabbed his helmet and tossed it into the river. It bobbed before the current caught hold, taking its path back into the jungle. “I killed her.”

  “You didn’t kill her. Trust me. We all have things we aren’t proud of. You said it yourself.” Donovan squeezed Williams’s shoulder. “Come on, bro. Believe it.”

  “I didn’t kill her just like I didn’t kill those people back there. It was my decision that led to this. I deserve this. Not you.”

  “What are we going to do? Just give up? Would she have wanted this?”

  “She would have wanted—” It sprang out of the sky like a budding flower. A spark of hope. “Over there. Look.” He pointed at the sienna horizon, above the jungle treetops. Smoke twisted upwards in a white column. It was a large fire, manmade.

  “Is that what I think it is?” Donovan asked.

  “Well, I’ll be damned,” Jackson followed up.

  “Follow the river. We need to follow the river through the jungle. Come on.” There was a chance. A slim hope, but a chance. At least he would fulfill his duty to the two. He fought past the guilt, the hunger, the stench that marred his rotting leg. He had a chance to save them.

  “What if it’s the NVA or another VC camp?”

  “Doesn’t matter. We need food. We need water.” The hip-tall sawgrass sliced into Williams’s forearms as they made their way underneath the cover of jungle. He could save them.

  “How are we supposed to make it through here?” Donovan asked.

  Unlike the jungle they left behind, the undiscovered area appeared even more feral, its stalks and branches thicker, more erratic in its growth. There was a darkness about it that pulled them into its confines.

  “We don’t have a choice,” Williams said. “Garcia would say that Jesus made it in the desert for forty days and forty nights. We can at least give this a try. Let’s just hope those smoke columns are for real.”

  THIRTY

  They fought against both the humidity and time, trudging over the unforgiving terrain and the never-ending maze of trees. Every time they thought they had found a path, the jungle would throw another hurdle in their way.

  “I’m too damned exhausted, guys,” Donovan called between labored breaths. Williams could see it in the yellow in Donovan’s eyes. He’d been struggling for the past couple hours. Donovan complained about pangs around his kidneys and the knot in his abdomen. Dehydration was taking him.

  “Don’t quit on us.” Williams sucked in mouthfuls of the spore-laden air. The trek through the heavy undergrowth sapped every bit of strength that remained in their already-fatigued muscles.

  “My stomach feels like it’s going to explode.” Donovan’s breathing grew shallow. His mouth opened wide, gasping for air that would not come. Bits of white gathered on either side of his lips. Then he crashed to the ground, narrowly avoiding the sudden drop to his side. The waters flowed faster, carving out a deeper ravine in the rock.

  “Donnie, you ok?” Jackson asked.

  “I’ve seen better days. Far better days.” Donovan tried to get to his feet, but collapsed back to his tail, clutching his arm against his stomach. “Just need a few minutes.”

  “I know you’re thirsty. We’re all thirsty. I guarantee there’s something on the opposite side of this jungle. Fresh water. Fresh food. We’ll get it,” Williams said, allowing Donovan a short reprieve. “You have that strength in you. You just need to find it.”

  “I said before, what if it’s a VC camp? Hell, they’ll torture the shit out of us. I can’t deal with that. I’d rather die out here with you guys,” Donovan groaned.

  “We don’t know if it’s a VC camp.”

  “I know what you’re saying, Chris, but I’m done. Toast.” Jackson grabbed Donovan around the waist and propped him against a fallen tree that spanned the ravine, forming a bridge over the river. His listless head lolled to his side as his neck barely held on to its weight.

  “Yo
u need the rest of my water. Don’t have much,” Jackson said.

  “Save it for yourself. I want you guys…to make it. I’ll die on my own terms.”

  “Why are you talking like that?” Williams huffed. “Why give up when we’re almost there?”

  “Because.” Donovan massaged his thumb over his right bicep in a circular motion.

  “Because why, man?” Jackson chimed in.

  “I’m…” Donovan looked at his arm. “Hell, who am I kidding?”

  “What is it?”

  “I didn’t want to say anything.” Donovan removed his hand from his right bicep, revealing his death sentence: two clear puncture marks highlighted the engorged area. The veins surrounding the bite swelled varicose and purple. “Was hoping it was nothing. Didn’t want to worry either of you.”

  “Snake bite.” Williams cursed when he saw it.

  “It bit me…back before we found Simmons’s body. Yellow-and-black bastard. Didn’t want to say anything. Wanted to keep going for your sakes, but man it hurts.”

  “You should’ve told us.”

  “Would it have mattered?” Donovan’s head rolled forward. His chest contracted several times as he tried to catch his breath, but he managed a smile. “It’s ok, though. Got to be honest. I’m a little relieved. Been holding that secret about that girl for awhile now. Now that I’ve got it off my back, I feel kind of pure, you know? Like I’ve been baptized.” Donovan winced. “Thing is, I tried contacting her to apologize. Every time she picked up the phone, I’d just hang up, too ashamed. I should’ve talked to her. I should’ve said I was sorry.”

  “What kind of snake is black and yellow?” Williams pinched the wound. A mixture of blood and yogurt-like milk seeped out. He debated whether to cut the wound open and extract the poison or cut the whole damn limb off. He knew better, though.

  “Don’t tell me a krait bit him,” Jackson said.

  Williams closed his eyes tight, wishing that Jackson had not reminded him. He would have rather remained ignorant to the fact. The Malayan krait spelled death for a few soldiers, but most of the time killed local farmers. It was a silent predator and possessed a small mouth and a bite that barely registered with the victim.