Mitch refolded the handkerchief, his eyes wet. “I hope your mother is satisfied now,” he said.
“It’s not her fault,” Billy said.
Mitch continued as though Billy hadn’t spoken. “This would never have happened.”
They were all quiet. Snow was falling and a car moved through the alley, its motor muffled and sputtering. There was the sound of chains on ice as tires spun for traction. New snow would be flying up all around the wheels.
“You never know what can happen,” Bess said.
Her words were so heavy in the room that Billy found himself saying more than he’d intended. “Dad, they only had a couple of grams between the four of them.”
“Grams? What the hell do you mean? What do you know about grams?”
“I mean they only had a small amount.”
His father made no response.
“I think she has to stay in the state about a week,” Billy said, “until the arraignment. The father of one of the boys flew down last night. I guess he’s arranging things. They already have a lawyer, and rooms in a motel.”
“What motel?”
“A place called the Sea View. In Naples.” Billy dropped his voice, uncertain how much Danner would want Mitch to know. “They were camping out on a beach in Naples.”
Mitch stood, scowling. “You get me the phone number of that motel. I want to talk to Danner.”
Billy nodded. “Mom has it. I’d better get back, she’s pretty upset.”
His father didn’t answer. Billy gestured at Bess apologetically. “I’ll call or come down as soon as I hear anything.”
“Yes,” Bess said, “of course you will.”
He turned and let himself quietly out the house, pulling the door tight behind him and closing the screen door so it latched. The look of the old woman’s face stayed with him as he walked through deep snow to his car. He tried to imagine Danner in jail and couldn’t. Bail would be arranged by afternoon. They wouldn’t send four kids up for three grams of marijuana, especially when the nearly empty box of dope was found at the campsite and none of them admitted to possession anyway. Even though it was a felony charge, getting them off would probably be a technicality. And the lawyers’ making some money. But his parents wouldn’t see it that way. They thought Billy was going into the army and Danner was going wrong, all in the same week.
When he touched her there, through her clothes, he felt a small hardness throbbing like a pulse point. Her whole body, spread-eagled on the seat of the car, turned on that hardness. Kato draped one leg over the back of the seat and the other over the column of the steering wheel so that Billy was just at the vee of her crotch, leaning back against the door on his side and watching her. She threw her arms out as though floating on water and kept her eyes closed, and Billy watched her with no self-consciousness. She worked up to her own feeling a little shyly, in private; when she couldn’t keep her eyes closed any longer that was a signal. If he kept touching her then, it was an unspoken promise he wouldn’t stop, and when she came her whole body rippled lengthwise with a delicate vibration that reminded Billy of horses shivering their flanks. Often he didn’t let her go that far; he liked to feel the trembling tight around him, from inside her. Her muscles seemed to imitate a spastic lapping of water. It was so gentle and felt so foreign, so mysterious, something fluttering against the inner walls of a cage. To Billy it didn’t seem part of either one of them; if he was lost in his own sensation, he missed hers altogether and couldn’t tell if she’d felt it. So he tried to wait and while they were touching each other, taking turns and trading off, he was priming himself to wait; they were intent and usually stopped talking except for involuntary sounds. This was a drug between them; there was the weightless high of dope but they were excruciatingly alert and wound tight. They could go on for hours.
Finally they took their clothes off and the heated interior of the car was like a capsule with steamed windows, drifting in space. They lay down in this isolated nowhere and cried out with relief at his first thrust inside her. They made love every way possible in the cramped room of the front seat, one of them changing position when they felt him almost coming. At last they let go and rode their own movement, not thinking, racing: he opened his eyes for an instant and a small shape in the steamy window had teared clear. The snowy hill below the plant lot was a luminous slant in the winter dark. Far below, cars moved on the Winfield road. Billy saw the lit points of headlights in the midnight blue of the cold air, but knowledge of what he was looking at was nowhere inside him.
First he was conscious again of sounds; he heard the hum of the car heater, he heard Kato breathing. “You there?” he whispered.
“I’m here.”
He sat up, pulling out of her as she touched him. She’d used their clothes as a pillow; now she gave him his pants and shirt and pulled her coat on over her nakedness. “I’d feel better if we parked behind the drive-in,” she said. “It’s spooky here, all these old trucks.”
Billy zipped his Levi’s. “You scared?” He circled her throat with his hands, pulled her closer and kissed her forehead. “I used to come here when I was a kid, same trucks. Doesn’t seem spooky to me. Besides, there are always two or three cars parked behind the drive-in—the police swing by. And who knows which police.”
“He wouldn’t,” Kato said. “I’d never speak to him again.” She pulled her jeans on under the coat.
“What have you told him, anyway, all this time?”
“I haven’t told him anything lately. About a month ago, I just said I couldn’t see him for awhile.” She reached into her purse for a cigarette.
“Kato, suppose I wasn’t getting drafted?”
“We were seeing each other again before you knew you were getting drafted.”
“But not as much.” He raised his brows, smiling. “Maybe you have a thing for uniforms.”
She lit the cigarette. Now he saw her clearly in the glow of the match; her eyes glistened with moisture. What was she feeling? Her eyes always looked wet after they made love, but the wetness seemed an automatic response, like the tears of someone choking or sneezing.
Kato held the cigarette and looked at Billy, her hand shaking a little. “Maybe I do, Billy,” she said, and her voice broke.
He touched the steering wheel. It was cold and suddenly he was cold; he felt the cold dark seeping into the car. He leaned forward, switched the heat on higher. The blower hummed.
“I’ll write to you, Billy.” She pursed her lips when she exhaled smoke.
“Maybe you will at first,” he said carefully. “But it’s okay. You’ve already written to me.”
She flung her blond hair back from her face and moved over near him. “Anytime you come home, call me. You’ll be back on a leave before they send you anywhere, won’t you? No matter what people tell you, get in touch with me.”
They both sat looking at the patch of night framed in the windshield of the Camaro. It was snowing again. Kato rested one hand on Billy’s thigh. There was no sense being jealous, or mad at her. She would always be herself, pretty and tarnished, but honest like a guy was honest. She didn’t try to work things around.
“I don’t know what will happen,” she said. Her hand on his leg moved now, stroking him. “You can always reach me through my father.”
Billy gazed into the snow, imagining himself a grunt with a shaved head, buying Shinner Black cups of coffee at the Tap Room or the Rainbow. Where’s Kato, Shinner? Give me a phone number. Shiner would smell of Rebel Yell and he’d answer with a bleary, good-natured silence. Billy shook his head.
Kato glanced at him. “I know, but eventually he’d tell you.”
“I suppose so.”
“You heard anything else about Danner?”
“She’s staying in a motel. Her arraignment isn’t until the day after I leave. I bet she’s having a great New Year’s Eve.”
“I guess.” Kato leaned forward and put her cigarette out. “Do you want to go by that party?�
�
“No, this is my party. 1969 can end right here.”
Kato laughed. “I think it already did.”
Billy pulled her close and put his face against her hair, smelling a sweetish odor of cream rinse and tobacco smoke. Her hair wasn’t usually so light in winter; she must be bleaching it again. She had a kind of sexiness that wouldn’t diminish as she grew older. Middle-aged, she would look knowing and tired, he thought, her blondness brassier.
She rubbed her eyes with her hands, like a kid, then looped both arms in his and settled against him. “I wish we could just go to sleep,” she said.
The snow blew now in minute flakes that swirled like sand. There must be a long narrow beach behind the Sea View Motel in Naples, Florida; Billy couldn’t quite see it but he imagined the sound of surf. Here the wind was a constant murmur with snow inside it. His mother would be lying awake in the dark, listening.
WAR LETTERS
Billy
1970
Why have we been able, so many times, to spoil Charlie’s whole day? Two reasons: One, the devastating firepower our weapons produce; Two, the rapidity with which we can put out that fire. But—and here’s the hooker—we can’t do that unless we’re on the guns, completely alert and aggressive about starting to fire. We can’t do it if, when the first incoming rounds start, we head for cover and wait until things let up. We have to watch for the flashes, spot them, and shoot back with everything we’ve got.
Don’t get me wrong—I know this is the way our crews do it. So, all I’m saying is—keep up the good work!
—The Triumverate, May 1968
First Infantry Division newssheet
Lake G. Churchill, Jr.
LTC, Arty
Commanding
To ANTI-WAR American Servicemen! We warmly welcome American GIs who, for the sake of America’s honor and human conscience, resolutely oppose the aggressive war waged by US Imperialism in South Vietnam! We warmly welcome conscientious GIs who refuse to obey Inhuman orders forcing you to perform savage acts against the Vietnamese people! We have good will for you and don’t want to hurt you. To help us differentiate you from the stubborn thugs fighting us, you should do as follows. Read all instructions with care!
—Propaganda pamphlet
distributed by SVNLF forces
THE VIETNAMESE PEOPLE ARE FIGHTING FOR THEIR INDEPENDENCE AND FREEDOM THAT IS JUST WHAT THE AMERICAN DID IN 18TH CENTURY
—SVNLF trail leaflet
M-16 Rifle Tips (c.) Clean your rifle every chance you get. 3–5 times a day will not be too often in some cases. Cleanliness is next to godliness, boy, and it may save your life!
—Defense Department pamphlet,
1967
FORT KNOX, KENTUCKY
Pvt. W. Hampson/RA 11949711
Co. E, 16 Bn 4Tng Boe USATCA
Fort Knox, KY
Jan. 20, 1970
Dear Mom. How’s life in Bellington? Things here are not too bad. I am fine and have put on some weight even tho the food is terrible. Weight must be all muscle since Basic is one 24 hr. workout. Quarters are okay, I think from WW II, two-story wood barracks with double metal bunks. Weather here a lot better than at home, not near as much snow. You’ll be glad to know I’m getting good grades as a draftee, tho no PX privileges for anyone for three more weeks. Training classes are pretty interesting, things like map reading, CPR, marksmanship that are generally useful. Danner will be fine, don’t make a big deal of it all, she wouldn’t be on the dean’s list etc if she were “on drugs,” as you say. Not much time to write but like getting your letters. Keep them coming! Will be here until at least end of Feb. when I get reassigned for AIT (adv. indiv. training), I hope somewhere in the south. I did get south after all, so goes to show you, someone is on my side. Take care and write soon.
love, Billy
Feb. 20, 1970
Dear Danner. Mitch already wrote me the case was finally dropped in Florida and you are officially a free woman—too bad, you could have dropped by to see me on your way back to trial in Naples! He took care to check and you don’t have a record. Now you can think of the whole thing as a business deal that took some suffering. I don’t know about being glad it happened (to see what jail is like? a day and a night don’t count)—that’s like me being glad I’m here. So far am keeping my head straight, only ones that get harassed real bad are the fat ones who just can’t make it. Made a good friend, Rick Singleton from Merrimac, Ky., not too far from here, so we met his girl and her friend on a weekend pass. Had several letters from Kato, sent me clippings of weddings she wrote up, pretty funny. Some of them she just talks to the mothers on the phone. You wanted to know what it’s like here—get up at three when it’s dark out and cold as hell in the barracks—gets fucking cold in Kentucky no matter what you heard. Make tight beds, 45-degree angle creases the DI measures if he wants to give us shit, sweep, mop, wax floor, line up footgear in rows. Then double time to parade ground for reveille, still dark, damp as hell, no snow but thick white frost on the ground and mist and weird, all these silent guys lined up like tenpins waiting for a giant bowling ball. Uniforms a big deal. Buttons buttoned or the DI pulls them off and hands them to you to sew on again. Later: All you swinging dicks wake up, sleep in Basic, die in Nam. That shit is the fuck of it but they don’t get to me much. Truth is I like the physical stuff—being in top shape and passing all their tests, even the screwball shit like night infiltration, crawling around under barbed wire through ditches while they fire machine guns over our heads. Can’t see shit, only tracers. Then everyone gets up at the end and marches back to the barracks in the dark. It’s a real setup and the DIs are real assholes, but it’s hard to believe all this is really going to lead to anything later, like Nam, you know? Some guys in the platoon saw your picture and asked me if you wanted to write them or if you have any girlfriends who want to write letters. I told them your friends were a bunch of hippies and they thought that sounded fine.
love, your bro
FORT DIX, NEW JERSEY
Pvt. W. Hampson/RA 11949711
Co. B, 3rd Bn, USATCA
Fort Dix, NJ
March 10, 1970
Dear Mom. Arrived here at AIT about four days ago, assigned to Weapons Platoon. Similar barracks etc but colder now than was in Ky in Jan. Some of the same drills and phys. cond. courses but mostly training on the M-60 since my MOS is machine gunner. Got your letter about you and Danner coming up—I think that would be fine, maybe late in the month. Will apply for a pass but anyway will be able to go off base to dinner, etc. There is a Family Welcome Center that runs tours of the base and some reasonable motels nearby. Whole unit is doing well so far, so PX privileges are up. Food about the same as Fort Knox unfortunately, I’m looking forward to my May leave so I can get a good hamburger. Hope your job is going well and you are feeling good—may still be cold there but don’t be depressed, spring will be coming before you know it.
love,
Billy
April 2, 1970
Dear Dad. Sorry no letters back lately, but I have been real busy. Am real familiar by now with the M-60, step up from the M-16’s at Fort Knox—gun is a 7.62 standard round with an interchangeable lock mechanism, weighs about thirty pounds, heavy sucker to lug around but have gotten used to the noise and am pretty good in practice, am developing an affection for the thing. Since it looks like I will get sent over, am getting used to the idea, have been thinking of volunteering as a chopper door gunner—carrying the M-60 through triple-canopy jungle for a year does not appeal to me much. Have talked to my CO about it and will make up my mind in two weeks or so whether to put in a request for duty. Have always wanted to fly tho would rather do it over the Carolinas or Kentucky—actually I could use VA benefits for pilot training after I get out, would get plenty of experience in a chopper crew. Tell Aunt Bess and Katie thanks for the socks and scarf they sent last month, but real glad I don’t need them anymore. As for what I do with spare time, not much—nearest towns are Wright
stown and Sykesville, smaller than Bellington, kind of deserted almost or look that way by nine at night. Mt. Holly a little bigger but real drab. In the company we call them Cities of Abuse. Some of the guys wrote up a petition for passes to Saigon as a joke.
All the best to
everyone,
Billy
April 27, 1970
Dear Danner. Yes I’ve been getting your letters and I understand, but this is my thing and you’ll have to try to accept it. If you were me you might do the same. The nightmare is going to be on the ground, that is clear, no matter what the statistics about gunners (where do you get all this shit?), and we hear plenty here based on the real stuff—I want to be up, moving over it with my own gun in front of me. If I get hit I want to get hit with plenty of metal around me. This is not crazy logic—we are not talking about the same world, and there is no way to play it safe. I’ve hauled the M-60 all over Fort Dix, and any fucker dragging it through paddies and setting it up in hill country is going to be plenty vulnerable—they always go for the gunners, to put them out, whether they’re in the air or not—so whatever choice I had was gone when I got assigned Weapons and the M-60 before AIT. My choice is ground or air, and I know I feel less like a sitting chickenshit in the air. I only tell you this because I know you will keep it to yourself. My real feeling is that I’m not so scared of being dead, if it’s fast—I’m scared as shit of lying in some jungle all fucked up, waiting for a dustoff that can’t get in because the zone is too hot. That’s what I have the dreams about. What do you mean, aren’t I scared? What kind of fucking question is that? If I go down in a chopper there will be another chopper in fast, to get me and to protect the machine. Now that I know I’m going to Nam, I would just as soon go, stop thinking and waiting. Probably when I get there the only familiar thing will be the gun and I will be feeling like holding on to it. It’s nothing like John Wayne or that show we used to watch after school—what was it?—12 O’Clock High. Used to love that show and the bomber jackets. When you get finished firing fourteen rounds on an M-60, you get this vibration in your body that’s like the ack-ack of the ammo, except it’s silent, and a hot flash like a drug hit as you step away. But no bomber jacket. Sorry I hardly ever write, I do read all your letters, some of the best entertainment around here, and I mean that. We can talk more on my leave—I’ll be home by the night of the 5th. Mitch is driving up to spare this poor grunt the bus ride.
Machine Dreams Page 28