Operation: Beach Angel

by Margaret Kay

  Booker laughed. “Son, I’ve been doing this a long time. I have a great memory for names and details. Look, I started out much like you are now. The military gave me a great start in life. I think it could for you too.”

  “Think about it, Johnson. Really think about what you’re going to do in life, where you’re going. And consider where you’re going to be and what you’re going to be doing in five years, ten years, or when you’re thirty-eight years old, like I am. The last twenty years have flown by. I’ve had a good life and I thank the Navy for that,” Bennett said.

  “Yeah, I’ll think about it,” Johnson said to placate them. He pointed at the door. “Can I go now?”

  Bennett nodded.

  After Johnson left, Booker spoke. “You need to do what you can to get that boy down to the recruiting center. He has potential, and it’s not going to get developed properly here.”

  Bennett agreed. Later that afternoon, after Johnson had worked out for three solid hours, Bennett followed him into the locker room. He was leaning against a locker when Johnson came back into the room from the showers, towel slung around his waist.

  “Johnson, I want to talk with you more about the military.”

  “Shit, Coach, can you give it a break?”

  “I know you’ve heard it from me over the years, how good of a start in life the Navy gave me and up until now I have respected your choice to not listen. But something Booker said really made me think, and I don’t like the thoughts I’m having. JD and Tommy know you can identify JD as the shooter at that store. I really think you could be in danger. I don’t want to see anything happen to you. Joining the Navy would get you out of here and give you a future.”

  Johnson sat down on the bench and ran his fingers through his wet hair. “I guess it wouldn’t hurt to check into it.”

  An hour later, Johnson released his seatbelt as Coach Bennett put his car in park. He gazed out the front window at the sign that read ‘Armed Forces Recruitment Center’ that hung over the door in front of them. Through the windows, he saw men in a few different uniforms talking and laughing.

  “Now that we’re here, I don’t know about this, Coach,” Johnson said.

  “We’re just going in to talk and get you some information. No one is going to make you join, not today or any day. If you decide to, after you hear what they have to say, that’s your choice. I told you about what it’s like to serve on a ship and on a base. It’s a good life, Johnson. You will get pay and health benefits that you aren’t going to get at any job as an eighteen-year-old with no training or advanced education.”

  “It’s just that we’re talking four years. What if I hate it?”

  “Then you suck it up and tough it out. It’s only four years. And bootcamp is only eight weeks. It didn’t bother me, but I know a lot of guys thought it really sucked. But it’s only two months of your life.”

  “Fine,” Johnson said. He got out of the car.

  Inside, he watched Coach Bennett warmly greet the two Navy guys. Bennett knew them both. He was introduced to them and the guys in the different uniforms. One was the Marine Corp recruiter; the other was the Army recruiter. They told him the Air Force recruiter would be back in the office in an hour. Each branch of the military had its own office in there. The others left, and he sat down at a table with Coach and a guy named Petty Officer Brinkley. He was a black guy in his early thirties.

  “Bennett tells me you’re a good kid, no record, never been in trouble, just graduated high school.”

  “Johnson played on my football team all four years. He’s a natural leader,” Bennett added.

  “The Navy has a lot to offer someone like you, Johnson,” Brinkley said. “I know Bennett has told you about what life is like in the Navy, so I’m going to concentrate on what the Navy can offer you over the Army, Marines, or Air Force.”

  “Coach Bennett thinks I should consider being a cop.”

  “Master at Arms, an MA is the rating. It’s a good job and can lead to civilian law enforcement after you get out of the Navy.”

  “That’s what Coach said.” He nodded at Bennett. On the wall behind Petty Officer Brinkley was a poster of men rising out of the water with rifles in their hands. “Who are those guys?”

  Brinkley looked behind himself to where Johnson pointed. “Those are Navy SEALs, the best damn warriors on the planet.”

  “What do you have to do to be one of them?”

  “You have to be the best, the strongest, the toughest. They have a fortitude not many have. They are smart and determined. They are the most cohesive team in the world. Their training is the hardest in all branches of the military,” Brinkley replied.

  “I’ve seen movies about those guys. They’re bad ass,” Johnson said.

  Brinkley went over to his desk and brought a piece of paper back. “Have you taken the ASVAB?”

  Johnson shook his head no. He didn’t know what it was.

  “The ASVAB is the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery. It’s a test that has ten sections that rate different centers of knowledge, skills, aptitude. Different jobs in the Navy require different minimum scores in different areas of the test. You graduated high school, so you’ll do fine on the test, but the individual areas are what’s important.”

  Johnson looked at the paper he handed him. It was a test. “This is it?”

  “No, it’s a practice test. It’ll give us an idea of where you are right now.” He pointed to a little room at the rear of the building. “Go back and take it really quick then we can see what you may need to study to do well in the sections you need to qualify to be a Master at Arms.”

  “I didn’t think I’d be taking no test,” Johnson protested. “I haven’t studied or anything.”

  “It’s just a baseline test of your knowledge right now. Don’t worry. It doesn’t mean anything,” Brinkley assured him.

  He wanted to walk out the door, but instead, he took the test to the room and sat down. He listened to Bennett, Brinkley, and the other Navy dude talk while he took it. It wasn’t that hard. When he finished it, he brought it back out and handed it to Petty Officer Brinkley. He watched him grade it, getting pissed when he saw him cross through wrong answers.

  “Johnson, you scored in the eightieth percentile on this. That’s good. Your only low section is the General Science Section. You did okay on the important sections for the MA rating. If that’s what you want to do, I can give you some study material to look at before you actually test. Most importantly, you scored very well on the word and paragraph sections as well as the math sections.”

  Johnson felt pretty good about that. He pointed again at the poster. “What if I want to be one of those dudes?”

  Brinkley chuckled. “There’s no rating for SEALs. You go in as MA or whatever and then volunteer for that duty after bootcamp. If you’re one of the best, they’ll take you, but you have to prove yourself in bootcamp. There’s talk in the command of making SEALs their own rating, but that hasn’t happened yet.”

  “Did you want to talk with the recruiters of the Army or the Marines?” Bennett asked him.

  “No, man. If I’m gonna do this, it’s gonna be the Navy.”

  “So, are you ready to take the ASVAB and see what job you qualify for?” Brinkley asked.

  “Yeah, but I want to study some first.”

  “When we take you down to MEPS to test, it’s a full two days. You take the test and get a physical. They drug test you, and then you see what jobs you qualify for. You pick your job and then swear in,” Brinkley told him.

  “Swear in?” He asked.

  “Yes, you join and get a ship date up to six months out,” Brinkley said.

  “Fuck man, I didn’t say I’d join on the spot. I’d like to know the options and think about it.”

  “It doesn’t work that way,” Brinkley said.

  “And they do a drug test?” Johnson asked, knowing damn well he’d fail it.

  “Yes. And if you fail the drug test you wil
l never be able to join the military. So, you tell us the date you can go down after being drug free for thirty days,” Brinkley said, his gaze then flashed to Bennett.

  “I need to think about this. I’m not sure I can do this,” Johnson said.

  “Bootcamp is going to be a breeze for you, physically. You’re in great shape. Mentally, it may be a bit rougher. They tear you down and build you back up. You get indoctrinated into the military, a shared experience. Johnson, I know you are smart enough to learn everything they’ll teach you,” Coach said.

  Brinkley handed him a book. “This is the prep for the ASVAB. You can take it home and look through it, take some practice tests. That’ll give you a better idea what the test will be like, and it gives you stuff to study for each section.” He handed him a business card. “This is my card with my phone number. Will you give me your phone number, so I can check in with you in a week or so?”

  “No, I don’t have a cell phone or anything and I don’t want you calling my house. I haven’t talked with my momma about this and I don’t want you to tell her.”

  Brinkley looked at Bennett. “I’ll touch bases with you.”

  Bennett nodded.

  Bennett dropped Johnson off at his house. Johnson heard his momma, grandma, and sister in the kitchen when he came inside. He took the book right up to his bedroom and hid it under his pillow. He didn’t want his momma to find it. That night he stayed up late. He read some of it and took two of the long practice tests. He couldn’t believe he did so well, scoring over eighty percent on the tests. That was a B. He hadn’t scored a B on a test in school since junior high. Of course, he hadn’t studied for a test since then either.

  Two Weeks Later

  Johnson called Petty Officer Brinkley back from Coach Bennett’s office. It was a Monday. It had been more than a month since he’d smoked pot. He’d also completed the entire ASVAB practice book, studying it harder than he’d studied anything during the entire four years of high school. Bennett drove him back to the recruiting office.

  “I’m ready to join,” Johnson told him. “But after I join, I need to go to bootcamp right away. I can’t hang out at home for a month or two.”

  “It doesn’t always work that way,” Brinkley said.

  “That’s the deal. If I can’t go right away, I might not ever be able to.”

  Johnson had dodged his friends over the past two weeks saying he had to spend time with his family. He was in fact studying very hard. He was determined to do well on the ASVAB. But it was getting harder to dodge them. Even Shereese was coming around his house, trying to get him to go out. He doubted he’d be able to go a month without getting high again. And Tommy had just been arrested the previous weekend. Johnson was scared to death that Tommy would point the finger at him as a snitch and someone might come after him. He was also worried Tommy would implicate Elias in the robbery of Mr. Washington’s store.

  “I’ll see what I can do,” Brinkley assured him. He seemed to understand what Johnson was getting at.

  While he waited, Brinkley made the appointment for him to test at MEPS on Wednesday. His score would be back on Thursday morning, and Petty Officer Brinkley would take him back to see what jobs he qualified for and to get his physical. He knew he’d have to decide on the spot and enlist.

  Thursday Afternoon

  Petty Officer Brinkley pulled up to the curb in front of Johnson’s house and put the car in park. He offered his hand. “Congratulations. You should be very proud of yourself.”

  Johnson nodded, but all he felt was apprehension, knowing he had to go inside and tell his momma what he’d just done. He shook Brinkley’s hand.

  “I’ll stay in touch with you over the next two weeks. If you need a ride to MEPS on July twenty-first, let me know.”

  “I will,” Johnson said. He got out of the car and forced himself to go into the house. He could hear voices coming from the kitchen. It sounded like his momma, grandma, and his sister, Faith. “Hey, what’s going on?” He asked as he came into the kitchen.

  “I’m just heading out, picked up an overnight shift at work,” Faith said. She gave him a quick embrace, said her good-byes, and left.

  “Did everything go good helping Coach Bennett again today?” Momma asked.

  He’d told her that being gone the two full days while he was at MEPS was to help Coach. “I need to talk to you for a minute.”

  “Sure honey,” she said as she started the sink water and piled dishes into it.

  He took a seat at the kitchen table across from his grandma. “Momma, will you come and sit for a second? I’ll wash those dishes for you after we talk.”

  His mother sat down beside him and took his hand. He gazed over her face. He couldn’t imagine the pain she had from burying one of her children. She was the kindest woman he knew. And she didn’t deserve that. She didn’t deserve what he was about to do, drop this bomb on her.

  “I have to tell you what I did today. I enlisted, Momma. I enlisted in the Navy. I took their test yesterday and I scored real high. I don’t know how I did it, I guess I was paying attention to more stuff in school than I thought.”

  “What do you mean you enlisted in the Navy?” Momma demanded.

  “If I don’t get out of here, I’m going to end up dead like Elias or in jail. The Navy is my only hope to have a good life. I leave for bootcamp in two weeks.”

  “Two weeks?” Momma repeated. “I already lost one son. I can’t lose another.” Tears dripped down her face.

  “You’re not going to lose me. I’ll work hard and I’ll send part of my salary home to you. The Navy will take it out of my check and send it right to you every payday. I already arranged that. I won’t need much money. I’ll live on base and they’ll feed me too.”

  “Why on Earth would you join the Navy? And why didn’t you talk with your dad or me about it?”

  “I had to do it on my own, momma. I’m a man now, done with high school and I didn’t have no plan. Coach Bennett was in the Navy. When he first mentioned it to me, I thought he was high, but the more I thought about it, the more I thought it would be good. What am I gonna do if I stay here? In the Navy, I’m gonna be a cop. They’ll train me and if I decide to get out after the four years I committed to, I could probably get a job being a cop anywhere I want.”

  “I didn’t know you wanted to be a cop. Since when?” Momma asked.

  “Since Elias got shot. It just kind of made sense.”

  “I’m very proud of you,” Grandma said, laying her hand on top of his and his momma’s. “The military will make a good man out of you. Your grandpa was in the Army, you know. He was so handsome in his uniform.”

  “Mother, please,” Momma said.

  “It’s done, Nancy,” she said, her kind eyes locking with his momma’s. “He’s enlisted. All we can do now is support him. You’re a good boy, Landon, always have been. I’m proud of you. You have a future that can be anything you make of it.”

  “If you’re going to do this son, then you do it all the way. You understand me? You do your best. No more of this squeaking by with a C. No more doing the minimum,” his momma said.

  “I will. I already have. The recruiter gave me a book to study for the ASVAB. I spent the last two weeks studying it. That’s why I’ve spent so much time in my room. I studied harder in the last two weeks than I did all through high school. I will admit that. I’m going to make you proud of me, Momma,” he swore.

  Momma hugged him. “Oh Landon, you already do.”

  Johnson wasn’t close with his father. But even at eighteen, he appreciated the overnight job and all the overtime that Del Johnson worked to keep a roof over his family’s head and food on their table. His momma had been the one that raised him and his siblings with what he always thought was an opinion in passing from his father. When Elias was killed, his father only took three days off work. He was no more emotionally present then, than he had been Johnson’s entire life.

  But when he was told his son enlisted
, Del reacted in a way that Johnson would never have predicted. He gave him a beer and sat down with him over a drink to have the first real adult conversation of Johnson’s life with his father. He was open and authentic on what being a man meant. He spoke about the mistake he had made by not being more a part of his son’s lives. What surprised Johnson the most was that his father fully supported his decision to join the Navy.

  Alpha

  Navy SEAL and Shepherd Security Operator Landon ‘Lambchop’ Johnson waited in the unmarked DEA loaner car outside of the hotel in Seattle, Washington for his teammate, Danny ‘Mother’ Trio, to return to the car. The two of them had just returned from Anchorage, Alaska. It had been an emergency side trip that pulled them away from their team’s mission there in Seattle. Mother’s girlfriend had been kidnapped for the second time in as many months. They apprehended the perpetrator, and he was cooperating with authorities, giving up the man who he said had orchestrated it. Lambchop hoped that those behind it would be brought to justice.