Grenade

by Alan Gratz

  Ray dropped flat to the ground. Sergeant Meredith took two running steps from everybody else, unhooked his grenade pouch, and chucked it away as hard as he could.

  Ray had just enough time to scream “Sergeant!” before—BOOM!—the pouch exploded and the sergeant was thrown back against the outside of the tomb like a rag doll. Mud and bits of shrapnel peppered Ray’s helmet, but he wasn’t hurt.

  Big John looked up from the muck. “What the hell just happened?”

  “Sergeant Meredith!” Ray cried. He was up and on his feet and slipping toward the sergeant before anyone else. “It was one of his grenades!” Ray told the others. “In his pouch! One of the pins must have got caught on something and worked its way out!”

  Sergeant Meredith had tried to twist away from the blast, but one whole side of him was torn up. He was still alive though.

  “Somebody get on the radio and call for a medic!” the Old Man said.

  “No time!” Big John said. He pushed his heavy rifle into Ray’s hands, and with one great heave Big John picked up Sergeant Meredith and threw him onto his shoulder. “He’s not going to die here. Not like this!” Big John told them, and he took off for camp at a run.

  Ray and the others ran with him. Sergeant Meredith hung over Big John’s shoulder, his unconscious face turned to the side, facing Ray.

  Sergeant Meredith was the one who’d taught him how to survive. Sergeant Meredith was the one who’d given him his nickname. Sergeant Meredith was the one who had listened when Ray had argued for the Okinawans. Sergeant Meredith was the one who had taught Ray how to grieve for the death of a soldier.

  Ray just hoped he wasn’t going to have to grieve for Sergeant Meredith.

  Back at camp, the medics whisked Sergeant Meredith away. Ray and his squad waited on pins and needles for word on the sergeant’s condition.

  News of a death finally came that day, but it wasn’t Sergeant Meredith. It was Franklin D. Roosevelt. The president of the United States had died of a stroke.

  Ray sat down on his helmet, stunned. Roosevelt had been president of the United States since Ray was six years old. FDR had led America into war after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor in 1941. Less than a year ago, he’d been reelected to a fourth term, which had never happened before with any US president. Roosevelt was well liked and respected among the Marines. A lot of them around the camp were shaken up by the news, and Ray saw one or two of them crying. Ray felt more shocked than anything.

  “It’s Jap propaganda,” Gonzalez said. “It has to be.”

  “No, it came in over the radio from the ships offshore,” a captain told them. “It’s real.”

  “Who’s in charge now, Vice President Truman?” Gonzalez asked. “What do you think he’ll be like?”

  “Doesn’t matter,” Big John said sourly. “Losing the sergeant means more than losing some politician off in Washington. The president dying don’t change a dang thing for any of us on Okinawa.”

  “We don’t know the sergeant is dead yet,” Ray argued.

  “No, but you saw him. Even if he lives, he’s not coming back. After all those battles he lived through. To go out like that …” Big John shook his head.

  “Still doesn’t mean we can’t be sad about the president,” the Old Man said, but Big John just shrugged.

  “Grenade!” someone yelled, and suddenly a live grenade plopped into the muck at their feet. What? How—? Ray thought, but before he or anyone else could leap away or drop flat, the grenade went off with an ear-splitting BANG!

  Ray jumped out of his skin, and some of the other guys screamed, but the grenade hadn’t exploded. The top had blown off it, but its iron pineapple shell was still intact. Ray staggered back. He didn’t understand what was going on.

  One of the recent replacement troops, Private Wilbert Zimmer, guffawed nearby. “I thought I shook all the powder out, but I guess there was a little left in there after all!” he crowed. But he was the only one laughing.

  The grenade had just been a prank? Ray felt like he’d almost had a heart attack. He put a hand on a tree to steady himself.

  Big John bellowed with rage and charged Zimmer, tackling him hard. Big John battered the private with his big powerful fists until Ray and the Old Man and three others could finally pull him off.

  Private Zimmer’s face was purple and his eyes were swelling shut. “I was only joking!” he blubbered. “Nobody got hurt!”

  “Sergeant Meredith was nearly killed by a grenade today, you idiot!” Gonzalez told him.

  “I didn’t know,” Zimmer said. “I didn’t know.”

  Ray woke to relieve Big John on second watch late that night. The rain was still pouring down, like heaven was crying for President Roosevelt, and for everyone they’d lost so far in the war.

  “Word came down while you were sleeping,” Big John whispered to Ray. “The sergeant made it. He’s got his Golden Ticket. What we all want—medical evacuation to a hospital in Hawaii.”

  Ray wasn’t sure he wanted to get hit by a grenade like Sergeant Meredith, even if it did mean a ticket to Hawaii. But hearing the sergeant was going to live took a huge weight off Ray. His fitful sleep in the foxhole had been full of nightmares about exploding grenades.

  Even though Sergeant Meredith wouldn’t be coming back, Ray felt like the sergeant was still with him, in a way. Not his ghost—he wasn’t dead—but his spirit, maybe. Like a part of the sergeant would always stay with him.

  “Who’s our new sergeant going to be?” Ray whispered.

  “You’re looking at him,” Big John whispered back. Big John had been given a field promotion from Corporal to Sergeant. He was their squad leader now.

  Big John settled back into the foxhole and closed his eyes. “Sergeant Meredith got out just in time. We’ve been ordered to the front first thing in the morning.” He opened his eyes to look at Ray. “Everything we been through ain’t nothing compared to what comes next.”

  A soldier stood silhouetted in the little door to Hideki’s family tomb. It was too dark to see if he was Japanese or American, and Hideki fumbled for one of the grenades in his pocket. He’d just got hold of one when the soldier stepped farther into the tomb. It was a Japanese soldier! A private. Hideki could tell from the single star on his collar.

  Otō put a hand on Hideki’s arm, quietly signaling him to put away his grenade. “Welcome to the Kaneshiro family tomb, Private … ?”

  “Shinohara,” the private said. He scanned the room with the wild urgency of a trapped animal. His uniform was torn and covered in dirt and blood. Somewhere along the way he’d apparently lost his rifle, because all he carried was his sword.

  Hideki stood at attention. A private was the lowest rank in the Japanese army, but privates still outranked every boy in the Blood and Iron Student Corps.

  “Is there anybody else here?” the private demanded. “Have you seen any other soldiers, from either side?”

  “No, sir,” Hideki answered, careful to use Japanese. “Not since yesterday. But we’re expecting a doctor soon.”

  Private Shinohara scoffed. “A doctor? Ha.”

  His eyes fell on the stone bowl with its tiny offering of food, and he pounced on it, scooping out the rice and stuffing it in his mouth.

  “Hey! What are you doing? Stop!” Hideki said, forgetting the private’s rank. “That’s an offering! You can’t eat that!”

  Hideki’s father reached out for him again. “Hideki, don’t.”

  The private ignored them both and ate the rice. Hideki burned inside, but there was nothing he could do. Besides outranking Hideki, the private was bigger and stronger than he was. And the private had a sword.

  When the private was finished gulping down the rice, he grabbed one of the large urns off a shelf and moved it near the door.

  “What are you doing?” Hideki cried again. “This is my family’s tomb! This is a sacred place!”

  “It’s an IJA base now,” the private told him.

  Hideki looked to his fa
ther for help, but Otō had his eyes closed and was slumped over to the side again. Where was that doctor?

  Private Shinohara went to pull another urn from the shelf, and Hideki grabbed his arm and tried to yank him away. The private threw Hideki to the ground and pulled his sword from its scabbard with a shing. It glinted in the dim light from the entrance.

  “Get out!” the private roared. “This is my hiding place. Get out! This cave is for army personnel only!”

  “This tomb belongs to me and my family!” Hideki told him. “Besides, I’m in the army too! I’m in the Blood and Iron Student Corps!”

  The private looked incredulous. “You’re not in the real army. You’re not even real Japanese! Get out!” The private took a swing at Hideki with his sword, and Hideki jumped back out of the way. Hideki’s blood boiled. He was being attacked by someone from his own side, in his own family’s tomb! He thought about going for a grenade again. But what was he going to do? Blow up a Japanese soldier? And himself and his father and his family tomb with him? But they couldn’t stay here with Private Shinohara. The man was crazy.

  Hideki got under his father’s shoulder and lifted. Otō moaned in pain, but he stood, putting most of his weight on his son. Hideki steered them toward the door. Anger rose in Hideki like the tide. This was stupid! They shouldn’t have to be running from their own family’s tomb. But Hideki didn’t see that they had any other choice.

  Private Shinohara kept his sword pointed at them the whole way, a mad gleam in his eyes. “Get out. Get out!” he roared. “If you dojin could defend your own stupid island, I wouldn’t even be here!”

  Hideki picked up the sack with the pictures of the Emperor, and he and his father staggered out into the rain. They made it as far as a nearby banyan tree before they both collapsed in a heap. Otō cried out again.

  “I’m going to get you a doctor!” Hideki said. He stood up to go but Otō called him back.

  “No, Hideki. Don’t leave me.”

  “But you said someone was on the way.”

  “Yes. Death is on the way for me, Hideki,” his father said. “There is no doctor coming. I came back to our family tomb to die.”

  Hideki’s insides felt hollow. His father had been lying to him! Hideki had suspected it all along, but he hadn’t wanted to believe it. And now it was too late.

  Hideki dropped to his knees and sobbed. “No, Otō. No!”

  “Don’t cry, Hideki. This is a blessing.”

  “A blessing?” Hideki said.

  “I got to see you again,” his father said. It was harder and harder for him to breathe. “I never thought I’d see any of you again before …” Otō’s eyes were a million miles away.

  “You’re going to be all right,” Hideki told him. “I’m going to find a doctor. You’re going to live.”

  But Hideki’s words were empty, and they both knew it.

  “I should have kept our family together,” Otō muttered.

  “There was nothing you could have done,” Hideki told him. “There’s nothing any of us could have done.”

  “You must find your sister,” Otō said. He stopped to cough. “Forget this war and those stupid photographs. Find Kimiko and get yourselves to safety. That’s all that matters now.”

  “You died a hero, Otō,” Hideki said. “Fighting for Japan. I’ll tell everyone.”

  His father laughed. It turned into another painful cough. “I’m no hero. I was so scared I pissed my pants. I was hit as I was running away.”

  Hideki was stunned. “But—but I’m the one who carries Shigetomo’s curse, not you.”

  “Shigetomo wasn’t a coward,” Hideki’s father said. “He was brave. Braver than any of us. I understand that now, and I hope one day you will too, before it’s too late.”

  Shigetomo brave? Hideki couldn’t believe what his father was saying.

  Otō grabbed Hideki’s jacket. His eyes were wide, desperate and pleading. “Find your sister. Promise me you’ll find her.”

  “I promise, Otō,” Hideki said, frightened.

  “Yes. Good.” His father let go of him and slumped back against one of the roots hanging down from the branches of the banyan tree. “There are evil spirits all around, Hideki. More than ever. But evil can only run in a straight line. Keep changing course so the evil can’t … can’t catch …”

  Otō’s eyes still glistened, still stared up into the falling rain, but his chest stopped rising and falling. His body settled down into the mud.

  Hideki’s father was dead.

  “No. No! Otō! Come back! Otō!” Hideki sobbed. He lay across his father’s chest and cried as he hugged him good-bye.

  Hideki couldn’t carry his father back into the family tomb, not with Private Shinohara there. And he didn’t have a shovel to bury him. He would have to leave him here, underneath this banyan tree, and come back later, after the war, and give his father a proper burial. Until then, Hideki would fulfill his father’s dying wish and do the thing Otō had failed to do in life.

  No matter where she was, no matter what she was doing, Hideki would find his sister.

  Ray and his squad were a few hours into their rainy march when he heard explosions. He ducked instinctively, but the bombs weren’t on top of them. Not yet.

  “Japanese mortars,” Big John said.

  Things weren’t going well on the front lines. So, as Big John had promised, the First Marines were being ordered south to fight there. The soldiers of the Army’s 96th Division currently fighting at the front were to swap places with them, continuing the lighter duty of clearing caves and securing the northern part of the island while they recuperated.

  “How can you tell one explosion from another?” Ray asked.

  “You get shot at enough times, you get to recognizing the sound,” Big John told him.

  “You haven’t faced mortars yet, have you Barbecue?” the Old Man asked, walking alongside them. “Mortars lob bombs at you from a long way off. Like a long fly ball.” The Old Man whistled while he made an arcing motion with his hand. “Lot of new guys, they don’t know the secret to running through mortar fire.”

  “Run zigzag?” Ray guessed.

  The Old Man shook his head. “No. You run straight away. No turning, no looking back. That’s how you survive a mortar attack.”

  Stay low, don’t bunch up, and run like hell, Ray thought. Just what the sergeant had told him as they came off the boat. Sergeant Meredith, that was. Ray had to remember that Big John was their sergeant now.

  Stark’s long legs took him on ahead, and Big John fell in beside Ray as they walked.

  “I love the Old Man like a brother,” Big John said, “but he’s dead wrong about how to survive a mortar attack, Barbecue.”

  Ray frowned. “I should run zigzag after all?”

  “Naw. The secret to running through artillery is that it doesn’t matter what you do,” he told Ray. “You zig, you may make it. You zag, you may get hit. There’s a bomb or a bullet or a grenade out there with everybody’s name on it, and if it’s gonna get you it’s gonna get you.”

  That was a hell of a way to live your life, Ray thought. Knowing that death could catch up to you any second and that nothing you did made a difference. Ray wondered again about his father in the First World War. Hiding in foxholes, pinned down by Germans, listening to the bombs explode all around him. Had he also expected death any second? Was that what had broken him? Made him into a monster?

  Ray touched the long scar on the inside of his left arm and remembered how he’d gotten it. Ray had been shooting a rifle since he was six, and every winter it was his job to shoot the hogs before he and his father hung them up to butcher them. It had been the same every year, until he was eleven years old. That year, Ray’s father had stood to the side with his butcher knife like always, waiting for Ray to put down one of the pigs. But that year, everything went wrong.

  Usually, one .22 rifle slug was enough to kill a pig. But this pig didn’t die with one shot. It took the bullet and
squealed, staggering away. The high-pitched screeching was the most awful thing Ray had ever heard, and he immediately felt sick. He hadn’t meant for the pig to suffer. Ray hurried to take aim with his rifle again, to put the poor thing out of its misery.

  And that’s when his father had gone crazy.

  “No!” Ray’s father screamed. “Stay away from him! Get away!” And suddenly he ran at Ray with the butcher knife. Ray got the rifle up just in time to block the first of his father’s slashes, but the next one caught Ray on the inside of his left arm, carving a deep gash from his wrist almost all the way down to his elbow. Ray screamed and dropped the rifle. He ducked his father’s next attack and ran for the house, clutching his arm to his chest. His mother drove him to the hospital for stitches, and when they got back, his father wouldn’t look him in the eye. But Pa had never apologized, never tried to explain, and none of them had spoken a word about what happened ever again.

  As many times as Ray had replayed that day in his head, he had still never understood exactly what it was that had set his father off. Was it the gunshot? The pig’s squealing? Ray chasing it down? Like all the other times his father had gotten violent and unpredictable, there was no understandable reason for it. But that time had been the worst. That time it had cost Ray two pints of blood and the last bit of love he’d had for his father.

  “Okinawans!” somebody yelled, waking Ray from his reverie. “Refugees coming through the lines!”

  Ray instinctively tightened his grip on his rifle, and he saw the other Marines raise theirs under their rain capes. Big John had kept Sergeant Meredith’s new rule about not killing Okinawans. But any encounter made the squad jumpy.

  There was no mistaking these people as anything but refugees though. Their hair and clothes were filthy, they had scratches and poorly bandaged wounds, and none of them looked like they’d had a good meal in a month. But the worst part was the fear on their faces, like Ray and all the others were the most frightening monsters they’d ever seen. Some of them couldn’t even look at the Marines, they were so scared.