by Tanya Biank
Ski set down his tray of lasagna and salad and sat next to his son. Gary Shane had been through the mess hall line before his dad arrived and had just finished some pizza and a glass of lemonade.
“I’ve got something for ya,” Ski said. From his pocket he pulled out a copper-colored coin slightly larger than a half dollar. On one side it read, “Presented by the Command Sergeant Major.” On the other side it bore the 504th unit crest.
“This is something for you from your ol’ dad. Keep it on you for coin checks.”
The military-unit coin is a relatively new tradition. Started at Fort Bragg by Special Forces troops, it has become widely popular throughout the Armed Services. Commanders and senior NCOs hand out specially minted coins to soldiers for a job well done. Soldiers keep the coin in their wallets, and if they are asked by someone in a bar to show their coin, and they don’t have it, they have to pay for a round of drinks. If they produce the coin, the challenger has to cover the round.
“Your mother told me you’re getting out after two years, is that right?”
“Yep, in October.”
“Let me see your ID card.” Ski examined its expiration date. “What are you going to do when you get out?”
“My buddy and I are going to go to New York and work for GM; his mom can get us jobs there, and I want to enroll in school somewhere and take classes. I think I’d like New York with its music scene and all.”
“Son, there’s no General Motors in the city, but there’s a plant in Newark. I think it’s a good idea.” Ski wanted to be encouraging. “You guys are interested in cars.”
Ski was glad Gary Shane was getting out of the Army. The world was now more uncertain than ever for soldiers, and besides, he and Delores still wanted the boy to go to college.
“Now, just remember, if you want to come home for a while, that’s fine, too. Your room is waiting. I was thinking of making it into an office, but you know your mom would never let me do that.” That was classic Ski. “You sure you don’t want to come home?”
“Yeah, I’m sure,” Gary Shane said with a laugh.
“Hey, your mom gave me this camera and told me to take lots of pictures. Let’s get some shots before we head out of here. It’s not often you have two Kalinofskis in uniform.”
Ski then took all the NCOs outside the mess hall and onto the porch in the frigid Balkan air for a pep talk and safety briefing. Gary Shane stood next to his father as Ski spoke.
“We’re in the home stretch, guys. Watch over each other. Keep doing the right thing.”
In the Army there is always paranoia about things going wrong near the end of a seamless deployment or field exercise. “Ol’ Murphy” of Murphy’s Law—if something can go wrong, it will—is one person soldiers never want to have around.
“You’re doing a great job,” Ski continued. “Take care of the soldiers. Don’t let them do anything stupid. It’s more important than ever to keep an eye on the men.”
After the talk Ski and his son tried to call Delores, but Gary Shane’s phone card wasn’t working, so they headed for First Sergeant Tracy Long’s office.
“I can’t get through to my wife,” Ski told Long. “Do you mind if we use your phone?”
“No problem, sergeant major.”
As Gary Shane talked with Delores, Ski asked Long how Gary Shane was doing.
“He’s doing great, sergeant major.”
Ski asked the same question when he saw his son’s squad outside on a foot patrol.
“Gary’s doing great, we love him,” came the response.
It was time for Ski to meet with the battalion command sergeant major. “I’ll catch up with you later this afternoon,” he told Gary Shane. “I’ll be here for a couple more days. I love you.”
“Love you, too, Dad.” And with that father and son hugged each other good-bye.
In Fayetteville Delores finished up her coffee and dressed for Command and Staff. At 9:30 A.M. on the first Monday of every month, the division commander’s wife presided over the meeting of senior wives at Fort Bragg’s Watters Center, passing along information on post matters like health clinics, upcoming events, and updated rosters that the women would then take back to their coffee groups and FRGs. Delores had been attending the meetings for almost ten years, and she always looked forward to them. This morning her spirits were still high about the phone conversation with Ski and Gary Shane, and she was eager to share her news with the other women.
It was a clear morning, with the temperature in the thirties. Most wives wore slacks, skirts, or dresses, but Delores almost always went casual. She put on white sneakers, Lands’ End blue jeans, a long-sleeve white T-shirt from L.L. Bean, and her favorite black shirt, which had “82nd Airborne Division,” her name, and a rose all embroidered in red—a gift from Ski. She slipped her gold crucifix on last; she never left home without wearing it.
Cherish, who was now thirteen and out of school for a teacher workday, was coming with her. Delores made sure her daughter brought something to keep herself busy. “I’m going to be taking notes and listening to the head table,” she said.
She was still beaming as she entered the Watters Center with Cherish, made her way into the auditorium, and sat down at the 504th table with ladies from her brigade.
“I heard from my two favorite guys this morning,” Delores told two battalion commanders’ wives. “Gary and Gary Shane called from Kosovo. You know, Gary’s there for a week with Colonel Campbell.”
“When is Gary Shane due home?” one of the women asked.
“He redeploys in mid-May to Fort Drum. We’re going up there. I can’t wait to see him. As soon as Gary gets back, I’ll make reservations for the three of us.”
Delores looked around as the meeting was called to order. It was odd that Ann Campbell, the wife of the brigade commander, wasn’t in her seat. She had thought they might have lunch together after the meeting. Ann’s books were on the table, and her coat was on the back of her chair. Something must be up with the unit, Delores thought.
Suddenly Ann appeared next to her. She was an ER nurse and had short dark hair and was always bubbly and optimistic, but now she seemed nervous, and her fair skin had turned the color of ash.
“Delores, could you and Cherish please come into the hall?” Ann said softly. Something was wrong. One of the soldiers in the brigade must have gotten hurt or into trouble.
Delores and her daughter followed Ann out. Across the hallway, standing in the entranceway to Room 124, stood Command Sergeant Major Thomas Capel. His soft brown eyes were red, as if he had been crying.
This has something to do with me, Delores realized. This is going to affect me in a way I do not want to hear. There has been a death. There has been a death. This is something I don’t want to be hearing. All she wanted to do at that moment was grab Cherish and run out of the building.
“Please come with me, Delores,” Capel said.
She started crying hard. Capel took her into a counseling room with a table and chairs. The space was filled with people, including the brigade chaplain, Major Jeff Watters, and the brigade surgeon, Major David Doyle. Charlie Thorpe, the command sergeant major of the 82nd Airborne Division, and his wife, Willann, still in her white nurse’s uniform, were sitting with all the others. All these people … this is not good, Delores thought. No one said a word until Delores broke the silence.
“Okay, what the hell are you going to tell me has happened to my husband in the short time since I spoke to him? That he has been killed? Delores never used profanity. She looked over at Charlie Thorpe. She and Ski had been friends with him since before they were married.
Cherish, who was sitting in a wingback chair near the window, started to cry.
Thorpe was an old-school black sergeant major with a voice that sounded like a Humvee driving over gravel. “No, Dee, not big Gary—little Gary.” He continued with the precision of a twenty-one-gun salute: “Gary Shane committed suicide in Kosovo at 1:13 P.M.”
D
elores froze, unable to move. She could barely speak. “No! Major mistake. No, not my baby! Not little Gary.”
“Yes, Dee,” the sergeant major said, his voice softening. Delores began to sob. She grabbed Thorpe and buried her head in his chest, coating his uniform with her tears.
“It’s my husband that has been killed; Gary, my husband.”
“No, Dee, it’s Gary Shane,” the sergeant major said again, gently.
Every Army wife, somewhere in the back of her mind, knows she can lose her husband, but a son? The thought was inconceivable to Delores. Gary Shane had just turned twenty-one.
She lifted her head up and looked at Thorpe. “Not my baby—not Gary Shane. Maybe it’s a local or someone who resembled Gary Shane, but not my baby. Maybe he’s just hurt somewhere? How do you know? Are you sure? This can’t be true. I just spoke to Gary Shane and his dad this morning. I spoke to Gary Shane for thirty minutes. Tell me, please, how can this be true?”
She buried her head back in Thorpe’s chest. If she could only go back in time an hour or so, to when her life was happy and normal. Maybe if she hadn’t come to Command and Staff, this wouldn’t have happened. Just get the keys, get back in the Camry, and get out of the building, she told herself. This cannot be happening.
Instead she found herself in a dark gray government van with an entourage of senior soldiers and wives taking her back to her house. Capel drove the Camry. Suddenly, in the midst of her grief, Delores had another sick feeling. She was an excellent housekeeper, but that morning she had left her kitchen table and countertop cluttered with fund-raising papers, envelopes, and brochures. What would the other wives think when they saw the mess?
It may seem strange to outsiders that having a house out of order would be such a pervasive and prevalent thought among Army wives in a moment of horror, but it is. Psychologists may have their own interpretations, but I think that Army culture and expectations within that culture have a lot to do with it. Army couples like to put their best foot forward at all times. A soldier’s family and the neatness of his home are all reflections upon the soldier, who himself is expected to be orderly and disciplined. Army people never forget their dirty neighbors.
From the van Delores kept trying to call her next-door neighbor. The woman had a key to the house. Maybe she could go in and put things away. But Delores never got through.
She looked out the window, her eyes swollen and puffy. She desperately wanted to speak with her husband, to be in his arms. She had so many questions and no answers.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
After father and son had said good-bye, Ski went to the battalion command sergeant major’s office. He was there for a meeting, but he took the opportunity to ask the command sergeant major the same question he’d been asking everyone: “How’s Gary doing?” And he got the same response he’d been getting since Gary Shane entered Basic Training: “He’s doing great.”
Ten minutes later First Sergeant Tracy Long came running into the office looking panicked. “Sergeant major, you gotta come with me.” The sergeant major excused himself, leaving Ski in the office alone. He knew it must be an emergency of some sort. Something was obviously wrong. At least it ain’t Gary, Ski reassured himself. He’s with me. Something must have happened on a patrol.
A moment later the first sergeant and the sergeant major reappeared along with some other soldiers. The men stared at Ski with solemn faces. Some wouldn’t meet his gaze. What in the world? Ski thought.
“I’m … I’m sorry,” First Sergeant Long stuttered. “Gary’s gone.”
“What are you talking about, Gary’s gone?” Ski was on his feet now, his hands on his hips, his jaw slightly dropped.
“Sergeant major, I’m sorry … he’s dead … he’s gone.”
“What? It can’t be. I was with him just ten minutes ago.” Ski couldn’t process what was being said. It felt like time had stopped. He could hear the distinctive chopping sound of helicopters behind the shouting and commotion outside.
“Are you sure? Come on …”
Gary Shane had been excused from a squad patrol because his father was visiting. He had gone back to his room, Conex #29, locked the door behind him, changed into his gray PT clothes, and neatly hung up his BDUs, placing them in the wall locker across from his bed.
The room was sparse—two bunks, two wall lockers, and a window air conditioner. His roommate was out with the squad. Gary Shane had secretly kept some ammunition from the arms room from an earlier patrol. Now he loaded it into his M249 SAW (Squad Automatic Weapon), a 5.56 millimeter light machine gun that can engage targets eight hundred meters away. At fifteen pounds it’s a bulky weapon, and like a fat lady with skinny legs, the SAW’s slender barrel seems out of proportion with its receiver. Gary Shane placed the cool round muzzle inside his mouth, pointing it upward. He pulled the trigger and fell facedown on the floor. Soldiers outside heard the gunfire. The smoke and sparks from the weapon set off the room’s fire alarm. Soldiers had to get a master key to get into the room, but it was too late.
The day after Gary Shane’s death, I was at work taking care of last-minute details for my trip to Vietnam when I opened an e-mail that had been sent from a public affairs office in Pristina. The subject line read: “Soldier dies in Kosovo.”
I opened the e-mail. The writing was in another language, but the name “Pfc. Gary S. Kalinofski” stood out like blood on a white wall. In horror I scrolled down and found the English translation. Gary Shane had died from a gunshot wound “unrelated to engagement with hostile forces.” It’s a buzz phrase in news releases for either an accident or suicide. This couldn’t be happening, I thought, tears streaming down my face. It must have been an accident. Maybe the soldiers were fooling around and something bad happened. Then I remembered, “Oh, God, Ski is over there.”
I had run into Ski a few weeks earlier, before a parachute jump at Green Ramp on Pope Air Force Base. He was his usual upbeat self, eyes twinkling, arms crossed, and legs apart like an inverted V. He told me he was going to Kosovo and would get to see Gary Shane.
Now I insisted on being the one to write a story, and I began to track down Gary Shane’s high school teachers and his friends at Fort Drum. The article never ran. Later in the day I was horrified to confirm through back channels that Gary Shane had committed suicide. My paper’s policy on suicide was not to report it unless it was done in a very public way or involved a public official or other prominent person. I wrote a few short paragraphs citing statements from the press release.
Ski wasn’t home yet. I planned to go over to the Kalinofskis’ house that night but was told the family did not want visitors. It turned out that was never Delores’s wish. She didn’t know that a well-meaning relative was turning away people at her door.
That would change two days later. On Wednesday evening, March 6, Ski arrived home in Fayetteville. He and Colonel Campbell had accompanied Gary Shane’s body on a C-130 cargo plane to Germany, where an autopsy was performed. At first Ski had been convinced there must have been foul play or that it was an accident, but the windows and door of Gary Shane’s room were locked from the inside. It was clear that his son had taken his own life.
In front of the Kalinofski house, cars crowded the cul-de-sac. Inside casseroles, salads, sheet cakes, buckets of Kentucky Fried Chicken, coffeepots, and cartons of creamer covered the kitchen counter and table, along with boxes of tissues. Plants and flowers filled the family room, and neighbors, relatives, and friends from Bragg milled through the house.
Only later that night, behind closed doors in their bedroom, were Delores and Ski finally alone. She sat in her rocking chair while he knelt down beside her and cried.
“We’ve lost our boy … . We lost our baby I don’t know what happened,” Ski said. “For the life of me, I don’t know what happened.”
All week neighbors and wives from the brigade filled the house with food. Ann Campbell had made sure of that. But the dishes had no taste to Delores, and she subsisted mostly on
coffee and glasses of milk. The company of others comforted her during the day. At night, when everyone else was in bed, Delores would slip out of bed—quietly, so as not to wake Ski—curl in her rocking chair, and cry. Dear God give me the strength to let this broken heart and broken soul heal!
She felt like a total failure. How could my son speak to me for thirty minutes and ten minutes later commit suicide? Why didn’t I sense something wrong with my son? These thoughts consumed her. What kind of a mom am I? What was his pain? Why couldn’t he have told me?
The night they made the funeral arrangements, Delores was again in her rocking chair. This time she was poring over photos of Gary Shane she planned to put together for a collage to be displayed at the funeral home. Ski came upstairs after everyone had left and put his head in her lap.
“He’s gone. Our son is gone,” he sobbed. “Oh, God, didn’t he know that I loved him?”
Delores had never planned to tell her husband what Gary Shane had said before he left for Basic Training. She didn’t want to hurt him further. But now she had to tell him.
“I don’t know what he was thinking,” she said. “Honey, honest to God, when he pulled that trigger, I don’t know what he knew. He told me before he left for Basic that he thought you loved Cherish more than you loved him or me. I told him that wasn’t true and he needed to talk to you about it.”
Ski continued to sob as Delores stroked his head.
“We always showed him and told him we loved him,” Ski said. “We never withheld our love from him. What made him do this?”
Delores was crying uncontrollably now, too. “Why didn’t the love reach him? I want to know why my son took his life. I need an answer from heaven right now.”