Wait: The Brazen Bulls Beginning

by Susan Fanetti

  All the political assholes were eating French pastries and talking peace at fancy French tables, but here on the ground, it was looking more and more like the US would pull out whether a peace had been reached or not. Hell, they were already pulling out. When the 173rd had deployed back to the US in 1971, Brian had known then that the US was giving up. A few weeks before he’d landed back on Vietnamese soil, the 101st Airborne had pulled out, too—and they had been the very last ground unit in-country.

  The only combat units still engaged were bombers. As far as the US was concerned, the war was just about over. Soon the South Vietnamese would be on their own.

  Which made being back here piss Brian off all the more. Fucking Cornish had recalled him to help with the logistics of the transition of military leadership fully to ARVN—the South Vietnamese Army—and the final removal of the remaining combat troops. Fucking desk work, after all his time in combat, like there was no other monkey who could read a goddamn map or ledger.

  And of course there were plenty of monkeys. He was one of a whole team of them. He’d been here for weeks now, and had not yet discovered what it was he could do that made him so special he’d been recalled out of inactive status. He was good at this, sure. He didn’t like it, but he was good at it. But so was every other NCO on the team.

  What made him special was that Lieutenant Colonel Daniel T. Cornish preferred working with him, and the son of a bitch had dragged him back on that basis alone.

  Once, he’d considered Cornish a friend. Certainly, he’d respected the fuck out of him. Now, though, it was all Brian could do not to punch the bastard every time he looked at him. But that would just get him a court martial and prolong his time away from Mo and their life. So he kept his fists at his side, his head to his work, and got it done.

  I miss you so damn much, Mo. he wrote. I want this to be over and I want to be home with you. I’m going to be better to you when I am. If this time away has done anything good at all, it’s made me see that even working at Essert’s was okay. He’s an asshole, yeah, but I was working on engines, which I love. And I was coming home every night to you, and that will always be the best thing in my life, no matter how long I live.

  I love you, Irish. I’m sorry I hurt you again. I hope you’re okay.

  I love you.

  I love you.

  Brian

  ~oOo~

  My love,

  I’m fine. I miss you every day, and I’m angry at the Army, but not at you. You don’t know how it helps to read your description of evening walks and Vietnamese soup. The thought that you’re safe and well sustains me. I love you and want you home.

  Maggie had her baby—a wee pink miss they’ve named Annette Michelle. She was nearly two weeks late, and the doctor had to go in and get her, so she clearly takes after her ma, wanting to lie in until all hours and never on time for anything. Haha.

  Uncle Dave and Aunt Bridie are over the moon. Their first grandchild. I thought Uncle Dave was going to pop, he swelled up so big the first time he held her. He also cried, but we weren’t supposed to notice that.

  She’s very fat and bald, and a little scrunched up, what with being crowded in there for so long. But she’s a pretty wee thing, with rosy cheeks and a touch of what might be red hair.

  It’s hard, Brian. All these babes around me, and I want one of our own so much. But at least I get to share in others’ joy. I’ve volunteered for lots of auntie time.

  School is going well, but the year’s over in just a few more weeks. I’m a wee bit afraid of having the summer off. All that time alone to miss you even more. Aunt Bridie thinks I should take up a new craft. What do you think? Should I start decoupaging the furniture? Haha.

  I love you, Brian. Come home to me, mo chuisle.

  Mo

  5th May 1972

  ~oOo~

  Brian and Mo had been together more than four years now. Even though they’d been apart for a sizeable chunk of that time, he knew his woman well. She was sensible and driven, and she could cope with what life threw her way, whatever it was. But he also knew, maybe more than anyone else in her life ever had, how her plans for the future were really precious dreams and how deep those dreams went, how badly she wanted certain things—in particular, a family. She wanted Brian, and she wanted their children. A home she could make and be proud of, a family to fill it, a life to build around it. He could read between the lines of her pretty handwriting and know she was struggling far more than she’d let on. Simply admitting that she had fears, that some things were hard—for Mo Delaney, those admissions constituted cries for help.

  He was worried. So he wrote every day, and kept his letters full of news and empty of his own frustrations. Each night in his room, the last thing he did before turning in, he wrote to her. He even bought a little instamatic camera and began taking photos to send to her, so she could see that Saigon was far from most of the fighting, and he would be home safe when this tour was over. They would try again for a baby, if she wanted—or maybe adopt; he’d started thinking adoption might be good for them. He would do everything in his power to give his wife the life she wanted.

  ~oOo~

  The war was far from over. The Easter Offensive was in full swing, and ARVN forces were dying in droves, as always. But now, for the most part, they were dying alone. US forces were stationed at air bases, and engaged from thousands of feet in the air, or they were in Saigon, pushing papers and sharpening pencils.

  Occasionally, there would be a small skirmish nearby, the Viet Cong sneaking close to chip away at the city, but the real fighting was far away.

  That didn’t mean there was no danger at all. Brian hadn’t written about it to Mo, and wouldn’t, but there was more than merely paperwork. Occasionally, they traveled to the bases where troops were still stationed. Cornish liked to have face to face contact with COs of forward bases as he gathered information to plan deployments. Usually that meant a helo flight, and sometimes a couple of hours by jeep as well. Always, there was a chance for enemy contact on the road.

  The North Vietnamese were gaining ground fairly rapidly in this new offensive—which was the point. They’d taken note of the withdrawal of US troops, and they were surging forward over a wildly outgunned and outmanned ARVN, now supported only by air strikes. While Henry Kissinger and Le Duc Tho hashed out whatever peace they might eventually agree to, Le Duc Tho’s army was improving the North Vietnamese position steadily.

  Brian had enough seniority not to be Cornish’s fucking chauffeur. But that meant they had plenty of time to talk on these occasional jaunts out of Saigon.

  The first couple of trips they’d taken together, Cornish had tried to keep a conversation going, as if they were still friends. But Brian could hold a grudge good and tight, and he had no interest in being friendly with the man who’d dragged him back across the ocean. He answered every question that wasn’t a direct demand for information with no sir, yes sir, whatever you say sir.

  By the end of August and their fourth such jaunt through the country, Cornish had soured as much on Brian, so they rode in silence. Cornish studied reports like he hadn’t been reading them for days already. Brian looked out the side window at the scenery bumping past along war-ravaged roads.

  The war showed everywhere—in napalmed forests, rubbled homesteads, and pitted roads. In villagers scarred and maimed from burns and bullets and savagery. And yet, life went on. In places that had gone long without a battle or a skirmish or an ambush, rice paddies grew lush, and farmers did their work. With a narrow enough focus, one could almost pretend there was peace.

  The young corporal who was their driver downshifted, and the jeep slowed. “Colonel, sir?” the corporal said.

  Brian heard worry in the kid’s tone, and his soldier’s body went into full alert before he’d turned his head.

  About a hundred feet ahead, the road was blocked. A cart and horse, a load of what looked like furniture, or maybe just scrap wood, and two young men or boys. The cart
seemed intact. Why they were stopped and blocking the road wasn’t immediately clear. From this distance, it was hard to make out details, but the corporal had been smart to leave so much room.

  What’s in the hat, mama san? What’s under the rice?

  Brian popped the strap on his holster and reached for the M16 stowed behind him.

  Cornish put his hand up before Brian had a grip on the rifle. “Hold, Sergeant. Corporal, pull forward. Slowly.” The corporal complied, and they moved forward at a snail’s pace.

  What’s in the hat? What’s under the rice?

  Brian scanned the area, but it was just rice paddies, and scattered farmers, at too great a distance to be dangerous. No good cover nearby.

  Unless they were in that cart, under the cargo.

  “Colonel …” Brian warned.

  “I know. But we can’t do anything from back here, and we’re not turning around. Forward is the way.”

  “Let me at least have the rifle ready, sir.”

  Cornish gave him a swift, sharp look and nodded. Brian reached for the M16, checked it, readied it.

  He tried to remember the corporal’s name. He was new, reassigned just a week or so ago from combat support to HQ after the latest drawdown made his position obsolete before his tour was complete. He was Reedy, or Greedy—Creedy. Sam Creedy.

  He was the most at risk, behind the wheel as they came up on this possible threat. Jesus, he did not want this kid biting it on a goddamn driving detail from HQ.

  “Look sharp, Creedy.”

  “I am, Sarge.”

  “Close enough,” Cornish said. “Do you speak native, corporal?”

  Creedy looked into the rearview mirror. “Sir?”

  “Do you speak any Vietnamese?”

  “No, sir. Sorry, sir.”

  “Shit.”

  Cornish was about as hopeless with the language as Brian, and that was saying something. None of them could communicate with those boys—at this range, half the distance they were before, it was clear they were boys, no older than twenty—unless those boys spoke English. In the countryside, that was unlikely.

  The boys had come around to stand before their horse and cart. They were filthy, and wore dark, tattered clothes. They stood and stared at the jeep. That was not encouraging. But at least they weren’t armed.

  Cornish was an officer. Creedy was a kid. Brian sighed. “I’ll go.”

  Cornish looked like he meant to say something, then closed his mouth and gave Brian a nod. “Careful, D. You’ve got enough commendations and Purple Hearts, don’t you think?”

  “Yes sir, I do.” He opened the door and slung the M16 on his shoulder.

  As he walked to the boys, the taller, and possibly older, of them stepped forward, his hands up in the gesture that said Not a threat, don’t shoot. Brian kept his hands on the rifle, ready to aim but not aimed yet, and kept an eye on the shorter boy and the cart behind him. If trouble was coming, it would come from there.

  “You speak English?” he asked.

  “You soldier. Help please?”

  A little bit of careful relief unspooled on the floor of Brian’s gut. “What’s the problem?”

  “Come help please?”

  “What do you need?” He’d come close enough to the boy speaking to be sure he wasn’t hiding a weapon—and that a lot of the filth on him had the dark red tinge of aging blood. The other boy had been crying—and he was decidedly younger. Maybe only thirteen or so. Also bloody, but neither from obvious wounds of their own.

  The hairs on Brian’s nape stood up straight. “What happened?”

  “Come please,” the boy said again, and Brian began to wonder if he’d heard the full extent of the English the boy knew.

  Keeping his eyes sharp on that fucking cart, he followed both boys to the other side—obstructed now from the jeep, so he might be thoroughly fucked any second now—and saw the problem. “Jesus.”

  “Help please,” the older boy said. “American soldier help now.”

  In the ditch along the side of the road, half full of murky water, lay a middle-aged woman. Crouched beside her was a girl of about five years old, sucking her thumb and rocking. The woman must have stepped on a Betty—both legs ended in jagged stumps, but what was left had been tied off with tourniquets, and she was unconscious but still alive. Her chest heaved in stuttering bursts.

  “This is your mother?” he asked the older boy.

  The boy smiled, a manic slash full of relief and terror. “Yes, mother. Please help.”

  They were two hours from the nearest town with any hope of medical help. This woman was going to die. But Brian remembered the day he’d been given up for dead again and again and again, and if not for the iron-clad will of one young soldier, he would have died on a muddy, forsaken hill.

  “Okay. We’ll help.”

  On his way back to the jeep, he checked the cart. Nothing but scrap wood.

  ~oOo~

  It was well past dark when they got back to HQ. When they’d left the woman and her children at the little health clinic, she was still alive. Whether she’d keep going, or what kind of life she’d live in rural Vietnam without her legs if she did—well, those were questions above Brian’s pay grade.

  Corporal Creedy dropped Brian and Cornish off and headed to the motor pool. For a moment or two, the two men stood in the courtyard without speaking. Brian lit a cigarette and took a long drag. He offered his pack to Cornish, who took one and pulled his own Zippo from his pocket.

  Brian watched the light flicker across Cornish’s face as he lit his smoke. “If there’s nothing else, I’d like to head back to my room, sir.”

  Cornish took a hit—and then coughed harshly. “Jesus, I can’t believe you still smoke these unfiltered fuckers.” He took another, smoother, drag and blew it out. “I didn’t have you recalled on a whim, D. You know that, right?”

  Brian had been back in-country five months. In all that time, Cornish had never taken on this topic head-first. There had been plenty of sidelong comments and oblique explanations, even something approaching an apology or two. But never head-on like this. He didn’t know how to respond.

  “What we’re doing, withdrawing from this war, in a lot of ways, it’s more complicated and dangerous than fighting it ever was.”

  “I don’t understand, sir.”

  “It’s not just cutting and running. There’s logistical issues, tactical, strategic—and I’m talking from a military perspective and a political one. And a human perspective, too. When we leave, the South Vietnamese—they are all of them fucked hard. Sideways. The NVA will roll right over them all and wreak bloody vengeance.”

  “I understand all that, Colonel. I don’t understand what that has to do with me being recalled.”

  Cornish considered him in the dark. “You are a soldier, Delaney. In your heart, that’s what you are. Just like me. I’ve lived this life since I was old enough to choose it, and I know a real brother when I see one. You chose it, too, remember. This is the world you thrive in. I called you back because I needed you. I trust you to know what we’re doing and to help me do it right. But I also called you back because it’s where you belong.”

  “You’re wrong, sir. I was where I belong. At home. With my wife, who’d just lost a baby.”

  “I’m sorry for that. But it’s not what I’m talking about. You can have a wife and a family and be a soldier. Especially now, with the withdrawal fast-tracking.”

  Cornish was a lifelong bachelor, and Brian had never seen him with a woman, not even here in Saigon, where they had regular personal time and it seemed like half the men in the unit had found Vietnamese girls to call their own.

  “Yeah, looking at you, I can see how easy it is to have a wife and family. You’re a great example of that, sir.”

  “It’s not the Army keeping me from it. I don’t have a wife because I don’t want one.” Brian got the sense there was more to it, something Cornish was almost saying. Cornish took another drag and adde
d, “I want to put your name in for officer training, D. You belong in the Army.”

  “I’m too old.” It was the first thing that came to him; the idea had surprised him so thoroughly his mind had fallen over its own feet.

  “You’re not. Cut-off’s thirty-three to enter the program. You’ll be right up against it when your tour’s over, but if you go in, we can end your tour a couple weeks early, since you won’t be separating.”

  “I don’t have a degree.” Or any interest in going to college.

  “There’s a program for NCOs with combat experience. You’ll need to seek a degree after the program, before you can get promoted, but then you’ll be fast-tracked to O3.”

  Brian considered the proposition for the length of time it took to smoke his Camel down, drop the butt, and grind it out on the bottom of his boot. “I don’t want it, sir. I’m not interested. I just want to go home.”

  “That’s the life you want?”

  There was a lot about the life he’d been living in Oklahoma he hated. He hated that little house and their shitty neighbors. He hated his boss and the way he’d ruined a job Brian should love. He hated that he couldn’t get on top of his work life and earn decent money. His wife was the breadwinner, and that galled the shit out of him every time he opened the fucking checkbook or a bank statement. He hated how his insecurity about work and money was keeping them in that shitty house, because he was afraid to take on a mortgage and then fail.

  He hated that he still dreamed of the war, and those dreams carried into his waking. He hated that he took his bad moods out on his amazing woman. He hated the way he could see her disappointments and sorrows building up in her. He hated that she didn’t have cause to be proud of him the way he was proud of her.