War Year

  Seemed like I just barely got to sleep when they rousted us out of bed. My watch said quarter to six. It was still dark. I got my shaving kit and hobbled out to the shower.

  It was almost worth getting up that early, though, because they had hot water. It was quite an experience, after shaving with cold water for four months. And the shower was pure heaven, even though I had to leave my crutch and hop across the slippery floor like some weird kind of bird.

  The guy in the shower next to me looked at my leg. “Man, you really got fucked-up good.”

  “Yeah. Landmine.”

  “No kiddin’—you must be the only wounded guy in this barracks. ’Most everybody else’s here for the clap or malaria.”

  “What about the other guys on crutches—some case of clap they must of picked up.”

  “Nah—broken legs. No other heroes.”

  Hero, that was a laugh.

  We had a formation at six-thirty, everybody standing around in their blue pajamas while the first sergeant read off a bunch of announcements. I heard that I was supposed to report to room 101 at 1330 for physical therapy. After he finished the announcements he said, “Cripples, fall out and get yer brooms,” and everybody who had a crutch or a cane went back into the barracks. It took us about five minutes to clean it up. Then some of the guys went to chow. I was so tired I just racked out for a few hours.

  It was hotter’n hell when I woke up, about ten o’clock. There wasn’t anybody else in the billet. I figured they must’ve gone someplace where it was cool, so I gathered up my crutch and set out to find them.

  Went about a block down the main drag when I heard these monster air conditioners chuggin’ away. It was the library. Sure enough, it was crowded—there were only three seats left. I found a bunch of books of cartoons and sat in the cool until noon, just diggin’ it.

  There was a formation at 1300, but we cripples didn’t have to go to it. So I put off chow until about 1230, then walked over to the mess hall.

  It was hot as a steam room in the mess hall. Can’t complain too much, though. Since I had a crutch, I didn’t have to stand in the line; I just sat down and a Vietnamese girl brought me a tray full of food. Not bad, either, by army standards; two hamburgers, french fries, and a salad.

  After chow I wandered over to 101, the physical therapy building. It was air-conditioned there, too—but pure torture. I spent an hour lifting weights (little sandbags) with my bad leg, hurt like the very devil. They gave me a Darvon for my trouble and I limped back over to the library.

  I felt better after sitting in the cool for a while, so I decided to go out and explore some. Would be a great place if you had any money to spend—snack bar (with pizza), big PX and a gift shop—but I only had eleven dollars, and I decided to save it for beer. That would be 110 beers, a couple of weeks’ worth.

  I wound up in a big recreation hall run by the Red Cross. They had all kinds of games and stuff. Played a few games of checkers with a Red Cross guy named Jerry. He beat me every time, but in return he told me how I could get some money—there was a man from the Fourth Division who could get me up to twenty bucks a week, that’d be taken out of my pay later. I decided I could afford a pizza tomorrow.

  There was another formation about sundown, but all that happened was that the first sergeant called out the names of the guys who’d be leaving in the morning. Then he let us go to chow (which was pretty fair beef stew).

  For a couple of weeks I did pretty much the same thing every day. Kind of made the rounds between the library, the Red Cross center, physical therapy, chow, and the EM club. Sometimes I’d hang around the PX and read the magazines. Not real exciting, but sure beat the hell out of being a combat engineer.

  Then my leg got better and they took away my crutch. That made all the difference in the world. The next morning I couldn’t fall out after the first formation, and I had to take PT.

  The first exercise was jumping jacks, you know, where you jump up and down and swing your arms around—like a guy who’s on fire and trying to put himself out. No way in hell I was gonna try one of those.

  The guy who was leading them glared at me all through the exercise and, when they were finished, yelled out:

  “Whatsamatter, soldier, you on vacation?”

  “Have a heart, Sarge, I just started walking yesterday.”

  “So you don’t think you can do jumping jacks.”

  “That’s right, Sarge.”

  “What can you do?”

  “Dunno, Sarge.”

  “Try twenty pushups. Right now.”

  That shouldn’t have been hard; I was doing eighty every day in Basic Training—but I could only do twelve, and had to fake the rest of them, with everybody watching. A month in the hospital can really put you out of shape.

  Had to fake most of the other exercises, too, except for the arm twists. And when they got out on the road to run their mile, I just limped along behind at a slow walk. A different guy was leading the running, and when he saw me lagging behind, he dropped back.

  “Somethin’ wrong with yer foot, fella?”

  “Just got off a cane yesterday.”

  “Well, fall out and go to chow. Don’t sweat the run.”

  First nice thing anybody had done for me in some time.

  The work formation was right after chow. I got assigned to a sandbag detail, one of those jobs that never ends. Since we had more empty sandbags than we could fill in a week, we just took it as slow and easy as we could.

  At 1300, I went to my physical therapy appointment. Didn’t even think about the 1330 formation. But, since I wasn’t a “cripple” anymore, I was supposed to be there. And people who skip the midday formation get put on the next day’s shipping roster.

  I didn’t find out until the next morning, when the first sergeant called out the names of the people who were leaving. Instead of going to PT, I limped into the orderly room. The only guy there was a private, reading a comic book, feet stuck up on a desk.

  “Hey, man.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Can you tell me what the fuck I’m doin’ on the shipping roster today?”

  “Whatcher name?” I told him. He looked at a clipboard, hanging by the desk.

  “Says here, ‘AWOL 1330 formation.’ Musta been yesterday—what, did ya skip out?”

  “No, man, I couldn’t make the fuckin’ formation; I had a physical therapy appointment.”

  “Shoulda told somebody. Right now, you better find some doctor who’ll give ya an excuse in writing. Otherwise you gotta leave at nine o’clock.”

  I went down to the infirmary. There was a fat sergeant at the admissions desk.

  “Sarge, I gotta see a doctor.”

  “Your name on sick call?”

  “No, it’s not.”

  “Well, you better get on sick call or you won’t see no doctor.”

  “But Sarge, it’s after seven. I can’t get on sick call this late.”

  He shrugged. “So don’t die here. Go find a medic at the emergency room.”

  “Sorry, Sarge, a medic won’t do.”

  “Oh, you gotta have brain surgery or somethin’. What’s the score?”

  “Well, they put me on the shipping roster today—”

  “Congratulations.”

  “Goddammit, Sarge, I can’t half walk yet!”

  “Look, son, I get twenny guys come in here ev’ry morning tryin’ to get off the shippin’ roster. Tough shit, all of ’em. I ain’t never let one through, never will.”

  “Sarge…”

  “Yer all just a buncha chickenshits, don’t wanna go back an’ fight.” He was shouting, and I could smell whiskey. “I was in Korea.…”

  “Bet you were tough, Sarge.” I’d rather have killed that motherfucker than all the VC in the world. I slammed the door good and hard on the way out.

  So at nine o’clock I rode a bus to the airport and got on a C-130 to Pleiku.

  TWELVE

  I walked in through the captain’s d
oor and came to attention in front of his desk. “Private Farmer reporting for duty, sir.”

  “At ease, Farmer. Have a seat.” I sat down across from him.

  “For one thing, you aren’t a PFC anymore. Your orders for Spec/4 came in right after you were wounded.”

  “That’s good news.”

  “Yes, and the army owes you some money. You can go down to Finance and get it, any time you want.

  “Now, Farmer, you probably know I don’t order men back into the field, once they’ve been seriously wounded. I’ve kept a job open here at base camp, assistant to the supply clerk. Don’t suppose you want it.”

  “Sure do, sir.”

  He chuckled. “Can’t say I blame you. He’ll run you ragged, though… you were limping when you came in. Wounds still bother you?”

  “Yes, sir. I had to leave the hospital before I was finished with physical therapy.” I told him the story about the formation I missed, and how I got railroaded out.

  “That’s unfortunate, but I suppose it happens all the time. Tell you what, after you go to Finance, drop by the battalion aid station and see whether they have any physical therapy equipment. At least they should be able to set up some exercises for you to do.

  “I’ll put you on light duty status”—he pulled out a pad and scribbled something on it—“and you can do your physical therapy instead of coming to the morning formation.” He handed me the paper. “This is good for three weeks. If anybody asks you to lift something heavy or walk any great distance, just tell them you can’t. They can check with me.”

  “Thank you, sir.” The slip said “Sp/4 J. W. Farmer, light duty to 30 June.”

  My back pay, with the promotion, came to almost 500 bucks. I pocketed fifty and put the rest in the company safe. It turned out they didn’t have any physical therapy equipment at the battalion aid station, but the doctor there had a book that showed three exercises I was supposed to do for the leg. They weren’t as bad as the sandbag-lifts at Cam Ranh Bay, but they did hurt some. Still, got me out of morning formation.

  My new job, helping the supply clerk, was dull as hell. Most of the time I just cleaned equipment that wasn’t really very dirty. Sometimes I’d make lists, type ’em up, and file ’em away where nobody would ever see them.

  One day I was cleaning up, getting ready to close the supply room for the night, when the door opened—and a hand grenade flew in!

  I started to roll under the counter when I saw it was harmless, the arming lever taped down securely.

  “Awright, who’s the wise fucker?”

  “I cannot tell a lie. I am the wisest fucker in the company.”

  “Willy!”

  He was just as mangy-looking as ever—conditions in the field hadn’t improved any—so I got him a new set of fatigues and a bar of soap. After he cleaned up and changed, we went over to the EM club.

  “Well, Farmer, how do ya like bein’ a base-camp commando?”

  “Beats the hell outa humpin’.”

  “Hmm—I don’t know. It’s been pretty easy since you left. With the monsoon coming up, we aren’t humping as much. Mostly just stay in fire bases.”

  “And you don’t have to shine boots or salute officers.”

  “That’s right. I understand old General Stoner’s a real sonofabitch for military courtesy.”

  “Yeah—shit, it’s gettin’ to be just like Stateside. Inspections every morning. If it moves, salute it. Have to go through the fuckin’ chain of command to talk to anybody. What a bunch of bullshit.”

  “So why don’t you volunteer for field duty again, man? We’ve got it easy.”

  I had thought of it, but… “No way, Willy. I can put up with anything for another four months. Just wanta get out of here alive.”

  “Yeah, I was just kidding, I guess. Half-kidding, anyhow. Showers every day and cold beer every night—fuck, you’ve got it made.”

  We talked for a long time, mostly about what we were going to do when we got back to the world. Just about talked each other into going back to school. Couldn’t hurt.

  Willy was dead tired, so we left before the club closed. The next morning I drove him down to the pad and put him on a bird to the fire base. He still looked pretty shot. I was doubly glad to be where I was.

  Base camp life went along as usual for me, pretty dull and a little bitchy. Then one day I was walking along the road, coming back from the PX, when a jeep passed me, stopped, and hauled-ass in reverse back to me. There was a little flag with one star, fluttering on the bumper. I dropped my package and came to attention. General Stoner.

  The driver, a captain, got out of the jeep and walked up to me. “Soldier, you are in trouble.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “The general feels that, if a person can’t be bothered with military courtesy in base camp, not even to the extent of saluting a general… he should be sent someplace where he won’t have to worry about military courtesy.”

  General Stoner was sitting in the back seat, staring straight ahead, not looking at me. I’d heard of this; don’t salute Stoner’s jeep and zap, you’re out in the boonies. Never thought it’d happen to me, though. Hell, I’d never even seen his jeep before.

  The captain whipped out a leather-covered notebook. “What’s your unit—who’s your commanding officer?”

  I told him and he wrote it down. Then he got my name and serial number (and checked my dog tags to make sure I wasn’t lying).

  “Report yourself immediately to your company commander and tell him what happened. Tell him you request immediate transfer to a field position.”

  Yessirs and salutes and all that bullshit, and he got back in the jeep and drove off. I went back to the company and reported to the captain.

  “Jesus Christ, Farmer, you really blew it this time, didn’t you?”

  “Yes, sir, I did.”

  “Well, I’ll send you out to the fire base where your old platoon is. They haven’t had any action for over a month, so it shouldn’t be too bad. But I don’t know how soon we can bring you back… how short are you?”

  “Three months, sir.”

  “Hmm—we’ll try to get you back in base camp your last six weeks.

  “Well, go get some field gear and run down to the pad before it gets dark. Better hope you can get a ride out, too. We’ll both be in hot water if you’re still here tomorrow.”

  So I requisitioned myself a pack and a gun, canteens and grenades (you can carry them on choppers) and all that junk. It took me a half-hour’s wait to get a slick, and another half-hour to get to 2124, which the pad man told me was about thirty clicks—kilometers—west of Pleiku. That’s about eighteen miles.

  The fire base had moved to an old abandoned tea plantation. They were serving chow out of a falling-down farm building (still, better than C-rations), and the medics were set up in an old barn—just sitting around playing cards, which was a very good sign. There was even a dirt road leading into the place.

  I found the engineers, but Willy wasn’t there—in fact, the only guy I knew was Doc Jones, the engineer medic.

  “What you doin’ back here, man? Thought you was in some soft base camp job.”

  “If I told you, Doc, you wouldn’t believe me. Where’s Horowitz?”

  “Out with D Company. S’posed to come in tomorrow.”

  “Thought they weren’t humpin’ anymore.”

  “Jes’ overnight stuff, ambushes.” Doc introduced me around to the new guys. Sergeant Miller, the new platoon sergeant, put me to work cleaning chain saws. Said he wished he had something better for me to do, but it was either that or fill sandbags.

  The last chopper in was a big Chinook, or “hook,” a boxcar-sized chopper with a monster load of beer and soft drinks. The engineers got six cases of beer and two of soft drinks. After we split them up and traded around (two beers for a soda), I wound up with twenty-one beers (and no sodas, never learned to like them warm).

  We decided to do some serious drinking that night. Sergeant
Miller produced a fifth of Scotch—God knows where he got it—and we sat in a circle, passing the Scotch around, washing it down with beer, tellin’ lies.

  Most of my memory of that night is pretty fuzzy, both because of all the drinking and because of what happened the next day. One thing I do remember, though, was when Doc Jones lit into me.

  He was telling a joke about two Negroes on a motorcycle having a run-in with a white cop, and when he imitated the cop talking, he sounded like any regular white man, no black accent at all. I thought we were good enough friends, so I asked him straight out why, if he could talk regular English, he didn’t talk that way all the time.

  It must have been a sore spot, or maybe I was just stupid to ask in the first place—I didn’t have any Negro schoolmates in Enid and was just curious—but he really blew up. Where had I been all my life, he asked, that I thought there was only one way to talk English—people talk the way it’s most comfortable, the way they’re brought up. Besides, he said, I sounded like Chester on Gunsmoke; half the time he couldn’t understand a word I said! Everybody took Doc’s side, and I felt like a real hick. Things got back to normal before we’d finished the bottle, though.

  As the old saying goes, “beer on whiskey, mighty risky.” I got to feeling woozy after a couple of hours, and went off to hit the sack. I remember starting to blow up my air mattress, but when I woke up in the morning I was lying on the cold ground, the air mattress on top of me without any air in it. Maybe that was because I forgot to put the plug in when I finished blowing it up.

  “Wake up, Farmer. Just got time to say goodbye.” Someone shoved a can of steaming black coffee under my nose. My head throbbed with every heartbeat.

  “Willy—thanks. What time’s it?”

  “Little after seven. Everybody else is asleep down in the bunker. You decide to live dangerously? Or just hanker to sleep under the stars?”

  “Musta passed out. Little party last night—you got an aspirin?”

  “No, but I can probably find Doc’s bag.” He started rummaging around the pile of rucksacks and stuff alongside the bunker. “All that time I was lying out there in that ambush, trying to stay awake, you guys were lappin’ it up—here we go.” He brought over a couple of white tablets and a canteen.