Drill & Sanctimony

At noon, the cattle cars hauled four platoons of Echo Company Privates to the firing range. All afternoon, we lined up in the foxholes to pop off rounds, and I mean very few rounds. For the first time, we used our M-16s as machine guns. The Drills allowed us to fire three-round bursts, but with a twenty round magazine, that meant seven squeezes of the trigger and back to the windscreen for a good long sit.

  I asked Orta, "When do we get to fire the M4 and the grenade launcher?"

  "When you get to Baghdad," she said.

  All day long I spied on Shipman, West, and Pint. They floated on high-hopes, floating on their secrets. Sitting with my rifle between my knees on the bleachers, I considered telling them to call it off. Hardly ten minutes could pass without Pint stopping by to say hello to Private West. Wherever she went, the lamb was sure to follow. He nodded knowingly at her - a wink, an eyebrow raise. She pursed her lips and offered curt smiles, causing Pint to blush and peer around to see if anyone had noticed. Ever vigilant, Shipman maintained his distance from West, but from afar he gazed, like Mario at the Princess. Longing looks traveling great distances, yearnings cast over rows of Kevlar helmets, love's Hail Marys, back and forth all day over the rifle range. All three of these actors did quiet reconnaissance of the windscreen, checking the rendezvous point, peeking around the sides of the tin windscreen at the spot where the silent kiss was scheduled to occur.

  During the long hours of waiting, Pint came up to me on three separate occasions to ask about updates, checking for new messages in his inbox. Again, I was unable to spill the beans, thinking only of my next turn on the firing line and graduation.

  "I haven't heard anything from her, Drill Sergeant."

  "If you do, you know, just let me know. I'll be nearby."

  "Sure thing, Drill Sergeant."

  The sun dove into the earth. The hour neared. Pint nearly levitated on his third visit to question me, even offering me a favor for my services rendered. At nine o'clock he asked, "Would you like to fire twice this evening? We have some extra rounds."

  As he spoke, a flare shot into the sky, drawing oohs and aahs from the Privates. The flare marked the beginning of the night fire exercise. I asked Pint, "Can I shoot one of those things?"

  "It's called a parachute flare."

  "Yeah, can I shoot one?"

  This request he didn't expect, but after scrunching his nose, he granted my request.

  "Yes, I suppose you can," he said. "I'll tell Drill Sergeant Pfeffer that you will be allowed to fire one flare. After you fire on the line, go to the tower. I'll give him a heads up."

  Firing at night tripped me out. Every fourth shot fired was a tracer round, which zipped through the night like a laser. At last, here was ammunition that looked like a video game. Finally, after almost two months, I experienced a real Call of Duty moment. The sergeant in charge of the range ordered us to "pull the trigger as fast as you can," and I did. My tracers, at first, were diving into the dirt, and I realized that I was aiming too low, so I pointed my rifle at a forty-five degree angle, which lifted my tracer rounds into the atmosphere, high above everyone else's, over the range and into the woods.

  Drill Sergeant Pfeffer galloped down the firing line and yelled at me for aiming so high.

  "This ain't anti-aircraft training, Sprungli. Aim lower."

  When I was done, he scolded me again, ripping the rifle from my hands. Breaking the rifle down to its components, Pfeffer said, "This is what I'd like to do to you. Break you down into parts and recycle you." Then he added with a shake of the head, "I hear Pint's letting you fire a flare yet tonight."

  "That's right, Drill Sergeant."

  "What'd you do to deserve it? You don't deserve a perk. The only guy in your whole platoon that's worthy of reward is Shipman."

  "That's right. Me, Drill Sergeant."

  "You boots look better." Still, he sighed in disgust. "Ok," he said. "In a half hour, meet me at the tower to fire your flare."

  Back on the bleachers I watched the clock and observed West and Shipman, who kept a distance from each other. Pint paced back and forth in front of the windscreen, acting the chaperone to those waiting to fire. Whenever a flare erupted in the sky, I became excited at my chance to fire one. A smudge on my boots caught my eye and I used a cleaning rag to touch them up. The comment from Pfeffer, the Ranger, filled me with pride. Between the flares and my boots glistening in the night, I began to forget about West and her suitors as the half-hour expired.

  To the tower I marched, walking swiftly. Pfeffer greeted me at the stairs with a sneer. I climbed the steps and from inside the control tower I enjoyed an amazing view of tracer rounds whizzing downrange. The red piercing lights in the darkness, the crack of the rifles, and the smell of brass casings on the ground below all together gave me pause for a moment. I had a moment in the control tower. For some reason the tracers reminded me of Star Wars beam weapons and blasters, turbolasers, quad laser cannons, swivel mounted laser guns, concussion missiles, and tractor beam projectors.

  Pfeffer held the flare gun in his hand. He said to me, "In five minutes, I'll let you fire the flare."

  "What time is it?" I asked.

  "Why? You gotta date?"

  "Just wondering."

  "It's a minute before twenty-two hundred, Sprungli."

  "What? Twenty-two hundred?" I said. "But that's ten o'clock!"

  "No kidding?" Pfeffer said.

  Watching the tracers, I had lost track of time. Now through a side window of the tower, I peered out into the darkness toward the windscreen. I was poised to miss the kiss, and suddenly I didn't want my fellow soldiers to get caught fraternizing, nor did I want to cause Pint pain. A well of military esprit de corps previously unknown filled me, and simultaneously flooded me with guilt. I pressed my face to the window to look at the windscreen, which was too far away in the darkness.

  Down the firing line, I noticed the shape of a short man walking, holding a flashlight. The flashlight swung up and down and the gait was Pint's. He was moving swiftly toward the windscreen, having waited until the last minute, sticking strictly to the plan. And I had to stop him, to stop Shipman and West from meeting, to break up the entire event before it happened, but from the control tower I could not reach them in time. The flashlight bobbed with every step, marking Pint's position, and I asked again, "What time is it now, Drill Sergeant?"

  "Twenty-two hundred," he said. "Don't ask me again."

  "Can I fire the flare now, please?"

  "You know what?" Pfeffer paused and bit his lip. "Yes, you can. Because after that, you can leave and I won't have to listen to you anymore."

  We stepped outside onto the tower's platform. He gave me instructions, but given the time, I ignored with details. There was a trigger and a business end. What else did I need to know about flares?

  Pfeffer positioned me, even put my arms at a certain level, and then he backed away three steps, like a golf caddy.

  "Fire when ready."

  In the corner of my eye, I saw Pint's flashlight extinguish near the corner of the windscreen. Pint was in his final approach. I raised the flare gun and spun toward the windscreen.

  Pfeffer shouted, "Don't!"

  I pulled the trigger.

  A pop sounded and out jumped the flare. The canister sailed through the air, toward the company, who saw the incoming flare and scattered out of the bleachers to avoid what appeared to be an errant lob from the tower. The hundreds of boots moving at once on steel made the sound of a crashing wave,

  As the flare erupted over the windscreen, Pfeffer grabbed me by the back of the neck and stripped the flare gun from my hands. Before, he had mentioned how he wanted to break me down like a rifle. He now acted on that impulse, putting me into a pretzel shape, boxing my ears, and finally battering both of my kidneys. Lying prone on the platform I was able to witness the quake of light split the darkness wide open and I prayed that the illumination separa
ted Shipman and West before Pint arrived, before anyone touched lips.

  A chorus of voices in Echo Company cried, "Ooh!" and I could see many Kevlar heads tipped backward to intake the bright light. The Privates rushed forward and spilled around the edges of the windscreen, into the zone of the secret tryst.

  Suddenly, as fast as sound travels, a roar of laughter reached my ear, loud enough that Pfeffer stopped wrangling me. The laughter continued as the flare wafted down from the stars to the earth. A little parachute carried the bright lamp overhead, slowly and dramatically, until the lamp burned its last bit of fuel and snuffed.

  The sound of the laughter struck me, and I wondered what had happened. Had West embraced Shipman? Was Pint raging at the two of them for fraternizing?

  I didn't have to wait long. The news spread like flames down the firing lines, as a Private in the first lane turned to a Private in the second lane, and so on like a game of telephone. Privates popped up and shouted from one side to the other, sharing the news and then laughing themselves. In a matter of seconds, the gossip reached all the way to the tower where Pfeffer and I heard the tale.

  The words came up to us from an inarticulate Private who had just contracted laughing sickness.

  "What the hell is going on?" asked Pfeffer, shouting down from the control tower.

  "Drill Sergeant Pint, he..." The private started to hiccup. He paused to take off his glasses and hold his stomach.

  "Get yourself together, fool!" Pfeffer said.

  "Drill Sergeant Pint, he..." The Private gasped and choked and aspirated and swallowed.

  Pfeffer was not in the mood. "Ok, we got the first part. Now don't repeat it again. Go on to the next part."

  The Private held his breath until he could squeeze out one word at a time.

  "Drill...Sergeant...Pint...was..."

  "Get to it!" Pfeffer ordered.

  "kissing..."

  "Kissing?" said Pfeffer.

  "Drill Sergeant Pint kissed Private Shipman!"

  Pfeffer grabbed the railing on the platform and descended the tower staircase in a lurch, taking four steps at a time. He forgot about me. The kidney pain no longer ached, because I went into shock for several minutes at the revelation from the laughing Private.

  Chapter 24. Military Justice