Victor’s breath formed little fog clouds in the cool, humid air of the tent. The clouds kept getting smaller and smaller. Then they stopped altogether.
It was 3:08 a.m. and the medical attendant saluted. I did the same. He was a private, first class, like Vic and I were, when we first met. He even had the same innocent face, the kind that belongs to somebody who wants to be a hero and will walk into a meat grinder to prove it.
He pulled the sheet over Vic’s head and started to roll the gurney out of the tent.
“Hold on soldier, I need a minute.”
“Yes sir,” he saluted and stepped back outside, leaving me with Vic, and the smell of burnt flesh.
Next to Vic’s gurney was another one, and another, right down to the end of the tent. Each one holding a body underneath a sheet. Some had the same small fog clouds that Vic had. Some didn’t, the last breath having come and gone, with no one close to witness it.
I pulled the sheet back from his head. “Well Vic, it looks like you owe me five bucks. I know you thought I’d go first. I thought I would too. You remember when we first made that bet? It was just before we shipped out about two years ago. We hardly knew each other.”
“Hey Lonnie, I’ll betcha five bucks you go before I do.”
I remember shakin’ your hand and thinkin’, This dude is my kinda crazy.
“I never told you I actually wanted to go first.”
There was a big red stain on the sheet where it lay over Vic’s chest. His face was jacked up but he looked peaceful.
“You know I should be on that gurney not you. I’m just a lonely old dumbass. My old man drank himself to death, my mom’s right behind him. I got no girl, no kids, nobody. I’m like them poor bastards we’re tryin’ to kill every day, and all the refugees runnin’ for their lives, and the ones stuck in camps, waitin’ to die. Nobody gives a shit about them either. But you, you got a wife, kids, cousins, your mom and dad. Your funeral’s gonna be standin’ room only!”
I grabbed a towel from the end of the gurney and wiped my face. A muddy mess of dirt, tears and jungle scum turned the towel an ugly shade of brown.
“I killed a lot of people Vic. We both have. Some you kill from a distance. Those are easy when they’re far away and you can’t see ‘em. But the ones up close, you see them go down with your own eyes. Funny thing for me, I don’t remember what they looked like. I don’t remember seein’ a face. All I saw was two eyes and the life drainin’ out of ’em.”
My shoulders shook. I couldn’t talk. Then the words came back.
“I did what I had to do Vic, what I was trained to do. I never thought about whether it was the right thing to do. I just figured it was. The dude that dropped you probably saw it the same way. I mean shit, we’re the ones invadin’ his country. He’s gotta think he’s doin the right thing.”
The medic poked his head in. I waived him in and wondered if he knew what doin’ the right thing meant.
He put the sheet over Vic’s head and rolled him out of the tent. For a second it felt like an ending but I knew it wasn’t. We could drop a million bombs, scorch the whole damn country with napalm and they’d keep fightin and dyin,’ just like us. And we’ll never know their names. And they’ll never know ours.
