D: L&L - Part 24 | Dot: Underwater
The water was ice cold, and I plunged below the surface as it carried me away. Scrambling, I swam for the far bank, not seeing the rock. The world went black.
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Thunder rumbles across the valley below as we climb. Hendricks is in front of me, and I’d yell at him for kicking up rocks in my face, but I just duck my head and deal. The A-10s are close, closer than they should be, rocketing past overhead. I look up for a brief moment, catch a glimpse of a cammo tailfin peeling right. A blast of heat tickles the back of my neck. Too close. They’re right behind us, and there will never be enough rockets. One more pass and the Warthogs will be done.
LT barks, and we split off at the top of the ridge, three left and four right. I go right with Hendricks, tugging on his Alice to slow him down. He stops and turns, his blue eyes dark and hollowed out, the exhaustion playing across his face as thickly as the dust and sweat. “Down, Dre,” I muster, spitting dust with my words. He tugs his glasses down and wipes his face. “Down, Dre. Fuck, dude. They’ll be over the ridge in a sec.”
A crack splits the air, followed by a zing. PFC Andrew Hendrick’s face explodes, and he slumps to the ground where I’m already laying. He wasn’t ready for a day like today, and I will cry for him when the time comes. I roll into position, tipping my M27 down toward the village we just left, and find two targets. Before I can even squeeze the trigger, the cracks in the air next to me announced their death. Tommy don’t play.
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My hand struck something, and I latched on. A branch, a root, a slick tuber that jutted out into the water, my fingers finding purchase for a moment, long enough for me to come up for a breath. I groaned, gasped, grunted, trying to grab the thing with my other hand, to pull myself above the fast running water, the white caps crashing against my face. I sputtered, gasping for a single good breath, feeling my grip slipping, sliding, and I cried out just as my head went under again.
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“He was a good kid,” I say, shaking my head. As if he’s only two years younger than me, barely twenty-four. I look over at his body, covered by his poncho, while No-Doz patches up my arm. It’s just a scrape, but he’s taking care of business. A good medic. He always thanked me for never getting more than a bump or a bruise, maybe a scrape. Even when we went through that village back in Hejaz, that kid and his AK. I was dead to rights, but he dropped it and ran instead.
“He was a good Marine,” says LT as he squats next to me, watching No-Doz bandage the zinger. “Doc?”
No-Doz doesn’t look up. He’s almost done, and then he’s got to deal with Dre. I can see it in his face. He’s taking his time. The last thing any of us want is to deal with Dre, especially the man who’ll have to examine what’s left of his head. He’s tired. We all are. A single tear drips from his nose, and we pretend it’s sweat.
“Hot out again,” I say.
“A burner,” he says back, not looking up.
I can’t see his eyes hidden behind the rim of the helmet, but I’ve known him for two years and two deployments. I know the doc. Better than most, better than a should. He’s very careful with the bandage, and I want to reach out and touch his face, but the LT doesn’t need to know. He does, I’m sure, but I didn’t wanna put it in his face.
“Done here,” says No-Doz, nicknamed for his favorite candy on deployments. “I gotta check Dre.”
The LT stands and walks away. He doesn’t want any part of what’s about to happen. I rest a hand on Alex’s arm for a moment, letting him know how careful I’m being. I promised to be careful so when we get back to the states…
He took a 7.62 through the stomach the next day, just as the Blackhawks were in sight.
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I crashed into something, reached out, flailing, scrambling for purchase as the water threatened to pull me under it. A tree. A dead tree. A waterlogged tree laying a dozen feet into the river, its roots still firmly bound in the riverbank. I latched on, kicking my legs, pulling myself up. I held on and just breathed, gulping huge mouthfuls of air into my lungs and coughing out copious amounts of water. On and on it went, shivering and shaking, screaming into the wet wood.
The house was gone. Melsha gone. Snickety gone. Bright Lettins gone. And Dre and Alex. And it was just me again. And again. And again.
I looked up. Nothing in any direction, save an endless forest of dead trees. No little zombies. No purple haze. No burning village. Just three dead trees by the side of the river, and me hanging on with what I had left.
No way Grandma would have gotten through this. Or maybe she was just batshit crazy, after all, and that’s what it took.
