Deros Vietnam (9 page)

All this disquiet helped keep you awake on watch—but it would play tricks with your mind. You'd start to tell yourself that when you didn't hear the jungle's natural sounds, that's precisely when you'd be in deep do-do.

On some nights,
this
night, the quiet was too much to bear. You could even hear it, and you wanted the silence to stop. You wanted to stand up or scream or jump or run. Or even just reach down to scratch your balls or remove a leech.

Then every fiber in your body froze. There was that noise, the one from before, the one you couldn't pinpoint. The mounting monsoon rain intensified the noise. There it was again—and again. Some kind of a low, guttural growl—could that be possible? And movement; yes, definitely some movement.

Suddenly, the source of the growl made a sudden leap.

MOTHERFUCKING GOD IN HEAVEN!

Pandemonium and sheer terror. Screams. A huge cat had pounced out of the darkness, seizing something or someone in its jaws.

A TIGER!

Someone fired a flare, and in the fleeting yellow light you could see what looked like a tiger's paw pinning a soldier to the ground. Shots. More screams. Another flare Why the fuck didn't you fire? Would it come for you next? Piss ran down your pant leg.

And then the darkness returned.

One of the grizzled veteran reporters from Reuters Wire Service would tell you later that “Tigers kill very quickly, usually by ripping the spinal cord at the neck with a blow from their front paws,” he'd make a snapping gesture with his hands, “or by biting through the skull,” he'd smile a malevolent smile and grit his teeth. “They would never try to eat something before they killed it first.”

By the Time I get to Phoenix…

I entered Saigon's Imperial Bar. I didn't even finish asking my question when the bartender pointed me in the direction of Phuong Thao. The place was crowded for a weekday afternoon, mostly military brass and Five O'clock Follies reporters. It was blue with cigarette smoke and a haze of strong perfume. I heard the strains of a sappy Carpenters' song playing in the background. The bar itself was decorated in full tropical décor, as if any of us needed to be reminded where in the hell we were.

My guide was the Imperial Bar's maître d', Lucky. His alabaster face seemed to collapse around some wrinkles in the middle and his smile reminded me of Peter Lorre in “Casablanca.” For a minute, the entire scene reminded me of “Casablanca,” down to the parrots staring at me and tracking my movements from their bright yellow cages behind the bar.

“She beau-te-fulll girl, Phuong.” Lucky ran his tongue over his lips in my direction. “You maybe like bang bang with Phuong?” He leered his Peter Lorre leer. “You know her Vietnamese name has special meaning. Phuong veerly special,” Lucky whistled.

He pushed me in Phuong's direction, but I resisted. I didn't want to appear too eager, or too cowardly. Stealthily, I slid toward her, observing how perfectly the slits of her turquoise
ao dai
hung proportionally over the sides of the bar stool. She wore black trousers beneath the
ao dai.
I stopped behind her to admire the colorful birds pictured on the back of the smooth, silk garment. Phuong smelled like chrysanthemums, and, for a moment, I felt like I was walking on one.

“'Scuze you, GI,” Phuong snapped in my direction, following immediately with her Imperial Bar smile. I was tongue-tied, and as awkward as if I were back at the 8th grade dance at Most Blessed Sacrament. Phuong could be the most beautiful woman I had ever seen.

“Hey, it's okay. You buy for me Saigon tea.” Phuong got immediately down to business. All I could do was stare.

“What American GI always say ‘Kaz got your tongue,'” Phuong laughed, lifting her
ao dai
so that I caught a glimpse of the beautiful white skin between the slits and her trousers.

“This here Spec. 4 Bailey,” Lucky gestured toward me. “He write for Army paper and
Stars & Stripes.
He write story about Imperial Bar so we get more bizness,” Lucky smiled a big smile. “He want to intervue beau-tefull Saigon g'rl who visit Imperial Bar to make GI feel better about being far away from home. You be nice to him and tell him good story.”

Lucky headed off to negotiate short-term contracts for his other star players. Phuong waited for me to say something.

“Thank you for doing this,” I finally spoke up. “It won't take long.”

“Lucky pay me, so I okay,” Phuong volunteered. “You still buy for me Saigon tea?”

I tried to get the bartender's attention. Phuong turned her chair, her knee brushing against my leg. Had it been this long since I'd been with a woman, sat next to a woman, tried to talk to a woman?

Wanted a woman. This woman.

I looked at Phuong's face. It was so bright, so radiant, that I instinctively reached for my sunglasses. That impulse reminded me of Murphy. Damn! I came here for him, not for me.

“I bring greetings from a very good friend, His name's Murphy.”

Phuong just stared. Not even a flick of the eyebrow.

“Dwayne Murphy,” I continued. “Big GI, very funny, red hair, long sideburns.” I gestured with my hand to my own sideburns. “Always wears sunglasses.” I held mine up to her. “Talk very very fast. He talk about you.”

Phuong cast her eyes around the bar. I looked for a damn bartender. I knew I'd lost her. I played my trump card.

“He told me he calls you ‘Foxy Phoenix.'”

Phuong's face burst into a warm and knowing smile. Like a nervous suitor, I kept talking.

“Murphy says you are very special. He says your name has to do with the bird phoenix and is one of four Vietnamese girls' names that represent the four sacred mythical creatures. You special girl.”

“Me like Murphy. He make me laugh.” She paused and her face grew dark. “But he in trouble.”

“How did you know that?”

“Ly tell me, she Lucky's sister.”

“How does Ly know?”

“Her boyfriend Bao work at Long Binh. He say Murphy kill GI.”

How in fucking hell did these people know everything that's going on?

Lucky reappeared, this time with an officer on one arm and an older Vietnamese woman on the other.

“You ask Phuong about Bar, not about bad t'ings,” Lucky then made a sweeping gesture toward Phuong.

“Major, may I present Miss Phuong Thao for your dining pleasure.”

I reached for Phuong's hand but missed and my arm brushed her colorful
ao dai.
She looked back at me. Nothing.

“What are the other three?” I asked, almost inaudibly. Phuong gave me a puzzled look. “The sacred creatures? Murphy asked me to ask you.”

Lucky grabbed Phuong and began to escort her and the major off to a table in the dining room. The parrots screeched in Vietnamese as the bartender placed a Saigon tea on the bar in front of me.

A Lean, Well-Painted Face

It was late in the war and nearly everyone had left Saigon except a one-time temptress who sat in the window of a building where a bar used to be. Day and night the traffic passed by, and the woman liked to sit late because it helped her remember the old days. She would sit and stare out the window for hours upon hours. Two janitors would watch her because they didn't want to work and they were attracted to her ancient beauty.

It was monsoon season, late in the Year of the Pig, and the janitors sat together at a table close against the wall near the door of the building. A steady stream of soldiers went by in the street. The janitors made fun of the soldiers who were too young to understand their dialect.

The woman knew what they were saying and she hated them for it. She hated the soldiers, too. She hated all the Americans who had abandoned her in this shattered place. She harbored a special hatred for the young men who fell in love with her, boys really, whose eyes were dreamy, whose lips were dewy, and whose souls were empty.

The janitors would tease her about having lovers who committed suicide.

“Who would kill himself for you?” they'd ask her. “Didn't they know you would grow old? That they would have to leave?”

She thought of the tall red-haired boy, the one who swore to the moon and the sky that he would never leave.

“She stays up because she likes it,” said the older janitor.

“She's lonely. I'm lonely. You're lonely. We're all lonely.” The younger janitor spoke riddles to the Saigon night.

The woman looked over at them.

“You do not understand,” she told them. “This was a clean and pleasant bar, well lit.”

Neither of the janitors knew what to say.

“Good night,” the younger janitor, sounding defeated, stood up to return to his work.

“Good night,” the other said.

The woman sat and stared out the window at nothing. The janitor turned off the flickering light. She continued her own conversation. She recited a Buddhist prayer from her childhood, one she used to repeat when her lovers would beg, weep, or shout.

“May all sentient beings have the courage to look within themselves and see the good and bad that exists in all of us,” she spoke to the darkness. “May we open our hearts, shining the light of love into the dark recesses where doubt and fear reside. May we have the courage to step into that light and embrace whatever we find, letting it rise to the surface freed by the act of loving kindness. …”

She thought of her past, remembering the light, which had always been good.

Herded Through the Grapevine

I hated pulling guard duty for a lot of reasons, but I hated it most because it reminded me that I was in the Army—and in Vietnam. Something about putting on a helmet, carrying that goddamn M-16 and a bag of ammo magazines, filling my canteen, and marching out to the bunker line as if I really was a soldier—man, that was an Aqua Velva wake-up call.

Every time I put my hands on that sleek, black barrel, it would trigger a nausea that enveloped my entire body so that every inch of me felt like it was about to puke. I never admitted it to anyone, even though I was relatively safe in the air-conditioned jungle at Long Binh.

When I wasn't on guard duty, I tried hard to forget I was even in Vietnam. During the day I'd pretend to be working on a real newspaper, not the piece of crap Army propaganda rag I helped edit. Even while I was pounding out some bullshit about winning the hearts and minds of the Vietnamese peasants, I envisioned myself in the role of an ace reporter for a hard-charging publisher like Charles Foster Kane, pushing to uncover the next big scoop.

I spent my down time in the IO hooch watching reruns of
Bonanza
and
Room 222,
or sitting outside watching movies. In either instance, high.

When that got old, I'd listen to rock and roll albums or tapes, hanging loose in the purple haze, avoiding all the other war shit.

Except for guard duty. That was real Army stuff. You couldn't bullshit your way through guard duty because it was too real. Nobody can lie and B.S. for that long without slipping up. Nobody stuck over here anyway.

The only compensation was that if you were lucky, you could spend eight hours of your life in the dark with somebody cool or interesting. Like Jackson. Before that night, which is why I'm telling you this, I'd suffered through a couple disastrous bunker mates. One was a Jesus freak from Missouri who spent all night trying to convert me. “Go and make disciples of all nations, Matthew 28:19,” he chanted. “Go where you wanna go, do what you wanna do,” I shot back. “John Phillips 1965.” That pissed him off no end.

The other douche bag was this kid from Hawaii who cried a lot about how shitty he was treated by all the other racial groups in ‘Nam and back in Hawaii, not that I had a clue what that meant or why I should care. I figured the “Kauai Kid” had dropped some bad acid.

Given my track record, I wasn't looking forward to wasting another slice of my life with some redneck, pussy, or Holy Roller, but I definitely lucked out with Jackson. He had some really good shit, so we smoked and settled in, listened to a little music, sang a few bars, and set about debating the pros and cons of the ‘Nam grapevine.

But first we had to endure the customary Army rigmarole before we ever got to our bunker, including the usual back-and-forth between the field officer of the day and us flunkies.

“What are the general orders?” The man of the hour was a shake and bake type fresh out of Officers Candidate School. Like hung-over altar boys unsure of our liturgical Latin, we muttered back something about “guard everything within the limits of my post” and “quit my post only when properly relieved,” then grabbed our dicks to illustrate our interpretation of the sacred text.

After Jackson and I got our buzz on—judging by the taste he'd laced his joints with a little opium—he started painting these dazzling verbal pictures, word-portraits of Vietnam that somehow sharpened my sense of where we were and what our being there had to do with the grand scheme of things.

“Imagine,
mon ami,
that we are seated in a lush and fragrant French rubber plantation,” Jackson intoned, using an accent that made him sound like Pepe Le Pew. “Tres bien, non? Long Binh is ze bright shining star, and each point of ze star is connected by channels of water—what we Francais call ‘trenches'—to a series of star bunkers.”

“Where are you, little star?” Jackson's voice jump cut from Paris to Philly as he suddenly burst into song. “
Whoah-oh-oh-woh-oh, ratta-ta-tata, too-oo-ooo.”
Jesus if he didn't sound just like one of the Elegants.

Fucking Jackson went on like that all night—presenting Long Binh post as a many-pointed French star, visualizing Greek gods hewing rocks to construct the steel-reinforced concrete bunkers, even scaring me a little when he described the trenches snaking around the base with such a hiss in his voice that I swore there was a viper in the bunker.