How Can You Mend This Purple Heart (14 page)

Here I was, groping at a selfish desire for unconditional acceptance.

You self-centered son of a bitch.

I was suddenly engulfed with an overpowering sense of humility and isolation. Earl Ray had been right all along. I didn't belong in the same hospital, let alone breathing the same air among them in this hallowed sanctuary. I didn't dare think of leaving.

Sit up straight and try not to puke.

“Hey, Shoff,” Big Al said, smiling. “Earl Ray says you don't like being called a non-combat motherfucker. Don't blame you. Earl Ray should worry more about himself instead of looking around at what everybody else has or doesn't have. Ain't that right, Earl Ray?”

Earl was drawing down deep on a Marlboro and squinted out through the lofting smoke. “I'm the one that said we ought to bring him in here, ain't I? Don't mean shit to me anymore what anybody's done. Nothing means shit to me anymore.”

“Dwhat about Jendeefer?” Ski said, puffing on a newly-lit Winston.

“What about Jennifer? Open another window, for God's sake!” Earl said, waving at the smoky air with his left arm stump.

I turned to open the window behind me, but Moose stopped my chair and went around the half circle opening all of the windows as far as they could open. The cool air rushed in, resuscitating the room.

“Jennifer ain't shit either,” Earl said. “I'm just going to get me a whore to live with when I get out of here. Somebody that doesn't know shit about me and doesn't want to know.”

“Okay. Okay. Let's save it for later,” Moose said. “Big Al, did you bring that care package from your buddies in 'Nam?”

“Absolutely!” he smiled.

Big Al delivered a bundle from behind his back and handed it to Moose. It was the size of a small loaf of bread, wrapped in brown paper and tied with twine. It was covered with stamps and addressed to Lance Corporal Al Labonte, FPO Atlantic, Q Ward, U.S. Naval Hospital, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The handwriting was jagged, like an old man's with Parkinson's disease.

Big Al was getting an occasional care package from his buddies in Vietnam and this one had arrived earlier in the week. The contents were almost always the same: a short letter with combat updates, those wounded or killed, a couple Polaroids of the guys, pictures of dead Viet Cong, and two or three Thai sticks.

I was about to learn what a Thai stick can do.

Moose opened the package and handed Earl Ray the photographs. Earl balanced the first two side by side on the arm of his wheelchair and pondered them for a couple of minutes. With a shit-eating grin, he handed them to me.

It was the first time I had ever seen dead men who had been shot to death or blown up. Four of the dead Viet Cong had been propped up against a thatched building, and the others had been laid out in the dirt. They all looked to be about eighteen or nineteen years old.

A couple of guys in dirty green fatigue trousers and no shirts were standing over them with their rifles down at their sides; they couldn't have been more than eighteen or nineteen, either. Earl pointed out to me that two of the dead men in the dirt had had their ears cut off.

The shirtless Marines in the photos showed no emotion. They were just looking at the camera as if it were a mandatory duty, something that had to be done—hurry up, get it over with, and get on with the day.

“Ain't that a pretty sight?” Earl grinned. “Take it in, Shoff. Take as much time as you need, man. You look at it long enough, you may not give a shit, either.”

I handed the pictures to Ski and just stared at my lap.

“You wanted to be here, Shoff,” Earl Ray said. “If you don't like it, now's your chance to leave.”

“I ain't leaving,” I said. “A couple of pictures with dead people ain't going to make me go. I just don't want you to hate my guts, Earl. I can't change who I am and what's happened.”

“I don't hate your guts, Shoff. I just hate who you are,” Earl said. “I hate every motherfucker out there,” he said, pointing out an open window with his Marlboro. “So don't think you're so fucking special. If I didn't want you in here, believe me, you wouldn't be in here.”

“You guys don't know what it means for me to be in this room,” I said, struggling for anything to say.

“Yes dwe do,” Ski said. “We just weesh you was a Marine.”

“So,” Moose broke in. “You're an honorary Marine! You're in here because we want you in here. We think you're all right for a non-combat motherfucker,” he grinned.

I couldn't help but sit up a little taller in my chair, my nerve endings beginning to feel a little normal again.

“This doesn't mean you're one of us, Shoff,” Earl Ray said. “It just means we don't mind having you around.”

“I gave up my chance to be one of you a long time ago,” I said, still fumbling for words. “If it's all right with you guys, when I get out to the rehabs, I'll get me a tattoo—“Honorary U.S.M.C.”

“I'll go with you and make sure it ain't too big,” Earl Ray said. “And it can't be where anyone can see it.”

“I wouldn't care if it was on the top of my head,” I told him.

“Dyou see? That eeze why we like you!” Ski laughed.

“Now, ain't that some shit! We got us a genuine honorary by-God fuckin' Marine!” howled Bobby Mac. “And a fuckin' relative to boot! Don't get no better than this, man!”

Moose had handed the paper wrappings back to Big Al, who was ruffling through the half-empty package for the long-awaited prize inside—four olive green and umber-brown magical leaves twisted in tight spirals.

Thai sticks are a wonderful blend of some of the finest hemp in the world, lovingly laced with glistening sprinkles of opium. Big Al's buddies had outdone themselves this time, and I was about to experience just how far beyond the call of duty they had gone.

Sgt. Bobby Mac held the joint between the thumb and forefinger of his left hand as if it was a poisonous snake. Gently rolling the twisted stick back and forth in his shrunken fingers, plying it into a firm and tight roll, he put it to his lips. Moose lit it with his shiny silver Zippo U.S. Marine Corps logo lighter.

The sweet aroma filled my nostrils like air passed through angels' wings. Bobby Mac put it to his lips, inhaled deeply, and passed it to me.

Its taste was even sweeter than its fragrance. It bathed my tongue like Christmas ribbon candy, and as I inhaled its floating nectar, the rush to my brain was immediate and all-powering. It was far beyond any morphine or painkiller. It was cool, calming, and soothing. Touch, smell, sight, and hearing were super receptive and a profound awareness came over me. My thoughts drifted to the Amber Wall.

I listened to them as they talked and laughed and spilled their guts about everything and anything. I listened as closely as I could to their stories, my mind drifting to the will of the drug, not sure of how much I had heard or how much I had missed—or even how much I had said. We laughed hard at everything, and at some point Big Al produced a small bottle of Jack Daniels. It didn't last long.

After a couple of hours, the Thai stick began to fade and we talked about doing it again. I would wait for the invitation.

I slept through breakfast, and when I awoke, I saw that Earl Ray's bed had not been slept in.

“He's down to Q dward. Went there last night weeth Big Al,” Ski said. “He mumbled somedthink about getting out of here. Dwe couldn't stop him. The corpsman had to put him down as AWOL.”

“Shit, man, we got to do something,” I said.

“It's okay, they dwon't do anything to him,” Ski said.

“He's got pills, Thai sticks, and booze, Ski.”

“Don't dworry about him, man. He dwill be okay.”

“I know what could happen. He's like me. I love the shit, and he may not know when to stop.”

“We all love the sheet, man. Eet's okay. We can call down to Q Ward and see.”

Earl Ray wasn't there. He was in emergency sick bay. He had rolled his wheelchair off a set of steps, and the stump of his left arm was wide open. His stomach had been pumped of painkillers.

A corpsman wheeled Earl Ray back on Ward 2B late in the afternoon. As he was rolled into the slot next to the nurses' station, he made a sideways glance at Ski and raised his head in defiance, blowing out a hard puff of air.

He was put on strict watch and an even stricter regimen of painkillers. Dr. Donnolly had been called and was on his way.

“No way, Dr. Donnolly,” Earl Ray said. “It was just too much of everything.”

“What do you mean by everything?” Dr. Donnolly asked.

“Just what I said, everything,” Earl replied. “Too much booze, too many pills.”

“What about too much on your mind? You can't keep it to yourself and make it through this, Earl.”

“I made it through 'Nam, I can make it through anything.”

“I'm going to make sure you see Dr. Frazee. He's been to Vietnam himself, and he can help you with this. This is an order from an officer,” Dr. Donnolly commanded.

“He's a shrink, ain't he?” Earl stammered. “The shrinks I'm seeing now don't know shit.”

“Dr. Frazee is one of the best damn psychologists in the military,” Dr. Donnolly said. “I'll set it up for first thing tomorrow morning. In the meantime, let's look at that arm.”

It wasn't as bad as we had first heard. The doctor on duty had done a great job. The cup of skin over the end of Earl's stump had been sewn back in place with just a few stitches. Dr. Donnolly rewrapped the stump, phoned Dr. Frazee, and left the ward.

“Too much of a good thing, eh Earl?” Bobby Mac chided.

“You can never get too much of a good thing,” Earl replied.

“Got that right. Right now, all I want is too much of a good woman!” he laughed.

“They ain't all they're cracked up to be,” Earl shrugged.

“I just want to be up to their cracks!” Bobby Mac howled.

“Do you think every fucking thing is funny? Sometimes you irritate the shit out of me.”

“Now, ain't that some shit. You got to learn to look at things different, man. The sun's going to shine whether we're here to see it or not. They're still shooting at each other in 'Nam, and it don't mean shit to us now, does it? The only thing that matters is right now, right here. Just start looking at it that way, and it makes shit a whole lot easier.”

Earl got down in his chair and headed for the solarium.

“Anybody care to join me?” he said to nobody.

“Not where you're headed, man,” Bobby Mac laughed.

Inside Looking Out

THE NOISE OF
the busy Saturday traffic, passing pointlessly beyond the cast iron spires of the front gate, hummed through the open solarium windows like coarse sandpaper. A warm afternoon breeze floated our cigarette smoke into lazy cirrus clouds, and an urge to belong, to be a part of something, to be of value, was pushing at the monotony and nothingness of life on 2B.

It was my third intrusion into the hallowed sanctuary. For some strange reason, the closing of the heavy wooden doors this time gave me a feeling of being trapped.

“It's happening, you know,” Earl Ray said.

“What's that?” Moose asked.

“People are beginning to hate us.”

“Ain't a damn thing we can do about it.”

“Yeah, but how can they hate a guy with no legs? What the fuck do they know?”

“Fuck 'em. We don't owe them shit, anyway,” Moose said.

“Ain't that some shit,” Bobby Mac chimed in. “Their day will come.”

“You think they ever think they might owe us something?” Earl said. “Fuck no, they don't,” he answered himself. “They're spitting on our guys coming home, for Christ's sake!”

“Take it easy, man. You don't want to get worked up over those assholes.”

“Moose is right, Earl,” Bobby Mac said. “Fuck 'em. They ain't shit and won't ever be shit to us.”

“If I had my legs, I'd track every one of them down and kill those fucking long-hairs with my bare hand,” Earl said.

“If I had my leg and my arm, I'd just go home and start all over,” Moose said.

“You mean you'd join the Corps and go back to 'Nam? That's fucked up,” Earl snapped.

“No. I didn't say that. I said I'd start all over again. Just like I'm going to when I get my arm and leg and get out of here.”

“It ain't the same,” Earl spat, shifting in his chair.

“I know it ain't the same. But it's what we got and we got to get used to it.”

“This is what we got, huh?” Earl said as he lifted up his half left leg and speared the air with the stub of his left arm. “I'm supposed to feel lucky because I've got my cock? Bullshit.”

“It's what we got, Earl,” Moose said. “That, and each other. You think I can do this alone?”

“I don't need anybody's help,” Earl said.

“We all need someone we can count on. Ain't that what the Corps drilled into our thick heads?”

“That's different.”

“No difference at all. Remember your first real combat?” Moose asked. “Man, I do. All the rah-rah in the world and I was still scared shitless…well, I'm scared shitless now, my friend.”

Sgt. Bobby Mac Joyce pointed to his good eye with the thumb on his fingerless hand. “Got to look at what you have, Earl. Not at what you used to have.”

“You're right, Moose,” Earl shrugged. “Ain't nothing different about any of it.”

Earl Ray sat staring at me, his eyes looking through me—somewhere beyond the solarium walls. I squirmed in my wheelchair feeling like a little boy about to be belt-whipped by his old man, but at that moment, Earl Ray didn't even know I existed.

Earl Ray turned to Moose, blowing a puff of air from the corner of his mouth.

“I did the right thing, you know,” he said. His voice tapered off like the blue cigarette smoke swirling out the windows.