The World Played Chess (83)

My legs were leaden. I was trying to run but I could hardly move them. I didn’t believe I’d make it to the stairs. I expected to get blown up by a mortar.

When I reached the bottom of the ramp, I was so tired I could barely climb. I’d humped for miles with eighty pounds on my back, but it felt as if I’d used every ounce of adrenaline. I had nothing left in reserve. My legs had ceased to function. I was helped up the ramp stairs by two marines. I expected to get hit. Even when I was on board, strapped into a seat, I didn’t believe the plane’s wheels would leave the ground. A shell would hit the plane and I would die on board.

Death follows me.

The pilot wasted no time. We barreled down the runway and I felt the wheels leave the ground. We ascended, nearly vertical, to get out of antiaircraft range. I waited to hear an explosion, expected to see one of the engines out my window burst into flames, to feel the plane jolt violently, and for Vietnam to pull me back, refusing to release her grip.

But there was no jolt.

There were no flames.

The plane ascended, and soon, through the rain, I saw the blurry South China Sea. I realized it was not raining. I was crying. I looked around the plane. It was maybe half-full with guys who looked like me—dark skin, dirty hair, beards. Everyone on the plane was crying. Tears of joy. Tears of sorrow. Tears of disbelief.

It hit me: all the guys not on this flight. Kenny, Forecheck, EZ, Victor Cruz, and a dozen others, a thousand others, tens of thousands.

I felt guilty to be going home, to have lived.

There were no stewardesses. No hot dogs. No Cokes.

Nobody talked. Nobody said a word.

I cried until I fell asleep.





Chapter 24


August 23, 2016

Elizabeth remained active to keep her tears at bay. She pulled new sheets over the blue twin mattress—a simple task made more difficult because our son had elevated his dorm room bed six feet off the ground. Beneath it we had positioned Beau’s desk and a compact refrigerator Elizabeth bought so Beau could keep food in his dorm room. I suspected it would be used more for beer, though I didn’t say this thought out loud. I said the arrangement provided more floor space, which was at a premium.

I grabbed a sheet corner to assist with the task and noticed how soft and luxurious it felt. I checked the tag. “Egyptian cotton? We don’t even have Egyptian cotton on our bed at home,” I said to Beau, who smiled.

Elizabeth had spared no expense at this parting of the ways, not that the luxuries had dulled her pain or mine any. She snapped the sheets over the mattress as if it had offended her, and she beat the two goose-down pillows like punching bags to fluff them. Her blonde hair fluttered with the rhythmic oscillating fan she had placed near an open window, but the breeze did little to alleviate the heat and stuffiness. The temperature had been the first thing to hit us when we stepped into the room, the smell a close second. It smelled like someone had spilled a gallon of lemon-scented Lysol. We left the door open to air out the room, and we could hear excited freshmen celebrating this beginning, their first year out from under the parental thumb. Adults.

They had no idea.

Elizabeth set the pillows at the head of the bed, then pulled up the blue goose-down comforter; she’d matched UCLA’s school colors—powder blue, gold, and white. Now she lamented that it all seemed rather precise and bland. I didn’t have the heart to tell her the bed covers would soon be beneath a cascade of unwashed laundry, books, papers, and food wrappers. She compared Beau’s side of the room to that of his roommate, whom we had not yet met, and whose décor was anything but bland. Above the Star Wars bedding the roommate had neatly pinned wall-to-wall Star Wars movie posters. For the next nine months, Beau would awaken to a black-clad Darth Vader, Luke and Leia holding blasters, and Han and Chewie, the Wookiee, beneath the Millennium Falcon.

My son had given me a concerned look when he’d first stepped into the room. “What the hell?” he said.

Mary Beth laughed at both the décor and at her brother’s seeming misfortune. I didn’t want Beau to prejudge a person he had not yet met. A college roommate, I knew, was like a spouse. The room would be the home to which they both returned for the next nine months. What was that saying about not having the ability to choose your family?

Apparently not your freshman roommate, either.

Beau had spent an entire day answering questionnaires about his likes and dislikes, his habits, his hobbies, the music he listened to, how late he studied, and how early he woke, so the school could pair him with someone with similar habits and interests.

At least in theory. I was relatively certain Beau had never written the words “Star Wars” in any answer.

Ever the good soul and optimist, Elizabeth said, “It’s a bold statement. He must be confident in who he is.”

Elizabeth had been, as expected, melancholy since leaving home the prior day to make the long drive from Northern California to Westwood. She did not see this trip as a beginning for Beau, but as an end; she was losing her firstborn, her baby boy.

“You didn’t bring anything to put up on your walls,” Elizabeth said.

“It’s fine,” Beau said, pacifying his mother’s concern. “I have a bulletin board, and I brought some family photographs to put up.” He looked at the desk clock. “You should get going. I have an orientation at three.”