Fields of Fire (44 page)

40

SNAKE: Well, I'm gonna get me some of that. Bring me home a medal. No more mopping up other people's pee.

Outside, low gusts of wind rattled trash and made dirty eddies in the sidewalks, but never blew high enough or strong enough to move the amber haze that hugged the skyline. The streets were filled with garbage and spiraling trash. Fronts of buildings were piled with junk and stained by soot. Everywhere there was lifeless, controlling concrete. Wasteland. Home of the regurgitated and the lost.

It was late morning. Inside the creaking, fetid row-house the windows whined and rattled at the wind, leaking arctic currents through their looseness when the gusts beat at the panes. Snake's mother sat up in her bed, waking late and alone, and felt her feet grow icy as they moved from the bed to the floor.

Just can't keep it out, she mourned to herself. This damn place. Like living outside. No use caring 'bout it, either. Won't change it. She caught a glimpse of the picture on the dresser, then settled her gaze on it and smiled briefly. She felt a secret sweet elation, just a current of unadmitted elation.

He'da changed it. Yeah. I think he would have.

She stood beside the bed, feeling old and shivering in her underclothes. Feeling old was a recent misery that had crept up on her. She was not yet comfortable with it, or even able to accept it. But it was a real emotion on lone cold mornings. Old. She took a cotton robe from the bedpost and threw it around her shoulders, snuggling into it. She would wear the cotton robe all morning. Perhaps all day. So little to dress for. So little to care about. Then she picked the picture up and held it, remembering.

It was his Boot Camp picture. He was short-haired and uniformed. The elation came back again, mingled with just a tinge of relief. The picture stared back, eyes cool, invincible behind the glasses, chin forever tilted in arrogant bravado.

Crazy kid. Always fighting. She smiled sadly. Always in trouble. But you sure did a wonderful thing over there, Ronnie. You sure did. Wonder when that medal's gonna come?

She held the picture to her shrinking, hollow breasts and imagined the ceremony. What will I wear, she wondered for the latest innumerable time. I'll have to buy a suit. A good one. She touched the bleached hair, now lusterless and brown from being forty-five and not caring any more. And get my hair done right. And I'll stand there on the White House lawn and cry just a little—I know it's gonna make me cry, hearing 'bout the brave way he died—and I'll just say Thank You, Mister President. This'll never take his place, you know that, but I'm so proud of what he done. Died for his country. Died a hero, my little Ronnie did. Then after they give me the little shadow box—I seen 'em in the magazines, a handsome officer all fixed up in his Number Ones walks up and stands in front and hands it over, maybe touching my cheek to help wipe tears and all—then after that we'll go inside the White House and we'll all have a cocktail. I'll stand there chatting with the President, maybe even have lunch. Wonder when that medal's gonna come? Been over two years now. Sure takes a long time. But I guess they got a lot of paperwork.

She reached into the top dresser drawer and took out a stack of letters. On the bottom of the stack were the cryptic messages Snake had sent her from the bush. She flipped through them. Saved 'em so he could tell me the stories. Every one of them's a story. She shook her head, near tears. That little fart sure could tell a story.

On the top of the stack was the other letter. Two days after Snake was killed his company commander had written to her. He wrote of what a fine Marine her son had been. He wrote of the universal respect he had known, of the combat meritorious promotions he had received. Then he described the way her son had died, fighting tear gas and incredible odds and single-handedly saving the lives of at least two people.

She had marveled at the description of the things Snake had done. She had slowly waved her head from side to side, reading the Captain's letter. Like something in a movie, she thought wonderingly. To jump out in front of all those guns so many times, to save a wounded friend. And, the Captain had written, I want you to know I am recommending your son for the Medal of Honor. I am getting witnessing statements right now. I think he deserves it. I think he'll get it.

That had been more than two years before. She stood reading the letter in the arctic clutter of her bedroom, the pages stained and wrinkled from having been read at times like these. Such times came often now.

A wonderful thing. To jump out in front of all those guns like that. Wonder when that medal's gonna come?

SHE did not know it but the medal would never come. Three days after the Captain wrote the letter, the Regimental Legal Officer had visited the field. He was in the process of completing a formal investigation regarding an alleged atrocity that had occurred on a patrol some weeks earlier. It was alleged that six members of the company had participated, either as perpetrators or as aiders and abettors, in the murder of two Vietnamese civilians. One of the six had actively discouraged such heinous acts, and had willingly cooperated in the investigation. In fact, he had initiated it. The others, it seemed, had participated fully, according to the statement, and were to undergo an Article 32 investigation to determine whether charges would be filed against them. Snake, according to the statement, was the main perpetrator. Division has a special interest, the Legal Officer made a point of saying. The General himself. These things can cause serious political difficulties.

The company commander took the report from the Legal Officer and glanced at the names. Snake: dead. Bagger: blind. Cannonball: shot. Goodrich: amputee. Cat Man: still here—squad leader now. Dan: not chargeable by American authorities.

“Well,” said the Captain. “They're pretty well avenged already, wouldn't you say?”

Then he read Goodrich's sworn statement, and felt a hot ball of disgust roll through his abdomen. Unarmed. No direct provocation. Executed firing-squad style in front of their graves. Goodrich wrote well. The Captain was infuriated. Two civilians killed in cold blood. Snake had ordered it done. It was all in the statement.

“Tell Division the murderer is dead,” the Captain said. “He died a week ago out in the My Hieps. Tell Division we regret the incident, and we'll cooperate fully with the investigation of all participants. Tell Division I'm relieving the squad leader, and canceling an award recommendation that I just started on the murderer. Tell them that, Captain.”

The Legal Officer nodded, writing laborious notes in his notebook. The company commander lit a cigarette and thought of what the newspapers would say if they found out about the incident. Perhaps they would even use his name. It might ruin, and would certainly affect, his career. He shook his head. People like that, he mused. I'll just never understand what gets into them.

AND in the icy bedroom Snake's deluded mother swayed, the letters a small warmth to her. Such a wonderful thing, Ronnie. To jump right out in front of all those guns and save a wounded friend. Well, you always had the guts to do that. You just never seemed to have that kind of friends. You finally found them. Must have been a hell of a friend, that you would die for him. I'da liked to hear the story.

41

ROBERT E. LEE HODGES, JR.: And will I, in the end, meet your fate, Father? I'm not afraid. You and the others taught me that.

I

They sent his mother a flag and a gold star and the medals he had earned and she put them into the footlocker he had prepared before going overseas. She could not bear to touch the locker again and whenever she allowed herself the miserable luxury of looking at it she would break down. After a few weeks of such disruptions her husband moved it into the dusty dankness of the back shed, placing it beside an older, similar footlocker that a few remembered but none would ever open.

II

Okinawa, 1976
The small boy shuffled into the cluttered shop and looked up to her. He had a long, angular face and wavy brown hair that tufted in occasional piles of waves, and his skin was just a touch diluted from the gold. The rest of him was unmistakably Oriental. He was a beautiful child, a complementary mix of gold and white. He looked up to her and clenched little fists and softly broke down into confused, painful tears.

“My father is not dead and I am not Japanese.”

She knelt to him, looking into his eyes. “Your father is dead.” About the other she could not argue. It was the law. A child was the nationality of his father. Her son was an American. The law did not solve problems. It merely created new ones. The boy was becoming old enough to understand such things and his life was confusing, unanchored. Seven years, she thought. Has it been that long?

“My father is not dead. He ran away. He went to America and left us.”

She sighed. The other children had been taunting him again. She took his shoulders and squeezed them and embraced him, feeling him shake with silent misery.

“Your father is dead, Hitoshi. He died before you were born.”

“Then why do we never speak of him? And why do we never visit his family tomb?”

She sighed again, stroking the tiny back. It is time. He is old enough that he has become aware, and it can no longer be ignored. He must be told. It has been wrong not to talk to him about it before. But one cannot speak warmly of a former lover and continue to be welcome in another man's bed.

Kakuei had been understanding, and had forgiven her for her earlier errors. But he would not tolerate the flaunting of them, even to assuage the confusion of the product of the error. Hitoshi had spent his early years inside a shadow, knowing he was different, knowing his father was American, but knowing only that. Not understanding the origins of his difference. He had instinctively felt his stepfather's resentment, sensing in his child's way that he was a millstone to be carried by the older man in order to obtain the affections of his mother. And she had gently, steadily loved him, with a special tenderness, perhaps even more than the other children. He, the upshot of a month spent dreaming, the prize and punishment of her momentary unfettering.

It was so crazy, she thought, the memories surrounding her. He was so crazy. A gentle, crazy man. But it had been so easy to get caught up in his eager insanity. She continued to soothe the crying boy. And this is all that is left of him. This crying child who does not know who he is. Or what he is. It has been so long and now there is Kakuei and I cannot say I loved him. Perhaps I did. Perhaps beneath the excitement of him, beyond his urgency, there was love. But it does not really matter now. The boy is all that is left and he faces a resenting world that he did not ask for and does not comprehend. I must save the boy. I must, for his own sake. And, I suppose, for the remembrance of a man I might have loved.

The boy was finished crying now, still sniffing and catching his breath, but the tears stopped by his mother's warmth. She continued to hold him, thinking of the dead man who had created him. Half of this boy is him, she pondered. More than half—it is a boy. He somehow lives in the sniffling warmth I am caressing. Did I love him? I don't know. I love this part of him so deeply. I must have loved him.

She took his shoulders again and looked into his eyes, her oval face a warm smile. “Would you like to go for a taxi ride? Just you and me? There is something I would like to show you.”

The boy smiled back, excited now, the hurt slowly evaporating into the air of his excitement. He nodded eagerly. She walked into the darkened, cluttered back room of the store and awakened her husband. I am lucky I found a man such as this, she thought as she shook him, memories of the earlier years now painfully in focus after her thoughts while consoling Hitoshi. So many did not understand. Perhaps it was because he was older. He did not forever turn his back because I slept with an American. So many turned their backs.

Kakuei rolled on the low board that he had been resting on, and then stretched lazily, looking at Mitsuko. “Why do you wake me?”

“I am taking Hitoshi to Kin. The children have been teasing him again and I must explain it to him. It must be done. Will you mind the shop and watch the other children?”

Kakuei sat up, rubbing his eyes slowly. He was a large, heavy man, more than ten years older than Mitsuko. He did not like to watch the children. Women watched children. It had always been that way. “I will watch the store. Take the children to your mother. And do not stay long.” He looked meaningfully to her. “Kin is not a good place to spend long periods of time.”

She nodded her silent agreement. Kin was the Gomorrah where she had lived her sinful past. “I will not be long.” She picked up the baby and took the hand of the little girl, now three years old, and called to Hitoshi. Outside the store they walked down the narrow road past overflowing shops, turned onto the narrower strip of dirt, becoming lost inside a mass of stalls and bustling people and wispy, smoke-filled odors, and reached her parents’ stall. Her father sat on the bench at the rear of the stall, smoking a cigarette and drinking green tea, watching television. He noticed her and nodded a short hello.

She walked to the rear of the stall and went behind the curtain there and found her mother cooking over a small stove. They spoke briefly, amiably, and she left the two younger children and walked out of the stall. As she reached the strip of dirt again her father looked up from his television and called to her.

“Where do you take Hitoshi?”

“To Kin. To show him.”

Her father grunted. “You should have seen enough of Kin by now. You should never need to show him.”

She smiled tightly, slightly irritated but unable to contradict him. It was the wages of her past not to contradict such assertions. Besides, she reasoned, he is old. He does not understand Hitoshi and he does not understand Kin. He only understands that he somehow won a major victory when the American who threatened his existence was killed. He will die with the taste of victory in his mouth. But he will never understand.

Mitsuko took Hitoshi's hand and they walked silently to the main street. Once outside the netherworld where people knew her the stares of the curious and the leering began, and she sank behind a practiced mask of unseeing indifference. Hitoshi's features were a magnet that drew stares from Okinawans as well as Americans. It is worse for him, she thought. When I am without him there are no such stares. But there are always stares for him. And unkind words. I must find pride for him. He is such a good boy.

They remained quiet during the taxi ride. Hitoshi stared out the window, contentedly watching beach and bustle. Taxis are a treat for little boys. Mitsuko stared out, too, filled with thoughts of her rides along the same road with a fleeting lover, now long dead, who left her with a dream that disappeared and a legacy that now sat, at once both curse and blessing, where he had sat those years before. So crazy. But it had been so nice to dream.

The taxi pulled up to the gate and she paid the driver, remembering the first night at the same gate, when his refusal to leave the car became the driving force that made them lovers. She helped Hitoshi from the taxi, he staring with excitement at the spaciousness across the fence, and at the frothing green sea of men and equipment there.

She stared too, feeling a curious mingle of emotions that left her strangely aching. So much had changed. Nothing had changed. The military camps on Okinawa were a constant in her life. They had always been where farmland was to Mitsuko. She did not question that. But beyond their presence there were changes that were so great that she stared at the constant in front of her and could not recognize a part that might have known her once, those few years, those lifetimes ago.

It was a sameness on the surface: a military sea of trucks and jeeps and green-clad warriors, dotted with islands of Quonset huts and square, same buildings. But the currents of wild emotion caused by men being launched into a war zone were calm now. It somehow seemed a different sea. And her friends who worked there were all gone. Reversion to Japan and yen inflation had eliminated the jobs. Such a different sameness.

Green-clad warriors passed in trucks and jeeps, staring at the girl and her half-American son, commenting freely to themselves, reveling in inferences. She was beautiful and she stood gazing through the fence, dreaming of some moment years ago that made the green sea suddenly have meaning, and she felt the hungry stares of men gone vagabond from homeland separation. But she was immune to them, having grown up under thirsting glances. Only once did the immunity dissolve. Why, she wondered, staring at the green sea, her face an emotionless mask adrift in aching memories. Why did it dissolve? It would have been so simple if it had not.

Hitoshi hugged her legs then, awed at the military bustle. But I would not have him. Sweet nemesis. Reminder of the crazy days. Preserver of a dormant dream. I must find pride for you.

Her son looked up to her. “Why are we here?”

She knelt on the sidewalk, the mesh fence on one side and the busy road on the other, Kin beyond the busy road, and talked above the traffic noise. She was smiling a secret, hoping, smile. “I want to tell you about your father,” she began. “And this—” she remembered urgent, laughing words, a particle of conversation from a moment long ago—“this is, like his family tomb. We can remember him here.”

The boy was at once hushed and serious. He did not hear the traffic churning past him. He was lost inside his mother's eyes, waiting to at last learn of his father. “Is he buried here?”

“No.” She tried to find the words. She felt a helplessness in trying to find descriptions that would be meaningful, and give her son strength. How to explain? She had not understood it totally when he had explained it to her those years ago. She had dwelt on it for weeks when she learned of his death, finally garnering the courage to ask the Assistant Club Manager to check on him after having received one letter and then nothing for a month. She was certain that she felt the emotion he had attempted to convey.

But it is so difficult to articulate this emotion, she fretted. “No. He spent the last days of his life here. He is buried in America.”

The boy knew much of America. It was a place, far distant, where fathers ran away to. It was also his homeland, although he could not comprehend America. He was American. The law said that. “But he did not die here. Or in America.”

Mitsuko felt an embryo of deep frustration in her chest. “No. He died in Vietnam. Far away.”

“Why was he buried in America?”

“Because it was his home.”

“Then why did he die in Vietnam?” Hitoshi did not know Vietnam.

“He was a warrior there. These men—these Americans you see. They are warriors. They fight in many places.”

The boy looked puzzled. His mother had told him it was wrong to fight, even when the children taunted him. “Why? Why do they fight in many places? Are they angry?”

She had never considered why. She smiled, helplessly stripped by the innocent questioning. “I do not know why.”

The boy persisted, sensing that he would not have another chance to so openly discuss this shadowed vision that somehow was his father. “If he did not die here and he is not buried here, then why is this his family tomb?”

She was sorry that she had used the analogy. She had believed that it would help him in his quest for pride by giving him something on Okinawa that was constant and involved his father. But the boy was too filled with questions after years of waiting, and the emotion was unexpressible.

She shrugged, stripped again by his questions. “All such places are his family tomb.”

Hitoshi watched Marines pass in and out of the gate and marveled at them. Americans. I am an American, he thought. Am I like them? I do not feel that I am like them. But then, I do not know them. He turned to his mother, now lost in velvet remembering thoughts. “What was he like?”

She stared through the fence. Mercurial memories rolled through her, heavy with ache, like water-filled balloons that would burst if handled.

“Your father was—a very brave man,” she sweetly told the boy, trying to remember something of him worthy of recounting to a little boy. So few days together. So little knowledge of each other. He forceful and sensitive and persistent, a ball of curious, foreign emotions that simply would not be denied; she swept up by his attractiveness and persistence, standing helplessly as the immunities wore down.

A beautiful man. But I did not know him, she thought sadly. Not really. How can I tell our son that? How can I tell him he was born of honest attraction and a frantic confusion that may have been love? The result of it has crushed part of him already. I cannot tell him that. I must help him be a strong man.

The boy cocked his head and stared curiously, deeply interested. “How was he brave?”

She held his face, still kneeling by the traffic, the bustle of Kin on one side of them and the military sea beyond the fence on the other. “He was a brave warrior. He was not afraid to fight in battle for his country. Once he was shot here, and here, and here, and here—” she touched her head and arms and back and legs, remembering—“yes!”

The boy was astounded and touched his own body in the same places, his eyebrows arched and his mouth agape. She smiled, sensing a spark inside her son. “Yes! In all those places! But he went back into battle, even after that. And he was killed in battle.”

The boy was sombered and slightly drained from the story. “Is it good to be so brave? To fight for your country like that? Was it a good thing that my father did?”

She squeezed his shoulders, anxious to fan this first spark of identity. “Yes! It was a very good thing your father did.”

He smiled then, grateful to discover such a key, and spoke with hushed determination and a fierceness that surprised her.

“Then I too will be a warrior.”