How Can You Mend This Purple Heart (16 page)

“Let's get this over with,” Earl said as he glided toward the waiting parts.

“We need to put fresh Ace wraps on these,” one corpsman said. “You want help taking those off?”

“I put 'em on, I can take 'em off,” Earl said.

Earl Ray put his teeth into the elastic wrap on his left arm and pulled hard. It snapped loose and sprang back against his face with a plop. “Fuck.”

“Wait until you have some broad's bra hit you in the face like that,” Bobby Mac laughed.

“Just grab this wrap and shut the fuck up,” Earl Ray said as he motioned toward his half leg.

“Damn, Earl. I've never seen stump ends this calloused,” one of the corpsmen said. “What did you do?”

“I took sandpaper from the Puppet Shop,” Earl shrugged. “They never missed it.”

The cups of skin, draped and sewn over his three limbs, had finally healed, and Earl had chafed the stumps with the sandpaper until the bloodless skin was like horsehide.

“Okay, let's get this on you,” one of the corpsmen said as he lifted the plastic arm with its cable tendons from the PT table. They tried to encourage Earl Ray as best they could, telling him it was natural for the plastic limbs not to feel right, but Earl Ray didn't see anything natural about it.

The two corpsmen slid the plastic limbs over Earl Ray's freshly wrapped stumps and fastened them into place. The arm pulled down on Earl's shoulder like an anvil as he shifted against its weight. The hinge that was supposed to be an elbow may as well have been welded shut. A pincer-like hook stabbed out from the end of the arm. The whole thing looked more like a leg from a giant insect.

“What fucking good is this going to do me?” he said as he squeezed the hook with his right hand.

“You'll learn to use it, Earl. I promise,” one of the corpsmen assured him.

“Yeah, like a weapon,” Earl said. “Maybe kill me some long-hair. Or that fucking Sgt. Pepper.”

Putting on the plastic legs wasn't any better. At least the right leg didn't require a harness. The artificial three-quarter left leg was fastened to his waist and overlapped the arm harness on his shoulders. The canvas straps were buckled across his chest and back like crisscrossed suspenders.

The bottom half of each leg was one solid piece of plastic. The left leg was hinged at the knee with two metal rivets and an axle that allowed the leg to scissor ninety degrees. The legs had no ankles to bend or cushion his weight, just a forged curve flowing into a slight semblance of a foot.

“Couldn't they do anything about the color of these things?” Earl chided. “They look like my sister's Barbie dolls.”

“Ain't nobody going to see them, anyhow, Earl.” Moose assured him. “Just wear long pants.”

One of the corpsmen retrieved a pair of shiny black Cordovan shoes from under the PT table, size ten and a half. “Let's get these on you, Earl,” he said.

With his limbs secured in place, the two corpsmen lifted Earl from his chair and supported his surprisingly heavy upper body. One corpsman stood facing him, the other close behind gripping a canvas belt tied to a harness around Earl's torso.

Earl stared down at his feet as he stood up from his wheelchair for his first walk down the plank. Several blasts of air spanked from the corner of his mouth.

The plank was a hospital-designed-and-built, five-foot long, shoulder-width walkway to Hell. Black cast iron pipes ran parallel to the floor about three feet high. Typically used for bathroom plumbing, the pipes now served as handrails, but more often than not, they were the only support that kept the young amputees from crashing to the floor.

The paint on the pipe rails was partially worn away, evidence of the grueling hours and days of those struggling to learn to walk again. The entire PT staff, and anyone who had experienced its ability to mercilessly humble even the toughest Marine, referred to it reverently as “walking the plank.”

Earl wobbled slightly, made a half step forward, and planted his new feet flat on the rubber mat. He looked down at the shiny black plastic shoes, his bare plastic, Barbie-pink legs with no socks, and blew air up from the corner of his mouth.

“Even the fucking shoes are phony,” he jeered.

He wobbled again, and the legs suddenly locked in an upright, rigid position. He reached out with his right hand and gripped the black pipe with a crushing force. Anything for balance, he leaned his plastic forearm into the other pipe.

“C'mon Earl, dyou can do eet,” Ski told him.

“Yeah, man. You can do it,” Moose coaxed.

“Lift your right leg first, Earl,” the corpsman in front told him. “It's easier than trying it with your left leg.”

Earl Ray raised his three-quarter right leg just off the ramp, and the stump slipped inside the hollow socket of the plastic limb. His left leg looked like it was nailed to the floor. He had lost all sense of balance. The athletic rhythm he once had of shifting his weight from leg to leg was totally and utterly gone. All of his weight was now forced against his stumps.

The two corpsmen held tightly to both tethers. Earl Ray shifted to his stronger right leg, and as he did, he stubbed the artificial shoe into the rubber mat of the ramp. His wooden arm slid violently off the black pipe. The corpsman in front was ready. He lunged forward, his face just over Earl's left shoulder, his muscular arms thrust under Earl's armpits.

Moose was the first one to reach Earl. Bobby Mac, Ski, and I nearly rolled into one another as we grabbed the black support pipes in a feeble effort to help in any way. Ski's front wheels slammed into the three-inch-high planking, nearly dumping him onto the plank between Earl Ray and the front corpsman.

“Jesus, you guys don't move that fast even for a Thai stick,” Earl spat.

“We're just here to help if you need us,” I stammered.

“Didn't I choke the shit out of you for that?” Earl Ray smirked.

“Yeah, but this time I'm not being a smartass.”

“Well, get the fuck away from here before I hurt someone,” Earl said.

“It's okay. It happens to everybody,” the corpsman in front said as he steadied Earl upright.

“Look at me,” Earl snapped. “I ain't like everybody. So don't give me that shit.”

Earl's entire body shifted and twisted as he lifted his right leg off the plank. His right arm and elbow were pressed painfully into the black pipe; his plastic arm, pressing hard onto the rail, slid an inch forward. His left leg suddenly locked up and the plastic arm went sliding at full speed down the cast iron support. Earl Ray's heavy upper body lunged between the pipes as the plastic arm slid violently off the railing. The full force of his muscular shoulders and upper body went crashing into the front corpsman, knocking him hard onto the plank. Earl Ray's grip on the black pipe with his right hand was the only thing keeping him from squashing the corpsman. He swayed slightly back and forth, hanging from the pipe like a knocked-out boxer clinging to steel ropes.

Sweat was dripping from Earl's nose; his right hand kept its grip on the pipe like a lifeline. His left arm, with its insect pincers, lay hard against the corpsman's shoulder. The corpsman got to his knees and supported Earl from underneath. The back corpsman grabbed the harness straps, and the two lifted Earl upright and balanced him once again between the pipes.

“Okay, Earl, you ready to try one more time?” the front corpsman asked.

“A Marine eeze always ready,” Ski said.

The front corpsman held Earl's pincer forearm as if he were guiding a small child safely through a dark passage. The corpsman behind him moved closer and placed a secure hand in the middle of Earl's shoulders.

Twenty minutes later, the three men sagged against the pipes and each other. With only three feet to show for all the effort, Earl was bent and exhausted. He slumped to the floor, surrendering to the plank.

“God dammit!” Earl shouted as the two corpsmen cushioned him back into his chair. “God dammit!”

He was out of breath; his pajamas soaked, hair dripping wet, his entire body was like rubber. All those hours of lifting weights, the one-arm pull-ups on the trapeze bar, the countless sit-ups, the leg lifts, the arm curls, the burning muscles—and how many fucking times had he squeezed that goddamn ball!

“God dammit! Get these fucking things off me! They're like a fucking straitjacket! I can't breathe!”

He tried to pull his right half leg from its socket. It was stuck like a plunger and made a loud sucking noise. He let go of the leg, stripped off his pajama top, ripped the harness from his left shoulder, and flung the creature arm across the room.

“You want to help?” Earl snapped. “Then get these fucking things off of me.”

Moose unbuckled the harness from around Earl's chest and shoulders and pulled the full-length leg from Earl's left stump. One corpsman removed the half leg and Ski and I wheeled over with towels to sop up Earl's sweating body. Fresh elastic wraps were wound tight over his stumps, and Moose and I helped Earl into clean pajamas.

“Get me back to the ward. I need a fucking needle.”

Back on 2B, Earl's thirst for relief from the pain and anger was quenched with the welcome quiet of the magical chemicals.

“Fuck the trapeze. Fuck the push-ups. Fuck it all!” Earl Ray said as he slid from his bed into the waiting wheelchair. “It's all been a big fucking waste of time. Who the fuck are they trying to kid with all this?”

Earl Ray wheeled over to the pile of plastic trash bags stacked next to the large cabinets. As the guy in blue coveralls loaded the trash onto his cart, Earl tossed the squeeze ball into one of the bags.

“Burn that with all the other fucking garbage.”

He returned to the solace of his bed and waited for the drugs to take control. Earl had been given a little extra morphine to quicken the time between the reality of the plank and the dream world of unconsciousness. We had all been to that place many times, and the tell-tale signs were glowing in Earl's smile. The face turns up in a sly, unprovoked grin. Dreaminess flows into your consciousness. You pass into the soft hazy world between reality and escape. It's the time to just lay quiet and feel the warm ooze flowing through the brain, try to make it last as long as you can. Push the threshold of the glow farther and farther, the sudden rush of warmth through the entire body, its pleasure so reassuring.

“Hey Ski. This morphine shit is good,” Earl slurred. “I'm almost painless, man. I think my mind is numb. Man, I sure wish Jen would walk in. Put her hands on me, feel her breathe against my face…”

Tiny beads of sweat popped from Earl Ray's forehead as the morphine reached its euphoric peak.

“Ski, I can feel my legs. They're back where they should be. I can almost reach up and pull Jen down to me…my face tingles, man. Is it Jen? I think she's trying to tell me something…”

As the drugs completed their journey through Earl Ray's mind and body, he surrendered to the resonating warmth and the ever-growing threshold of a brighter glow.

It was a feeling with so much promise.

Life Goes On

FOR THE NEXT
few weeks, time drifted slowly and methodically on Ward 2B. Bodies gradually responded to the nurturing and coaxing of the healing staff. Those who had reached full ambulatory status had been transferred to the rehab wards, and the beds on 2B had been shuffled to keep the new arrivals closest to the center of the ward and the nurses' station. The rearrangement put Ski, Earl Ray, Moose, Bobby Mac, Roger, and me at the south end of the ward, closest to the solarium.

Time not spent in physical therapy or the mess hall was filled with assigned chores and helping those who were now the new bed-ridden. We would refill water pitchers, empty urinals and bedpans, deliver a cold wash rag, change a pillow case, open a milk carton, or give our time in any small way. For Earl Ray, Ski, Moose, Bobby Mac, and Roger, it was a way to give a fellow Marine some comfort and friendship. For me, it was one more way to mask the guilt and to feel like I belonged.

We grew closer together as a group, but we would never grow close as individuals. The social nature of the military demanded transient and temporary friendship, and the instinctive human understanding in each of us dictated that someday, one by one, we would part ways. It was an ever-mindful presence that is borne from the absolute certainty of the temporary nature of military life.

We kept an even greater distance between ourselves and the new arrivals. Most of us would be out of the hospital by the time these guys would even be thinking of a wheelchair. They would form their own transient groups and follow us in time through this endless procession.

A New Pair of Shoes

ANYONE WHO WAS ABLE
to move about on crutches or a wheelchair was given a light duty assignment. It was all the small stuff: cleaning and straightening bedside cabinets, steaming out bedpans and urinals, handing out clean pajamas, and just about any odd job to keep us busy.

Big Al was given Master-at-Arms duty of his rehab ward, and Roger George had taken over Big Al's duty of announcing the new incoming to 2B.

The envelopes bulging with the patients' medical histories were being delivered on a regular basis.

Roger had jumped at the chance at what he saw was the most prestigious duty assignment on the floor. He didn't deliver the packets with the same flamboyant and siren-like pronouncements of Big Al. He carried his cargo in a makeshift pouch he had stitched together from old pajamas and strapped it to the side of his wheelchair like a saddlebag. He would enter Ward 2B with the papers of a new arrival secured in the pouch and roll silently to the desk. Every bundle was carried with the reverence and honor of a dignitary. Each packet was placed gently in the center of the nurses' station as if it were the patient himself.

When the pajama-pouch wasn't being used for its primary purpose, it was stuffed with the day's mail and personally delivered by Roger to the patients on Ward 2B. He got to know all of the guys that way; that was Roger.