Soul Survivor (18 page)

Even by the hectic standards of the Leiningers, the summer of 2002 was frantic. Bruce’s oldest son, Eric, was graduating from
Virginia Tech. The family flew up for that, and during the flight, James made a big impression on the pilot with his intimate
knowledge of a cockpit and his unbridled enthusiasm for flying.

And in the midst of all this, Bruce had to have a double hernia operation, after which he had to drive to Dallas. Jen and
Greg were holding a big party celebrating the final stages of the adoption of their daughter, Ainsley. Bruce was just two
days out of the hospital, but he had to make the drive. Andrea drove the four hundred miles to Dallas with Bruce reclining
in the passenger seat, packed in ice.

At the same time, the
20/20
staff wanted to shoot some preliminary footage of James at a museum of old planes. So after the party for Ainsley, they all
drove to Galveston—another three hundred miles—where, on June 29, they filmed James at the Lone Star Flight Museum. James
circled a polished-up Corsair, pushing on the propeller, touching the wheels, inspecting with striking familiarity the vital
parts that dwarfed him.

He was all business, performing a professional pilot’s preflight inspection of an aircraft.

(Bruce was limping along, a spectator, dreading the 235-mile drive back to Lafayette on Interstate 10—a bumpy nightmare.)

The
20/20
crew took seemingly endless film of the four-year-old child soberly circling the Corsair. James pointed out the tailhook,
which, he said, clearly indicated that this was a naval aircraft. Only Navy planes had tailhooks to grab the arresting wire
when landing on an aircraft carrier. He also pointed out the vulnerable tires, which took a lot of pressure on a hot carrier
landing; they had a tendency to burst—another fascinating detail that Shalini Sharma had confirmed with a naval historian.

Less than a week later, Andrea was atwitter. Shari Belafonte was coming to her home! The daughter of Harry Belafonte! The
whole panel was atwitter—no one more than Bobbi, who swooned over Harry Belafonte. Shari was the on-air talent who would be
conducting the interview for the
20/20
segment.

For two days, Andrea tried to anticipate everything she could. She cleaned and polished like a soldier getting ready for inspection.
She had a large carafe of coffee waiting, also a big tray of Danish pastry. She had arranged with a local catering company
to deliver box lunches and pasta salad at eleven thirty a.m.

At eight a.m. on July 2, the crew arrived at the house. They were five: one sound man, one lighting technician, two camera-men,
and the producer—Melissa. All in their late twenties or early thirties, they were very businesslike. They came in and scoped
out the house, looking for the best angles and camera shots. Then they started moving the furniture around, took everything
out of the sunroom…

Oh, God!
Andrea fretted.
What if I haven’t cleaned out that room like a fiend? What if they find the dust bunnies or, God forbid, a dead cockroach!

Melissa explained that Shari and Carol Bowman were at Girard Park, near the campus of the University of Louisiana, filming
some other locations and interviews, but they’d be along.

Finally, the appointed hour arrived. At nine o’clock, the doorbell rang, and there they were.

Shari Belafonte, stunning in her golden hair and olive flight suit, seemed to radiate glamour. Her smile was like sunshine,
and James took to her immediately. She got on the floor with him and played with his toy planes, and he told her why none
of them had propellers.

At one point, the phone rang. Andrea could see by the

caller ID that it was her sister Jen, so she asked Shari to pick up the receiver. Jenny was starstruck and said, “I feel like
I’m talking to Mick Jagger or something.”

Carol looked like a therapist to Andrea: calm, accepting. She was a middle-aged woman in a military green outfit, soft-spoken
with a benign smile, and seemed not at all judgmental.

Carol and Shari were bothered by the heat—it was July in the South—and they asked for ice water as Melissa set up the shots.

And Andrea was being a vivacious Southern belle, making sure that everyone was being plied with enough food and beverages,
that she was getting enough photos of this once-in-a-lifetime experience, that James was behaving, that she didn’t look a
million years old. That she didn’t look fat! All the while, one thought kept running through her head:
Shari Belafonte is in my friggin’ house!

The lunch showed up on time, but they sent gallons of pasta salad by mistake. In the background, Bruce was a little bewildered
by all the fuss, as well as a little tender from his recent surgery.

Meanwhile, the gaffer set up the lights, the cameramen their equipment, and the sound man his microphones and recorders. Melissa
explained how the particular shot would go. If it didn’t go the way she wanted, she yelled, “Cut!” and they redid it.

At one point, Shari asked if Andrea and Bruce believed in reincarnation or in souls returning to earth, whereupon the sound
man reported that the battery for the recorder had gone dead. He put in a new battery, but something then went wrong with
the charger, and it wouldn’t record.

Melissa told Shari to ask the question again, and the screw holding the camera on its tripod broke, and the camera came crashing
to the floor. They tried again, and again there was a glitch. Then the TV in the next room suddenly came on, and everyone
felt a cold, eerie chill. Except for the TV in the distance, there was breathless silence. Finally, the producer said, “Let’s
just come up with another question,” which saved Bruce from having to answer the crucial question about reincarnation—something
he had dreaded ever since they agreed to do the segment.

The Leiningers had little time to spend with Carol Bowman, but she did tell them her thoughts. James was a delightful child,
and the nightmares were connected with reality. He was not imagining the dreams, and he was completely authentic in his reactions.
She saw Andrea as a concerned parent who was trying her best to cope with a dizzying whirlwind. But Andrea was receptive to
the idea of a past life. She was open and friendly and willing to take advice: be gentle with James; do not try to push him
to answer questions; allow him to find his own comfortable ground. If he wants to talk, let him, but don’t push him. If he
doesn’t want to be interviewed, don’t force him. Andrea didn’t have to be told, but she agreed. She saw her son’s experience
in the same way that Carol Bowman did. James was the conduit of a mysterious wonder that they called a past life.

Bruce? He was another story.

“Bruce,” Carol Bowman would say later, “was very hostile to the idea of reincarnation. That was very clear. He did not believe
in it. He fought it.”

In a way, Carol handled Bruce the same way she handled James: she left him alone. No forcing beliefs down his throat. He would
have to come to his own conclusions by himself. She knew that the harder she pushed, the harder he would push back.

And indeed, Bruce was having trouble with Andrea’s stubborn certainty. She believed in the whole past life business, but he
was still hip deep in his search for Jack Larsen. He wanted proof—something that would stand up to scientific testing—that
there was even such a thing as a past life and, furthermore, something tangible about his son’s experience. So far, all he
had were baffling indications that something unusual had taken place, but no real proof of what it was.

Well, there were a lot of people who felt like Bruce. In fact, in the end, Shari Belafonte thought that the case was too weak
to put on the air. Not that she didn’t believe it. Just that there was not enough proof. Not enough for prime time.

“At the time,” Carol Bowman would recall, “it was not a really great case. There were good indicators, but nothing compelling.
It was, as I recall, just another kid with nightmares.”

It was, they all would discover, early in the game.

I
T WASN’T THE uncertain journalists or even the equivocating experts who moved Bruce to keep chasing after a solid explanation
of his son’s nightmares. It was his own unwillingness to let it go. He had to know what was happening to his son. And he had
to know by something sturdier than a hunch, intuition, or an ethereal, wishful theory.

And then, on April 30, 2002, something tangible arrived: a letter. Leo Pyatt had come through.

Dear Bruce,

I am pleased to inform you that VC-81 Natoma Bay CVE 62 reunion is firmed up. It will be held in San Diego, Calif. on the
8th, 9th, 10th and 11th at the Grant Hotel in September… Yes, our numbers are dwindling, but we can still enjoy these gatherings.

Leo Pyatt VC-81

CVE 62

And so there he was on September 8, flying two thousand miles to San Diego, feeling a little foolish—a fifty-three-year-old
World War II groupie with secrets to try to uncover… and secrets to keep.

They didn’t have room for him at the U.S. Grant Hotel, where the reunion was being held, so Bruce stayed half a mile away
at a Holiday Inn. He dropped off his luggage and grabbed his shoulder case loaded with his tape recorder, spare batteries,
notepads, and a bunch of pens, along with his list of eighteen names gathered from all the memorial Web sites: the men of
Natoma Bay
who had been killed in action.

The U.S. Grant, with its majestic lobby and tasteful trimmings, belonged to another time. It was built in 1910 with all the
splash and splendor of Edwardian fashion. During World War II, it was one of the smart retreats for sailors who would soon
be off to war. There were plush memories at the Grant for the men of
Natoma Bay
who had all come through San Diego more than half a century ago. The hotel was a reminder of a stylish and comfortable world,
as well as of their youth.

Bruce asked the concierge about the reunion, and he pointed to a sign:
Natoma Bay
Ready Room, Second Floor. It was in the ballroom.

I felt as if I was treading on sacred ground. They were, to be sure, old-timers—not one of them younger than seventy-five—but
there was the unmistakable light of something exceptional in their eyes. It was the glow of men who knew exactly who they
were and what they had done. They joked and teased each other with the easy familiarity of men who had been through some version
of hell together. They had been tested.