Keeping Watch by Laurie R. King
Authors: Laurie R. King
guts. He had seen so many Vietnamese smacked around and beaten that the sounds did not even make him look around.
For a while, the everyday horror had festered inside Allenâs mind. For a few days after Christmas, he had felt as if he would burst with the memories, swollen as a corpse about to spill itself out onto the earth. For a time, he had almost wished for the release of pressure, looking for ways to cause his mind to break up, thought about just pulling a grenade pin and hugging the thing to his heart.
In the end, the buildup had simply leaked out of him, leaving him a functioning shell. The vivid dreams of raining belt buckles and his foot coming down onto the trigger of a Bouncing Betty ceased to torment him, and during the day he grew accustomed to seeing men he knew were dead walking or sitting with the others: blink hard enough, they went away. As for fear, it was a tool, adrenaline cranking up the perceptions. It could even be a thrillâlike the sheer, heart-pounding helplessness of coming down into a red-hot LZ, when the zip and clang of bullets made your balls shrivel up behind your navel, until you set down in an orgasm of terror, finding release in a stream of heavy-laden men pouring out the back of the chopper. Exhaustion, pain, filth, it all got converted into
bau,
pronounced as if it were a Vietnamese word, a joke-adaptation of
business as usual
. Tedium? Turn off the brain and hump the pack. Horror? Let the eyes glaze over. The bright and shining terror of an FNG make you want to just bash him on the head and put him out of his misery? Donât sit near him, donât ask his name.
More and more rarely did he stand back, reflecting on how strange it was that he didnât find the war intolerable, or even particularly awful. He wasnât even afraid of death any longer, looked unmoved on horror, and only the rare pulse of his bodyâs fear told him he was still alive. Life was a long stretch of tedium broken by the fierce joy of battle.
And joy there was, now that he was learning the language of the jungle. In the bush, as the thud of rotors faded, the men would stand motionless until sounds returned: the buzz of insects, the cry of birds, the hiss of the radio. Then slowly they would move out, hunting the enemy, seeking out his hiding places, offering themselves to him as a snake hunter might offer his hand to coax a rattler from his den. And the smaller the group, the more Allen liked itâbeing stripped down to a night ambush party of three men carrying nothing but M16, canteens, and a Claymore was an experience so intense, it was like being drunk, or in love. Saigon was far away then.
Allen learned the bush, his senses screwed tight to the brink of madness: the chill back-of-the-neck sensation that meant Charlie was watching; a sure conviction that the path ahead held a booby trap; the sixth sense that kicked in when you could feelâ
smell
âthe enemy with a kind of internal radar. Nights were the best, keeping watch, when only your alertness stood between your brothers and deathâhe loved them then, his brother soldiers, loved them like heâd never loved Lisa, or his parents, or even Jerry. He discovered that he had a knack for ambushes, working with Streak and Mouse to triangulate a suspected hole in the ground and wait for Charlie to stick his head out, and he developed rituals the night before a patrolâlaying out his boots just so, repacking his field pack, covering two sheets of paper with a dutiful set of entertaining lies to Lisa; they became a kind of meditation. He ate less meat, used mud on his exposed skin instead of the Armyâs insect repellent, he eyed everyone other than his platoon-mates with close suspicion.
He didnât grow braids, although he did toy with the idea of transferring to recon, so he could spend more time in the green. Away from all the crap. And he didnât rape women or collect ears himself, but once heâd
For a while, the everyday horror had festered inside Allenâs mind. For a few days after Christmas, he had felt as if he would burst with the memories, swollen as a corpse about to spill itself out onto the earth. For a time, he had almost wished for the release of pressure, looking for ways to cause his mind to break up, thought about just pulling a grenade pin and hugging the thing to his heart.
In the end, the buildup had simply leaked out of him, leaving him a functioning shell. The vivid dreams of raining belt buckles and his foot coming down onto the trigger of a Bouncing Betty ceased to torment him, and during the day he grew accustomed to seeing men he knew were dead walking or sitting with the others: blink hard enough, they went away. As for fear, it was a tool, adrenaline cranking up the perceptions. It could even be a thrillâlike the sheer, heart-pounding helplessness of coming down into a red-hot LZ, when the zip and clang of bullets made your balls shrivel up behind your navel, until you set down in an orgasm of terror, finding release in a stream of heavy-laden men pouring out the back of the chopper. Exhaustion, pain, filth, it all got converted into
bau,
pronounced as if it were a Vietnamese word, a joke-adaptation of
business as usual
. Tedium? Turn off the brain and hump the pack. Horror? Let the eyes glaze over. The bright and shining terror of an FNG make you want to just bash him on the head and put him out of his misery? Donât sit near him, donât ask his name.
More and more rarely did he stand back, reflecting on how strange it was that he didnât find the war intolerable, or even particularly awful. He wasnât even afraid of death any longer, looked unmoved on horror, and only the rare pulse of his bodyâs fear told him he was still alive. Life was a long stretch of tedium broken by the fierce joy of battle.
And joy there was, now that he was learning the language of the jungle. In the bush, as the thud of rotors faded, the men would stand motionless until sounds returned: the buzz of insects, the cry of birds, the hiss of the radio. Then slowly they would move out, hunting the enemy, seeking out his hiding places, offering themselves to him as a snake hunter might offer his hand to coax a rattler from his den. And the smaller the group, the more Allen liked itâbeing stripped down to a night ambush party of three men carrying nothing but M16, canteens, and a Claymore was an experience so intense, it was like being drunk, or in love. Saigon was far away then.
Allen learned the bush, his senses screwed tight to the brink of madness: the chill back-of-the-neck sensation that meant Charlie was watching; a sure conviction that the path ahead held a booby trap; the sixth sense that kicked in when you could feelâ
smell
âthe enemy with a kind of internal radar. Nights were the best, keeping watch, when only your alertness stood between your brothers and deathâhe loved them then, his brother soldiers, loved them like heâd never loved Lisa, or his parents, or even Jerry. He discovered that he had a knack for ambushes, working with Streak and Mouse to triangulate a suspected hole in the ground and wait for Charlie to stick his head out, and he developed rituals the night before a patrolâlaying out his boots just so, repacking his field pack, covering two sheets of paper with a dutiful set of entertaining lies to Lisa; they became a kind of meditation. He ate less meat, used mud on his exposed skin instead of the Armyâs insect repellent, he eyed everyone other than his platoon-mates with close suspicion.
He didnât grow braids, although he did toy with the idea of transferring to recon, so he could spend more time in the green. Away from all the crap. And he didnât rape women or collect ears himself, but once heâd