13th Valley (59 page)

The CP group was joined by Thomaston and Egan and the meeting began. It lasted only a few minutes. Cahalan reviewed the day's activities about the valley. Recon had killed one NVA in a brief encounter. Bravo had engaged an unknown-sized enemy force with unknown results. Egan bitched about the tunnel. “God mothafuckin whore damn,” he cussed. “We're practically still right there. We're jumpin back and forth, not goin anywhere, not doin anything where we're at.” El Paso agreed and said that's what killed Ridgefield. That dampened their spirits even more.

“Where ma plasma?” Doc questioned. “They was supposed ta send out a hun'red bag.”

No one answered him. They all seemed to be in a stupor. Their eyes had sunk into deepening sockets. Since leaving the tunnel they had covered 3000 map meters, perhaps six kilometers climbing up and down, each carrying refilled rucks and equipment, all on full alert, in either tropical heat or in harsh cold rain.

“Tomorrow,” Brooks said a little too loud, loud enough to inject command energy into his weary soldiers, “tomorrow we get out of here. We cross the valley. El Paso, get De Barti and Caldwell on the hook. Cahalan get Red Rover. Any questions? No? Good. Tomorrow we get the ambush team back in at first light, then rendezvous with 2d and 3d. Then we cross the valley.”

Cherry shuddered: The wind was harsher now. He had crossed and wrapped his arms about his chest. His rifle was muzzle up between his legs, his thighs pressed it as if for warmth. The jungle was pitch black. Cherry could not even see McCarthy who was sitting less than a meter from his feet. The trail had become a river and the water surged against Cherry's ruck and his ass. The water streamed right through the material of his pants. Cherry's teeth chattered. With this wind and rain, he thought, I could probably scream and not be heard. El Paso called again checking security. Cherry keyed the transmit bar. He rolled to his left, to his knees, and crawled forward a foot. Numbnuts was right there.

“Hey,” Cherry hissed. “Hey, find out when we're …” Cherry reached out and grabbed the thumperman.

“What?” Numbnuts said, startled.

“Cool it. Hey, when we goina move? Were you sleepin?”

“I wasn't sleepin,” Numbnuts snapped.

“When we goina move out?” Cherry asked.

McCarthy tapped Cherry from behind. “We movin? I'm fuckin freezin. When we …”

It took three or four minutes in the dark for them to determine they had broken contact, had become separated, were alone. “Hey, nobody signaled me,” Numbnuts defended himself.

“You mothafucker,” McCarthy spit at Numbnuts' face. “I can't believe you did that.”

“I wasn't sleepin,” Numbnuts snapped again. “Maybe you was sleepin.”

The urge to smash Numbnuts in the face seethed in McCarthy. It seethed in Cherry too. Cherry forced his brain back into control. What should I do? he thought. What's got to be done? He knew he could not call out, ‘Hey, where are you guys?' though that was his first impulse. He hesitated to use the radio. He could call back to the CP but he could not call the ambush team. He had the team's only radio.

“Willis,” Cherry addressed Numbnuts using the thumperman's surname to establish his own authority, “move up the trail about ten feet. See if you can find Denhardt. Doc, you watch below us. I'm goina call Rover Two and get Egan. We gotta link back up with the team.”

“I aint goin up there,” Numbnuts protested. “I can't see.”

“Shut the fuck up,” Cherry whispered violently. A natural command instinct had surfaced in him. “When you speak, you speak quiet, Fucker.”

“You go up there,” Numbnuts whined irritably. “Why should I listen to you? Huh? It wasn't my fault … Auughh …” He screamed as Cherry jerked him up by his shirt then slammed him down into the mud. Cherry grasped him by the throat, held him with his left hand. Numbnuts squirmed. Cherry cocked his right arm, squeezed his fist, aimed at Numbnuts'head …

“What the fuck are you doin?” Someone grabbed Cherry. “Where the fuck you been?” It was Silvers. “Get up. Get up there. Get up there. What the fuck's wrong with you?”

Silvers grabbed Cherry, spun him uphill and pushed him. Numbnuts jumped up about to protest but Silvers was already at the head of the little column. Numbnuts ran a few furious steps to catch up. Cherry was vibrating with rage at the injustice of Silvers' accusing him. He stepped more lightly than he had ever stepped. Rain or no rain, he was a good soldier and he wasn't going to take the rap for Numbnuts' fuck-up. Cherry stepped where Silvers stepped except smoother, quieter. As they approached the summit LZ the slope leveled and they slowed. All of a sudden the howl and roar of the wind was engulfed in three successive explosions BOOM!BOOM!BOOM! and a fusillade of firing.

Cherry and Silvers dropped. The firing was 30 meters away. Silvers rose and crept quickly cautiously forward. Cherry, McCarthy and Numbnuts followed. Jax, Lairds and Denhardt were all firing their 16s and Marko the 60 as Brunak fed. They sprayed fire across the entire LZ.

“Over there,” Denhardt yelled. “Out there,” he screamed. Silvers reached him. “There's gooks over there. I seen em.” He continued firing. Silvers tossed a grenade and fired. Cherry squeezed off a burst on full automatic. Then everything became quiet. There had been no return fire.

They paused. The team huddled together to discuss what to do next. The rain was still coming down hard and making noise in the canopy. The NVA could be maneuvering up to their sides, around behind them, maybe even in front of them. “We blew it, Man,” Marko said. “We gotta go back.”

“Call the CP,” Jax said. “Tell em we done blowed our position. Ef anybody out here, they know right where we at.”

They all agreed. No one, including Silvers, wanted to remain. They had fired too much at too little.

Silvers grabbed the hook. “Quiet Rover Four, this is Rover Two Two. Over,” Silvers called. At the CP El Paso answered and passed the hook to the L-T. “We're comin back in,” Silvers informed Brooks. Brooks asked questions. He listened. He thought it would be more dangerous for the team to move than to stay and rearrange themselves. Silvers argued for returning. Brooks denied his request again. Their conversation ended there.

“Let's go,” Silvers said. And without permission the ambush team backed out of its position behind the blown trees, returned to the trail and descended toward the ravine. Very quietly they descended in column, all of them very alert now, holding the rucksacks to their front in an unbroken chain.

Egan and Thomaston had crawled away from the CP meeting and had dragged themselves through the mud to a guard/ sleeping position at the side of a foot-thick tree. It could not have been more uncomfortable. Because of the slope, they slid into each other, pressed each other against the tree. On top of all else, where the tree's roots spread, rising from the ground like an inverted fan, the tiny cavities and recesses were filled with spider webs. Egan felt wretched. Finally he got up, moved up the hill several meters, found a thin tree trunk and tied himself to it. He settled back wrapped in a poncho liner and poncho and closed his eyes. Stephanie came to him immediately. Like magic she eased the discomfort and anguish. She floated into the jungle and the rain ceased, the wind became a gentle breeze.

After that October afternoon in New York Daniel Egan lost contact with Stephanie. He called a few times without receiving an answer and finally found the phone disconnected. It must have been at least a month between calls and in those months he found a new Daniel, a man sexually attractive to women. All this time, he thought, I thought you had to be something special to get a girl. I thought they had to love you. In the course of a semester Daniel moved from naive small town boy to campus stud. He kept score, laughing about it with his football friends, and flaunting his prowess at fraternity parties. He fell in love a dozen times and forgot a dozen names. And he found he hated it. Something was missing.

On a cold snowy night in February Daniel was in bed with Little Fannie, a fraternity sweetheart. They had just made love or at least balled. He had just come. He was still atop her, still in her, semi-flaccid. For this, he had said to himself, for this I didn't pull it for two days. He lay there thinking. Then he rolled off. “Fannie,” he said. “Ah, I got a big exam tomorrow. I got to study.” She said go ahead and pulled the blanket tightly about herself. “Ya can't stay while I'm studying,” he said.

“You got to be kidding,” she had said. In the end he threw her out. After she left he lay alone for a long time. Then he rose, went to his desk and wrote a note to Stephanie.

Now in the vacuum of darkness, on that empty fetid hillside morass where he had tied himself, her image warming his enslaved soul solidified and she spoke the soliloquy of her reply, a reply which did not arrive until early June.

Dear Daniel,

I'll bet you're wondering what's happened to me. Things have happened quickly and have been very complicated but I'll try to explain as best I can.

The last time we talked I told you I didn't know where I was going. I had to leave NYC, so, I went home. I'm skipping around. I've been having trouble with my step-father because he thinks what I did was a terrible sin. I'll get to that. One night, shortly after I moved back in, he and mother were arguing about my being here and I overheard and went downstairs to tell him to leave mother alone and that I would leave. Before I knew it I was telling him how he had never shown me any love. The idea that he had failed as a father and that therefore had contributed to my sin surprised him. He's always been such a success at everything.

Anyway, I'm married, getting divorced, and I've had an abortion. Actually, you're not going to believe this, but I had two. I've been through quite a lot since I last saw you. The first abortion didn't work. I don't know if you know anything about them. They certainly are not fun. I became very ill after my second D & C which is a scraping of the uterus. I only got out of the hospital yesterday. When I get up and around I'm planning to get a job and save some money so I can go to school. I want to work with children. I have definitely decided not to go into art.

As far as the divorce is concerned that will be happening very soon. Not a definite date now but soon. As soon as possible. I hesitate to write you, Daniel, because I've been so sick and because I really don't know if it is the right thing to do. I respect you so much and I don't want you to get involved in anything ugly. This is really hard for me to put into words but it is how I feel. I wasn't going to write then I started thinking about how much I wanted to hear more from you and that you would know yourself just how much to get involved. I don't understand exactly how I feel. The whole time I was living with my husband I couldn't stand it and I thought of you constantly. I wanted to call you so badly. Daniel, please write. Write me a long letter. You're such a wonderful writer, so precise and beautiful with words.

Please don't be afraid of my feelings. I'll never press you. Could you send me a sketch too? I know someday you'll be a superb architect. It's very late but I don't want this letter to end. It's almost like I'm talking to you. I guess I should get to bed.

Love,

Stephanie

Two Fridays after the letter arrived, Daniel left school. He hitchhiked to her, arrived on her doorstep at three Saturday morning and allowed the long sleepless night to torture him in an attempt to atone for his lapse. “I brought you something,” he smiled when she opened the door six hours later.

“Daniel,” she screamed with glee. She rushed to him and they embraced and held each other tightly and then her mother was there saying hello and making them breakfast.

Saturday was beautiful. She took him to a lake and they hiked to the secluded far shore. Stephanie had never been lovelier. The air remained crisp all day, the sunshine warm and clean.

“Daniel,” she said. God, he thought, how much I love to hear you say my name. “Why are you so quiet? Talk to me. I've told you all about my past eight months and you've told me nothing.”

He wanted to speak but he couldn't. How could he confess to her that he had been on a fuckathon. He looked into those beautiful eyes and he thought of himself and he felt like dirt.

“I love your sketch,” Stephanie said. She kissed him then raised her sweater and exposed her breasts and gently pulled Daniel's face to her.

Egan lying tied to a tree on the wet jungle hillside rolled to his side and pushed the poncho liner up higher about his neck. He felt pleasantly warm. The image before him shifted. There were two lovers alone and in darkness. He recognized himself. “I've designed some of the world's most wonderful homes in my head,” his image said.

She laughed. “I've painted some of the greatest pictures in my mind.”

They both laughed. Then they stopped and were silent and they shared a sorrow. What if I never really design them? he shuddered. What if they are not the most wonderful when they are on paper? She too shuddered, then breaking their silence Stephanie said, “Please. Let's go someplace.”

“Yes,” Daniel said. “Let's go.”

“Where?”

“Nowhere. Let's just go.” They rose and stood for a dizzy moment and looked at each other. Stephanie sat back down. “Get up,” Daniel pleaded gently. “We will go … somewhere.”

“Where?” Stephanie cried. “You're going to go back to school or to a job. Leaving me again.”

In the cold jungle the memory now agitated Egan. Perhaps he had been too close to it then. Perhaps he could understand it better now, from this distance in time and space. Much of what Daniel Egan remembered of Stephanie was not her at all but was only him when he was with her. Perhaps I wasn't sensitive enough to perceive more than just me, he thought. I never asked her how she felt or what she thought.
I didn't really know her.
She is not really here at all, he thought. The wind blew colder. He wanted to know her so much more.