Fall of 1970, on the outskirts of Da Nang City, South Vietnam

By Joe Lampiasi (pictured)

The corporal was not quite awake when he heard the rain; from habit he huddled into his poncho liner to stay as dry as he could until it was his turn for watch. He tried to doze off for just a few more minutes, but sensed something was wrong so became sharply alert as he began searching the darkness for whatever had alarmed him.

He did not move as he listened to each of the night’s sounds separately attempting to identify what was wrong: the air was still and cool, the rain on the metal roof was not loud, but steady…. That was it: the rain on the roof. He was under a roof safe from the rain. He realized where he was, exhaled in relief, and relaxed with that knowledge. He surprised and pleased to be dry during the rain.

It was Saturday night; on Thursday he’d left the CUPP and for twenty piastas hired a motorcycle to take him to First Battalion’s compound, where he’d been re-assigned. He did not think of it as the rear, he thought of it as THE REAR: an almost mystical place with beds, and roofs, and hot showers, a mess hall, and safety.

As he lay in the darkness listening to the rain he thought, “Just two more nights and I break my record.” The record he was hoping to break was consecutive nights in a bed. When he’d first arrived in country – that’s how he thought of it now, not “in Vietnam” but “in country” – he’d slept in a bed four nights in a row. Since then, the most he’s had was three nights on a couple occasions and two nights a few times. Otherwise, he’d been in the field and had slept rolled in his poncho liner.

He turned onto his back, interlocked his fingers between his head and pillow as he listened to the now comforting patter of the rain, and, knowing he would not get back to sleep soon, sat on the edge of the bed to smoke. He liked to be the only one awake late at night: a silent guardian, smoking in the darkness. He liked the quiet and the solitude; he liked the safety the building offered; he could smoke inside at night and not worry about snipers.

He found his Luckies and his Zippo next to the ashtray on an ammo crate that served as a nightstand. He’d bought a plain Zippo in the States. Other Marines had engraved lighters that read “Vietnam – 68,” “Death Before Dishonor,” or “Born To Die.” Bulldogs and Marine Corps emblems were popular, too. When a Korean with an engraving tool had shown up at the CUPP unit the temptation had been too great; the corporal’s lighter now read, “Owned by a genius unrecognized in his own time.” Rather, that’s what he’d intended, but the Korean had spelled it genious; the corporal had been so pleased that he’d paid an extra dollar, wished he thought of it himself and decided to spell genius that way from then on.

The room was dark beyond the cigarette’s glowing coal. Even so he closed his eyes, inhaled, and held his breath. He let the smoke fill his lungs, then thought pleasantly, “A bed and a smoke at night, this is first class.” He exhaled into the darkness like he’d seen the actors in the old movies and reveled in his newly found decadence.

The corporal had read a self improvement book while he was in the hospital not long ago; he knew the time he’d spent in the First Med had technically set the record, but reasoned that hospital time was somehow different so decided that any hospital stays, no matter how long, would not be counted toward his “consecutive nights in a bed record.”

The book stated the successful people made lists of goals: short term, mid term, and long term goals. These goals needed to be realistic, attainable and concrete, but most importantly they needed to be written down to provide focus. The corporal was 19 at the time and certainly wished to be successful, so immediately upon finishing the book began to compose his own list of goals.

On three sheets of paper he printed GOALS in large letters; also centered, but in somewhat smaller letters, the second lines read, “short term,” “mid term,” and “long term.” On the first sheet under the title and the subtitle he wrote: “1. Not Dying.” He leaned back in his chair and tried to think of other worthy goals, but could not.

He stared at the papers for several minutes and thought of the various ways the alternative to his primary goal had been recently achieved by so many and how, wrapped in blood-soaked poncho liners, they waited with quiet, infinite patience to be carried into the helicopters that would evacuate them and how he waited with them, not believing it at first, then wishing it hadn’t happened, then looking for someone to blame and then realizing the only difference between them was the blood soaked poncho liner and time, and finally sitting quietly among them with infinite patience and not minding the flies or the death smell.

While he loaded the dead into the waiting helicopters, the pilots impatiently kept the rotors spinning – always. The corporal thought of one especially, when he’d lifted the poncho covered corpse by the shoulders the head had rolled down to the feet; the poncho had been snapped shut so the head had lodged in the bottom and not rolled out, but he wondered at the time if the head and body actually belonged together, or if they’d been packaged for convenient handling and, like potato chips, body bags should be stamped with the same disclaimer: … ” Packed by weight not volume, contents may settle during shipping.” He turned his face away from the poncho and the thought and dragged the oozing package onto the waiting helicopter.

In the end he decided that one goal, especially this goal, would be sufficient. Having made that decision, he lifted page three, lit it with his Zippo, held the nearly blank page as long as he could, then dropped it into a metal ashtray and watched the remnants curl, and then turn to ash; he repeated the procedure with page two. He re-read page one, picked up his pen and underlined “Not” so there could be no mistake in his meaning. He re-read it, as if to commit it to memory, then neatly folded it and put it into his wallet where it still was, soft from humidity, but legible.

He crushed out his Lucky, got back into bed, and pulled his poncho liner over himself. He was glad to be assigned to Battalion in THE REAR, and he was glad to be dry during the rain, but most of all he was glad he wasn’t dead; that was enough for now. He lay on his back, intertwined his fingers between his head and his pillow, and smiled into the darkness. He smiled at being dry and safe, but mostly he smiled with the pure joy of being alive as he listened to the rain’s gentle patter on the metal roof.

Joe Lampiasi attended college in Maine and Massachusetts; after graduation he moved to Georgia, South Carolina, and then Florida. He now lives in New York and has two children.

Posted by Elizabeth Armstrong Moore on Monday, January 22nd, 2007 | Email This Post

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