Won't You Please? (story 2)

Thursday, February 22, 2007


Finally, the news cast faded and a Fanta commercial followed the reading of death, and that’s when my dad started balling. He was really letting it go, crazy heaves and wheezes through his tight throat, eyes glassy, reflective pools flowing out all over. I was pretty stunned, you know, ‘cause he doesn’t really do that kind of thing. I’d heard he’d been that way, mom told us, at the funeral of his brother. But I was a kid, and I barely remember that.
This was somebody I knew, though. He was really shaken, quivering the armchair and letting his cigarette burn down. I sorta thought I ought to, you know, give him a hug or whatever, but that might be weird. It was tough to initiate that. I just threw something out. “Well… I grew up with him too, you know. It’s really sad. He was one of the best.”
My dad stared into oblivion, the deepening valleys in his gaunt face flooding. “Well, we were in it together. He was with me.” He nodded and closed his eyes with the memory.
“You mean, he grew up in California City too?”
He scoffed, the tears misting off his lips a little. “No, of course not— chrissake, there was no California City until the ‘70s. I was there after. But he and I were in it together in ’68, in Vietnam, son.”
I squinted with disbelief. “What? Are you kidding me? He was in ‘Nam with you?”
His jaw clenched. He set aside the ashy cigarette and pointed with his beer in the other hand. “You don’t call it ‘‘Nam,’ ‘cause you weren’t even there, and you’ve got no idea, alright? ‘Cause this was…” He trailed off, shaking his head and searching for someplace to start. He took a gulp of his Rolling Rock and set it down, pushing through his thinning and graying hair, and he stopped. He’d found where to start. “But yes, Fred Rogers was in Vietnam with me.”
I wasn’t sure if I could take it seriously. Somebody had told me that before, I’d heard it before, but I wasn’t sure.
“Chrissake…” he searched the dark and musty living room. “Well it was 1967 and I’d volunteered. I wanted to go out to school, out to California, ‘cause Pennsylvania didn’t do well to us, you know? Dad’s mushroom farm 86ed and that was that for college. So I volunteered.”
He’d told me about the farm before. “When did you meet Mr. Rogers?”
“Well, Fred and I met on Parris Island for boot camp. We were bunk buddies, right, I was up on top. We both grew up in Pennsylvania, too.” He stood up, surveying the room. “It wasn’t a great thing for any of us, wading out in the swamps up to our shoulders, for chrissake…” He pulled a cigarette from the pack in his shirt pocket, hanging it from his lip. “I was a tough one then. Slow to pick it up and quick to drop out. I thought I couldn’t make it. But Fred pulled me through it.”
In a slow and pondering sweep, he turned and lit the hanging cigarette and faced the night, staring out into the neighborhood between the burgundy drapes in the window.
“You see, I could barely keep in step with the rest of ‘em. Always fumbling. The drill sergeant had a thousand and a half punishments for sloppiness. Sentry in the rain. Scrub the floor with a tooth brush. Disassemble my rifle, reassemble, disassemble, reassemble— that son of a bitch drove me right up it.” I watched him take a meaningful drag and exhale. “But Fred stuck by me. He taught me focus and discipline and a lot about the world. I mean, chrissake, I hadn’t even had a chick yet and these loudmouthed leatherneck terrorists are prepping me to gun down reddish fools swinging around in the jungle. But Fred taught me about the world, and chicks, and everything. Very patient man. He taught me about God. He said ‘goddamn it, I’m gonna show you, and I’m gonna put the fear of God in you.’”
My dad was washing over with some crazy vision. I was searching for something, at all, anything to say, but my mind was spiraling with confusion and embarrassment. What the hell was Mr. Rogers teaching my dad about chicks?
“He made me into a real man. We even met the Vietnamese dart girls, ‘cause they, uh…” Suddenly, Dad looked away. He shook his head. “Well, you know, we met them. Don’t worry about that. You forget that. Anyway, Rogers was a no-bullshit kind of guy, and you could see it— he was ripped in the corps, tattoos all up and down, skulls up on the shoulders. I’m sure he lost weight after the war, ‘cause it was madness in there.”
I nodded. I put my chest out a little. “You kill a man?” I asked, trying awkwardly to sound like I was in on something.
It irritated him, and he turned, his face narrowing at me. “Chrissake… now listen. Rogers made me realize, growing up on the farm gave me some background for marksmanship. I could definitely hit a target. And he could too. So we volunteered for sniper training and they trained us as marksman and forward air controllers. We shipped out with Chuck Mawhinney, too, someone told me he was in the battalion. We shipped out in time for the Tet Offensive. Cong, that son of a bitch, ripe enough to come out fighting on a holiday.” He pointed viciously at the air with the smoldering cigarette, his face contorting, “we were into it with that son of a bitch at Khe Sanh. That was bad. Our guys were going hill by hill. They had some nice artillery positions on us, but Rogers and I— we took enough out one by one. Rogers was my spotter, and a damn good one. You know how it works; he’d scope him out and read the distance off to me, you know, that patient voice he’s got. After that we’d call in the flyboys. The air strikes got Cong good. We got ‘em good.”
He relaxed a bit, the lines smoothing out in his face, and he slowly returned to the arm chair and took a drag. He examined his cigarette, exhaling the fumes around it. “That’s where I learned to smoke. Rogers got me into that. Settles your nerves. He had a few nasty habits, you know, but everyone did.”
“Did he try heroin?” I asked meekly. I knew it was a little much, but that’s why I said it. It was just the most crazy, extreme thing I could come up with. The conversation made me feel like a kid at a political rally or a frat party or something.
“Well sure. We didn’t really have much time for that kind of thing, though. He just flirted with it a little,” he reassured me, “plus the main thing— we knew some fellow who figured you could smoke hash from a shotgun. I guess Fred had a tough time with that kind of thing after the war, but I suppose he did ok with that show and everything. I guess—“
“Were you there with John Denver?”
“What?” He stopped a moment and then squinted at me critically.
“John Denver. I’ve heard Mr. Rogers was there before, but also, somebody told me John Denver—“
“I’ve heard enough.” He looked away disgustedly. He grabbed the Rolling Rock and took a long swig, putting it down again. He paused, glanced at me, then looked into the air critically. “You need to be more careful who you listen to, son. That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever goddamn heard.”
Posted by Matt Carney at 12:16 PM