BEN STOOD OUTSIDE the COP, watching a pickup soccer game between his soldiers and some of the local kids. As usual, his platoon corporal, Eric Coleman, had kicked off the game. Coleman was gawky and tall, but his toothy grin and oversize ears were like kid-nip to the haji children; they flocked to him. He had such an easy way with the local population that Ben always brought Coleman along when they needed to interview people.
Ben, however, never felt comfortable around the Iraqi kids. The young boys were especially friendly, but slippery too, like their innocence was a ruse. You wanted to love those children but you couldn’t trust them. And then you felt like a jerk for not trusting them, because weren’t they only kids and wasn’t their country going to shit? Ben suspected that if he looked less soldierly—less muscular and serious, with eyes that did not frown—then he’d feel less self-conscious. Becca had assured him that his smile more than compensated for his eyes. But how often did you smile when you were interrogating a family about the militants next door?
On this particular afternoon, Coleman was being schooled in fake-outs by a twelve-year-old boy named Majid. The kid called Coleman Soldier Eric, and the two of them appeared to have bonded over Corn Pops, which the corporal smuggled out of the mess. Coleman talked about Majid a lot, actually, how the kid could be a soccer star one day if his godforsaken country ever got its act together. Now, watching Majid dribble and fake, Ben understood Coleman’s interest. But Ben worried. Soldiers should not be so attached—or involved. You had to put people in boxes in your head. You had to be able to tape those boxes up and stow them away. If you couldn’t do that, you might very well lose your mind. Ben had seen it happen more than once.
He’d spoken to Coleman about this, but though a sergeant outranked a corporal, Coleman wasn’t green; he’d done a previous tour in Afghanistan. And he and Ben were friends. Ben wondered if attachment was more his own problem than Coleman’s.
“Aren’t we supposed to be winning hearts and minds?” Coleman had rebutted when Ben asked about Majid. The comment was likely meant as sarcasm, but who knew? If he let Coleman cultivate Majid, then down the line the kid might provide some useful intelligence.
But now, in the middle of the soccer drill, Majid skidded to a stop. A man stood across the street, shouting. He had a black mustache and was dressed like any number of local shop owners.
“What’s the matter?” Coleman shouted in Arabic.
The man ignored him. “Majid!” he called angrily.
Majid’s eyes widened as though he’d been caught stealing. Suddenly, Ben understood that Majid was not allowed to play soccer with the soldiers.
“It’s just a game,” Coleman said in English. “It’s harmless. Look, your son, Majid, he’s really good.” Coleman pointed fervently at the boy. “Really good,” he said in slow, exaggerated English. “Mumtaz.”
Ben did not like where this was going. “Let’s go in, Corporal,” he said.
“It’s only soccer,” Coleman protested. “Look.” He turned back to Majid’s father, who was becoming increasingly irate. “Don’t be angry with him. You really don’t understand how talented he is.” Majid’s father crossed the street and grabbed his son’s arm. “Now, that’s uncalled for,” Coleman said.
“I understand you,” said Majid’s father in heavily accented English. “And I do not care. I do not want my son around you.” He practically spat on Coleman. As his father pulled him away, Majid looked back over his shoulder with sad, frightened eyes.
Coleman stood there, shaking his head. Ben walked over. “What were you thinking?” he demanded. “That could have escalated. We talked about this.”
Coleman looked pained.
“Hey, man,” Ben said, finding it impossible to pull rank. “It’s okay. Majid’ll play soccer with his friends.”
Coleman looked at Ben like Ben just didn’t get it. “He’s going to learn to hate us,” he said, and he glanced back at the COP. It had been a school once, then an insurgents’ arsenal, and now it was a makeshift base, fortified with blast walls and barbed wire. He watched a Humvee head out to patrol the trash-strewn streets. “The father—he’s the reason that Humvee might not come back. Because his son will grow up to fucking hate us.”
For a moment, Ben didn’t comment. He considered this a simplistic view of the situation. But what if it really was that simple? Coleman’s oversize shoulders sagged, and Ben felt compelled to make the guy feel better. Somehow.
“Maybe you’re right,” he said at last. “But by the time Majid grows up, it’ll be our unlucky successors who get the brunt of his hate. You’ll be playing soccer with your own kids. You won’t even remember Majid’s name.”
“Yeah,” said Coleman. “Sure.”
Ben shot upright. “Majid!” he exclaimed. But the only person there was Miles, sitting in a chair beside the bed.
“Who’s Majid?” Miles asked Ben’s ear.
“How long have you been sitting there?” Ben demanded. He felt thoroughly creeped out.
“You were gone, man. I finished two cars while you were out.”
Ben rubbed his eyes. “What time is it?”
“Almost one thirty. It’s a good thing I didn’t let you get in the car yesterday. You needed those z’s.”
“Yesterday? Oh, Jesus.” Ben scrambled out of bed. “Why didn’t you wake me?”
“You needed the sleep, man.”
“Get me my keys, Miles!”
Miles nodded with a wormy smile. He led Ben back to the garage and handed him the leather key chain stamped with Becca’s initials. Ben unlocked the car and climbed in. He stuck the key in the ignition, but the engine wouldn’t start. He tried again, with no luck. Ben leaned his head out. “What’s wrong with it?”
Miles crouched down beside the open passenger door. “Nothing. But you have to blow into this if you want the car to go.” He reached across Ben’s lap and pulled a small device, roughly the size of a primitive car phone, off a patch of Velcro on the dash. The object was black with a panel of buttons, a narrow screen, and a tube sticking out from the top like a short, squat antenna. A spiraled cord connected this object to a box installed beneath the steering wheel. “Ignition-interlock Breathalyzer,” Miles said, not waiting for Ben to ask.
“You’re not serious.”
“Reno’s instructions.” Miles shrugged. “I’m only the apprentice.”
“So if Reno says jump . . .” Ben scowled, inspecting the installation. It looked easy enough to dismantle.
“Reno doesn’t make me do anything. You’re in no shape to be on the road without some kind of check. You think I’m so pathetic?” Miles shook his head. He looked angry. “I feel sorry for you, man. I mean, fuck. I lost my wife over there. But I’m pulling myself together.”
“I never said you were pathetic.” Ben did not like to be blamed for things he had not done. Miles was just like those asshole men in the bar—and the waitress. Why was everyone ganging up on him?
Miles snorted. He was no longer looking at Ben’s ear; he’d managed to fuse his eyes onto Ben’s face. The guy’s expression was ugly and as twisted as a mechanic’s rag. “Anyway,” Miles said, composing himself, “if you turn that thing on and blow, the car’ll start. But don’t try to take it apart. I’ve fixed it so that if you do, the car won’t go at all. That was my idea, by the way. Not Reno’s.”
Ben gaped. He would not—could not—bend over and blow into the tube. But what choice did he have? He needed to get back on the road, get back to Becca. Also, if the opportunity presented itself, he needed to plant his fist in Reno’s face.
In one swift motion, Ben picked up the Breathalyzer, switched it on, and stuck the plastic nub between his lips. He could feel Miles’s eyes on his neck, but forget pride. He was doing the necessary thing. If Becca were here, she’d say the same. Do what you need to do.
He blew and the system beeped approvingly. Ben turned the key and the car started.
Miles leaned through the window. “Do you want to know where Becca is?”
Ben was bursting with impatience. “Of course. Why wouldn’t I?”
Miles shrugged and his eyes drifted to the ground, like the pupils were too heavy to stay level. “I mean, this could be your getaway vehicle. You could start over. If it’s too hard to go back. I don’t know. Maybe that’s the best thing for you and your wife.”
“You don’t know my situation.”
Miles smiled as if he did, in fact, know Ben’s situation.
“You think because we fought in the same war, you know me?” Ben said. “You don’t know shit about me.”
“Once you know where she is, you won’t be able to walk away,” Miles said, seemingly unruffled. “You’ll go back, and this whole mess will probably just repeat itself. But if you leave now, you’ll free her from all that. After all, if you’re not with her, you can’t hurt her.”
Ben knew this. It was the reason he’d taken Becca’s car and left in the first place. But he hadn’t considered it in a big-picture kind of way. At least, he hadn’t admitted the option to himself. It could be that Miles understood the situation precisely. Or that Miles was spouting more of Reno’s manipulative bullshit. “Where is she, Miles?”
Miles nodded, but whether the nod was one of approval, acquiescence, or disappointment, Ben couldn’t tell. “She’s at her aunt Kath’s. In Arkansas.”
Without so much as a goodbye, Ben reversed out of the garage, swung the car around, and accelerated, heading back the way he’d come.
December 13, 1976
Dear Willy,
A week after your arrival, we set out into the wilderness. Of course, all of fucking Vietnam felt like wilderness to me, but Cambodia even more so. Because we were searching for a place that possibly didn’t exist.
A Huey dropped us off in the dark, fifteen klicks into the jungle. We headed due west, using your map. I walked point, followed by King with the radio, then you, then Reno. I was worried Reno would end up shooting you out of sheer frustration, but I needed somebody competent watching the rear.
It didn’t take long before I was ready to drop your skinny ass faster than a grenade with the pin pulled out. You were so skittish—starting every time a twig snapped—and you kept pulling at the collar of your uniform like it was trying to strangle you. You had no business being in the jungle with us.
Meanwhile, when you weren’t letting every goddamn thing scare the bejesus out of you, you were giving us a lecture on the Cham of Li Sing: How they came from some ancient culture of Hindu origin that dated back to the seventh century. How they worshipped Durga, the ten-armed warrior goddess. You said the ten arms of Durga represented ten alliances—ten indigenous minorities throughout Cambodia and Vietnam. Apparently, we—meaning the United States Army—didn’t know exactly where these tribes lived. We knew only that Li Sing was the center point of all ten groups, their heart.
You told us a saying among the Cham: “The body follows the heart.” In other words, if the people of Li Sing agreed to fight Charlie, then the other tribes would follow them.
I wanted to know how you were so sure the people of Li Sing wanted to follow us. And you said maybe they didn’t. But you were so excited to actually meet them, you didn’t care.
By midmorning on our first day in Cambodia, on our journey to find the Cham people of Li Sing, the sun had burned away the fog, and the jungle was as stagnant as the inside of a mouth. When we stopped for water, I noticed Reno cursing and scratching at his arm. “Something bit me earlier,” he complained and rolled up his sleeve to reveal a nickel-size circle on his forearm. It was perfectly round and inflamed, but we paid it no mind. Reno said he was fine and we had endless miles of brush to hack through.
By the late afternoon, it felt like we’d been humping for days. So it was something of a relief when we stepped into an open sweep of low grass and put our machetes away. The clearing was a strange place, admittedly. In direct sunlight, it should have been much hotter, but it was cool, like a cold spot in the middle of a lake. I shivered as wind rustled bushes around the perimeter. I held up my compass, but the needle was frozen stiff. I borrowed Reno’s compass and discovered his had the same problem. Meanwhile, you sat on your helmet, staring into the jungle. Reno stripped to his undershirt and inspected his arm. The skin was flushed between his hand and shoulder, and the circle had turned black. He pulled out his cigarettes, but his fingers were shaking so much, he could barely get one lit. Sweat glistened on his face and neck.
King walked over. “You feel that breeze?” I nodded. “We’re too exposed out here.” He held out his canteen to Reno, but Reno choked on the water and spat it out. “Tastes awful.” King drank and said the water was fine.
“This place is like some kind of Cambodian Bermuda Triangle,” I said and told King to dial camp. He did, but all he got was static. He adjusted the controls. More static. You, Willy, just sat there through all of this, resting your head in your hands. I wondered briefly what you were thinking and whether you were replaying the ambush in your head—the private’s face splattered all over your freshly pressed uniform. I thought that some people just have bad luck. Shit had happened to all of us, but not on our first day.
I’d just given orders to move back under cover when something crackled. We snapped to attention—except for you, still fumbling to get your helmet on—and flexed our weapons.
Then a figure stepped into the light: a woman. She wasn’t more than five feet tall, and her clothes hung from her little body like rags on a line. Her eyes were glazed over with the look of a mortally wounded soldier, a man who doesn’t know he’s dying.
“What’s she doing out here?” Reno demanded, moving forward.
“Search her,” I ordered and I nodded at King to follow him.
“On your knees!” Reno said.
The woman didn’t move. She didn’t even look afraid.
“Get down on your knees,” said Reno, “or I’ll put a bullet through your flat-ass chest.”
I moved closer behind Reno and saw that the rash had crawled up the back of his neck and into his scalp.
“Get the fuck down!” Reno brandished his gun.
The woman opened her mouth and uttered something unintelligible.
“Now!” Reno screamed, and I could have sworn he was going to shoot her, except suddenly you bounded forward and thrust yourself between him and the woman.
“Move out of my way, kid,” Reno said.
“Take it easy!” King yelled and glanced back at me, panicked.
“She can help you,” you said, looking the woman dead in the eyes. “She says Reno’s sick. He’s in trouble.”
“Like fuck I’m—”
“She knows what bit you, Reno.”
The woman babbled quickly, the words pouring from her mouth as though from a faucet.
“Does the water taste bad?” you asked, and the urgency in your voice sent a pulse of fear through me. Then Reno’s legs buckled. King rushed forward to catch him.
“She has medicine,” you said—nearly cried—to me.
“I don’t trust her, Willy,” I said.
You shook your head madly. “Proudfoot, listen to me. This woman’s from Li Sing.”
Currahee!
CO Proudfoot