Hamilton, Georgia – 2009

I’ve got Carl Wild’s number, but I don’t call. We’ve been texting back and forth, so I know where he’s been and his assorted shenanigans. I know that he deployed to Iraq again from 2007 to 2008 and got hit with a rocket two months into his 2009 tour of Afghanistan. For some reason I can’t bring myself to hear his voice. Maybe it’s because I feel guilty for having spent the last six years in school and in non-combat units when I should have been watching his back. He asked how the book is coming, and I lied and said that it’s almost done. Truth is I couldn’t bear to look at it most days.

About that same time, I ran into newly promoted Sergeant First Class Trevor Davis while shopping at the Sam’s Club in Columbus, Georgia. He looked exactly the same except more serious. We clasped hands vigorously while we congratulated each other on recent promotions. He called me “sir” which made me feel like an imposter. I would have been more comfortable going to parade rest while speaking to him. His words of congratulation were kind but they nailed me to the floor like accusations. Before we parted company he asked me how the book was coming along. I lied and said it was almost done.

The bright spot in my world was the imminent deployment of my battalion to Iraq. I had been languishing in a maintenance company for over a year, first as the executive officer and then as a warehouse supervisor. The gig out at the warehouse was not that bad. It was isolated, and I could shut my door when the anxiety started to overwhelm me, which began to happen more and more. I sat at my desk and tried to work as my racing mind attempted to fixate on shiny objects.

My commander at the time was also a prior-enlisted man who was a little older than me. He sported one of the new Combat Action Badges that were created for all of the non-infantry guys who saw varying levels of enemy contact, which varied wildly from case to case. I asked him how he earned his and kept waiting for the punch line before I realized that he had finished the story. He began to exhibit PTSD behavior not long after and was eventually removed from command to seek further treatment. The whole affair left me shaking my head as I tried to envision how the events that he had described could have driven him over the edge. It made me wonder how close to the edge I might have drawn.

As my boss began the transition process with his replacement, a female West Point graduate, I was promised to the battalion headquarters for the upcoming deployment. Deep down in my bones I longed to return to the devil’s sand box, even as I told my wife how upset I was at leaving again. The truth was that I couldn’t wait to go. All of my old comrades had been at least once while I enjoyed the soft life. I was a junkie hooked on combat. A grave error had been made by the Death Angel, and I sought to give him a second go at it as though Death were a child who couldn’t quite hit the ball off the tee. So I grabbed hold of the opportunity to go ‘once more unto the breach’ at the expense of my health, my marriage and—most likely—my sanity.