Chapter Four

 

The next morning I awoke with a start, a dull ache remaining from a remembered migraine and a forgotten nightmare. I wanted desperately to get in the rented convertible, return to Pineville and fade back into a familiar world of four bare walls and mind-numbing drugs. Instead, I slipped on my bathing suit and padded outside to the courtyard swimming pool.

Sun had just emerged from behind distant tree-covered crests and the courtyard deserted. Slipping up to my neck in cool water, I took a deep breath of morning air and gazed out across the hills. Sometime during the night it had rained. Now, banks of dark cumulus clouds rimmed Brannerville. Along with colors of hazy morning gold, they painted the horizon with a wildly contrasting palette.

Ten laps of the small pool left me panting and wondering if I had the physical strength to continue my search. A familiar voice saved me from having to think about the mental energy that I would need to complete the task.

“Up early, aren't you?”

It was Amber, peering over the gate at me. She was dressed in revealing pink shorts and singlet for an early morning jog.

“Morning. You're up early yourself.”

“I like to exercise before work. It invigorates me for the rest of the day.”

“You look great. If I had legs like yours I'd run ten miles every morning.”

“You get legs like these by running ten miles every morning,” she said, unabashed by my brazen compliment.

She did have great legs, long, tanned, and tapered—dancer's legs but without the emaciated look of some long distance runners.

“Why don't you slip on some running gear and come with me?”

Amber's voice had a wonderful resonance and I found myself smiling with pleasure and wishing I had running gear so I could go with her.

“I'd really like that. But I don't have anything to wear.”

“Hey, that's a woman's excuse,” she said, smiling wryly. “Don't you at least have tennis shoes and shorts?”

I did. Five minutes later, I joined her, feeling slightly foolish in Bermuda shorts, dark socks and worn-out tennis shoes. A hundred yards from the motel, I followed her up a wooded trail, into the hills. After a mile, she slowed to a walk to let me catch my breath.

“You live around here?”

“Just over the ridge,” she said.

“Hope I'm not holding you back. Run ahead if you want.”

She laughed and shook blonde hair out of her eyes. “Don't worry about me. Are you all right?”

“A little winded.”

“What about yesterday? Uncle Enos said you almost fainted outside his office.”

“Must be the altitude,” I said.

“It's only nine-hundred feet above sea level here.”

“I'm fine. Let's run.”

I sprinted up the path, not wanting to continue the conversation. When we reached the top of the distant hill Amber grabbed my arm and stopped me, grinning as I doubled over and began to turn blue.

“Can you make it back to the motel?”

“Of course I can,” I said, but without much conviction.

“Sure?”

“I'm sure.”

Then she did something quite unexpected. Patting my behind, she said, “Take it easy. I'm leaving you here but I'll pick you up for dinner tonight at seven.”

With that, she hurried away over the rise at a rapid, lung-busting clip. She had barely disappeared from view when rampant greenery closed in around me, returning me against my will to the jungles of Vietnam.

***

Jungle night, dark as a black glove cloaking a war waged on many fronts, mine fought along jungle trail systems, winding out of North Vietnam that skirted Laos and Cambodia. North Vietnamese regulars traveled in small convoys, always at night, always on trails that extended, like distended entrails, through dark triple canopy.

We were on ambush, lying in wait like stalking animals, and my muscles ached from two days of disuse. My bladder was full and I was almost blind from staring into darkness. Our squad had placed three claymores on one end of the trail, three more on the other—six weapons forming two claws of a deadly pincer as we flanked one side of the trail in a semi-circle.

The opposite flank encompassed thick jungle growth impossible to penetrate. At least as fast as hapless Vietnamese soldiers would have to exit the scene of impending carnage. I was lying on my stomach trying not to squeeze the trigger of an M-60—locked, loaded, and ready for blood.

I heard something—bamboo snapping beneath someone's foot. Whispers pealed like church bells. It was not the choir and they were not on their way to Sunday school. The stench of unwashed bodies accosted my nostrils and I began to see wraith-like movement along the trail. A row of single file soldiers moved slowly past our position.

An exploding trip-flare lighted the jungle with smoke and billowing crimson and our clacker man blew half the Claymore mines. So close was I to the blast, I didn't hear the remaining weapons detonate but I saw the bloody result through dilated eyes suddenly awash in strobe-like eruptions of murderous light. As I watched, bodies of terrified soldiers began dissolving in slow-motion explosions of flesh, blood and bone.

Three North Vietnamese Regulars somehow survived the blasts only to have us greet them with free fire from grenade launchers, M-16s and the M-60. Realizing they couldn't escape through thick jungle they raised their weapons, opened fire and charged, headlong, into our position.

Every third round from the M-60's muzzle was a tracer that continued lighting up the night until my bullets were gone. The semi-circle of flashing death destroyed bamboo, trailing vines and any hapless creature caught in its deadly swath, my finger clenched on the big gun's trigger until thirty seconds after the last round of ammo had passed through the chamber. A dying flare told me there was nothing left to shoot at but my twitching trigger finger kept trying anyway.

One of the charging Vietnamese soldiers almost made it until taken out by a close range gut shot. He died after thirty minutes of screaming agony. At first, there was silence, and then darkness. Left only was the stench of death, spent blood and gunpowder and urine from someone’s loosened bladder—maybe my own.

I opened my eyes on the hilly trail above the Holiday Inn. Someone was screaming. It was me.

***

Amber arrived at seven dressed in army-green shorts and a pink flowered blouse that complemented her hair, eyes, and complexion. She was driving a topless Jeep complete with roll bar.

“What do you do when it rains?” I said.

“Stay home.”

“Glad it's not raining.”

“So am I. Hope you don't mind but I also invited Uncle Enos. He liked you a lot.”

“Did he tell you that?”

“No, but I've known him since I was a little girl. Sometimes he comes on like a wounded bear, but he's really a pussy cat.”

“I'll take your word for it,” I said.

Amber turned off the main blacktop a mile from the motel and I realized the necessity for the Jeep. She lived in a mobile home at the end of a narrow dirt trail on a mountain overlooking Brannerville. Professor Quinn was waiting for us when we reached the trailer.

“This is beautiful,” I said, getting out of the Jeep and looking down the mountain behind me.

“My little acre of paradise,” Amber said.

It was. Towering pines surrounded the trailer and a giant hammock hung suspended from the trailer's patio beams. Mosquito mesh enclosed it and I suspected Amber slept there when nights were warm. A flop-eared hound sauntered out from under the trailer, wagging its long tail and licking my hand with a warm tongue.

“Admiral's not dangerous,” Amber said.

“Sure he won't lick me to death?”

She laughed. “He might try but I suspect he'd rather have your leftovers from dinner.” She glanced at Professor Quinn and said, “We're here, Uncle Enos.”

“About time. I'm starving.”

Amber hugged the old man affectionately as a black cat slithered between her bare legs. I soon learned she had three more cats and a parrot named Bones. Other animals appeared as we sat on the ledge overlooking Brannerville—a possum, three raccoons and a skunk. They ate cat food straight from Amber's palm. After washing up in the trailer, we returned outside to watch the dying sunset. Quinn uncorked a bottle of Arkansas red wine and offered me a glass.

“No thanks,” I said.

“Sure?”

“I don't drink.”

I was glad I couldn't see their reaction in the dim light of dusk. Amber was a vegetarian and for dinner, she prepared a Chinese vegetable stir-fry. After eating, we watched the flickering lights of Brannerville. Quinn continued to grumble about his desire for a thick porterhouse and baked potato. Far away, a whippoorwill trilled.

“The moon will totally eclipse tonight,” Amber said.

Old Man Moon had reached his apogee and he was already yellow and full. As we watched, one of his edges began darkening slowly.

“What's your line of work?” Quinn said, breaking the darkened silence.

“I am presently unemployed. Before that I was a petroleum engineer.”

Quinn was un-awed by my former profession. He only grunted and his frown and headshake were apparent, even in the dark. Amber, sitting beside me in a canvas director's chair, surprised me.

“I'm impressed,” she said, clasping my hand in an affectionate way I didn't expect.

“Professor Quinn tells me you're a poet.”

I heard her sigh and could only imagine the expression on her pretty face.

“I'm a police officer,” she said.

“Can't you be both?”

“Police work has changed my artistic perspective. Now I write Neo Pop and it's not exactly widely accepted by the American literary scene.”

“Because it's total nonsense if you ask me,” Quinn said. “All the major literary journals published Amber's work before . . .”

Professor Quinn stuttered and Amber finished his sentence. “Before I joined the Beat Revolution.”

I interrupted and said, “At the risk of sounding stupid, what is Neo Pop?”

“It is short for New Populism. Field described it as poetry of mass culture. At its best, it is brash, sexy and loud. But it makes a statement in an easy, unstuffy way.”

“Poppycock,” Quinn said.

Amber and I both looked at the old man and laughed. In over forty-odd years I had never heard that word used in actual conversation. Our momentary levity was lost on the Professor who continued trying to out glare the moon.

“You're a prude, Uncle Enos,” Amber said.

Quinn said, “Maybe you should find a gentler profession, more compatible with poetry.”

“You're very wrong,” Amber said. “Creating poetry is the most violent profession. Even Frost said 'Poetry is a way of taking life by the throat.' It's real and visceral. Why shouldn't everyone, not just New York stuffed shirts, be able to enjoy it?”

When the old man grumbled, Amber hugged him, obviously incapable of sustaining any palpable anger for very long.

“You understand, don't you Tom?”

“You're talking about passion.”

“Yes. Passion for life, and the written word.”

When she returned to her chair she grasped my hand again. Above us, the moon stole away behind the earth's shadow leaving only a crescent of light, and then more. Feeling almost human, I squeezed Amber's hands and said, “Please recite a poem for us.”

I could feel her hand tense. She began in whispered tones.

“If the Man in the Moon had a penis, someone would demand its nightly eclipse.”

I waited for her to finish. When I realized the entire poem consisted of only two lines, I said, “Wonderful,” and again began to laugh.

“And what are we supposed to make of that?” Quinn said.

“Whatever you want, Uncle Enos,” Amber said, squeezing my hand.

We watched the moon become completely black. When it began to lighten Professor Quinn tried to make conversation, but soon lapsed into silence as the phenomenon continued to unfold above us.

Finally he said, “Early class tomorrow and too much esoterica for this old man. Ready to go, Tom?”

I wasn't, but said, “This was wonderful, Amber. Sorry it has to end. Maybe I'll see you again before I leave town.”

“Lunch tomorrow,” she said. “I'll pick you up at noon.”

Admiral followed her into the trailer, wagging his tail and smacking his lips over an old bone he had dug up from somewhere. I followed Professor Quinn to his old yellow Metropolitan.

The car started on the first turn of the key and Quinn said, “Neo Pop police poet, bah!” Then he said, “She likes you.”

His pronouncement intrigued me and I said, “How do you know?”

“I have never heard her recite before. Not even for me and I've known her for thirty-two years.”