Pete Hamill - Loving Women

I felt us list a few degrees and heard some godawful noises from belowdecks and then the Captain was gone into the smoke and I could hear him yellin, shut the engines down, shut down the goddamned engines .

While we kept plowin ahead .

I pulled on a kapok life jacket and tied it tight and started moving aft. There were scared kids everywhere, not knowin what to do, where their battle stations were, but knowin, like sailors do, even green-shit recruits, that they were goin into the sea .

I turned some of them around, told them to get to the fan tail, tie on life jackets, get ready to go. I tried to help some guys get the whaleboats out of the chocks, but then we listed another six or seven degrees, and one of the guys lost his grip and went into the sea and the boats were hanging beyond our reach. And I could see others jumpin in, some without life jackets, some just in skivvies, cause they’d been sleeping when the Japs whacked us. A guy sat on the deck, his whole body black and burnt. A corpsman was giving him morphine, but then we listed again, and the burned guy started slidin away .

There were maybe five hundred sailors on the fantail, now, all half dressed. None of them had flashlights or guns or knives. And the ship was still driving forward. There were a lot of officers runnin around now, all the green shitbirds from the Academy, and they were all yellin about stoppin the ship, like it was a truck on a road someplace. They were useless. Most of em didn’t even know how to find the fuckin engine room never mind go down there and shut off the engines. A few kids started going off the fantail. I yelled to the others to get the floater nets ready, these great big nets with floats attached. Then there was a big jolt. The whole fuckin ship just twisted, and we went over another twenty-five degrees, the port side high up in the air, and kids were fallin all over the ocean. Along with equipment and bunks and all that loose gear that had littered the deck. The number 3 screw was still turnin and I saw two kids hold hands and jump off the fantail and get chopped to pieces by one of the propellers. The company bugler went into the sea, holding the goddamned bugle .

It was a mess .

A real fuckin mess .

Then I started climbin up the deck. It was like the whole world turned on its side. What I used to walk on was now a wall and I had to get up the wall. I pulled myself over the top and found I was standin on the side of the ship. There was maybe a hundred other sailors doing the same thing. Later I learned we got hit at 12:02 and the ship went down at 12:18 .

Sixteen minutes .

It seemed a hell of a lot longer than that .

I stood on the port side, and then just walked straight ahead and stepped into the sea .

I started swimmin hard, trying to get away from her, afraid of suction. I’m a good goddamned swimmer, but I could barely move in the water. And then I knew why. It was full of thick black fuel oil. I tried goin under the oil and made some time and came up and looked back. The Indianapolis was layin real low in the water. I could hear shouts. A few screams. And I thought I was still too close. That the suction would pull me down. I didn’t know. I’d never had to abandon a ship before. But I looked back and all I could hear from her was the lappin of waves against the steel hull and then she just slipped away under the sea .

No suction .

No whirlpool .

She was just gone .

Then … hell, I aint afraid to admit I was scared. I was alone in the sea, covered with oil. I was afraid the SOS never got off the ship. I was afraid the Japs would come to the surface and shoot the shit out of us. I was afraid of being alone in the biggest goddamned ocean in the fuckin universe. I didn’t know if any rafts had been cut loose and I didn’t know how many others were in the sea with me and whether I’d find them .

Then somethin hard bumped into me. I grabbed for it. A crate of potatoes. I held on to that and then a part of a desk floated by and I held that too, an arm on each one, just floatin, savin my strength. I could hear voices everywhere but I couldn’t see anyone. I heard a kid screamin for his momma. Someone was prayin too, the good old Baptist shit. Then a kid come along, swimmin, no life jacket. I told him to grab the piece of desk .

It ain’t enough, he said. I ain’t strong enough .

Grab the motherfucker, I said .

And he did and drifted off. Later I found the desk but not the kid .

I held on to that potato crate as long as I could. But the potatoes must’ve started takin on water and it started ridin lower. I tore a slat off and started dumpin the spuds, shoving a few inside my shirt. I didn’t think after that. I just floated for the rest of the night .

In the mornin, I could see other sailors. Maybe a hundred and fifty of us, scattered all over the ocean. And not a raft among us. I learned later that about eight hundred went in the water and some of them had rafts, including the captain. But we were scattered over miles of ocean because the ship kept goin after she was hit. We were so low in the water we couldn’t see where the rafts were and nobody had flares. Nobody had food either. I saw an orange float by and grabbed it and shoved it in my shirt along with the two potatoes. I was looking for the rest of the potatoes when a guy bobbed right up to me. His face was black from the oil. And worse. He was fuckin charred, boy. His eyelids were burned off his eyes and he couldn’t see anything. He said to me , What is this?

And slipped under the sea .

In the daylight, it looked like a sea full of niggers. Everybody was covered with oil. Some guys were in uniform but others didn’t have shirts or even pants. We started movin toward each other. And I saw that some guys didn’t have life jackets either. The sun started risin, the biggest hottest most orange sun I ever saw .

Then I heard a guy scream, looked over, saw him tear off his life jacket and go under. That was the beginning .

I started yellin at them all: Don’t drink the sea water. Whatever you do, don’t drink it. I knew that drinkin sea water was death. First you go crazy and then you get sick and then you die. I told the ones closest to me to pass it on: Don’t drink the fuckin sea water. And then I started trying to calm the ones near me. Sure, I said, the wireless must’ve gone off. And if it didn’t, as soon as we don’t show on Leyte, they’ll come lookin for us. Don’t worry, I said. Stay calm, I said. Don’t use up your energy. Most of all, don’t drink from the sea .

I gave two of them a potato .

Then the strange shit started .

First of all, guys started goin blind. Later on I heard this was called photophobia. Comes from the sun, the oil, the reflection on the ocean, all combined. I saw three guys screamin they couldn’t see anything. Then I thought about myself. With my skin, I wouldn’t last the day. I was covered with oil. But if I didn’t do something the sun would still get me. I saw a guy float by face down in the water. The back of his head was shredded. I unleashed his jacket and then tied it over my head like a bonnet. It didn’t work perfect. You see my skin here? You see these scars? You see where the nerve ends was just burnt off? Well, I didn’t get that jacket for a bonnet, it mighta been worse .

Late in the afternoon that first day, Monday, the sharks came .

We saw the fins, just like in a movie. Three of em. Circlin around us. The first thing they hit was one of the dead guys out on the edge of the group. Just smashed into him and pulled him under. But they wasn’t finished. One of the kids suddenly screamed, the goddamnedest bloodcurdlin scream I ever heard, and then he was gone. Blood mixed with the oil. The others started thrashin around, splashin and kickin, but I remembered somethin from some magazine saying the best thing was to just lie on your back very still. The shark sees you kickin and he thinks you’re already done for and you’re an easy kill. I told this to the ones near me and flopped over on my back. I felt somethin bump me and then go away and then another godawful scream and I just lay there for a long time .