Kevin Powers - The Yellow Birds

“What’s it like over there, Sarge?” Murph asked sheepishly. He was sitting cross-legged in the snow, his rifle over his lap like he was cradling a doll.

Sterling laughed. “God, that fucking question.” He had begun gathering rocks and tossing them into my upturned Kevlar.

Murph looked away from him.

He spoke firmly. “They aren’t gonna pop up and wait for you to shoot them. Remember your fundamentals and you’ll be able to do what needs to be done. It’s hard at first, but it’s simple. Anybody can do it. Get a steady position and a good sight picture, control your breathing and squeeze. For some people, it’s tough after. But most people want to do it when the time comes.”

“Hard to imagine,” I said. “You know, whether we’ll be one or the other?”

He paused. “Better get to fucking imagining.” He started to chuckle again. “Just gotta dig deep. Find that nasty streak.”

I listened to the crack of rifles on the line. Saw branches lift and shake off snow when birds took flight, startled at the sound. The sun was small and bright in the sky. The rain had let up to a noisy drizzle.

“How do we do that?” I asked.

Sterling feigned frustration, but I could tell our solid performance on the range had given us some latitude. “Don’t worry. I’ll help.” He seemed to catch something spilling out of himself and corrected his bearing. My Kevlar was full of rocks.

“Shit,” said Murph.

“We just gotta train it up. Practice, practice, practice,” Sterling said. He laid his head down on the ground and put his feet on my upturned helmet.

Murph started to say something, but I put my hand on his shoulder. “Yeah, we get it, Sarge,” I said.

He stood up and stretched. The whole back of his uniform was wet, but it didn’t seem to bother him. “It was their idea,” he said. “Don’t forget that. It’s their idea every time. They ought to kill themselves instead of us.”

I wasn’t sure who “they” were.

Murph was looking at the ground. “So…so what are we doing?”

“Don’t worry so much, ladies. You two just hold the tail. Everything’ll be cool.”

“The tail?” I asked.

“Yeah,” he responded. “Let me fuck the dog.”

The reports of rifles disappeared. Our last task was over. We loaded back on the trucks, anxious for a pass and time with our families. I thought about what Sterling had said. I wasn’t sure he wasn’t crazy, but I trusted that he was brave. And I now know the extent of Sterling’s bravery. It was narrowly focused, but it was pure and unadulterated. It was a kind of elemental self-sacrifice, free of ideology, free of logic. He would put himself on the gallows in another boy’s place for no other reason than that he thought the noose was better suited to his neck.

And then we celebrated. There were banners and folding tables in the base gymnasium. Our families watched as we stood in formation while the battalion commander gave a rousing, earnest speech about duty, and the chaplain injected humor into somber tales of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And there were hamburgers and French fries and we were glad.

I brought a plate to my mother and sat across from her, a small distance away from the throngs of mothers hanging on their sons’ shoulders, the fathers holding their hands on their hips, smiling on cue. She’d been crying. She rarely wore makeup but it ran down into the hollows of her eyes that day. It smudged on the back of her wrist where she’d rubbed the tears away while sitting in the barracks parking lot in our ancient gold Chrysler.

“I told you not to do this, John,” she said.

I clenched my jaw. I was still young enough then for the weak mannerisms of rebellion. I had practiced them from the time I turned twelve until I left our house, when I got fed up with nothing and called the only cab that had ever graced our long gravel driveway. “It’s done, Ma.”

She paused and took a deep in-breath. “OK. I know,” she said. “I’m sorry. Let’s have a nice time.” She smiled and patted the back of my hands where they sat on the table and her eyes welled a little.

And we did have a nice time. I was relieved. As I sat up listlessly the night before the range, I’d run through all the possibilities that lay before me. I became certain that I’d die, then certain that I’d live, then certain that I’d be wounded, then uncertain of anything. It had been all I could do to keep from pacing the cold tiles, looking out the window for some sign in the snow or the lamplight. I remained uncertain. But I settled on the fear that I would die and my mother would have to bury a son she thought was angry. That she’d take the flag and see me lowered into the brown Virginia dirt. That she’d hear the salute of rifle shots roll in quick succession through the air, the whole time thinking that they sounded like the door I slammed when I was eighteen and she was in the backyard picking honeysuckle off the fence.

I went outside to smoke and see my mother off. I kissed her on the cheek and surprised myself with the force of my lips. “You need to quit those things,” she said.

“I know, Ma. I will.” I stubbed the cherry out beneath my boot. She hugged me and I could smell her hair, her perfume, my whole life back home. “I’ll write as soon as I can, OK?”

She stepped slowly away from me, raised her hand to wave and turned and walked toward the car. I remember following her taillights as they turned out of the parking lot, watched them grow smaller as they passed the PT field and turned again toward the guard shack at the base’s exit, where they disappeared. I lit another cigarette.

Most of the families had gone by then. Most but Murph’s mother and a few others I didn’t know. I saw Murph leading her by the hand throughout the gymnasium, investigating each small cluster of remaining people briefly, then moving on. I didn’t realize they were looking for me until Murph turned in my direction and I saw him mouth something to his mother. I got up from the chair where I’d been sitting and waited for them to cross over the painted lines of the basketball court that had been used for our festivities.

Mrs. LaDonna Murphy hugged me tightly when I met her. She was small and frail-looking in a weathered sort of way, but younger than my mother. She smiled broadly when she looked at me, still wrapping her arms around my waist, looking up and showing me teeth slightly browned by smoke. Her hair was a faded blond worn in a bun, and she had on jeans and a blue button-up work shirt.

“Five more minutes, men,” one of the NCOs called.

She released me from her embrace and said excitedly, “I’m just so proud of you guys. Daniel’s told me so much about you. I feel like I know you already.”

“Yes, ma’am. Me too.”

“So y’all are getting to be good friends?”

I looked over at Murph and he gave me an apologetic shrug. “Yes, ma’am,” I said. “We room together and everything.”

“Well, I want you to know if y’all need anything, I’m gonna take care of you. Y’all will get more care packages than anyone.”

“That’s really kind of you, Mrs. Murphy.”

Sterling called Murph to help another private sweep up red, white and blue confetti from around the three-point line of the court.

“And you’re gonna look out for him, right?” she asked.

“Um, yes, ma’am.”

“And Daniel, he’s doing a good job?”

“Yes, ma’am, very good.” How the hell should I know, lady? I wanted to say. I barely knew the guy. Stop. Stop asking me questions. I don’t want to be accountable. I don’t know anything about this.

“John, promise me that you’ll take care of him.”

“Of course.” Sure, sure, I thought. Now you reassure me and I’ll go back and go to bed.