Winston Groom - Gump & Company

Mr. Gump, who has been described as mentally retarded, fled back to the wall and began to climb over into West German territory. Sources said the soccer fans, in their efforts to apprehend Mr. Gump, pursued him across the wall and in the process began to dismantle the barrier which has stood as a symbol of Communist oppression for several decades.

Subsequently, joyous Berliners of all political persuasions joined hands in tearing down the wall and ultimately held what sources described as “the world’s largest free-floating street party and beer bash.”

In the confusion, Mr. Gump apparently escaped unharmed.

The final score of the East Berlin-Soviet Union soccer match was a 3 to 3 tie. The score of the American football game at the time of its disruption was not immediately available.

“Gump, you numbnuts,” the post commander says, “we got no more communism, we got no more reason to be here! Even the goddamn Russians are talkin about givin up communism! Who in hell are we gonna fight if we ain’t got the communists to fight? You have rendered this whole army superfluous! Now they will send our asses home to some godforsaken post in Palookaville and we will lose the best duty we could of dreamed of, which is right here in a quaint village in the German Alps! Gump, you have destroyed a soldier’s dream—you must be out of your mind!”

He goes on like that for a while, poundin on his desk an thowin shit around the headquarters, but I get the drift of what his argument is, an it ain’t doin much good to argue with it. Anyway, I gone on down to the latrine an assumed my new duties, which is to constantly scrub ever tile with a toothbrush an some bathroom cleanser. Sergeant Kranz, for his association with me, is given the task of wipin up behind me with Spic and Span, an he is none too happy about that, neither.

“We never had it so good, cleanin them tank treads” is the way he puts it.

Once a week, on Sundays, I get a pass to go into town, but the post commander have ordered two MPs to escort me everwhere I go, an to not let me out of their sight. This, of course, makes it somewhat hard for me to have a decent relationship with Gretchen, but we done the best we could. It was now generally too cold to go on picnics up in the mountains, as the Alps become chilly in the winter. Most of the time, we gone into the beer hall an set at a table an just held hands while the MPs was glarin at us from nearby.

Gretchen is really a nice person, an does not wish to spend the rest of her life as a beer maid, but she don’t know what else to do. She is very beautiful, but say she thinks life’s done pretty much passed her by.

“I am too old to be a model,” she says, “ und too young to give up on everything else. Maybe I’ll go to university. I want to make something of myself.”

“Yeah,” I says, “that would be good. I went to the university once.”

“ Ja, Forrest? Und what did you study?”

“Football,” I says.

“ Ach! ”

Good things, as my mama Gump used to say, are not meant to last forever, an this was no exception.

It wadn’t before too long when the post commander called us all to the parade ground, an made an announcement.

“Men, there is the good news and the bad news.”

At this, they was some low mumblin from the troops.

“The bad news,” he says, “is for those of you cowards who are just drawin your pay and do not wish to perform your duties as soldiers.”

They was some more mumblin.

“The good news is, for those of you who wish to start killin an dyin—which, if you din’t know, is your bidness—you are gonna be afforded ever opportunity—thanks to some sombitch called Saddamn Hussein, who is the A-rab in charge of Iraq, an who has now started a war with our own commander-in-chief, the United States of America President George Herbert Walker Bush.”

At this, some of the mumblin turned to cheerin.

“And,” the commander says, “we are all gonna go over to Iraq an whip his heathen ass!”

So that’s what we did.

The night before we left I got a pass to go see Gretchen for a last time. She has just saved up enough money to enter the university, an in fact is takin her first classes. I waited outside the schoolroom for her to come out.

“Oh, Forrest,” she says, “it is so wonderful! I am studying English!”

We helt hands an walked for a while, an then I tole her what was goin on. She didn’t scream or carry on or nothin, she just hugged my arm tighter an said she figgered this kind of thing would happen one day.

“All my life,” Gretchen says, “I have learned not to depend on good things happening, but I still always hope they will. One day you will come back, ja? ”

“ Ja, ” I tole her, but I didn’t know if it was the truth or not. After all, things don’t seem to work out too good in my life, neither.

“When you come back,” Gretchen says, “I will be speaking English as well as you.”

“ Ja, ” I says.

Anyhow, next mornin we left Germany.

First, we loaded up all our stuff, which was tanks an self-propelled guns an things, an flowed off to Saudi Arabia. When we arrived there, our division was eighteen thousan strong. Added to the rest of our army, we is about a million against twice as many A-rabs, which our leader, General Norman Scheisskopf, says should make for a fair fight.

Saddamn an his A-rab army are occupyin the little country of Kuwait, which was known mostly for havin a bunch of awl wells. Matter of fact, they was enough awl in Kuwait to run the entire United States of America for ten years—which I spose was why we is here. We is fixin to thow them out, so’s we can keep the awl.

The one thing that stood out in my mind about Saudi Arabia was sand an dust. They was mountains of sand an dust everwhere we went. Got in your eyes an ears an nose an clothes, an soon as you’d wash it out, more dust an sand would come along. Somebody says the army have trucked in the dust an sand just so’s we would not get to feelin too comfortable before we had to fight Saddamn Hussein.

Since there is no latrine here except a hole in the ground, Sergeant Kranz an me have been returned to our duty cleanin tank treads, although this time it is not mud, but sand an dust we have to get out. Everday me an the sergeant be whiskin out the treads, which of course are just as dirty in five minutes than they ever were.

Anyway, one day we all get some time off an go into town.

The men are unhappy account of in Saudi Arabia they is virtually no whisky or women. In fact, whisky an women is against the law—well, whisky is anyway, an women might as well be, account of they run aroun inside big ole cloaks so’s you can’t see nothin but they eyes. The A-rab men wear them cloaks, too, an most of em have on them little shoes with toes that curl up at the ends. Somebody says that is because when they is out in the desert an gotta take a shit, they can grap ahold of the ends of the shoes when they bend over an it keeps them on balance. Whatever.

Anyhow, I am figgerin that long as I am here in the bazaar, I might as well send another present to little Forrest so’s he don’t think I have dropped off the edge of the earth. I gone into one of the shops an am lookin around at all the shit when the shopkeeper come up an ast what I want. I tole him a present for my son, an his eyes lighted up. He disappeared behind a ole curtin to the back of the store an reappear with a dusty wood box, which he laid out on the counter. When he open it up, I see inside a big shiny knife.

The shopkeeper very carefully run his fingers over the handle of the knife, which is black wood with a bunch of jewels set into it. It is a curved knife, with a fat blade that is inscribed with all sorts of fancy Arab writin.