Matt Gallagher - Youngblood

So the terp had dreams. “I’d be happy to,” I said. “But I’m just a lieutenant. You should ask someone higher ranking, like the colonel.”

Snoop smiled. “He already said yes. He said I should ask you, too, since we work together.”

I remembered a news article I’d seen online about the arduous visa process for interpreters. “What happens if the papers don’t go through right away? Back to the Sudan?”

“No.” His frown enveloped the room. “War is there, too. It followed us here.”

I hadn’t known that about his homeland, and suddenly felt very small.

There was a quick knock at the door. A couple of inches too long, it opened with the sound of a popping jaw. It was Dominguez. Or his head, at least, freshly cut and shaved. Fuck, I thought. I knew I’d forgotten to do something.

“Sir? The service kicks off in fifteen. First Sergeant wants everyone there ten minutes early.”

“We’ll be right down.”

Dominguez left, the door still ajar.

“Well,” I said to Snoop, slapping my thighs as I rose, “let’s do this.”

He nodded, mumbling to himself in Arabic. It sounded like a prayer.

•  •  •

Ortiz’s memorial service began with a company roll call. Four platoons abreast in the gravel courtyard behind the outpost, called to attention by First Sergeant’s booming, brassy voice. The crushed pebbles under our boots simmered after another day of unrelenting heat. The sunset wore a thin ribbon of clouds like a garter, and a pale wind carried the flavor of sewer into my mouth.

“Batule!”

“Here, First Sergeant!”

“Butler!”

“Here, First Sergeant!”

I stood behind the platoon, Chambers in front of it, chest out and back straight as a date tree along the canal. I snuck a glance behind me at Captain Vrettos, rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet, anxious and exhausted as ever, his skeletal frame threatening to tip over. Behind him, in a formation of their own, were the terps. A couple tried to imitate the position of attention, but only Snoop had it right, shoulders square and heels together, toes pointed out at a forty-five-degree angle.

“Demo!”

“Here, First Sergeant!”

“Dominguez!”

“Here, First Sergeant!”

It’d been three weeks since I’d broken into the commander’s room and Alphabet had been killed. This was our fourth service since that night. The first for Alphabet, whose fiancée found out about his death on Facebook hours before a military chaplain came to her door. The second for Mackay of headquarters platoon, after he turned himself into pink mist in a Porta John. The third for Reed and Dela Cruz of first platoon, whose Stryker rolled over a mine packed with a charge of eight hundred pounds of high explosive. The vehicle had gone poof into the stonewashed sky, and someone’s small intestine knotted around a telephone wire. The wire was cut down to retrieve the intestine, much to the locals’ displeasure, but it had been impossible to figure out whom the organ had belonged to. Reed? Dela Cruz? One of the survivors, sent home to a half life of amputated limbs and never-ending VA appointments? We’d guessed Reed, and included it in his pile.

“Lieutenant Fields!”

“Here, First Sergeant!”

“Gilotti!”

“Here, First Sergeant!”

No one else at the outpost knew about the sworn statements. I’d considered sharing them with Captain Vrettos, but he’d never get over the breaking and entering. Confronting Chambers about them seemed reckless. I’d toyed with the idea of confiding in Dominguez or Snoop, but knew neither could do much. I’d folded up the statements in my Lawrence of Arabia book, figuring that’d be the last place anyone would look, especially Chambers. Then I hid the book inside the trunk under my bed, which now had a metal lock of its own, because I now had secrets of my own.

Only Will knew. He was in the process of tracking down the two officers from First Cav, Grant and Tisdale. “It’s a small army,” my brother had said over the phone. “And a smaller officer corps. I’ll find them. Then we’ll make sure Mister Kill Team becomes someone else’s problem.”

He’d also repeated his suggestion about finding an Iraqi willing to write a statement about Chambers’ actions in 2006. Alia had played dumb again, Haitham had disappeared again, and Fat Mukhtar had demanded to speak to the Big Man before writing anything about an American soldier. I’d backtracked immediately, telling Snoop to blame it on a translation error, something he’d sulked about for a couple of days.

In the meantime, Ashuriyah burned.

“Ibrahim!”

“Here, First Sergeant!”

“Janis!”

“Here, First Sergeant!”

It wasn’t just Ashuriyah, either. All of greater Baghdad seemed trapped in the amber of violence. Sadr was threatening to lift the Mahdi Army cease-fire while the media aired reports about when the rest of Iraq would return to chaos, its inevitability not even a question. Rumors swirled that the generals at division believed our town was the catalyst for the resurgence of attacks, something that hung over Captain Vrettos like a gallows rope. PowerPoint slides and briefings now included terms like “containment” and “body counts,” and not ironically. We weren’t even supposed to call the outpost an outpost anymore, because of the Status of Forces Agreement with the Iraqi government; it’d been declared a “joint security station” to stay open.

“Ortiz!”

A balmy hush filled the courtyard. I resisted the urge to scratch my shoulder blade. A finch sang in the day but was not answered.

“Private Diego Ortiz!”

Someone in the ranks whimpered. The finch called again, still with no answer. Into the dusk dripped the smell of yesterday’s blood.

“Private Diego Santiago Ortiz!”

The pale wind gasped. “He is no longer with us, First Sergeant,” Chambers said. A three-volley salute of fire followed.

Crack.

Crack.

Crack.

There were no more birdcalls.

Time melted. A bugle sounded taps. The Big Man gave a speech about sacrifice and duty. My throat was dry and scratchy for want of water. We lined up one at a time to say our good-byes. A portrait of Ortiz leaned against a stack of sandbags, in front of a pair of his spare tan boots. His rifle was black and shiny, wiped cleaned of blood and sand, and mounted into the ground, muzzle down, with the bayonet fixed. A helmet sat on top of the rifle’s buttstock and a set of stainless-steel dog tags was wrapped around the vertical grip. The tags read:

ORTIZ

DIEGO, S.

240-83-6230

O+

ROMAN CATHOLIC

I was last in line. For some reason, for no reason, for all reason. Hog finished ahead of me, whispering the words of the Lord’s Prayer before walking away. The words “kingdom,” “glory,” and “power” cut through the air with Protestant severity. I wondered if Ortiz’s family would appreciate a Cotton Belt Baptist’s supplication for their son. It probably didn’t matter.

I stared at the portrait. He looked older in the framed photograph than he had in person, his eyebrows more prominent, his chin fuller. The “Welcome to Iraq” speech I’d given him was the only meaningful conversation we’d had. He’d been a good soldier. That was what Dominguez said, anyhow. The burden of the moment felt like a boulder bearing down, and I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to feel more or less guilty than I did. I stroked the corners of his dog tags and wondered why there were still rubber sound silencers on them.

“I’m sorry,” I said. I tugged at the bracelet on my wrist, studying the pattern of the beads, red, green, yellow, red, green, yellow.

I started a Hail Mary, but stopped a few words in. I couldn’t remember all of it. I saluted and took a few steps toward the outpost.