When
we left, Nathan walked with me to the top of my drive, and before he turned he
hugged me like the brother that I was, and when he let me go he looked right at
me and said: 'We'll see this thing through together, Danny.'
The
same words I had uttered after our escape from Benny's when Nathan had floored
Marty Hooper.
Marty
Hooper was dead, as was Larry James and the other boys from Myrtle Beach. Their
bodies were probably still out there, buried beneath mud or scorched foliage,
or scattered in a hundred parts across a waterlogged field beneath tall trees
and clear cerulean skies.
And
we were here - Nathan Verney and I - and the threat of that other world was
growing closer with each heartbeat.
I
thought then of Jack Chantry, his belief that after the death of his daughter
he was living on borrowed time. He had believed he should have died instead of
her.
Was
it the same for us?
Should
we have stood up in front of Sergeant Mike and pledged our allegiance to the
flag, the Constitution, the American way of life?
Should
we have walked out there carrying things called heat tabs, Kool Aid and
C-Rations, carrying steel helmets with liners and camouflage covers, carrying
compress bandages, steel brushes, gun oil and fragmentation grenades, carrying
our own chewing gum and lucky dice? Should we have walked out there carrying
the weight of our broken hearts and our fear?
Should
we have done those things?
And
should we now be dead in Da Nang or Ky Lam or Saigon?
The
war, though a million miles away, seemed right there across the state line. But
it was the borders within that counted, and with each revolution of the earth I
felt the invasion coming.
For
the first time in my life I felt
real
fear.
And
that, along with everything else since that day at Lake Marion, Nathan Verney
shared with me too.
In
March of '66 I took a part-time job at Karl Winterson's Radio Store. It wasn't
so much that we needed the money - the Carolina Railroad Company pension was
still coming in month after month - but more because I wanted something to do
with my time. It didn't seem to matter what it was, anything would have done,
and I had a chance to listen to all the music I would have missed at home.
Nathan
would come down when Mr. Winterson was out, and together we'd find small
back-porch radio stations out of Memphis and New Orleans. The reception was
awful but still we heard things like Howlin' Wolf and Sonny Boy Williamson.
There was a world of great music out there, and just because we lived in some
small town in North Carolina didn't mean we had to miss it.
Those
hours we spent together were some of the closest we ever shared, for hours
would go by when not a soul would come down there to disturb the atmosphere
within the store. Made me wonder sometimes how Mr. Winterson made a living.
With the windows wide and the front door open, the sun beating on the sidewalk
like a tyrannical stepfather, Nathan and I would simply sit back and share the
silences between the songs. Sometimes we'd talk - of where we were going, a few
dreams, some other things - but mostly we just talked of nothing consequential
at all. Nathan would make up stories, and his imagination would grow out beyond
the confines of the walls, and I would marvel at the sheer quantity of ideas
that could be carried inside a single head.
'Most
people are actually aliens,' he told me one time. 'Most of the people we know are
actually aliens.'
He
paused and looked at me, his expression certain, indignant almost, utterly
believable.
'Your
mother is an alien,' he said. 'She's from Arcturus 7, a small satellite star
that orbits Jupiter… and she has two skins. Her outward skin she takes off at
night, and inside she's nothing but gloop and boogers. And one day soon, when
you least expect it, she's gonna creep into your room when you're sleeping and
bite off your Johnson.'
'Shut
the fuck up, Nathan.'
His
expression didn't change.
'Sure
as shit I'm tellin' the truth… and Eve Chantry is the same you know?'
'Outta
your freakin' tree,' I said. 'You've lost whatever you got when you came into
this world and a handful more besides.'
Nathan
nodded. He peered at me like a condescending professor. 'So tell me this,' he
said. 'How come, if your mother isn't an alien, your right eye can go one way
and your left can go the other at the same time?'
I
frowned. 'They can't.'
'Yeh
right,' Nathan said sarcastically. 'You wanna know what people call you when
you ain't around?'
I
raised my eyebrows.
'Bughead.'
'What
the fuck are you talking about?'
'Bughead…
that's what people call you when you ain't there.'
'Horseshit.'
'So go
get a mirror… go get a mirror and look see what happens when you stare at
something. Your right eye goes one way and your left eye goes the other.'
'That's
just so much crap.'
Nathan
shrugged. 'Please yourself… bughead.'
So,
sure as hell, I went and got the mirror, and fool me if I didn't stare at the
thing for a good five minutes. Only stopped when I caught Nathan's reflection
behind me, his face fit to burst, even holding his crotch like he was going to
piss himself right there and then on Karl Winterson's chequerboard linoleum
floor.
After
he stopped laughing he told me I was dumb as milk. Told me that I actually
believed that my mother was an alien.
'The
fuck I did,' I said defensively.
'Then
what the hell did you go get the mirror for?'
I
stood looking at him.
'Asshole,'
I said.
'Bughead,'
he replied, and started laughing once more.
Such
conversations, too many of them to remember. Stupid things, meaningless things,
but things that would seem so important later. That was what we were like -
Nathan Verney and I - before the real world came a-calling.
It
was one of those days in June when we heard about James Meredith. It came down
as a newsflash from KLMU in Augusta, the same station I had been listening to
when my father told me JFK had been killed. James Meredith was the first black
student to enroll at Mississippi University in 1962, and all we knew was that
he'd been shot in his back and his legs on a march someplace.
Nathan
was stunned speechless. He'd believed the white- negro situation was resolving,
and things had in fact been quieter for some time. Evidently things were all
aflame as much as they'd ever been; we just hadn't been paying a mind to it.
He
didn't speak of it as I expected him to. He left for home, went to see his
father, and I didn't see him for two or three days.
Seemed
to me as the summer passed through Greenleaf we were spending less and less
time together, and though I never felt we were losing touch I believed that
those subjects where we shared the same viewpoint and understanding were
diminishing in number.
I
felt in limbo, waiting for notification that my presence was required at a boot
camp somewhere in the South while praying that the war would end before it
came. It was as if waiting was my station for the time being, and those of us
who had not volunteered in that tent with the fried chicken and potato salad
felt that we would all just have to keep quiet and sit it out. There was no
point making any plans. None at all. What would plans mean until we knew? Once
upon a time I had thought of college, learning a trade, somesuch thing as that,
but the war had changed everything. My ma knew this, and she didn't push either
way. She was happy I was doing something with my time rather than sitting in my
bedroom reading comic books and trying to hide the fact that I was smoking
Lucky Strikes.
At
the end of June we started bombing Hanoi. I referred to the U.S. as
we
even though I felt that the bombing of Hanoi was nothing personal. I did not
wish to bomb anyone. I was still naive, trusting that the powers that be must
have at least believed with all they had that such an action was required. We
knew nothing of the atrocities that were being perpetrated out there, and would
not know for some time yet.
I
worked on through the summer at the Radio Store, and though I saw Nathan less
than I would have liked, we stayed on the same wavelength. We never spoke of
the Draft directly; to do so would have been to grant it energy and spirit, but
we referred to
the thing,
how we would react if
the thing
came,
if we walked downstairs one sleepy-eyed morning, and there it was.
And
so it went that way, all through '66, and it was in that year that I had more
time and yet achieved less than in any previous year. Or so it seemed to me.
Perhaps it was merely that I no longer felt a child, something I had believed
would occur at sixteen or seventeen. It hadn't. The fragment of child within me
stayed alive and well and living in Greenleaf until gone Christmas and the
start of 1967. I believe I hung onto that child, the wide-eyed innocence, the
sense of trust in humanity, the conviction that all folks were fundamentally
well-intentioned, and that when it came down to it they would always decide in
favor of good and right and equity.
I
learned this was not the case in February.
It
was obvious from her manner and speech that Eve Chantry was unwell. She
appeared outside her house less and less frequently, and sometimes I felt like
I was her last lifeline to the known world. I would visit two, perhaps three,
times a week, and more often than not I would find her still in bed in the
mid-afternoon. I had taken to entering unannounced, and one Wednesday afternoon
in the middle of that month I went as usual. I took fresh milk, some eggs, some
pancakes my mother had made. I found Eve asleep, a tray of food from the
previous night still untouched on the bed. I knew enough to understand that as
long as she continued to eat regularly then she would be fine. Alarm bells were
installed and operational from that moment.
She
woke easily, but even as she slurred into consciousness I could tell that there
was something wrong. Her face seemed different, her speech a little awkward,
and I recognized the indications of a stroke that had been so present in my
father's manner.
I
insisted she see a doctor, and after much disagreement she conceded defeat. She
was a proud woman, a single- minded and ferociously independent fighter, and
the possibility that she would be unable to fend for herself was perhaps more
damaging than any other single threat.
Dr.
Backermann came unhesitatingly. He examined, he questioned, he tested, he
scribbled copious notes in a grubby little book, and then he took me aside and
peered at me slightly suspiciously over gold-rimmed half-moon spectacles.
'You
are not a relative, Daniel Ford,' he stated with authority. He delivered this message
as if it was an unfortunate and brutal revelation.
'No
Sir,' I replied.
'I do
not therefore understand your involvement.'
I
remember smiling, as if humoring a child.
'Eve…
Mrs. Chantry and I are friends,' I said.
'Friends?'
Dr. Backermann asked.
'Sure,'
I said. 'I visit a couple of times a week, bring some food over, keep her
company.'
'Mmm,'
Backermann grunted, a further hint of suspicion in his tone.
He
again peered at me inquisitively over his spectacles.
'You understand
that I am not at liberty to discuss her medical condition with you,' Backermann
said drily.
I
nodded. 'She's gonna be okay, though?'
I
heard myself ask the question, and already there was that strained sense of
hope present. It sounded like a plea.
'Okay?'
Backermann asked, almost to himself. 'She has had a stroke, much the same as
your father…'
Backermann
looked at me to see if I would react. The last thing he wanted was some
over-emotional youth on his hands.