Some of you know and some of you may not, but I happen to be a Soldier. This piece is something that I wrote a few months after returning from my first tour in Afghanistan. It was a very difficult time for me, dealing with losses and having a hard time readjusting to things. To me, my depression seems to show through the words very plainly. Eventually, I submitted this to a veteran's writing competition but it didn't go anywhere. I'm not really even sure what genre this falls into. It's sort of a conglomeration of things that happened to me, things I went through afterward and things that I witnessed many friends go through as well. Maybe the best way to put this is that even though it's written about me, it's actually about everyone who experienced war. I'm not sure what your opinions or politics about war are and frankly, I don't give a damn, but give this a read because it isn't about war at all; it's about people.
I have very mixed feelings and am apprehensive about opening up like this, but I guess fuck it.
Noise. Always noise. Never a moment's peace and quiet. Sitting in front of the screen he pauses to focus on the noise. Usually, they aren't really sounds, they're just noise, but now, the static hum clarifies into the sounds which they really are - the drone of the endless line of helicopters slowly flying laps overhead, the whoosh as cars pass by outside the window, the rumble of trucks accelerating away from the stop sign just down the road. If he's lucky, he might hear the wind push through the sickly, thin tree struggling to survive in the muddy grass. Sometimes, on those rare sunny days, he might even catch the sound of a bird chirping nearby, albeit they never seem to be cheerful or pleasant songbirds - only harsh, squawking cries. Probably crows. There seems to be a never ending pile of bird shit on the cement steps outside the four exits. The birds manage to perch on the tiny ledge above the door frames, but he's never actually seen one. Just heard their squawks and seen the evidence they leave behind. It reminded him of that one Edgar Allen Poe poem. He couldn't remember the name, but there was nothing poetic about a damn annoying bird squawking and shitting all over the steps.
There was no wind today. No sun. Just the usual, dreary, damp drizzle this unfortunate corner of the country experienced for nine or ten months out of the year. It never even rained hard enough to hear on the roof. Or maybe that was just because the roof sat several feet above him, and the asbestos ceiling tiles and concrete blocks were too thick for the sound to penetrate. There weren't any storms, either. He wondered what anomaly allowed an area to experience so much rain but never any thunderstorms, but then quickly decided he didn't give a shit. Nothing to break the monotony of grey days, squawking birds, and the steady stream of cars.
With a soft - clank, clank, clank - the heater turned on. Typical. He had spent all winter with no heat, trying to keep warm with a tiny, insignificant space heater and an ugly wool sweater, but now that it was spring, it made sense that the furnace would start working. Or, perhaps it had just been fixed. That was probably it. People were inconsiderate like that. It almost seemed that people would go very far out of their way to not solve a problem until that problem no longer mattered. He could almost sympathize, because some days it was easier to just sweep things under the rug than deal with them, but he loathed it because the problems did usually get corrected, just way too late.
Brought back to reality by the furnace, he glanced down and noticed that his cigarette had burned itself to ash in his fingers. He wasn't supposed to smoke in here, but he'd covered the smoke alarm with a tightly taped plastic bag. What else was there to do? He dropped the butt into a nearly empty beer can, swept the ashes off the desk onto the floor, and pushed himself backwards, chair scraping along the scarred, tile floor. The fact that the floor was also made of asbestos used to upset him, but it didn't matter since everyone is going to get fucking cancer anyway. Between the food he ate, the water he drank, the air he breathed, and the oversized microwave emitter that had cooked his brain for months in Afghanistan, he was definitely, indubitably fucked.
Plodding over to the old rattling refrigerator that always left an oily puddle on the floor, he reached in and pulled out another beer, cracking the tab and chugging down half of it. Looking at the partially American flag covered can, it certainly wasn't a very good beer, but it was cheap, it was cold, and it made the days pass a little quicker. He collapsed back into the dirty, stained chair, wondering how many different camouflaged asses had sat in it over the years, and which one of them had snapped the arms off. Prick. Higher ups said it as a joke, but a month or two back, one of the rare days when he actually had to do work while at work, one of his soldiers had broken a rock. He had taken a big rock. Hit it with a little rock. And the big rock broke. Soldiers can, quite literally, break a rock. It was small wonder that his chair was broken. Turning his head to the left, he looked at his bed, which was also broken. The hooks that latched the bed springs to the frame were bent in one corner, so the metal frame was propped up on a low night stand.
Taking one last drag, he flicked the cigarette towards the old, rusty window with its broken latch, hoping there was no one loitering on the bird shit encrusted steps two floors below. It had been a few minutes since he'd heard any birds, so there probably was. The butt hit the dirty, stained wall just below the sill and bounced back onto the floor. He sat there considering whether to get up and toss it in the beer can, but before he made up his mind the cherry burned out. The asbestos tiles were good for something, after all.
He turned back to the screen. Scrolling down the page, he clicked on a new link. Soon, naked bodies were bumping and thrusting against one another. He watched in both disgust and fascination as the man began to choke and beat the woman. Seconds ticked by into minutes and his mind began to wander. Faces and names surfaced. Some were attached to memories of sweat, booze, and pleasure, but they were usually just faces. No names. Others were a different sort - rather than memories of being breathless, they were breathtaking. There was one at a zoo with a big pair of golden aviators, not unlike Elvis' famous glasses. A bonfire in the woods at night encircled with forgotten faces all talking and shouting animatedly, but there was no sound, no voices, no noise. Only one face in the flickering light of the fire was visible - dark, but not tan, wreathed in long, flowing, black hair, two points that were her eyes, glittering both dark and light, flanking a perfect nose that turned up just slightly at the end. It all turned to pain and his mind slipped on to the next. This one was of blond, loosely curled hair, green eyes, and a cheerful, easy laugh. He thought about the basement they had shared so many hours in. The couch where there had been two slight indentations from the times they'd laid there. After that, another face, sad eyes surrounded by heavy eye shadow and a short blond bob, but a slamming door and shouted laughs coming from the hallway brought him crashing back.
The woman was wiping her face and licking her fingers, glistening in sweat, while the man stood there, chest heaving. Thinking of all those faces made him wonder where they all were. Most he didn't care about - they were still unemployed, pot smoking douchebags that lived with their parents. Just like it was still high school. One face, he knew, was dead. Heroin. Three years ago. Those other two were engaged. That was a weird thought, knowing he'd been inside her. The rest? Who gives a shit?
He picked the sock back up off the ground where it had fallen and tossed it back in the drawer next to the desk. It was still clean. He'd save it for another day. Glancing at his watch, he wondered how much longer it'd be until he was officially off work and he could continue doing exactly what he had been doing all day. All week. All month. All year. It had only been nine months since he'd come home, but it seemed an eternity. Some newer faces had never come home. Just memories. Like Rob. Rob had four kids - two daughters, two sons. His daughters were four years apart but shared the same birthday. That was the day he'd been killed. Of all the 365.25 days of the fucking year, he'd bought it on his daughters' birthday. In a sick kind of way, that thought made it a little easier for him to sleep at night, when he thought of the other two faces he'd left over there. Not faces, so much as bodies. They'd been two far away to see their faces. Just loose, brown and dirty white clothes billowing in the hot, dusty wind as they ran. Just a few seconds to properly brace himself behind the machine gun, aim, squeeze and hold the trigger, and down they went. They only face he remembered from that day was the farmer driving past on an old, rickety tractor. Brown, wrinkled and weather beaten, but absolutely blank. Entirely void of all emotion. There was no fear, no surprise, no anger, just a face. As they had driven away, the farmer had turned in his tractor's seat and watched as they disappeared into the distance, leaving behind two bodies lying twisted and sprawled in the dry dirt.
The next beer tasted a little bit better. After a while, the cans had begun to accumulate on the desk. His phone vibrated and it was his squad leader. "Regular time. Regular place. Regular uniform. See you tomorrow." He felt let down. Another day had passed without accomplishing anything. There was nothing to accomplish. He missed it. Every day there had been a mission. Maybe they weren't big or exciting or important, but they were missions. Every single time he had gone to flop down on his green, stained cot with "U.S." printed in black letters on one end he had felt satisfied, because he had done something. He had meant something. He had succeeded. Now, the only thing there was to accomplish was to walk down the street to the store to buy more booze and smokes. He looked down at the lit cigarette and dropped it in the beer can, quitting, cold turkey. Fuck that. He lit up another.
Looking out the window at the drizzling rain, he wondered what he was going to eat. There was no way he was walking through that piss just to eat the same, bland food that the chow halls always served and that always made him sick. Hopefully, there was something in the freezer. His microwave was weak and underpowered, but at least it worked. You just had to add twenty percent to the cooking time. If that failed, he could always order pizza. Even though it was just down the street, even closer than the chow hall, he could have it delivered downstairs. The only downside was to walk down two flights of stairs, pretend to have cheerful, idle conversation with the pizza guy or girl, and then walk back upstairs. Then, it was hit or miss if the pizza was decent. Some nights it'd be good, but other nights it'd be so greasy and buttery that it would leave a thin puddle on the bottom of the cardboard box and the entire room would smell like garlic until the box got thrown away. If there was nothing in the freezer, he'd probably just go without eating. It didn't really matter to him.
Once the beer ran out, he'd lie down on his broken bed and pretend like he was going to sleep. Maybe he'd get lucky and catch a few hours. Maybe he'd get lucky and wouldn't have nightmares. His phone was just sitting there on the desk, silent. Maybe it would ring. There were two girls he half-heartedly dated on the weekends he felt up to it. It had been a few months, but they might call. That would take a lot of energy, though. That would be worse than the pizza guy. But, not as bad as the dates.
More helicopters. More cars. Stupid fucking furnace. Smoke another cigarette. Drink another beer. More helicopters. More cars. Stupid fucking furnace.
They always said it was like walking on razor blades, war. It's not. It's like beating your head against the wall. Repeatedly. You rarely fight the enemy, those assholes; you fight complacency. You fight yourself. You fight boredom. That one, redeeming quality, that light at the end of the tunnel, the finish line -- it isn't going home, that first beer, or that first fuck -- it's the end of the day. It's that accomplishment. That success. That 'hell, yes' feeling. That knowing that you made a difference, no matter how insignificant. That you did your part.Everything here is running a race with no finish line. It's just running laps.