Scareforce (14 page)

And then every once in a while she’d get these feelings about someone she hadn’t seen in a long time and before you knew it
they’d be calling her or writing to her. It was only a little spooky.

After a while she started to encourage J.T. to play out in the back or in his room. She said that the lanai didn’t seem healthy.
She wouldn’t explain it because it seemed to embarrass her.

I was pulling a lot of alert by this time so I was gone a lot. Sherry started to really develop a thing about the lanai. She
said when she sat in the living room sewing or something it always felt like someone was watching her. Someone out on the
lanai. It got so bad that on one of my back-to-back tours she went out and got curtains to cover the lanai windows. Said it
made the place brighter. Yeah brighter. It also covered up the lanai so nobody could look in on her.

Then it got real strange. First, my mom came over to visit. No, I don’t mean there’s anything strange about my mom. While
she was there, J.T. told her all about the army man. She didn’t know that he was imaginary. She didn’t know too much about
the military. She thought he was talking about some real army guy. So one night she was out in the living room while Sherry
was giving J.T. a bath. We tend to be pretty loose on a base. Nobody every locks their doors and it’s pretty normal for someone
to walk into the lanai so that they can knock on the glass door. Couldn’t hear someone knock outside too well.

Anyway, she came and told Sherry that someone was there to see her. Sherry went out but there was nobody. She said, “Where,
Mom?” and Mom told her on the lanai. But there was nobody there.

Sherry asked her who it was. Mom said, “I think it was your friend, the army man that J.T. keeps talking about.” Sherry got
a chill and just stared at Mom. Mom said, “You know, he had on a tan uniform, not like the one Chuck wears.”

Sherry just said something dumb like “oh,” but she didn’t sleep all that night, thinking about J.T.’s army man.

Finally, one night after Mom left, I came home from a real late flight. It was more like real early ’cause it was three or
four o’clock in the morning. I went to open the lanai doors and they were locked. We never lock our doors but this time Sherry
or somebody did. So I was stuck out there on the lanai without a key. It was like four in the morning and I didn’t want to
wake anybody up. I knew Sherry would be getting up at six so I decided to wait. See, I’d been flying all night and I wasn’t
thinking too straight.

So I sat down on the papa-san chair and before you knew it I was dreaming. Or at least I think it was dreaming. It was real
strange. It was like I was hearing this story and living it at the same time.

I was on this island but I wasn’t me. But I’m not sure who I was. The island was Guam but most of the buildings were either
missing or real strange. I was waiting. I was waiting for something to happen. I kept looking up and seeing these airplanes
go over. They were up high so I couldn’t tell what kind they were. For some reason they scared the crap out of me. I kept
thinking Saipan, Saipan. But I didn’t know what that meant.

Then all of a sudden the dream got real intense. There were all these explosions and loud bangs. It was like having your head
in a bucket with some yo-yo beating on it with a club. It went on and on until I couldn’t hear myself think.

I kept running and moving and ducking and hiding but I didn’t know from who. There were other guys around me but I couldn’t
see them very clearly.

Then suddenly I was all alone on this little hill overlooking a big drop-off. It was almost like the drain hole out back but
at the time I couldn’t place it. All I knew was that I was all alone. And I’d never felt that all alone and lonely in my life.
It was so sad that I couldn’t take it and I woke up. But I must not have been all the way awake. Because I was staring at
my reflection in the glass doors, but it wasn’t me. It was this guy in an old dirty tannish kind of uniform. He had some kind
of straps wrapped around his shins up to his knees and he had on this pot of a helmet, like nothing I’d ever seen. And he
was carrying a gun, an old bolt-action job with a long wooden stock. It looked like it had some kind of flower painted on
the stock.

He was standing there staring at me and he had the saddest look I’d ever seen in my life. It just hit me way down deep.

I don’t know how long I stood there looking at him. Gradually I realized that he was gone and it was just my reflection. Then
Sherry opened the door and I just about jumped out of my skin. Sherry matched my jump because she didn’t know I was standing
there on the other side of the curtains. Adrenaline—what a rush!

I just couldn’t get the dream or whatever out of my mind. 1 kept wondering who he was and what had made him so sad. 1 knew
deep down that he wasn’t some figment of my imagination. He was a real guy.

Then a few weeks later we were knocking around the island, taking in the sights. We were at this little park in Agana. I was
enjoying the sun and Sherry took the kid into this little building off to the side.

After a few minutes she came out and she was all white like she’d seen a ghost.

“Maybe you better come in here and see this,” she said. “J.T.’s found his army man.”

The building turned out to be this little museum about the war on Guam. I saw J.T. standing in front of this glass case looking
at some old Japanese army clothes.

“Is that like your army man wears?” I asked him. And he nodded his head. I agreed with him. It was just like the guy I saw
in the glass door.

The display was about this guy who was a Japanese soldier who got left on Guam and stayed hidden for sixteen years. He finally
walked out of the jungle in 1960, still not convinced that the war was over. I got a copy of the book he wrote. I read it.
Then I knew what was going on.

He wasn’t the only one to survive and be left. There were a bunch of them. He was one of the few to make it out alive, though.

It was some story. How he and his friends, just kids, got drafted into the army and shipped off to Guam just before the Allies
came to take it back.

How they watched the enemy airplanes, our airplanes, fly over from the south, night after night, day after day. Concentrating
on another island, probably Saipan. How they heard the constant bombardment of Saipan in the distance. How they wondered when
their turn would come. There was no doubt that the Americans would come. There was little doubt that they would win. But the
Japanese had been instructed to fight on, fight for the emperor. Never yield, never surrender.

I read how the bombardment finally started. It went on for hours and days and it was like living in hell. I read how they
waited for the invaders to follow the bombardment and kill them all. They waited until they could wait no more and finally
the attack came. And their leaders didn’t know what to do. There was no orderly counterattack. It was every man for himself.
Many finally found themselves alone, cut off, and hopeless.

They didn’t know if the war was over. They didn’t know if their army had been defeated or had left. They only knew that they
were alone and they could not surrender.

That’s what I think happened to the guy on our lanai. He got left. He got separated. And then he died. But he never surrendered.
And I don’t think I would be able to tell him that their army lost. But I wish to God that I could tell him that it’s over.

W
HEN I entered the service it seemed to be full of old farts who spent all their time reminiscing about Korea and World War
II. As I neared the end of my service it seemed that all the old farts had been replaced by a bunch of young kids who thought
Vietnam was ancient history. Yeah, I know it’s hard to see the old farts when you are one. But it was a good thing that the
generations got mixed. War teaches us a lot of very difficult lessons. Lessons too painful to have to keep learning over and
over again. So I listened to the war stories. I hope the kids still do.

“Bullet Flight, turn right heading 262.”

“Roger approach, understand you want us to go right to 262. Is that the military right or what?”

The air traffic controller stared at the blips on his radar screen and immediately realized his error.

“Uh… negative Bullet, turn left heading 262.”

“Okay, that’ll be a lot easier, approach.”

“Bullet, roger, say altitude.”

“Altitude.”

“Bullet, say altitude.”

“Altitude.”

“Damn pilots!” the microphone flew across the console. “Stupid, egotistical jerks, the whole bunch of them.”

The controller reached for the mike again, but another hand reached it first. He stared at the hand, then followed it up to
the face. It was probably the oldest-looking face he had ever seen in an Air Force uniform.

“Try it this way.” The face smiled as the hand keyed the microphone. “Bullet flight, say altitude.”

“Altitude,” came the monotonous reply accompanied by muffled laughter.

“Roger, Bullet flight, say canceling flight plan.”

“Uh… negative approach… uh… we’re level at one six thousand.”

“See, you just have to know how to handle ’em.” The ancient one smiled and dropped the mike back in the young lieutenant’s
hand.

“Thanks, but who are you, sir… uh.… Sarge… uh.” The junior officer stared in bewilderment at the rank on the intruder’s collar.
It was like nothing he had ever seen before.

“Warrant officer is the proper designation but Red will do just as well. They’ve been calling me Red since I enlisted over
thirty years ago.” He ran one hand through his almost nonexistent hair. “Course back then they had a reason to call me Red.”

“Okay, Red, nice to meet you.” The lieutenant stuck out his hand. “I’m Skip. Like the way you handled that smart-ass pilot.
They’re all alike. None of them is worth a bucket of warm spit.”

“Now there’s where I beg to differ with you, Skip. If you can get someone to cover for you, I’ll tell you why. If anyone asks,
just tell them I’m inspecting you.”

“Oh, my God, you’re Warrant Officer Garza.” The light of panic glowed suddenly in the lieutenant’s eyes. “I’m sorry sir… ah
Warrant… I didn’t recognize you.”

The young officer had heard about Warrant Officer Garza, the toughest inspector on the general’s team. They said he was a
thousand years old and tough as nails. He was rumored to have given flying lessons to Curtis Lemay.

“Relax, Skip. It’s still Red. You’re inspection is already over. I’ve been watching you for the last hour. Don’t worry, you
passed.”

“Whew.” The relief in Skip’s voice was evident. “Would you like a cup of coffee, or something?”

The officer handed his mike over to another controller and led the way into a small lounge. After the darkness of the control
room, the lounge was almost too bright.

“That was pretty nifty the way you put down that jackass in there. This job would be a whole lot easier without pilots.”

“Sometimes they can be a real pain in the posterior,” the old aviator agreed. “But I still think that they’re some of the
greatest people around. Owe my life to several of them. One more than most.”

“Oh, I see,” replied Skip. He had just noticed the wings that Garza wore over his right shirt pocket. “1 guess you would owe
a lot to your own pilot. You were a gunner, right?“

“Yes, I was a gunner. On several different types of aircraft. And I served with some very good pilots. But I wasn’t talking
about my own pilot. I was talking about a different kind of pilot altogether. A fighter pilot.

“Since you just passed your inspection with flying colors and you’ve got a lot of time on your hands, I’ll tell you about
him. That is if you want to listen to the ramblings of an old war-horse.”

The old gunner didn’t wait for a reply. As he wrapped himself in his tale, Skip watched enthralled. It was as if time was
unwinding from the old face. He seemed to get younger as he talked about a younger time for the Air Force.

When the war came along I was already in what some youngster would call my middle years. I had been born on a small farm and
lived and worked the same one for most of my thirty-two years. I took over after my daddy died and raised crops and a family.

I guess I could have hung around and bought a couple of war bonds while the younger men fought the war, but it just didn’t
seem right to me. It wasn’t some police action like you got going now, with everyone not too sure who’s right or wrong. It
was easy to choose up sides. That German fanatic with the toothbrush mustache was a real threat to my way of life. So I went
down and volunteered. Told the guys in charge that I was only twenty-four. Now I know I didn’t fool anybody. But they needed
as many men as they could get and I was in pretty good shape so they let me in.

I had every intention of being a pilot. Thought if they gave me a good plane, I could get the war over that much faster. But
at the time what they needed most of all was gunners. Way they explained it to me, the B-17 only had seats for two pilots
but it had room for eight gun aimers. Being a dumb old country boy, I agreed that it seemed the way to go.

Before I discovered the error of my ways, I was in the middle of a very hot war and up to my elbows in shell casings. Being
a gunner on a 17 was a whole new way of life. It meant sitting in front of an open hole in a noisy airplane, freezing to death
and wishing the bad guys would show up and try to kill you so that you could have something to take your mind off the cold.

It seemed like as soon as we’d leave Jolly Old England everybody would get mad at us. The air just filled up with nasties
who wanted to have our hides. But we did have one or two little friends. They always seemed to arrive about the time things
got really tense. They were the proud individuals who flew cover for us.

One in particular was this major who led a squad of P-47 Thunderbolts. The Thunderbolt, or Thunder Jug as the pilots called
it, was some piece of work. It wasn’t as fast as a lot of the fancier fighters, but boy was it tough.