Robbie Lee Robison
Muddy Water, Catfish, and Noodles Suspended motionless in the translucent liquid, protected from sound and light, instinct is all that provoked his escape. Gus exploded into the brilliant light and gasped a huge breath of air. As he tread water he instinctively searched for his father and found him in the same spot where he last saw him, squatting with his back leaning against the broad trunk of a towering cottonwood tree that shaded his side of the river. Eyes squeezed to slits against the sun's reflection met Gus' glimpse, but the glare cut straight through him. "Boy, you come up one more damn time 'thout a fish on your arm I'll knock th' whey outta you," the father, Henry Bryar, said. Gus neither changed expression nor answered. Breathing deeply since he broke the surface, he took a great breath and pushed himself back under. The time he spent under water was the only time during his entire eighteen years he felt truly safe. He paddled down until he saw rocks and debris through the cloudy, brown water then paralleled the bottom to the bank. The light was weak this deep and his vision died at the end of his reach, yet he soon found where the current had over time carved out a pocket in the bank wall. He swam to the edge and stuck his right arm into the dark maw and wiggled his fingers. Water pressure squeezed his temples and ear drums like a tightening band, and experience told him he had used up over half of his time. Despite the growing pain Gus was relaxed in the peaceful setting, wishing he could stay longer. He closed his eyes as his left hand pushed up against a ledge of protruding bank, fighting the gas in his lungs pulling his body to the surface. He understood and accepted the laws of nature that pushed and tugged him underwater because they were consistent and dependable. Above the surface where he had to deal with people, he spent his time bewildered by their actions and was hesitant to speak, having learned that was the best way to avoid provoking any type of angry retort. He had nearly given up when he felt a gristly grip take hold of his fingers and give a hard jerk. Gus thrust his left arm into the blackness and expertly grabbed the outside of the gills, then pushed his right arm down the throat and out the gills, ignoring the accompanying pain. The cat's gums were lined with broken rows of teeth that resembled extra coarse sandpaper, and judging by where they were rubbing his forearm raw, experience told Gus that this one was an eighteen to twenty pounder. He kicked off of the bottom with his right arm trailing and the big fish, rendered helpless with an arm through its gills, offering little resistance. He broke the calm surface with another gasp and saw that his father hadn't moved. "Am I gonna have to whup ya, boy?" Henry asked casually. Gus paddled with his legs and left arm and shook his head no. His father finally stood and stretched back with his hands on his hips. He took lazy steps to the water's edge and, work boots and all, splashed directly toward Gus. When Gus' hand hit bottom he stood in water to his waist, and Henry saw the seven inch wide head of the catfish still firmly attached to Gus's bleeding arm. The older man leaned down and grabbed the other gill and together they carried it out, now thrashing its tail as it began an agonizing struggle with suffocation. "I reckon this'un 'll do. Put 'er there behind that log so she don't flop back in. Look at that belly. She's fatter'n a town dog with babies," Henry said then looked down at his son who stood a good ten inches shorter than he. As often happened when Henry considered Gus, he thought of the boy's mother, and he blamed her for dying and leaving him a boy to raise on his own more than he missed her, and wondered how giving birth to such a small pinch of a human could kill a woman. When he couldn't come up with an answer, he settled for blaming Gus for it and the rest of his problems to boot. The thirty inch channel catfish, its body dark green on top and dull silver on the sides with distinctive spots, slapped its huge tail, trying with all its might to fling itself back into the safety of its dark underworld. This technique had often sent a fish falling from a predator's grip, but this time it was too far up on the bank. Just to make sure Henry rested a soaked boot on its back as the slaps slowly weakened. Once it stilled Henry picked it up and looked to Gus. "I'm goin' to Runnel's to fry this 'un. Get another'n for you if you want to eat." He turned and squished out of the clearing down a faint trail for an afternoon of fried catfish and home-made liquor. Gus stood dripping and silent, hoping he wouldn't see him again until morning. By noon the sun had been baking the ground around the Red River for hours and the temperature was above ninety-five. Peanut patches lined both sides of the road Gus walked, the sandy earth either packed down and baked by the heat until it was brick hard, or deep and loose in the road bends, like dry quicksand. Gus had long ago stopped feeling the burning sand or sharp pebbles that were mixed in. Years of barefoot summers had given him thickly calloused feet, and they now wore a covering of sand, resembling the cornmeal covered chunks of catfish he would soon be frying. He had shoved a stick through the gills of a twenty pound mud cat, caught in the same hollow as the one his father had claimed, and carried it, gripping the ends of the stick over each shoulder, its white belly soft and still faintly cool on his sun tanned back. He ambled along with his head down, the bottom of its swinging tail even with his tail bone. He gradually became aware of a car approaching from the direction he was walking by the pleasing sound of tires gently crushing grit and gravel. It was louder than the engine noise so evidently the driver was content to creep along at idle so as not to kick up dust. The car stopped beside Gus and he looked up to see Mr. Hayes at the wheel of his long, white and still shiny '65 Impala. His straw hat was cocked back on his head and he squinted through gold rimmed glasses as he smiled. "I'll swan, Gus Bryar, if you can't catch a fish. What's that one, twenty-five, thirty pounds?" Gus was stone-faced as he stared into Mr. Hayes' eyes, considering the question. When he was sure of his answer he said, "I reckon 'bout twen'y." "Yes, sir, boy, you are the noodlin'est son-of-a-gun I ever saw." Hayes well knew that 'son-of-a-gun' was one of the kinder terms directed at the boy. "There was a time all the men up 'n down the river went noodlin'. Didn't think nothin' of slidin' into the water after them big cats. Nowadays ain't but a handful of them ol' boys still doin' it. You're the only young 'un doin' it at all, I know of." Gus thought back to the day years earlier when his daddy had jerked him up by his arm and gave him scant instructions on how to noodle before casting him into a deep bend of the Red River. Having caught the stink of whiskey on his father's breath he knew better than to resist. He sank below the reddish-brown surface, terrified, barely able to swim at eight years of age. When he surfaced, thrashing clumsily, Henry threw rocks and cursed at him. "Get yer worthless runt butt back down 'ar 'n noodle, God Dammit! You might be too small to work a lick, but damn if ya ain't gonna provide for th' table! " He had nearly drowned that day as he sobbed, gasping for air, and dodging rocks. Henry's drunken aim was bad but one pecan sized stone connected with Gus's forehead, giving him a goose egg that lasted two days. He finally struggled to the opposite shore and hid for the rest of the afternoon, his father too lit to find him. Sleeping on the ground was no discomfort to Gus, but the dewberries and pecans were long out of season, and the few wild onions he found didn't staunch his hunger, so at first light he snuck home to scrounge up a meal. He expected Henry to be still asleep from drinking, but there he sat inside the dim cabin, waiting. "That w'ar your first lesson, boy. This time I 'spect you to do better, n' if you run agin, I'll lay the cane to ya when I catch ya." Henry took him back out to the river but didn't have to throw him in. The day after that the same thing. It took tremendous effort and will on Gus's part, but he overcame his fear and learned how to catch catfish by hand. While his father never complimented him on his ability or even what he caught, Gus felt he was good at it, and what he most liked about noodling was that under the water no one hurt him or taunted him. It was quiet and peaceful and sometimes he simply stayed motionless underwater, his arms outstretched and eyes closed, feeling a part of the dim stillness, and allowing the warm water to nourish and protect him. Mr. Hayes had turned his squint from Gus to the peanut patch and watched the heat shimmers rising from the field and wondered how he had survived so many summers of his life picking cotton, peanuts, and other crops in that blasted heat. Gus continued to stare at Mr. Hayes and, after thinking about it, decided that no comment was necessary. He chose silence over speaking unless forced to do so by a direct question, and even then he would stay mute if he was unsure. Mr. Hayes finally turned back to Gus and blinked, as if seeing him for the first time that day, then looked at the whiskered monster on his back. "You enjoy that catfish, now, boy" he said with a nod and let off of the brake. The silver-tipped fins eased past Gus, and the beauty of Mr. Hayes fine automobile made him feel ashamed of his filthy, calloused feet. Had he worn shoes he could have taken them off and carried them in his lap so as not to soil the car if Mr. Hayes had offered him a ride. As it was, he could never accept a ride from anyone, except in the bed of a pickup. Although Gus was completely passive throughout his encounter with Mr. Hayes, he was glowing with pride at being considered successful at something. All his life he had been ridiculed at being short or stupid, or both, though he didn't feel stupid at all. He had learned to accept angry punches at home as part of growing up, so when boys with clenched fists appeared before him on the school playground he took his beatings without comment or even fighting back. This lack of self-defense was taken as weakness in Gus's character, and only encouraged his bullies to further torment him at their whim. As the sun fried his neck, he heard a car approaching from behind going much too fast. The engine raced and its tires growled and he heard whoops coming from inside the machine, so without turning he recognized it as the hot-rod Chevy belonging to Billy Don Russell, a local drop-out and hell raiser. Gus kept his back turned and his step constant, neither escaping nor resisting, and when the car reached a distance of twenty feet away Billy Don slammed on the brakes, skidding and showering the road and bar ditches with a torrent of gravel and sand. Most of the rocks missed Gus, but he and his catch were smothered by the ensuing sand cloud that slowly dissipated in the hot, still air. As the roar of crushing gravel subsided, it was overtaken by the hooting laughter of the five boys crowded inside the car. They were almost equally red-faced and dust-covered as Gus, especially their heavily-oiled hair. "Well, Hell-fire!" shouted Billy Don. "The runt finally has him a date! Hey, shit-ass, it's not your arm you're supposed to stick down her throat!" The others joined in. "That CAT-fish is as close as you'll ever get to pussy!" "I know what he's gonna do! He's gonna sniff his right hand, pretend the smell is pussy, and jerk off with his left!" Lonnie Watson's disembodied head rested where the back window was rolled down. Through a contemptuous sneer he told Gus, "Git yer ig'nernt ass home, boy. My daddy left you a love note from Uncle Sam." The motor had been idling roughly and Billy Don slammed the hammer down, and as the engine roared he jerked his left foot off of the clutch. The Chevy fish-tailed off, causing Gus to turn away this time to avoid having gravel shot directly into his face. After the second haze of gravel dust slowly disappeared he spit into his hand and cleaned out his eyes the best he could then resumed the long walk home. The catfish on his back was covered with sand but he was going to peel off the smooth skin when he got home so it wasn't ruined. As he walked he imagined Billy Don and the others being as impressed and nice as Mr. Hayes was, and them asking all about how he did it. They would ask him if he was ever scared, swimming in that muddy water and sticking his hand into holes and under rocks, and he would say, 'Heck, no.' The Bryar homestead was a ruin standing in the middle of verdant fields, looking like a thorn tip being forced out of skin. Faded tire ruts led to the shack surrounded by a small square of fallow ground sprouting thirsty Bois D'Arcs. It sat 50 yards off of the gravel road and in the middle of vast acres of peanut plants standing in neat rows, as if combed by a giant hand. They didn't have a mail box so Gus found the letter that Lonnie's father left stuck on a nail that protruded from the front door. It was addressed to him and the return address was the United States of America Selective Service Department in Washington, D. C. Gus knew his number was up and that he would soon be going to Viet Nam, and as he cleaned and gutted his dinner, he wished that he could leave that day. The nervous snickers he heard and sideways glances he felt from the teenage boys at the bus station bothered him little, as he had been through that and worse his entire life. Gus was eighteen years old but stood only five feet, two inches tall and weighed one hundred and eighteen pounds. He hadn't grown any taller since he was fourteen and he had stopped wishing for the growth spurt his Na-Nah had promised him long ago. "Don't you worry none, baby," she would promise, her sun burned face wrinkled and brown as an over used grocery sack. "Once't comes it'll shoot you up like a corn stalk." She had died not long after she had made that promise and although it didn't come true Gus felt he had learned an important lesson from her. She was the only person who had shown him the tiniest bit of kindness, and if she would lie to him then there was no one anywhere in the world whom he could trust. During the long wait for the bus to take them to basic training the other boys would stand, stretch, and look out the window. Eventually they would sit down, farm boys in one group and town boys in the other, and whisper to each other and laugh. Gus sat apart from both groups and assumed they were laughing at him. It didn't bother him because he felt that he could handle any disrespect and rudeness a person could direct toward him. It was twenty-six hours later when he finally stepped one foot off of the bus at Fort Benning, Georgia, that he learned about an entirely new level of abuse. His second foot had not touched ground when a torrent of screams made him recoil and look up into the angriest, blackest face he had ever seen. "What in the hell happened to the rest of you, boy? Fuck all if you ain't but knee-high to a grasshopper. God dammit, have we already worked our way through all of the able bodied men? All that's left in the United States of America is fucking midgets?" Gus had frozen in his half crouch as the drill sergeant towered over him and screamed. "Don't stop, little girl, you're holding up progress! Get in line with the other sissies!" The sergeant addressed the next in line, "C'mon, boy! Drop your cock and toe the chalk! Uncle Sam needs you to learn how to kill Commies! Now, now, now…" Gus sprinted in the direction of the man's pointed arm and lurched to a stop next to the side of the last boy in line. After years of his father punctuating every other outburst with an angry backhand he knew how to follow orders without questioning. He stood ramrod straight as another tall sergeant screamed orders and insults at the recruits in line and the first sergeant directed his ire at those who had been yukking it up at the bus station. As scared as he was Gus, couldn't help but feel a surge of pleasure as the big boys got to feel picked on for a change. The harsh treatment did not relent as the days of basic training unfolded. Rather, they increased twofold as Sgt. Fields, the screaming black giant who first greeted Gus, got to know each recruit and learned how to get under their skin. Sgt. Fields took the obvious route toward Gus and continued to berate him about his stature. "Goddam, boy, I seriously believe that yo mama pinched you off before your best parts slid outta her. Is that what happened, Recruit Knee High," Sgt. Fields asked one morning during pre-breakfast calisthenics, using the nickname he had coined for Gus. Gus had seriously considered that very idea many times, and as he once again pondered the possibility, said nothing. After patiently waiting almost an entire second for Gus' response, Sgt. Fields leapt the eight feet that separated the two of them and came to a dead stop four inches from Gus' face, the same distance that his Smokey the Bear hat brim extended from his head. "Recruit Knee High, are you ignoring me? Does your puny brain in your puny head think that if you don't answer me I'll go away and stop bothering you? Is that what you think, little Recruit. Knee High?" Gus was prepared this time. "Sir, no, sir!" He hoped that Sgt. Fields noticed that he had not missed a beat of his jumping jacks during this exchange. Sgt. Fields stepped away from Gus and strode in front of the company, glaring at each recruit as he yelled. "Well, then, Recruit Knee High, it must be because you don't like me. That hurts me. Now I'm going to go eat breakfast and sulk. And because Recruit Knee High hurt me so bad, I want you ladies to give me a five mile run before breakfast. Move it! Now! Hup. Hup. Hup." Gus was already considered an oddball in his company because he kept to himself and didn't enter the gab sessions in the barracks, so after that run they began to resent him and look at him as the weak man in their group. The worse that Sgt. Fields treated them, the worse they treated Gus. Gus didn't like the treatment but he was experienced in it, and when the verbal taunts and shoves from his fellow soldiers began to occur during the brief moments they were out of Sgt. Fields' sight he wasn't surprised. It was just a way of life to Gus and he decided to drive on, accept the abuse, keep his gaze down, and do his best to keep from getting singled out. One day after Gus had earned the troop an extra fifty push-ups because of another slow response to the sergeant's question, he walked by Recruit Bullseye on the way to the mess hall. The chubby recruit painfully raised a tired arm and poked Gus in the chest. "You stupid little cracker shit. The next time you fucks up and causes us some shit, I'm going to personally pound your face to pulp." Recruit Bullseye, aka, Vincent Boyton, was from Detroit and he didn't think that anything with any intelligence would allow themselves to live in a miserable place like Oklahoma, not that the high school drop-out could find the state on a map. Gus looked up the nine inches that separated his face from the red, sweaty cheeks and puffy lips of the pudgy bully, and after considering the threat silently trudged over to the mess hall. Gus graduated from basic training as a Private, E1. He remembered how Sgt. Fields had always stressed that no matter how ugly or stupid any American soldier was, he always had a chance to grow and progress in "This Man's Army," and Gus felt that no matter what fate lay ahead of him in his deployment, it was better than what awaited him back home. When Gus finally landed on the tarmac of the Saigon Airport he was the only grunt glad to be there. But as the company of young and untested men stepped from the air conditioned cabin of the charter jetliner into the suffocating tropical heat, the likes of which none of them had ever felt or even imagined, the reality of the situation elicited several gasps and groans. Gus was practically ecstatic to finally be in 'The Nam,' as he had heard it called, because he fully believed that now that there was a flesh and blood enemy out there trying to kill them, the company would stop giving him so much shit. It was 1967, the beginning of the push to get more boots on the ground, and Gus found his boots hitting the ground in the Cu Chi province. He was a replacement for another replacement who was careless about where he stepped and had set off a homemade VC anti-personnel bomb made from a Coke can, scrap metal stolen from a U.S. garbage dump, and gun powder taken from an unexploded 500 pound bomb. That private went home to a hero's funeral and Gus took his place in line as his new platoon crept single file into the jungle. Bullseye had also been assigned to this group and when they stopped for cigarettes he practically collapsed to the jungle floor next to Gus. They were keeping the new guys in the middle of the group on their first foray into Charley's playground but they all separated themselves from Gus and Bullseye, not wanting to look so uncool as to talk to a cherry. Bullseye was breathing hard and sweating hard while casting a rueful glance at Gus, who was just as covered with sweat as his fellow rookie, but somehow seemed calm and relaxed as he looked at the endless foliage surrounding him. His glance hit upon another G.I. who was looking back at him. The soldier stood and made his way over to Bullseye and Gus. "Nothing in basic prepared you for this, huh?" he asked them both in a friendly voice. "I'm Rico." "I can barely fuckin' breathe," Bullseye gasped. "I feel like I'm wearin' a soakin' wet wool sweater." "Hey, that's a good one. I'm gonna use it." He smiled looked to Gus. "How are you holding up, buddy?" Bullseye interrupted the awkward silence that followed. "He may not answer you," he said between breaths. He was too gassed to become irritated with Gus. "We thought he was a retard back in basic." "Uh, I don't so. Uncle Sam may be getting desperate for warm bodies but he wouldn't stoop that low. I suppose he speaks when he wants to, right buddy?" Rico asked. Gus nodded his head and said, "I'm purty good." "Right on," Rico chuckled. "Alright, now, the first thing we have to establish is what to call you newbies. Did you get a handle in basic?" "They called me Bullseye in basic. Drill Sergeant said that if I didn't lose weight I'd make a perfect target for Charley." Rico laughed his easy laugh again, putting Bullseye and Gus more at ease. "That's pretty good for a hard-ass drill instructor. I don't think we'll change that here." He leaned in close. "Most of these guys are uneducated. Good soldiers, mind you, just not practiced in creative thinking, so if they were to name you, well …I wouldn't expect anything Dickinsonian from them. "Take me, for instance. Once they learned that I was from Puerto Rico, they settled on Rico. Pretty simple. I, on the other hand, finished three years at Dartmouth on a full academic scholarship before dropping out to help my mother make ends meet back home. I guess Uncle Sam thought I was ungrateful because I had barely unpacked when my number was called. And here I am, naming new recruits to Viet Nam." Bullseye nodded agreement and said, "Yeah, I don't want anything Dick or Sonian, that's for sure." "Never mind," Rico said. "Little Man, what did you do for fun back in the world?" Gus felt at ease with this dark skinned, curly headed man. He hoped they would become friends before pshawing such a bare-faced hope. "I liked to go noodlin?" "Noodling?" Rico asked, making sure that he had heard right. "Well, now you must tell me what, exactly, is noodling?" For the first time in his life Gus was cut off when he was about to speak. "He talked 'bout this in basic once. That's when we knowed he was a retard," Bullseye said. Some of the platoon who weren't otherwise occupied were listening to the conversation. "He says noodlin' is when he'd go under that muddy Okie water and stick his arm down a fish's mouth 'stead of using a rod and reel like normal people." "Far out!" Rico said breathlessly. "Is that true?" Gus nodded and grinned, sensing he wasn't being mocked. "Well that's perfect," Rico grinned back at Gus. He stood up and said, "Hey, fellas, I want you to meet Noodles and Bulls…" The angry bark of AK-47s interrupted Rico's announcement and slammed him to the ground. Gus and Bullseye were the only ones still sitting upright with their mouths agape a second later while the other soldiers were on the ground, crawling for cover and calling to each other for suppressive fire and the enemy's direction. Bullets whipped the foliage and echoed off of the trees. M-16s began cracking in the general direction of the VC's location. Gus snapped to and dove behind the dead palm tree trunk he had been sitting on. He peeped over the trunk and first saw Bullseye still frozen until a black arm shot out of a nearby bush and roughly jerked him to the ground. Thanks to a youth spent hunting the woods of Oklahoma combined with his basic training he determined there were two semi-automatic weapons grouped approximately 12 meters away at 2 0'clock concentrating their fire into the center of where the group had been sitting. The tree trunk he was behind led thirty feet to his right and ended beside the stump it had been separated from. He ducked down and crawled in that direction. A grenade shook the ground by the time he reached the intersection of the trunk and stump. Someone had tossed a smoke grenade for cover but from his vantage point he could see the thick clump of vegetation that the gunfire came from, and, upon a closer study, could see that it looked artificial. He stared to the side of the muzzle bursts and could make out a shadowy outline through the bush. He slowly raised his rifle and released the safety. As he lined up his sights the incoming fire abruptly stopped and the figure disappeared. He pulled his rifle down without firing and snapped the safety back on, reflecting his upbringing of never wasting a bullet and not the current American soldier's approach of emptying every available weapon into the spot he believed an enemy occupied, ever faithful in Uncle Sam's inexhaustible supply of bombs and bullets . The Americans continued firing for another three or four minutes until Sergeant Johnson screamed to hold their fire and the shots slowly died off. They waited until he was satisfied the VC had disappeared back into the jungle, then began to secure the area. Gus watched as the soldiers searched the area but didn't go near or even appear to see the thatch of greenery where attack originated from. "Doc, get me a casualty report!" Sergeant Johnson yelled. "Where's the cherries? Did they make it? Sing out!" "I got Target over here," yelled a private called Cotton. "He froze up and was 'bout to get his dumbass shot to hell but I pulled him down into cover." From the bush came a whine, "Bullseye, not Target." Gus had stood up by the time Sergeant Johnson yelled out, "What about the small one? Anybody see 'im?" "Here, sergeant," Gus answered, and all those who heard him turned in his direction. He was by the toppled tree trunk, far from the rest of the group. "Running away from the action ain't gonna save you, cherry," the sergeant said to Gus, then over his shoulder he asked, "What's his handle again?" "Noodles," a G.I called Mouth said in a tired voice as he sat down on a palm stump, his rifle butt resting on the ground between his boots. He was watching as doc poured sulfanilamide on the hole gushing blood out of Rico's chest. "Noodles, you stick close to me from now on until further notice. You run off again and cause one of my soldiers to get jacked huntin' you down, I'll gut shoot you myself. You copy that?" Gus considered explaining that he had worked his way outside for a clean shot at the saw two enemy combatants in the camouflaged thicket no one else saw or avoided. Instead he followed his old pattern and finally nodded his head once. At that the sergeant turned back to the troops. "Alright, doc, let's hear it." "Just Rico," Doc answered as his blood covered hands stopped patching and stilled. "And he's KIA." Noodles looked at his friend's lifeless body for several moments before he went to stand behind the sergeant. Gus' platoon was in the midst of a long term mission that would turn their daily actions into a routine were it not for their pure absurdity. At dawn each day they boarded helicopters bristling with guns and delivered them to their patrol point of the day. In the early morning light they passed over a carpet of purple-green rolling treetops, interrupted by clouds of mist, mountains, and perfect squares of rice fields, already occupied by slow moving oxen and farmers in conical straw hats. The grunts watching the countryside fly by would not allow themselves to consider it one of the most beautiful sights they had ever seen. They would land at a predetermined clearing where they would exit the choppers and begin to walk in a careful crouch, hunting men to kill, men who were equally eager to kill them. Once inside the tree line they each became Alice in Dangerland, and nothing on the streets of Detroit, the farms of Iowa, the beaches of California, or even the woodlands of New England could have prepared them for life in this rabbit hole. The towering trees made a living tunnel that kept the sun out but not the heat nor rain, and they walked through a humid burrow reeking of rotting vegetation, with prehistoric plants that sliced and stung and insects the size of pets and shadows that might or might not be a man aiming an automatic weapon at their head. It made a claustrophobic feeling that only Gus was comfortable in, thankful for the protective embrace of the jungle. His eyes were constantly moving from the trail to the surrounding foliage and trees and back again, having learned to avoid the briars and poison ivy of the Oklahoma woods while ever on the lookout for deer, rabbits and squirrels for the dinner table. He was the perfect point man stationed in the rear by a sergeant who misread the small, silent soldier. Naturally Mouth was the first to gripe about Gus not participating in the point rotation. "Shit, I guess if I'd been born a retarded midget I wouldn't have to walk point, neither," he said during a cigarette break. Earlier that day a North Vietnamese guerilla had suddenly appeared and squeezed off three wild shots that just missed Mouth while he was on point. He'd been grumpy ever since. The sergeant smoked his Marlboro and thought of a girl he had slept with during R&R in Tokyo two months prior. Gus sat beside him, weighted down with canteens, M-16 clips, and grenades, resupplying the other soldiers being his main duty so far. He listened closely to Mouth and remained quiet. "Yeah, Sarge," Clown piped up. "He's been in the shit two months now and ain't taken point once. He can't be no worse than that fat fuck Bullseye." "That's right, Sarge," Bullseye said, ignoring the insult. "I been on point twice since Noodles an' me got out here but he ain't done it once. I say put the runt out front!" The rhyme was accidental but it had a good ring to it and it made the other soldiers nod their agreement. Meanwhile the sergeant reluctantly pulled himself from his beautiful Japanese lover's arms and back into the jungle clearing where they sat. He slowly turned a half-closed gaze onto Bullseye and said, "That what you'd do, is it boy? Junior, when I need some fat, sorry-ass cherry son-of-a-bitch to tell me how to run a platoon just go ahead and frag me, got it? Until then keep your fat mouth shut! God damn it, how I wish some of Noodles's silent act would rub off on you." He stood up and swept his gaze over the sweat stained soldiers. "And that goes for the rest of you whiners, too! You want to bellyache, bellyache where I can't God damn hear it! Now, as for him," he said as he pointed at Gus, "he is no where near soldier enough to take point. Him taking point would mean more of you dead than I can spare. If we were up to full numbers maybe he could try to learn to stay alive at point. As for now, he can't hack it, so you have to hack it. Got it?" Gus's eyes had followed the conversation from mouth to mouth as they derided him and his face registered no emotion. For the last couple of weeks he had heard the same muttered complaints and seen the resentment in their eyes as he had replenished their combat needs of water and ammo but this was the first time the subject had been broached in the sergeant's presence, and the sergeant had stood up and agreed with them as he defended his actions. It was just another pointless foray into the jungle. The heat was oppressive, insects were buzzing them, and sweat was running into the dozens of scratches that the razor grass had made. Suddenly the point came under fire. The initial attack had included a grenade, possibly a booby trap, and shrapnel had hit one of the GIs. Charley was concentrating fire on the wounded man, knowing the Americans would senselessly risk their lives to save a wounded and possibly dying companion. The platoon knew they had less than five minutes to find and kill the Vietnamese or they would never be found. Fortunately the company's grenade gun man, Greaser, had leapt off of the trail at the first sounds of attack and had instinctively crawled to a flanking position as the firefight progressed. He slowly lifted his jungle cap covered head above the foliage to see two black pajama clad figures standing in a hole forty feet to his left and firing at his buddies. Greaser, who grew his hair long on top and kept it heavily oiled with Brylcream, smiled as he settled into a crouch and aimed the deadly weapon he carried as easily as a slingshot. Ideally Greaser's weapon would be fired at a trajectory to land several hundred feet away but he had learned long ago that nothing worked ideally in Viet Nam. He aimed directly at the base of the two men, squeezed the trigger, then immediately dropped to the jungle floor and clamped down on his ears, not watching to see if he hit his target or not. A huge explosion shook the ground and stopped the firing on both sides. It was a good five seconds before the dirt and flesh that the grenade had propelled skyward stopped falling back upon Greaser and the other forward men, and they cautiously stood. As they looked to where the enemy had hidden and saw a smoking gap in the foliage they erupted in cheers. Greaser was the first upon the seen with his .45 drawn, and after he determined that all that was left of the enemy was strips of black cloth and body parts, he raised his pistol and grenade gun victoriously in the air and then bowed. During the bow he happened to look between his legs and saw gaping darkness. He quickly straightened and yelled, "Tunnel! Freeze!" The platoon had been cheering and crashing through the foliage as they approached the smoking hole when they instantly stopped. Tunnel entrances were always protected by booby traps. Sergeant Johnson used hand signals to post lookouts at the four directions and direct the rest to begin searching, save those attending the wounded man and, of course, Noodles, whom Johnson signaled to stay put. This tunnel had only one booby trap, but it was a Claymore, a U. S. made anti-personnel bomb placed head high in a tree and pointed back down the trail with a trip wire stained brown and stretched across the path. It would have decimated the man who tripped it and anyone within fifty feet of him. After it was disarmed everyone sat for a break and Noodles took water to the group surrounding the wounded man. He saw the medic and others leaning over Bullseye, his face pale and his right leg ending in a bloody mess above his knee. He looked at Noodles and pleaded with his eyes for everything to be like it was. Noodles stared back silently before dropping two canteens and turning away and helping the others get caught up with water, grenades and ammo. Sergeant Johnson and the radio man were standing by the tunnel and occasionally squatting down to try and see into it and speaking into the radio handset. It was the typical entrance, straight down about four feet before turning 45 degrees, two feet high and two feet wide, heading God knows where. Noodles approached them with a canteen in each hand, staring into the tunnel, its innocence ominous, just a hole in the ground barely large enough for someone even as small as him. Sgt. Johnson saw Gus approach and said jokingly, "O.K. Noodles, shuck your gear. You're going in the hole." Gus looked from them to the tunnel entrance as the platoon members within earshot laughed. It was the first time that Gus had seen a tunnel, though he had heard bits of conversations referring to Charley jumping up, popping off a few rounds and disappearing again down his rat hole. Noodles set the canteens down and knelt by the entrance, bending over to look inside the dark maw as the resting soldiers watched him. "Man, stop pretending," Mouth scolded him. "That's a job for real soldiers. They be along soon." "You idiot, we're real soldiers," Greaser said, laughing. "That's for those insane cats that specialize in tunnels." Gus saw nothing in the tunnel but light gradually losing out to darkness. He stood, undid his pack and web belt holding the extra munitions, took off his helmet and stepped into the hole, and the laughter stopped. The soldiers shifted their focus from Gus to Sergeant Johnson, who was wearing a perplexed expression. He looked upon Gus, and the small soldier looked even shorter standing in the trench. Did the sarge sense that Gus yearned for a chance to prove he belonged with the guys in the platoon, or was he simply tired of treating him like a runt puppy, tagging along behind a group of boys, begging for a treat and not a kick in the ribs? He didn't say. He just looked to Greaser, who, having discovered the tunnel was responsible for it, and nodded. Gus was handed a flashlight, a combat knife, two anti-personnel hand grenades and a .45. Upon Greaser's advice he duct taped the knife sheath to the inside of his left forearm, stuffed a grenade into each back pocket, held the flashlight in his left hand and the cocked .45 with the safety on in his right. Gus took several deep breaths and was about to go down when Sergeant Johnson squatted beside him to offer the final words. "The tunnels are booby trapped just like outside, maybe more so, so don't get careless. We're going to tie you off with a 100 foot rope." "Makes it easier to pull your body out," The Clown shouted from the back. There was nervous laughter as he was tied off but Noodles took it with the same expressionless face and silence he always offered. He looked at the sergeant, felt the situation didn't require any comment, then squatted in the tunnel, got on his belly, and began crawling. He stopped just past where the light ended and waited for his eyes to adjust but it was total darkness. There was no way he'd be able to see without the flashlight but he knew that neither would anyone else in the tunnel. He crawled on, using his left hand in front of him to feel for anything unusual. He stopped to feel under and around every twig, root and lump, gingerly checking for wires. It was tediously slow but time had no meaning down there. The tunnel was humid, it stunk of rot and human waste and it was hard to breathe, but he kept crawling, inch by pains-taking inch. Somewhere in the darkness Gus felt a slight sensation on his face and froze. He lay still for 45 seconds or possibly 5 minutes, he couldn't tell. Every sense was straining to perceive what caused the light, tickling feeling that gently brushed his cheek. As sweat dripped down his temple he felt it there, the only cool spot on his body. It was a draft. He was by an opening of some kind that led to a source of air. The tunnel was narrow with a low ceiling but there was enough room for him to shift positions. He lay as low on his belly as possible and rested his chin on the ground looking straight ahead. He reached his left hand as far ahead and to the left as he could and switched on the flash button on his flashlight. The light burned his eyes but he saw the empty tunnel continuing on straight ahead and another tunnel adjoining the main one up just a few inches up on the right when rifle shots exploded louder than anything Noodles had heard before and kicked out clods of earth near the flashlight. He instantly dropped the extinguished light, but the image was burned into his retinas like it was still lit. He used the same hand to reach into his back pocket and pull out a grenade. Putting down the .45 long enough to pull the pin he tossed the grenade into the adjoining cave in a way that make it would bounce off of the wall for a deeper penetration. If the AKs were loud he knew the grenade was going to sound like a 500 pound bomb going off right next to him, so he clamped his hands hard over his ears and shut his eyes as tight as he could while crawling backwards using his elbows and knees. There were brief panicked screams in Vietnamese just before the blast erupted, the concussion shocking his senses. He still saw only the frozen image of the tunnel ahead of him and his ears rang with a high pitched buzz. His nose filled with the cordite smell of gunfire and grenades. If there were other VC in the tunnel coming to find out what the explosion was, it would be like shooting fish in a barrel for them. That was when he felt a powerful tug around his waist and he was roughly pulled backwards by his death rope. Confused and unwilling to leave the protection of his recent home he dug his hands into the sides of the tunnel as he was dragged out and was able to grasp a slimy root but it came with him. Seconds later hands were pulling him back into the South Asian sun where the air was fresher than he remembered. The platoon was crowded around him, their faces moving as they laughed and smiled and spoke, but his ears felt stopped up and were still ringing. One by one the faces stopped talking and smiling and looked down to his hand. Gus stood drenched in sweat with the cord still attached to his waist and lifted not a tree root but the remains of one the VC's arms and stared at it. Disinterested, he tossed it to the ground. Sergeant Johnson had radioed in the tunnel location, and as soon as Gus had dusted himself off, drank a canteen full of iodine water, and picked up the extra supplies he was responsible for, the Sarge called him over and said, "Take a knee, private. We need to talk." With Gus on one knee looking up at him Johnson spoke. "No good deed goes unpunished. Because of your success in that tunnel the Captain has ordered me to make you the platoon's 'Tunnel Rat.' Have you heard of 'Tunnel Rats?'" Gus thought it over and was not happy with the comparison. "I know what a rat is, yes, sir." "Roger that," the sarge answered, not catching the misinterpretation. "Between you and me, I think we're only hearing of about half of the tunnels discovered so far. See, it's been our procedure that the unlucky son-of-a-bitch who finds one has to check it out. Nobody wants to go down there so half the time they're not reported when found. "And when they are reported, as often as not we throw down a satchel charge and call it good. Hell, most of my guys won't get ten feet down a tunnel before they get stuck anyway. Fuckin' Greaser's too big to go in or he would have had to do it today. But he didn't, you did, and you did a helluva job. As your reward, you get to do it again. That's the Army for ya." Sergeant Johnson looked at Gus for a second and said, "Your orders are, any time we find a tunnel you're to enter, reconnoiter and report to me your observations. Disarm all booby traps, return what info you can. See if you can find the other end of the God damn thing. "The Captain thinks that our lack of success," Johnson caught himself and rephrased. "Proven success of B-52 air strikes is directly tied to the enemy's use of extensive tunnel systems. But he needs evidence of it before he pushes that theory up the line. Questions, Noodles?" Gus had listened carefully because he did not want to ruin this opportunity. He wanted to go back into the tunnels, and after hearing what was expected of him knew he could perform his duties and prove his worth to the sergeant. When he was sure of his answer he shook his head no. "I figured. Until we find our next tunnel continue with your current duties and stay out of the line of fire," Johnson said standing. "At least now I have a fuckin' answer when they start bitching about you not walking point." As expected, the tunnels were reported with more regularity after that, sometimes as many as one every third or fourth patrol. When calls of, "Where's the Rat? Bring up the Rat!" rang out Gus heard derision in their voices instead of the respect he was being shown for the first time in his life. The troops knew that a soldier had to be crazy to go into those tunnels, and they started giving Gus a wide berth when he walked up the line to make his descent into the depths of those crazy Asian catacombs. When sent down, Gus spent as much time in each tunnel as he could, protected by the walls, enveloped by the darkness. The sixth sense that he developed noodling in muddy creeks served him fittingly in this underground blackness, and though he came across many booby traps he never set one off. He would light one of the candles he preferred over flashlights for their soft light, and gradually follow the wire to the grenade or swinging punji sticks and disarm the trap. After disarming it he would quickly extinguish the light and let his eyes clear while feeling a sense of power over the impotent threat his hands gently explored. He would crawl slowly with his uniform shirt and pants clinging to his sweat-soaked body, the stink of the tunnel filling his nostrils, grit crunching between his teeth, all senses wide open and fully focused on edging forward the six inches his left hand had just cleared. He always hoped that the hole would be empty, and he would crawl to the length of his rope undisturbed, safe within Mother Earth. Not that he was afraid of finding anyone, for he proved that this was his element as much as the enemy's, but he enjoyed the peace he found below the surface, alone and away from the others. He fouled rice when he found it, exploded caches of arms, and made a labored report to Sergeant Johnson. After each tunnel Gus returned to the back of the patrol and picked up the canteens, feeling the looks the other soldiers gave him and wondering what he could have done better. Time slogged by as slowly as an exhausted soldier through a muddy rice paddy. One day the platoon was stopped for a blow on another of their patrols when Mouth came looking for Gus. "Sarge wants to see you on the di-di." He suspected they had found a tunnel so he dropped his gear and went to the sergeant at a trot. Sgt. Johnson was just signing off of the radio when Gus stopped before him, his flashlight and .45 ready. "You're going to the rear, Noodles," Sergeant Johnson said. He was studying a map and didn't look up. "The chopper's 5 minutes out so get your shit together." In his own good time Noodles broke his stare from the side of the sergeant's face and turned and trudged to his gear, disappointment weighing him down more than a fully loaded pack. "God dammit, boy, what now?" Mouth said, noticing Gus seemed more down than usual. "They sending you to Viet Nam or sump'n'?" Noodles picked up the gear and before he turned away said, "Gotta go to the rear." "Gotta go? Mother-fucker, you get to go! Goddam, you want to stay so bad, I'll trade with you and I'll get some lipstick on my dipstick while you crawl around them fuckin' tunnels like a fucked-up goddam gopher. Gotta go, my ass!" Noodles and two other G.Is also on R&R from different platoons rode the chopper over the green carpet of the delta and landed at the base camp on the Mekong River. They were greeted by a REMF who told them, "Gentlemen! In approximately three hours a Huey will take you to Saigon where you will catch a military plane to Tokyo for your 48 hour whore and booze fest. In the meantime please stash your gear and weapons in the lockers provided you." After storing his gear Gus ambled around the base growing more and more disturbed by his situation. Two hours ago he felt that he had a burgeoning role in his unit, and was a productive member of the platoon. But then the sarge pulled him off the line and busted him to the rear because, Gus felt, he was disappointed with his performance. No matter what he did, how deep he went or how many fish he caught, they were always mad or disappointed with him. Just like before, just like always. Gus found himself at the perimeter line of the camp and followed the concertina wire to the front gate. Just outside the wire but still open to GIs was the Saigon River, and Noodles strolled past the guard shack down to the bank and sat down and watched some Vietnamese fishermen cast a net into the water. It was just after noon and they soon quit and poled to shore near Noodles where they beached their sampan and pulled out a basket of about 15 fish, wet and shiny. Noodles looked from the river to the catch and back again and knew that this river was teeming with life and he recognized his chance. Maybe if he caught them a fish, maybe then they would see that he was good at something and they would like him. He stood up and walked down to the river's edge where he took off his shirt, shoes and socks and neatly placed them in a pile. He stood there naked, having given up wearing skivvies to avoid crotch rot in the damp jungle, and silently looked over the muddy river. Then he nonchalantly walked into the water, recognizing the familiar feeling of mud squishing between his toes, and smiled. The guard had watched him since he had exited the gate but had not said anything as he disrobed, having seen G.I.s who are fresh out of combat do some unusual things. But as soon as Gus's foot touched the water he yelled out, "Private! The river is off limits!" Knee deep in the water, Noodles whipped his head around and shot back, "Mind yer own God Damn business, you little bastard!" He eased over to a spot that looked like it held promise. There was a large tree leaning over and shading the water, and a small clearing on the shore. The bank appeared to cut away under the tree's roots and experience told Gus that there was a cave hollowed out from the current. He took a deep breath and went below the surface. By then the guard was on the phone with base HQ about a possible suicide in the river. Noodles pushed himself under and stopped, motionless, weightless, adjusting to the dark silence. He slowly kicked over and down and with his hands extended felt the roots of the tree above him, and he used them to pull himself up above the water. The guard saw his head surface and screamed, "Hey! That's dangerous water! You can get tangled in the roots! Come back to shore!" Other G.I.s with MP bands on their biceps were running over to join him. Noodles looked over and saw the concern on his face and felt sorry for him. "Don't worry," he called to the guard, "I'll bring you back a big one." He took another breath and went down and entered the cave. He pushed down, down until he was just inside the cave and held his left hand out and wiggled his fingers from pinky to thumb and back. In the dark brown water he barely made out an immense log submerged just below him and went to reach under it, a perfect spot for a lazy catfish to wait for food to flow by him. He knew he had to surface soon but he went deeper still, and when he touched the log it felt covered with moss, but he knew that could not be what caused it to be so smooth and slimy. When the log shifted and turned toward him, Gus flinched. He saw huge eyes sitting about 18 inches apart looking back at him and gasped, filling his lungs with water. The monstrous head lurched out with surprising quickness and took in his arm almost to the shoulder, squeezing down with jaws carpeted with hundreds of tiny, sharp teeth, which cut into his arm like a rasp into a horse hoof. He tried to scream but his lungs, full of water, stayed silent as he convulsed wildly, shredding his arm against the beast's coarse mouth and jerking his shoulder out of its socket. The giant Mekong Catfish swam languidly backwards, dragging its catch deep into the cave. As Noodles's body slowly stilled and he lost consciousness, he gratefully entered a still, dark place. |