A special thank you to my father, Dan Trussoni. Thanks also to my mother, stepfather, and Debbie Trussoni. Thank you Kelly, Matt, Phil, Rita, and Tracy. Blagodaria to Nikolai, Lachezar, Milena, and Ogniana, my Bulgarian family who provided patronage and Kamenitza as I wrote the first draft. Thanks also to Jesse Lee Kercheval, Ron Kuka, and Susan Bernstein at the University of Wisconsin. I am grateful to the James A. Michener/Copernicus Society of America, and to those at the Iowa Writers WorkshopJames Alan McPherson, Marilynne Robinson, Lan Samantha Chang, and Connie Brotherswho offered guidance. Above all, I owe thanks to Amy Williams and George Hodgman for believing in this book from the beginning.
A few years after my trip to Vietnam, I flew to Wisconsin to see my father. Dad wasnt a regular at Roscoes anymoreage and sickness had made him reclusivebut every once in a while hed go to the North Side to have a drink, for old times sake. Roscoes had a new owner and a new name and had been remodeled. The faade was hidden behind terracotta brown stucco; the interior suffered from an abundance of light. I didnt recognize anyone in the place. The crowd seemed younger and happier than I remembered.
I had a baby of my own by then, a boy whose eyes were so free of the past, so innocent, that I promised I would do everything I could to protect him. I tucked my son in a blanket and took him with me to the bar, where I climbed on a stool next to my father. It felt just like old times, only now I was the one with problems. I had recently left my sons father and was raising my baby alone. Although Kelly had done a great job of raising her son on her ownshe had recently graduated from college, and was hoping to begin a career as a social workerDad was skeptical. He did not approve of my decision. He believed it was a sign of a weak character to walk away from a challenge. As Dad lectured me, I handed him my son and rested my head on the bar. The baby had been up all night, crying, and I was exhausted. Id never expected that raising a childwould be so much work. When I complained that I hadnt slept a full night in nearly a year, Dads eyes sparkled. Yes, he said, holding the voice machine to his lips. Kids can be a real pain in the ass sometimes. He bounced his grandson on his lap, stroking his curly blond hair. I could see a slight resemblance between them, something in the eyes. But then again, they can be pretty damn wonderful too.
Over drinks, Dad told me about a trip he and Debbie had recently made, to see Mrs. Goodman, in Knoxville. He had never forgotten the afternoon that Goodman died, and, as he had once told me, he had always felt somehow responsible for Goodmans death, as if Tommy had taken his bullet.
They packed the Cadillac and drove through small towns, sleeping in motels and Super 8s along the way. It was the first time Debbie had been south of Chicago, and they tried to see the trip as a vacation. Thomas Goodmans mother lived in a huge house surrounded by land. When they rang the bell, Mrs. Goodman was waiting. She led them inside, through vast empty rooms. Dad knew Tommy Goodman had come from money, but he never knew just how much until he saw the house. It looked exactly like he had always imagined a plantation house to look, with a columned porch and rooms that went on forever.
Mrs. Goodman was tall and thin, like her son had been. Her husband, Thomas Goodman Sr., had died not long after Tom, and Mrs. Goodman had lived alone for many years. Dad thanked her for sending him Christmas cards every year. It was nice of you to think of me, he said.
Mrs. Goodman led my father and Debbie into the sitting room, where she served them coffee in china cups. Pictures of Tommy were hung around the room. My father stood, to get a better look. He saw Tommy as a boy of four, sitting in his mothers lap, a happy-go-lucky grin on his face. He saw Tommy as a teenager, dressed for the prom, his arm around the girlfriend who had sent him a letter in Vietnam, breaking their engagement. He saw Tommy Goodman as he had not seen him beforenot as a tunnel rat or even as a buddy but as somebodys son.
My father placed Tommys camera on the coffee table. He said, Ive been keeping this, meaning to give it to you. Im sorry it took me so long.
Mrs. Goodman took the camera in her hands, as if weighing it. You know, she said, Thomas volunteered for duty. His father thought it theright thing at the time; we both did. But one thing Ive always wondered about. Nobody has ever been able to tell me how my son died. But you were there with him, werent you?
When my father said yes, he had been there with Tommy, Mrs. Goodman wanted him to tell her what had happened that day.
Are you sure you want to know? Dad asked her.
Yes, she said firmly. Please. I need to know.
After my father told her the story of Tommys deathabout the tunnels and the jungles and the terrible morning when Tommy had taken my fathers bulletMrs. Goodman looked at him, tears running down her cheeks, and said, You are a good man for coming down here like this. And a good friend to Tommy. God bless you for that. I never knew what happened to him. In all these years, I never knew for sure.
It was strange, listening to my father speak. His whole expression was full of sadness, yet his mechanical larynx made him sound robotic, unemotional. You cant imagine how sad she was, he said. Resting his hand upon my sons arm, he continued, You just cant imagine how great the loss, until youve got a child of your own.
I knew, as I sat with my father and my son, that Dad was right. Fifty-eight thousand American soldiers had died in Vietnam, and yet those numbers meant nothing to me until I walked in Washington alongside the dark mirror of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial wall and traced one name, THOMAS GOODMAN, with the tips of my fingers. Millions of Vietnamese had died in the war, but these deaths never touched me the way one Vietnamese soldier, whose picture I found in my childhood, had. And although twenty thousand American children were orphaned by the war, it was only when I looked at my own life that I saw the hole that Vietnam created, for all of us.
AFTER MY VISIT, DAD DROVE ME TO THE AIRPORT IN HIS NEW CHEVY. IT WAS an American-made gas guzzler, all silver and chrome, a truck unlike any he had driven when I was a kid. My son was buckled in his car seat, between us, but that didnt make Dad cautious; he drove over the speed limit, taking the back way to the airport, still running all these years later. As we drove alongside the Mississippi River, a white paddleboat floated into view. Dad veered over a viaduct and tapped the brake, slowing to twenty-five miles an hour. The cops always sit right at the bottom, hesaid, holding his mechanical larynx between his fingers, like a cigarette. I know their game by now.
At the airport, Dad insisted on unloading my suitcase from the bed of the truck and carrying it inside. Still weak, he couldnt carry it well. When I offered to help, he turned away, embarrassed, and struggled on. As we walked into the airport, a crowd of people stood by, holding signs that read WELCOME HOME with great yellow balloons and ribbons tied around the edges. Dad stopped dead in his tracks, set my suitcase down, and stared, as if hed been punched in the gut. Ill be damned, Dad said. I know that family. Theyre from up around Romance. I wonder which of their boys is coming home. Dad walked over to the crowd and greeted them, shaking hands and slapping backs, one of the gang. He was too embarrassed to use his voice machine with anyone but family, so he wrote everything on an erasable whiteboard. Unable to go with my father, I stayed behind, holding my son.
