Phil Klay - Redeployment

We shot dogs. Not by accident. We did it on purpose, and we called it Operation Scooby. Im a dog person, so I thought about that a lot.

First time was instinct. I hear OLeary go, Jesus, and theres a skinny brown dog lapping up blood the same way hed lap up water from a bowl. It wasnt American blood, but still, theres that dog, lapping it up. And thats the last straw, I guess, and then its open season on dogs.

At the time, you dont think about it. Youre thinking about whos in that house, whats he armed with, hows he gonna kill you, your buddies. Youre going block by block, fighting with rifles good to 550 meters, and youre killing people at five in a concrete box.

The thinking comes later, when they give you the time. See, its not a straight shot back, from war to the Jacksonville mall. When our deployment was up, they put us on TQ, this logistics base out in the desert, let us decompress a bit. Im not sure what they meant by that. Decompress. We took it to mean jerk off a lot in the showers. Smoke a lot of cigarettes and play a lot of cards. And then they took us to Kuwait and put us on a commercial airliner to go home.

So there you are. Youve been in a no-shit war zone and then youre sitting in a plush chair, looking up at a little nozzle shooting air-conditioning, thinking, What the fuck? Youve got a rifle between your knees, and so does everyone else. Some Marines got M9 pistols, but they take away your bayonets because you arent allowed to have knives on an airplane. Even though youve showered, you all look grimy and lean. Everybodys hollow-eyed, and their cammies are beat to shit. And you sit there, and close your eyes, and think.

The problem is, your thoughts dont come out in any kind of straight order. You dont think, Oh, I did A, then B, then C, then D. You try to think about home, then youre in the torture house. You see the body parts in the locker and the retarded guy in the cage. He squawked like a chicken. His head was shrunk down to a coconut. It takes you a while to remember Doc saying theyd shot mercury into his skull, and then it still doesnt make any sense.

You see the things you saw the times you nearly died. The broken television and the hajji corpse. Eicholtz covered in blood. The lieutenant on the radio.

You see the little girl, the photographs Curtis found in a desk. First had a beautiful Iraqi kid, maybe seven or eight years old, in bare feet and a pretty white dress like its First Communion. Next shes in a red dress, high heels, heavy makeup. Next photo, same dress, but her face is smudged and shes holding a gun to her head.

I tried to think of other things, like my wife, Cheryl. Shes got pale skin and fine dark hairs on her arms. Shes ashamed of them, but theyre soft. Delicate.

But thinking of Cheryl made me feel guilty, and Id think about Lance Corporal Hernandez, Corporal Smith, and Eicholtz. We were like brothers, Eicholtz and me. The two of us saved this Marines life one time. A few weeks later, Eicholtz is climbing over a wall. Insurgent pops out a window, shoots him in the back when hes halfway over.

So Im thinking about that. And Im seeing the retard, and the girl, and the wall Eicholtz died on. But heres the thing. Im thinking a lot, and I mean a lot, about those fucking dogs.

And Im thinking about my dog. Vicar. About the shelter wed got him from, where Cheryl said we had to get an older dog because nobody takes older dogs. How we could never teach him anything. How hed throw up shit he shouldnt have eaten in the first place. How hed slink away all guilty, tail down and head low and back legs crouched. How his fur started turning gray two years after we got him, and he had so many white hairs on his face that it looked like a mustache.

So there it was. Vicar and Operation Scooby, all the way home.

Maybe, I dont know, youre prepared to kill people. You practice on man-shaped targets so youre ready. Of course, we got targets they call dog targets. Target shape Delta. But they dont look like fucking dogs.

And its not easy to kill people, either. Out of boot camp, Marines act like theyre gonna play Rambo, but its fucking serious, its professional. Usually. We found this one insurgent doing the death rattle, foaming and shaking, fucked up, you know? Hes hit with a 7.62 in the chest and pelvic girdle; hell be gone in a second, but the company XO walks up, pulls out his KA-BAR, and slits his throat. Says, Its good to kill a man with a knife. All the Marines look at each other like, What the fuck? Didnt expect that from the XO. Thats some PFC bullshit.

On the flight, I thought about that, too.

Its so funny. Youre sitting there with your rifle in your hands but no ammo in sight. And then you touch down in Ireland to refuel. And its so foggy you cant see shit, but, you know, this is Ireland, theres got to be beer. And the planes captain, a fucking civilian, reads off some message about how general orders stay in effect until you reach the States, and youre still considered on duty. So no alcohol.

Well, our CO jumped up and said, That makes about as much sense as a goddamn football bat. All right, Marines, youve got three hours. I hear they serve Guinness. Oo-fucking-rah.

Corporal Weissert ordered five beers at once and had them laid out in front of him. He didnt even drink for a while, just sat there looking at em all, happy. OLeary said, Look at you, smiling like a faggot in a dick tree, which is a DI expression Curtis loves.

So Curtis laughs and says, What a horrible fucking tree, and we all start cracking up, happy just knowing we can get fucked up, let our guard down.

We got crazy quick. Most of us had lost about twenty pounds and itd been seven months since wed had a drop of alcohol. MacManigan, second award PFC, was rolling around the bar with his nuts hanging out of his cammies, telling Marines, Stop looking at my balls, faggot. Lance Corporal Slaughter was there all of a half hour before he puked in the bathroom, with Corporal Craig, the sober Mormon, helping him out, and Lance Corporal Greeley, the drunk Mormon, puking in the stall next to him. Even the Company Guns got wrecked.

It was good. We got back on the plane and passed the fuck out. Woke up in America.

Except when we touched down in Cherry Point, there was nobody there. It was zero dark and cold, and half of us were rocking the first hangover wed had in months, which at that point was a kind of shitty that felt pretty fucking good. And we got off the plane and theres a big empty landing strip, maybe a half dozen red patchers and a bunch of seven tons lined up. No families.

The Company Guns said that they were waiting for us at Lejeune. The sooner we get the gear loaded on the trucks, the sooner we see em.

Roger that. We set up working parties, tossed our rucks and seabags into the seven tons. Heavy work, and it got the blood flowing in the cold. Sweat a little of the alcohol out, too.

Then they pulled up a bunch of buses and we all got on, packed in, M16s sticking everywhere, muzzle awareness gone to shit, but it didnt matter.

Cherry Point to Lejeunes an hour. First bits through trees. You dont see much in the dark. Not much when you get on 24, either. Stores that havent opened yet. Neon lights off at the gas stations and bars. Looking out, I sort of knew where I was, but I didnt feel home. I figured Id be home when I kissed my wife and pet my dog.

We went in through Lejeunes side gate, which is about ten minutes away from our battalion area. Fifteen, I told myself, way this fucker is driving. When we got to McHugh, everybody got a little excited. And then the driver turned on A Street. Battalion areas on A, and I saw the barracks and I thought, There it is. And then they stopped about four hundred meters short. Right in front of the armory. I couldve jogged down to where the families were. I could see there was an area behind one of the barracks where theyd set up lights. And there were cars parked everywhere. I could hear the crowd down the way. The families were there. But we all got in line, thinking about them just down the way. Me thinking about Cheryl and Vicar. And we waited.