Night Terror

When I woke up, the nightlight plugged into the wall was out. The familiar hum of the AC was missing, and everything was quiet. It was silent as a graveyard.

I started to sweat; my gut curled painfully. They always waited until it was dark; that was when they would come at you. And no matter how quiet the night was, you could never hear them until it was too late to run; you always heard them too late... I stared into the inky blackness. I could almost hear them, I knew I could. I mean, I knew they couldn't really be there... but at the same time, I was certain--

A twig snap! That was a twig, and that was definitely a stealthy footstep! I could barely breathe. The sudden flash of an arty round was followed by the roar of its explosion almost instantly, and my original fear became abject terror from one heartbeat to the next. I heard a whine, like a trapped animal, and I realized it was coming from me. They would hear me! They would hear me and come for me like Nelson! They'd find me and I'd get disappeared just like him and our guys'd get picked off one by one when they came tome look for me and they'd find me one piece at a time hacked apart and my face would be frozen in pain when they found my head like I found Nelson and--! I clapped my hands over my mouth in the humid blackness to silence my gear; I couldn't even see my hands that close to my face, it was so dark. ... It always got so dark out here...

"You okay, hon?" Donna's voice was fuzzy and sleepy beside me...and as loud as a tank. What the fuck was SHE doing here?!

Another artillery round went off on the other side of her, and in the flash I saw the silhouette right next to her. I rolled over top of her like we had been taught and grabbed the gook by the throat. Donna screamed in surprise and shock as I tackled the shadow to the deck in the darkness. I slammed his head against the hard ground repeatedly, hearing him scream. Nobody was going to disappear again while I was on watch!

I pounded and pounded, and he stopped moving...but the screaming continued: "Where's Nelson?! Where the fuck is my friend, you son of a bitch?! Where's Nelson...?!"

I was crying and screaming in the dark at the VC beneath me. Another artillery flash--

--But no explosion this time. Why couldn't I hear the explosion? And another silent flash. Not arty...lightning. Not artillery in southeast Asia, but lightning in my bedroom. Not arty in the bush with a creeping Cong dead in my hands, but a thunderstorm, oh God! A thunderstorm! Lightning in my bedroom and my God, oh God! It wasn't the VC! In those flickers of light from the window I could see the face of my little boy on the ground beneath me, surrounded by the blood from his head, his face, oh please God no! His face was still frozen in pain and fear, just like Nelson...!

***---***

Lieutenant Gannon sat stunned and speechless as the stout man with the close-cropped hair, lean muscles, and tattoos sobbed and shook in front of him. The wife was at the hospital, under observation herself. The doctors had had to give her a massive dose of valium to bring her out of her hysteria; she wouldn't let go of her nine-year-old son's battered, lifeless body in the emergency room. She bared her teeth and growled at anyone who tried to calm her, "Leave him alone! He's scared of storms, and he can sleep in my bed if he wants!"

Gannon closed the folder on the table in front of him and shook his head sadly. "Mr. Lavette--Bill... Jesus, Bill. I'm...I'm afraid you're under arrest for the homicide of your son."

Gannon's old friend, Bill Lavette, up until thirteen months ago a sergeant in the USMC, looked at him in anguish. He was still sobbing as he turned around and put his hands behind his back.

As Gannon clicked the cuffs around the man's arms, he fought very hard against the urge to cry himself. He managed to keep it together until the deputies had walked Lavette out of the room and down the hall. Then he sat down in the chair his old pal had been sitting in and began to silently weep.

After a while his own tears tapered off, and he was left with one impotent, forlorn thought.

"We lost a lot more than the war over there. Jesus Christ, we lost so much more than someone else's war..."