Forrest Gump (7 page)

Bubba say he’d hep me carry my shit down to the bus depot, but I say I’d rather go alone. “Keep in touch,” he say. Anyhow, on the way to the bus station, I pass by the Student Union store, but it ain’t Friday night, an Jenny Curran’s band is not playin, so I say, the hell with it, an catch the bus on home.

It was late at night when the bus got to Mobile. I had not tole my mama what had happened, cause I knew she’d be upset, so I walk on home, but they is a light on up in her room an when I get inside, they she is, crying and bawling jus like I remember. What had happen, she tell me, is that the United States Army has already heard bout me not makin my grades, an that very day a notice done come for me to report to the U.S. Army Induction Center. If I had known then what I know now, I would never had done it.

My mama take me down there a few days later. She has packed me a box lunch in case I get hungry on the way to wherever we is going. They is about a hundrit guys standin aroun an four or five busses waiting. A big ole sergeant be hollerin an yellin at everbody, an Mama goes up to him an says, “I don’t see how you can take my boy—cause he’s a
idiot
,” but the sergeant jus look back at her an say, “Well, lady, what do you think all these other people is? Einsteins?” an he gone on back to hollerin an yellin. Pretty soon he yell at me, too, an I git on the bus an away we went.

Ever since I lef the nut school people been shoutin at me—Coach Fellers, Coach Bryant an the goons, an now the people in the Army. But let me say this: them people in the Army yell longer an louder an nastier than anybody else. They is
never
happy. An furthermore, they do not complain that you
is dumb or stupid like coaches do—they is more interested in your private parts or bowel movements, an so always precede they yellin with somethin like “dickhead” or “asshole.” Sometimes I wonder if Curtis had been in the Army before he went to play football.

Anyhow, after about a hundrit hours on the bus we get to Fort Benning, Georgia, an all I’m thinkin is 35 to 3, the score when we whupped them Georgia Dogs. The conditions in the barracks is actually a little better than they was in the Ape Dorm, but the food is not—it is terrible, altho there is a lot of it.

Other than that, it was just doin what they tole us an gettin yelled at in the months to come. They taught us to shoot guns, thow hand grenades an crawl aroun on our bellies. When we wadn’t doin that we was either runnin someplace or cleanin toilets an things. The one thing I remember from Fort Benning is that they didn’t seem to be nobody much smarter than I was, which was certainly a relief.

Not too long after I arrive, I get put on KP, on account of I have accidentally shot a hole in the water tower when we was down at the rifle range. When I get to the kitchen, it seems the cook is took sick or somethin, an somebody point to me an say, “Gump, you is gonna be the cook today.”

“What I’m gonna cook?” I axed. “I ain’t never cooked before.”

“Who cares,” somebody say, “This ain’t the Sans Souci, y’know.”

“Why don’t you make a stew?” Somebody else say. “It’s easier.”

“What of?” I axed.

“Look in the icebox an the pantry,” the feller say, “Just thow in everthin you see an boil it up.”

“What if it don’t taste good?” I axed.

“Who gives a shit. You ever eat anythin around here that did?”

In this, he is correct.

Well, I commenced to get everthin I could from the iceboxes an the pantry. They was cans of tomatos an beans an peaches an bacon an rice an bags of flour an sacks of potatoes an I don’t know what all else. I gathered it all together an say to one of the guys, “What I’m gonna cook it in?”

“They is some pots in the closet,” he say, but when I looked in the closet, they is jus small pots, an certainly not large enough to cook a stew for two hundrit men in the company.

“Why don’t you axe the lieutenant?” somebody say.

“He’s out in the field on maneuvers,” come the reply.

“I don’t know,” say one feller, “but when them guys get back here today, they gonna be damn hungry, so you better think of somethin.”

“What about this?” I axed. They was an enormous iron thing bout six feet high an five feet aroun settin in the corner.

“That? That’s the goddamn steam boiler. You can’t cook nothin in there.”

“How come,” I say.

“Well, I dunno. I jus wouldn do it if I was you.”

“It’s hot. It’s got water in it.” I says.

“Do what you want,” somebody say, “we got other shit to do.”

An so I used the steam boiler. I opened all the cans an peeled all the potatoes an thowed in whatever meat I could find an onions an carrots an poured in ten or twenty bottles of catsup an mustard an all. After bout a hour, you could begin to smell the stew cookin.

“How’s the dinner comin?” somebody axed after a wile.

“I’ll go taste it,” I say.

I unfastened the lid to the boiler an there it was, you could see all the shit bubblin an boilin up, an ever so often a onion or a potato woud come to the top an float aroun.

“Let me taste it,” a feller axed. He took a tin cup an dip out some stew.

“Say, this shit ain’t near done yet,” he says. “You better turn up the heat. Them fellers’ll be here any minute.”

So I turned up the heat on the boiler an sure enough, the company begun comin in from the field. You coud hear them in the barracks takin showers an gettin dressed for the evenin meal, an it weren’t long afterward that they begun arrivin in the mess hall.

But the stew still wadnt ready. I tasted it again an some things was still raw. Out in the mess hall they begun a kind of disgruntled mumblin that soon turned to chantin an so I turned the boiler up again.

After a haf hour or so, they was beatin on the tables with they knives an forks like in a prison riot, an I knowed I had to do somethin fast, so I turned the boiler up high as it could go.

I’m settin there watchin it, so nervous I didn’t know what to do, when all of a sudden the first sergeant come bustin thru the door.

“What in hell is goin on here?” he axed. “Where is these men’s food?”

“It is almost ready, Sergeant,” I say, an jus about then, the boiler commenced to rumble an shake. Steam begun to come out of the sides an one of the legs on the boiler tore loose from the floor.

“What is that?” the sergeant axed. “Is you cookin somethin in that
boiler!
”

“That is the supper,” I says, an the sergeant got this real amazed look on his face, an a secont later, he got a real frightened look, like you might get jus before an automobile wreck, an then the boiler blew up.

I am not exactly sure what happened nex. I do remember that it blowed the roof off the mess hall an blowed all the winders out an the doors too.

It blowed the dishwasher guy right thru a wall, an the guy
what was stackin plates jus took off up in the air, sort of like Rocket Man.

Sergeant an me, we is miraculously spared somehow, like they say will happen when you are so close to a han grenade that you aren’t hurt by it. But somehow it blowed both our clothes off, cept for the big chef’s hat I was wearin at the time. An it blowed stew all over us, so’s we looked like—well, I don’t know what we looked like—but man, it was strange.

Incredibly, it didn’t do nothin to all them guys settin out there in the mess hall neither. Jus lef em settin at they tables, covered with stew, actin kinda shell-shocked or somethin—but it sure did shut their asses up about when they food is gonna be ready.

Suddenly the company commander come runnin into the buildin.

“What was that!” he shouted. “What happen?” He look at the two of us, an then holler, “Sergeant Kranz, is that you?”

“Gump—Boiler—Stew!” the sergeant say, an then he kind of git holt of hissef an grapped a meat cleaver off the wall.

“Gump—Boiler—Stew!” he scream, an come after me with the cleaver. I done run out the door, an he be chasin me all over the parade grounds, an even thru the Officer’s Club an the Motorpool. I outrunned him tho, cause that is my specialty, but let me say this: they ain’t no question in my mind that I am up the creek for sure.

One night, the next fall, the phone rung in the barracks an it was Bubba. He say they done dropped his atheletic scholarship cause his foot broke worst than they thought, an so he’s leavin school too. But he axed if I can git off to come up to Birmingham to watch the University play them geeks from Mississippi. But I am confined to quarters that Saturday, as I have been ever weekend since the stew blowed up and that’s
nearly a year. Anyway, I cannot do it, so I listen to the game on the radio while I’m scrubbin out the latrine.

The score is very close at the end of the third quarter, an Snake is having hissef a big day. It is 38 to 37 our way, but the geeks from Mississippi score a touchdown with only one minute to go. Suddenly, its forth down an no more time-outs for us. I prayin silently that Snake don’t do what he done at the Orange Bowl, which is to thow the ball out of bounds on fourth down an lose the game again, but that is
exactly
what he done.

My heart sunk low, but suddenly they is all sorts of cheering so’s you can’t hear the radio announcer an when it is all quieted down, what happened was this: the Snake done
faked
an out of bounds pass on fourth down to stop the clock, but he
actually
give the ball to Curtis who run it in for the winning touchdown. That will give you some idea of jus how crafty Coach Bryant is. He done already figgered them geeks from Mississippi is so dumb they will assume
we
is stupid enough to make the same mistake twice.

I’m real happy bout the game, but I’m wonderin if Jenny Curran is watchin, an if she is thinkin of me.

As it turned out, it don’t matter anyhow, cause a month later we is shipped out. For nearly a year we has been trained like robots an are going to somewhere 10,000 miles away, an that is no exaggeration. We is going to Vietnam, but they says it is not nearly as bad as what we has gone thru this past year. As it turn out, tho, that
is
an exaggeration.

We got there in February an was trucked on cattle cars from Qui Nhon on the South China Sea coast up to Pleiku in the highlands. It wadnt a bad ride an the scenery was nice an interestin, with banana trees an palms an rice paddies with little gooks plowin in them. Everbody on our side is real friendly, too, wavin at us an all.

We could see Pleiku almost haf a day away on account of a
humongus cloud of red dust that hovered over it. On its outskirts was sad little shanties that is worst than anythin I seen back in Alabama, with folks huddled neath cloth lean-to’s an they ain’t got no teeth an they children ain’t got no clothes an basically, they is beggars. When we get to the Brigade Headquarters an Firebase, it don’t look real bad either, cept for all that red dust. Ain’t nothin much going on that we can see, an the place is all neat an clean with tents stretched far as you can see in rows an the dirt an sand aroun them raked up nice an tidy. Don’t hardly look like a war going on at all. We might as well of been back at Fort Benning.

Anyhow, they says it is real quiet cause it is the beginning of the gook new years—Tet, or somesuch—an they is a truce goin on. All of us is tremendously relieved, because we is frightened enough as it is. The peace and quiet, however, did not last very long.

After we get squared away in our area, they tell us to go down to Brigade Showers an clean ourselfs. Brigade Showers is just a shallow pit in the groun where they has put three or four big water tank trucks an we tole to fold our uniforms up on the edge of the pit an then get down in there an they will squirt us with water.

Even so, it ain’t haf bad, account of we been for nearly a week without a bath, an was beginnin to smell pretty ripe. We is assin aroun in the pit, gettin hosed down an all, an it is jus bout gettin dark, an all of a sudden there is this funny soun in the air an some jackoff who is squirting us with the hose holler,
“Incomin,”
and everbody on the edge of the pit vanish into thin air. We standin there butt neckid, lookin at each other, an then they is a big explosion close by an then another one, an everbody start shoutin and cussin an tryin to get to they clothes. Them incomin explosions fallin all aroun us, an somebody shoutin, “Hit the dirt!” which was kind of
rediculous since we was all press so flat in the bottom of the pit by now we resemble worms rather than people.

One of them explosions send a bunch of shit flyin into our pit an them boys on the far side get hit with it an start screamin an yellin an bleedin an grappin at theyselfs. It were all too apparent that the pit was not a safe place to be hidin. Sergeant Kranz suddenly appear over the edge of the pit, an he holler for all us to get the hell out of there an follow him. There is a little break between explosions an we haul ass out of the pit. I come over the top an look down an godamighty! Lyin there is four or five of the fellers who was squirtin the hose on us. They is hardly recognizable as people—all mangled up like they has been stuffed thru a cotton baler or somethin. I ain’t never seen nobody dead, an it is the most horrible and scary thing ever happen to me, afore or since!

Sergeant Kranz motion for us to crawl after him, which we do. If you could of looked down on it from above, we must of made a sight! A hundrit fifty or so fellers all butt neckid squirmin along the groun in a long line.

They was a bunch of foxholes dug in a row an Sergeant Kranz put three or four of us in each hole. But soon as we get in em, I realize I’d of almost rather stayed back in the pit. Them foxholes was filled waist stinkin deep with slimy ole water from the rain, an they was all sorts of frawgs an snakes and bugs crawlin an leapin an squirmin aroun in them.

It went on the entire night, an we had to stay in them foxholes an didn’t get no supper. Jus afore dawn, the shellin eased up, an we was tole to haul our asses outta the foxholes an get our clothes an weapons an prepare for the attack.

Since we was relatively new, they was really not much we could do—they didn’t even know where to put us, so they tole us to go guard the south perimeter, which is where the officers’ latrine was located. But it were nearly worse than the foxholes, account of one of the bombs has hit the latrine an
blowed up about five hundrit pounds of officer shit all over the area.