House to House: A Tale of Modern War (36 page)

When I left for Iraq in early June, he barely even spoke to me.

I stared out the plane’s window for a while before finally falling asleep in my seat. The flight attendants left me alone, but my slumber was restless and full of anxious dreams. In the back of my mind, I wondered if I’d pushed things too far, done too much damage this time.

An hour later, we made our final approach into Buffalo from JFK in New York. The plane circled, then touched down. I was moments from facing…what? Will Evan be hostile? Will he fear me like he did all those other times I came home?

The passengers deplane and head up the gate. I stay in my seat perhaps longer than I should. Almost the last one off, I grab my overnight bag and walk for the terminal. Each step brings more trepidation.

Have I lost him again?

I see Evan and Deanna waiting for me on the other side of the security gates. Evan’s face is bereft of expression. I can hardly hold the tears back.

Deanna offers a warm hug and a passionate kiss. I want so desperately to make this work. I need her to know how much I love her. Despite everything, despite who I am and how I react, I love her with such depth that I gave up the one thing that made me feel useful and important for her, and for our son. I am no longer a soldier. This is my gift for them. But is it too late? And do they see it as a gift?

Evan stares at me.

I try to hug him. He takes a step back. I pause, my heart in my throat. I’ve got to reach out to him, let myself be vulnerable. I find the courage, but he backs up again.

“You can’t go to Iraq anymore.”

“I know.”

He looks up at Deanna, then back to me. “Did you fight bad guys? You told me you weren’t.” His voice is suspicious, full of accusation. He doesn’t trust me, and I don’t blame him for that.

“No, Evan. I didn’t fight bad guys.”

I can’t bring myself to tell him the complete truth. I want so desperately to go back into this fight. I miss it every day. I always felt I could change the world with a rifle in my hands and our flag on my shoulder.

“Did you get shot?” he looks me over, apparently searching for bullet wounds.

I grin a little. “No, Bud, I didn’t get shot.”

“People get shot in Iraq.”

“Yes, they do.” It strikes me then that Evan for the first time has a grasp on the dangers that are faced over there. He’s six now, and the world is coming into focus for him.

“People get shot, Daddy. They
die.
Bad guys kill them.”

I think of Edward Iwan and Sean Sims. “Yeah, I know they do, Evan.”

He takes a tentative step toward me. Deanna’s holding her breath. So am I. He sharpens his gaze and looks me right in the eyes. I can’t remember the last time he’s done this.

“You know why you didn’t get shot?”

I’m surprised by the strength of his tone. He’s trying to be tough with me. All I can do is shake my head.

“’Cause I saved you, ’kay? It was
me.
”

I start to laugh, but I see he is utterly serious. I humor him. “You did. You saved me. Give me a big hug. I love you.”

He steps into my arms and I crush him close. But he’s not finished. “No more going to Iraq. Iraq is done, got it?”

I start to cry.

“Bad guys are done. They lost.” His voice is even stronger. He’s lecturing me, showing me what he needs. I’m so proud he’s found the courage to do this; all I can do is hold him. He’s making it clear he will not be victimized by my comings and goings anymore. He’s drawn the line.

I chose family this time. I chose Evan.

He really did save me.

I break our embrace and kiss his forehead.

“I love you, Daddy.”

His eyes start to water, but he ignores the tears. He’s being tough. He’s being proud. He’s being
my son.

We turn, hand in hand, and depart the terminal as a family.

Spring 2007

The old woman in Fallujah, the final reunion with Evan and Deanna at the airport, these twin moments brought me to where I am today. Evan no longer tells people I fight bad guys for a living. When asked, he tells his friends that his dad talks on the phone a lot and vacuums on occasion. I smile and laugh and go back to working on this book. I wrote it so someday, when he is old enough, he will understand his father at last. And perhaps he’ll share that insight with his younger brother. Four months after I came back from Iraq for the last time, Deanna broke the news that she was pregnant.

I am a father now above all else. I’ve embraced my new life and made my peace with the old one. I will always be unapologetic for what it took to beat our enemies in Iraq and win my battles. I sleep through the night. God and I have had our heart-to-heart.

I don’t have the nightmares that I read other veterans are having. None of my old friends do either. I don’t dream about seven-foot insurgents chasing me down Iraqi streets. And yet I think about Iraq almost every day of my life. Almost every dream I have is about Iraq, but none of them are bad. There will constantly be regret, sorrow for those we lost, but never nightmares. I will always hate war, but will be forever proud of mine.

When the wind blows just right, sometimes I close my eyes and still envision a heat-scorched stretch of highway. There is a watchtower burning in the distance. It is Highway South Five, the checkpoint we couldn’t save from destruction back in Muqdadiyah almost three years ago. My platoon stands on both sides of the road. Bullets are heard in the distance, but there isn’t any danger. Each soldier I pass stares at me for what seems like an eternity. Their faces are covered in sweat and soot. They just stare at me expressionless and move to the side as I pass. Fitss spits dip juice onto the road. Captain Sean Sims and Doug Walter look up at me from their map. Sergeant Major fixes his boot lace. And Lieutenant Ed Iwan nods at me. As the smoke from the burning checkpoint billows up from behind, the images from my past get smaller and smaller. Until, finally, all is open road.

I have permission to move on.

For now, I look forward to the time when Evan and his younger brother can play together. I see them in the backyard, both clad in boy-sized desert camo, low-crawling through the grass as they ambush neighborhood kids, playing the bad guys, and save the day. Each attack executed to the pinnacle of absolute doctrinal perfection, a perfection that only a well-rehersed combat element can unleash. Evan cooks off the pine cone grenade as his brother lays down plunging suppressive fire. Each boy will have his own Bellavia nametape on his chest. Each face camouflaged in tiger stripes. Evan, after all, means “little warrior.” As for my youngest son, Aiden, he carries the middle name of an unsung but still great American hero: Edward Iwan.

Aiden Edward Bellavia.

May he grow to be half the patriot of his namesake.

Appendix

They sacrificed so that we may all live without interruption from comfort.

Our fallen warriors:

Brief Glossary of Terms

Abrams:
The M1A2 Abrams is the U.S. Army’s main battle tank. Equipped with a 120mm gun, a .50 caliber and two 7.62mm machine guns, and reactive armor, it is the finest armored vehicle in the world today.

AK-47:
The most widely used rifle in the world. This is the standard assault rifle of the Islamist insurgent in Iraq and Afghanistan. The 7.62mm AK-47 is tough, durable, and can be fired in both full auto and single-shot mode.

AT4:
Light antitank weapon armed with the 84mm high-explosive antitank (HEAT) warhead. Although not designed to do so, the M136 AT4 was used in Iraqi Freedom as a tool to destroy built-up enemy positions.

Bradley:
The Bradley Fighting Vehicle is both an armored infantry transport and a tracked, heavy-support weapon. It is equipped with a 25mm cannon mounted in a fully transversable turret, an M240C 7.62mm machine gun, and wire-guided antitank missiles. It can carry a squad plus of infantry inside its rear bay and is the standard vehicle for every mechanized infantry unit in the U.S. Army.

Cyclic:
Firing an infantry weapon fully automatic for a considerable period of time. Usually, such weapons are fired in short, disciplined bursts to ensure accuracy and ammunition conservation.

Fatal Funnel:
Doorways. In house-to-house, room-to-room fighting, doorways are deadly places for assaulting infantrymen. Going through a doorway leaves the infantryman at his most vulnerable. He cannot get support from his buddies, and the enemy usually has their weapons zeroed on these entrances. During Fallujah, virtually an entire squad from 2–7 Cav went down in one doorway during an ambush.

Frag:
A fragmentation hand grenade has a blast radius of five meters.

JDAM:
Joint Direct Attack Munition. This is a fancy way of saying “Smart Bomb.” Air-launched by Navy or Air Force planes, the JDAM guides itself to the target based on global positioning system satellite data. It can be dropped in any weather, including fog and low cloud cover. Other smart bombs, such as those guided by lasers, cannot be used in overcast conditions.