Mass Casualties: A Young Medic's True Story of Death, Deception, and Dishonor in Iraq (24 page)

The day goes on and more and more people get the shot, the main reason being that most don't want to lose their rank and throw away the careers they spent the last twenty years on. Dr. Bill comes in and says there are two patients on the way from the ER, GSWs. He then tells Reto and me that only a handful of people throughout our four-hundred-person unit have still refused the shot.

“Lot of good our fucking pamphlets did …” Reto says, turning around to grab instruments for the cases.

I tell him to be quiet and help him with the instruments. There have been a few people around the hospital talking about the pamphlets. They're the same people also saying that the GOBs are looking for those who did it. Reto and I have done research and found out that what we did (encouraging people to refuse a direct order) is considered mutinous and a jailable offense in itself, so even if we got the shots, we could still go to jail if anyone finds out that we hung the fliers.

1400 HOURS, OR

After a five-hour surgery, I am exhausted. I see Gagney and Reto sitting at a table in the break room. “Have a seat!” Gagney says.

I am in no mood to listen to his shit, but I slowly take a seat.

“Listen guys. Tomorrow is your final day to refuse. You and a few other idiots are the only ones left. Smarten up. Don't make things hard on yourselves. Do you want to go to jail? Be a good little soldier. Do what you're told” As he leaves, he is very calm.

“Oh, and by the way …” he says looking over his shoulder, “I looked it up in the regulations, and you can legally be shot for refusing a direct order during a time of war. We could take you out back and shoot you tomorrow; just something to think about, I know I have….”

I look at Reto and I know that he won't back down. They can't use scare tactics to force us to take the shot. The question is no longer whether or not the shot is safe, it's do we succumb to their threats? We are here to be men and fight for our country, not for the land that it is on, but for the virtues that it stands on: liberty and freedom.

1500 HOURS, MY ROOM

It's comforting to finally know the answer. No more seesawing back and forth in my mind. On the way to our rooms Reto and I talk about sports, the weather, anything that will let our minds escape what's going on. When we get back to the room, I smoke four cigarettes and take three sleeping pills. Not surprisingly, I still can't sleep. I decide to go outside and smoke the rest of the cigarettes in my pack. I take two more pills. My mind is restless no matter what I do. I'm afraid I'll overdose. I look over at Markham in bed and I want to wake him up. I want to talk to him; I want him to tell me I'm doing the right thing. I lie back down.

My mind begins racing and echoing every thought and fear I've had over the past few days.

I figure the worst that can really happen is that I find myself in jail in a few days. I know I can handle jail. I will just spend my time reading and writing. Mandela was in jail for three decades.

The worst thing that could happen in jail is another inmate tries to rape me. I decide I won't let that happen and I'll die fighting. I might soon be dead because, worst-case scenario, I find myself in jail and someone tries to rape me … and I don't let them and I die fighting … and I don't die from a mortar attack or a terrorist … instead, I die for what … an ideal … a belief … is it worth it… ? is anything worth it… ?

WEEK 4, DAY 5, IRAQ

0900 HOURS, OR

It's 0900 and the sun is already shining. It hurts my eyes and burns my skin. Reto walks toward me, and I can tell by the bags under his eyes that he didn't sleep well either.

“I'm out of cigarettes,” I say. He takes two out of his pack and hands me one. We light up.

“Listen, man, I'll understand if …” he trails off.

“Let's just go,” my voice gives me away. I force myself to look at Reto, and I'm surprised to see that it looks like he wants to give in. He's silently begging me to give in.

We're not going to cave. We are going to refuse the shot for the final time. We know the possible consequences and we are ready.

Something starts happening after I realize that we'll actually be refusing for the final time. My body feels strange. I've never felt this before. I'm scared of the feeling, but I like it. My head is floating up as if it's attached to a balloon. My shoulders are back. Twenty-one years old and my father would be proud.

“You know, there's got to be some type of middle ground here. Things are never 100 percent black and white,” Reto says.

“What do you mean?”

“Look, there's got to be some way we can beat them at their own game without getting the shots and without going to jail….”

As soon as he says this, I think of something. I am a complete idiot. Reto is an idiot. I start laughing. Reto looks at me. I laugh harder. Reto is smiling.

“What, what, man? What's so funny … ?” I laugh harder. Reto is smiling a huge smile. He can tell I thought of something. I calm myself down enough to talk.

“We are fucking idiots.”

“What, man?”

“This will work. Why the hell didn't you mention this middle ground shit before? You know you could have saved us a lot of worrying. And I could have saved about four packs of cigarettes….”

“Tell me.”

I grab two pieces of paper.

“Follow me.”

We start walking.

“My roommate Markham doesn't have to get the shot because he had an adverse reaction to some shot and he's allergic to latex.”

We walk in the hospital and toward the doctors' break room. I always knew that working side by side with these doctors day-in day-out would have its benefits.

I walk up to Dr. Bill with Reto following closely behind. We look like two schoolgirls, excited and giggling. I whisper in Bill's ear, hand him the two pieces of paper, and he hands them to a friend sitting next to him. The friend signs them. Reto and I are now allergic to latex. I almost cry as Reto and I run back toward the building for our anthrax shots. We hand our paper to the person who's supposed to be administering the shots, and we turn and run back to the OR.

Gagney stops us as we are entering the OR.

“Hey. Not so fast. Why are you two clowns smiling? Did you get those shots!?!”

Reto and I look at Gagney. Not even he can ruin this moment.

“Yeah, we took care of it,” I say.

MONTH 8

“I NEED SOME THING TO TAKE THE EDGE OFF.”

WEEK 1, DAY 5, IRAQ

1800 HOURS, SLEEPING AREA

Socrates once said that the unexamined life is not worth living; however, he ended up having to kill himself because he wouldn't compromise his way of life. I wonder if it could then be said that he examined life and found it not worth living.

Today I'm celebrating my twenty-first birthday. Actually, my birthday was last month, but I didn't celebrate or mark the occasion. I think it's finally time for me to examine my life.

WEEK 1, DAY 7, IRAQ

2200 HOURS, OR

We've been on second shift for two days now and not a single case has come in; first shift, however, has been getting at least six a day. It's boring, which is why we are playing baseball inside the hall of the OR.

“HOME RUN!!!” Reto yells as he throws his broom handle baseball bat to the ground and runs for first base on our makeshift field. I chase after the baseball, a rolled-up Ace bandage, and Reto runs from first to second base. “That's not a home run,” I yell as Reto goes from second to third base. “A home run is when you hit it over the door frame, and that was under it.”

Reto doesn't listen and heads for home plate anyway, which is a crumpled up pair of pants.

The OR door slams. Reto and I look to see who it is to make sure that we're not getting in trouble. We invented our OR version of baseball yesterday, and we've already gotten three complaints about the noise. We look over, though, and are relieved when we see it's just Proust, a specialist and a medic in the ER. He's twenty-two but looks about seventeen — six feet tall, white, and has a pot belly and random tattoos all over his body. He also lived in my barracks in Wisconsin and always walked around naked. He also masturbated at least twice a day — I know this because he would announce it so that he could have some privacy in the bathroom. I didn't like the fact that he walked around naked, but I did like the fact that Denti had to sleep next to him. It was funny to hear stories about Denti waking up to an eyeful of Proust's ass.

The dirt on him concerns raunchy e-mails he sent his girlfriend, Clementine. She's twenty-seven and a staff sergeant in charge of the supply section for our unit. She's about 5′8′ with washboard abs, dark Portuguese skin, and size D fake breasts that her ex-boyfriend bought her. For reasons unbeknownst to any of us, nobody in the command (especially First Sergeant Mardine) likes Proust or Clementine, and the second it was found out that they were a couple, they were forbidden from seeing each other and put on separate shifts so that one would be sleeping while the other worked.

Long story short, Proust and Clementine couldn't see each other so they e-mailed each other really raunchy, nasty messages. This girl Consuela, who works in supply with Clementine, hates her because Clementine wants Consuela's job. Clementine works late one night and reads the e-mails from Proust. She gets horny and decides to “take care of herself” in the bathroom. While she's there, Consuela walks in and sees the computer on. Proust's email is still on the screen, so she prints off twenty copies of this completely raunchy e-mail. I mean, Proust was talking about all the toys he wants to use on her and vice versa. Around midnight, Consuela takes the copies of the e-mail and tapes them to the back of all the bathroom doors — male and female.

First Sergeant Mardine sees the papers on the doors and orders someone to take them down. Consuela is sent down south, and Clementine is fired from being in charge of supply. She is now First Sergeant Mardine's assistant so that she can “keep an eye on her.”