Paradise General (24 page)

Some tears flowed. Others stood with concrete faces. His unit was outside waiting for word of his condition. It was tough telling them that we did all we could but it still wasn't enough. We felt like failures as we watched their shoulders sag and lips get bitten. This unit had already suffered too many losses during the Surge—now came one more.

One soldier stepped forward, shook our hands, and murmured thanks. Then he and his buddies wandered off to let it all sink in. There would be an empty cot in their barracks that night. Loved ones back home would have an empty room. And countless lives would forever have a big hole that could never be filled.

The next day we got together as a group in the musty tent and beat ourselves up as we reviewed everything we had done and maybe could have done better. But in the end, though, we realized we had done everything right in a case that was destined for wrong. The angry accusations were forgiven and forgotten.

Nonetheless, the death of the young soldier hurt with a pain none of us could put into words. We are not gods. Sometimes we make mistakes. And even when we don't, we suffer because we are not able to undo the damage one human can inflict on another. Each of us would see this young man's face the rest of our lives. But his family would be the ones that missed his face the most.

The loss dominated everything we did over the next few days though we knew we had to move on without distraction. Other wounded needed us to be at the top of our game.

Bill and I eventually made our way over to a grassy field for our long-awaited game of catch. It was much-needed therapy on our own field of dreams. For brief periods, we talked about our families, our lives back home, and how we doctors were blessed to have each other, on good days and bad. The unique smell of a leather baseball glove pressed against my nose was a welcome distraction from the pain of the war.

Most of the time, there was a simple silence as we tossed the ball back and forth, lost in our own thoughts and questions. I wondered where the soldier was now. What happens after you die? How is his family doing? What about all their plans for the future? What were this kid's final thoughts as he lapsed into death?

Just thinking about it gave me a headache, but as the catch continued, my time will Bill brought serenity. It's funny how the great American invention of playing catch is so simple and pure. It made me wonder if we should have the Shiites and Sunnis pick up a ball and a mitt, and make them play catch until they decide to stop fighting. Better yet, maybe we should have all world leaders step onto the lawn of the U.N. and toss a ball around until they solve out their self-manufactured troubles.

The rhythmic “thwop … thwop … thwop” of a scuffed baseball smacking the web of a broken-in glove is without question a sound of peace. And our world could sure use a good game of catch.

I
N PAST WARS
, the lifeline to home was prehistoric: snail-mailed letters and packages trapped by months in transit. No news wasn't necessarily good news, a lot of fingernails were gnawed to the nub as both sides waited for the postman to appear with the written words of a loved one.

We were fighting in the new millennium of war; not only did we have the latest and greatest weaponry and imagery, we had the Internet and a satellite phone system to keep us in liberal contact with the home front. In the case of the 399th, we were extra lucky: the hospital had its own phone tent with a few snail-like computers thrown in for Internet access. It was cramped, it was hot, but it was ours.

The compromise was privacy. We couldn't help but overhear who was struggling with the strain of too many absent hugs and kisses. We Reserve docs were fortunate; our deployments were a short three and a half months compared to the ungodly fifteen-month tours the rest of the hospital were trapped in. Our interminable waits for the phones and computers were all too often uncomfortable, overhearing the latest arguments over things that probably wouldn't have been arguments if the two sides were face-to-face. There were a lot of
conversations top-heavy with quarrels and spats, many triggered by unspoken loneliness and worry.

As we'd sit and wait our turn for the phone, we'd bury our faces in a newspaper and make believe we didn't notice the shouting, with one side stressed over the blown-up soldiers seen that day, the other fretting over coping alone with the day-to-day troubles at home. And the younger the couple, the louder the screaming. The calls were cyclically predictable—a calm start, a raised voice, followed by a rapid escalation to a steadily increasing volume of anger and cursing. Then came a gradual easing of tensions, with softer words, and a few “I love you”s, followed by the hang-up.

If the hang-up prematurely became a phone slam-down early in the conversation—before the “I love you”—we'd always let the aggrieved party cut in line and hop back on the phone after they had a chance to go outside and walk off their anger. The rule was simple: never leave a phone call angry.

My daily phone calls went smoothly for the most part, with only a rare harsh word. My family had already been through a tough deployment back in 2004, so they knew the rules of the game, as did I. Keep it light and try to avoid pressuring either side about anything non-life-threatening.

The last time I was in Iraq, I never told them about the hours spent on the road, or the shotgun that sometimes traveled with my medical pack. They didn't hear about the rocket that landed yards away, blowing other soldiers up but missing me—until I was safe in the living room of my home. I stretched the truth constantly about where I was and what I did, but this time I knew I had to walk the straight-and-narrow road of truth; they were veterans themselves and wouldn't be fooled. But fudging wasn't necessary—this deployment was easier and my position on the danger scale was near zero.

The toughest call I had the entire deployment was with my mom early one Sunday morning. It's tough being a parent, especially when you have a son or daughter in a combat zone, and I've learned there's
little difference whether the child is nineteen or fifty.

I stopped in the phone tent minutes before the start of my shift. It was still Saturday night in America, and my extended family were gathered in Wisconsin for the wedding of my niece Megan. The entire clan traveled across the country to get together for the first time in years, and I was the only one not there. I sat in the steamy tent in a rickety folding chair, speaking to each as they snuck from a rocking dance floor into a quiet closet at the banquet hall.

As I worked my way down the line of celebrating relatives, a seeping emptiness and loneliness added miles to the thousands already separating the hall from my hospital. Then, in the middle of an emotional black hole, I was rescued by a dose of the most potent of medicines: my mom's voice.

She's eighty-seven years old, and has suffered more than her share of war in her life, starting with my dad. They were married in August 1943 and he shipped out just three days later. Months were spent sitting by the window, futilely waiting for the postman to come. There was nary a word for eight excruciating months—then came two short letters, and even they were heavily censored; the first had only three words survive: Okay, love, Steve. It wasn't much, but it was at least enough for that one day. The second letter was a few sentences longer and was sent from a hospital in Naples, where he was recovering after being wounded by artillery.

Her youngest brother, Artie, was a soldier in Korea in 1950. He almost froze to death after being wounded and left for dead in some battle for a hill with no name.

Her next worry was my older brother, Steve. He was in Vietnam in 1967, the longest year of her life as a mother. Steve, like many other veterans of that war, was forgotten and unappreciated by our nation. But not by the mothers who waited for them to come home.

Then I threw her for a major loop when I joined the Army Medical Corps in 2003. She couldn't understand why I would do such a thing at my age, asking “Didn't I know better?” All I could say was that it
seemed like the right thing to do.

At her age, my mom isn't as sharp as she used to be, but she knew clearly where I was, what I was doing, and had the same questions about the war as many Americans. We only talked for a few minutes; I told her I loved and missed her and she returned the sentiment, and then added how proud she was that I was taking care of young soldiers. She then handed the phone off to my sister, who told me Mom left the cramped room with a new spring to her tired steps and a peaceful calm in her eyes. I think she just needed to hear my voice telling her I was fine and I was safe.

I wiped away a few tears. The brief conversation triggered flashbacks of being a kid and my mom taking care of me: playing peek-a-boo, walking me to grade school, taking me for my driver's test, and hugging me tightly at my dad's funeral. Quick little snippets that packed a nostalgic punch. I realized, no matter what the age, sometimes a guy just needs his mom to tell him everything will be okay.

As my sister and I talked, the tent began to shake with the vibration of an incoming bird. It was time to get back to the war and take care of some other mom's child.

I hoped my eyes didn't show the redness of homesick tears. I kept my head down as I grabbed my gloves and stethoscope and headed to my position in Alpha bay.

The stretchers carried two soldiers; both had been hit by an IED and their vehicle had caught fire after the blast. One had a wafting odor of burnt meat rising from his body. Fire not only meant charred flesh, but superheated air sucked into lungs. I now had to worry about inhalation injuries along with the burns on the skin.

I leaned in closely as the medics cut away his blackened uniform.

“What's your name, buddy?”

“Antonio.”

“I'm Dr. Hnida, Antonio. Where you from?”

“California, just outside of L.A. Near the beach.”

“Kind of like here. Lots of sand, but I think you forgot to bring the ocean.”

His mouth bent into a small, crooked grin—his teeth extra white against the smoke-stained skin of his face.

So far so good. I needed to look at the burns a little closer, but at least I knew he could talk—and if he could talk, he could breathe—and if he could breathe, his airways weren't fried shut. And a smile told me he wasn't going anywhere bad soon. He'd need some surgery to clean up his wounds and a close eye to make sure his airways didn't swell over the next several hours.

“Hey, I'm going over to your buddy. Just tell the folks if you need more pain medicine. You're going to be fine. Why don't you read some old magazines from 1972 we keep in our waiting room.”

Out came a small chuckle that had to hurt the burnt flesh.

“Thanks, Doc.”

“Don't thank me yet; wait until you get my bill. I get time and a half on the weekend.”

I scooted around the cluster of medics starting IVs and cleaning the wounds.

Kneeling down at the next stretcher, I saw the wide eyes of a terrified soldier. This morning young and invincible, now scared and vulnerable.

“Hey, buddy, I'm Dr. Hnida. And me and my crew are going to get you all fixed up.”

There were two rules I needed to follow when dealing with the wounded. The first was introducing myself as “Dr. Hnida.” Iraq was the first place I'd ever done that, I usually wanted people to call me “Dave.” But if there was one thing I learned about medical care in a combat zone, it was a wounded soldier wanted a “Doctor” to take care of them—not a “Dave,” or even a “Major” for that matter.

The second rule was to make sure that one buddy always knew how the other buddy was doing. Sure, a soldier was worried about his wound, but he always seemed to fret more about the unknown injuries
of a friend on the neighboring stretcher.

“Antonio is fine and says hi. So he's good. How about you?”

“Man, I hurt, especially my leg.”

“It looks a little gnarly but it isn't going anywhere. We'll take a couple of X-rays and square you away. Hey, what's your name and where you from?”

“Todd. From Indiana.”

“It rings a bell. In America, right?”

“Yes, sir,” he chuckled. “Right smack in the middle.”

“Well, Todd, you're going to be on crutches for a while but nothing is going to fall off when you walk around back home in the land of Hoosiers.”

I turned to the medics after finishing my exam.

“Let's grab some films. Please give Dr. Stanton a call for Mr. Todd here and Dr. Nunnally for Mr. Antonio.”

I went over and parked myself at my desk. One of the medics wandered over and told me he was the bearer of bad news. Oh damn.

“Sir, some strange goings-on around camp the last couple of days. I mean, this is all rumor, you understand. But anyway, seems Moe, Larry, and Curly had a few mishaps.”

Ah, the revenge of the medics.

“Yeah, it seems Moe was sitting in a porta-john when a truck backed up against the door. Heard he was stuck for a while in the heat and stink. People walking by must have thought they were hearing things. A lot of yelling coming from the house of poop.”

I didn't want to know any more details. But I certainly enjoyed the mental portrait of a screaming man stuck in 130-degree stench.

“Then Larry was taking a shower over in the trailer. Somebody must have taken his towel and clothes by mistake. Heard he had to streak back to the barracks. With that body, heard it was ugly. PTSD ugly.”

That was a picture I didn't want to see.

“Then the air conditioner ghost came by the barracks. You know,
the one who plays with the air-conditioning fuse box. Flips a switch. Turns it off. Guy comes out of his sizzling-hot room only to hear the air start running again when the fuse is flipped back on. Man, when that happens fifteen, twenty times, gotta be aggravating. That ghost sure must have been mad at Curly.”