Fives and Twenty-Fives Page 7

  “Sure, man.” I dropped my identification card onto his clipboard.

  “Thank you.” The man checked my name on his clipboard and put the card under the silver clip. He pulled a new card from his pocket. “This is your new identification.” The card already had my picture. “I keep the old one. From now on, you only get your old identification when you go home on leave. No name on your new card. Just a number. This is for your safety and your family’s. Now, go down those stairs.”

  The man pointed to the door of the nearest bunker.

  I leaned in close and smiled. “Might I ask you a question, man?”

  “Sure,” he sighed. “Quickly, though.”

  “Where are you from?”

  He shrugged. “That’s not really something you ask around here. But, what the hell? America. Michigan.”

  “I’m sorry. I was not clear. I meant, you know, before then.”

  “Lebanon.”

  I laughed. Who was he trying to fool? The Americans? Believing Lebanon somehow sounded better than the truth?

  “Okay, man.” I said, walking to the bunker. “Try that on the ladies.”

  “What?”

  “Syria—that’s what you meant, right?” I reached the door and called over my shoulder. “When you get back to Damascus, though, tell that to the ladies. Lebanon! Invite them to the beach.”

  “Michigan,” he said sternly.

  “Yes, and I went to Jordan once. But I will always be from Baghdad.”

  The door opened to dark, steep stairs. I saw lights at the bottom and heard men laughing and speaking English. I dragged my hands along the walls and moved one step at a time while feeling for the steps’ edge with my right foot. I reached the bottom, turned the corner into a bright room, and understood at once the original purpose of this bunker. It was not some dirty hole, meant for simple storage. It was a luxury place built by Saddam, so his officers could shelter themselves from American bombs in their customary grandeur. And now, in this new Iraq, Saddam’s old adversaries had found it and made themselves quite comfortable.

  “Schlonak,” an American exclaimed. “Assalamu alaikum!”

  My vision returned fully, and I saw a civilian in cargo pants, boots, and a collared shirt with an embroidered corporate logo. I made special note that he did not wear a pistol. He was middle-aged but still in good shape, hands planted on his hips, his chest puffed out.

  A marine about the same age stood behind him; an officer, I guessed, from the shiny metal on his collar. He smiled and waved, as well.

  “Take a seat anywhere,” the civilian said. He gestured to the plastic chairs, in neat rows on the marble floor.

  “Okay.” I shrugged. I put my hands in my pockets and considered my options. The curses and heavy breathing of the old men coming down the steps grew louder.

  The officer spoke again. Just to me. To me alone. “Safe trip?”

  “Yes. Fine.”

  Deep in the bunker, down the long hallway behind the Americans, a man shouted. Angry Arabic words exchanged in the dark.

  “No worries,” the civilian said, pointing down the hall with his thumb. “Just, it gets a little loud back there sometimes. Don’t stress.”

  Out from the dark came an Arab man, older, fat, and mustached. He wore a marine’s uniform, but like the man with the sunglasses and the clipboard upstairs, he was not a marine. He stormed past the officer and his friend.

  “Liars.” He hissed, “No more liars today. Going to smoke.”

  The officer laughed and patted the angry man on the shoulder. “You’re a saint, Cadillac.”

  I remained still. Cadillac brushed against me on his way up the stairs.

  The officer turned to me. “Please, please. Min fadlak! Relax.”

  I did as he asked.

  And now, the old men came in, one at a time, breathing hard. When we were all seated, the civilian with the broad chest spoke. He greeted us in polite Arabic, as though he had practiced the one phrase all day. Then he switched back to English.

  “First, let me compliment your bravery. Even for what we pay, it is understood that you are heroes for this.” He stopped to look us each in the eye. “True Iraqi heroes. Also, let me say we know the dangers your families face. This is why, once you leave this bunker, you will not use your real names. Not to me. Not to Colonel Davis. Not to the marines you work with. We will provide each of you with a nom de guerre.” He shook his head and frowned. “Sorry. A fake name, that is.”

  I looked around the room. The old men nodded as though they understood any of this.

  “Okay.” The civilian examined his notes. “We need to discuss classifications. At Government Center in Ramadi, you were all classified by the intake marines. Category one, two, or three. Category two and three have provisional security clearance, and the ability to translate as well as interpret.” He looked down at his notes and frowned as if he somehow disagreed with his own words. “I say provisional, because clearances are usually given only to American citizens. But with your demonstrated abilities and loyalty you are, uh, granted provisional status.”

  The old men smiled.

  “Okay, so; category two and three interpreters will live in this bunker and work with intelligence personnel. Talking to detainees. Translating documents. You will never leave Camp Taqaddum unless you’re being escorted home for personal leave.” He asked the officer softly, “We got any category ones here?”

  The officer nodded and held up one finger.

  “Category one cannot be granted provisional clearance, for whatever reason. So, if you are category one, you will work with marines in the field. Going out on patrols. Living with them. All right, then? Everyone check the cards Frank gave you upstairs.”

  We all looked down.

  “Any category ones?”

  I saw it on my card, a big green digit in the corner. I raised my hand.

  “Great. Go ahead and stand up. We’ll need you to leave now. Just head back up those stairs and talk to Frank, okay? You’ll get a brief later. The rest of this is just for the cleared interpreters.”

  The civilian smiled like he was my friend.

  I stood, my knees a little weak, and found the old man with the gray mustache in the back row.

  “Uncle,” I said in Arabic, “enjoy your time here. I hope you ask many good questions.”

  “I look forward to making your acquaintance,” he replied.

  I walked across the room and up the stairs.

  Behind me, I heard the civilian ask, “Okay, anyone hungry?”

  Back on the surface, Frank, the man in the sunglasses, the man from Michigan, laughed. “Back so soon?”

  “Category one.”

  “No kidding,” he quipped as he turned pages on his clipboard. He stopped on a page with three long columns of words, most of them scratched out with pencil. “Let’s see what we have left.” He moved his pencil down the page until he found a name he liked.

  “Dodge.” He smiled. “From now on, your name is Dodge. Understand?”

  “Fine.” I did not know what it meant and did not ask.

  He told me anyway. “A type of car. A good, dependable car.” He waved for me to follow him over to a line of white Toyota trucks, brand-new.

  “So. Dodge. You have anything? Personal items?”

  “No. In Ramadi they told us to leave everything there.”

  “All right. Then first thing to do is set you up with gear. Here, this one.” He pointed to the truck at the end of the row.

  We got into the truck and Frank turned on the radio. I knew the station from Fallujah, and the voice of the singer. Gehan Rateb. The hot Egyptian television host. I thought of what the jihadis would do to the Fallujah disc jockey with the audacity to play her music, if they ever found him.

  Frank turned the dial before I could ask if he liked Gehan or thought she was hot. He landed on a station with an American disc jockey. A woman.

  “Welcome back to the Country Convoy, with Specialist Kristy . . .” />
  “We’ll skip the supply warehouse and just drop you off with your unit,” Frank said.

  “We’re broadcasting live from the Green Zone on Armed Forces Radio . . .”

  “Engineer Support Company is top of the list for a terp, so you can start out with those guys. Maybe another unit down the line.”

  “Before we get back to that great country music, a quick rundown of Green Zone events . . .”

  “You’ll get uniforms, flak, helmet, hoods, sunglasses, and boots. Maybe a medical kit . . .”

  “At thirteen hundred, we have yoga by the south pool . . .”

  “No weapon, though. Terps don’t get weapons.”

  “At fifteen hundred, we have water aerobics in the west pool . . .”

  “Engineer Support Company gets outside the wire a lot. They fix things. Roads and pavement. They build checkpoints, too.”

  “At twenty hundred, we have the weekly movie by the north pool . . .”

  “You’ll go out with them and deal with civilians. Sometimes civilians get too close and the marines shoot up a car.”

  “The movie this week . . . Cast Away, starring Tom Hanks.”

  “Those guys over at Engineer Support shoot up a lot of cars by accident. You’ll go and apologize for them. Got it?” Frank lit a cigarette and switched off the radio. “Also, you talk to the Iraqi Army for them. Regular jundis mostly, but a few officers, too. So if you have politics, or family with politics, or family at all, or religion, or opinions, or anything . . . now you don’t. Understand?”

  We drove past the hospital and the dining hall. Massive, metal-framed tents covered in white vinyl, with generators and air conditioners off to the side.

  “So, Dodge. Shiite or Sunni?”

  I looked out the window, at the Americans waiting to get lunch. “Neither. I am a Jew.”

  Frank laughed. “Sure, me too. But seriously”—Frank slapped me on the knee—“hey, you listening?”

  “Yes, I am listening, man.”

  “Don’t tell them anything. Do not tell. Anyone. Anything. Got it? Last week, out with some grunts over by Fallujah, we found a house with fifteen heads in it. No shit. Fifteen fucking cut-off heads. My family live in Michigan, okay? And that’s all anybody knows. They don’t know my name. They don’t know anything about me, and I’m an American, man.” Frank pulled on his cigarette. “So. What’s your name?”

  “Dodge. My name is Dodge.”

  “Good.”

  We passed a sign reading WELCOME TO ENGINEER VILLAGE, WHERE SAFETY IS PARAMOUNT. SPEED LIMIT 5 MPH AT ALL TIMES.

  Frank lifted his foot off the accelerator and the truck rolled past a field of armored vehicles, of a type I had never seen. Marines wearing tan, camouflage trousers and green T-shirts walked back and forth with ice chests, machine guns, and ammunition cans.

  The truck glided to a halt next to a concrete building left over from Saddam’s old Air Force. Faded paint over the door read in Arabic TAMMUZ AIRBASE, 14TH SQUADRON. I wondered if the Americans knew that. I wondered if anyone had ever asked.

  A forest of radio antennas grew out from the flat roof. A sign out front, stenciled on rough plywood, read ENGINEER SUPPORT COMPANY. HOME OF THE FINEST. MAJOR R. E. LEIGHTON, COMMANDING.

  Frank put the truck in park and tapped out his cigarette. “This is you, Dodge.”

  We got out and walked under the awning, up to a plywood door bolted to the wall. Bad carpentry, that door. “Ghetto rigged,” as the Americans would teach me to say.

  Frank knocked and a marine with a pistol on his hip answered. Young and tall. Blond. Well muscled. A river of cold air spilled out with him.

  “Can I help you?”

  “Yeah. Hey. I’m with intel support. Dropping off your new terp.”

  “He cleared?”

  “Category one. So, he can live with you guys, but he’s a no-go for secret spaces.”

  “Not coming in here, then.” The lieutenant stepped outside, letting the ghetto-rigged door close behind him.

  “Wait. Lieutenant Cobb. Sir.” The voice came from inside. Then the door popped open again and another marine came out. Older and out of shape. Smiling like he was well practiced.

  “Yeah, Gunny?”

  “Road Repair Platoon’s due for a terp, sir.”

  “How’d you come to that conclusion, Gunny?”

  “Lieutenant Wong over at Bulk Fuel Platoon got the last terp. Before that, you guys over at Construction Platoon got the plasma-screen briefing board. I’m just saying, sir. You know—just trying to keep it fair for my lieutenant, is all.”

  “Fine. Take him over there. Clear it with Major Leighton when he gets back.”

  Now another voice approached, this one full of command. “I’m back. Make a hole.” He walked by us, this Major Leighton, wide-shouldered and bald with a white scalp burnt red from the sun. He pushed through our little crowd and walked into the cold room. “The memorial service is over,” the major said from inside. “Everyone should be back soon. Get this shit squared away.”

  The lieutenant and the fat gunnery sergeant marine stood up straight. “Aye, aye, sir,” they said in unison.

  Once Leighton was gone, the lieutenant turned to the fat gunnery sergeant. “Listen, Gunny. Do whatever you want. I have no time for this.”

  “Thank you, sir. Corporal Jones can handle my desk while I’m out.”

  “Yeah. I know he can.” The lieutenant disappeared behind the plywood door, not even trying to hide his dislike for this out-of-shape marine, this smiling politician. I did not like him either.

  “Hi, how are you? I’m Gunny Dole.” He forced his hand into Frank’s palm and shook it hard. Up and down like a whip. “Road Repair Platoon chief, senior enlisted. I spend most of my time here, though. Working with the operations section. Making sure everything goes smooth. Lieutenant Donovan and Sergeant Gomez pretty much got it handled over at the platoon. Not much need of me.”

  All that explanation, all those excuses, and we had only just met.

  “So, who’s this guy?” He pointed at me.

  “Dodge,” I answered before Frank had the chance. I put a hand on my chest. “A dependable car.”

  Gunny Dole slapped my shoulder. “I had a Dart myself, for about ten years! That was back in the day, though!” He laughed, by himself. “Here, follow me over to the platoon. Let’s get you a cot.”

  We walked around the squat concrete building, out back to a dirt patch guarded on all sides by tall, earthen berms. The whole company, all those Americans, were tucked right up against the edge of the plateau. I wondered if they knew that everyone down by the river could see them, clearly, moving around up there.

  They kept an area of dirt, about thirty meters square, empty and smooth for exercise and such. Plywood huts, long and skinny with doors on either end, were arranged around the empty square three deep on each side. They had room enough inside each for about twenty beds.

  “Most of the company’s over at the chapel,” Gunny Dole said, and then stiffly, “Memorial service. We took a KIA last week.”

  “Sorry to hear that,” Frank said. Clinical and detached, like he had tried before, many times, to say it well but had learned that there was no right way.

  “Yeah.” Gunny Dole put his hands in his pockets. “He was a good guy.”

  It was the first thing I heard him say that I believed.

  Gunny Dole knocked on the door of a plywood hut in the back row, built closest to the berm at the edge of the plateau. When no one answered, he pushed it open. “Anyone home?” He turned on the lights.

  “Here, Gunny.” A young man sat on his bunk at the far end. He had been sitting in the dark.

  “Hey, Doc. Not at the chapel?”

  “Gear watch. Someone had to stay back.”

  “With the lights off?”

  “Fuckin’ sauna in here.”

  “Okay.” Gunny Dole looked puzzled, as if trying to work out how a single light would add any appreciable heat to the whole, long room. He
shrugged. “Doc, this is Dodge. Dodge, this is Doc Pleasant. The platoon corpsman. Medical guy, I mean. He takes care of us.”

  I nodded to him. “Good afternoon.”

  He looked me up and down and frowned. A few years younger, but skinny and gangly like me. He had some unfortunate acne left in what appeared to be the final months of his teenagerhood. His thick, red hair was cut short on the sides. Not exactly the best look.

  “This is the only bunk,” the Doc said, pointing to the empty cot across from him, addressing Gunny Dole rather than me.

  “Guess that settles it, then. Dodge, go grab your bunk. Doc, look after him for a bit. Get him set up with gear when the company makes it back from the chapel.”

  Then, Frank and Gunny Dole left the two of us alone.

  The Doc did not get up. Did not say a word or even look to me. He just sat there and stared straight ahead.

  So I walked over and sat down across from him on my new bed, deciding I would let this truculent Doc speak first, whenever he felt like it. It took several minutes.

  “You Iraqi?” he eventually asked.

  “Yes. From Baghdad.”

  “The fuck you know about Metallica, then?” He did not ask nicely.

  “This?” I pointed to my shirt. “I go buy albums in Baghdad. We have a place there called Music Street. We have Metallica. AC/DC. All that.”

  He nodded and lay back with his head down on the cot. Sprawled out and limp.

  “What about you, man? Do you like Metallica?”

  “No,” he said. “Used to. Been a while.”

  “Not anymore, then? Why not?”

  He sighed. “Look, I’m supposed to watch you, but I kinda need a nap. So just . . . Just stay put.”

  And then he fell asleep. So I did the watching. When I grew bored, I took the Mark Twain from my back pocket and began to read, arriving by chance on the page where Sherburn admonishes his lynch mob, saying they will not pursue him in the daylight, and that “the average man don’t like trouble and danger.”

  I suppressed a laugh, careful not to wake the Doc.

  Soon, marines came shuffling back into the hut and sprawled out across their cots as well, with red eyes and rifles seeming heavier than usual for them.

  My new friends.