By Terry Tierney
Make It Home Alive
During my second beer the yelling begins upstairs. I try to block it out, but when I hear the loud smash of breaking glass and Donna crying, I stride toward my front door, intending to check on her. I hear footsteps running down the stairs followed by a loud knock. I snatch open the door.
Charles stands in front of me holding a gun. The barrel points at the floor, his finger on the trigger. He breathes hard, his face burning red.
He squints up at me, tilting his head, his lips quivering. “Donna told me.”
I nod my head slowly, glimpsing the gun and trying to keep his eye, wondering how much Donna revealed. He might think I’m the one banging his wife. I recognize the service issue .45 and check the safety latch partially hidden by his thumb. The gun is ready to fire but he hasn’t shot me yet.
Charles looks down at the pistol and tilts his head the other way. A tear rolls down his cheek. He breaks into sobs, rocking his shoulders, his hand firm on the .45.
“Maybe you should give me the gun,” I say in a soft tone.
He shakes his head. “I can’t do that.”
He raises the gun to his chest, opening his palm and studying the dull black steel. “I want to know where that Rich is.”
“He’s not here.” I wave him in, pointing toward the kitchen and waiting for him to walk ahead of me. He carries the gun flat against his white T-shirt like a dinner plate, but his index finger remains on the trigger. I pull out a chair for him and he flops down, releasing the gun from his hand like a hot iron, dropping it on the table with a thud.
“I have beer, coffee, and water.” I force a smile.
He wipes his eyes on his shirt sleeve.
“And ice cream and donuts.”
“Those damned donuts.” His wife keeps us both supplied with day old discards from her job at Dunkin’ Donuts.
I watch his face and his .45 as I retreat to the stove to warm up some coffee. He lowers his head above the gun and shudders with a quick sob. “I’m gonna kill that son of a bitch.”
“He ain’t worth it.”
Charles jumps to his feet. “He deserves worse.”
“Maybe. But you need to think about yourself.” I hold his bloodshot eyes. “And think about Donna.”
Gritting his teeth, he rolls his neck and takes a couple of deep breaths like he’s trying to relax, but his shoulders sag back down.
“Is Donna okay?” I ask.
“She’s fine. I didn’t mean to hit her the other night. I shouldn’t have done it.” He walks to the stove and stares at the heating percolator. “I hate myself.”
I study him for an awkward moment. “The coffee’s only a day old,” I tell him. “I have free milk from the dairy if you take it that way.”
“I should kill myself, that’s what I should do.”
“Then Donna would have nothing.”
“She’s got Rich.”
“He won’t last.”
Charles peers at the ceiling like he’s trying to probe Donna’s mind through the joists and floorboards.
“Coffee?” I hold up my coffee cup, and he sits down. I fill the cups and take a sip. “Less burned than I expected.” I point my chin at his gun. “Where did you get the .45?”
“Army surplus.” He looks at me. “You know guns?”
“I was in the military.”
He pauses for a second and drops his eyes. “I didn’t know.”
“No one does, except my boss.” I smirk. “Take that back. I put it on my application at the dairy, so now everyone knows.”
Charles straightens his shoulders. “I’m in the National Guard.” He studies my face. I sense him clicking off the difference in our ages. “Did you go to Nam?”
I fetch a bag of donuts from the cupboard. I never talk about the war but I hope I can distract him from his .45. “Yeah, I was in country.”
He says, “I wish I went to Vietnam.”
“No, you don’t.”
“Yes, I do.” Charles jerks his head up and down. “My cousin told me about it.”
“He lied.” My chair scrapes the linoleum floor when I sit back down. “He should have told you the war was about staying alive and keeping your friends alive. Nothing else.”
Charles squints at me, unbelieving. He watches me empty the bag of donuts, one glazed, one with sugar, and one with chocolate frosting. He raises his eyes, still doubtful. He reminds me of a young private, fresh from boot camp, starched and secure in his beliefs, a lot like me the first few weeks.
“Let me tell you something.” I sip the bitter coffee and lean forward in my chair. “I was a Marine. During my last tour we got a new lieutenant who wanted a medal, so he sent us out on extra patrols. He had no idea what he was doing, other than getting us killed. We all hated him.”
I chug the rest of my coffee, my fingers quivering at the memory. “During night watch my job was to pick targets for the nightly mortar barrage and give them to the duty officer. One night I put the coordinates of his hut on my list. He transferred the next day.”
Charles stares at me like I’m a ghost.
“The company commander was mad as hell and said he would court martial me, but I never heard any more about it. The officers hated that bastard, too.” I grab the glazed donut and rip it in half. “Some nights I imagined my coordinates were the old men who sent us there. LBJ, McNamara, Nixon. If I were there now, I’d have coordinates for Ronald Reagan.”
I raise my empty cup. “But I didn’t kill any of them.” I slam the cup down harder than I intend, shaking the steel table. “If I end up dead or stuck in jail, they win.” I look Charles in the eye. “If I make it home alive, I win.”
Charles breaks my stare, his hand fumbling to pick up the piece of glazed donut, turning it in his fingers. “They don’t know you won.”
“I know.” I stand up to refill my coffee cup. “I don’t care what they think.”
Charles rolls the piece of donut into a little ball. He pops it in his mouth and gathers the fallen sugar into a pile. “I don’t know some of the men you hate, but Ronald Reagan’s a good man.”
“You’re thinking about the movie star cowboy.” I shake my head. “Now he threatens war every day, and he only cares about rich people. Wait until they have layoffs at Agway.”
“They’re talking about it.”
“Yup, same with the dairy.” I dunk a piece of donut into my coffee and watch the oil slick spread.
We sit there for several minutes, sipping our coffee and picking at donuts. Charles looks up from the table. “Donna’s been talking to your girlfriend. They went shopping.”
“Angie likes Donna, just don’t let her know you called her my girlfriend.”
He breaks into a half smile and stands up. His face still gleams pink, though a few shades lighter. Checking the wall clock, he says, “I better get ready for work.” He clicks on the safety and slides the gun into his jeans. “Thank you for the coffee.”
I show him to the door and retrieve a fresh can of Genesee. I listen upstairs and the rest of the evening is quiet until I hear Charles descend the stairs for his shift.
By that time I’m pacing the floor, walking from kitchen to living room and bedroom and back again. I’m wired from the coffee, but I know it’s more than that. I stop for a few breaths and walk some more, trying to shake off the tension of the visit and my unwanted memories of the jungle. Long after Charles leaves, I still see faces and coordinates. One sip of beer and one step at a time, I finally make it home again.
Terry Tierney was born in South Dakota and raised in Minneapolis and Cleveland. After serving in the Seabees, he received a BA and MA in English from SUNY Binghamton, and a PhD in Victorian Literature from Emory University. He taught college composition and creative writing and later survived a series of Silicon Valley startups as a software engineering manager. His stories and poems have appeared in over seventy literary journals, including Ghost Parachute, Fictive Dreams, Rust + Moth, Typishly, Valparaiso Poetry Review, The Lake, Third Wednesday, Puerto del Sol, and Poetry Northwest. He is the author of the Pushcart Prize-nominated poetry collection, The Poet’s Garage, and the novel Lucky Ride. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.