A very bad day

1,063 words

Lippman hated the place. He hated everything about it. It was too hot, too dry, too brown. On the rare days when merciful rain fell, the sand turned to rank, boot-sucking-off mud that dragged you down and made you curse rain. He absolutely hated it. Shifting slightly in the scanty shade provided by one of the innumerable squat brown huts, he restlessly watched for any enemy movement. The huts were the same color as the sand, making everything look like a huge piece of drab fabric stretched over a canvas, the kind that flour sacks used to be made of. He couldn’t remember what the fabric was called. That was going to bug him next time he tried to sleep. Damn. Sleep was hard enough to come by.

Except for the muted shuffling of boots in fine sand and the occasional spurts of rat-tat-tats in the distance, all was quiet. He’d been there long enough to distinguish exactly which type of gun he could hear being fired. Yet another thing to hate. Except for people and various modes of transportation, there was nothing to make noise. You got used to the background noise being explosions, either real ones or tests, and the shaking of the ground; the percussion of mortars were now a lullaby. In the times of true silence, everyone seemed to be waiting for the next shot or the next bomb to go off and give you something to listen to. The bomb squad guys always looked tired. If it hadn’t been for his family back home he would’ve been one of them. Constant activity, no matter how dangerous, was preferable to waiting for something to happen. He hadn’t even seen his daughter who would be two months old next week. His son, Tyler, hadn’t even started crawling when he left. And now, Tyler was running and getting into everything, according to his frazzled wife. Every time Lippman had the chance to call home, she asked what he was doing there to fill the days, and every time she asked he would lie. Even though he knew she was trying to be supportive, she worried enough even when thinking he did nothing but watch radar screens, which he did in between the raids and door-breaking.

But so far this mission was quiet enough to write home about it. There had been nothing. He watched the rest of the squad carefully, but not as carefully as they were all moving. Every single soldier knew the slightest mistake could be a deadly one, no matter how quiet it had been. There were always stories circling the tents about mistaken identities, miscommunications, or just dumb blunders and the horrors that resulted. None of them wanted to become a story. He waited, then darted from the short wall he’d been crouching behind to stuff his bulk behind a doorframe. It wasn’t easy for a guy his size, being someone who couldn’t be thin if he tried. A friend of his, Miller, moved past him towards a new spot, all silence and stealth.

Then Miller dropped. One pop. Not even a rat-tat. Just one. Then everything went to hell. Explosions to each side rocked the earth and dust misted the air. Black, choking smoke bubbled into the air and his throat constricted at the mere thought of that smoke penetrating his mask. A bullet thudded into the frame above his head, showering him in splinters of wood. Shouts assaulted his ears, fighting for dominance over bullets and bombs going off everywhere. Through the haze of dust he saw the outlines of robed, rag headed men. He raised his gun, an M-16. He fired. Percussion. Pound, pound, pound. The backfire reminded him that this was real. His shoulder was gonna hurt tomorrow. Stray bullets sent up fresh puffs of dust, miniature geysers and dirt devils.

Miller was still down. Twitching.

How long had it been? One minute? Two? He had no idea. He just kept firing. So did everybody else. Agonized screams let them know someone was hit, but on which side? Both? Click. Click. He paused, reloaded. They always carried extra clips. Good thing too. Heavy though.

Return fire slowed, ceased. Breaths were held and slowly released. Through the fabric mask he could taste the fight. It was a nasty blend of dirt, blood, hot metal, and smoke. The smoke carried the smell of burnt flesh, and it didn’t take much to make your eyes water and your soul feel fouled. He waited, gun held at ready. The dust started to clear. Two of the other guys, Crew and Holland, ventured out and dragged Miller out from the street. Blood trailed behind them, staining the sand ochre. Shots were fired again. Back and forth again. Medics worked on Miller, heads bent to avoid shrapnel or odd bits of debris. Lippman peered around the doorframe, hoping to get a clear shot to someone.

There was a kid walking towards them. A boy. What the hell? The boy walked slowly, almost hesitantly. He saw straps on the scrawny shoulders. A backpack. Poor kid was trying to get home from school. To anyone stateside, that would’ve seemed odd, but it wasn’t. It happened all the time. Lippman wanted to yell at him to find cover, but didn’t. He wasn’t sure why. The boy stopped, turned back. Lippman then saw the men, hiding behind a crumbling wall. Men that were urging the boy on. The kid moved again. Paused. Looked back, moved forward. Lippman judged that the boy wasn’t much younger than his own little brother back home. As he watched, the boy pulled out a cell phone. The realization roared through his system and every inch of skin prickled. It was the newest form of bomb detonation. Punch in seven little numbers and kaboom. The entire squad would become stories. Shit. Lippman looked to the rest of the squad. Nobody else had noticed the boy. He was alone in this. He aimed, hate at the sick bastards who used children to do their dirty work seething inside. Lippman and the boy’s eyes locked for those brief seconds as still-small fingers hit numbers. Seven numbers didn’t take long.

Just one pop. That was all it would take to save the squad. There was no time to think, no time to hesitate.

Lippman tried not to hate himself.

He pulled the trigger.