He pulls the pin and hurls it at Bates, who is still on the radio. It explodes in a ball of flames and sets him ablaze. Jack, who, as always, is less than two feet away from his lieutenant, is also partially engulfed in the searing white flames.
The grenade brings with it five thousand degrees Fahrenheit of heat, and its force is so extreme that it incinerates Bates and burns part of Jack’s face off, blinding him in his left eye and taking with it a portion of his scalp and hair. His skin melts through every muscle, down to the bone.
Jack does not remember Doc hurtling toward him, his friend’s hands rushing to unbutton his own flak jacket and then pulling it off his body to smother the fire burning Jack’s scalp and face. He will never recall the steps Doc takes to administer morphine and to seal off his wounds with Vaseline strips, or how his friend realized there was no place left on his head to write the letterM.
The helicopters are already circling above, laying down heavy fire to wipe out the enemy. One of them is lowering to retrieve the wounded and dead. Nobody knows what to do with Lieutenant Bates, who is no longer recognizable, like a ball of melted wax.
Chief and Doc are making stretchers out of the dead men’s ponchos to carry them toward the chopper. Chief slings Flannery over his back and hurries to get him on board.
“There’s one more man down,” a voice calls out, and Doc hurries to find who it is.
“It’s Danny,” someone yells.
Exhausted and following the code of the corpsmen, Doc searches through the dead to find him.
Little Danny Donovan is only eighteen years old, a fresh recruit who came only a few weeks before to replace Stanley. He’s crying that he thinks he’s going to die, but Doc can see it’s just a painful, but not fatal, shoulder wound.
“You’re going to be okay, Danny. You’re going to be okay.”
He is wrapping Danny’s shoulder as Chief and the other men help carry the remaining wounded and dead to the chopper. They won’t leave a single body behind.
“Doc, am I dying?” Danny’s eyes are wet with fear.
“You’ve got a long life ahead of you, you’re going home,” Doc assures him as he sees the crew chief on the chopper gesturing that they have to hurry and get the hell out of there.
He reaches to help pull Private Donovan up, hoping to rush him to the chopper, when out of nowhere, an NVA soldier who has been lying on the ground and thought by the others to be dead pulls himself up and shoots Doc in the head.
CHAPTER 46
KATIE’S MORNING HAD STARTED OFF POORLY.EVEN BEFORE SHEstepped outside the house, she sensed it was going to be a really,reallybad day. Her mother had broken the yolk on her fried egg and refused to make her a fresh one, instead calling Katie wasteful and ungrateful. Plates were angrily slammed on the table, and no one lifted their glasses of orange juice to drink. Molly looked down at her bowl of cereal as though she was silently in prayer. Minutes later, Katie’s father swept in, downed a cup of coffee, oblivious to the tension between his wife and eldest daughter, blithely kissing all three cheeks before heading out the door.
The slain egg now lay untouched. A sloppy white-and-yellow amorphous mass. Katie knew she’d soon be engaged in battle over whether that egg would end up in her stomach or in the waste bin. Clearly, it was going to be just that kind of day.
Grace looked over at her daughter and felt herself reaching her tipping point. All week Katie had been frustrating her, and now she found herself beyond exasperated with her eldest daughter. Katie had slipped her red swimsuit into the washing machine, instead of washing it in cold water in the sink, and subsequently ruined an entire load of everyone’s clothes. “Katie Rose, I expect you to finish that egg,” uttered Grace between gritted teeth.
Katie rolled her eyes and stabbed at the egg before moving it around the plate. Something happened between the two girls because suddenly Molly cried out, “Stop kicking me!”
Why did everything always have to be a battle with her eldest daughter?
The noise of the children bickering was the worst sound of all. Grace threw the pan into the sink. “Next time, Katie you can make your own breakfast! I was making meals for my sister and brother from the time I was seven years old.” Her face flamed red. She was glad Tom had left already so he didn’t have to witness her coming undone like this. Her fingers gripped into little balled fists. Would it be so terrible to reach for the rolling pin just to make Katie realize how angry she was? She reached for the drawer, but the inside was jammed with spatulas and slotted spoons. A single can opener. Where was that rolling pin when she really needed it?
“Mom, I’ll eat the egg.” Molly pulled the plate to her corner of the table. In a few minutes it was gone.
With her mother’s palpable irritation in the air, Katie got up from the table and slyly hit her sister on the side of her arm. She did it just because she could, and somehow it made her feel slightly better. And while she knew it was juvenile on her part, if she were going to be cast as the bad daughter, she might as well go all out.
She was tired of having such a Goody Two-shoes for a younger sister, particularly as she had her own problems that no one else seemed to care about. Her period had arrived two days early and that had been just one more thing to put her in a bad mood. She loathed putting a bulky pad in her swimsuit and then having to cover it up with a baggy pair of shorts. The weather report had predicted temperatures above ninety degrees for that afternoon and she already felt sticky thinking about herself roasting outside on the lifeguard tower. Feeling bloated and irritable, Katie stormed off to the garage to retrieve her bicycle, only to find that the chain was dangling off the rear.
She fiddled with the chain, but, after several minutes, couldn’t get it back on the tracking despite her best efforts. A wave of frustration rose inside her and Katie gave the bicycle a little shove. As it fell, the sound of the metal hitting the garage floor was loud enough for everyone in the Golden household to hear.
“What is it now?” Grace asked as Katie emerged in the kitchen. She had been scrubbing a frying pan in the sink and enjoying a few minutes of calm. She turned off the faucet and looked at her daughter standing blankly by the mudroom door.
“Mom—my bike’s broken!” Katie’s voice was a painful mixture of teenage anger and selfish desperation.
“What happened to it? You didn’t mention anything yesterday when you got home.…” Grace looked up at the wall clock. It was already seven thirty and Katie was supposed to be at the club by eight. She knew what was coming even before her daughter said it.
“Can you drive me?” She heaved herself over the counter, pleading to Grace with great dramatic affect.
Grace wanted to tell her no. Her anger had dissipated, but it was still there. Like an oven that was still warm, even after the heat had been turned off.
