Breath exploded from my body like a detonating grenade. I lay paralyzed and tried to suck air. The grenade must have been a dud, thank God.
Plock . Plock, plock . Dirt clods rained down. One struck my cheek. Not a dud. The grenade had exploded. The drill lay across my body, so heavy his heart thudded against my ribs.
The dirt on my cheek was warm. I wiped it away and held it in front of my eyes. It dripped red. Flesh.
I tried to scream, but I still had no breath. I couldn’t hear anything anyway. Ruptured eardrums?
A silhouette jerked across the sky. A Smokey Bear hat. Fourth Platoon’s drill vaulted the sandbag wall alongside us. “Jesus. Fuck.” It sounded like he spoke through a pillow.
He yelled, “Medic! Get the fuckin‘ medic!”
Walter! I shoved the drill off me, sat up, and rolled to my knees. Other heads bobbed on the opposite side of the sandbag wall. I scrambled up, pulled myself across, and looked down into the revetment
Smoke swirled around people kneeling beside Walter. He lay facedown where he landed, his arms still stretched out. His cheek rested against the earth and his eyes were open. He looked fine, though his glasses were crooked, the way they got, even with that elastic band he wore around the back of his head.
Except that below his belt he was gone.
Just gone. He was just a head and torso, like a GI Joe doll thrown in the trash.
Somebody was screaming, over and over. It was me.