Nightmare on Haifa Street

Bravery? At what cost?

What is Iraq like?

     I remember years ago when I visited a friend in Phoenix. Being a New Yorker, I had no clue of what I was about to step into. The jet was comfortable and the landing was uneventful. The walk up the jet way was equally uneventful and I wandered into the terminal where Kelly greeted me and led me to the exit. Only when we walked through the automated doors did it hit me, and it hit me with all of the power of a blast furnace. The 106-degree air temperatures swept over me as though I’d walked through a curtain into a sauna that was devoid of any moisture. My knees buckled instantly. Only by the grace of God did I manage to keep my feet.

That's what Iraq is like.

        I flashed back to that day at Sky Harbor Airport as I stepped from the transport into the drab tan world that would be mine for the next year. This place was like Phoenix, only worse. The wind that I saw before stepping from the plane was the cruelest of illusions. What I thought would bring cooling relief, brought only the hot sting of the Iraqi sands. This time my knees didn’t hold. An hour later I awoke to find myself in the cool air of the base infirmary.

        “How do you feel soldier?”

        “I’m good now.” I answered as I tried to struggle to my feet.

        “Why don’t you relax while you can.” The medic suggested. You’re going to have plenty of chances to be a hero soon enough.”

        Considering that the mere act of sitting up had robbed me of my equilibrium, I decided to heed the sage advice I’d been given. As I lay back down, she spoke as she checked the stability of my I.V. needle.

        “Good choice soldier! I’ll be back to check you shortly, for now, enjoy the fact that you aren’t out in that sun.” She said over her shoulder as she left me lying on my gurney next to the infirmary entrance.

        Minutes later, the infirmary exploded into a furious frenzy of activity. The storm of activity was centered around the two soldiers with devastating injuries that they wheeled past me. The first was a soldier who looked no older than 15. His semi-conscious, guttural groans were barely audible above the roar of the medics who worked frantically to stabilize him. One of the medics shouted his name and yelled at him in an attempt to keep him conscious. Blood flowed from the gaping wounds in his chest and neck.

        “Jacob! Jacob! Jacob … God damnit, don't you die on me kid! You stay with me Jacob, okay … Jacob! Private Jacob Krueter, stay awake; stay with me son. That’s an order!”

        I wish I could tell you what the other soldier looked like, but what remained of his face was so badly burned that my stomach retched as I turned away. Though he never moved, made no sounds and showed no outward signs of life, the medical team worked on him feverishly for forty eight minutes that seemed more like hours; they labored over him nonstop until 11:36am. That was when Sergeant Sean “Gunner” Westbury was declared dead. And so it was that I was introduced to the perils of the Haifa St. patrol before I ever left the infirmary.

        The next morning I joined my unit on my first tour of Haifa St. The morning air was mild, no more than 85 degrees. My position was as the machine gunner on the lead truck; a position that I would later learn had been Sean Westbury’s. Though the temperatures were not yet oppressive, the flying dust and the lingering smell of diesel fuel and burned out vehicle shells filled the air. Improvised explosive devices are a menacing part of life in Iraq. Some are triggered by cell phones, some by timers and some by trip wires. The strain was palpable as I rode with my head on a swivel, watching for anything unusual. I wanted to watch every person who looked at us too long or held a cell phone in their hand, every car that showed brake lights ahead of us and every rooftop.

        “Hey Gunner,” my driver called to me without turning his head “keep your watch front. Your job is eyes front. If your watching center gun's field, who the Hell is watching your field? Do your damn job, they’ll do theirs!”

        “Yes Sergeant.” I snapped back.

        I saw him at the border of my periphery, a dark haired boy no more than eleven or twelve. I wouldn’t have given him a second look if not for those eyes. His eyes were deep and dark, and they held more behind them than he could possibly have seen in his few years. Whether it was hate, desperation or agony, I couldn’t tell; but something in his eyes held my attention. I’d heard stories about young kids who were insurgents and sometimes became suicide bombers. His unyielding gaze was making me very uneasy.

        “Gunner!” Came the growl from the front of the open Hummer. “Unless you want to end up like Westbury, you keep yer Goddamn eyes front!”

        Though I swung my head forward, my eyes trailed uneasily behind and stayed on the boy as long as they could. The boy’s dark, vacant eyes never left our vehicle. As the weeks passed, I learned what to look for on the street, what insurgents did and how they behaved. I learned which cars were suspicious and which ones were not. The entire time the boy would pop up on that same block every day. As time passed, I saw the boy more and more often. The more I saw him, the more he reminded me of a boy I’d gone to elementary school with named Hadji. I came to call my unknown observer Hadji.

Over the next several months, the outrageous and the terrifying became commonplace. The occasional insurgent would appear on a rooftop and open fire on us. Though we’d killed almost every insurgent that ambushed us, we lost several men and almost a dozen were wounded. Any wire could be a tripwire for an unseen I.E.D. We had to be constantly vigilant because any vendor’s pushcart, animal carcass on the side of the road or burned out shell of a car was a potential I.E.D. These things became routine for us and that frightened me. How could such monstrous violence ever become routine and commonplace to human beings? I was terrified at what I might be becoming.

        When the package came for me from Watertown, NY at mail call I knew it was from Mom, not just from home … from Mom. We’d all learned to hover around the guys who got packages from home in the mail; that’s where the treats were to be found. Mom did not disappoint. Along with the neatly folded letter, buried within a thick, insulating layer of small bags of skittles candies, were four dozen of my mother’s famous pumpkin cookies. I knew from experience that although they might look like formless masses of baked slop, they were the absolute best cookies on the face of the earth. I fended off the guys, who had picked up the scent of treats and were on me like hyenas trailing a wounded gazelle. But these cookies were not for those vultures, or even for me. These products of my mother’s love had a higher purpose. These cookies were going to help me remember what love and humanity were all about.

        The next day, near the end of our patrol, with the grudging permission of our commanding officer, we took a substantial risk and made an unscheduled stop. In the yard of the neighborhood school, just off of Haifa St., the children played not much differently than they did in Watertown. After making a few passes and determining that the risk was moderate, we formed a perimeter with our armored vehicles and with gunners watching the street and surrounding buildings, we broke out the goodwill, fruit and boxed juices from the mess hall. The children were reluctant to visit with us, perhaps more afraid of who might see them with us than they were of us. We were uneasy too. The longer we weren’t moving, the more we felt like targets. After what seemed like an eternity, a sweet little girl of about eight broke the Mexican standoff. She slowly walked up to Corporal Granger, took the Juice and apple that he offered and gave him a precious smile in return. That moment was the first time in months I had felt anything besides fear or anger. I could tell by the glistening moisture in Granger’s eyes that he was feeling something too. The other children followed in short order and as they formed a crowd around us, I broke out Mom’s box. I couldn’t love these children, but I could show them some kindness and pass along to them some of Mom’s pumpkin flavored love. As the cookies dwindled down to a precious few, I lifted my eyes and saw Hadji standing at the back of the crowd watching me intently. I took the last three cookies from the last Zip-Lock bag and extended my arm, offering them to the boy. Finally, he stepped close enough to take the cookies. I pointed to myself and spoke.

        “Chad … Chad … Chad.”

        Then I pointed at him and waited.

        “Holliday! Holliday!” Came the impatient call to me from the drivers seat.

        “Okay Corporal, give me just a few seconds.” I answered without bothering to turn around.

        “Jamil.” The boy finally said, placing his finger on his chest. I smiled at Jamil and patted his head as I jumped back on my Hum-Vee. I smiled and waved at Jamil as we pulled away. He never smiled or returned my wave. He just gazed at me with those bottomless eyes. That meeting seemed to chip at the iceberg. Over time Jamil would give me the slightest bit of a smile as we passed by him on patrol.

        Corporal Granger, however, didn’t see things as I did. He didn’t trust Jamil and warned me on several occasions not to drop my guard. Jamil’s deep gaze made Corporal Granger very, very uneasy.

        The last time I saw Jamil was the Thursday of a particularly quiet week. Quiet isn’t good, it just means that what hasn’t happened yet is all going to happen in one big, ugly, explosive mess. On this particular Thursday there was actually a breeze that actually carried air that wasn’t scorching. The temperature was a bearable 97 degrees. At the far end of our patrol, we made our turn in an expansive parking area and started the four-mile run back to the base. I was on heavy machine gun in the lead vehicle, and looking forward to the air-conditioned comfort of the mess hall, but my attention was on my job. I had learned the consequences of letting your mind drift two weeks prior when a sniper fired on us from a car ahead of us that I was supposed to have cleared. Fortunately no one was hurt that day, no one that is, except the three insurgents in the car who were all killed. Though I longed to be done with patrol, there were no such lapses that day. The barely visible reflective glint in the road ahead seized my attention immediately. It was too perfectly straight.

        “Wire!” I called out at the top of my lungs. “Straight ahead. Two feet off the deck.”

        My call brought our vehicle, and the two behind us to an immediate stop and everyone automatically went on higher alert. Gunners swiveled from side to side surveying cars, windows and rooftops as Granger squinted, trying to spot the location of any device the wire might be attached to. Corporal Doug Piper started to get out to inspect the wire when Armageddon broke loose. Snipers appeared and opened up from both sides of the street. The heavy metallic plunk of rounds impacting our vehicles rang around us as we returned fire. I’d been in firefights before, but with snipers on both sides of the street, we were surrounded. I was more frightened than I had ever been in my life.

        Piper was hit in the opening volley and knocked off his feet. As I returned fire, I saw Piper out of the corner of my eye. As he struggled back to his feet and limped towards the wire, his shredded boot betrayed the foot wound that he’d sustained. If Piper had reached the wire, he could have cleared our path and we’d have gotten out of there. But Piper didn’t make it any further. I didn’t see it, but that sound will be with me forever. It was the sound that a milk carton makes when it hits the floor, followed immediately by what I can only describe as a raspy gasping sound that had to be the expulsion of his final breath. And then there was a thud. Doug Piper was dead, and we were pinned down until someone could clear that wire. I had just taken out my second insurgent and was about to get out there and clear the wire.

     That was when it happened. A little boy bolted out from between two burnt out cars and ran toward the wire in the street. As the boy passed Piper’s crumpled body, a volley of automatic weapon fire hit him but he kept moving. Amazingly, he staggered the last twenty feet and fell across the wire like an exhausted marathon runner at the tape. When the wire was drawn tight and snapped, nothing happened. I don’t know to this day if an I.E.D. failed, or if the wire was just a trick to slow our patrol down.

“All clear, Let’s roll!” came the command.

        We were still taking occasional fire as the patrol began to roll again, but we were moving. I jumped out to get Piper’s body and as I ran past the little boy, I realized it was Jamil. He lay there in that horrible, oil stained, filthy street with smoke still rising from his seeping wounds and those deep, dark eyes still open and staring up at me. I glared back at Granger, who was a step behind me.

        “Can I trust him now, Corporal Granger?”

I was just a little bit farther from Watertown. 
 

Reviews

[Siobhan MacIntyre]

Very well done, Jerry! I am quite pleased to see that your love affair with commas has waned. Your descriptive is very good. I have not forgotten our conversation about my friend who was in Iraq; he was swamped at the time so I didn't mention this to him. Now that he has slowed down some, I will ask him to give a read-through and initiate conversation.

[L.P. Hawkins]

My God, this is very good work! The story flowed from beginning to end with no snags or snares commonly found in short stories: From the beginning part where Chad is immediatly born witness to Jacob's (a name screamed over and again that still rings in my head as I write this) death-- bringing a sign of what is to come-followed by the hardening of Chad's will towards his job, the suspicions of Jamil's character, the short rekindling of compassion with the cookies immediately followed by the explosive conclusion--all of this put together in a way that puts the reader, mind and body, heart and soul, into the story. If I could award seven gold stars, it still would not be enough for this piece.

[Nicolas Drago]

What a story! I was in the mood to read today so I chose something from your works because of your helpful review of my poem. I thought this was really intense. I'm not good with reviews because I don't feel qualified to critique someone's writing. I wish I had something to offer you, constructively. You should know that I haven't read much at the cafe that has gripped my attention the way this has. Good story telling.

[Moonlight]

This was an extremely intense and emotional piece.

You did a fantastic job describing your experiences; I was completely 'with you'...my attention didn't waver for a second!

Moonlight.

[L Turner]

Very nice work. In an instant, you took me from Arizona to Iraq. I fear that those kind of flashbacks will become all too common for the returning veterans. Perhaps stories like this will help others to understand the confusing Hell that is war.

[Reality]

wow, that was very touching and hits close to home. a friend i respect deeply was in the iraq for about four years or so. i feel horrible for the children in iraq and pray the violence will end at some point, although it seems like the war will never end. great job on this story, its def one of my favorites :)