“Is that picture
over there from when you finished basic?”
“Yeah.”
“I’ve got
respect for people who serve. Not saying that growing up near a base didn’t
have its bad days.”
“Oh yeah?”
“I’ve never felt
quite comfortable about calling anyone a squid, despite my experiences, and I’m not
stupid enough to say anything bad about the Marines. Never used the ‘J’ word,
but I heard sailors use it a bit.”
“You mean
‘jarhead’, don’t you? Everybody does stupid stuff, from time to time. ”
“Can’t ever
recall any bad incidents with any of the guys from the Corps. Somehow, I
imagine that if there were any bad incidents with them, I wouldn’t be around to
remember.”
“Actually,
after my first time back, I almost got into it with a bunch of them. Thought I
was going to die.”
“Really? What
happened?”
“Well, we’d
just come back and a buddy of mine…we were headed to a convenience store with
our girlfriends. We were dressed normal, didn’t have a car or anything. We were
about to go in when a Jeep pulled up and a bunch of guys started piling out.”
“A Jeep?”
“Yeah, but
with the top off, roll bar, headlights. They guys didn’t even bother parking.
They just pulled up sideways, jumped out. Big guys mostly. Must have been their
first night out after training or something. Those dudes had some arms. You
could tell they’d been drinking. First guy out pointed at my friend and I and
said, ‘I’m gonna kick your asses and fuck your women.’”
“Shit! Did you
have to fight the guy?”
“No way.
There were too many of them. They would have messed us up anyway. But I was carrying. I wasn’t technically supposed to be, but
I’d just gotten back. Out of habit.”
“What did you
do?”
“I drew my
pistol while keeping my eyes on the big guy, their leader. They all froze. I
guess they weren’t expecting it. Then the guy at the front called out, ‘He’s
only got six rounds.’ That’s when I leveled the gun at him and said, ‘I don't miss.You’ll be first. Who wants to be second?’”
“Wow. That’s
sounds pretty badass.”
“No, it
wasn’t. It was fucked up.”
“Well, what
happened? Those guys didn’t just fold up and leave, did they?”
“They were in
a different branch, but all the jargon is close enough…I told them that I was
going to report it in to their CO on base, that the crew better get back in
their vehicle, unless the rest of them wanted to be reported for disorderly conduct
too. One of the guys said something like, ‘Dude, this isn’t good, let’s
go.’”
“So, did you
call it in?”
“Of course I did.”
“What happened
to big guy?”
“I don’t
know. I imagine he caught hell.”
“That’s heroic, the way you handled it.”
