Magpie # 32

Phil and I, 17 year old virgins, 6 foot tall and bullet proof, joined the Corps after high school and took our places in 'Nam with India Co. 3rd Marines.

In our first battle, Phil took a gunshot to his leg; severing his achilles tendon. While not a go home wound it did land him in the naval hospital in Japan. We knew he'd be back with us in a couple months.

Getting shot brought Phil face to face with his mortality and he resolved that if he was going to die in this war, he wasn't going to die a virgin. So during his convalescence,in Japan, he made a visit to a local whore house just outside the compound.

Inside the brothel he handed the madame 200 yen and a young Japanese woman appeared and led him upstairs to a bedroom. He didn't speak Japanese and she spoke no English so conversation was through hand gestures only. On a bedside table was a lamp which the girl switched on and a dim light bathed the room. Next to the lamp stood an hourglass. She flipped the hourglass upside down. As the sand funneled through the narrow waist she took off her kimono and, naked, lay down on top of the bed.

Phil stood still as a statue, staring at the hourglass until the girl cleared her throat and giving Phil a puzzled look mimed to him to take off his clothes. Looking now at the whore, he stripped naked. His limp dick stared at the floor. She motioned to him to get on the bed and she used her hands to stimulate his peter. He glanced at the hourglass. Next she put his penis in her mouth and began a forceful sucking. He found the sensation uncomfortable; like being stuck in a vacuum cleaner. He pushed her head away from his groin, and looked again at the sand pouring through the glass. Now she was laying atop of him grinding her mons against his willy, trying to entice a cock like erection from him. She kissed him on the mouth and slipped her tongue between his lips, but his dong wasn't stiff enough to slip through her nether lips.

When the last grain of sand dropped on to the pile, the girl got up, donned her kimono and left the room.

I stand today, 27 August 2010, staring at Phil's head stone for the 45th year in a row. The engraving is simple enough:

Philip Benoit

Born: Portland, Maine, September 19th, 1945
Died: Viet Nam, August 27th, 1964

This is a work of fiction.

#30-Flight

Fear of flying was not yet a novel by Erica Jong when Edmond (Eddie) Oaks was winging his way homeward in the belly of a Hercules C-130. Humorous erotica, which may have held his imagination captive while on the ground, was the last thing on his mind today 30,000 feet above the Pacific Ocean.

Eddie hated to fly. The thought of going up in an airplane would cause days and weeks of trembling anxiety in Eddie. Yet as a Boomer, he was living in the era of unsurpassed air-travel and speedy arrival at destinations was rapidly becoming the norm. One example: Many of LCpl. Oaks Marine Corps buddies had been shipped to Viet Nam on troop ships, taking 30+ days to make the crossing from the west coast of the USA to Viet Nam. Eddie wasn’t sure he’d of liked that either but taking the plane from San Francisco to DaNang, a 17 hour in the air flight, literally caused his mind to enter constant fright mode.

His escape from the reality of the trip was sleep. Yes, He slept for the greater majority of the hours the plane was airborne. Waking, or being awakened to eat was the only time he ventured into the reality of being suspended miles above a huge and treacherous sea. Thoughts of the plane diving into the ocean and plunging miles below the surface were constant reminders of the peril he saw himself in. The thought of the impending exposure to enemy gunfire was seen as a welcome reprieve from his current state of fear. To add fearful imagining to fearful imagining he also knew that after the plane had settled on the bottom of the ocean, the sharks would come in to the plane and shred his body, devouring his flesh while his mind was painfully aware until the shark finally gulped down his head.

Believe me I have given you but a minuscule snapshot of Eddie’s fear of being in a plane.

Despite the fact that he had arrived without mishap, and obviously had done so many times up to that point in his life, his fears remained unabated.

He had been taken to and from numerous battles by Huey helicopter, literally saving his life on a few occasions and still he detested flight.

Eddie was wounded in both Operation Starlight and Harvest Moon, yet any fears engendered by the war never rose to the level of that of flying.

Now here he was, cradled in the webbing seat of the uncomfortable cool cave of the C130’s cargo hold. Looking out at the sunny cumulus cloud filled sky watching the beautiful billowy clouds passing in close proximity to the plane’s window. Eddie was startled by a cloud formation that resembled a person of great stature sitting on a throne. He tried to decide if the cloud sculpture was Odin, or Zeus, or may be Neptune. No not Neptune He’d show up if they crashed in the ocean. No, No it couldn’t be God he thought. Well, He supposed it could be but anyway it was sure a curious apparition. As he continued to stare and conjure imaginings he suddenly heard a voice, a deep baritone voice and there was no mistaking that it was coming from the “God” on the cloud throne. The voice and the words were so clear, he had to look beside him to see if there was someone sitting beside him and talking to him. Nope, he was alone.

The voice said: Don’t come back this way again!

Eddie came home in 1965 and the war continued for another ten years. Interestingly, Eddie refused to watch any newscast or read any media concerning the war because when he did so he would be overcome with a strong to desire to go that way again.