white gloves marched in formation, then handed Mom an American flag folded into a tight triangle with the white stars on the blue background facing up. Seven people from Codie’s unit came, including her sergeant. They were all nice. They all said nice things about Codie. But they didn’t know her. The chaplain who conducted the generic, interdenominational service didn’t know her, so all he could talk about was how our nation owed a debt to Codie and she’d given her life defending what she believed in.
That was wrong. Codie wasn’t defending what she believed in. She was just a girl who didn’t have the grades to prove how smart she was, and not much else going on at the moment she enlisted. It was also wrong that there were no cousins or friends from grade school. No aunts or uncles just because our grandmother was from Okinawa and our father checked out early and my mom hates his family. Or they hate her. The story keeps changing. But it was still wrong. There should have been people there who remembered Codie from before her permanent teeth came in. Who knew that she loved the Black Keys and Flamin’ Hot Fritos. That if the skin of a mango so much as touched her lips they would swell up like a starlet’s after too many collagen shots. That her handwriting was comically unreadable. That she could run the four-forty in under a minute. That her favorite movie was
Princess Mononoke.
That when our mother was too busy to go to the commissary or her car needed a new transmission more than we needed groceriesand the money ran out before the month did, Codie would make us mustard-and-sugar sandwiches and ketchup soup. But no one said any of these things at her ceremony.
All any of them wanted to talk to me and Mom about after the service was what a one-in-a-million fluke Codie’s death was. How weird it was for not just a female, but a female air force, to get killed by mortar fire. How it had something to do with her just getting there and not being fully briefed on SOP. How someone must have really screwed up if they hadn’t told her never to go outside the wire.
That was the first I’d heard about Codie dying outside of the base. When I asked what had happened, why no one had told us about this before, their gazes ping-ponged around from Mom then back to me, and they all went mute until someone asked Patterson, the guy who’d made the comment, whether he was so stupid because his mother is his sister or if it was from being dropped on his head. Then they started in on how no one really knew how Codie had died. How details were sketchy. How the jerkwad fobbits were too fucking illiterate to even write a decent report.
“So why did you say that?” I asked Patterson. “About Codie being outside the wire?”
He didn’t answer, but a staff sergeant with a head too small for his beefed-up shoulders whispered to me, “Don’t worry. We’ll get them for you. We’ll get the sons of bitches who did this to your sister.”
I wasn’t trying to get in the sergeant’s face when I asked, “Is that supposed to make me feel better?”
“We understand,” he said. “We’ve all been where you are now, and it sucks, and sometimes it just helps to stay angry.”
“I’m not angry, I really want to know if you’re planning to get the person who was actually responsible.”
“Just give us a name.”
“Her.” I pointed at my mother. “The person who signed her enlistment papers.”
Before my mother could say anything, I walked away from all of them and went back to the cemetery. I half liked and half hated that an enormous coral tree shaded it. I liked that a fluffy quilt of crimson blossoms had already settled over Codie’s grave. I hated that I’d never be happy again when I thought of twirling with her in a shower of coral tree petals in Hawaii. My mother and I didn’t exchange one word onthe long flight back to Okinawa. That was her version of being understanding and forgiving me. It was my version of
That was wrong. Codie wasn’t defending what she believed in. She was just a girl who didn’t have the grades to prove how smart she was, and not much else going on at the moment she enlisted. It was also wrong that there were no cousins or friends from grade school. No aunts or uncles just because our grandmother was from Okinawa and our father checked out early and my mom hates his family. Or they hate her. The story keeps changing. But it was still wrong. There should have been people there who remembered Codie from before her permanent teeth came in. Who knew that she loved the Black Keys and Flamin’ Hot Fritos. That if the skin of a mango so much as touched her lips they would swell up like a starlet’s after too many collagen shots. That her handwriting was comically unreadable. That she could run the four-forty in under a minute. That her favorite movie was
Princess Mononoke.
That when our mother was too busy to go to the commissary or her car needed a new transmission more than we needed groceriesand the money ran out before the month did, Codie would make us mustard-and-sugar sandwiches and ketchup soup. But no one said any of these things at her ceremony.
All any of them wanted to talk to me and Mom about after the service was what a one-in-a-million fluke Codie’s death was. How weird it was for not just a female, but a female air force, to get killed by mortar fire. How it had something to do with her just getting there and not being fully briefed on SOP. How someone must have really screwed up if they hadn’t told her never to go outside the wire.
That was the first I’d heard about Codie dying outside of the base. When I asked what had happened, why no one had told us about this before, their gazes ping-ponged around from Mom then back to me, and they all went mute until someone asked Patterson, the guy who’d made the comment, whether he was so stupid because his mother is his sister or if it was from being dropped on his head. Then they started in on how no one really knew how Codie had died. How details were sketchy. How the jerkwad fobbits were too fucking illiterate to even write a decent report.
“So why did you say that?” I asked Patterson. “About Codie being outside the wire?”
He didn’t answer, but a staff sergeant with a head too small for his beefed-up shoulders whispered to me, “Don’t worry. We’ll get them for you. We’ll get the sons of bitches who did this to your sister.”
I wasn’t trying to get in the sergeant’s face when I asked, “Is that supposed to make me feel better?”
“We understand,” he said. “We’ve all been where you are now, and it sucks, and sometimes it just helps to stay angry.”
“I’m not angry, I really want to know if you’re planning to get the person who was actually responsible.”
“Just give us a name.”
“Her.” I pointed at my mother. “The person who signed her enlistment papers.”
Before my mother could say anything, I walked away from all of them and went back to the cemetery. I half liked and half hated that an enormous coral tree shaded it. I liked that a fluffy quilt of crimson blossoms had already settled over Codie’s grave. I hated that I’d never be happy again when I thought of twirling with her in a shower of coral tree petals in Hawaii. My mother and I didn’t exchange one word onthe long flight back to Okinawa. That was her version of being understanding and forgiving me. It was my version of
Similar Books
