Another Man's Moccasins

She gave me one last pat on the shoulder before walking away. “You go back.”

I drank steadily through the afternoon, the weight of my wounded arm sloping my shoulder farther and farther down until it was all I could do to continue raising my one hand to play.

I’d probably gone through an entire case of beer by the time I noticed it was full night; the crowd was pushing in against me. I’d also noticed that Le Khang hadn’t brought any more beer over for a while, a sure sign I had been cut off.

Rescue came in the form of a familiar powder-blue arm, which reached across and placed another beer next to all the empties on the flipped-up cover of the zebra-striped, grained piano.

“How you feelin’, Hollywood?”

He smiled and sat on the edge of the bench, and I noticed how little room he took up in comparison to Henry Standing Bear. Hoang had been released only two days after the incident at Khe Sanh, had already been reestablished to active flight duty, and had flown three more missions since the beginning of the week. “I buy you beer.”

“Thanks.”

He continued to smile at me. “You drunk.”

“Stinking.” He looked puzzled. “Stinking drunk.”

He brightened, always game for another piece of American slang. “Stinking drunk?”

“Stinking. Drunk.”

He held his beer up to mine as he chanted the phrase to himself. I picked up the bottle, wet with condensation, and tipped his. The English lesson made me think about Mai Kim, and thoughts of her battered away at the waves of alcohol that kept rolling onto the beaches of my mind. “Where’s Mai Kim?”

He looked at me blankly. “She not here.”

“Where is she?”

“She gone.”

I drank my beer. “Oh.”

I scratched my head and watched as my hat slipped off and fell on top of the foot pedals of the piano. Hoang reached down and snagged it and placed it back on my head backwards. “You stinking drunk!”

I pushed back and stood, none too steadily, and waited for the world to stop moving. It was getting late, and I decided to make the long trek back to the other side of the airfield where they’d lodged me in the visitors’ barracks. Hoang was next to me and put an arm on mine to help me steady a persistent list. “You go home?”

“Yep.” I stuck a hand out to grip the piano, which provided a little more support than the compact pilot. “If I can.”

“I help you.”

I half tripped over the piano bench and watched as everyone moved away. There was a brief upsurge of nausea, and I belched, which made me feel a little better. “I’m okay.”

As I turned and shambled toward the open doorway, Hoang raised one of my arms and slipped under to help me navigate what now appeared to be the pitching deck of the Boy-Howdy Beau-Coups Good Times Lounge. I pulled away and fell down the two wooden steps that led out of the bar.

I rolled over and stared up into the hazy star-filled night. “Ouch.”

Hoang’s face was above mine. “You fall.”

“I guess I could use a little help.”

The Vietnamese pilot grabbed an arm and helped me get to my feet. He was surprisingly strong and half led, half supported me as I wavered down the deserted red-dirt road. He nodded his head. “You save my life.”

I looked at the ludicrous figure of the tiny man in the powder-blue jumpsuit and white silk scarf. “When?”

“You funny guy.”

I stopped and saluted the two air policemen who were stationed at Gate 055. The APs asked Hoang if I was going to make it or should they call a patrol with a jeep or maybe a forklift. Hoang shook his head and explained that we would walk the perimeter to the next gate to give me a chance to sober up. He also explained how I’d saved his life.

They said that was great.

He then explained how I’d saved other people’s lives, too.

They said that was great, too.

I puked.

I don’t think they thought that was so great.

Hoang supported me as we walked along the fenced boundary and looked at the moonlight casting down on the high whitewashed walls of the old French fort—Hotel California, as the locals referred to it. It didn’t look real, or it looked too real, and I felt like I was on some movie set where we would walk behind the structure and see the two-by-four bracings that held up the naked backs of the walls.

The nausea was creeping up in my throat again, and I stopped, leaning against something and sitting on a hard surface. “Hey, Hollywood, you ever see Beau Geste?”

“No, but need to talk to you.”

“One with Ronald Colman?”

He looked a little worried. “No...”

“Gary Cooper?”

“No.”

I looked at Hoang, who was blurred and wavering in the close strangeness of the Vietnamese night. “How about Gunga Din, did ya see that?”

"Lieutenant... need to tell you something.”

“What?”

He looked around. “Need to tell you something.”

I ignored him and started reciting Kipling.

You may talk o’ gin and beer

When you’re quartered safe out ’ere,

An’ you’re sent to penny-fights an’ Aldershot it;

But when it comes to slaughter

You will do your work on water,

An’ you’ll lick the bloomin’ boots of ’im that’s got it.

He edged away. “Lieutenant . . .”

I shook my head and immediately regretted it. “Doesn’t matter.”