Craig & Fred

by Craig Grossi

  Ysa pulled off the bracelet. “This is yours, man,” he said, putting it on my wrist. “I want you to have it.”

  I felt a burn rise up in my throat and eyes, and I couldn’t choke back the tears. The gift of the bracelet was a small and simple act, but, in that moment, it meant everything to me. Right there in the bar, I broke down completely, as if a year’s worth of repressed emotion were flooding out. I cried hard, my head in my hands. Ysa put his arms around me and we hugged. For the next ten minutes, I tried to pull it together, but I couldn’t. Ed, Patrick, and Brian all came over to see what was going on. They tried to console me, gathering around me with their arms locked around my back, but there was no way for me to compose myself. All I could think about was Justin. Eventually, Ysa and the guys got me out of the bar and took me home.

  The next morning, I woke up in bed and looked down at the guys lying on their mats on the floor. At my feet, Fred looked up at me, and slowly Ysa, Patrick, and Ed woke up, too. Right away, I put a smile on my face and started talking about what we were going to have for breakfast. I tried to brush off what had happened the night before. But I could tell the guys were worried about me. For Ysa, Pat, and Ed, things were different. They were all still on active duty, so they were around each other and around other marines all the time, working, relaxing, shooting the shit, and talking about stuff—the good and the bad. I think they realized that for me, since I’d gotten out of the marines, it was different. I had come home to civilian life and just kept going.

  “You can’t keep that stuff inside, man,” Ysa said. “You gotta talk about it. You gotta find an outlet.”

  It was the first time I remember anyone really calling me out on the way I was coping—or not coping—after coming home. And I respected the way Ysa talked to me. He wasn’t coddling me; he wasn’t looking at me like I was broken. He simply told me I was wrong, in a way only a fellow marine could. It was just factual—almost as if I’d been slacking off on working out and had gotten out of shape, and he wanted me to get it together. “You’re only doing a disservice to yourself,” Ysa said. It was my duty to take care of it—to take care of myself.

  “If you’re not dealing and talking, you’re taking yourself out of the fight. It’s not gonna end well,” Ysa said.

  I knew he was right.

  Back in Seattle, Matt and I waited for an update from Josh, who’d been at the VA hospital for a few hours.

  “You know, if it is a blood clot, it’s a good thing you stopped in Portland,” Matt said. Portland hadn’t been a stop Josh and I planned to make. After Josh’s moment of cliff-jumping fame in Crater Lake, a couple and their three grown kids approached him and struck up a conversation. They’d invited us to use their campsite in Bend, where we were already planning to go, and afterward, their oldest daughter, Heather, insisted we see Portland. “You can use my apartment and I’ll stay with my boyfriend. It’s right in the Pearl District, so you’d have a great time,” she offered, insisting we shouldn’t miss the city. We’d planned to make the six-hour drive from our camping spot in Bend up to Seattle but ended up taking a detour at Heather’s urging.

  “What do you mean it’s good we stopped in Portland?” I asked Matt. The two of us were sitting at the dog park watching Fred and Matt’s white Labrador, Lucy, chase each other.

  “Clots usually get worse during periods of rest, when someone sits still for an extended period of time. If you had driven all the way up to Seattle from Bend, one of the clots could have traveled up to Josh’s brain or his heart. That could have killed him,” Matt said with the matter-of-fact tone unique to medical professionals.

  “Holy shit,” I said, trying to grapple with how bad things could have been.

  I thought back on the trip and considered the close calls we’d had, from the Land Cruiser nearly sinking in the Mississippi mud to Josh’s prosthetic giving out in the middle of the redwoods. We’d come so far and seen so much, managing to get by with only a few mishaps. Still, those mishaps could have been really serious had things gone only slightly differently. Maybe this latest close call was our final warning.

  As the sun began to set, I decided to get Fred settled in at Matt’s and head back to the hospital. The last text I’d received from Josh said he was still waiting to see the doctor. I figured I’d go wait in the lobby. I didn’t want him to feel alone.

  Under the fluorescent lights of the VA lobby, I made a crappy cup of coffee from a vending machine and took a seat in a stiff plastic chair. In front of me was a big coffee table with magazines spread across it—VFW, Military Spouse, Highlights. A few elderly veterans wearing Vietnam vet ball caps sat quietly in wheelchairs or with walkers. The group appeared to be waiting for a bus back to their assisted-living facility. I didn’t speak to any of them, but I always felt bad thinking about the way veterans of that era were treated when they came home. Many of them had been drafted into the conflict and saw combat that left them physically and mentally scarred. The society they’d returned to was a far cry from our current “Thank you for your service” spirit. Plus, the VA and all the other resources weren’t as robust then as they are today. It was something I tried to remind myself of any time I found myself complaining about the VA.

  A text came in from Josh: “Blood clots. They wrote me a prescription. I’ll be out in 10.”

  I was relieved they weren’t making him stay in the hospital, but I knew we weren’t out of the woods. About twenty minutes later, Josh came through the doors carrying a shopping bag of meds. He was still limping a little bit, but there he was, smiling and on his feet.

  “Hey, man, you didn’t have to wait for me,” he said.

  “Well, I really wanted to get a look at the lobby of the Seattle VA. It was right up there on my must-see list with the Grand Canyon and the redwoods,” I joked as we walked out. The bus was loading the last wheelchaired veteran as we got into the Land Cruiser.

  “I never thought I’d be so happy to see the inside of this beauty,” Josh said as he clipped his seat belt. He explained how he’d been prescribed a blood thinner that he’d need to inject into his stomach twice a day, along with some pain meds.

  “The doctor told me to take it easy, but she didn’t say anything about not traveling,” he said.

  I paused a moment, genuinely surprised that he didn’t seem to be considering packing it in and catching the next flight home. From what Josh was saying, it sounded like the medication wasn’t really a “fix”—just enough to make him comfortable till he got back to his regular doctor in D.C. But I didn’t say anything.

  “If you wanna keep going, it’s your call. I just don’t want you to drop dead on me. That would really kill the trip,” I joked.

  “I always thought my time would come in the passenger seat of a Land Cruiser—I just didn’t think it’d be this soon,” he replied with a smile.

  A few days later, at a bar in Minneapolis, we had our first big fight of the trip. We were staying with Josh’s high school friend Alex, who took us to a Twins game. Afterward, we went to a bar by the stadium for oversize soft pretzels and a few beers. All night, I’d noticed Josh had been favoring his leg, leaning into the prosthetic. I was concerned about him, especially because the rest of the trip would be all driving. I only had enough money for gas and food, and I planned on going straight through from Minneapolis to D.C.

  “Hey, man. You feeling okay? How’s your leg?” I said, trying to keep it casual.

  “Yeah—I’m fine, man. Why?” Josh said.

  “You just looked a little uncomfortable while we were walking around tonight. I realized I hadn’t really asked you about your leg in a while,” I said.

  The truth was, things had been tense between us since Seattle. After saying good-bye to Matt, we drove ten long hours to Bozeman, Montana. We camped overnight and I went for one last long mountain bike ride, then it was onward to North Dakota, where we camped under the most brilliant stars we’d ever seen. Then we’d made our way to Minneapolis, Josh’s hometown. Nothing h
ad happened, but the whole time, I could feel a strain between us that wasn’t there before.

  Even though I wasn’t saying it, I was annoyed because I thought Josh was putting his health at risk. We both knew he’d done more on this trip on one leg than we ever thought possible. It was incredible. Now why didn’t he know when to call it quits? He should have flown home from Seattle and seen his doctor back home, I thought. I wanted Josh to understand the difference between doing something worthwhile to challenge himself and doing something dangerous just for the sake of doing it. Instead of acknowledging the reality of his pain, he was ignoring it. To me, it was obvious. What was much harder for me to see was how the things I was saying to Josh applied directly to me, too.

  “Look. Why don’t you just say it? You think I should fly home. I can tell you’ve been thinking it,” Josh said.

  “Shouldn’t you listen to the doctors in Seattle? Didn’t they say riding in the car could be bad for the clots? That’s pretty much all we’re gonna do between here and D.C.,” I said.

  “If you want me off the trip, just say it,” he said, clearly upset.

  We’d had a few beers, and after all this time on the road together, we were on each other’s nerves. It was easy for the conversation to escalate. Alex came back from the restroom and saw we were in some sort of discussion. She let us be, walking over to the bar with her friends.

  “I want you to make that decision. I want you to take a look at your situation and deal with it instead of sweeping it under the rug and making it someone else’s problem,” I said sharply. “You’ve seen this summer what you’re capable of. How far you can push yourself mentally and physically. Now you need to accept your limitations.”

  The next morning, I drove Josh to the airport. Our argument at the bar hadn’t gone anywhere productive, and when we got back to Alex’s apartment, I went to bed and Josh booked a flight. Now we were in the truck again, and it was quiet.

  We got out at the departures terminal and stood on the pavement at the back of the Land Cruiser. Cars went by and people hurried through revolving doors. I reached for Josh’s duffel bag and handed it to him. We looked at each other, managed smiles, and even hugged.

  “Thanks, man,” Josh said earnestly. “I had a great time.” He gave Fred a kiss on the head.

  “I couldn’t have done it without you, man. I’m really glad you came,” I told him. It was true.

  In the front seat, Fred didn’t whimper or complain. He seemed to understand that it was Josh’s time to leave our little pack. I shifted the Land Cruiser into gear and pointed us in the direction of home.

  CHAPTER 16

  Homecoming

  After my last mission in Afghanistan, during the final days of my deployment, my buddy PJ and I sat in our barracks on Leatherneck and drank. We’d had a bottle of Johnnie Walker Red Label stashed away since we’d first arrived in-country. For seven months, it waited for us.

  “Before we go home—when we know we’re done with field operations—we’re gonna drink this whole thing, me and you,” I’d said to PJ. That felt like a long time ago now.

  We brought Coke back from the chow hall and sat across from each other on our bunks, our packed bags around us, passing the bottle back and forth. We hadn’t had a lick of alcohol in seven months and we were each down a good fifteen pounds, so it didn’t take much for the booze to do its thing.

  PJ and I had trained in intelligence together before coming over on the same deployment. We’d been roommates, too. We were close. Back at Pendleton, when we were preparing to deploy, our command informed us there would be only two positions for intel collectors out in the field, both up at the infantry-held base at the Kajaki Dam. The rest of us should expect to spend our deployment on Camp Leatherneck. We knew the fighting in Kajaki was bad, that the marines there had suffered a lot of casualties, but the thought of spending our deployment sitting at a desk was devastating. PJ and I both wanted that placement in the field doing what we’d trained to do.

  Later, our commander, Gomez, pulled me and PJ aside. He knew how close we were. “PJ, you’re going to Kajaki,” he said. “Craig, you’ll be on Camp Leatherneck. I can’t have you two in one place; I need one of you here.” We all knew PJ and I made the best team, but he couldn’t send two close friends out into that environment. If something happened to one of us out there, it’d compromise the other’s ability to continue the mission.

  I was crushed. Little did we know at the time what lay ahead for me.

  Back in the barracks, PJ and I started swapping stories about what we’d seen and done in our time apart. Our deployments turned out to be relatively similar. PJ had seen some serious combat in Kajaki. The Taliban wanted to regain control of the dam, so they were relentless. And since it was a known coalition base, the whole surrounding area was heavily laced with IEDs. PJ had seen guys evaporate in front of him. One moment your buddy was there, the next moment he was gone.

  There aren’t many words for things like that. He knew, and I knew, what it was like, and that was enough.

  After Sean and Justin died, I went on one last, long mission. Instead of inserting by helicopter, we drove MRAPs and M-ATVs out into the desert. We took a compound—one big enough that we could drive the vehicles into it—that Ysa and Bobby, Justin’s replacement, cleared. It got turned into a patrol base: PB Alcatraz. Eventually, tents, barracks, and showers would be flown in. The coalition would use it to secure the area, including the stretch of 611 leading toward the dam.

  On that mission, a lot of things happened in Sangin that I thought I’d never see. After a few weeks of harsh fighting, we started to see villagers moving about during the day. Kids were running around, chasing each other, playing in the sand. A local market—a little mud-walled structure by the side of the 611—reopened. We started leaving the compound during the day, meeting and talking with more villagers than we ever had before. Ysa and I would go to the little market and buy produce—cucumbers, apples, figs, pears—almost like we were grocery shopping back home. My rifle became a burden—as if it were a hassle to carry it. For a while, things in Sangin were relatively peaceful. It felt like a completely different place.

  Then we started to see what we called “combat tourists” arrive on our base: majors, colonels, and other high-ranking leadership. They’d fly in from Leatherneck and demand to go out on “presence patrols,” which basically meant taking a walk through Taliban town in the middle of the day like a bunch of tourists. These patrols were dangerous because they didn’t serve any purpose. There wasn’t a group of villagers we were hoping to talk with, and the routes were loosely planned. It was as if they wanted to be able to say they’d patrolled in Sangin without actually having to spend any real time there. It was dangerous, and I didn’t see the tactical benefit. To me, it was a sign the bureaucratic war machine had caught up with us. I was ready to come home.

  Still, I didn’t feel good about getting out of there when other guys had to stay. After Justin died, Ysa and I got really close, along with Bobby, Justin’s replacement. Bobby had joined us after recovering from a gunshot wound to his left bicep; he was a welcome addition to our crew of misfits. When I left, Ysa and Bobby still had another four months on their deployment. I felt like I was abandoning them, and I couldn’t shake the feeling that one day I’d wake up to a call with news that something had happened to one of them.

  When PJ and I finished the bottle, I slept better than I had in a long while. A few days later, I’d be on a plane to Camp Pendleton, where I would turn in my gear and get processed out of First Intelligence Battalion. Then, at last, it’d be home to Virginia and to Fred, who’d been waiting for more than three months for me to come home.

  It was strange to be on a commercial jet in civilian clothes, but I felt good. I liked going unrecognized, just a regular guy on a plane. Instead of cammies, I wore my blue Capitals cap, jeans, and a sweatshirt. I watched movies on my iPad. I didn’t feel particularly emotional. I was excited to see Fred, excited to get back
and move on.

  When we touched down at Reagan, I walked through the terminal and there they were: my mom, dad, stepmom, stepdad, my sister and her family, my then-girlfriend, and a bunch of high school buddies. They had a huge banner. WELCOME HOME CRAIG! it read in big block letters. They wore homemade T-shirts with my face on them and waved little American flags.

  I fixed a big grin on my face and walked toward them. It wasn’t a phony smile; I was glad to see them—surprised, actually. I didn’t know they were all going to be there, especially with the sign and shirts. But before I knew what I was thinking, just like that, my mind went to Sean and Justin. Their families weren’t going to get to have this moment. The thought sent a wave of rage and regret through my body. I felt sick.

  I hadn’t told anyone too much about my deployment. When I got injured, I didn’t want to freak out my family. I almost didn’t call at all. Then a couple of guys at Leatherneck told me that sometimes, in reports that got sent back home, names from the WIA list could accidentally get put onto the KIA list. I didn’t want to think about what it’d do to my mom and dad if somehow they were falsely notified that I had been killed. So I called them both and carefully delivered a watered-down version of the rocket explosion that almost blew me to pieces.

  Still, no one knew much, which was fine before, when I was over there. Now that I was standing in front of everyone, it felt different. I didn’t know what my friends had heard—if they thought I was fucked up in the head now. I worried that everyone would think I was a different person, that my injury and my time in Afghanistan had changed who I was.

  I put myself on cruise control, going numb to the noise of my emotions. I kept that smile going and took turns hugging and thanking everyone. My mom, who wore my high school ice hockey jersey, was sobbing as she pulled me in for a long, tight embrace. Then I hugged my dad, and over his shoulder caught sight of Sarah, who was crying, too. She was holding my little niece Sam, who was born just before I deployed and was now almost a year old.