The Paratrooper

The Paratrooper

September 8, 1967 – Midnight

Awakened by a loud explosion that seemed to stem from the vacant field across the street, Scott clutched his bedsheet as flashes of light seeped through the roller blinds.

    He bolted to his brother’s bed, shocked to see that the blast hadn’t woken him.

    In a state of confusion, he dragged a captain’s chair toward the window, slowly opened the blinds and sat down.

    His eyes grew wide once he saw men jumping from planes and floating like jellyfish across a murky ocean sky, hitting the ground and rolling in mounds of dirt like tumbleweeds. They struggled to free themselves from parachutes.

   Staring through the haze, he watched young men, dressed in olive-drab jump suits and netted helmets covering their heads—their hands clutching rifles.

    As they scuttled toward the desecrated field, he witnessed these men battle against other soldiers whose words were foreign to him.

    Tanks and military vehicles raced down the landscape ruins, trampling over patches of fiery grounds. As more men rained from above, he kept his eyes on larger planes flying from the north, dropping bombs that caused the sky to change colors and men to take cover.

    The longer he watched the chaos, the less frightened he became. He felt as if he were watching a rerun.

SEPTEMBER 9 – The Following Morning

Scott felt his brother Butch slap him on his shoulder.

    “Hey, goofball! Did you sleep there all night?” Butch asked, laughing so hard, he fell backward on his brother’s bed.

    Scott lurched forward and groaned. “No, not all night. I was watching a war going on out there.” He pointed across the street.

    “What the heck are you talking about?” Butch crimped his lips. “You mean you had a dream?”

    Scott, still looking at the vacant field, replied, “No, I wasn’t dreaming. I heard lots of noises outside last night. When I got up to look, I saw men with parachutes jumping from C-47 planes. There were soldiers firing 105-millimeter howitzers, and the men they were fighting had red stripes on both shoulders of their uniforms and the same stripe on their hats. They were carrying Type 99 Arisaka rifles and Type 30 bayonets. Lots of M3 half-tracks drove across the field.”

    But before Scott could finish his strange tale, Butch interrupted him. “Hold your horses, little brother. These C-47s and M3 half-tracks... how do you know about all that? Did you learn that in school? Or, I know. You read about that kinda stuff at the library.”

    “I did not.” Scott folded his arms firmly against his body.

    “Well, then, Dad musta told you stories about the military.”

    Frustrated by his brother’s disbelief, Scott shouted, “Dad doesn’t like to say anything about when he was in the navy. Mom says he doesn’t like to talk about it. You know that, Butch!”

    Butch rolled his eyes, assuming his brother had lost his mind. “Well, maybe one of the neighbors, Mr. Watson or Mr. McMahan told you stories when they fought in the war.”

    Shaking his head, Scott insisted that no one had schooled him.

    “Well, if you can tell me how you know all that stuff, then maybe I’ll believe you. Right now, I think you’re nuts,” Butch laughed.

    Butch tucked himself back into bed, rolled over and went back to sleep.

Afternoon Chores

While tending to the lawn work, Scott dug deep to uproot several stubborn weeds and unearthed something shiny near his mother’s colorful perennials. He scooped it up and let it settle in the palm of his hand. It appeared to be a lapel pin, with curves on each side, a cone-like shape in the center, and four stars. He could barely make out the engraved words because dirt filled its crevices, but he did make out US at the top.

    He became startled and dropped the pin when his brother shouted, “Quit foolin’ around and get to work!”

      As Butch walked toward him, Scott scrambled to pick up the pin and shoved it inside the front pocket of his pants.

    “What are you hiding, lil’ brother? Cough it up,” Butch demanded, reaching for the object.

    Scott hesitated for a few seconds before retrieving the pin from his pocket. He handed it to his brother.

    “Where’d you get this?” Butch asked, loosening the dirt with his finger.

    “I found it in the planter, next to Mom’s flowers.”

    “It looks like a military pin,” Butch said, holding it up to the sun. He turned and walked toward the porch to examine it more thoroughly.

    “Maybe it’s Dad’s,” Scott whispered, following close behind him.

    Studying it carefully, Butch responded, “Nah. This ain’t Dad’s. He was in the Navy. This don’t look like no navy pin. It’s got gold in it. If we sell it, we could be rich! Go hide it under my mattress.” 

Mid-Afternoon

Scott lay on his bed and stared at the pin, feeling its contours with his index finger.

    Butch had cautioned him to be discreet about it because he wanted to make a buck by selling it. But Scott was worried that it might have a connection to their father. If they were caught doing anything with it, there would be serious consequences. He crept into his parents’ room and sat on the bed next to a pile of ironed clothes, unsure if he should tell his mother what he had found.

    Mary turned to her son, placed the hot iron on a metal plate, and took a seat next to him. “What are you doing in the house on a nice day?” she asked.

    Scott shrugged. “Butch took off with his friends. Maybe I’ll go watch TV.”

    As he lingered at the doorway, his mother asked him to step back inside.

    “I know you, Scott Matthew. There’s something on your mind. Do you want to talk about it? It’s just you and me right now.”

    Scott ran to his room, retrieved the pin, and showed it to his mother. “I found it outside underneath our bedroom window where your flowers are growing. Honest, I did, Mom. It was in the dirt. It was shining, so I picked it up.” Scott’s voice trembled a bit. “If it’s Dad’s, can you put it back where it belongs? I don’t want him to think I took it from him. Please?” he pleaded as he handed it to his mother.

    Once it exchanged hands, Scott could see the spooked look on his mother’s face as she quickly placed the pin on the bed. “Are you okay, Mom?” he asked with concern.

    Without replying to her son’s question, she said, “Well, honey, this certainly isn’t your father’s. He served in the US Navy as a gunner’s mate.”

    Mary walked to a maple dresser on the other side of the room. She reached into a pink leather jewelry box embossed in gold and pulled out a one-inch pin.

    “This is what gunner’s mates were given,” she said, placing it gently inside the palm of her son’s hand. “Your father wore it proudly.”

    Scott studied the pin. It had two barrels that looked like deck guns, and they crossed together.

    Mary looked adoringly at her son, then explained, “Although other ranks of the military could parachute out of planes, I believe this type of pin you found was given to paratroopers who were good at it. Take the pin and put it in a safe place, Scotty, in case you find out who the owner is.”

    Scott handed his mother his father’s pin, picked up the pin he had found, and ran to his room.

Midnight

The sounds of battle jolted Scott out of a deep sleep once again. He rose slowly from bed and crept toward the bedroom window.

    Balls of fire whirled from the sky and burst into flames as they hit the ground. Men collapsed to their death, yet he wasn’t afraid. Like the night before, parachutes fell from the sky. For some strange reason, his fixation was on one particular paratrooper.

    As the young soldier hit the dirt ground, he struggled to stand. Once on his feet, he reached for a rifle beside him and stared up at the house. The paratrooper walked slowly toward the window, locking eyes with Scott. Then came the knock.

Scott stood eye to eye with him through the window screen—the soldier's knuckles still resting against the glass.

    Scott let out a bloody scream.

    Suddenly, Butch’s strong hand took hold of his shoulder. Scott closed his eyes, his heart beating against his chest.

    “Why are you standing next to the window?” Butch asked, guiding him back to his bed.

    Scott pulled the sheets over his body and explained to his brother about another battle across the street. But this time, he described the young paratrooper. 

    Butch darted toward their bedroom door when he heard footsteps coming up the hallway. He smiled, clearly relieved to see that it was only his mother slipping into the room and not his father.

         “What happened?” she asked.

    “I found Scotty by the window just now,” Butch spoke on his behalf. “He told me he saw a bunch of soldiers fighting in the field.”

    Scott couldn’t close his eyes. He could still feel his nerves shaking inside him. He listened to the soothing voice of his mother as she guided Butch back to his own bed. “Scotty’s just having a bad dream." she said.

Mary’s Intuition

Gently brushing away strands of hair away from Scott’s face, Mary thought about the pin he had shown her earlier and wondered whether it might have caused his nightmares.

    “Scotty, dear, it was all just a bad dream. Everything is all right now,” she said, tucking his blankets around him.

    “It was too real to be a dream!” he said to her. “And there was a man! A man who was staring at me! The man that came to the window looked just like me! Then he knocked on it. I was staring at myself!” His voice quivered.

    “Everything is okay now,” Mary reassured Scott again. She stayed by his side until he fell asleep.

    As Scott’s eyes shut, she stood up and reached for the cord to the window blind, noticing a soft light glowing in the field. As she continued to monitor the light, it grew brighter. Seconds later, a thick cloud of dirt swirled like a small tornado. Once the dust settled, a vague image of a young man appeared. She could see that he was wearing military fatigues, a netted helmet on his head, and was gripping a rifle with both hands. She blinked in disbelief. When she opened her eyes to take another look, she saw no one was lurking outside, and no activity was taking place across the street. Whatever she had seen was replaced by an eerie calm.

    Mary’s clairvoyance was strong. Still, she questioned her rationality, stunned by what she saw. Suddenly, she noticed the streetlight shining on the pin that Scott had found. It was near the edge of the dresser, ready to fall to the floor. She picked it up to move it and felt the same sense of unearthliness she had earlier when she held it in her hand.

    She placed the pin back on the dresser, kissed Scott on the cheek, and released the cord to the blinds until the room went dark.