Bobbleheads of War

The day he left for training was the most accomplished Adam had felt in his eighteen years. Coming from a town where the cows outnumbered the locals, Adam’s sense of pride certainly was justified. Only three people had left before Adam. There was Sarah. Bodacious, she went to Los Angeles to pursue her grunge punk music career. There was Billy who had pretty much fled from the ‘villagers with pitchforks’ after his mother discovered her son exploring the Baptist Minister’s ‘sacred’ areas. Then the third was of course the minister. Last Adam heard, Sarah had an underground hit called ‘Lost Country Girl’ but started to worship at the church of cocaine and has since starred in many adult films. Billy is a successful fashion columnist in Portland and lives with his partner who is 30 years his senior and likes playing a little too much. As for the minister, well he found a job at a fast food joint in Wapeka and living on his government dependent cousin’s couch.

So Adam’s departure was finally a proud moment for the entire town. The day before, the whole town came out to Main Street and threw the biggest going away party filled with a Miss East State kissing booth, a civil war reenactment and a parade honoring Adam as he sat on the back of a tractor trailer. It was a shock for Adam to be honored with so much fanfare. Yes, he was doing his patriotic duty, but it was his only option. You see, he was the brightest in his graduating class of 13 students. 13 students made up of farmers, debutantes and that one kid whose black cloak emphasized his silent disposition. Yet, his grades still could not get him into the nearest community college just a mere 60 miles away. Adam had always dreamed he would be the first to successfully leave his town only to return as a wealthier prodigal son. He saw big cities, parties, women, cars and more voluptuous women. The annual Pie Pick Competition and the Pickle Parade simply didn’t please him as much as his nosily doting neighbors.

But beyond the decadence of the outside world Adam was keenly aware his town and nation were under attack. Their very way of a simple farmer’s life was threatened by a gaggle of men who wore short pants, tall hats and mastered the sculpted outstretched mustache. These Commedia Dell 'Arte characters were constantly being spoken about with seething slander on the news and, how, after infiltrating the government’s coded data, proceeded to hijack the Emergency Broadcasting System with the message on looped scrolling feed, “You who are superior must be brought back down to where the people are…” and followed by a starving child crying at the end of a gun. The attack lasted for three hours and Adam knew his nation- the strongest, wealthiest, smartest and freest in the world- had to be defended.

So, killing two birds with one stone, Adam got his dad to start up the teal antique pickup truck held up in the garage, drove 55 miles and signed a marriage license with his motherland. “Are you ready to protect your family, friends and farm from our enemy?” Spitted the recruiting officer whose neck was the size of his thigh with veins popping out with each ‘f’ pronunciation.

“Yes sir!” Adam stuttered back in a cracking purposefully lower octave.

Before Adam knew it, the honeymoon was over. The glorious parade faded into the distance like his parents who stood stationary at the town’s only bus platform with its chipped blue painted walls and broken third step and waved goodbye with pride and fear. A rusty bus was taking their son faster and faster into the deserts of an unknown land.

"Hi!", said the bobble headed boy next to Adam. Bobble Head was a scrawny and short. An unintimidating man whose large nose seemed emasculated by the thick black spectacles resting on top. Adam looked at Bobble Head as if to observe a creature from another planet. It was the meeting of opposites. Urban met rural, Jesus met Moses, farm hand met Plato in hand, horse rider met Cadillac driver and most especially blind patriotism met blind idealism.

It was a friendship forced out of an assigned six-hour bus ride. It was a friendship formed in the sharing of the dimly lit bunk beds. It was a friendship finalized as their heads were shaved and they saw the other breathless, bloody and broken by the weather’s and drill sergeant’s random temperature. Adam would hold Bobble Head up when his chicken legs gave out and Bobble Head would help Adam reassemble his weaponry when his smarts just couldn’t cut it.

"Hey, are you awake?” Bobble Head whispered from his bunk up towards Adam one late night when the snoring harmonized like a well-trained orchestra and bunks shook with dreams of the girl back home.

“Yeah, what’s up? Can’t get your rocks off without me?” Adam snorted purposely calling out the fat guy from California in the juxtaposed bunk who clearly was using Adam as his lustful focal point.

“Shut up man! Leave that kid alone!” Bobble Head jovially retorted, “No seriously though, why are you here?”

“I love my country and she needs me to…”

“No, no” Bobble Head curtly cut him off. “Spare me the gravestone epitaph. Really, what keeps you going here? Where do you see yourself after this hell?”

Adam knew his answer, but no one had ever asked, let alone seemed to care. “Well, I don’t know. I guess I want to do well by myself. Maybe live in the city for a while, make a name and money for myself so I can pussy hunt for a little.” Adam added the last part with a chuckle to break away from the awkwardness he felt. Clearing his throat when Bobble Head didn’t laugh, “Then move back to town, find a nice gal, take care of my parents and the family farm.” It wasn’t that Adam wanted the future to look like his childhood, but it was all he could wrap his head around.

“Okay.” Bobble Head responded as he seemed to process Adam’s words, “Good night, bud, don’t shake the bed as fast as Cali over there. I need my beauty sleep.” It was Bobble Head who ended up delivering the laugh line which broke the awkwardness.

The next time the same conversation came up happened almost nine months after Bobble Head had asked. In those nine months the two brothers had completed training. Adam slept with four women (two at once), tried cocaine and won $2000 on a $5 craps game investment. Bobble Head slept with one woman who was by his side for those brief days as they spoke fluid French, debated the merits of existentialism and invested $5 in a dusty dilapidated biography of Frida.

Days before the conversation was picked up, this time Adam asking, their regiment had been shipped off to the motherland’s mustached enemy’s fatherland. When their boots were on the ground both noticed the air smelled like freshly cut grass with a hint of red dust. There the cars were replaced with goats, roads by mud, lamp posts by fires while the future stopped, and the present was all old father time had patience for.

The day Adam asked was the day he questioned himself and his motherland. Earlier they took another village from the rebels but all they found was a baker who unfortunately wore a mustache. By facial hair association he was shot threw the temple as an enemy combatant while on his knees pleading in gibberish, regretful tears rolling down his cheek. As his body hit the ground with a thud all Adam heard was his fellow soldier's laughter, hollering and expressions of patriotism which had put him there. Maybe it was all this time with the overly emotional and intellectual Bobble Head, but he no longer saw black and white. Instead, Adam felt the harsh pain of humanity's gray purgatory.

As the baker’s blood amassed in an overflowing pool it drained towards a fresh loaf of bread the dead man had been carrying moments before as a welcome gift. The bread, soaked with its maker's sweat and now blood, was all Adam could see until he caught the deep gaze of Bobble Head while a regretful tear ran past his black thick rimmed glasses and evaporated before hitting the barren ground. It was at that moment Adam saw his father, the baker and his friend at the same. Bobble Head was right to ask him, 'why was he here'.

On the way back to base the sun set and released hues of oranges Adam had never seen. Bobble Head must have seen Adam’s amazement “It’s funny how light reflections can make something so beautifully unique. As the worst brutality and selfishness can be shown by one neighbor to another its beauty remains, timeless and overseeing our transgressions.” With that the base doors closed behind them, and they drank stolen bottles of wine celebrating their thirteenth captured village.

The night grew hazier and as everyone had wandered off to sleep. By debauchery or ignorance Adam and Bobble Head were left alone. Just two men from two different worlds sharing one moment only brothers understand. “So why are you here?” Adam asked with just as much self-doubt as curiosity.

After a big gulp of wine, down to the last drop Bobble Head pushed up his glasses onto his nose’s bridge and looked Adam dead in the eyes, “I had to see it!”

“See what?”

“I had to see war. I had to feel the pain of the thing I despise the most. Yeah, my parents said I was a fool. But what kind of man would I be if I spoke out against something I have never understood. I have never felt its pain. I have never faced it head on. To know myself, I have to know the good and the bad to truly know what life has to offer.” Time passed with a silence only found in unadulterated respect and comfort until it was broken by Bobble Head’s chuckle, “Or maybe it was just to meet you. God works in mysterious was.”

After that night they both spoke to each other only through eye contact as they went village to village, death to death and tear to tear as shame held their hearts. That is until one dawn the bright oranges came out again and broke the brother’s gaze and mesmerized Adam again with its far-off engulfing beauty. Adam stood silent, lost in the escape, until Bobble Head jumped in front of him. “Hey, we’ve got a lot more to do. Let’s keep on because there is even more beauty ahead.” Adam returned his gaze to Bobble Head. For a second they shared a mutual excitement for the future filled with hope. Bobble Head flashed a smile which eclipsed the dawn until there was a popping sound, the smile faded and a splash of red joined the timeless orange horizon. Bobble Head’s head snapped back with a force born from a barrel and a bullet of hate. As his lifeless body hit the ground his black rimmed glasses broke in two and shards flew in every direction. On his knees and covered in death Adam, motionless, saw the dawn turning to night and quickly looked past his tears to restore their gaze. There was nothing to be found but his memories.

Years soon passed. The mustached rebels were now the motherland’s greatest ally. All the bloodshed, the cold sweat nightmares, broken homes and shattered dreams seemed forgotten. There would soon be talk of another war but this time a man emerged from the crowd wearing thick black rimmed glasses. This man never returned home after he left for war. Instead, he found a new home in books, ideas, revolution and most importantly, humanity. Everyone stared in respectful silence at this man standing in front of them. He spoke but one phrase, “I have known war, I have known love. I choose love.”