Cleo’s Bad Day

By David Beakey

The day Cleo got his Dear John letter we were on a hill overlooking Khe Sanh. This was the third time we had taken this hill. Every time we left, a spotter plane or a recon unit would let us know that they had seen NVA on the hill again. It became like a game. We just wanted the hill to be unoccupied and they wanted to use the hill to call in artillery strikes on the airstrip and ammo dump at Khe Sanh. It always seemed unfair to me that we had all kinds of air power and they didn’t have any, south of the DMZ. But they had their advantages too; they knew the land, they were supplied with modern weapons by Russia and China, and they had years of experience fighting a guerrilla war. Some of the bunkers they constructed on the hill we now occupied could take a direct hit from anything short of a B 52 and sustain little damage.

A chopper dropped some C Rations, ammo and mail. We hadn’t received mail in three weeks. Everyone gathered around as the Gunny yelled out our names. Most of us got at least one letter. I found a quiet place and was reading my letter when I heard an ungodly wailing sound from the other side of the hill. I went over to check it out. Cleo was standing up with a crumpled letter in his hand. We all respected Cleo. He came from Chicago and was a member of the Blackstone Rangers. He got shot before he got to Nam. He was usually a cool customer, and had a regal way about him, even under fire.

Doc (he wasn’t a Corpsman, we just called him Doc) was Cleo’s best friend. He went up to Cleo and took the letter out of his hand. Sure enough, it was the classic Dear John letter. “You’ve been gone so long…”, “Your friend Duck has been coming around…”, “I was just so lonely…” We all dreaded getting a letter like that, a letter that makes it clear that Jody has taken over. We didn’t know what to say.

Cleo picked up his M 16 and walked away from us. I was frozen. Should I run after him, shouldn’t somebody do something? We all expected to hear a shot, but it was quiet.

We milled around feeling awkward. Doc started walking in the direction Cleo had gone. Eventually, most of us went back to our positions. About two hours later I saw Cleo. He was talking with two of his friends, members of his squad. I saw him say something and the other two marines started laughing. Even Cleo managed a faint smile. After he got that letter, he didn’t seem to change at all. One time, about a month later, we were at a base camp and I was smoking a joint with him. I mentioned something that was bothering me. He looked at me and said, “It ain’t nothing but a thing.” You know, he was right.