Crocodile Smile

I asked my old friend, as I helped him and Evelyn into the car, if it would be all right with him if I wrote a book about him.
"You want your next book to be about me?" he said, stopping midway from settling into his seat, one leg dangling. His old wrinkled face contorted and his eyes welled with tears. Evelyn sat stock still, looking straight ahead. Alzheimers was apparently winning today, and she had been mute since I walked in the door to gather them. The few attempts to speak thus far had been mumbled garbled words, impossible to decipher.
"Yes," I said, "If it would be ok with you. And I'd really like to sit down and write all your WW2 adventures. There aren't many WW2 vets left."
"That's true. Just three from my battalion of 200 that I know of," he said, dabbing at his eyes, "Well I would be honored!" He shook his head, smiling, as he finished settling in the seat and clicking on his seatbelt.
"Hello Asherel," he said, noticing her in the front seat. She can't always come with us, but she had scurried to finish her school work so that she could this time.
"Asherel!" said Evelyn, a bright smile shattering away her illness momentarily.
I gazed deep into her eyes, which were for a brief time, aware.
"Yes, Asherel is with us today," I said.
"Asherel," she repeated clearly, looking steadily at me.
"So Comer, while we drive and look at the Spring, would you tell me some WW2 stories?"
"Oh I have plenty of them," he said, "But they aren't very happy."
"Well I want to hear those too, but for now, can you tell me the happy ones?"
"Ok, well, you know, I was assigned first gunner in Milne Bay. That means I was the first one to engage the enemy. I was in charge of the Bufer guns. We called them ack-acks. Anyway, our job was to shoot down the Japanese airplanes. I was quickly promoted to Corporal, and then put in charge of the first gunner group. Well, one man outranked me, but I was the leader."
"Why ? Shouldn't he have been in charge?"
"Yes, but he was an asinine coward. Never did anything."
"So he listened to you?"
"They all did. All but one time."
"What happened that one time?"
"One didn't listen to me. Only happened one time though."
"Why...? What made him listen?"
"A rifle butt to the jaw."
"Ouch. That was allowed?"
"It was war. Anything was allowed. What were they going to do? Send me to the front?"
I laughed.
"Anyway," he went on,"One day I was out walking along the beach, and I saw a mirage, clear as the object itself hovering over the water. It was a Japanese submarine. That sucker was about 100 yards off shore. I could see it in the air so clear I could touch it."
"I didn't know you could see mirages over the ocean."
"No, neither did I. Neither did my commanders when I radioed it in. But I told them I wasn't crazy. There was a submarine sitting right there in the bay. So they had no choice but to send out airplanes to check it out...and you know, it was right where I said it was. They dropped depth charges and they sunk it."
"Wow," I said, "What was it planning to do?"
"Bomb our supply ships. And you know there was a blockade and we were starving."
"So you saved your men with that mirage."
"Could be."
"Maybe it was a vision from God."
"Haha. Well, might a been...but I think it was a mirage."

He told me many stories, including one about a wild boar baby his men raised to be a 400 pound tame pet.
"But some fool shot it when we were starving. No one would eat it though. It was our pet."
He told me about crocodile hunting in Australia,and how he shot a huge one bigger than himself.
"Did you save the skin for crocodile shoes for Evelyn?" I asked.
Evelyn had been mutely crunching her extra crispy chicken the entire drive, looking straight ahead while Comer told his stories, but at this last remark, she burst out laughing, and looked cheerfully at her husband. He patted her hand, grinning.

As I returned them to the Nursing Home, I thought how little it takes to make others happy. I had just heard on the radio that to develop volunteer minded adults, they need to volunteer as young people. I remembered watching my dad always bringing a young service man out to lunch with us, and Mom working with an older woman to help teach her to read. I thought of our history studies and the section we are reading now about JFK telling us not to ask what our country can do for us, but what we can do for our country, about Gandhi, and Martin Luther King Jr., and the 15 year old black girl who walked the gauntlet of spitting, threatening adults and children to be the first black to enter the white school in the south. I thought of Jesus and His admonition to win our enemies with kindness, and to turn the other cheek when one cheek is slapped. I thought of how the Bible calls for all of us to serve, and to love one another, and how sometimes it is as simple as letting an old man tell long ago stories.

Mark 9:35
Sitting down, Jesus called the Twelve and said, "Anyone who wants to be first must be the very last, and the servant of all."




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