"Sgt. Harmon. You got a minute?" his platoon sergeant asked.
"Yeah, sure. What's up?"
The staff sergeant was four years older than him, but at 25, he seemed ancient when most of the rest of the platoon was between 18 and 21. Grant Harmon was four months away from turning 22, and having nearly finished his four-year enlistment, he was now officially a 'short-timer'.
"You got a letter for me?"
"Nah. I'm not married and I'm an only child. If shit goes sideways, two Marines in dress blues will show up at my parents' house and make their day. The last thing they need is a sappy letter from their dead son."
"So no letter for your next of kin? No one you want to say anything to after you've bought it?"
"Nope. Not really," Sgt. Harmon told him truthfully. He'd come to terms with his possible death, and he didn't think a letter would jinx him. He just didn't see it as something he needed to do.
"Okay. Just checking. You're the only Marine in this platoon who hasn't written one, and I'm not gonna ask again," the staff sergeant told him. It wasn't a threat. It was a simple acknowledgement that it was Harmon's choice.
What Sergeant Harmon didn't mention was that he did have a letter. It was just wasn't to his next of kin, and it was too private to talk about. He'd written it over the course of the last six months of their 8-month deployment, a little here and a little there, and he'd just finished it a few days earlier.
He had no intention of ever mailing it himself, but were he to 'buy the farm', he knew the staff sergeant would almost certainly be the one to inventory his personal effects, and when he did, he would find it. The only things left to do were to put in an envelope and address it. Or maybe not.
Anyone in a combat zone could use the postal system for free. But it might be smarter to put a stamp on it—just in case. The reason why was simple, or more specifically, it would make someone else's life simpler if they mailed it.
Harmon knew how Marines were. Either the staff sergeant or some volunteer would spare no effort to find her once they got back stateside in order to hand deliver it, and he wasn't about to put anyone through that. So after assuring his platoon sergeant he still had no 'if-I-die letter' for him, Sergeant Harmon pulled an envelope out of his footlocker and penned her name on it.
Just seeing it in writing made him think of her again, and as he wrote the address down from memory, he smiled as he thought back to that one day when the two of them had nearly become lovers. But at the time, she'd been married and his teacher, and in the end, he just couldn't go through with it.
It didn't matter that her husband was a first-rate shit who alternated between neglecting her and berating her, and on occasion, pushing her around. In his book, married was still married. But she was so beautiful it had nearly been impossible to say 'no', and there were times when he couldn't help but wish he'd been raised without a conscience. But he had, so nothing too serious had happened between them. And it wasn't that she lacked one herself. But after years of verbal and physical abuse, the temptation to cheat with someone she felt that way about had been extremely strong.
Since leaving his hometown, Grant Harmon had often wondered if she'd stayed with her husband, but out of respect, he'd never once tried to contact her or ever told her how he really felt. But were something to happen to him, his final wish would be to let her know.
He had no way of knowing if she'd even read it or possibly tear the letter up in anger or perhaps just sit there and cry or something in between. But because he couldn't control her reaction, he wasn't going to spend time worrying about it. All that mattered to him was that she knew.
He still had no idea whether or not he'd make it home alive, but with less than six weeks to go, and the entire platoon having only lost one Marine with two others wounded, he liked his chances.
Having penned the final words there was nothing more to say. The letter was four pages, front and back, and written in his own sloppy handwriting on unlined stationary. But it was from the heart, and she was the only woman he'd ever loved, and although neither of them had ever spoken those three words, he knew she'd once loved him, too. By now, it was likely she'd mostly forgotten him, but he'd never forgotten her.
So he fished out an envelope he'd kept tucked between the pages of the book he was currently reading and addressed it to her.
Denise Thomas ℅ Auburn High School Auburn, WA 98002
And with those memories fresh in his mind, he went to make sure everyone in his squad was ready to move out for what could well be their last op 'in country' on this deployment. More were possible, but so far, nothing else was on their radar.
It was a little after midnight when the convoy stopped, about halfway to the village they were going to in order to offer food and render medical aid. Sergeant Harmon quickly fell asleep underneath one of their vehicles knowing that a portion of the rifle company was always on watch. It would be his turn in a few hours, so he grabbed some shuteye while he could.
He normally slept under a Humvee, but this night he lucked out and found himself under an MRAP which stood for Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected, a heavily armored vehicle that could withstand the shock wave of an IED. If the only Marine they'd lost so far had been in one of them instead of an 'up-armored Hummer' he'd undoubtedly still be alive, and the other two men who'd been wounded wouldn't have had a scratch on them. But even now, after all these years in Afghanistan, not everyone got to ride in an MRAP, and that's just how it was.
He pulled his two-hour watch from 0200-0400 then fell back asleep. It was a few minutes before sunrise when the fire watch, the two Marines assigned to stay awake for rotating, two-hour shifts woke him up.
He sat up, shook off the cobwebs, then cursed the god-forsaken hellhole called Afghanistan before packing up his poncho liner then taking a leak and brushing his teeth with water from his canteen. The big change since around 2008 was that even Marines no longer had to shave when deployed to a combat zone, so Harmon thanked God for minor miracles as he tossed his pack into the Humvee he'd be riding in and waited for 'the word'.
He hadn't ridden point in over a month, but this was his turn. He'd be riding with the company commander, the company air officer, and the CO's driver, a lance corporal from third platoon.
"Sgt Harmon. You ready to get out of here?" the Marine captain asked as he approached without saluting, something Marines also didn't do in combat zones.
"Oh, hell yeah, sir," he replied.
"I'll second that shit," the other captain, who wore aviator wings on a flight suit, something that still surprised the young sergeant, said. This officer was so good that the CO had made him the company operations officer, too, as he looked around scanning the area for any sign of bad guys.
The driver overheard and laughed but didn't say anything. His only job was to drive for the company commander, and he was waiting for the order to move out.
The CO met with the other three officers and the company first sergeant to discuss the route of travel and for the umpteenth time to go over rapid-reaction drills in the even of an IED or an ambush.
"All right. Saddle up!" the first sergeant hollered after the meeting ended, his order sending Marines scurrying to their vehicles as lieutenants briefed sergeants who then briefed their men.
As they rode along, the air officer said, "I'm thinking one more op before we start cleaning up gear and get ready to get the hell out of here."
"I agree," the company commander said. "Barring anything unforeseen."
Everyone listening knew that meant they could be extended for any reason at any time, but with any luck, they'd really have just one or maybe two tactical operations left. Or this one could be their last. No one really knew. It took time to clean vehicles and get them ready for embarkation back to the States, and that required a minimum of ten days. So with just around 40 scheduled days remaining, it was very possible that one last, 3-4 day op could be it.
"Okay, let's get off this road," the company CO said. "See that little stream bed?"
"Yes, sir," his driver responded.
"We're gonna go right through that then stay more or less parallel to the road."
