Bad Coffee
It was a cold and damp morning, the moisture stuck to skin like flies to fly paper. The loud "thud thud thud" of the helicopters had awaken me from my trance, after two and half hours of sleep. I had risen just in time for a fresh cup of coffee when all of the sudden a chopper touched down just outside the barracks kicking up all the debris and dirt it could find. The night before had been a hellish one, the mortar blasts and screams of my fellow soldiers had kept me awake nearly all night. And how, my coffee had been ruined by the damn helicopter.
I was in the worst place on Earth, Saigon, in 1968. Definitely the wrong place at the wrong time. My orders were simple, so I thought. Meet up with a group of Green Berets just outside of enemy lines, and go north to a small village controlled by American troops, we would get more information soon after we had arrived. That was it, just like king of the hill when I was kid. I met up with my partners in a joint called the Lucky Money, a real run down place, the air filled with stale smoke and the scent of plastic palm trees. Let's just say the Lucky Money had seen better days. Hell just four months ago Bob Hope had occupied that vacant stage. The atmosphere was filled with tension. At the drop of a pin the whole environment could erupt into total chaos, half the time shoot outs would start in the street just from punks tossing rocks around.
The guys I met up with were worn down, not one of them had a good night's rest in at least a month, you could see it in their eyes. All they wanted was a ride home, and they were going to do anything and everything in their power to get home. The leader of the group, Colonel Jake Denton, had been here two damn years. He didn't have much to say except he missed his kids. The other three were all from Texas, but none of them knew each other until the army put them together. The mousy looking kid was from Dallas, and he always had a cigarette...
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