Trenches

By

Timothy C. Phillips

Alabama, 1975

The day was hot; hotter than usual. The wind picked up the fine brown dust that

made up the place. It stuck to everything. The boy looked at his arms and saw that they

had acquired a red, gritty tinge. Another city garbage truck came in the outlet road; the

dust came up in an immense plume behind it, stretching all of the way back to the

highway, almost a mile away. The boy drew a heavy breath, then spat reflexively. Every

breath drew in with it the sickly sweet smell of the landfill.

He thought of his friends, most of them now far away for the summer in Florida, or

other exciting places. A couple of the boys from his class were away interning at

Yellowstone; most had simply disappeared to the beach for a few weeks when school had

let out; but not him. His father had told him “Son, I need you to do me a favor. We‟ve got

an employee, an older gentleman, who is due to retire soon. He‟s rather old, a lot older

than our average retirees, and the hot weather takes a lot out of man his age. I want you to

postpone your summer vacation and go help the old fellow out until June rolls around.

You‟ll be paid good money, working for Calhoun County as a temp. You‟ll have plenty
of dough for Florida, or wherever you end up. You‟re graduating next summer, and I‟ll

make it up to you then.”

His father had seemed incapable of understanding that by June, the other kids, his

friends, would be back at home; to go later would be to go alone. Also, most kid‟s dads

never asked them for favors, especially not of such a magnitude. Perhaps it was because

his father had never asked him for anything; in any case, he had at last given in.

The place itself was bad enough, although the job was simple. Sign city garbage

trucks in and out, note the driver and the time. Maybe Dad‟s trying to toughen me up, he

had thought when he first had gotten there, smelled the smells, seen the mountain of

garbage in the distance that the bulldozers plodded over and crushed into the ground.

There had to be a higher purpose if his father had sent him here. He had almost gotten

over his initial shock when he had met the old man.

It wasn‟t that he hated the old man; he‟d even tried to be nice to him, making small

talk; but what does a seventeen-year old have to say to a man seventy years his senior?

Anyway, his attempts at friendly banter, if not met with scorn, received only grunts or

vague nods as replies. He had taken to avoiding the old man. The truck drivers knew this,

because he had too often forsaken the cover of the tin shed that was their “office”, for the

sweltering sun. The old man, he was sure, had overheard their jeers. If the old man cared,

he showed no sign.

The trucker slowed as he pulled up near the boy. “What are you doing way down

here, boy?” He smiled and nodded toward the distant shed. “Old man got you pretty

scared, eh?” He grinned as he reached down to take the clipboard from the boy, and

scribbled his initials.

 “I‟m not scared of him, he‟s just boring‟. He won‟t ever say anything.” He had to

shout over the roar of the truck‟s engine. The plume of dust, following the truck, was

floating in over them now. It smelled liked a grave, the boy thought.

“Well son, you better get up there, bored or not.” The driver handed the clipboard

back, and nodded to the northwest, as he drove away. “That rain‟ll be here in a jiffy.” The

boy looked up as the truck roared away. He heard the driver laughing, distantly, and

silently cursed the man for not giving him a ride. He started jogging toward the distant

shed, just as the first warm drops pelted him.

He felt angry, angry with himself for wandering so far from the shed and not

noticing the rain clouds, angry at the driver for leaving him to get wet, angry with his

father for making him perform such drudgery for some old fossil too mean to even talk to

him. It all seemed so unfair.

His feet began to get heavier; it was the fine dust, made into red mud by the rain.

With every step, his boots accumulated a new layer. He was breathing heavily by the

time he gained the shed; he felt tears stinging his eyes. He tried to blink them back, so the

old man would not notice. That would only add to the anger and shame he felt.

When he at last entered the open door, the old man was up, opening the windows

of the little shed, to let in the cool air. He nodded when the boy came in, but said nothing.

The rain rattled noisily on the tin roof. The boy sat down on and tried to knock the mud

from his boots on the concrete floor. It was no use; the stuff was adhered to the boots like

glue. Suddenly overwhelmed, he threw the clipboard down, and put his hands in his face.

“Goddamn it!” He felt his tears, hot against his palms. This made him even

angrier.
 “What is it, boy? What‟s the matter?” the old man said. The boy looked up at him,

his face still burning.

“I hate it here! I hate the heat, the smell, the flies, and having to work around all

this filthy garbage! I‟m seventeen, I should be somewhere having fun! Goddamn this! All

this mud!” The boy stopped suddenly, sullen. He sat and looking down at his muddy

boots.

The old man went over to the corner, and got something from near the potbelly

stove.

“Here, boy. Scrape your shoes off.” The boy looked up. The old man held an old

knife out to him, handle first. The boy took it from him. It was an old bayonet, a relic

from the landfill, no doubt.

“Thanks.” The word was barely perceptible. He took the knife and began scraping

his badly caked shoes. The mud came away in chunks. The boy stole a glance at the old

man. He was staring with a strange intensity at the mud, and the bayonet. The boy

became nervous.

“Sorry I got mad, It‟s just this damned mud…”

The old man continued to stare, but his gaze drifted outside, and beyond.

“Let me tell you about mud, boy.” Something in the old man‟s voice made the boy

stop what he was doing. “And about being seventeen.”

 France, 1918

There was no respite from the killing on Friday, as they had hoped. They had

gotten their orders that morning, while they crouched in the mud, deaf from the pounding

of the artillery. Seven o‟clock, Fenn, the boyish lieutenant, had shown them with his

extended fingers; they would be going over at seven that morning. Most had done

nothing but think of home, or pray. Some wept openly. As usual, one or two broke down,

writhing in the mud like worms. They were the sane ones; no one with his mind still in

one piece would go back into that killing fire, having lived through it once.

Steeley checked his ammunition for the hundredth time; he likewise checked the

workings of his rifle. When the order came down the line to fix bayonets, he had already

done so. Most had. They knew what was coming. The concussion of the shells drew

closer. Sticky globs of the stinking black mud sprayed them, flung into the air by the

Heinie shells. The first rays of light showed in the East; not long now.

“The Alleymen are laying on thick!” His friend Colvard yelled in his ear. Steeley

nodded at the bigger man. They both knew it would end soon. They also knew what

would come after that. Presently a hush fell over the landscape. Nothing moved. Sweat

was on Steeley‟s brow. He lifted a trembling hand to wipe it away. He heard someone

gasp, and realized dimly it was himself.

“GA-aas!” Someone screamed. “Gas!” There was a sudden furious flurry of activity

as men fought with their cumbersome packs to break out gas masks. The green cloud

rolled in quickly; the wind was behind it; the pragmatic Germans had waited until the

wind was just right to loose the killing fog. He heard the screams of those who were
caught without masks, heard them thrashing in the knee-deep mud, somewhere down the

line. He did not look. He pulled his own mask on, no more than a hot, heavy canvas bag

with a crude breathing apparatus attached. Through its grimy eyepieces, he saw Colvard

pulling on his own mask; beyond him, he saw the Captain down the line raise his sword.

Lieutenant Fenn nodded and screamed, straining to make himself heard through his own

mask and the screams of the dying.

“Go! Go! Go now!”

They scrambled up the top, and over. The German machine guns began to chatter

immediately. Men died on the way up the wall, their muffled screams all around him,

dying in their masks. Some tore the masks off, unable to bear the smothering feeling of

the heavy facial gear. They fell down thrashing immediately, their lungs turned to a

bloody slush by the mustard gas. Up ahead, the German machine guns busily carried on

their work. Blood sprayed his mask; a man to his left ahead had taken a round in the

head. He wiped it away and continued to advance.

Somewhere, he heard the Lieutenant shouting again. “Charge! Charge! Charge!” He

felt his feet quicken obediently sensed the rush of the other men around him; time

collapsed, slowing for him as objects and people moved faster. Up ahead. Wire. He

rushed through, fell, felt it tear into his hands, shins. He struggled up from the mud and

went on. His feet grew heavy with layers of the black bloody mud, heavier every step.

The machine guns chattered to his right. More men fell, squirming and screaming in the

wire. The machine gunners killed them where they lay. The threat of gas now gone, men

began to rip off the suffocating masks.

 He felt a bullet tear through his pack, another rip his shirt; he went on. Ahead was

the lip of the German trench. A German stood below and in front of him, struggling to fix

his bayonet. Steeley shot him in the face, dove down inside the trench. Colvard was

beside him, then others. Germans began to spill over from the other side of the trench,

from their reinforcement trench. Counterattack. There was shooting all around him;

grenades went off, men screamed to their god for mercy. He stood on the bodies that lay

in the mud; he bayoneted a German in the throat who was bogged down, unable to move.

Beside him, Colvard suddenly put both hands to his left side and slid down into the mud,

blood rushing from his nose and mouth.

A young German infantryman stood behind him, his smoking rifle trembling in his

hands. Steeley leapt down into the mud; it came up to his knees. He struck the boy in the

face with the butt of his rifle, once, twice, three times. Sweat poured down his face in

cold rivulets. He continued to strike the boy in the face, long after the body was still.

Lieutenant Fenn was nearby now, organizing the survivors into the semblance of a

unit. A German round had badly dented his helmet, and his right hand clenched his left

forearm, which was bleeding profusely. He looked pale, and old. “Continue the advance,”

he said. He nodded in the direction of the second German trench. “That way. Now.” As

they scrambled over the edge, Steeley did not look back at the body of his friend.

A second wave of American infantry rushed up behind them, filling their thinning

ranks. The captain had committed their reserves. The fresh men passed Steeley and his

comrades, headed on toward the second German trench. Tired, they followed the new

attackers along. But already the momentum was bogging down. It was far too congested;

men ran shoulder to shoulder past Steeley. Confused orders were shouted. There was a
clattering of machine guns and small arms from the German positions. Men went down in

waves. Steeley heard tortured cries, and saw blood spray from the front ranks. In seconds

men were running back past him, some without their helmets, some without even rifles.

“Counterattack! Counterattack!” Someone to the right screamed. Steeley could

not tell if this was an order to do so, or warning of a German force on its way. Most

turned and fled. Steeley went with them. The German guns still spoke behind them;

running men were hit all around, stumbling along, dead before they fell. Officers shouted

in vain for them to turn around. They dashed in a headlong mass for the trench from

which they had come, leaping over the bodies of their own slain that lay huddled in the

mud with those of the enemy.

II.

In the gathering darkness, Steeley looked out over No Man‟s Land. Above,

somewhere, he heard the laboring motor of a biplane. It sounded strained, and sputtered.

A damaged craft, perhaps a wounded pilot, trying to make it home. Steeley felt someone

at his elbow, and turned, half expecting to see Colvard. It was Fenn, with his arm

bandaged. He still looked older, somehow.

“It was hell out there today.” Fenn offered, his gaze following Steeley‟s over the

empty land. A flare lit his face momentarily, and faded. It was growing darker. Steeley

did not reply; he was straining to hear the aircraft engine. He wanted to listen to it until it

faded in the distance. He found himself hoping that the pilot made it home, whoever he

was. Even if he was German.

“We lost a lot of men. I—ah, Colvard, he was a good man.”

 Steeley gazed intently out into the darkness. He felt tears sting his eyes. Want did

this son of a bitch want? Far above, the engine stuttered precariously, seemed to get

closer. Losing altitude, some quarter of his mind informed him.

“Well, here‟s how it is, Steeley. We lost a lot of men, including non-

commissioned officers. You‟re experienced, and a good soldier. So, you‟ve been

promoted. Acting Sergeant. You‟ll take charge of your platoon. Orders have come down

from Division; we‟re to go over again in the morning. Congratulations.” Fenn slapped

him on the back; Steeley sensed him moving away. It was completely dark now.

Occasional shells or flares lit the night; tracers were visible in the darkness; but above it

all, the infinite darkness rolled. Steeley heard the airplane engine growing fainter and

fainter in the distance.

“Make it home.” He whispered.

 Alabama, 1975

“Are you alright, son?” It was his father, leaning back over the car seat.

“Oh, yeah, I was just thinking.”

“Thanks for coming today, son. I know that you don‟t like funerals.”

“I‟m alright.”

“We don‟t have to go to the cemetery, if you don‟t want to. If you‟d rather—“

“No, really. I want to.”

The family sat in folding chairs at the grave‟s edge. Mr. Steeley‟s children, he

supposed; most looked older than his own father. The minister was speaking.

“Mark the perfect man, and behold the upright; for there is a happy end to the

man of peace. Our Brother, our Father, our beloved friend, George Steeley, has left us;

but it is written, „The last enemy that shall be abolished is death.‟ And so George Steely

has gone forth to best his final foe.”

The boy had been standing with his head down, but a sound had reached his ears.

He looked up searching. He saw nothing, but he heard it. The motor of an airplane. He

smiled inwardly; and it was a warm, new feeling for him; a communion with the old man,

shared by no one else. The prayer went on.

“…the days of our years are threescore and ten, yet is their pride but labor and

sorrow; for it is soon gone, and we fly away…”

Somewhere, above him, the airplane droned on, its noise growing fainter in the

distance. He looked up, into the summery sky. Tears were in his eyes, but he was smiling.

“Make it home.” He whispered.