Regarding a Spat of Unfavorable Weather

It was an unlucky occurrence, then, that they visited the park in 1986. Ten years earlier, and old Y. Bao still would have had his wits about him, preventing the whole affair from happening in the first place; ten years later, and he would have been dead, mourned by a loving family, and in any case not allowed to keep the pistol due to new regulations. The year, though, was 1986.

But still-how deeply unfortunate! If they had gone a month earlier, the weather would have been pleasant, incapable of catalyzing such a volatile reaction in the man; if they had gone a month later, he would have been in a wheelchair.

But the month was November. The year was 1986. Y. Bao took a step forward onto the dirt, following his daughter and her chil-dren. He felt the rain on his jacket, flowing down through his hood and wetting his hair. He took one step, and another, looking up at the waving figures of his family as they beckoned him forward. Then he looked down at the mud. The rain was light, but it had been going for hours, and the dirt was melting into muck. He tried to shake it out of his mind, tried to follow his family and enjoy the outing but the rain dropped and fell; the mud climbed and rose upward. Mud. He'd fought in this mud before. Dug the trenches. Lined up with his friends and cousins, fired his weapon until the field was quiet. Mud. He was back, but he would not go quietly; no, he put one hand on his pistol, holstered where it had always been, gathering dust after the end of the war.

Wasn't that them, in the distance? Were the Japanese not coming over the hill, charging with their rifles and bayonets, ready to shell the land into blood and dust; was the mortar not firing again and again, filling the air with that screeching whine; were the shouts of the dead and dying not rippling through the air, offered up into a pale cold sky? Enemies were circling-cold-blooded and vicious, screeching crows at the feast, shaking their limbs in grotesque displays. The nation was behind him, his brothers and forefathers beside him; ahead, there was only the inevitability of duty— and the enemy. They were shouting, roaring with hatred. Take up the rifle, soldier. Protect that venerated ground, consecrated by the pure-hearted sacrifice of a generation. Recognize the demands of history, the demands of the dead, the screaming, the bloodletting, the gnawing, chewing, frothing— and the shot rang out.

Anonymous