Marooned with a Marine

When I was conscripted to one of the divisions of Marines involved in the attempt to keep the peace during the civil strife of a south Pacific state, its sounds perhaps more romantic, and more erotic than it actually was. I was there as a civilian advisor, supporting the Marines and acting as a possible liaison with the locals. I am a psychologist, complete with degrees and accreditation, but it was my doctoral dissertation research on the psychological stressors associated with the repealing of the don’t ask don’t tell stricture on gays in the military that got me attached during this action. The truth is, I just plain like military men, whether they be soldiers, sailors, airmen, or Marines. Mostly, however, I prefer the last. They have, in my experience, the most truly military natures. Perhaps it comes from the principle of opposites attracting. The clean-cut, physically capable military man, who gets physical things done with a calm efficiency—that’s kind of the opposite of me. Any athletic feat requiring physical coordination, even throwing a ball, for example—I seldom could hit a target at any distance. I think that was part of why I never actually joined the military—even though, after completing my master’s thesis on the psychological effects of military culture on young men, I was invited to do so. The other part was the spit-polished and organized life I associated with military men. I might admire it in others, but doing it, no. Even getting up early is something I find a challenge. But, like I said, I am attracted to all of those things, and military men in (or out of) uniform, ring all my bells. So, when I was asked to join the Marine expeditionary force as an advisor, to be embedded with the troops, I just couldn’t say no. * * * * I know that there are those who decry American interference in foreign crises, and certainly the results of many such interventions have been sufficiently mixed to at least raise the argument. But personally, while I too might doubt the wisdom of a given action—which is often really hard to determine until years after the events—I do believe in the general good-will or intentions of most of such American actions. And yes, I know what they say about good intentions paving the road to hell. But still, isn’t it arguable that on occasion such attempts just might be justified? Anyway, good, bad or other, we were there, and I was—well—what seemed at times to be hip-deep in Marines. I found that I had few real complaints. I never heard the full story about the crisis until much later—due to what happened and where I was at the time—but the chief characteristic about what I remember about that final day was confusion, along with frenzied activity and, of course, fear. The air was full of testosterone—capable, resourceful, and virile men doing their utmost to perform the evacuation with a minimum of casualties. What I heard, by word of mouth, was there appeared to have been a major sea change in the local situation, at the highest levels—though whether that was a coup or some other political change, nobody seemed sure. Mostly, those in the expeditionary force were too busy to speculate. At last, I was escorted by one of the larger specimens among the Marines, out onto the landing strip. When I saw the aircraft I was being led to, I was surprised. I had arrived with a Marine contingent in one of those enormous Lockheed Hercules and, though there was one of those on the tarmac at the time, it was already taxiing. Presumably, full of Marines. The aircraft my Marine and I were heading to, was a Beechcraft Huron, a small turboprop that ordinarily seated thirteen passengers. I remember that the smallness of the aircraft brought on a feeling of unease. Somehow, being sandwiched in among all those Marines in the Hercules had ameliorated the effects of my tendency toward anxiety about flying. This aircraft, I thought, looked—well, vulnerable—even though I was assured that there was minimal danger of our coming under fire. There were four of us, other than the pilot—and there were no empty seats. Most of the interior of the plane was filled with equipment. And, though I didn’t do more than look as I passed it on my way to my seat, it was pretty clear that the equipment was of the surveillance system electronics variety. Indeed, after we were seated and the plane started to taxi, the two passengers in the row in front of us hastily got up and did a last-minute check, pulling on straps and generally making sure the equipment was securely strapped down. I craned my neck around, watching this with unease, but when I straightened my neck, I caught the gaze of the Marine sitting across the aisle from me. He gave me a reassuring smile, which, partly because a smile on that good-natured, masculine face was quite decorative, did something to sooth my nerves. The plane turned at last, and in the short calm before acceleration, I could hear distant booms of the conflict between the two local factions that had rendered our presence as peacekeepers impossible. The engines revved and we started to move forward at rapidly increasing speed. I closed my eyes, fingers gripping my armrests fiercely—and pictured in my mind that Marine’s reassuring smile, to help distract from my flying phobia. It helped. I began taking discrete glimpses of the man. Sitting in that seat, his long legs were displayed, I thought, to their best advantage. Even in his camo garb, the perfect proportions, the sensuous curves of the muscles pressing out against the fabric, were very evident. That I was especially appreciative, suggested the idea that my fear and tension had actually increased my s****l response. Might that make a paper? I found myself thinking, and posed the idea, half as a joke, because imagining the details of such a study—I would, I decided, restrict subjects in the study to Marines—provided a welcome distraction to my persistent anxiety, which only increased as the plane lifted off. When he leveled off, things became easier for me. We were out over open sea now, and the sight of the broad blue of the Pacific through the window was vastly reassuring—because we were now away from the conflict itself—and beautiful in a calming way. We were away! I told myself. We had made it. With sources of natural beauty on either side—the Pacific Ocean and the Marine, I began to relax at last. And eventually I drifted off. * * * * I awoke due to the plane encountering slight turbulence. I jerked awake, sitting bolt upright and not sure where I was. Then I remembered, and looked out the window. Still the blue of the Pacific. I sighed, and turned my head to look across the aisle. The big Marine was asleep, which allowed me to study him at my leisure—though I couldn’t see his face, which was turned away. Fortunately, his legs, chest and shoulder provided sufficient visual interest. And that powerful neck. He wasn’t, I decided, a heavily built individual. Rather, apart from being well-muscled, he was just plain large. Standing he must have been six-feet-six in his boots. And he just oozed quiet competence—which I found even more attractive. I thought about the Marines I had interacted with during my time as part of expeditionary force. Before this I had met a certain number of men in the other branches of the military, but I had come to have a particular respect for Marines. Again, Marines seemed to be more military in some way; they took their roles more seriously. And, to be blunt, they came across as being simply more virile. But it was more than that. Somehow, a Marine not in uniform was still definably a military man. I found that very attractive, and not in a predatory way (in the negative sense, at least), but rather as an observer, in an appreciative sense. And if there’s one thing that a field psychologist enjoys, it’s to observe. Since my joining the expeditionary force, I made copious notes each day in shorthand, and transferred them to my personal laptop in the evenings. Well aware of the security factor that was always present in anything to do with the military, I was scrupulous to keep everything, so to speak, above the belt—professional, and discrete. Besides, it wasn’t anything classified that interested me. I was along to study how Marines coped with the sort of peacekeeping this action was. That, of course, didn’t mean that I didn’t have private fantasies now and then, or, rather, frequently. I just never expected anything to come of them. During my first days as an embedded civilian, I received my fair share of casual teasing, which didn’t bother me. I understood the process. It was members of a closely connected group testing a newcomer, to see what he was made of, and whether they could trust or depend on him. (Being a professional psychologist does have its advantages—for psychology is the study of the behavior of the human animal.) I was not, however, subjected to any actual nastiness; for all their rough and tough miens, Marines, I learned, had a bedrock principle of respect for anyone who passed their tests, which I found most welcome. They didn’t press too much about what I was doing there, but when they learned that I was a psychologist I was given the nickname, Doc. I didn’t object. I mean, I did have a PhD, but I knew that the “doc” they referred to was the medical connotation associated with psychologist. I never told them the difference, that while psychiatrists were actual medical doctors, psychologists were simply scientists. It didn’t seem important. There was, unsurprisingly, the connotation of therapist associated with a psychologist, for I did have some Marines come to me with their problems, on the quiet. I wasn’t a clinical psychologist, which is what professional therapists often are, but I did my best with them. I knew that the largest part of therapy is simply listening with an open mind and heart, and luckily, I had both. The former I possessed simply from being a scientist, the latter in part because of my temperament, and in part because—as I said before, I simply plain liked men in uniform—especially Marines. * * * * I awoke, or rather was shot out of my sleep, by an explosion that rocked the aircraft. I was thrown about in my straps, and momentarily flailed, until my hands found my armrests, and clung on for dear life. No one cried out, and my ears were ringing after the explosion. I heard the engine noise change, and then the entire world went topsy-turvy as the plane at first rolled over, and then curved into a steep dive. I must have left finger impressions on those armrests, but I said not a word, my jaws clenched, my mind blank with terror, awaiting the inevitable fatal crash. Instead, there came another rapid change in orientation; we were almost level now, which was amazing and hope-generating as well. But then the floor of the plane began to tilt, forward and to the right. I was just anticipating the start of another sickening dive, when the crash came. The nose and one wing must have hit the water first, for we spun as we rapidly slowed. I was thrown forward violently, and hit something hard and metal with my head, and became dazed. I was still vaguely aware of my situation, but did not seem able either to make sense of it, nor to move any part of my body. One thing that now struck me was the fact that we were no longer falling, were in fact almost stationary, the only movement of the cabin being a slow tilting that went back and forth. It couldn’t have been much later that I felt more than saw a figure standing over me, and then a face looking down into mine. Blue, I thought. Blue eyes. And, so beautiful! I heard a voice, but for some reason couldn’t make sense of the words. Then I became aware that my feet felt very cold. And wet. Things began to clear at that point. I could see the Marine bending over me. He was undoing the straps that held me to the seat. When he had done this, he stuck his face into mine and spoke in a loud voice. “You okay?” I considered, nodded. “Any pain?” I considered again, and shook my head. There was pain, but nothing too bad. “Wait here,” he said, and then went away. I looked around a bit woozily and saw that the equipment that had been behind us seemed to have erupted all over the passenger area—metal objects and pieces everywhere. It struck me then how lucky I had been, I had not been rendered unconscious or even killed. There was a shard of sharp metal that had penetrated the back of the seat in front of me. I saw the top of a head over the back, lolling to one side, and not moving. I shuddered. No one other than the one Marine was moving, and the water level around my feet was rising quickly. Already it was half-way up my calves. Then the Marine was back. He forcibly lifted me up by one arm, then shoved his face in mine again. “Can you stand?” I tried, and found I could—albeit uneasily. I nodded. “Good. We’re the only survivors,” he added grimly. He went forward to the escape hatch, and I followed. It wasn’t easy, with pieces of electronic equipment everywhere. When we were at the door, he shoved a seat cushion at me, and wrenched the door lever around. The door popped out, and I could see outside. We were right over the wing, which I could just see below the surface of the choppy sea. The water began really to pour in now. “Out you go!” he said, and without ceremony pushed me through the door, holding my head down so I wouldn’t bump it on the door frame. I hit the water, still clutching my cushion for dear life, and pushing down with my feet, felt the solid top of the wing, which was several feet below the surface now. There came a splash, and I saw the Marine land several feet away. He was holding a cushion too, and had a pack over his shoulder. Turning to me, he gestured and yelled, “Come on! We need to get away from the plane before she goes down!” He began to swim away, and I followed his lead, holding my seat cushion to my chest and making the frog kicks of the breast stroke. Our progress seemed slow, and several times the Marine turned and yelled at me, “Harder!” I felt a sudden pulling backward, and knew the plane was going down. I frog kicked with all my might, afraid I would be sucked under, but at last the pull diminished, and was gone. I looked around, saw bubbles coming from the spot where the plane had disappeared, and shuddered. The image of the big metal machine falling fathoms down into the darkness of the sea was truly horrific. Then I looked at the Marine, and saw to my surprise that he was grinning. “We made it!” he said. “Yeah,” I said, not feeling very excited. For one thing, it was raining. For another, the clouds overhead were darkening ominously, and a wind was beginning to rise. This meant that the waves were increasing in size, and we couldn’t see very far unless we were right on the peak of one of them. My companion did not seem to be discouraged, however. He slowly rotated on the spot, and craned his neck every time a big wave crest lifted him on high. At last he cried out and pointed. “Land!” I wanted to ask how far, but decided against it. The Marine clearly was hopeful, and I decided to go with that. So, we both pushed our respective seat cushions in the direction he had indicated. Meanwhile, the storm worsened. The waves grew larger, the rain heavier, and now there were lightning flashes, followed by deafening thunder. Once or twice, when I was on top of a wave, I did glimpse something ahead of us. Clearly, an island of some sort. And it didn’t seem to be that distant. Redoubling our efforts, we worked for what seemed a long time, until I was quite exhausted. That was when I first heard a new sound—the sound of surf. I stared in the direction we were trying to head, and when I was on top of a wave, I saw that the island was still some distance away. Yet closer than it was the distinct sound of surf. I saw white spumes of spray rise up to enormous height. The waves themselves were becoming larger as well, which I couldn’t quite understand. Then my companion cried out, “A reef!” I only had time enough to think: Oh, God! Then we were lifted up, up, up, by a wave that seemed to rise higher than what was possible. At the same time, I was anticipating being dashed against the reef. When I thought of the rough rocky texture of reefs, I consoled myself with the idea that at least it would be quick. But that’s not what happened. I came down, indeed, but was dumped only into water. Momentarily, I panicked, for I had lost my seat cushion. I looked and felt around, but couldn’t find it. It was then I noticed that I was in fairly motionless water. The up and down motion of the waves was gone. Feeling somewhat relieved, I blinked and, in the light of the next lightning flash, through the rain, saw I was close to the island itself. I could see a beach about a hundred yards away. Then, in the next flash of lightning, I saw the Marine. I swam to him and in the dimness following the flash, could only make out that he was lying, motionless, still clinging to the seat cushion, or was strapped to it somehow, for his head rested on top of it, which thankfully kept his face out of the water. He didn’t seem conscious, however, and when the next lightning flash came, I saw that there was blood on the side of his face. I swam over to the still form and, without hoisting myself at all onto the cushion—which would submerge if I tried to use its buoyancy—I began to push the Marine and cushion in the direction of the shore. My progress, however, was slow. But at last we were away from the immediate vicinity of the reef and so out of reach of the occasional spume of water that would erupt over the reef and crash down into the lagoon. But it was a number of minutes more before I felt, with the tips of my lowered foot, a sandy bottom—and almost wept with relief. I was concerned that the Marine still had not regained consciousness. Until now, I hadn’t felt for his pulse because I hadn’t wanted to consider the possibility of his being dead. But I forced myself to do this. Yes! I could feel his pulse. I felt greatly reassured. I stood up and was only up to my waist in water. I looked around and saw, in the dim light, the curve of the beach, with a line of palm trees and jungle growth just beyond, and beyond this a large rocky rise of land with a conical top. On the other side, the rough spray of water showed the presence of a seemingly continuous curve of reef. I looked down at the Marine’s face. There were slight movements of the lips, which was encouraging, but he was still out. So, I began to take slow steps along the submerged sand toward the beach, pulling the Marine and cushion with me. It was only when the cushion grounded on the sand in several inches of water that things became really difficult. The Marine’s body had been dragging slightly on the bottom for several feet, and now it looked daunting in its size and mass. I sat down and rested, to catch my breath. I felt weak even after I had caught my breath. But the need to pull the Marine up onto the beach seemed imperative. The work was as exhausting as I expected, and my progress from minute to minute could be measured in inches. But at last I had him on the beach, with only his feet in the water of the lagoon. That’s when I noticed that he wasn’t wearing boots. Only socks. By this point I felt as weak as a kitten, and decided for the time being to admit defeat. Looking around, I saw nothing moving, either in the water or on the sand, and decided that at least for the moment we didn’t seem to be in any imminent danger. I checked out the Marine, and saw there were two cuts—one on his shoulder, another on the side of his head. Neither seemed very deep, but I removed my jacket, shirt and T-shirt and used the last to bind his head, on the vague supposition that a head wound might be somehow more dangerous. I felt his pulse again. It was strong and regular. Then I wondered about his continued unconsciousness, though now he was moving his lips slightly again. I watched those lips, which even in this repose were almost hypnotizing in their perfection. After hesitating, I shifted my position. Kneeling beside him, I lowered my head and, placing my lips gently over his, closing his nose with two fingers. And blew. The chest rose, and I turned my head and let the air come out of his mouth. Then I repeated the action. After a half-dozen of these the Marine coughed up some water, and began moving of his own accord. Still unsure of what exactly to do, I lowered my face again and pressed my lips against his, forcing air again into his lungs. At this the Marine’s hand came up and pushed me back. I sat up and saw him looking at me, a frown on his face. “Stop that!” he said. I could barely catch the words, they were so slurred. But I nodded, and desisted. He continued to lie where he was for a while, his eyes closed; but it was clear that he was conscious. He was just gathering his strength, orienting himself, I supposed. When his eyes opened again, they stared straight up, at the brooding sky, blinking at each raindrop that hit his eyes. At last, however, the eyes shifted, and he looked at me, uncertainly at first. Then, unexpectedly, a slight smile appeared. “Hi,” he said.