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Authors: David Finkel
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realizes he has forgotten it. He goes back inside, finds it on a table, and heads back out down the wrong hallway. He wanders around until he finds the right one, gets to his car, discovers that he forgot his keys in the ignition, is relieved to see that he forgot to lock the doors. He sighs. He wasn’t like this before. Before, everything was easy.
He runs his hand across his head. “Still have to get my haircut,” he reminds himself.
He drives toward Building 212 and the entrance on the far left when his phone rings: Building 212 is wrong; go to the S-1 shop and ask for someone named Estramada.
“Estramada,” he repeats.
He hangs up and realizes they didn’t tell him which S-1 shop. The battalion’s? The brigade’s? He tries to call back but no one answers. He goes to the battalion S-1 shop, asks for Estramada, and is told there’s no Estramada there. He turns to leave. This time he remembers his beret. “Um, we have an Estremera,” someone mentions then, as he is almost out the door. Estremera? Did he get the name wrong? He goes in search of Estremera. “Don’t you have a board today?” she asks when he locates her. How in the world does she know that? he wonders, but instead of asking, he tells her about his brother, and she in turn picks up a phone and calls Transportation, which refers her to Casualties, which refers her to Soldier Actions, where she finds someone who says that yes, Tausolo can get on a plane. She apologizes for how long this is taking. “I don’t know why I didn’t figure it out,” she says, rolling her eyes and pretending to shoot herself in the head. She tells him which building to go to for the ticket, which building to go to for the control number, and which building to go to for an antiterrorism briefing a soldier is required to have before he can travel. “Too easy!” she says, and sends him on his way to the briefing, except once he gets there he is told he has to take an online test first, and no, they don’t have a computer for him to use.
It’s 1:30 p.m. now. He has to report for his WTB interview at 2:45. There’s still plenty of time for a haircut. At least that will work out. He goes to the barber, gets in line, checks his paperwork, and realizes 2:45 is wrong. He’s supposed to report at 1:45. “Ah God,” he says, and with his hair still too long, he flees the barbershop and makes it a minute early.
Theresa is there waiting for him with some lunch, suspecting he’ll be a while. Eleven other soldiers trying to get into the WTB are there, too, and so are two of Tausolo’s sergeants who were with him in Iraq and have shown up in case he needs people to speak on his behalf.
One of them—Sherfield—tells Tausolo what to do when he’s called in. Present to the general. Sit between the general and the command sergeant major. The general will go first, then the command sergeant major, and then everyone else. Doctors. Psychiatrists. The WTB commander. There could be forty people in all.
The other—Davison—knows as well as anyone what Tausolo has been through. He was in the convoy that day. He didn’t reach Harrelson, either. He got banged around during the deployment, too, and gets headaches so severe now that sometimes he throws up and sometimes his wife has to cover the windows with blankets and sometimes he stands under a shower until the water goes cold and—
“Nobody cares, brother,” Sherfield says tenderly.
“This shit is intense shit,” Davison says. But Tausolo, he goes on, is in a different category. “He’s coped and dealt with some of the most
extreme
shit.”
He looks across the room at Tausolo, who is sitting with Theresa. “When you have a soldier of that caliber, you know when he’s broken, and when he’s broken, he’s gotta be fixed,” he says. “To go from what he was to what he is? Something
had
to have broke. He needs help, and he needs to keep getting help.”
He thinks back to another time he escorted Tausolo to an
He runs his hand across his head. “Still have to get my haircut,” he reminds himself.
He drives toward Building 212 and the entrance on the far left when his phone rings: Building 212 is wrong; go to the S-1 shop and ask for someone named Estramada.
“Estramada,” he repeats.
He hangs up and realizes they didn’t tell him which S-1 shop. The battalion’s? The brigade’s? He tries to call back but no one answers. He goes to the battalion S-1 shop, asks for Estramada, and is told there’s no Estramada there. He turns to leave. This time he remembers his beret. “Um, we have an Estremera,” someone mentions then, as he is almost out the door. Estremera? Did he get the name wrong? He goes in search of Estremera. “Don’t you have a board today?” she asks when he locates her. How in the world does she know that? he wonders, but instead of asking, he tells her about his brother, and she in turn picks up a phone and calls Transportation, which refers her to Casualties, which refers her to Soldier Actions, where she finds someone who says that yes, Tausolo can get on a plane. She apologizes for how long this is taking. “I don’t know why I didn’t figure it out,” she says, rolling her eyes and pretending to shoot herself in the head. She tells him which building to go to for the ticket, which building to go to for the control number, and which building to go to for an antiterrorism briefing a soldier is required to have before he can travel. “Too easy!” she says, and sends him on his way to the briefing, except once he gets there he is told he has to take an online test first, and no, they don’t have a computer for him to use.
It’s 1:30 p.m. now. He has to report for his WTB interview at 2:45. There’s still plenty of time for a haircut. At least that will work out. He goes to the barber, gets in line, checks his paperwork, and realizes 2:45 is wrong. He’s supposed to report at 1:45. “Ah God,” he says, and with his hair still too long, he flees the barbershop and makes it a minute early.
Theresa is there waiting for him with some lunch, suspecting he’ll be a while. Eleven other soldiers trying to get into the WTB are there, too, and so are two of Tausolo’s sergeants who were with him in Iraq and have shown up in case he needs people to speak on his behalf.
One of them—Sherfield—tells Tausolo what to do when he’s called in. Present to the general. Sit between the general and the command sergeant major. The general will go first, then the command sergeant major, and then everyone else. Doctors. Psychiatrists. The WTB commander. There could be forty people in all.
The other—Davison—knows as well as anyone what Tausolo has been through. He was in the convoy that day. He didn’t reach Harrelson, either. He got banged around during the deployment, too, and gets headaches so severe now that sometimes he throws up and sometimes his wife has to cover the windows with blankets and sometimes he stands under a shower until the water goes cold and—
“Nobody cares, brother,” Sherfield says tenderly.
“This shit is intense shit,” Davison says. But Tausolo, he goes on, is in a different category. “He’s coped and dealt with some of the most
extreme
shit.”
He looks across the room at Tausolo, who is sitting with Theresa. “When you have a soldier of that caliber, you know when he’s broken, and when he’s broken, he’s gotta be fixed,” he says. “To go from what he was to what he is? Something
had
to have broke. He needs help, and he needs to keep getting help.”
He thinks back to another time he escorted Tausolo to an
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