Chapter 1

Well, I have no idea how to start this, but here I go.

There is not much to tell I don’t think. More than anything else, I am a soldier. Then, and now. I had been since I was 18 years old. It was the only way to get away from the gangs, and my father. He was an abusive asshole, always was and always would be. I had to move with the guy after my whore of a mother got herself killed.

No, I mean that literally. My mother was a whore. That is how she got knocked up with me by a man who never married her. Granted, he did stick around and gave me his name, Clinton James Lee Junior. But back then, mom was only a slut. After catching her cheating behind his back once too many times, dad left and moved from South Sacramento to Stockton. He still came up to visit me most weekends, but most times I was with my mom.

And by the time I was 10, I realized that all of those men that kept coming into the apartment at night were not just boyfriends. I would come home from school, and a bit later one of them would be leaving her bedroom. And maybe an hour or so later another would arrive and she would take him into her bedroom. It was only when I was 14 and she would leave me alone for several hours most nights that I started to realize what she was, and how she made her money.

By then, I was already getting into trouble. But the Boy’s and Girl’s Club had a karate program, and she put me into that. “It will teach you discipline, Clinton. This will be good for you, trust me.” Well, the only thing it taught me was how to fight. At least, that is what I thought at the time. But I was careful, the guys that taunted me at school would have accidents later on. Never bad ones, but enough that they all tended to leave me alone after that.

Then I was home alone when a knock came at the door. I answered it, and it was the police. Two of them actually, and asking me if my father was here. And when I told them my father lived in Stockton, they got on the radio and called somebody. They sat in the living room and I was uncomfortable, but finally, this lady showed up. Children’s Services. Seems my mom had finished a trick, and instead of coming home got some bad heroin.

Well, I spent that night in a shelter. But the next day, my old man showed up and took me to his home. And there, I had to learn new things. Like that his wife resented the son he had from a whore, and did not like me. And that there was a pattern, dad would get yelled at by his wife, then take it out on me.

I did not ask for much, but he did agree that joining the YMCA was a good thing. And there, they had classes in Taekwondo. So I changed to that art, and Master Hung probably saved my life. I was starting to hang out with a gang, since my mom was Mexican I fit right in. Fluent Spanish, I learned I could bang with the best of them, but still walk into a store and take what I wanted because they rarely looked much at the white kids.

But once I was hanging out with my crew and talking bout boosting some CD players when Master Hung stopped his car and told me to get in. “Clint, you need to stop hanging around people like that. Is that what you want to be when you grow up, a criminal?”

“Master Hung, what else can I do? I’m not White, I’m not Mexican. I suck at sports, what else can I do? At least this way I get some money.”

“Well, what do you like to do?”

“I like to fight!” I said, which was true. I was not a bully, but I did enjoy seeing bullies in pain. Whenever we rumbled with the kids close to the Community College, I always hung back a bit. And when I saw one jump Pepe or one of the smaller members of my crew, I would in turn jump him. Pepe was small, and if somebody who was bigger jumped him, I would jump them in return. Most of the time imagining it was my dad I was hitting.

“Well, fighting is not a good way to live. No future in it. But there is a way you can fight, and not get in trouble for it.”

And that was how I found myself in the Guardian Angels. We were a gang, but a different kind of gang. We wore red jackets and red berets and also roamed the streets. But instead of stealing and fighting, we tried to stop fights. And for the first time, I placed in the regional competition. Fourth place, my dad even smacked the back of my head saying I should have done better

But I learned I liked the Angels better than my old gang. I was seeing that they were bullies also, just in a different way. There, they hurt others who are not members. As an Angel, we only hurt those who hurt others. And I did like that better.

But I also needed money, now that I was not getting a cut of what we stole. Master Hung got me a job with a guy that he knew that did construction. It paid like shit but was good for about $100 a week. And they even started to let me swing a hammer, helping to put in walls and things like that. By the end of my first summer with them, I was pulling in over $300 a week, and learning how to make things.

It was during my Senior year, and Master Hung asked me again what I wanted to do with my life, what I wanted to be. I said again I wanted to fight, and he suggested that I do that. He took me to see the recruiter, and I realized that I really could be paid to fight.

That weekend I handed my father the booklet I had gotten. I told him I wanted to be a soldier, and he hit me. Turns out, it was the last time he hit me. In the last year, his wife had left him, and he had started drinking again. He screamed that no son of his was joining the army. We were better than that.

Hell, my dad worked in a warehouse, moving boxes around all day. I told him I wanted to be a soldier, and he hit me. But when I repeated it, as he swung I grabbed his hand and twisted. He fell to the ground and swore as his beer fell off the table and landed on him. “Dad, I am going to be a soldier, and you are never hitting me again. Hit me again, and I will hit you back.”

Well, he would not sign the form, so I had to wait until January when I turned 18 so I could sign them myself. And I passed the test I had to take, but in some areas not by much. And even though my recruiter was telling me I could be a mechanic or work on computers or anything else, I knew what I wanted to be, a soldier.

So three weeks after graduation, Master Hung picked me up at home where I had all I wanted to keep in a backpack. He drove me to the office, where I got in a van and my recruiter drove me to Sacramento. And three days later, I was on an airplane flying to Georgia.

And six weeks later I was a soldier and started my real training. Infantry, lots of time running the hills and woods. And to my surprise, I was actually good at it! Living on the streets in Sacramento and Stockton had taught me to move quietly, and Master Hung had taught me patience. When we would be put into an ambush, I did not move. I was a leaf, a leaf on the ground, waiting to spring into action. Then when the Sergeant gave the order, I was a killer. Of course, the gun was firing blanks, but the beeps from those in front showed me they were just as dead as if I had fired real bullets.

Then came graduation. I had been writing and calling my dad, but he never answered. So of course he was not there. But they called my name, I got a certificate saying I was a soldier and Infantryman, and a gold disk with crossed rifles on it and a ribbon to put on my uniform. Three ribbons, actually. This is because we were at war, and we all got them.

I was sent to North Carolina and my first unit. Then to Air Assault school. A fancy name for learning how to get on and off of helicopters, and how to put things onto them. But I graduated towards the top of my class, just as I had from basic training and infantry school. And I soon traded in the single bar of a Private Second Class, for the top and bottom bar of a Private First Class.

Then, Afghanistan. The less said about that the better. 9 months of hot, high altitudes, and boredom interspersed with rocket and mortar attacks. I went home with some more ribbons and my Combat Infantry Badge. Short a few buddies, but also wiser and with some actual combat experience.