Armageddon In Retrospect - Kurt Vonnegut [26]
The old man rolled potatoes from the stove’s wood fire with a stick, knocked the embers from their blackened skins. “I haven’t been a very good father, letting you go without birthdays this long,” he said. “You’re entitled to one every year, you know, and I’ve let six years go by without a birthday. And presents, too. You’re supposed to get presents.” He picked up a potato gingerly, and tossed it to the boy, who caught it and laughed. “So you’ve decided tomorrow’s the day, eh?”
“Yes, I think so.”
“All right. That doesn’t give me much time to get you a present, but there’ll be something.”
“What?”
“Birthday presents are better if they’re a surprise.” He thought of the wheels he had seen on a pile of rubble down the street. When the boy fell asleep, he would make some sort of cart.
“Listen!” said the boy.
As at every sunset, over the ruins from a distant street came the sound of marching.
“Don’t listen,” said the old man. He held up a finger for attention. “And you know what we’ll do on your birthday?”
“Steal cakes from the bakery?”
“Maybe—but that isn’t what I was thinking of. You know what I’d like to do tomorrow? I’d like to take you where you’ve never been in all your life—where I haven’t been for years.” The thought made the old man excited and happy. This would be the gift. The cart would be nothing. “Tomorrow I’ll take you away from war.”
He didn’t see that the boy looked puzzled, and a little disappointed.
It was the birthday the boy had chosen for himself, and the sky, as the old man had promised, was clear. They ate breakfast in the twilight of their cellar. The cart the old man had made late at night sat on the table. The boy ate with one hand, his other hand resting on the cart. Occasionally, he paused in eating to move the cart back and forth a few inches, and to imitate the sound of a motor.
“That’s a nice truck you’ve got there, Mister,” said the old man. “Bringing animals to the market, are you?”
“Brummmaaaa, brummmaaaa. Out of my way! Brummmaaaa. Out of the way of my tank.”
“Sorry,” sighed the old man, “thought you were a truck. You like it anyway, and that’s what counts.” He dropped his tin plate into the bucket of water simmering on the stove. “And this is only the beginning, only the beginning,” he said expansively. “The best is yet to come.”
“Another present?”
“In a way. Remember what I promised? We’ll get away from war today. We’ll go to the woods.”
“Brummmaaaa, brummmaaaa. Can I take my tank?”
“If you’ll let it be a truck, just for today.”
The boy shrugged. “I’ll leave it, and play with it when I get back.”
Blinking in the bright morning, the two walked down their deserted street, turned into a busy boulevard lined with brave new façades. It was as though the world had suddenly become fresh and clean and whole again. The people didn’t seem to know that desolation began a block on either side of the fine boulevard, and stretched for miles. The two, with lunches under their arms, walked toward the pine-covered hills to the south, toward which the boulevard lifted in a gentle grade.
Four young soldiers came down the sidewalk abreast. The old man stepped into the street, out of their way. The boy saluted, and held his ground. The soldiers smiled, returned his salute, and parted their ranks to let him pass.
“Armored infantry,” said the boy to the old man.
“Hmmmm?” said the old man absently, his eyes on the green hills. “Really? How did you know that?”
“Didn’t you see the green braid?”
“Yes, but those things change. I can remember when armored infantry was black and red, and green was—” He cut the sentence short. “It’s all nonsense,” he said, almost sharply. “It’s all meaningless, and today we’re going to forget all about it. Of all days, on your birthday, you shouldn’t be thinking about—”
“Black and red is the engineers,” interrupted the boy seriously. “Plain black is the military police, and red is the artillery, and blue and red is the medical corps, and black and orange is…”
The pine