23
" But let me tell you this: sometimes at night, when I look up at the stars, an see the whole sky jus laid out there, don't you think I ain't rememberin it all. I still got dreams like anybody else, an ever so often, I am thinkin about how things might of been. An then, all of a sudden, I'm forty, fifty, sixty years ole, you know?
Well, so what? I may be a idiot, but most of the time, anyway, I tried to do the right thing-- an dreams is jus dreams, ain't they? So whatever else has happened, I am figgerin this: I can always look back an say, at least I ain't led no hum-drum life.
You know what I mean? "
― Winston Groom , Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1)
32
" trigger, a gook bullet hit him square in the head an blowed it inside out. He lyin on the ground, han still holdin to the gun for dear life, which he does not have any more of now. Oh God, it were awful—an gettin worst. No tellin what them gooks would of done if they caught us. I call out to Doyle to come here, but they is no answer. I jerk the machine gun from po ole Bones’ fingers an squirm over to Doyle, but he an the two other guys layin there shot. They dead, but Doyle still breathin, so’s I grap him up an thow him over my shoulder like a flour sack an start runnin thru the brush towards Charlie Company, cause I scared outta my wits. I runnin for maybe twenty yards an bullets wizzin all aroun me from behin, an I figger I be shot in the ass for sure. But then I crash thru a canebreak an come upon a area with low grass an to my suprise it is filled with gooks, lyin down, lookin the other way, an shootin at Charlie Company—I guess. Now what do I do? I got gooks behin me, gooks in front of me an gooks right under my feet. I don’t "
― Winston Groom , Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1)
38
" After a haf hour or so, they was beatin on the tables with they knives an forks like in a prison riot, an I knowed I had to do somethin fast, so I turned the boiler up high as it could go. I’m settin there watchin it, so nervous I didn’t know what to do, when all of a sudden the first sergeant come bustin thru the door. “What in hell is goin on here?” he axed. “Where is these men’s food?” “It is almost ready, Sergeant,” I say, an jus about then, the boiler commenced to rumble an shake. Steam begun to come out of the sides an one of the legs on the boiler tore loose from the floor. “What is that?” the sergeant axed. “Is you cookin somethin in that boiler!” “That is the supper,” I says, an the sergeant got this real amazed look on his face, an a secont later, he got a real frightened look, like you might get jus before an automobile wreck, an then the boiler blew up. I am not exactly sure what happened nex. I do remember that it blowed the roof off the mess hall an blowed all the winders out an the doors too. It blowed the dishwasher guy right thru a wall, an the guy what was stackin plates jus took off up in the air, sort of like Rocket Man. Sergeant an me, we is miraculously spared somehow, like they say will happen when you are so close to a han grenade that you aren’t hurt by "
― Winston Groom , Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1)
39
" clothes off, cept for the big chef’s hat I was wearin at the time. An it blowed stew all over us, so’s we looked like—well, I don’t know what we looked like—but man, it was strange. Incredibly, it didn’t do nothin to all them guys settin out there in the mess hall neither. Jus lef em settin at they tables, covered with stew, actin kinda shell-shocked or somethin—but it sure did shut their asses up about when they food is gonna be ready. Suddenly the company commander come runnin into the buildin. “What was that!” he shouted. “What happen?” He look at the two of us, an then holler, “Sergeant Kranz, is that you?” “Gump—Boiler—Stew!” the sergeant say, an then he kind of git holt of hissef an grapped a meat cleaver off the wall. “Gump—Boiler—Stew!” he scream, an come after me with the cleaver. I done run out the door, an he be chasin me all over the parade grounds, an even thru the Officer’s Club an the Motorpool. I outrunned him tho, cause that is my specialty, but let me say this: they ain’t no question in my mind that I am up the creek for sure. One night, the next fall, the phone rung in the barracks an it was Bubba. He say they done dropped his atheletic scholarship cause his foot broke worst than they thought, an so he’s leavin school too. But he axed if I can git off to come up to Birmingham to watch the University play them geeks from Mississippi. But I am confined to quarters that Saturday, as I have been ever weekend since the stew "
― Winston Groom , Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1)
