INKSTER -- Alfeeria Johnson had waited more than four years for this moment even though she was never sure it would come -- this tattooed stranger with a Southern drawl and a promise tucked in a plastic bag.
Knit together by fate and war, Johnson met Jeffrey Ward on Saturday. He was the Army medic for Johnson's son, 29-year-old Carl Thomas, and was one of the last people to see him alive. "I get to finally fulfill this promise I made," he said. "I finally get to get rid of this burden." This was Johnson's chance for answers. It was Ward's final reach for closure.
The Texas native, now 32, met Thomas about five weeks before they deployed together for Iraq. The men bonded quickly as they faced a savage reception at Camp War Eagle in northeast Baghdad in late March 2004. Thomas wasn't a typical soldier and Ward admired his competence and patience. Thomas didn't yell. He never cussed. He kept Psalm 91 tucked in his boot for protection. "There wasn't any drama there, just a solid dude. Unshakeable," Ward said.
Thomas, a Detroit native, joined the Army in 1996 after graduating from Maryvale High School in Phoenix, where he had gone to live with his father when he was 16. The Army provided a way to create a better life for his family -- future wife, Lanea, and daughter, Nataisha. He and Ward were assigned to 1st Battalion, 12th Cavalry Regiment, 1st Cavalry Division stationed in Fort Hood, Texas.
There was no escape from the war zone -- mortars and grenades hit Camp War Eagle so often that returning from lunch with limbs was a victory, Ward said. On patrol, improvised explosive devices spit ball bearings or nails thousands of feet per second, often leaving little to recover.
Many soldiers in the unit, including Thomas, asked Ward to return at least their helmet band to their family if they were killed. "I did it for guys that I knew were not going to have open casket funerals," Ward said, who also returned the bands to two other soldiers' families.
Ward carried out that promise Saturday, as he handed a small, dust-stained plastic bag to Johnson. It hadn't been opened since Sept. 13, 2004.
Through tears, Johnson examined the khaki-colored band imprinted with Thomas' code number, name and blood type. "Yep, there's his handwriting," she said, touching the place were Thomas had written numbers.
It is the only thing Thomas was wearing the day he died that Johnson has received. Though items may have been sent to Thomas' wife, Lanea, in Arizona, Johnson said.
Army officials are painstaking in gathering, cleaning and returning all personal effects, down to a pack of gum in a pocket, said Lt. Col. Richard McNorton, spokesman for the Army's Human Resources Command. "Great care is taken in preserving it," he said. Personalized helmet bands, like Thomas', dog tags, watches, jewelry, undergarments and anything else that is the soldier's personal property are cleaned and packaged to be sent to family, he said.
But Army policy and practice don't always match up, Ward said. And families often don't receive things that have been tattered or bloodstained. "The Army does not have a record of returning things promptly or even the right thing," he said.
Pleasantries could wait. Johnson wanted details -- excruciatingly vivid details. Was his body intact? What was missing? Were they ever found? Did he die instantly? Was he really in that sealed casket?
The answers were blunt and grisly. Johnson kept repeating the answers as if trying to memorize every detail.
The details of that September day are clear in Ward's mind: children's chatter, the stink of sewers, the teeming neighborhood of Kamalaya, just outside Sadr City.
Thomas' tank was parked in front of a school near a checkpoint soldiers called Circle 5. He and Staff Sgt. Guy Hagy were standing next to it when the improvised explosive device, buried just feet away, was remotely detonated, Ward said. Ward had been talking with them only moments before and had just returned to his vehicle. In the following haze, Ward worked to recover the bodies quickly in the 90-degree heat, saving the only thing of Thomas' he could: his helmet band.
For Ward, returning the band was the last gesture he could make for Thomas, and it would give him some closure he badly needed.
Johnson had struggled for years not knowing whether her son had died slowly, uttered any last words or endured great pain. Ward, who knew from experience what a bomb blast felt like, provided the answers she had waited for so long.
"He was gone before he hit the ground," Ward told her. "They just felt the light, felt the warmth and went to sleep." Her son had been laughing when the bomb went off, Ward said. He was still smiling in death.
Ward, wounded by a car bomb, returned from Iraq with a Purple Heart and the demons that come with it.
Life at home quickly unraveled for Ward, who was discharged in March 2005. He was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, struggled with survivor's guilt, became addicted to cocaine and served six months in jail. Jail saved his life, he said. It helped break his drug addiction and was where he reconnected with his faith.
When Ward returned from Iraq, he tried to reach Lanea Thomas but was told she did not want to be contacted. His efforts to reach other family members had been unsuccessful. Ward tried again to find Thomas' family. This time, he finally connected with Johnson through a reporter who had written about Thomas in The Detroit News.
In her tiny living room in Inkster, Johnson, 53, and Ward laughed, cried, downed fried chicken and spaghetti, and shared memories.
Johnson's longtime friend, George Owens, and sister, Diann Wood, talked with them. Thomas' sister, Devika Foster, who is also in the Army and stationed in El Paso, Texas, called and talked to Ward.
On Sunday, they attended Johnson's church, New Birth Baptist Church in Inkster. The Rev. Joseph Stephens' words from the pulpit had a special poignancy for Ward. "God has spared you another year," he told the congregation. "Make good ... on your promises."
For Johnson, closure will never come. But, with Ward, a measure of comfort has. "I'm grateful that (Ward) was there and he made it," she said. "He made it enough to come and tell me what happened." "It took four years, but he made it."
Contributed by Roger Kehrier who can be reached at rlkehrier@hotmail.com