The photo was taken at nine months into my tour. I was two days from my 19th birthday when I got a rare phone call from Saigon. I was miles west of Da Nang and had no idea who might try to reach me and assumed it could only be bad news from the world. But it wasn't. 

A friend from home was with Army Intel in Saigon and somehow knew I was in country. He must have had access and clearances to put through the call. He was about to rotate back. so we chatted and recalled stories from years earlier and vowed to share a brew when I got back.

By the time got home four months later, the scars of war had caught up to him and he had passed away from self medicating to chase away the demons. I realized then that we all died a little in Vietnam.  None of us came back without having been profoundly changed. Some for the better, some for the worse, some just because we were there. No one survives intact. Not all casualties occur on the battle field, or spill blood on the soil. 

You won't find his name on the wall. But to me, he died in Vietnam though he didn't stop breathing until the demons won out.