Chapter Six #2
He blinked slowly. Tears slid down his face, mixing with dirt and blood. “Have you seen Stevo? Private Grand. It was my job to keep him safe. He just got in-country two days ago. His mama and mine work at the same salon. In Baton Rouge.”
“I saw him,” Frankie said, finding it hard to speak past the lump in her throat. “He’s fine. He was asking about you.”
Private Fournette smiled, a little sloppily. “My… something hurts, ma’am. I figure that shot is wearin’ off. Man, I surely could use a cold beer.” He started to shake. His hand in hers went limp, grew colder. “Ma’am,” he said.
“Yes?”
It was a long time before he spoke, a shivering silence. “I wish I’d a told…” He wheezed hard. Blood bubbled up from his mouth. “Loved her.”
“You’ll tell her after surgery,” Frankie said. “Right after they fix you up. I’ll help you write a letter.”
“I…” He paused, shuddered, and closed his eyes.
His hold on her hand loosened. One minute he was there, holding her hand, whispering his regret, and the next moment, he was gone.
Mass casualty. That was what they called tonight, or actually MASCAL. Apparently, since the recent influx of troops, it was beginning to happen so often that they didn’t have time to call it by its full name.
Frankie stood in the back corner of the Quonset hut that housed the ER. After nine hours on duty, she was beyond exhausted and her feet burned with blisters, but it wasn’t the ache in her bones and muscles and feet that mattered. It was shame.
How on earth had she thought she belonged here? That she had something to offer men who were grievously wounded? She’d been as much help as a candy striper.
Tonight she’d held scissors in hands that never quite stopped shaking and cut off T-shirts and flak jackets and pants, revealing wounds that she couldn’t have imagined before today. She still heard patients’ screams inside her head, even though the ward had emptied a while ago.
Casualties, she reminded herself. Back in the world, they were patients; here, they were casualties. The Army was full of terms like back in the world . That was how everyone referred to the life that they’d left behind.
Frankie sighed heavily, heard footsteps, and knew it was Ethel, coming to check up on her.
“Well, that was an ass-kicker,” Ethel said, lighting up a cigarette. “And no, not every day is like this, thank God.”
In her mind, Frankie nodded. She was pretty sure that in fact she just stood there, staring at nothing.
Ethel put an arm around her. “How are you, Frank?”
“Useless,” was all she could say.
“No one is ever ready for this. The worst part is that you’ll get used to it. Come on.”
Ethel kept her hold on Frankie, led her through the camp. Frankie felt every one of the new blisters on her feet. Outside, the night air smelled heavy, like blood on metal; there was no moon to light the way.
In the mess, she saw a few men sitting in the enlisted section, drinking coffee, and as they approached the O Club, she smelled smoke wafting through the beaded curtain. Music followed the smoke, infused it with memories of home. “I wanna hold your ha-aa-aa-and.”
In the distance, she heard the whoosh of waves rolling in and out. The sound called to her like a siren song, reinflated her youth. Nights on bicycles with Finley, riding free, their arms outstretched, stars overhead.
Finley . She’d felt his ghost beside her all night, seen his eyes in the face of every soldier whose hand she’d held.
She pulled away from Ethel and walked alongside a coil of concertina wire, a barrier of razor-sharp spikes.
In front of her: the sea. It was a glow of silver, a sense of movement, and the comforting familiarity of it, the salty tang in the air, called out to her, reminded her of home. On the beach, she sat down in the sand and closed her eyes.
She felt the salt, tasted it. The sea—
No. Not the sea.
She was crying.
“You can’t be out here alone, Frank. Not all soldiers are gentlemen.” Ethel sat down beside her.
“I’ll add that to my list of mistakes.”
“Yeah. You gotta be careful. Over here, the men lie and they die.”
Frankie had no idea what to say to that.
“So. Which is it?” Ethel finally said.
Frankie wiped her eyes and looked sideways. “What?”
“Are you out here grieving the boys we lost or your own piss-poor set of nursing skills?”
“Both.”
“That means you’ve got what it takes, Frank. We all went through it. Nurses back in the world are second-class citizens. And, big surprise—they’re mostly women. Men keep us in boxes, make us wear starched virgin white, and tell us that docs are gods. And the worst part is, we believe them.”
“Doctors aren’t gods here?”
“Of course they are. Just ask them.” Ethel pulled a pack of cigarettes out of her pocket, tapped one out, offered it.
Frankie took the cigarette. She didn’t smoke—never had—but just now, it gave her something to do with her unsteady hands and blocked out the smell of blood.
“Why did you join the Army?” Ethel asked.
“It doesn’t matter anymore. It was a stupid, childish thing to do.” She turned to Ethel. “Why did you join?”
“We all have a long-story and a short-story answer to that, I guess. Long story, after I got my nursing degree, I decided I wanted to follow in my dad’s footsteps and become a veterinarian.
I was headed that way when the man I loved shipped out.
Short story: I followed him.” Her voice softened.
“His name was George. He had a laugh that fixed everything.”
“And he—”
“Died. And you?”
“My brother died over here, too. And… I wanted to make a difference.” Frankie stopped, hearing the naivete in her words.
“Yeah. That’s why I re-upped for a second tour. We all want that, Frank.”
Back in the world, when Frankie had told her friends that she’d hoped to make a difference over here, hoped to make her family proud, they’d rolled their eyes and acted impatient with patriotism; but out here, sitting beside this woman she barely knew, Frankie remembered the pride she’d felt on joining the Army.
“I’m sorry about your guy,” Frankie said. “George.”
“He was a real looker, my Georgie,” Ethel said with a sigh.
“And for a while, I hated that I’d followed him here and lost him anyway, but I stuck it out, and now I’m glad I stayed.
That’s what I’ve learned, Frank. I am better and stronger than I ever thought, and when I go back to my daddy’s farm in Virginia and get back into vet school, I know there’s nothing that can stop me.
I want it all, Frank. A husband, a kid, a career.
A big ole life that ends when I can barely get out of my rocker, with kids and animals and friends all around me.
You’ll find out what you want over here, too. I promise.”
“Thanks, Ethel.”
“Now, enough seaside weeping. Do you drink, Frank?”
Frankie didn’t know how to answer that. She’d gone to fraternity mixers in college, and she’d had a few beers, and she’d had two shots of whiskey on her first night in Vietnam, but really, she was a good girl who followed the rules.
She’d turned twenty-one in December—the age drinking was legal in California—but with Finley’s death and the terrible holidays last year, she hadn’t celebrated her birthday. “I have.”
“There’s plenty of it over here,” Ethel said.
“Watch out. Take care of yourself. That’s my advice.
I don’t drink, but I don’t judge, either.
Over here it’s live and let live. Whatever gets you through the night.
” She got to her feet, put a hand down for Frankie.
“Get up, Lieutenant, brush yourself off, and let’s clean up and fill our bellies and then head to the O Club to blow off some steam.
You just survived your first MASCAL in ’Nam. ”
Frankie had never seen any human eat as fast as Ethel did. It was like watching a hyena gulp down a kill as predators closed in.
Finally, Ethel pushed her empty plate aside and said, “I feel like dancing. You?”
Frankie looked down at her barely eaten Salisbury steak covered in brown gravy, and the overcooked green beans. Why had she taken so many mashed potatoes? “Dance?”
How could she dance? Her stomach kept roiling and cramping. She couldn’t shake the horror of what she’d witnessed tonight, nor could she accept her ineptitude. She was nauseated and ashamed. She pushed her chair back and stood up.
The mess hall was full of soldiers in bloody fatigues. She was surprised at how loudly they talked and how often they laughed. Frankie wondered how anyone who’d lived through a MASCAL could get over it so quickly.
She followed Ethel out of the mess. As they walked past the empty stage, Ethel told a story about the Christmas show at Di An when Bob Hope had entertained the troops.
“I sent a picture of me and Bob Hope home to my dad. He said he hung it up on the bulletin board in the barn, told everyone that his girl was saving lives…”
Frankie wasn’t listening. She had never felt less like being around people. She started veering to the left, eager to escape back to her hooch.
Ethel took hold of Frankie’s arm, as if she’d read her thoughts. “Steady, Frank.”
At the O Club, Ethel pushed the beaded curtain aside; the clattering sound filled in the beat of silence between songs.
Inside, there was barely room to sit or stand. Men stood in groups, talking, smoking, drinking. A Stars and Stripes newspaper lay on the floor with the headline MCNAMARA’S LINE FORTIFIED ALONG DMZ. The air was gray with smoke.
How could they be here, as if nothing had happened, some still with blood in their hair, drinking alcohol and smoking?
“Whoa, Frank. You’re breathing like a racehorse. You don’t want to dance, I get it. Hang on.” Ethel grabbed two cold Cokes and maneuvered back through the crowd, toward the doorway.
“Hey, pretty mamas, don’t leave us!” someone yelled out.
“Was it something we said?”
“I’ll put my pants back on. Come back!”
The two women walked past the latrines and the empty shower stalls and came to the row of hooches.