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Rain fills my ears, washing away the sound of his voice, his fists pounding her flesh. I roll myself all the
way over onto my back and feel wetness trickling down my cheeks. Tears? It can't be tears. A soldier's
got a job to do; a soldier's got no time to cry.
I know that part of it's a lie. I tasted plenty of tears in my day, standing by a strip of new-turned earth, a
shattered tree-branch jammed into the ground at one end, watching while someone hung an empty helmet
on top of it like the star at the top of the Christmas tree. And you know, it never failed: Someone would
always catch me at it and ask me was I crying and I'd always answer, No, it's just the rain.
So now it's still the rain. I let it come streaming down my face where I lie, knowing I could lie here
forever, staring up into a sky so flat and gray. For once the German planes aren't soaring through the
clouds, bombs dropping, earth gouting up brown and black and red. My ears still ring with the numbing
clap of sound that hit me like a sledgehammer in the back, threw me halfway to the woods we were all
racing to reach. I remember how I lay there, sucking mud, until Jimmy caught up with me, how he and
Frank got me moving again.
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Someone stoops over me on my left side now, someone on my right, just the way it was back then in
Italy. Strong arms hook themselves through my elbows and tilt me back onto my feet. My boots sink
deep into the mud. I stand there staring down at my uniform, filthy as a pig's ass and how the hell am I
gonna get it clean? Oh man, Captain Sharrock's gonna give me hell for this; he's one of the biggest
clean-crazy officers in the whole E.T.O.Keep it clean or dig the latrine, that's that fucker's motto. I run
one hand through my thick, red hair in consternation just as Nick gives me my helmet, Frank gives me my
gun.
I know that something's wrong, something big, but you know how it is: Your house catches fire and you
stand there yelling at the fireman who just saved your life because he didn't save your wedding photo.
Your father dies and you spend half the funeral fighting with your son. I ought to be flat on the floor of my
own diningroom but instead I'm standing in the rain outside the same tall window where I was standing on
the inside not five minutes ago, and all I want to do is argue with Nick, tell himWhat the hell are you
doing here, helping me stand up like a whole man again? It was Jimmydid it back then in Italy,
Jimmy and Frank, not you. You were shattered into a thousand pieces in a bomb crater
somewhere behind us. What the hell are you doing inside what's got to be my memory?
Nick smiles. I know, he says. It's a bitch, ain't it?
Frank claps me on the back. Good to have you, Red. Let's go.
What? I'm not going anywhere with you clowns!
You are, Frank says. Whenever he said something that way, back on the battlefields, you knew it was
going to be no use arguing: Frank had an eye for spotting the things you couldn't change, no matter how
much you wanted to, no matter how hard you dreamed. It saved his life more than once, and ours. If
you want, you can still go in and say goodbye, but
Goodbye? I ask, but they've already pulled me through the window, out of the rain. It's trickling down
my poncho, puddling up the floor where that bastard made Gina drop me. He's got her in a corner now,
right against the old marble fireplace Mary loved so much. She got her arms thrown over her head, trying
to shield herself from his fists. How soon before he catches wise and starts kicking her belly instead?
If I get only one goodbye before I go, then I want this one. I chamber a round and raise my rifle to my
shoulder. I've got him in my sights. I've never stood this close to a man I was about to kill, not once in all
the war. My lips are dry and hot, but all I can taste is rain. I pull the trigger.
Nothing. Not even a click; only a small silence. I lower my rifle and see Nick shaking his head sadly.
What's the matter with this fucking gun? I shout, waving it in his face.
Nothing, he says. No more than being what it is.
They won't shoot for us any more, Frank puts in. Nick told me; he tried. He had me try too, just in
case it'd maybe be different for me. It wasn't.
You know that? I challenged him. You know that for sure?
I've only just signed up, Red, but it doesn't take you long to learn the drill.
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Well, why don't you dogfacesdo something about it? I holler at them both.
You think I haven't tried? Nick says. You think all wewant to do is walk patrol? Wearing out our
boots, seeing the things we see and no way to do a damn thing about any of it? Once, just once I wish
that we could break the wall. Shit, what'd they tell you you became a soldier for?
Making it right again, Frank says, his mouth a cold, straight line. Standing up to the sons of bitches
who act like they're the only ones who count as human beings. Everyone else is nothing to them but
things, numbers, toys for them to break, tools for them to use. Standing up for the ones too beaten down
and weak to fight for themselves, that's why I signed up.
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