I miss you, girl. I could use your steadiness now, maybe one of your stories about galloping your horse through autumn leaves … or even one of your lectures on barbecue as a noun.
Hope all is well back in the world.
Love,
F
* * *
October 9, 1967
Dear Frank,
My heart breaks. For Jamie, for his son and his wife, and for you and all of the men he would have saved.
Damn war. I remember how I felt when I lost Georgie. I don’t think there’s a word for that kind of grief. But you know what I’m going to say. It’s ’Nam.
You meet people, you form these bonds that tighten around you, and some of the people you love die. All of them go away, one way or another. You don’t carry them around with you over there, you can’t. There isn’t time, and the memories are too heavy. You’ll always have the piece of him that was yours and your time together. And you can pray for him. One way or another, Frank, he’s gone for you, and you know that. As you said, he was never your guy, no matter how much you loved him.
For now, just keep on keepin’ on, Frank.
Sending peace and love, girlfriend.
E
* * *
October 13, 1967
Dear Ethel,
Today it’s hot enough to roast meat on the hooch floor, I swear to God. I’m sweating so much I have to keep wiping my eyes.
Thanks for your letter about Jamie.
You’re right. I know you’re right.
I can’t keep thinking about him. Wishing, remembering, replaying the choices we both made over and over. Fortunately for me, the 36th has been quiet for the past week. But maybe that’s not good. Too much time to think.
I guess I have to feel lucky to have known him, and to have learned from him. Too damn many lessons to learn over here, but the one that’s for sure is this: life is short. I’m not sure I ever really believed that before.
I do, now.
Thanks for being there for me, even from half a world away. I sure would love another picture from home. I miss you.
Luv ya,
F
Frankie put down her pen, took a sip of warm TaB, and folded up the piece of thin blue stationery. Leaning sideways, she put the letter on her bedside chest, beside the stack of letters from home she’d been rereading.
She should write to her parents, too. She hadn’t written in days, unable to find the words to put a pretty spin on her life over here.
She could write and say she was safe, she supposed. That was what they wanted to hear. Although, in truth, that was what her mom wanted to hear. She had no idea what her dad wanted from her anymore. He hadn’t written a single letter.
According to her mother’s frequent letters, everyone back in the world was talking about music and hippies and the so-called Summer of Love. The Summer of Love. （There wasn’t so much as a mention of it in the Stars and Stripes.） It was vaguely obscene. As if boys weren’t dying by the boatload over here.
She leaned back against the wall and closed her eyes, hoping to fall asleep. She wanted to dream about Jamie—it had become comforting in a sick kind of way, obsessively remembering him—but now, instead, she thought about Barb’s DEROS, coming up in December.
How could she survive over here without her best friend?
A knock at the hooch door woke her up.
“Come in.”
The door opened. A young private stood there, looking nervous, his knobby Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. “Lieutenant McGrath?”
“Yeah?”
“Major Goldstein would like to see you.”
“When?”
“Now.”
Frankie nodded and got slowly to her feet. She reached down for her shoes and put them on.
At the admin building, she knocked on the chief nurse’s office door, heard a mumbled, “Come in,” and opened the door.
The major looked up. Frankie saw exhaustion in the slant of her shoulders and the lavender bags under her eyes.
“Are you okay, Major?” Frankie asked.
“Rough few days,” the major said.
Frankie knew the major wouldn’t elaborate. Major Goldstein was old-school. There was a chain of command for a reason. Fraternization was out of the question. In a world where there were very few women to start with, and most were of lower rank and experience, it had to be lonely as hell. Certainly, the men who were of her rank considered themselves superior.
“You’re being transferred to the Seventy-First Evac.”
Frankie’s stomach dropped. “Pleiku?”
“Yep. It’s near the Cambodian border. Central Highlands. Deep jungle.” She paused. “Heavy fighting.”