For the Love of a Marine

by Sharon Kimbra Walsh

  “I hear you,” Henry responded sympathetically. “It’s a hard call and no, nobody deserves to end up injured or dead, I agree with you on that one, but—and this is going to sound pretty harsh—it’s what we all signed up for.” He stopped speaking, studying her face closely. “Are you sure you’re all right? You’re looking pretty pale.”

  “I’m just tired,” Katie explained, lightly brushing off his concern, then she chuckled quietly. “Perks of the job, I suppose.” She was not about to admit to her work colleague that she was beginning to feel ill. She felt lightheaded and nauseated, and while she was positive that the symptoms were simply the effects of the long hours she had spent in the hot and humid operating theater, her self-diagnosis did nothing to help her to feel any better.

  At that moment the second patient from Theater One, accompanied by the two CTMs from Surgical Team Two, was wheeled into the CCU. Transferred to a bed next to the first, the remaining two trauma nurses commenced their post-op observations and procedures, identical to those carried out on Katie’s still-sleeping patient. Katie and Henry, nodding to their CTH counterparts, left the CCU to go back to Theater One.

  Outside in the corridor, the temperature was far cooler than it had been in the theater and the CCU. While Lance Corporal Barrow went on into the now-empty theater, Katie paused, taking a deep breath of the fresher air. Leaning against the cool wall, she raised a hand to wipe away clammy perspiration from her forehead. She would never get used to the heat, no matter how long she stayed in Afghanistan. Her earlier nausea becoming worse, she tried to distract her thoughts from her unsteady stomach by studying her surroundings.

  The CTH was one of the few solid builds on Camp Churchill. A large, single story, sand-colored structure, it sprawled over an area of two thousand square meters, its rigid, straight lines at odds with the khaki canvas tents, sand-colored office containers and dun-colored, hard-packed sand and dusty earth that comprised the rest of Base Independence. It had started life as a MASH-style field hospital but as the base had expanded and become more developed and permanent, so had the Role Three Combat Trauma Hospital, a medical facility in miniature with state-of-the-art equipment, giving it the ability to be able to cope with the most complex of cases, something that was paramount in a war theater.

  Its interior décor was spartan in its gleaming whiteness with spotless walls and dark green, rubberized flooring that ran throughout each room and the long central corridor bisecting the length of the building. A large, red-lettered sign—easily observed by all who entered—was placed just inside the double entrance doors, prohibiting the carrying of weapons beyond a certain point. Camp Standing Orders stipulated that everyone entering the building, including all medical personnel, had to leave their personal weapons in a small room simply called the weapons room, just inside the double doors, and collect them when leaving.

  Leading off from the corridor were two operating theaters, each containing two operating tables. This gave the CTH the ability to perform four surgical procedures at the same time. In addition, there were two trauma rooms, each with a portable X-ray machine, capable of keeping four casualties stable until taken to surgery. The main rooms consisted of an MRI room, a twelve-man critical care unit, two twenty-man wards, the R&R room, shower and locker room facilities and a number of other rooms, all making up the labyrinth that was the CTH.

  A lifeline to the sick and injured, the CTH was a safe haven for those who needed to know that in the midst of war there were people who cared—that there was a place of peace and protection where wounds were treated and damaged limbs and psyches healed. It was where the medical teams and staff worked beyond the call of duty to offer survivors compassion, care and an unfailing hope of survival, together with dedication and commitment. All the skill and competence in the world, could not save some, but the majority of the casualties who passed through the CTH’s doors survived and went home to their families. This ultimately gave all the medical staff a sense of victory and achievement over those whose sole intent was to maim and kill.

  Katie jerked herself from her reverie. There was more work that needed to be done before she could rest, so straightening up from her weary slouch against the wall she went to the door of the theater. She paused there, her weariness intensifying, dismayed at the mess that greeted her. The room—the scene of the two earlier surgical procedures—now lay silent and empty but there was blood everywhere—droplets sprayed on walls, smeared liberally across countertops, the operating tables, and staining instruments and instrument trays. A curdled miasma of smells inside the room, combined with the heat and humidity, were such that Katie felt as though she was about to suffocate. Perspiration immediately broke out on her forehead and her stomach churned rebelliously with a surge of the earlier nausea. Attempting to ignore her escalating discomfort, she swallowed and moved into the theater to commence the task of restoring it to its prior cleanliness.

  After use of the theaters and trauma rooms, each needed to be thoroughly cleaned and sterilized. An infection control policy was in force and all surfaces—including walls, floors and anywhere that had come into contact with a casualty’s bodily fluids—needed washing with an anti-bacterial, water-based solution. Instruments had to be autoclaved for optimum sterilization and all equipment used, cleansed thoroughly in boiling water. Every swab and retractor had to be accounted for, instrument trays replenished and drug cabinets re-inventoried, depleted drugs replaced. Each room was always restored to its pristine condition smoothly and quickly, those personnel that carried out the tasks aware that there was always the chance of further casualties arriving at the CTH.

  Katie joined Lance Corporal Barrow, and while she worked, she listened to the muted voices of medical personnel drifting to her from the direction of the R&R room where everybody had congregated for a much needed coffee or cold drink and where, she knew having been party to the discussions herself, they would be going over the surgical procedures of the day and discussing the status of the patients. She longed to join them but the bloody mess in the theater needed tending to.

  Although they were both tired, Katie and Henry were adept at doing this particular task, and they cleaned the theater quickly and thoroughly, collecting all the bloodstained bandages, pieces of uniform and swabs together before sealing the bundles in bags to prevent further contamination and throwing them into a waste receptacle in preparation for incineration. At one point Katie discovered a set of dog tags lying in lonely isolation on the floor in a small pool of blood. Picking them up, she allowed them to dangle from her gloved fingers for a second then ran them under hot water and set them aside to place with the other personal effects.

  The CMTs from Surgical Team Two eventually joined them to assist with the clean-up. All four went about their work in silence, exhausted but with a quiet sense of efficiency. When they had finished cleaning Theater One, the four moved on to Theater Two then to each of the trauma rooms. It was when they had nearly completed their tasks in Trauma Room Two that Katie’s nausea abruptly returned with a vengeance. Breaking out in a cold, clammy sweat, she paused in her task of wiping down an examination table and swayed dizzily.

  Glancing down at her gloved hands in an attempt to distract her thoughts from how ill she was feeling, she noticed a liberal coating of dried blood on them, and geometric swathes of quickly drying red down the front of her scrub smock. She gagged slightly and put a hand to her mouth, remembering at the last minute about her stained gloves and jerking her hand away from her face. She knew instinctively that at some point in the very near future she was going to be very ill, and to avoid the embarrassing scene that this might create, she needed to get outside the CTH in the hope that some fresh air might help her feel better. Her face pale and covered in perspiration, Katie turned to Henry. “I need to go outside for a few minutes,” she announced, her voice shaking slightly.

  “Okay, no problem,” Lance Corporal Barrow replied, glancing at her. Seeing how suddenly pale and unwell she looked, his express
ion became one of concern. “Katie, you look terrible. Are you feeling all right?”

  “No, not really,” she answered abruptly. “I’m feeling a bit sick. I’ll be back in a couple of minutes.”

  Sensing that it might only be a matter of time before the unthinkable happened and that she was not going to be able to make it to the female toilets before it did, Katie about-turned and left the theater. Turning immediately right, she headed quickly for the wide double doors at the front of the building. As she neared the entrance, her stomach began to churn, prompting her to run, certain that she was not going to be able to make it outside before she vomited. There was no time for her to collect her weapon, and with one hand leaving a bloody handprint on the white paintwork, she thrust open one of the doors and hurried outside.

  It was a late mid-June evening, one of the hottest months of an Afghanistan summer, and even though Katie stood beneath a jury-rigged canvas canopy, erected to shield patients from the glaring sunlight when ambulances arrived to unload them, the temperature was searingly hot, the air dry. Now the heat, dust and stench of aviation fuel, together with exhaust and oil from vehicles, pervaded the air and Katie began to feel even more unwell.

  Fine dust, nicknamed moon dust because of its silvery color, added to the discomfort of those living on the base. It coated the air, getting into mouths, eyes and noses, and was a constant reminder that Base Independence was located in the middle of a desert. The dust was only one of the never-ending problems of this environment. Base personnel made regular efforts to try to prevent it from invading buildings, engines and even clothing, but it was an impossible task.

  Stopping abruptly outside the main doors, Katie took a deep breath and tried without success to calm her roiling stomach. Standing in the shade, she began to shiver, perspiration quickly cooling on her skin. She swallowed, head pounding, unsteady on her feet, and reached out a trembling hand, groping blindly for something she could hang onto, finding the solid doorframe, and grasping on tightly so that she could support herself. She bowed her head and closed her eyes, gritting her teeth and willing herself not to be sick.

  She focused on her breathing, opened her eyes and glanced around, trying to occupy her mind with more mundane things, but even these preventative actions failed to make her feel any better and suddenly she became aware that her struggles were failing dismally and she was going to be ill. Spinning to the left, she hurried around the side of the building in an attempt to remove herself from the view of anyone who might come out of the doors. She immediately vomited and continued to do so until her abdominal muscles contracted in rebellious protest then, moaning softly, retched dryly until her stomach eventually decided that it would allow her temporary respite. She straightened, tears of reaction trickling down her face, sweat-damp hair clinging to her forehead where it showed from beneath her floral surgical cap. She coughed slightly, clearing her throat, feeling weak and tired, stomach sore, as though it had been squeezed through a wringer and spat out. All she wanted to do at that moment was take a shower, change into clean scrubs and have a much needed rest.

  “Are you okay, ma’am?” a deep, husky American voice suddenly asked from behind her.

  Chapter Two

  Ma’am! Who’s ma’am? The question popped wildly into Katie’s exhausted mind as she jumped violently. She had believed herself to be alone and now she uttered a small unladylike squawk of surprise and spun round. The harsh sunlight blinded her, her vision blurring so that at first she could not make out who it was that had spoken to her. Blinking her eyes quickly, she finally made out the figure of a tall, broad-shouldered man clad in Army combat fatigues—ACFs—standing immediately behind her. Not expecting him to be standing so close, Katie took an involuntary step backward. Her boot sole slipped on the tiles laid haphazardly on the sandy ground and she promptly over-balanced, pin wheeling her arms to prevent herself from toppling over. A hand instantly shot out and grasped her arm, pulling her back to a safer footing.

  Gasping, embarrassed and irritated with herself, Katie shook off the rescuing hand and glanced up at the soldier in front of her. She was tall for a woman at five feet ten inches, but the top of her head barely came up to his chin. Against her will and totally alien to her character, she couldn’t prevent her eyes from traveling first down then up his body, taking in the dusty combat boots, desert camouflage combat trousers and khaki T-shirt that molded itself to a flat stomach, broad, well-muscled chest and tanned, powerful arms. An M4 carbine hung by its carrying strap, over one shoulder. Her eyes eventually settled on his face, and despite feeling wrong-footed and having just spent the last ten minutes being violently ill in front of this stranger, she noticed his eyes. They were a deep, almost cobalt blue fringed with extraordinarily long, dark eyelashes. There was a sharp, evaluating expression in them, as though he ran across women vomiting outside buildings every day and took it in his stride. His deeply tanned face had a firm, square chin, and beneath a military camouflaged cap, Katie could see cropped, dark blond hair.

  Katie was startled at the sudden surge of attraction she felt for the unknown man and it unnerved her. There was something about him that had started her pulse racing erratically and if she had been feeling a little better and the situation had been less humiliating, she would have been amused at her reaction. To make matters worse, she finally realized that she had been staring at his face for far too long and that the man was returning her stare just as intently, as though taking in every detail of her features. Katie found the directness of his gaze a little unsettling, and she cleared her throat nervously. Attempting to speak, she found herself struggling to form an adequate response to the soldier’s question, which she had almost forgotten. She wanted to let forth with a cutting response, to put this man down and divert the unnerving intenseness of his gaze, but found that she was completely tongue-tied.

  Anger and humiliation that a complete stranger had observed her being ill began to surge inside her and she wished that a hole would open up at her feet and she could crawl into it and disappear. To top it all off, he was a Yank to boot, and probably had all the arrogant character traits of one. Katie’s irrational annoyance at what she perceived to be a breach of her privacy increased twofold. A decent person would not have stood watching her be physically sick without announcing their presence. As she reached this conclusion, she straightened, raised her chin defiantly and snapped, “I’m fine, thank you…” She abruptly realized that she did not know the man’s rank and again, another wave of embarrassment washed over her and her cheeks flushed a bright red.

  “US Marine Staff Sergeant Joe Anderson,” the man volunteered, appearing to ignore her rudeness. “I’m glad you’re feeling better.”

  There was nothing in his tone except concern and sympathy, certainly no evidence that Katie could hear of contempt or ridicule, and a friendly smile played about his lips. Katie’s ire rose another notch because the staff sergeant’s voice was a deep, husky drawl and rolled over her like balm, easing her embarrassment and irritation and doing strange things to her nerve endings. She felt confused and this irritated her further. The unexpected attraction she felt for this man was unwelcome, unwanted and out of character. She was decidedly uneasy at the feelings he was triggering inside her and she had the urge to dismiss him rudely and run back inside the CTH like a frightened child.

  Watching the display of emotions flitting across the woman’s face—something that he had been studying intently and with a great deal of interest since he had startled her—Joe Anderson was uneasy at the strong surge of feelings she was arousing in him, and his observation of Katie was just as avid as hers of him had been. He had immediately noticed her tall, slim figure and, as he considered himself a normal hot-blooded man, had noticed that she had curves in all the right places, even beneath her shapeless scrubs. Her hair was short and curly and a color that he could only describe as burnished copper. Her skin was lightly tanned although at that moment her face was pale. A liberal smattering of freckles across
her small, pert nose and highly defined cheekbones stood out in stark relief, which he found undeniably cute. A tilt to her chin led him to believe that she might also possess a stubborn streak and probably a temper to go with it. The most stunning feature of all, however, was her eyes. A clear emerald green, fringed with long, dark, curling lashes, Joe could picture how they might flash and spark when she got upset or angry. He wondered how old she was and guessed her age to be in her early twenties. He felt sudden disappointment. He was thirty-six, probably a grizzled old man in her eyes, far too old for her—if he had any intention of getting to know her—which, he was attempting to convince himself, he had no intention of doing at all.

  Joe found himself feeling as uncomfortable as a schoolboy with these new and uncharacteristic thoughts. Attempting to dismiss them, he noticed a smear of blood on one of the woman’s cheeks, the bloody gloves and the dark red stains on the front of her top, and realized why she had been vomiting. He felt sympathy rise inside him. “Bad day, huh?” he asked casually.

  Acutely conscious of the staff sergeant still staring at her, and responding to that stare, Katie nodded. Trying to regain some shreds of her lost dignity, she attempted to distract herself by pulling off her gloves and shoving them into the deep pocket of her scrub smock. She noticed vaguely that her hands were white and wrinkled and remembered that she had forgotten to put medicated talcum powder on them before pulling on the clinging nitrile.

  “I’ve had better days, Staff Sergeant,” she finally answered politely. “I apologize that you had to see my…” She stopped speaking again because Joe Anderson was shaking his head.

  “No need to apologize, Corporal. I’ve seen grown men throw up over a lot less. Believe me.”

  Katie nodded, grateful for the casual dismissal of her apology. She sensed that he was attempting to make the situation less humiliating for her and again she felt calmed by his calm voice. Straightening, she smiled slightly. “Well, thank you for that, Staff Sergeant, but I do need to get back to work. Can I help you with something?”