Night Work: A Novel of Vietnam (The Jim Hollister Trilogy Book 2)

by Dennis Foley

  “Tell me about convalescent leave,” Hollister said as Connie Urbanik measured his leg again after three weeks of therapy.

  “Good deal. Uncle Sam lets you have a month or so of free leave in Japan after you get out of the hospital. You get to do nothing and finish mending.”

  Hollister made a face she couldn’t miss.

  “What’s wrong with that?”

  “I have to get back to Vietnam.”

  “Are you nuts?” she asked.

  “I know it makes no sense to you. But I’ve got an important job—important to me. If I stay away much longer, I will lose the job and end up being reassigned. My guess is it will be a job I will hate.”

  “I’ve never met a soldier who wanted to turn down leave.”

  “Do you have to take it?”

  “Well, you have to come back off leave and get a release from the doctors or physical therapist.”

  “Oh,” he said. He wasn’t pleased to hear that. “You mean I have to take the month, or whatever, and then come back to see you before I can be cleared to go back to Vietnam?”

  “You get the last week of this PT done as well as the previous weeks, and I’ll see what I can do to reduce your leave.”

  Hollister beamed. “Great. You’re on.” He got up to leave. “That all for today?”

  “Yeah. You’re building muscle mass. Your range of motion is much improved, and my guess is that it’ll continue. You have any complaints?”

  “No, ma’am. I’m ready to go.”

  “Not so fast. Listen, you got a girl or a wife?”

  “Yes, why?”

  “Fly her over here, and spend some time with her. If you still want to cut your leave short, I’ll make it happen for you.”

  She scribbled something on a pad, tore the sheet off, and handed it to him.

  “Take this to Personnel. You are on leave effective a week from tomorrow. It authorizes you thirty days. Do what you want, and let me know.”

  “Thanks. I don’t think I could ask for anything better.”

  “I could.”

  “What’s that?” he asked.

  “You could go a little easier on that booze.”

  Her words stuck in his head as he walked, with a slight limp, down the long corridor connecting two wings of the hospital. He shook it off as just a passing remark. She couldn’t have meant anything serious about it. After all, he didn’t drink during the day, and he never got sloppy drunk. It didn’t mean anything. He was sure of that.

  The phone call to Susan was a two-hour effort. He finally got her, waking her in the middle of the night. She shrieked with delight when he told her to get to Tokyo International for a week together. That was what he told her—that he had a week before he had to go back to Vietnam.

  That part of the call cooled her, but she quickly returned to the exciting part. He promised to call her in twenty-four hours to find out her travel plans.

  It was raining when the plane landed. Hollister stood up straight and waited just inside the terminal for her to get off the plane and walk across the concrete to the gate.

  Susan looked wonderful, and Hollister was almost speechless when he saw her. Her hair was longer, she seemed to be more slender, and her face seemed narrower. She wore Levi’s and a long coat.

  She raised her head as she came through the door, caught a glimpse of him, and broke into her smile. Hollister was immediately aware that every man in the terminal was looking at her. It made him feel good—proud.

  The crowd thinned a bit as she approached him. The last few steps she ran and almost threw herself at him. They embraced and kissed, and tried to talk, then kissed again. He laughed first. Then she got the giggles. When they got themselves under control enough to speak, they spoke at once. Then, careful not to interrupt one another, each paused to let the other speak. Then they did it again.

  He couldn’t contain his feelings and grabbed her, lifting her off the ground. She suddenly made a worried face and spoke. “Your leg. How’s your leg? Shouldn’t you put me down?”

  “Never.”

  She slapped him playfully. “No! I’m serious. Am I hurting you?”

  “Not a chance,” he said as he spun her around and shook her playfully. “I’m not ever putting you down.”

  “You better, ’cause I have to pee!”

  They both laughed, and he placed her gently on the floor and held her away from him so he could see her. “You look so wonderful.”

  “You look awful. You have bags under your eyes, your skin looks blotchy, and I haven’t seen you walk yet.”

  “We can’t all be beautiful,” he said. And then he walked around—test-driving his leg. It was painful but he would never let her know that the skin was still so tight that it burned when he put weight on the leg. Each time the muscle expanded to take the weight, the skin stretched and he could feel at least four of the tight scars left by the wire sutures. “Look. I’m perfect. Little scar, and I got a Purple Heart.”

  “Another Purple Heart,” she scolded.

  “Enough. Let’s go find your bags. I have a taxi outside and a terrific week planned.”

  The taxi took them to the tiny little hotel where he had rented them a room for the week. It was traditional Japanese, run by a family that spoke no English. The old couple stood at the front door and bowed deeply as Hollister and Susan got out of the car.

  The driver took care of the baggage, and Hollister tried to explain to the couple that Susan was his wife and that he had not seen her for almost five months.

  They didn’t understand a word, but bowed and smiled and pretended they did,

  The room was in the back of the hotel—ground level. Susan entered, shoeless, and took a breath of approval. “It’s so neat and warm. How did you find this place?”

  “There are plenty of guys at the hospital who are stationed here and know all the best places. They all told me this was the way to go. Okay?”

  She turned, took him in her arms, and kissed him deeply for the first time. “Yes, honey. It’s perfect.”

  The old man brought the bags and tried not to interrupt Susan and Hollister, but was unsuccessful. They broke their embrace, a little embarrassed in the face of the old man’s formal bow and traditional garb. Hollister thanked him, bowed, and tried to decide whether to tip him or not. Somehow, a man so dignified seemed above tipping. Hollister decided to deal with it later.

  When the old man left, Hollister and Susan explored the rooms—three of them. Hollister had already seen them and knew where everything was, but he wanted to be with her while she discovered them.

  She loved the tatami mats on the floor, the sliding shoji screens, and the hardwood trim that shined with years of care and polishing. It was an old building that surely went back to the turn of the century. A few Western conveniences had been put in—like a bathroom and better lighting. But the rest was traditional, sparse, Japanese decor.

  “Oh, Jimmy! Look at this,” Susan said as she opened the doors leading out into a private garden so manicured and so lush it took her breath away.

  They walked out onto the narrow mahogany porch that looked over the small pool filled with Japanese carp. The pool was shaped in a double lobe, with a small concrete bridge crossing the narrow part.

  A pagoda stood silently near the water, flanked by dwarf fruit trees anchored into a field of perfectly rounded pebbles that created a separation between the trees and the dark, rich grass.

  As they stood there looking at the beautiful garden, Susan slid her hand up Hollister’s back and dropped her head to his chest. “I missed you.”

  He looked at her and had no words to explain how far away the horror of the war had moved now that she was with him. He wrapped his arms around her, and for a long time they just stood there, silent and a little afraid.

  There was an awkward moment when they realized the room had no bed. The bedding, to be rolled out on the floor, was put away in closets, and it would be conspicuous, if not embarrassing, to get it
out in the middle of the day so they could make love.

  They compromised and headed for the bathroom. It had a large Japanese tub that could hold four people. Susan made him leave while she undressed and fussed with herself. He spent the time finding space in the bedroom to put her things—most ended up in a closet with a few built-in drawers.

  Susan emerged from the bathroom, her hair tied up with a ribbon, wearing the silk kimono that Hollister had bought and placed in there for her. She smiled and turned, showing off the beautiful pale blue floor-length robe. “I just love it. Where did you get it?”

  “One of the nurses on my ward seems to know every shop in Tokyo. She sent me to the place where I bought it. It never occurred to me I would have to find a place for tall American women.”

  They both laughed. She was beautiful. He just stood there looking at her.

  “Well,” she said, waving toward the bathroom. “It’s all yours.”

  Hollister called her. He had undressed and was already in the hot tub of steaming water—neck deep. He wasn’t going to admit it, but he was putting off the time when she would see his scar as long as he could.

  As soon as Susan entered the bathroom, she slid the shoji screen closed and dropped her kimono. Hollister groaned with delight. He hadn’t seen her naked in so long. He reached out for her to join him.

  As she stepped up on the small block to get into the tub, she intentionally paused long enough for Hollister to reach out and help her into the water.

  She folded into his arms and leaned back against his chest. They didn’t say a word or move for several minutes.

  Then she spoke. “You gonna let me see that leg or what?”

  “Oh, don’t worry about it. It’s just a scar. It’s okay. I’m okay. Really.”

  She turned and looked at him, sternly. After a long pause she simply instructed him: “Stand—up!”

  Hollister stood slowly. As the wound broke the water, she looked down at his leg. As he reached full height, his entire scar was above the water line in front of Susan’s face.

  She didn’t say anything. She just reached out and gingerly touched the ugly scar that tracked down the outside of his thigh. After the healing, it had taken on an uneven thickness and the color ranged from red to blue-red.

  As she ran her fingers down the scar, she started to sob—quietly. Hollister realized she was crying and started to reach for her. She refused to accept him; instead, she encircled his legs with her arms and placed her cheek against his wound—and kept sobbing quietly.

  He let her be. Eventually, she let him hold her, and they stayed that way in the warm water until she calmed down. They didn’t talk about it. He had no words for her, but he felt her pain over his confusing commitment to a war she didn’t understand.

  As the water cooled, they seemed to strike an unspoken agreement not to spoil their reunion with the war. That gave way to small talk, to more touching and more physical demonstrations of love.

  They left the tub, and found the futon and bedclothes, and abandoned any worry about the old man. They didn’t sleep that night.

  The Japanese food was excellent. The weather allowed a postcard view of the city, and the on-and-off rain kept the streets sparkling clean.

  They spent the entire day on the town in Tokyo doing all the touristy things. Even though he was in pain, Hollister worked very hard at concealing his limp. At lunch he had a few beers, and by the time they had finished dinner he had managed to stand off the pain with even more beer. He didn’t want to provoke her into bringing up Vietnam.

  The day turned into a wonderful night on the Ginza, then another passionate evening in the little hotel. By then they were over the awkwardness of being together again and had come to realize that they were quickly getting closer to being separated again. Their response was to become completely involved in each other and to avoid looking at clocks and watches.

  It became a swirl of sightseeing, shopping, laughing, playing, and nights of intense intimacy. Finally, it was the night before she had to go home and he had to return to Vietnam.

  They sat on the stone step leading down from the room to the little garden. “We going to talk about it or not?” she asked.

  “About it?” he replied.

  “Don’t make this so hard for me. I want to know what we are doing. Is there an end to this? Do I have to go home and cry myself to sleep every night, scared shitless every time the phone rings?”

  He dropped his head and remained silent.

  “I just want to know when it will end. I want to know when this will be behind us and we get to live our life. Is that too much to ask?”

  “No. It’s not. But I don’t know yet.”

  “When will you know? Are you going to keep putting it off until I have to bury you?”

  Hollister snapped at her. “You think I want to be over there? You think I’d rather be in Vietnam than with you?”

  “Jimmy, I don’t know what you think. We have put off so many long-range decisions because of the short-range ones that I just don’t know what we are doing.”

  “You’re angry.”

  “Yes. No. I’m frustrated. I’m worried. I’m afraid. And I’m selfish. I want my husband. I want my life, and I want my future back.”

  He looked at her.

  She continued. “I had a life before I met you. I had an idea what was possible and what I had to do to get there. Now I have no idea what is going on. You say you want to get out of the army, but I don’t see it. You say that you want to do something else, but it’s talk.”

  “I’ll be home in a few months. Between now and then we can make plans. I don’t want to come back here. But I …”

  “But you what? You can’t seem to break it off. You can’t seem to get around to getting on with our lives.”

  “I will. I promise. I will,” he said.

  She looked at him with as serious an expression as he had ever seen. “Do it soon. I can’t stay on this train much longer. Get this out of your system before it kills you or destroys us.”

  Chapter 23

  “WELL?” MAJOR URBANIK ASKED.

  “I’m ready for you to sign me out of here,” Hollister said.

  She took off her glasses and dropped them upside down on the medical forms on her desk. “You do understand that you can have another three weeks—and more—if you are having trouble with that leg?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  She reached out and took the personnel form from Hollister’s hand, then put her glasses back on. She scribbled her signature and checked some appropriate blocks. “This is wrong. You need more time. You need more distance from Vietnam. Listen, healing isn’t just an end to bleeding and sharp pain.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “No changing your mind?”

  He shook his head.

  It was called a “back-haul.” Hollister was able to catch a ride back to Vietnam in an empty medical evacuation jet, like the one that brought him to Japan. The stanchions stood empty down the length of the C-141. Hollister knew they would strain under the load of all the patient-laden stretchers on the return trip.

  He sat back in the seat and tried to get some sleep. It was the first night in weeks he hadn’t had a drink or a sleeping pill to help him. He failed.

  Brushing off his inability to sleep, he pulled out the maps and notes he had been studying. The handwritten letters announced his new preoccupation: WAR ZONE D.

  The area outlined in marker ink wasn’t much bigger than his hand—fingers spread. Still, it was over a hundred square kilometers. He sat and stared at the terrain. It had everything but mountains. There were bands of deforested terrain, stripped by air force Ranch Hand flights that dropped Agent Orange.

  Trails crisscrossed everywhere. Streams meandered through abandoned rubber plantations. Roadways and abandoned hamlets dotted the clearings. Locks, canals, and irrigation ditches spanned the distance between small rivers and old paddy fields. And everywhere else there were trees, bushes,
mangroves, and wild growth. All of this was a blessing—and a curse. The vegetation would hide LRP teams from immediate detection and conceal them when they needed it. But it would also conceal the enemy, who knew every single square meter of the area.

  He continued studying the map. He wanted to know where all the major terrain features were and where they were in respect to one another. The more he knew about War Zone D, the less of an advantage it would be for the enemy.

  The loadmaster brought Hollister a cup of coffee and then found himself a stack of soft emergency flotation equipment to use as a bed. Once the loadmaster was asleep, Hollister was alone again with his map in the cavernous jet.

  The Juliet Company base camp at Bien Hoa was a palace compared to the broken-down and abandoned barracks back at Cu Chi.

  It was dark when Hollister got out of the jeep that had given him a lift from the airfield to J Company. He stood by the roadway and looked at the compound. It was similiar to—only a lot better than—the one he had lived in on his first tour. Each of the team hooches was lit up with electric light, and scratchy music could be heard over the busy night sounds of the sprawling Bien Hoa complex.

  Hollister picked up his small AWOL bag and entered the compound. He walked over to Operations, a large sandbagged building surrounded by a fifteen-foot concertina wire fence. The doorway was a zigzag entrance that obviated the need for a door. Light, fragmentation, and small-arms fire would not be able to make the turns to get from the outside to the inside.

  He stepped into the small pool of light thrown by the low-wattage bulb over me doorway, then entered the maze, emerging inside Operations. He had not been there the only time he had visited the base camp.

  Inside there were two rooms. The larger one held all the communications equipment and office space for the Operations officer and NCO and a similar setup for the Intelligence officer and NCO. The corner had a radio setup for air force radios, and the opposite corner was reserved for the Artillery LNO.

  The smaller room, beyond the large one, was the briefing room. It held ten chairs, maps, easels, and a podium with a large LRP scroll painted on the front.

  Kurzikowski spun around to reach for something on the field desk behind the radios and caught sight of Hollister.