(3)
— Originally published in the Antietam Review (Spring, 1999)
Continued from page (2)
By the time Kerney got back to the table, Riley had taken his usual place
next to Diver. Griffin talked on about the night before, about the taste of
ba-muoi-ba, about the stench of the San Diego, and, finally, about Rosie. “I
like her. She’s quiet and shy and . . . safe.”
Riley paused, fork in mid-air. “Safe?”
“I mean, like, she doesn’t want to go to bed. I don’t either.”
“You got to be kidding.”
“It’s like this, Hal. I’m married. I, like, don’t want to be unfaithful to
Anita, I guess.”
“Nuttiest thing I ever heard of. Turning down a good piece of ass because
of some chick thousands of miles away who won’t even know—”
“I’ll know.”
Kerney narrowed his eyes. What kind of man was Griffin, anyway?
Watching Griffin’s bent blond head across the table, Kerney hated him.
“Trip wires,” Sergeant McCaffery was saying. “Gonna plant ’em. In the
ground. Outside the concertina wire. All round the perimeter. So if someone
comes wandering up from the river towards our defense, they’ll trip a flare,
and we’ll know they’re out there.”
“Why not string them in the concertina wire like we always do?” Riley
yelled.
“Because,” McCaffery said, “we got all that open space between the
perimeter and the river.”
“What if an animal trips a flare?”
“You shoot it, shithead.”
Kerney wasn’t listening. He was studying the soft, short blond hair on the
back of Griffin’s tan neck. Griffin sat in the hot sand two rows in front of him,
erect, arms folded, watching McCaffery. Like a good soldier, Kerney sneered
to himself.
“Okay, all you guys got that now?” McCaffery asked. “Then haul ass out
there and get them wires in. Come on, move out.”
The men got to their feet. Kerney shuffled along with the rest. When he
reached the perimeter, he paused, lit a cigarette, and sauntered into the
bunker.
TOM'S TALES