Читать книгу The Vultures - Mark Hannon - Страница 8

3.

When Tom got home from classes, he dropped his books on the dining room table and started looking through the mail.

His mother called out from the kitchen, “Hi Tommy. How’d it go at school today?”

“Ok,” he said, finding a blue envelope with his brother Rory’s writing on it.

“Rory sent us two letters, Tommy,” she said over the sound of sizzling pork chops on the stove. “Did you find yours?”

“Yeah, Mom,” he said, opening his letter as he sat down in the den where the five o’clock news was on.

“Three more weeks until he gets out of there,” she said, grabbing the medal of St. Michael around her neck and saying a quick prayer.

Tom looked down at the pale blue stationery.

Tom,

Just one month to go. I’ve finally earned my short-timer’s stick. I cut a notch in it every day until I get out of here.

The patrols have picked up a lot since we got mortared twice last week. Two guys got hurt, nothing really bad, but with the three guys out for malaria, we’re down five in the platoon, and only two guys came in to replace them, and they don’t know shit. They say the NVA has moved a lot of people in around here and are terrorizing the villes by night. A few of the local headmen disappeared, and a couple of them got found dead in a ditch just outside camp. After that a lot of the local men disappeared, too. We figure they got “drafted” by Uncle Ho, the dink bastard. Remember how Dad used to talk about how the French and Belgians were happy to see the Americans show up during WWII? Well, nobody’s friendly to us anymore. When we went through this one ville, we searched it for weapons but didn’t find any. The ARVN scout found a cache of rice he said was for the NVA, so we set the cache and a bunch of hooches on fire and left. These people get their asses kicked no matter which way they turn. I’ll be glad to get the hell out of here. I don’t know if we’re doing any good for anybody.

I’ve been saving up my money, and when I get home, I should have enough to buy a car. A few months after I get back to the states I’ll be out of the Army – that will be before the end of the summer, and we can go to the beach whenever we want.

Send me a letter, you bum! It reminds me that the whole world isn’t 110 degrees and full of bugs. I swear to God, when I get home I’ll never complain about the snow in Buffalo again.

Your Big Brother (and don’t you forget it!),

Rory

When Tom looked up from the letter, a reporter on TV was standing in a road outside a village. American soldiers in green were walking in a line away from the camera towards the village, and there were several contorted bodies in black pajamas lying on the road.

Tom couldn’t make out what the reporter was saying as he thought, Dead bodies and they just walk past them, and Rory’s part of this craziness?