Young Writers Society

As she slid into the drivers seat of the mud covered jeep, a hand reached out of the bundle, followed by a series of coughs and a quick introduction.

“Captain James Barten, just by the way.”

Della ignored the offered hand, starting up the machine and carefully rolling out of the mud before they got stuck. She looked back once more on the body they left in the snow, reassuring herself that someone would come back for the boy soon enough. Proper conventions called for retrieval of a body whenever possible - it just wasn’t possible right now.

The bundle spoke again, saying, “That’s my name. Of course, I already know yours, but I think I’m going to ask for it anyways. Or I could just ask about who is leasing the spot in your bed for the night?”

“Oh really, James. That’s a bit crude even for you and especially about the woman who is trying to save your life,” the priest from the back said, speaking up in her defense.

Father Louis pulled another blanket out of the back of the jeep and handed it up to Della. The temptation to let him die passed through her contemplating mind again, but Barten was surely like any other soldier that she had met out here. Quick to joke about her combined with a failure to follow through on any of the joke’s intentions.

To add to the priest’s objections, Della asked, “Don’t you think that’s just a little bit inappropriate for introductory conversation, Captain?”

“We didn’t exactly have a conventional introduction. And you’re not exactly my type so I’m just repeating jokes from all the men and women that interested in you.”

“It doesn’t matter who is screwing you or getting fucked by you tonight, Barten. Who makes you ejaculate doesn’t determine which jokes you can and can’t try on me.”

The silence that fell over them was like all of the silence in Korea. Just because no one was talking didn’t mean the room was going to be quiet for long. Their jeep was traversing along a road in the middle of a war zone, leaving behind a corpse wrapped in a thin blanket from the victim’s knapsack. A piece of material that the folks back home wouldn’t have even thought fit for a horse.

“Della, what are you going to do with the boy’s body?” Father Louis asked, making his presence known again.

“If I were back home, and I found a body in the woods, and I wasn’t following the code of conduct of the military, then I’d probably burn-”

“Cremation isn’t really the best idea for Catholics, Ms. Darling.”

Burning a body was her definite choice for happening across one in the old forests. But these weren’t the old forests that she was used to and she certainly hadn’t accidentally stumbled across the boy.

“You know boys and girls, though I’m not making any clear assumptions with you two, there’s a chance he’s not Catholic,” Barten said from the passenger’s seat.

The doctor had pulled himself out of the bundle of blankets beside her, coughing while lighting a cigarette, and was currently enjoying a few long draws in their agreed upon silence. Della ignored how his hand was still wrapped with hers as she drove slowly through the muddy ruts with her free hand. She instead had her attention split between their hazardous path and the state of the bullet wound she had spotted back at their wilderness triage point.

If a soldier didn’t want to tell anyone that he was dying then that was up to him, but it was her responsibility to make sure that the hospital had as many able surgeons as possible during this war.

She shook her hand loose of his, putting both hands back on the steering wheel while explaining, “No, sir. He is most definitely Catholic by the medal he was wearing and probably by the name that was stitched into his collar. Though, I doubt you would know about such things as a Texas Southern Baptist?”

Della added a questioning tone to the end of her statement, knowing that it wasn’t an entirely accurate summary of Barten, but it was her best guess so far.

“Close but no cigar, Miss Darling,” he replied. Barten stopped to take another breath, the slight wheezing more apparent than before. “I am in fact a Georgia Southern Methodist. So you were partially correct in your guess about me.”

“If you’re a Southern Methodist from Georgia, then how is any part of my guess correct?”

“Because I’m from Texas originally and I never quite lost the voice. It’s always confusing to the other lovely inverts I meet in my travels.”

Father Louis looked at Della with an open mouth and a blank state of confusion across his face. His eyes flashed between herself and the doctor, and she could already hear the questions coming from his slick Midwest accent.

“Excuse my ignorance, but what exactly are you two referring to because your accents both sound the same to my ears? And I lead the choir so I know my hearing is fair enough for government work.”

He was a Yankee. That much was clear from his confusion over the terms that she and Barten could throw back with ease after barely knowing each other. She just hadn’t been sure which part of the Midwest the priest was from before - there were some ‘Southern’ parts of the Midwest region.

Della ignored the priest at first, continuing her inquiry into Captain Barten.

“I guess they didn’t like your habits when you were in Texas, Mr. Barten.”

“I guess they didn’t,” he answered and blew out another puff of cigarette smoke.

Father Louis spoke again with more alarm than confusion, tapping Della on the shoulder.

“I’m sure that you two have some very interesting homosexual matters to discuss, but we’ve got some trouble coming up behind us.”

The doctor readjusted in his seat, moving one of the side view mirrors with a grim look passing his face before he even spoke.

“What’s happening back there, Barten?”

“You might want to pull over.”

“Why in the hell would I do that when you’re bleeding all over the god-”

The expletive that came at the end of her question was drowned out by the choppers that came swarming from above. Della moved the jeep over to the side of the road, directing Father Louis to keep pressure on Barten’s wound while they watched a series of ambulances, buses, and beaten cargo trucks pass by on the muddy road. They were all surely headed towards different battlefields and different hospitals based on their choices at the junction.

Their silence was not a voluntary choice anymore - they couldn’t have heard each other over the roar even if there had been anything appropriate to say.