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By Root 466 0

an army nurse. The nurse said that she had seen Captain Michaels performing his duties while out of uniform. She added that it was not unusual for officers, even the detachment commander, to wear civilian clothes while on duty. Then the commander was called to the stand, a major. He was questioned about his order to Captain Michaels to shave off a budding goatee. The major, who had a neat mustache, said that he had not cared for captain Michaels’s goatee and that he had ordered him to shave it off. The captain had done so. Then he told the court that the captain had failed to salute on more than one occasion. The final witness was a specialist who said that many officers and enlisted men did not adhere to uniform regulations. The palm frond turned purple and then nearly black in the fading light. Captain Michaels’s wife continued to fan herself until the proceedings were concluded for the day.

2005

I’m thinking what the hell is going on, he said.

Yes, she said.

Do you know what’s happening?

He had pushed himself up onto one elbow and the sheet fell down to his waist. His chest was muscular and squared like the surface of a huge chessboard. The round of his shoulder that she knew so well by touch looked entirely different from this angle, too large to hold on to, something cut from stone.

I don’t. I thought maybe you could tell me.

Who are they, these new people? He said it as if the others were familiar to him and not as much figments and ghosts as these new visions.

I think one of them is a photographer. The older one. And then the younger woman seems to be married to that army guy.

I got that, but who are they?

Milo, you know as much as I do.

It was the first time she had said his name. All I know is that these stories seem to be inside you. And that somehow when I touch you they come out. If you let us keep going maybe we can get some answers. But maybe not, she said.

He smiled at her.

So we’re the blind leading the blind.

So to speak, she said.

He rolled back onto his chest and spread his arms out like wings. The muscles in his back where his wings would have attached rippled like water under wind. He splayed out his fingers and she thought that he might fly off the table.

Okay, he said. Bring it on.

All around Joe and Vivian it was getting dark. Glowing white lights were arriving in the streetlamps and in the windows of the buildings.

Do you know what we’re doing? she said.

There were high trees along the sidewalk and the October wind that was blowing in her hair blew through the trees and seemed like it would blow out all the lights.

Iris

They moved the trial to New Orleans. The heat was just as bad. In the new courtroom Iris fanned herself with the newspaper. The story was all over the papers. It had started, probably, with a newspaper. She had been upset. He was gone. She was expecting their first child. He was drafted from the reserve. He was supposed to stay in Saigon. There were other doctors there who were regular army doctors but they were not sent to Soc Trang and he was.

Why was he sent instead of them? That’s what she wanted to know. But no one would tell her. She wrote letters to her senators. She wrote to the Army Surgeon General’s office. She was alone in New York and he was in South Vietnam. She was upset. It was perfectly understandable. But nobody understood. No one would tell her why.

The letters she received back on official stationery did not explain why her husband had been sent and not the army doctors and although the stilted words tried to convey sympathy for her situation they mentioned that many other wives were in the same position. Many hardships were necessary during wartime. Iris held the letter against her belly and closed her eyes. She was not an idiot. She was not a child. She knew that she was not alone in her misfortune. Did that make it any less unfair? Her husband was a reserve doctor. They had not bargained for this. She took out the heavy black manual typewriter in its case from the closet. Her back ached and she nearly dropped it on the floor. It was