The Major’s Secret

(Flash Fiction)

Outside the bar it was dark, twilight had come and left, you could see the gibbous moon setting in from the window; it was high in the heavens. The Major leaned heavy on the bar, reflected on his war wounds from Vietnam, it was 1971, and he had been there in 1968 through 1970, now stationed at Fort Rucker, Alabama. He was an instructor within a helicopter unit. His eyes had been badly cut, damaged, now scared, hit from hot flying bits and pieces of metal, during his war years. The scars ran deep, one in the middle of his forehead, the others under his right eye, another along the upper part of his right jaw bone, it had ripped the side of his face off, stitch marks from his nose, around his mouth to his chin.
When he had finished his second drink, he looked to the side of him, saw Corporal Hanson, he was his clerk, a nice looking young boy, eighteen years old, had joined the Army at seventeen, and seemingly got his rank quicker than the average young man in the Army, not having been in a war zone, were most men acquired their rank a little more rapidly.
He said to the young Corporal, “Funny seeing you here, it’s a ways from the base.”
“First time I’ve been in this bar, I was just kind of looking about for a new waterhole.”
And then the young man dug into his coat pocket for some money, pulled out a five dollar bill, and put it on the bar counter, ordered the same kind of beer the Major was drinking, Beck’s.
“Yes, Major,” repeated the young boy, “it’s my first time in this bar,” and he leaned forward to take the beer from the bartender.
The Major lit a cigarette, from the reflection of the light on his face, you could see the scars, the ones lower by his jaw were deeper than the ones under his eye, and the one on his forehead was thin but deep, bone deep, the others with the stitches were visible but smoother.
The boy was white faced, light brown hair. The Major, knocked on the wooden bar, “Give me two more beers here Ralph,” he knew the barkeep quite well, the boy noticed.
“You’re only eighteen years old, right?” asked the Major.
“Yes sir, I’ll be nineteen in October, I mean next month,” replied the boy, looking at the Major’s face, but not staring.
“You ever been in love?” asked the Major.
“I don’t quite understand sir,” said the boy with a modest look, one that seemed almost indifferent, if not arrogant.
“It’s a simple question, in love with a girl?”
“I’ve dated girls if that is what you mean!” said the boy with that indifferent and arrogant tone, and now an almost superior look.
“Listen Corporal, I asked a simple question, doesn’t give me any look of superiority.
“Yes sir, Major,” said the boy soldier head down, looking at his glass of beer, almost afraid to look the Major in the face.
“Are you in love with any of the girls you write now?” asked the Major.
“With one, sir, I write her regularly,” said the boy. But the Major new better, he had read all his letters, and he knew who he wrote: his sister, his mother and one girl he had dated from High School, but never a word of love or marriage, just talk on issues. He didn’t write any men, not even his father.
Now the boy turned his head to the other side of the bar, away from the Major, and the Major looked the boy up and down, and smiled, “No need to pout,” Said the Major, “I just was curious, nothing more.”
But there was more questions to come from the Major, as the boy now turned back to face him.
“Don’t be afraid of me,” said the Major, “the Army is a life of hardship, and one needs to advance, stay alive, and you need to be watchful of your superior looks, be careful that someone doesn’t get you.”
The boy looked deep at the Major, the Major then said, “Don’t worry, I’m not going to take you, or lay a hand on you, but you simply need to know your chances in war are less than good.”
“What do you want of me, sir,” asked the boy.
“Want,” said the major, “nothing, I don’t want a thing from you, matter of fact, it is best you finish your drink and go-on back to your barracks.”
The Corporal got red in the face, drank down his beer, as the Major turned back to staring at the wall across from him, and leaning on the bar as he had done prior to the Corporal entering his dialogue.
“I am not shady,” said the boy now standing on his feet, about to leave the bar, directing his words to the Major.
“Fine,” said the Major, “just make sure you do not end up in a war, you don’t really want to, just go after your great longing, carefully,” and he leaned back in the chair, smiled, folding his hands as if to feel more guarded, the boy did the same, unconsciously, and turned about walking out of the bar.
Several minutes had passed, the Major heard the door open in back of him, about twenty feet from the bar was the door, he looked across the wooden bar at the wall, into the mirror that hung on the wall, the Corporal had come back in, he mumbled out loud, “The little shady impostor.”

9-13-2008