Nick Nolan

by Double Bound (Sequel To Strings)

  "Ooooh, he got you there, Rubin," one of the other guys cackled.

  Jeff picked up his plate and then stood up from the table. "See y'all later," he announced dryly, and then made his way toward the cleanup station.

  Rubin looked at Arthur. "Ain't ya gonna go after your girlfriend?"

  "My girlfriend's dead, you fucker," Arthur snarled, and then picked up his plate to follow Jeff.

  "That's what I hear," Rubin answered, but Arthur was already too far away to hear him, or the other guys, laughing.

  * * *

  Jeff was more than halfway to the barracks when Arthur caught up with him.

  "What the hell is goin' on?" he asked him as a camouflage splattered Jeep sputtered by. "I don't get it. I probably saved your life--so wouldja mind filling me in?"

  Jeff stopped walking, glanced at Arthur and looked away, then shoved his hands in his pockets. "I know about it, Artie."

  Arthur's head felt woozy. "Know about what? "

  Jeff looked around nervously. "About you being that way," he said in a near whisper, pulling his hands from his pockets and flipping his wrists like a fey Tyrannosaurus rex.

  "How do you know, then?"

  Jeff looked away, laughing. " Everyone knows, man! Rubin's got a buddy who went to school with you at that rich beach place; this dude said you'd joined up even though you're a fag, and your 'dead girlfriend' was really your faggot boyfriend who ran off the road somewhere. Sound familiar?"

  Arthur was speechless, stunned. But it made sense--after all, his home really wasn't all that far from San Diego, and he'd disclosed to some of the other guys from LA, when pressed, that he was actually from Ballena Beach. "Yeah, that's what happened."

  "So I'm sayin', No way, man, to everyone, and then this thing happens at the water maneuvers and it somehow puts a picture in their heads, and now everyone's calling me 'Earl the Girl,' like they did to me in junior high--like I'm your bitch or somethin'."

  Arthur looked down. "Does Riley know?" he asked softly, envisioning his brief military career coming to an end.

  "They haven't told him yet 'cause you did save another Marine's life; they're waitin'

  for the Crucible to see if you can pass what they got in store for you, and if you do, then no one's blowin' no whistle."

  "I'll pass," Arthur told him, folding his arms across his chest. "You can bet your life on that."

  "I wouldn't be so sure," Jeff said, shaking his head.

  "Why not?"

  "Because they're gonna make it rough on you."

  "How rough?" Arthur asked, not wanting to know.

  "You'll just have ta see." Jeff shrugged his shoulders, turned and began walking toward the barracks by himself.

  Chapter 7

  The aptly named "Crucible" is the culminating test for each Marine recruit. Near the end of the eleventh week of basic training, each platoon is broken down into teams of about a dozen members before embarking on fifty-four hours of nonstop duress. During this time the recruits are almost completely denied both food and sleep as they march forty miles with full packs on their backs, while simulating a resupply mission within enemy territory.

  On the second night of this nightmare, they had been awakened at 0300 hours, after only four hours of sleep. It was unbearably cold in the damp night air, and Arthur couldn't remember when he'd ever been this uncomfortable; every muscle in his body was sore, his feet felt as if someone had beaten them with a baseball bat, his clothing was soaked through with equal parts sweat and rain, and his stomach was angry from days of deprivation. But the worst part was how his brain was spinning, almost to the point of rabid paranoia, with what events might be lying in wait for him during the coming hours.

  Because Chad and his buddies had been "twisting the noose" since the moment they'd begun.

  The first thing he'd noticed, on day one, was how heavy his pack was; after nearly three months of lugging a forty-pound hump on his back, he knew exactly, as did every living Marine, what forty pounds felt like.

  But this wasn't forty--it felt more like fifty. So he resolved not to think about it and concentrated instead on the cadence of his strides.

  And then after the first day of marching was complete, he'd pulled out two sizable loaves of granite from the bottom of his pack, which he placed strategically on either side of the flaps of his pup tent--to show that they'd come the distance with him.

  Fuck you, said the rocks.

  The next morning, after he'd trudged over a hill and dug a hole and squatted over it, he returned to find the damn things back inside his pack again.

  But overloading his gear certainly couldn't be the most evil they might conjure; if he knew Rubin, something really twisted was waiting for him up the road.

  He found out at the beginning of day two.

  His boots didn't fit. They were at least one size too small. But he pulled the laces loose anyway, and then pushed his already swollen feet inside and tied the laces just the same. And when they all began to march, his toes jammed themselves up against the steel tips and the backs of his ankles began rubbing themselves raw and his ankles started turning in to compensate and he felt a brand-new pain streaking like wildfire from his big toe all the way up to his thighs, hips and ass.

  So once again, he resolved to not think about it and instead concentrated on the cadence of his strides.

  Then, there he was on the morning of day three, with a fifty-pound pack on his shoulders and boots on his feet that were probably better suited to a fourteen-year-old boy's, knowing that the combination of these two factors might even cause permanent damage to his feet or legs or shoulders or whatever, but he didn't care.

  He had something to prove, and nothing was going to stop him.

  So he began to embrace the pain as he trudged through the darkness of night along that mercilessly uneven dirt road. I'm "forming" into a Marine, he told himself when the pain got especially wicked, like when his ankle twisted for the ninth time as he stepped inside a dried-out rivulet that his eyes had been unable to pick out in the dark. I'm "forming" into a Marine, he told himself when he thought about how his father had so grossly berated and neglected him, and so he imagined the pain in his feet resulting from kicking the man in the side as he lay prostrate on the ground howling with pain (this made him smile). I'm "forming" into a Marine, he told himself when he remembered those stupid, monkey-faced motherfuckers referring to his beautiful Jonathan as his "dead faggot boyfriend." I'm "forming" into a Marine, he whispered as he saw himself placing the generous barrel of the Winchester in his mouth and closing his lips around the metal. So by the time they reached the site of the "battlefield"--when he couldn't feel his feet anymore and his body was ambulating completely without any known effort from his brain--Arthur looked to the heavens and saw the sky lightening with the coming dawn; then, moments later, as the formations slowed their steps and they assembled in front of Sergeant Riley, the only thought that accompanied each diminishing stride was I'm a Marine.... I'm a Marine.... I'm a Marine.... I'm a Marine.

  The sergeant allowed them to catch their breaths and slug down some water from their canteens before calling "Attention." As Arthur snapped to, he saw that even though his knees were quaking, his head was held the highest of those around him, and he felt, for the first time, just a teeny bit proud of himself.

  He fought a smile.

  Riley cleared his throat. "Since a dead or wounded Marine," he brayed, "is never left on the field, one of you will be the designated casualty and will be rescued and carried through the infiltration course. You began this together and you'll finish it together, but just like on a real battlefield, you'll have only each other to depend on, so working together is the only thing that'll keep you alive. You'll break into your teams, perform a search and rescue, find your casualty and treat his wounds, then transport him back to base camp. Any questions?"

  "No, sir!" the recruits sang out.

  "The following soldiers are casualties: Campos, Blauefee and Jackson, you
're to stay behind while the rest resume marching; then in ten minutes the troops'll about-face and come back to find them."

  "Yes, sir!" they mustered as Arthur thought, Now I can get off my feet.

  They all looked around and nodded at one another in weary agreement, and a few actually slapped each other on the back and murmured words of encouragement to those who were lucid enough to listen. Then the teams began marching in ragged formation down the road they'd just traveled up, while Arthur and Privates Campos and Jackson were separated and hidden away "behind enemy lines," where they would await rescue and evacuation.

  Arthur decided to lie behind a crumbling outbuilding that, decades before, had been used as a smokehouse.

  He curled his arm up under his head and decided that he might as well steal a few minutes of sleep.

  Moments later he drifted off.

  * * *

  The scratchy woolen blanket thrown over his head jarred him awake. He tried to push it off, but then his arms were grabbed and restrained behind his back, while someone else had a hold of his legs and feet.

  The blows were brutal and were intended to inflict as much damage as possible. At once he felt his face slammed and his kidneys punched and his stomach stomped and his legs kicked.

  He couldn't see a thing.

  And he couldn't fight back.

  He tried curling himself into a ball--but the kicks to his spine and the backs of his knees caused his body to extend reflexively so that his front side became open to the assault.

  "Get his nuts," he heard someone bark just before a blinding pain exploded between his legs and he folded back in two.

  The body blows continued.

  Time stopped. The pain became a dull rush. And then something in his brain clicked--like a charge of TNT that's been kissed by a spark.

  He wrenched his right arm away from the determined hands that were gripping it and started swinging wildly. He made contact with soft flesh.

  "Fuck!" someone cried out.

  Then he pulled his left hand free, and as they tried grabbing for his arms they accidentally released his legs so he started pistoning his feet crazily and he felt his right foot hit bone and heard something crack.

  Someone yelped.

  Then he rolled over and tore the blanket off his head and started throwing punches and more kicks until he was up on his feet and crouched into the don't-you-even-think-of-fucking-with-me hand-to-hand combat posture.

  And when he lunged at Rubin, the others--directed by Jeff-- stepped back.

  He jabbed with his left and crossed with his right, and the big man went down on his knees."Throwin'me a blanket party, huh, you motherfucker?" Rubin flew backward and hit the ground hard. In an instant Arthur was on him, then straddling him, then pummeling his face.

  Left.

  Right.

  Left.

  Right.

  In the gray daylight of morning he could see blood gushing from the man's nose.

  Jab.

  Cross.

  Jab.

  Cross.

  Arthur's knuckles opened an angry red slice in the man's right cheek.

  Then his hands went around Rubin's neck, and all of the hatred and sadness and frustration and misery and fear he'd been storing inside his heart zapped down his arms into his hands, where it made his fingers clench into vicelike pincers.

  The man's face turned purple, the blood stopped running from his nose and his eyes bulged.

  His mouth gaped and his tongue protruded, but no noise came forth.

  He was screaming. Silently.

  And Arthur thought, None of them are helping him. They want me to do this.

  Still his hands squeezed harder, and those who could see it watched Arthur's face become a ferocious, snarling mask of itself. As Arthur shifted all of his body weight up and on top of him so he could press down harder, he thought, I'm going to kill him unless I stop right now.

  He saw Rubin's eyes roll up in his head as his body went limp underneath him.

  Arthur froze, and then released his grip.

  "Jesus," he heard someone behind him whisper.

  Rubin's limp head slumped to the side.

  Everything was perfectly quiet.

  And so Arthur kneeled over him.

  And he began performing emergency breathing on him.

  Expertly.

  With his right hand he pinched Rubin's nostrils shut and with his left he lifted his neck up and tilted his head back just far enough so that his own breath would go into his lungs and not down into his stomach, and then he locked his lips with the other's and pushed his breath into his mouth, and then he pulled his mouth away, but nothing came out of the other's mouth. So he tried it again and their teeth clicked against each other's and Arthur's breath went into him and he pulled away, but still nothing happened, so he did the same thing a third time, and that was when Chad Rubin regained consciousness and Arthur pushed himself up and off him with as much force as any man who had just saved the life of someone he would actually have preferred to murder... in self-defense or otherwise.

  "Is there some confusion about which one of you is the casualty, soldiers?"

  bellowed a gravelly voice from behind them.

  Arthur jerked his head over and saw Sergeant Riley standing beyond their group, his arms akimbo.

  They all, with the exception of Rubin, snapped to attention. "No, sir!" they answered in unison.

  "No, sir," Rubin echoed hoarsely from the ground.

  "Then, might I suggest that you gurney your wounded man and get him back to camp immediately; this delay is costing your team valuable time."

  "Yes, sir!"

  And with that, the recruits picked up their field gurney and brought it over to where Rubin was lying on the ground.

  Riley began walking away but stopped, and then turned around to face the group.

  "And by the way, Blauefee, I'm impressed," he made a show of telling Arthur in front of the other recruits.

  Arthur looked at him quizzically. "If I may ask, sir, how is that, sir?"

  The man clamped a leathery hand onto Arthur's shoulder and shook him back and forth. "Saving two Marines' lives in a week, and you're not even out of boot camp,"

  he told him, and then laughed. "You deserve that gurney trip back to the base more than anyone--oh, and Rubin," he barked while turning to glare at the prostrate figure on the ground, "you just make sure that his trip back is smooth, or there'll be hell to pay--and don't ever let your CO catch you sitting on your ass again!"

  Chad Rubin struggled to stand before saluting his commanding officer. "Yes, sir!"

  he managed before the big man turned and marched away.

  They'd started carrying Arthur to base camp, but he'd made them put him down, and then opted to walk the rest of the way instead, in spite of the damned boots on his feet. After all, it was clear to everyone who was the better--or rather, the best--

  man, and he saw no benefit in making the grueling trip back even worse.

  Because they were, for better or worse, brothers in arms. But then, as they neared the parade deck and Arthur climbed back onto the gurney to be carried home with his hands clasped behind his head, he decided to take one last verbal swing at his nemesis. "So how does it feel?" he asked him casually.

  "How does what feel?" Rubin muttered back as they all strained to heft Arthur's dense musculature down the last stretch of road.

  "I'm asking you how it feels"--he looked around and saw that all of the other guys'

  eyes were on him--"to have it be that the only reason you're still alive"--he thought he'd draw this one out for effect, so he paused--"is because the same fag-got that whipped your sorry ass...was gentleman enough to give you mouth-to-mouth."

  Chad Rubin didn't reply, but the other men yowled and laughed.

  Later that day, when back at the base camp the recruits were presented with their Eagle, Globe and Anchorpins, many of them wiped back tears. And it was easy to see why: Those who hadn't
resorted to treachery along the way felt invincible in body and unassailable in character and fiercely loyal to both the Marine Corps and the united States of America.

  But Arthur was not one of those who felt this way, because although he was now a

  "Marine"--albeit unofficially--the event held no joy for him. He was, instead, more frightened than he'd been even the night before the Crucible, with the knowledge of impending cruelty and possible attack.

  Because it finally hit him that he would never feel safe with these men. And although he reasoned that no Marine on active duty ever felt "safe," it would always be different for him. Because for Arthur Francis Blauefee, regardless of how dizzying the rank he attained, the enemy would never be farther away than the next bunk.

  * * *

  Graduation went swimmingly at the end of the thirteenth week. Arthur, along with the other recruits, donned his blue pants and khaki shirt and beige belt and black shoes and precious white hat with its snappy patent leather visor. Then the platoons demonstrated their excellent marching skills before listening to some long-winded speeches.

  After the formalities, Arthur watched from the corner of his eye as Jeff Earl first hugged his worn-out-looking mom and then shook hands with his hunky little brother, and Chad Rubin made a big show of French-kissing his soccer-ball-breasted, straw-haired girlfriend, and Sergeant Riley's bewigged wife sat bored and fiddling with her purse in the front row until being called upon to stand up--

  whereupon she flashed her shade-too-white false teeth while waving at the crowd appreciatively. Moments later the crowd dispersed and some of the Marines wept a little and everyone hollered with glee.

  Arthur had tried his best to look appropriately proud and happy during the ceremony and the ensuing merrymaking, but it took effort. No one had come to see him graduate. When he'd asked them, which hadn't been easy, he'd been advised that his mother had the flu and his father's eyes were too fuzzy to make that long drive by himself and Gwen's morning sickness was in full swing and Morgana's boys had soccer games and her husband was gone that week on business and blah, blah, blah.

  So that night, when he was back at the empty barracks lying on his bunk, Jonathan's handsome face--grinning devilishly, with dark eyes sparkling--seemed to swim comfortingly before him. You would've come to see me, he spoke to the apparition. Kid or no kid, wife or no wife, you would have been here. And I know that wherever you are you're proud of me, because you know how hard everything is for me, just like you know I'll always love you.