The Healer's War by Elizabeth Ann Scarborough Read Free Book Online

or played beach ball for a little while. But during the last month, our fellow officers had decided that female nurses were not safe consorting with all those horny enlisted men, most of them marines on in-country R&R from combat duty. Our fellow officers thought we were much safer consorting exclusively with horny officers. Carole, Judy, and I, as well as a lot of the other girls, were pissed off about it.
    The guys on the enlisted side of the beach were the ones who were taking all the risks. They were the ones who needed the morale maintenance that officers on the make were so quick to remind us round-eyes women was part of our patriotic duty. Probably some of those guys were dangerous-I mean, they were supposed to be dangerous to the Vietcong and the NVA, weren't they? But the treatment I'd received from them hadn't frightened me. Though there'd been some tentative passes, so respectfully tendered as to almost be comical, most of the guys had just seemed happy to be reminded that there were other kinds of people around besides Vietnamese and men.

    Carole was busily filling out her three-by-five cards when I arrived, while Judy tried to get to sleep. I waded into the sea. It was warm as urine and about as refreshing, but I wet myself down anyway, then waded back out again to lie face down to bake on my blanket.

    I dug little holes in the sand with my toes and tried to snuggle the sand into conformation with my body. The skin of my back twitched when I lay still, my muscles relaxing only slowly as they grew accustomed to the warmth of the sun.

    An aircraft carrier rode the waves on the horizon, a guardian beast for the beach. I felt, as much as heard, the distant rumble of artillery, the sand vibrating beneath my breasts and stomach.

    The tepid gray-green sea lapped the beach, its rhythm soothing. I lay still until the droplets of water evaporated from my hide and were replaced by droplets of sweat. Then, feeling like a dolphin needing to keep her skin wet at all times, I waded back into the sea.

    Before I could settle back down on my blanket, a shadow interposed itself between the sun and my body.

    "Hi there, young lady. You look like you could use a drink. What'll it be?"

    I peered up at this aspiring cocktail waiter. He had thinning grayish hair, an eager expression, and a white band around his left ring finger where his tan stopped.

    "Nothing, thanks," I said. "I'm trying to get some sleep right now.
    I'll get something to drink later."

    He plopped down beside me. "Don't be crazy, hon. You'll get all dried out in this sun. Hey, you're starting to blister already. Better let me rub some suntan lotion on you."

    "It'll just wash off again," I said, but he was already squeezing my lotion onto his big pink ringless hands. I thought about making a lunge for it and asking Carole or Judy to do the honors instead, but they had found new friends and wandered off down the beach.

    "My name's Mitch," the man said as he smeared goo onto my back. "What's yours?"

    "Kitty," I said. I didn't care how good it felt. Name, rank, and serial number were all he was entitled to.

    He chuckled as if he'd already made a dirty joke out of my name. I glared at him and he put a lid on it. I was surprised. It was the single indication he had given of sensitivity. Or perhaps he just felt vulnerable in swimming trunks.

    "What do you do, Kitty?"

    "I'm a nurse. I just got off a twenty-four-hour shift and I'm trying to get some sleep, " I repeated. A little reinforcement is never amiss when dealing with slow learners.

    "A nurse? Army?" he asked, and I nodded into the blanket. "Say, we sure do appreciate you girls. Me, I'm over at I Corps HQ."

    I grunted. If good ol' Mitch was from I Corps headquarters and had time to hang out at the officers' beach, he had to be some kind of brass, which accounted for the amount of it in his approach. He took my grunt for an invitation instead of what it was: the most eloquent un'cat'on I felt I could