a tiny of toy soldiers (the fifth time's the charm remix)
a remix of Broken Boy Soldiers by voodoochild for Remix Redux 2014
His first time back in a veterans' hospital, as close to physically whole as modern medicine can make him, wearing as close a face to normalcy as the mask shop's artisans can manage, and newly strayed from Emma's care (her kindness that doesn't sink in and reach him the way it used to), nothing he notices about his fellow patients sticks with him.
He observes, because he can't help but do so- it was always in his nature and his training and experience only honed the skill- but he's nervous about this follow-up and what he might hear. He's not comfortable in Chicago, but the anonymity of the city is better than the uncanny sensations of his hometown where some other version of him once trod.
But nothing unexpected comes out of the examination that day.
With those concerns dulled comes room for other thoughts. He sees other soldiers here, of course. Dozens of them. Broken and twisted and worn in one way or another.
Other men pause in their speaking when he enters the room. They resume their conversation, but not until they have seen- have assessed- him. Richard is becoming all too used to each subtle shading of the look that means pity.
He doesn't need any more of that.
He will have to go on watching.
There is a dark-haired man with sad eyes, like that Buster Keaton from the Fatty Arbuckle films, that follow the rim of his dark blue fedora as he turns it around and around, running the felt between his fingers.
When Richard draws near, the man looks up, taking the newcomer in from his eye level up. Up to his mask, there's only curiosity, maybe even of a friendly sort, but his gaze runs along that metal seam and his eyes withdraw. His face colors. Ashamed that he looked? Ashamed at what he thought once he did?
He carefully chooses not to look again. He's so intent on not looking that Richard is afforded however much time to observe that he cares for. Whatever is wrong with this man isn't telegraphed immediately by any visible or missing portion of his body. His nervous behavior does more to suggest his reason for being here. Some insidious wound of the mind that hemorrhages on and on.
Perhaps he has a family. A wife who can't understand what's happened to him because it's something she can't see. Maybe he thought it would better to have a visible injury, one that no one could doubt exists- until he saw Richard.
"Reynard," the nurse calls and doesn't even have to add his first name before Reynard acquiesces. He goes without a backward glance, though his head hangs low, eyes more on his feet than any of the room's furnishings or the woman with the clipboard and certainly not on Richard.
There begins to be a certain sort of familiarity in going to the hospital, soothing in its semi-regularity, though a niggling counter-concern has taken root that the true source of some of what draws him back lies somewhere deeper than his face and neck.
Richard knows as well as anyone (better, really) that they can't fix everything. So if it's not his body, then…
"Meloy, Paul," calls a different nurse than usual, removing a man with a cough. Another grows impatient and, grumbling under his breath, gives up on waiting. This leaves Richard in the company of a single fellow soldier once again.
"It's kind of gloomy today, huh?" this man smiles, all best intentions and crooked teeth. He has part of a newspaper folded in his lap on top of some book Richard can't see enough of to identify. He's trying to solve the crossword puzzle, but the page keeps moving between answers, just the hand he is using to write not enough to keep it securely in place. A clipboard would do it. Even a simple prosthetic would probably be good enough for that small task.
"It's in the bag," he tips his head toward a lopsided canvas bag at his feet.
Richard reflexively puts a hand to his own parcel, feeling the contours of the sniper's mask- the most important item contained within.
"My parents made me learn to be right-handed when I was a kid and now look- I have to switch back to my left again," the one-armed man shakes his head.
"It's like that…isn't it?" Richard muses. Your family thinks they're doing the right thing for you. Maybe it is. Maybe it isn't. It's not their fault if they're well meaning and doing the best they can, but that doesn't automatically make whatever they've chosen the right thing.
His temporary colleague doesn't understand. "It's like what?" he asks, chipper, his eyes straying from the good half of Richard's face to the false one the moment he lets up on consciously controlling them enough for his innate emotional response to overtake the veneer of polite living most people put on.
Now, Richard could force out a word or two more. "Your family's best wishes." Something like that. It might be enough and he and- whoever this man is- might understand exactly what he meant and share in the sentiment. But somehow he can't bring himself to try. The explaining is just too large a burden to bear.
"Nothing," he manages instead. "Nevermind."
He appreciates that the other man doesn't pursue it. He goes back to his crossword, focusing intently.
He doesn't notice when the nurse calls him: "Johnson, Les."
Richard clears his throat. "I…think that's you."
"Oh, thanks!" Les hops up, shoving the book and newspaper and pencil into his bag, "Sorry," he addresses the nurse.
There is a blind man. He has reddish-blond hair and either he's in the midst of changing styles or it's getting a bit long. He turns his head in Richard's direction when he comes in, but whatever he observes for himself about Richard, it won't be based on the same sort of judging with his eyes that so many people do. Maybe that's why Richard speaks to him first. "Good morning." Though he quickly realizes he doesn't know what else he should say. "Busy day?"
"For me? Nah. …Or do you mean here? They seem about as full up as usual."
It isn't a question he can answer, having not been fully decided on the meaning as he spoke. That's why it's better, perhaps, to refrain from speaking, at least until the exact words he means to say have been laid out end to end in his mind to achieve a certain meaning- like the parts of his rifle just waiting to be reassembled.
He offers up a noncommittal noise so the other man will know at least he's heard.
"I don't mean to be too nosy, but-" the blind soldier goes on, "I'm acclimating, you know, to listening. You have some kind of injury to your throat?"
That's not the half of it. It's not the half Richard is fine keeping to himself though. "That's right."
"You have a very distinctive voice." He smiles. "Got a name to go with it?"
"Richard Harrow." He imagines making some quip in reply- "Not so familiar with the voice as with the name" or something- but in practice he can't see it coming out right and if the line did manage to properly hit home it would give a greater lie to who he is than any happy omission about the state of his face would be. It would all fall apart in the next words he spoke, no matter what they were.
People tell each other lies all the time for all sorts of reasons. Some of them are meant for no crueler purpose than to keep society well oiled and running smoothly. These are the ones Richard has become least able to stomach.
"Clement Jurvet."
And his hand is warm and grateful when shook.
They fall in and out of conversation. Clement is the more eager speaker, but he neither overwhelms nor over-pressures Richard.
Clement has a sister. She brought him here, in the car he'll never drive again. The way he describes her has a familiar ring to it. Richard thinks of Emma and shifts in his seat, slipping his hand into his bag to feel for the German sniper's mask. His fingers don't find it with the speed he expects. There aren't that many items within. It shouldn't take long.
There. His fingers fumble it clumsily from among his carefully guarded belongings to the ground.
It must be nerves causing him to hesitate because Clement picks up the still wrapped mask. "Here you are," he offers it back, though his curiosity is palpable.
Even though keeping it revealed longer will hardly make it more knowable to Clement, Richard is quick to stow the item away. "It's…just something…from the war." He hovers between hoping to dismiss Clement's wonderings and considering indulging them. If he feels Clement out a bit, who is it going to hurt? But even lowering his guard enough to test this way is a risk.
"It's a memento?" Clement asks. "What is it?"
He tells the story of the sniper. The reaction he receives isn't the right one. (which is the right reaction? Richard will know when he hears it)
It seems a relief when the nurse returns and takes Clement with her.
Richard will be choosier with who he tells the story of the German next time.
There is a bespectacled man reading. It must be a busy day at the hospital, because although he's alone now, he seems decently settled in, slumped down into his seat. Or perhaps his posture is intended to make his face disappear behind the book: This Side of Paradise. The far edge of a slashed scar shows toward the inside his cheek before it disappears underneath his glasses and the perfectly sculpted nose that follows. It's not obvious from this angle. It's a more than serviceable tin nose.
The man makes a noncommittal sound of noticing. It's a good sort of greeting. It's an invitation for Richard to speak to him if he so desires, but not any pressure for him to respond if he doesn't.
The tin between them is more likeness than he has shared with any of the other men he's encountered at the hospital. Is it enough? "Hello," he replies.
The tin-nosed man folds down the corner of the page to mark his place. He closes the book, but keeps it in his hand. "Princeton," he says and taps his index finger against the cover. "The author and the protagonist. I couldn't afford that kind of education. …And the debutantes and all… I don't relate to this story very much."
Richard nods. Neither of those things are particularly close to his life experience either. This man is trying to make a connection with them anyway. Richard doesn't think he would bother. That makes them different, but it doesn't necessarily make either of them better. Maybe Richard would prefer to still be able to think that way. "You like to read?" he asks.
"Yes. I suppose it's my hobby. I used to write. …Before the war. I wanted to be a novelist myself." Gazing down on the cover of the book in his hands, he thinks this statement over. Does he just blurt this sort of thing out to everyone he meets? Richard doesn't think so, but there is no way to know from only this brief encounter.
"My name's Arthur Dimmond." He stretches out his hand.
"Richard Harrow."
They sit, one chair between them, in a silent, if not quite companionable, not heavily weighted either. Arthur doesn't reopen his book, but neither does he continue to speak. It feels like they are balanced on a scale. If this is all, they will part even. Anything else will tilt the balance in one direction or the other, for good or for ill.
Richard can trust himself to make the right choice, he thinks, assuming he knows what the right choice is. Is Arthur someone who can give him…whatever it is he's looking for?
"…Why not?"
"Beg your pardon?"
"Why…you don't want to write now," Richard clarifies.
"Well," Arthur clearly knows his answer, but is deciding how to frame it, "Before the war, I liked to write. I felt like I was pretty good at it and that the things I thought up were worth saying. But…over there…it didn't feel like what I wanted to write was really meaningful after all. I met someone else. A much better writer than me. But he died."
Arthur is a decent person, Richard thinks. Someone he wouldn't mind seeing again if their paths happen to cross. But Arthur isn't what he's looking for. Arthur is struggling too, searching for what he should be or do…
Richard can't give him an answer to this unasked question, certainly not when he is unable to answer it for himself. He is only a sniper. He doesn't give commands. Arthur probably feels like something similar. …But what does Richard know? His own heart is a slippery enough thing to lay hold to. The interior of a man is an island, shrouded in thick jungle. You might need a machete to see what lies deep inside. It's like Robinson Crusoe, after a fashion. He'd read a lot of books like that once. A vague wondering comes to him- what had Arthur wanted to write?- but it isn't strong enough to break the surface.
Arthur waits, whether or not he expects a response to come.
"Mr. Dimmond," the nurse says, familiarity in her approach to him. He must come often as well.
"Take care, Richard," Arthur stands and takes his leave.
"Mmm," Richard nods his reply.
There is a blond man, reading. Richard can't help but be drawn to the ones who read. It's hard to know whether or not that is a helpful distinction.
"A bunch of baloney," Jimmy says, refreshing in his honesty.
Jimmy's eyes are very blue. He sees the color clearly, in eyes that don't so much as stumble on his mask.
Whether or not to put him to the test of the tale about the German is a non-question this time around.
And Jimmy looks at him and nods and he knows.
If there's any thing out there for him in this world there is no place he would rather find it than at Jimmy's side (and if there is nothing left for him, perhaps, at least, there will be something for Jimmy).