Sobel had Easy spread so thin, Roe and I were forced to separate in order to properly get to each man. Roe took the left side of the woods and I took the right, heading off into the woods to find men to practice the medical techniques on. I quickly found Martin and Toye, patched up their fakes wounds before tagging them for stretchers. When I ran into Luz, he moaned and groaned as if he was in actual pain.
"My leg feels like it's on fire, McCall!" Luz shouted, letting out a loud screech that sounded like a strangled goose.
I pulled out an empty needle meant for morphine and jabbed him in the crook of his elbow with it. Luz let out a loud yelp before shutting up. I put a small piece of gauze on the needle prick and bandaged up where he was supposed to be hit on his leg. "There we go. Just keep it down and you'll be safe."
"Thank you, McCall," Luz said with a smirk. I tagged him for a stretcher before scrambling back off into the woods where I could hear other men calling out for a medic.
I made my way through the men, fixing them up and moving on to the next. They'd either keep quiet the entire time, or thank me and wish me luck as I continued to find more "injured" men. I had lost count of how many men I patched up before I came across Liebgott, who was sprawled out in a ditch and calling out for a medic. I scrambled down the hill towards him, silencing him as I skidded to a stop beside him.
"I've been shot twice in the chest," He explained. I nodded once before lifting him into a sitting position, pretending to check for exit wounds. "What're you doing?"
"Seeing if you have exit wounds," I explained.
"I don't think I do,"
"Okay then," I said quietly, remembering what to do next. I made him lean back against the side of the ditch and I moved to his other side to check where the pretend bullets went into his chest. I grabbed Liebgott's arm, throwing it onto my shoulder before undoing his shirt to check the wound.
"You do know there's nothing there, right?" Liebgott asked.
"I'm just doing what I'm supposed to," I said, setting a square of gauze onto his chest. When I was finished, I put his shirt back down and pulled out my iodine pencil. I got closer to his forehead and he moved away just a bit. I rolled my eyes at him. "The fact that you don't have an exit wound means that you could die. I use this to let the aid station know that you've been shot twice and that they're still in you."
Liebgott didn't move away this time when I wrote the letters "N.E.W" on his forehead. "What'd you write?" He asked, rolling his eyes upward.
"N.E.W, stands for no exit wound." I quickly explained. I could hear someone else a few yards away. I tagged Liebgott for a stretcher and darted off. He loudly said goodbye right as I got out of the ditch.
The practice lasted for about an hour until finally Roe and I treated the entire company. By the time we finished, we were both almost out of supplies, but everyone had been treated properly. As the last of Easy Company came out of the woods, Unger walked up to me and Roe and congratulated us on completing the task with flying colors. He then told us we'd be tested on different treatments the next day.
As Unger walked past Sobel, he stopped. "I'd have to say, Lieutenant Sobel; you have yourself two extraordinary medics here." Sobel blinked and Unger was gone before he could respond. Roe and I both straightened and turned back to look at our handiwork.
Our company had white bandages wrapped around arms and legs. They had patches of gauze everywhere. Some of them had our handwriting on their foreheads giving the fictional aid station details about whether a man received morphine, if they had exit wounds or not. I spotted Malarkey and Skip with matching "M"s on their foreheads; they were laughing about it. I was curious as to what injury Webster had, because his entire forehead was wrapped tightly with gauze.
That night after dinner, Roe and I went back and forth in the barracks, asking each other medical questions and then answering them. Several of the men would amuse themselves by watching us go back and forth. So we ended up having a large group made up of Malarkey, Skip, Guarnere, Toye, Liebgott, Luz, Perconte, Webster, Lipton, Hoobler, and Talbert.
"Protein deficiency can result in what conditions?"
"A medic may administer morphine to what kind of patients?"
"What is a recommended step in treating deep frostbite?"
"I understand everything they're saying," Liebgott said with a hint of sarcasm. A swell of laughter met his words and I found myself rolling my eyes at them all. Until it was time for light's out, everyone stayed surrounding our two bunks, listening to us quizzing each other back and forth.
Time blended together into one endless parade of physical training, running up Currahee, medical training, bland meals, and overall physical pain. Around the end of September, I started to notice changes to my body. My stomach was now firm and my upper arms and legs were thicker with muscle. The looser skin underneath my jaw had tightened and the baby fat on my face was all but gone. Basic training was almost over, and I already looked like a completely different person.
I had been writing letters to my fifteen year old sister, Elizabeth. Her letters could be summarized as "High school is dreadful. I hope you're doing okay in Georgia. Let me know if you meet any available men! I love you and miss you!"
Then again, my letters could be summarized as this: "Georgia is a lot like home: hot, humid, and rain that seems to make the heat even worse. If you think high school is rough, you should try this place. Most of the men here are available, but most of them also have girls back home or in town nearby, so don't get any ideas! I love and miss you too. Take care of home while I'm gone."
Around the end of November, Sink told us that basic would be finished in December. We'd be leaving Toccoa for Fort Benning, and there we would finally do what paratroopers were meant to do. We'd be able to jump out of those planes.
Everyone was eager to start flying, Malarkey even told us a story about how he once jumped off the roof of his house with only an umbrella. When Toye asked him why he would do that, Malarkey just shrugged and said that he thought he'd somehow be able to fly.
My birthday was the last day of November. I kept the knowledge to myself, not trusting the men with that fact. But the secret got out when I was reading a letter from Elizabeth outside the barracks, where anyone could look over my shoulder and read what she had written. She was wishing me an early birthday when Luz suddenly appeared at my shoulder.
"When's your birthday, McCall?" He asked. I tried to keep my blank face, but Luz saw straight through it and took the letter from my hands and ran off towards the mess hall. I hurried after him, not caring about what I looked like running after him. I chased him all the way around the mess hall and back into the barracks, where a lot of the company were on their cots. Luz stood atop his cot and read a bit of the letter before tossing it down to me.
"What the hell?" Bull asked loudly from his bed, which was right next to Luz's.
"How old you gonna be, McCall? Twenty?" Luz asked, jumping back down to the ground. The men inside the barracks automatically picked up on what I had been chasing Luz for and a thousand questions and comments started at once. I gave Luz a mock glare and he shrugged.
"What day is it?" Guarnere asked as loudly as he could.
"The thirtieth," I said, folding the letter up and putting it into my pocket.
"That's a Saturday, isn't it?" Skip asked, leaning over the edge of his bed to look at the pocket calendar he had. He quickly answered his own question when he found that it was this Friday instead of a Saturday. I sighed in relief; at least it wasn't a day where we'd be allowed to leave the camp. I couldn't imagine what would happen if the men made me go out to town with them.
But on the day of my twentieth birthday, the men found ways to celebrate with me under Sobel's nose. Guarnere and Toye spilt their canned peaches with during breakfast, Luz got me a pack of cigarettes (even though I didn't smoke), and Malarkey and Skip somehow got me some chocolate bars. I ended up splitting some of this stuff with others, not feeling entirely comfortable receiving gifts from these guys.
When we were dismissed for the day, I found Liebgott around the mess hall and I tossed him the smokes. He caught them and looked at me curiously. "You're giving me your smokes?"
"I don't smoke," I said with a shrug. "You were the first one who came to mind when I thought of who did."
Liebgott snorted and tucked the smokes into the pocket of his shirt. "Well, thanks for thinking of me, McCall."
"You're welcome," I said before turning my back to head back towards the barracks.
"Hey," Liebgott called after me. I stopped and turned around, raising an eyebrow slightly. Liebgott gave me another slight smile. "Happy birthday."
"Thanks, Liebgott," I said. I finally left, going back towards the barracks. That night, Bull started another card game and this time he started to teach me how to play. I sat between him and Liebgott, both of them giving me different advice on what to do. Every now and then they'd yell at each other for giving me "bad advice". The game went on for several hours until Nixon came in, ordering us to get some sleep.
A few days later, two days before we left for Fort Benning, I got a letter from my mother. It struck me as extremely odd; Mother hadn't written to me before, and I had left on bad terms with her. Like so many others, she thought I had some sort of death wish for going to the front lines. This time, to make sure Luz didn't get ahold of my letter, I went into the showers. It was a Sunday, so most of the camp was at church and others were trying to waste time or they were out in the nearby town. Most of Easy were in town.
I tore open the letter and quickly read my mother's neat cursive. As I read, I felt a tightening in my chest, constricting me with every word written on the page. The back of my eyes started to burn with unshed tears and I quickly folded the letter back up and put it in my pants pocket. Mother had known about the furlough we would be granted once we graduated. She had taken the time to write me a letter telling me not to come home.
Taking long and deep breaths, I stayed inside the showers until I managed to calm myself back down. There was no way I was going out there with a tear stained face. It took about thirty minutes, and when I was calm, I left the showers and back to the barracks. But as I passed a trash bin between the showers and barracks, I tossed the now crumbled up letter into the bin.
