This story contains a brief description of the mistreatment of a young woman. This section is set out with XXXXXXX (seven X's) to alert readers who may wish to skip it.
XXX
Forty-five minutes later, Hogan was seated at his table, quietly reviewing plans with Kinch, when Newkirk started to stir in the bottom bunk. Hogan looked over at him apprehensively. He wasn't eager for the conversation he needed to have. He was glad Kinch was there to help him navigate it.
Newkirk sat up in the bunk looking rumpled, tousled, and apologetic.
"S-sorry, Sir," were the first words out of his mouth. "I keep fffalling asleep."
"Don't be. You needed rest," Hogan said, rising from his desk and crossing the short distance to his bunk. He pulled up a stool and sat opposite Newkirk. "Rough day," he said.
"Bad day," Newkirk replied. "My head's all j-j-jumbled." He rubbed at his lip, swollen where he'd hit it. "Ow. Blimey, was I in a fight?" He looked from Hogan to Kinch, who was now standing beside the Colonel.
"Maybe," Hogan said, with a small laugh. Then he softened his tone. "Actually, Newkirk, you were hitting yourself. Do you remember that?" He searched the corporal's face for connection.
"Oh. Oh. I'm sorry you saw that, Sir," Newkirk answered softly. His head was down, studiously avoiding both men's eyes. "You too, Kinch."
"I'm not sorry," Hogan said. "It helped me understand how much you're hurting inside. Do you remember what you were saying?"
"Well, now that you mention it, of c-course I do. I'm not dim, Colonel," Newkirk said irritably. He continued to avoid Hogan's gaze, but he paused and looked sideways at Kinch. "And I sssuppose you want me to ex, ex, explain it?"
Kinch knelt down and nodded, fighting to maintain eye contact now that he'd finally achieved it. "I think it would be helpful to hear it from you."
"You know perfectly wwwwell wwwhat you heard, Kinch," Newkirk snapped. "It's what everyone says to me at one t-time or another, and what everyone th-th-thinks when they're not saying it. 'Spit it out! Spit it out! Stop this nonsense and get the damned words out, you st-st-st-st-st-stupid boy.'"
Newkirk crossed his arms and curled in on himself. He struggled to even out his breaths. Then he pulled his legs onto the bunk, wrapped his arms around his knees and rocked almost imperceptibly.
Kinch sat down beside Newkirk and wrapped an arm around him.
"Hey," Kinch said. "Hey, I'm right here, and I don't think any of that. Neither does Colonel Hogan." Newkirk leaned heavily into Kinch. "We've got you, Peter. It's going to be OK."
Hogan looked solemnly at Newkirk, rested a hand on his knee, and watched with rising concern as the corporal bit hard on his lip. Hogan's hand flew up to Newkirk's cheek; then with his thumb he brushed a dab of fresh blood from the corporal's mouth. "Easy, soldier," he said. "Don't hurt yourself again. It's OK to just let it out."
Newkirk knew what Hogan meant, but he wasn't ready to surrender to his emotions. He pulled himself out of Kinch's strong hold and latched onto his arm. He steadied his breath, then rounded his mouth, trying to push a sound through and only making a whooshing noise.
He went quiet, then tried again, squeezing his eyes shut.
"Wwwhen I hit myself," Newkirk explained in a slow and shaky voice, "it breaks up the st-stammering. V-v-voices are screaming that I'm too st-stupid and I can't speak properly and I j-j-j-just need to try harder. But if I can fff, ffff, ffffffeel something else, I can ignore them."
He finally looked Hogan in the eyes and said, simply, "Sir."
Hogan hardly knew how to respond. He rested his hand on Newkirk's neck, stroking the young man's jaw with his thumb. "So, what you're saying is, you'd rather feel the pain of hitting yourself than hear your own thoughts?" he asked.
"They're not my thoughts," Newkirk said fiercely. "It's what everyone else thinks."
Hogan squinted as if he was trying to get the words into focus. He dropped his hand, holding Newkirk's wrist. "How… how do you know what everyone thinks?"
"How do I know?" Newkirk looked incredulous, pulling his arm away. "How do I bleeding well know? I've heard it all my life. 'Spit it out, spit it out.' As if it's that simple."
"It's not simple," Hogan echoed.
"No, it's not, Sir," Newkirk responded, his voice crackling. "It's very, very hard all the time and I can't bloody bear it any longer." His eyes were angry and defiant.
"Yeah. Yeah, I can see it's hurting you terribly when you struggle with stutter… stammering, Newkirk," Hogan said. "Everyone's reactions make it worse." He was waiting for Newkirk to break down, willing him to just cry it out and get it over with. But Newkirk was controlling himself, pressing his fingers hard into the flesh of his crossed arms. Hogan persevered.
"But it's always been hard, hasn't it, Newkirk? What's different about now?" To Hogan's mind, little of what had happened over the past several days made sense. Newkirk had always stammered, but never so severely. And he had never simply shut down.
Newkirk was biting his lip again, and not attempting a response. Hogan tried a different tack.
"You were talking in your sleep," he said. "Very fluently, I might add."
"Great," Newkirk said. "G-good to know I can be so articulate when I'm asleep and it can't do me no bloody good."
"Do you remember any of that?"
"No," Newkirk said. He detected a deeper question in the Colonel's eyes. "Am I … am I in trouble? What did I say?" He turned to Kinch, who was still at his side. "Kinch, w-what did I say?"
Kinch looked at Newkirk. "I wasn't here when that happened, Peter. The Colonel was." He wrapped his arm around Newkirk, then looked at Hogan and nodded.
Hogan sighed and nodded a few times. "You were talking to Nightjar. You called her by name. And you said there was…"
Newkirk looked quizzically at Hogan as he hesitated.
"You said there was something you want to, um, do to her. Something you'd done to another girl who looked like her."
"Ruby," Newkirk whispered. "I was talking to her about Ruby?"
"What happened between you and Ruby, Peter?" Kinch spoke softly, tugging Newkirk a little closer. "Did you see her again after you were in school together?"
"All the time," Newkirk said with a harsh laugh. "She was my sister's Ellie's school chum. Mavis w-wouldn't let her c-come over to our ffflat, b-but…" His voice trailed off. "Well, as we got older, I couldn't avoid her. I saw her on the streets all the time, laughing that mmmmad laugh of hers. And when I was big enough to be interesting to her, she was all over me."
Hogan looked at Kinch, then back at Newkirk. "What do you mean?"
"Just what I said. Once she started developing, she was a bleeding octopus. Hands, arms, all over me. I couldn't shed her," Newkirk said bitterly.
"Well, what did you do?" Kinch asked.
"I made her bleeding well stop," Newkirk replied. He let out a huff of air.
XXXXXXX
Hogan and Kinch sat in a stunned silence, not sure what would come next. Stop how? Finally, Newkirk spoke.
"We were in the alley behind the pub one night, fffffour or five boys, sneaking out glasses of shandy. Fffifteen years old, and pissed out of our mmmminds. Well, along comes mmmy sister Ellie with her mmmates, and one of them w-was Ruby.
"She gloms onto me like she always d-did, trying to embarrass me, wrapping herself around me, p-p-pinching my cheeks, grabbing my arse. But you see, I had j-j-j-just shot up and I was taller than her, and stronger. So this time, I … well, I kissed her hard. Mmmade the other lads whistle and laugh. I p-pushed her up against a wall and j-j-j-just kept going at her. I p-put my hand up her blouse and groped her and kept pushing myself against her until I was hard and she was crying and trying to get away from me."
Hogan nodded, remembering painfully similar experiences when he was a stupid young adolescent and just starting to make sense of girls. Boys in a pack, egging each other on until they were out of control. "Boys will be boys," people said, and as long as the girls weren't nice girls from nice homes, the boys got away with it.
"What happened after that, Newkirk?" Hogan asked. "Did you hurt her? Did you, um... Newkirk, did you violate her?"
Newkirk nearly spat. "God, no Sir. I was a randy f-f-f-fifteen-year-old showing off for me mates, but I was terrified of girls. I let her go and she ran off crying with my sister and the other girls. We lads went off in a pack, found another alley and t-t-t-took care of ourselves, as boys will do. Then we laughed some mmore. Then we stumbled home, and I found myself in the kitchen fffacing M-M-M-M-Mavis, who was crying and yelling at me and telling me she'd never been so disappointed." He swiped at his eyes at the painful thought of letting down his beloved sister, stammering over her name in his shame.
XXXXXXX
"The truth is, Sir, I wanted to hurt Ruby. And I had dark thoughts about her for years. But I never touched her again in anger, not after that. And I was so ashamed of myself. I was never aggressive with another girl again, I promise you, Sir. It's not in me to treat women poorly."
"You were saying to Nightjar that you had shut Ruby up," Hogan said.
"Yes, Sir, I suppose I did. She never picked on me again after that. She had a bit of respect for me, I think, which made me feel even worse. When she got into trouble with other lads, I was the one she called on to sort them out, which I did more than once. I felt I owed it to her to protect after ... after how, how I acted," Newkirk said. "You do know she died, right Sir?"
"We checked her out with London, so I did know she died tragically in the Blitz, Newkirk. And she left a son," Hogan said. "I'm very sorry."
"P-P-P-Peter," Newkirk laughed. "She was daft, naming that little boy after me."
"Was there a reason for that?" Kinch asked.
Newkirk shrugged, looking embarrassed. "She was it was the proper thing to do, all things considered."