October 30th,
I met some of the new recruits today...nothing much to speak of really. Hawk seems bound and determined to bring every Tom, Dick and Harry into this outfit.
General Clayton Abernathy...the Tomahawk...is a great leader, and it is truly an honor to serve under his command. Nevertheless, as much as I admire and respect him, there are times when I strongly disagree with the decisions he makes. This flood of new Joes is one of them.
As far as I am concerned, the team was doing just fine with what we already had...a core of some of the best soldiers this man's army has to offer. If you take a close look at the personnel roster you will notice that the men that signed on in recent years rarely lasted more than 6 months before quietly being put on the sidelines. The veterans, on the other hand, are still in the action.
In fact, if I take this line of thinking to its logical conclusion, I would propose that GIJOE could survive perfectly well with the small group of soldiers it had before we moved to Utah, give or take a few latecomers.
Its not that the new recruits aren't good...no, these guys have some pretty impressive qualifications...but it takes more than that to make it in GIJOE. Some of these kids coming in have hardly ANY real battle experience whatsoever...totally green.
And don't get me started on the special units!
Eco Warriors (of which I am constantly reminded), Battle Force 2000...what the hell was that? It sounded like a Spielberg movie to me! Oh...and who can forget my all time favorite...Ninja Force!
The place is getting to look like something out of a bloody comic book!
As I have never been one to keep my opinions to myself, it was inevitable that I 'shared' my thoughts on the matter with Hawk earlier this week.
"A comic book..." Hawk smirked and raised an eyebrow, "...really?"
"Come on, sir...we have guys running around the desert in neon pjs! This isn't a bloody dojo! And now I am hearing rumors of something called Star Brigade! Next thing you know we will have the Millennium Falcon parked on level two..."
"Flint I think..."
"...I understand that we were spread out pretty thin some months, but we made due. Hell, we more than made due! GIJOE is supposed to be the elite...not rejects from Magnum PI"
"Yes...but you don't..."
"And speaking of Chuckles...what the hell do we need another covert ops specialist for...we have one already...and a damn good one at that. That guy sticks out worse than a polar bear in Florida..."
"FLINT!!" the General barked suddenly, completely derailing my train of thought.
"Sir?"
Needless to say, that tirade didn't go over too well.
I'm not an idiot; I understand that his hands are tied. I just can't decide whether or not this is a poorly conceived PR scheme by some suit on Capitol Hill...our team has become less and less 'secret' these past few months...or if the Jugglers are up to their old tricks and this whole recruiting drive is nothing but an elaborate ploy to discredit us.
Or maybe Hawk actually thinks that these people can contribute positively to the team. Given the General's reputation and experience, I can't help but think there might be something I am missing...some subtlety that I have failed to take into account.
What do I know...I'm 'JUST' a soldier; I don't have the time or the patience for politicking!
As much as I disapprove of this whole recruiting fiasco, I did meet one new Joe whom I quite like despite her being a ninja. Sure her file says she is Intel, but the minute I saw her with Snakes and Scarlett, the moment I noticed the symbol on her arm...I knew...
Arashikage.
Of course, Ninja or not, it goes without saying that any friend of Snakes is a friend of mine.
A cute girl with a happy attitude and a fun loving nature despite the seriousness of her family 'business', she is quite easy to get along with. Snakes and Stormy should take a lesson from her...just because you are come from a clan of martial arts master assassins doesn't mean you have to be dour and serious all the time!
Anyhow...on top of all this she knows Alison! Apparently they went to Bryn Mawr together and traveled in the same crowd. From the moment the two saw each other in the mess I knew that this little spitfire was someone I was going to be getting to know quite well...I am still chuckling to myself as I recall the stories she told of Jaye's life before Joe!
I don't care WHO I have to kill; I am going to get my hands on that video of Allie doing ABBA on the front lawn of the university campus!
Who would have guessed that the serious and professional Lady Jaye was such a troublemaker in her youth!
There is SO much I still don't know about her!
Would you believe I had no idea she could sing? I knew she could act, but when Jinx mentioned that she had an award winning voice, I was completely surprised! She had never mentioned it, and god knows I have never heard her hum even a note.
Mind you, if one didn't have access to her file I doubt one would ever know she was...is...a highly acclaimed actress!
I have seen her on stage only twice, both times completely unbeknownst to her as she never shares her schedule of appearances with others. I doubt anyone is aware she still hits the stage from time to time.
I found out about the plays by fluke, once discovering the program in her room, her name in bold letter at the front...once when I inadvertently overheard her speaking with the director over the phone.
I sat in the back, hidden amongst the substantial crowd and watched quietly as she took the stage. I knew she would be angry if she discovered me there...and as much as I wanted to walk up and congratulate her on a job well done I merely snuck out the exit as soon as the production was over and made my way back to base.
To her acting is something private, something deeply personal, much as the books hidden deep within my gear are to me. Acting is a part of herself that she wants to keep separate from her current life...maybe a part of her past that she clings to. As I mentioned, I know very little about her life before she joined the team...snippets here and there but I feel that much has been left unsaid...unrevealed.
There are parts of her that are still a complete mystery to me. If anything meeting Jinx today drove that home.
Sometimes I wonder if the woman I know is merely a character she plays...as far removed from her true self as when she plays Ophelia or Arial...or any of the other personalities to which she has been cast. I asked her that once, in one of our quieter moments, long after Grenada.
She turned and looked up at the ceiling of my room, her eyes unreadable as she considered her reply.
"Maybe...I don't know. Sometimes I think Lady Jaye doesn't really exist...that she is someone I made up...someone who I have always wanted to be but could never really given who I am...a Hart."
"You seem real enough to me."
"I suppose..." She sighed, "...but aren't we all just playing a part? You of all people should understand the quandary. Are you Flint or are you Dashiell...?"
"Depends on the day..." I smiled softly as I pushed the hair out of her eyes.
"'All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players; they have their exits and their entrances and one man in his time plays many parts'."
"As You Like It?" I cocked an eyebrow, always impressed when she is able to pull quotes like that out of thin air...but I wasn't about to be outdone in that department.
"I guess that makes me 'the soldier', 'jealous in honor and sudden and quick in quarrel?'" I frowned as I turned to her, "...but then who are you?"
"Depends on the day..." she winked.
She never did answer my question.
Alison certainly pours herself into the characters she plays. She 'became' Beatrice in a production of Much Ado About Nothing and wowed the crowd with her performance. She transformed herself into Titania in A Midsummer Nights Dream...and the audience was in awe. She fit the latter so very well...as there is something almost Fey about Allie in real life. It comes as no surprise that she would play the queen of the fairy folk so adeptly.
She is truly an artist...every line, every gesture, every look is studied yet as natural as if she was actually the person in question and not a mere actress playing a role. It is what makes her such an incredible Covert Ops agent. There are times when we have been on assignment when even I didn't recognize her!
I sometimes wonder, when Joe finally calls it quits and we are all spit out into the 'real world' once more, if the woman standing beside me would be the same one I have grown to love or some stranger I hardly recognize.
Silly, isn't it?
Regardless, spurred on by the stories told by her old friend over dinner, I began to ask Jaye questions as we settled in for the night. Since the...ummmm...incident in the bathroom ten days ago we've pretty much moved in together. I don't think I have been back to my quarters since!
In any case, as we sat on the bed going over the days events I began to ask her about friends and family...about her childhood...things of which I knew only bits and pieces. I inquired of her late father...always a tender point...and asked about her travels with him.
She raised an eyebrow in surprise and suspicion, but after convincing her of my sincerity (no...I was not going to blackmail her with the information...) she slowly began to speak of her life before Joe. I even saw pictures of her and her family which had been hidden in an old shoebox under her bed.
I saw photos of her dad and her at the foot of some ruins in Peru, of her cousins as teens, bruised and filthy but smiling after a rough game of Rugby, her aunt surrounded by a pack of huge shaggy grey dogs, her uncle coming back from a hunt with his sons and Allie in tow, she and her friends at grade school all dressed up in their uniforms...kilts, knee socks, penny loafers...Allie sporting two long braids! There was a picture of her on a horse...her horse...a big bay with a white sock and white stripe down his face, and a really cute one of her...she looked about six years old...in a little flowery sun dress, smiling in delight as she bottle fed a lion cub.
"That's some kitten, Al...It looks about as big as you were!" I laughed.
"My dad left me at the wildlife center in Tanzania for a couple of days while he was off with the Leakys"
"Louis Leaky...of Olduvai Gorge fame?"
"The same...my family, through my father of course, helped fund their research before the National Geographic Society took over. As a result my father was invited to help with the dig...I was still too young to go into the bush...it wasn't safe with the wildlife and all. How ironic that I should be left in the care of what amounted to a pride of orphaned lions, a herd of zebra and two baby elephants!"
There was a fabulous picture of her dressed as a young Queen Elizabeth for a production at Julliard, more of friends from her university days...including a young Jinx, one of her and her cousins as kids swimming in what looked to be a highland stream, and a couple of her and another girl sailing 'in the annual Vineyard regatta' she added as description, pointing to one of the trophies on her bookshelf.
"We retired that trophy...won the cup five summers in a row...no one could touch us"
I even saw a photo of the notorious Shawn...her past love. A striking gentleman, he sported a wool sweater and cords, an amused and intelligent spark in his eye drawing the viewer as he laughed at something that had caught his attention behind the camera...his arm around Alison who smiled in amusement, her face relaxed. They were attending some outdoor festival in Ireland.
Looking closely, it was not very hard to catch the incredible age difference between the two.
"You never told me he was your professor..." I mentioned quietly, referring to one of Jinx's earlier revelations. I looked up to find her still staring sadly at the photograph, her eyes unreadable.
"He was 'A' professor...I only took one class under him, and that was before we..." she left the words unsaid.
"You...loved him...." I stated. Surprisingly enough, my tone was not confrontational, but sympathetic. I knew about Shawn...not much...but enough to infer that he had been a big part of her life back then...and if there was anything I understood and understood well it was the pain of lost love.
She looked up at me and smiled softly as she took my hand and squeezed it, the simple gesture carrying more meaning than words could ever say.
My favorite though, was a lovely black and white of her dressed in a tight fitting black leotard, toe shoes, and a sheer little skirt, practicing at the bar in an empty dance studio. Sunlight was streaming in from the huge picture windows that graced the entire back wall, illuminating her perfectly as the camera caught her in a graceful pose, her face relaxed and beautiful...her hair tied loosely away from her face.
"Its like a Degas!" I exclaimed as I held the picture up to the light.
"Yeah, that's me...Prima Ballerina...NOT!" she laughed.
"It looks like you know what you were doing...you look...damn, you look beautiful..."
"Thanks, but it takes something more to get into the National Ballet School." She sighed, "That was my mother's dream for me when I was little, you know...she wanted me to be a dancer. I used to love ballet, but she pushed and pushed until she drained the joy right out of it."
She paused and looked at the picture before continuing.
"Ah well...it wasn't meant to be anyways. When I was twelve the school evaluated me and said I would never be a dancer...I did not have the correct body type. Something about my back or my joints, I don't remember. I liked acting better anyhow...and the dancing took too much time away from my other activities."
"You look older than twelve in this picture..."
"Ahhhh...yes...I think this was taken just before I left for the army..." she nodded, "...just because I couldn't do it professionally doesn't mean I could no longer dance. With the pressure taken off me I started enjoying it again. Its good exercise...keeps you flexible."
I bent to pick up another picture that had appeared in the pile, this one of her in army fatigues and combat boots, holding on to an M-16 and going through an obstacle course in what looked like basic training, and held it against the black and white of her dancing.
The stark and striking contrast between the two illustrated so perfectly what I was describing earlier. The women in these two photos might as well be completely different people!
I always knew she came from money...that she had enjoyed a privileged childhood, but going through this box of photos brought it home better than any high and mighty snobbery she spit out...the haughty attitude she can turn on at a moments notice.
Which begs the question...what is she doing in the army?
Her family doesn't have a history of military service. She has already traveled extensively so 'seeing the world' was obviously not a selling point for her. She has, or had...if you believe the tales of her disinheritance, Porsche notwithstanding...more money than she knows what to do with and doesn't need to work...and even if she did her impressive arts background and academic qualifications along with the family name would have opened doors for her that many can only dream of.
Why go military?
Her answer, as it always is when I ask her this question, was a vague comment about never being one to back away from a challenge.
I didn't push her for more details, not wanting to tempt the fates! I am well aware that had she NOT signed up I would never have met her. No matter what drove her to devote her life to the military, I am eternally grateful!
The rest of the pictures were of her and her army buddies from boot camp and Int school...along with several from GIJOE. Scarlett, Snakes, Duke and Roadblock...Ripcord and her after a jump, Ace and her sitting on the wing of an f-14 (grrrrr), and quite a few of a handsome looking fellow sporting a beret and a lopsided grin!
"Hmmmm...now look at THIS guy...good looking, dashing, intelligent..." I grinned as I pointed to a picture of me sitting on a tank, before pausing as I noticed a lone photograph sitting at the bottom of the box.
"Who is this?" I picked it up before Jaye could grab it from my hands. Captured on it was a beautiful woman leaning against a car outside what looked like a tennis club. She was wearing a white polo shirt and white shorts, her curly, dark brown hair long and hanging loose to her shoulders. Her skin looked soft and tanned, her body shapely, her eyes bright and intelligent.
In her arms was a very small little girl sucking her thumb and looking decidedly bored.
"She...she looks just like..." I paused and looked up at Alison, "...like you!"
"Its my mother..." she said in clipped tone, her face falling as she quickly began to put the pictures back in the box.
Her mother...the 'Wicked Witch of the East Coast' from what little I know of her. So this is the famous Katherine Hart!
"She doesn't look so bad..." I began but she interrupted.
"You haven't met her...believe me, she is a piece of work..." she took the picture from my hand and placed it back in the box, "That's enough about me, don't you think?"
"Yes but..."
She leaned forward and silenced me with a kiss.
"Thank you."
"For what?"
"For asking..."
That was the end of it. I knew that I had hit a sore spot. Although I am usually a complete and utter moron when it comes to her, I am slowly learning when to push forward and when to drop the subject.
This is definitely something that will have to wait.
Of course, that doesn't mean I am not going to drive her insane until she sings for me! No way in hell...
Now if I can only get my hands on that ABBA video!
I met some of the new recruits today...nothing much to speak of really. Hawk seems bound and determined to bring every Tom, Dick and Harry into this outfit.
General Clayton Abernathy...the Tomahawk...is a great leader, and it is truly an honor to serve under his command. Nevertheless, as much as I admire and respect him, there are times when I strongly disagree with the decisions he makes. This flood of new Joes is one of them.
As far as I am concerned, the team was doing just fine with what we already had...a core of some of the best soldiers this man's army has to offer. If you take a close look at the personnel roster you will notice that the men that signed on in recent years rarely lasted more than 6 months before quietly being put on the sidelines. The veterans, on the other hand, are still in the action.
In fact, if I take this line of thinking to its logical conclusion, I would propose that GIJOE could survive perfectly well with the small group of soldiers it had before we moved to Utah, give or take a few latecomers.
Its not that the new recruits aren't good...no, these guys have some pretty impressive qualifications...but it takes more than that to make it in GIJOE. Some of these kids coming in have hardly ANY real battle experience whatsoever...totally green.
And don't get me started on the special units!
Eco Warriors (of which I am constantly reminded), Battle Force 2000...what the hell was that? It sounded like a Spielberg movie to me! Oh...and who can forget my all time favorite...Ninja Force!
The place is getting to look like something out of a bloody comic book!
As I have never been one to keep my opinions to myself, it was inevitable that I 'shared' my thoughts on the matter with Hawk earlier this week.
"A comic book..." Hawk smirked and raised an eyebrow, "...really?"
"Come on, sir...we have guys running around the desert in neon pjs! This isn't a bloody dojo! And now I am hearing rumors of something called Star Brigade! Next thing you know we will have the Millennium Falcon parked on level two..."
"Flint I think..."
"...I understand that we were spread out pretty thin some months, but we made due. Hell, we more than made due! GIJOE is supposed to be the elite...not rejects from Magnum PI"
"Yes...but you don't..."
"And speaking of Chuckles...what the hell do we need another covert ops specialist for...we have one already...and a damn good one at that. That guy sticks out worse than a polar bear in Florida..."
"FLINT!!" the General barked suddenly, completely derailing my train of thought.
"Sir?"
Needless to say, that tirade didn't go over too well.
I'm not an idiot; I understand that his hands are tied. I just can't decide whether or not this is a poorly conceived PR scheme by some suit on Capitol Hill...our team has become less and less 'secret' these past few months...or if the Jugglers are up to their old tricks and this whole recruiting drive is nothing but an elaborate ploy to discredit us.
Or maybe Hawk actually thinks that these people can contribute positively to the team. Given the General's reputation and experience, I can't help but think there might be something I am missing...some subtlety that I have failed to take into account.
What do I know...I'm 'JUST' a soldier; I don't have the time or the patience for politicking!
As much as I disapprove of this whole recruiting fiasco, I did meet one new Joe whom I quite like despite her being a ninja. Sure her file says she is Intel, but the minute I saw her with Snakes and Scarlett, the moment I noticed the symbol on her arm...I knew...
Arashikage.
Of course, Ninja or not, it goes without saying that any friend of Snakes is a friend of mine.
A cute girl with a happy attitude and a fun loving nature despite the seriousness of her family 'business', she is quite easy to get along with. Snakes and Stormy should take a lesson from her...just because you are come from a clan of martial arts master assassins doesn't mean you have to be dour and serious all the time!
Anyhow...on top of all this she knows Alison! Apparently they went to Bryn Mawr together and traveled in the same crowd. From the moment the two saw each other in the mess I knew that this little spitfire was someone I was going to be getting to know quite well...I am still chuckling to myself as I recall the stories she told of Jaye's life before Joe!
I don't care WHO I have to kill; I am going to get my hands on that video of Allie doing ABBA on the front lawn of the university campus!
Who would have guessed that the serious and professional Lady Jaye was such a troublemaker in her youth!
There is SO much I still don't know about her!
Would you believe I had no idea she could sing? I knew she could act, but when Jinx mentioned that she had an award winning voice, I was completely surprised! She had never mentioned it, and god knows I have never heard her hum even a note.
Mind you, if one didn't have access to her file I doubt one would ever know she was...is...a highly acclaimed actress!
I have seen her on stage only twice, both times completely unbeknownst to her as she never shares her schedule of appearances with others. I doubt anyone is aware she still hits the stage from time to time.
I found out about the plays by fluke, once discovering the program in her room, her name in bold letter at the front...once when I inadvertently overheard her speaking with the director over the phone.
I sat in the back, hidden amongst the substantial crowd and watched quietly as she took the stage. I knew she would be angry if she discovered me there...and as much as I wanted to walk up and congratulate her on a job well done I merely snuck out the exit as soon as the production was over and made my way back to base.
To her acting is something private, something deeply personal, much as the books hidden deep within my gear are to me. Acting is a part of herself that she wants to keep separate from her current life...maybe a part of her past that she clings to. As I mentioned, I know very little about her life before she joined the team...snippets here and there but I feel that much has been left unsaid...unrevealed.
There are parts of her that are still a complete mystery to me. If anything meeting Jinx today drove that home.
Sometimes I wonder if the woman I know is merely a character she plays...as far removed from her true self as when she plays Ophelia or Arial...or any of the other personalities to which she has been cast. I asked her that once, in one of our quieter moments, long after Grenada.
She turned and looked up at the ceiling of my room, her eyes unreadable as she considered her reply.
"Maybe...I don't know. Sometimes I think Lady Jaye doesn't really exist...that she is someone I made up...someone who I have always wanted to be but could never really given who I am...a Hart."
"You seem real enough to me."
"I suppose..." She sighed, "...but aren't we all just playing a part? You of all people should understand the quandary. Are you Flint or are you Dashiell...?"
"Depends on the day..." I smiled softly as I pushed the hair out of her eyes.
"'All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players; they have their exits and their entrances and one man in his time plays many parts'."
"As You Like It?" I cocked an eyebrow, always impressed when she is able to pull quotes like that out of thin air...but I wasn't about to be outdone in that department.
"I guess that makes me 'the soldier', 'jealous in honor and sudden and quick in quarrel?'" I frowned as I turned to her, "...but then who are you?"
"Depends on the day..." she winked.
She never did answer my question.
Alison certainly pours herself into the characters she plays. She 'became' Beatrice in a production of Much Ado About Nothing and wowed the crowd with her performance. She transformed herself into Titania in A Midsummer Nights Dream...and the audience was in awe. She fit the latter so very well...as there is something almost Fey about Allie in real life. It comes as no surprise that she would play the queen of the fairy folk so adeptly.
She is truly an artist...every line, every gesture, every look is studied yet as natural as if she was actually the person in question and not a mere actress playing a role. It is what makes her such an incredible Covert Ops agent. There are times when we have been on assignment when even I didn't recognize her!
I sometimes wonder, when Joe finally calls it quits and we are all spit out into the 'real world' once more, if the woman standing beside me would be the same one I have grown to love or some stranger I hardly recognize.
Silly, isn't it?
Regardless, spurred on by the stories told by her old friend over dinner, I began to ask Jaye questions as we settled in for the night. Since the...ummmm...incident in the bathroom ten days ago we've pretty much moved in together. I don't think I have been back to my quarters since!
In any case, as we sat on the bed going over the days events I began to ask her about friends and family...about her childhood...things of which I knew only bits and pieces. I inquired of her late father...always a tender point...and asked about her travels with him.
She raised an eyebrow in surprise and suspicion, but after convincing her of my sincerity (no...I was not going to blackmail her with the information...) she slowly began to speak of her life before Joe. I even saw pictures of her and her family which had been hidden in an old shoebox under her bed.
I saw photos of her dad and her at the foot of some ruins in Peru, of her cousins as teens, bruised and filthy but smiling after a rough game of Rugby, her aunt surrounded by a pack of huge shaggy grey dogs, her uncle coming back from a hunt with his sons and Allie in tow, she and her friends at grade school all dressed up in their uniforms...kilts, knee socks, penny loafers...Allie sporting two long braids! There was a picture of her on a horse...her horse...a big bay with a white sock and white stripe down his face, and a really cute one of her...she looked about six years old...in a little flowery sun dress, smiling in delight as she bottle fed a lion cub.
"That's some kitten, Al...It looks about as big as you were!" I laughed.
"My dad left me at the wildlife center in Tanzania for a couple of days while he was off with the Leakys"
"Louis Leaky...of Olduvai Gorge fame?"
"The same...my family, through my father of course, helped fund their research before the National Geographic Society took over. As a result my father was invited to help with the dig...I was still too young to go into the bush...it wasn't safe with the wildlife and all. How ironic that I should be left in the care of what amounted to a pride of orphaned lions, a herd of zebra and two baby elephants!"
There was a fabulous picture of her dressed as a young Queen Elizabeth for a production at Julliard, more of friends from her university days...including a young Jinx, one of her and her cousins as kids swimming in what looked to be a highland stream, and a couple of her and another girl sailing 'in the annual Vineyard regatta' she added as description, pointing to one of the trophies on her bookshelf.
"We retired that trophy...won the cup five summers in a row...no one could touch us"
I even saw a photo of the notorious Shawn...her past love. A striking gentleman, he sported a wool sweater and cords, an amused and intelligent spark in his eye drawing the viewer as he laughed at something that had caught his attention behind the camera...his arm around Alison who smiled in amusement, her face relaxed. They were attending some outdoor festival in Ireland.
Looking closely, it was not very hard to catch the incredible age difference between the two.
"You never told me he was your professor..." I mentioned quietly, referring to one of Jinx's earlier revelations. I looked up to find her still staring sadly at the photograph, her eyes unreadable.
"He was 'A' professor...I only took one class under him, and that was before we..." she left the words unsaid.
"You...loved him...." I stated. Surprisingly enough, my tone was not confrontational, but sympathetic. I knew about Shawn...not much...but enough to infer that he had been a big part of her life back then...and if there was anything I understood and understood well it was the pain of lost love.
She looked up at me and smiled softly as she took my hand and squeezed it, the simple gesture carrying more meaning than words could ever say.
My favorite though, was a lovely black and white of her dressed in a tight fitting black leotard, toe shoes, and a sheer little skirt, practicing at the bar in an empty dance studio. Sunlight was streaming in from the huge picture windows that graced the entire back wall, illuminating her perfectly as the camera caught her in a graceful pose, her face relaxed and beautiful...her hair tied loosely away from her face.
"Its like a Degas!" I exclaimed as I held the picture up to the light.
"Yeah, that's me...Prima Ballerina...NOT!" she laughed.
"It looks like you know what you were doing...you look...damn, you look beautiful..."
"Thanks, but it takes something more to get into the National Ballet School." She sighed, "That was my mother's dream for me when I was little, you know...she wanted me to be a dancer. I used to love ballet, but she pushed and pushed until she drained the joy right out of it."
She paused and looked at the picture before continuing.
"Ah well...it wasn't meant to be anyways. When I was twelve the school evaluated me and said I would never be a dancer...I did not have the correct body type. Something about my back or my joints, I don't remember. I liked acting better anyhow...and the dancing took too much time away from my other activities."
"You look older than twelve in this picture..."
"Ahhhh...yes...I think this was taken just before I left for the army..." she nodded, "...just because I couldn't do it professionally doesn't mean I could no longer dance. With the pressure taken off me I started enjoying it again. Its good exercise...keeps you flexible."
I bent to pick up another picture that had appeared in the pile, this one of her in army fatigues and combat boots, holding on to an M-16 and going through an obstacle course in what looked like basic training, and held it against the black and white of her dancing.
The stark and striking contrast between the two illustrated so perfectly what I was describing earlier. The women in these two photos might as well be completely different people!
I always knew she came from money...that she had enjoyed a privileged childhood, but going through this box of photos brought it home better than any high and mighty snobbery she spit out...the haughty attitude she can turn on at a moments notice.
Which begs the question...what is she doing in the army?
Her family doesn't have a history of military service. She has already traveled extensively so 'seeing the world' was obviously not a selling point for her. She has, or had...if you believe the tales of her disinheritance, Porsche notwithstanding...more money than she knows what to do with and doesn't need to work...and even if she did her impressive arts background and academic qualifications along with the family name would have opened doors for her that many can only dream of.
Why go military?
Her answer, as it always is when I ask her this question, was a vague comment about never being one to back away from a challenge.
I didn't push her for more details, not wanting to tempt the fates! I am well aware that had she NOT signed up I would never have met her. No matter what drove her to devote her life to the military, I am eternally grateful!
The rest of the pictures were of her and her army buddies from boot camp and Int school...along with several from GIJOE. Scarlett, Snakes, Duke and Roadblock...Ripcord and her after a jump, Ace and her sitting on the wing of an f-14 (grrrrr), and quite a few of a handsome looking fellow sporting a beret and a lopsided grin!
"Hmmmm...now look at THIS guy...good looking, dashing, intelligent..." I grinned as I pointed to a picture of me sitting on a tank, before pausing as I noticed a lone photograph sitting at the bottom of the box.
"Who is this?" I picked it up before Jaye could grab it from my hands. Captured on it was a beautiful woman leaning against a car outside what looked like a tennis club. She was wearing a white polo shirt and white shorts, her curly, dark brown hair long and hanging loose to her shoulders. Her skin looked soft and tanned, her body shapely, her eyes bright and intelligent.
In her arms was a very small little girl sucking her thumb and looking decidedly bored.
"She...she looks just like..." I paused and looked up at Alison, "...like you!"
"Its my mother..." she said in clipped tone, her face falling as she quickly began to put the pictures back in the box.
Her mother...the 'Wicked Witch of the East Coast' from what little I know of her. So this is the famous Katherine Hart!
"She doesn't look so bad..." I began but she interrupted.
"You haven't met her...believe me, she is a piece of work..." she took the picture from my hand and placed it back in the box, "That's enough about me, don't you think?"
"Yes but..."
She leaned forward and silenced me with a kiss.
"Thank you."
"For what?"
"For asking..."
That was the end of it. I knew that I had hit a sore spot. Although I am usually a complete and utter moron when it comes to her, I am slowly learning when to push forward and when to drop the subject.
This is definitely something that will have to wait.
Of course, that doesn't mean I am not going to drive her insane until she sings for me! No way in hell...
Now if I can only get my hands on that ABBA video!