At 1500 exactly Malarky took over training maneuvers and I grudgingly made my way to the designated training room, the location sent to me the night previous in a move that would have not been out of place in an old James Bond movie. I had groaned and rolled my eyes as George snorted around his cigarette when the courier arrived with a message that said for my eyes only and to burn after reading (I tossed it to George who laughed and passed it around the room). When I arrived to makeshift training room it had already been set up as a classroom with a chalkboard up front and a couple of tables and chairs. The room was windowless and had a deadbolt on the door with a few flimsy lights to offer illumination to out work.
"Lock the door behind you Sergeant." Puck ordered shortly and with more than a little note of contempt. I rolled my eyes but did as I was told and sat at one of the tables next to Private Bitsui.
The "instruction" began with Puck trying (and failing in a glorious fashion) to tell us what certain words meant or how they were pronounced. I, being the generous student that I am, spent most of the lesson correcting him while Bitsui sat oddly silent beside me. This cycle went on until well past the time when chow had stopped being served and the night was fully underway by the time the Captain was either done or too frustrated with my constant interruptions to continue. He glared and muttered racist insults at me as grinned charmingly back and unlocked the deadbolt before exiting the room with Bitsui trailing along behind me. Once outside and out of earshot from any prying ears I turned to the silent private.
"You know, to speak code you do actually have to speak," I raised an eyebrow as shot a glance to the taller man.
"Yes Sergeant," he answered without looking at me and I narrowed my eyes at him.
"You do speak!" I tilted my head when no reaction came from him. "Everything good, private?"
"Fine Sergeant." He stood stark still, refusing to meet my gaze.
"Bitsui, I want you to look at me." I commanded in a voice that left no room for argument. He raised his head but his eyes didn't quite reach mine. "Look at my eyes."
His dark eyes met mine, a wild look in them I had recognized from the mirror in Bastone. It was a look of fear and uncertainty, the face of which I had become great friends with.
"Haalá áńt'é?" (How are you?) I did the only thing I could think of and spoke our shared language in effort to put him at ease. He perked up a bit hearing the familiar cadence of syllables roll from my tongue. .
"yáʼáníshtʼééh." (I'm fine.) He replied in a voice that was stronger than I had heard come from the young private before.
"Are you sure?" he nodded. "I don't believe you." I had to work to keep my voice even and low, leaving all chords of intimidation out of my speech pattern. I had dealt with young, scared kids like him before as plebes at the Point when I was an upperclassman. " You can tell me anything, you know that."
"Thank you Sarge," I could hear the sound of sincerity in his voice.
"Yeah well" I grinned, "we Diné need to stick together." I swung my arm around his shoulder and acted as if I didn't notice the flinch as we continued our trek but made sure I filed it away for later examination. We arrived at the crossroads that split the direction of my billet from his and I turned to look the kid in the eyes. "I mean it Bitsui. If anything… or anyone is bothering you, you let me know."
"I will, thanks Sarge." I nodded and watched him carry on to his quarters until I could no longer see his silhouette against the moonlit sky. I sighed deeply and made my way silently down the bath and to the building in which I shared a room with Malarky. The Irishman was snoring soundly in his bunk when I entered the darkened room and I shook my head in amusement. With a great sigh I walked over and flopped down on my bed, groan out loud in appreciation and closed my eyes as sleep overtook me almost instantly.
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After a couple of weeks of training, Captain Fuckwit (or Puck, as he was known in the 7th circle of Hell where he was spawned) informed Bitsui and I that we would be getting handlers tasked with keeping us alive in the Pacific. Bitsui's handler was another asshole from intelligence who seemed to be buddies with Fuckwit.
Luck for me I got officer Fuckwit.
To say that I didn't get along well with Captain Fuckwit would be a bit of an understatement.
To say I kept this feeling of total despization to myself would be another understatement.
"You know there are easier ways to get your oakleaves, Captain." Puck glared at me but said nothing as he huffed and puffed while trying to keep up with the pace I had set. On the other side of me I could hear Malarkey let out a snort in amusement.
I was leading morning PT exercises and we were one mile into our three mile run. Fuckwit was nowhere near being battle ready and he insisted on training with us until he and I were called to the Pacific, much to the chagrin of myself and Captain Speirs. I knew we would never make it to the the Pacific, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't recieve a small bit of entertainment as I watched the my desk jockey handler train like his life depended on it. I knew I would pay for the amount of glee I showed during these training exercises, but I figured it was well worth it to see Fuck looking as if he was moments away from having a stroke.
"Double time!" I yelled out and laughed as I heard a horrified groan come from beside me.
That night it was almost midnight before Fuckwit dismissed Bitsui and I was feeling the lack of sleep the next morning, but it was still worth it to see him collapse at the two mile mark
After morning PT Easy Company sat down in the mess as we chowed down on our usual army breakfast of unrecognizable food slathered in ketchup. I looked up from the horror show we called breakfast to see a lost looking Bitsui enter the mess and get his food.
"Sherwin!" I called out and waved him over to our table. He hesitantly took a few steps towards me, eyeing the rest of the table as I nudged Malarky to scoot over and give the private some room to sit. Bitsui quietly took the seat next to me, keeping his head down and eyes averted.
"You know," Malarky began glancing over the private's head to shoot me a confused look, "the longer you try and figure out what it is the worse it's going to get."
Don nudged the private with his shoulder and the two of us silently agreed to pretend that we didn't see Bitsui tense up at his touch. "Better to just eat it, easier to keep down that way."
Bitsui glanced up at the Irishman and gave him a hesitant smile and I shot a glance over at George who sat across from me. George narrowed his eyes and shook his head slightly, only enough that I would see.
"A'right Sherwin," I announced as I pushed the tray of red slathered mystery meat away from me only to watch Perconte snatch it up without hesitation. "Let me introduce you to this big group of degenerates that I've had to keep breathing for the entirety of this lovely government sponsored romp through the European countryside." I muttered and George sent what I wanted to believe was a potato flying towards my head.
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Walking back from our daily code training in the dark was starting to become a habit for both Bitsui and I. He had finally started to open up to me and we often found oursleve talking of our shared homeland. The topic of the particular day being the Chuska mountains and how their beauty seemed to sing in the silent sunlight. We spoke of the sandstone pools hidden deep in the mountains that were warmed by the sun and spending lazy summer evenings soaking in their clear water as the stars rose and shined so bright it was almost blinding.
I never realized how much I missed it and how good it felt to remember it until I had someone to talk about it with. We spoke of how we had grown up and I found many of his childhood memories matched my own. I felt an odd warmth knowing that not much had changed over the passage of time, that a hundred years away there was a child living and experiencing the same thing that a child aged me had.
His family, as many Navajo families did in this time, raised goats and traded their meat and hide in the towns that had cropped up along the rivers. His grandmother was an artist and made silver and turquoise jewelry that she traded with an orchard owner who I found myself hoping was my great great grandfather. He and I talked of sleeping under the countless stars in the warm summer night air and of legends passed down through the generations.
"What about your family?" he asked me one night, taking me off guard. "You know about mine, what about yours?"
"I… I don't have one," I answered after a moment of debate. It was not a lie per se, it just was not a whole truth.
"Are you from one of the schools?" he asked as we came to a stop at the crossroads where he took one direction to his barracks and I took another to mine. He was referring to the assimilation schools that many children were taken to in an effort to strip them of their cultural identity and them more white. Kill the indian, spare the child sort of bullshit that was common in this era.
"No," I answered, "I had a family, but I don't anymore. They're… not alive." It was true, but just not the complete truth.
"But who will help you get back to the corn pollen path?" he asked in an almost horrified voice.I started, caught off guard by the seemingly innocent question.
The path of beauty, the corn pollen path was sacred to our people. Whenever a member of the tribe left for war they strayed from the corn pollen path which is how we became known at a tribe of reluctant warriors. To stray from the path of beauty was akin to spending your life walking in darkness. The only way to return to the path once you left was to perform a ceremony had called the Enemy Way. The ceremony called the family and friends of the soldier to gather and from miles and miles away to help them find their way and bring their spirit back to Hozho, a state of balance. My grandfather would have been the one to conducted the ceremony for me, bringing in many distant relatives to his home to help my spirit heal
But I realized that I was alone. I had no blood family in this time to help me return to the path of beauty.
I was not a religious or spiritual person by any stretch of the imagination, but the act of your family coming together to help you heal your soul was something beyond religion. It was a way for them to show you that no matter what happened, what you went through, what you did, you were still loved.
"No one." I rasped as I blinked away the sudden emotion of overwhelming loneliness. Sherwin looked like he wanted to say something but his gaze caught on something behind me and he snapped to attention, straight as any arrow. I tilted my head at his actions before turning to look behind me.
"Benny," Speirs greeted, throwing a quick look over my shoulder to the private. "At ease, Private Bitsui."
I heard the private take a deep breath behind me and Speirs gave a minute nod of recognition to the private.
"Shouldn't you two be in bed?" The officer inquired as he lit a cigarette.
"We were just headed that way, sir." I answered evenly and Speirs shot me a look, no doubt surprised at the lack of bite or whit my answer held. My mind was elsewhere, in a distant time where a family that I would never again see lived and a melancholy feeling was swept over me. My eyes stared off in the distance, my gaze seeing things that only I could see, blurred by repressed tears.
"See yourself back to your company," Speirs ordered the private. I heard the crunching of Bitsui's boots against the earth as he turned and retreated.
I was vaguely aware of Speirs looking studying me and it took all my willpower to shake myself out of my stupor, forcing a smile to my face when all I could feel was a deep wistfulness of the likes I had never known.
"C'mon, you look dead on your feet." Speirs motioned for me to walk alongside him. I nodded and followed without question, comment or protest. We continued along the path in silence until we reached the old building that I was billeted in. My mind was still a million miles and 100 years away and I was having trouble finding my way through the fog of sorrow that encompassed my mind. Speirs stood silently next to me when we stopped in front of the door where the quiet muffled snores of the men could almost be heard in the still, quiet of the night air.
"You still with me, Sergeant?" he asked after a few moments, breaking me from the terrible loneliness of my own mind.
"I'm still here, sir." I answered with a slight nod. He rested his hand on my shoulder and opened his mouth like he wanted to say something, but just sighed and pursed his lips.
"Get some sleep, Jo," he finally ordered and squeezed my shoulder in a gesture of solidarity. I nodded and headed into the white washed house, too much weighing on me to speak anymore words for the day.
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I'm still here and I'm still working on this!