Front Lines (Front Lines #1)(72)

As she’s screaming a hand roughly shakes her shoulder. She pulls off the “pillow” and stares at an amused white sailor.

“What?” she snaps.

“Your lieutenant volunteered you. Sick bay is ass-deep in bruises and broken bones, dumb-ass coons not knowing you keep a hand for yourself and a hand for the ship, falling down hatches and—”

“What?”

“They need a Nigra medic to help with some of the coloreds. Tag: you’re it.”

She follows the sailor down labyrinthine corridors whose walls and floors will not stand still, up stairs that almost seem to change direction as the floor falls away, across just enough open deck to leave her drenched, and finally arrives at the sick bay.

Sick bay is roomy by contrast with her berth, but still no bigger than a pair of parlors. One room is distinctly for whites, the other definitely for colored. There’s a white doctor muttering to orderlies as he moves between the white beds, pointing at fractures, prodding at bruises, and ignoring anything said to him.

The injured black soldiers are receiving even less care, with one sour-faced white orderly and two black privates who are clearly at a loss. Frangie spots a familiar face. Sergeant Green has just heaved a loudly complaining soldier off his shoulders and onto a gurney that is already occupied.

It’s the wounded man who, despite having what looks like a sprained ankle, recognizes Frangie.

“Hey, it’s the little soldier girl.”

Sergeant Green looks, sees Frangie, and greets her with an annoyed, “Help me with this fool.”

Frangie helps to prop the wounded man in place beside the other man on the gurney and, seeking no further conversation with the obviously seething Sergeant Green, gets to work with gauze and tape and splints. She works for two hours without letup, caring for perhaps fifteen injuries, and by then the sea has gentled and Sergeant Green surprises her with a cup of hot coffee.

“Here.”

She does not drink coffee. Until now. She takes the cup.

“Thanks for helping out,” Sergeant Green says. Then, checking to make sure that he is not being overheard, he says, “I didn’t mean to snarl at you.”

“It’s fine, Sergeant,” Frangie says, taking a sip. He has added sugar to it, and some milk, and it tastes delicious.

“I’m going to get some air and have a smoke. You?”

She doesn’t smoke, but she would like some fresh air, so she follows Sergeant Green out onto the deck to get a cold, wet, salty slap in the face that makes her laugh.

“Where you from, Private Marr?”

“Greenwood.” And when he shows no recognition, adds, “Tulsa, Oklahoma. Also, most people call me Frangie.”

She winces, embarrassed by her name. It’s a little girl’s name, really, and she wishes she’d said Francine.

He extends a hand and says, “Walter,” earning a giggle from Frangie that she instantly regrets and tries to take back by covering her mouth.

“It’s all right,” he says tolerantly. “I guess I don’t look like a Walter. Everyone gets a laugh at that.” Then, staring at her sideways, he adds, “One laugh. Just one.”

“And you’re from . . .”

“Iowa.”

“You’re joking. Walter from Iowa? I didn’t know there were any colored folks in Iowa.”

“Well,” Walter says laconically, “now that I’m here I guess we’re down to about three left in the state: my mom and my two little sisters.”

“Do you mind if I ask what you do in real life?”

He shakes his head slowly, as if he can’t quite believe what he’s about to say. “During the week I design trailers. You know, what we call mobile homes. I’m an engineer.”

Frangie nods. That at least fits, somehow.

“On weekends I play a little bass.”

“In a jazz band?”

“Well, I don’t know I’d call us a band. More like four fellows who like to get together of a Saturday night. Play some Dixieland for the white folk, and maybe some blues for the college kids.”

Frangie looks more closely at him. He’s removed the glasses and stuck them in his pocket—they’d steamed up—and without them she sees the laugh lines they’d concealed. He doesn’t look so old now, probably no more than twenty-one, maybe a year in either direction. She notices as well the tiny veins of gold within the deep brown of his irises, and then quickly looks away, feeling very confused.

Apparently Walter Green feels equally confused, because he flicks an only-half-smoked cigarette into the wind and says, “Well, I better get back to it. Good evening, Private.”

“Good evening, Sergeant.”

And just like that they are sergeant and private again, not Walter and Frangie.

Back at her bunk, Frangie draws the offending letter out again. She is still angry about it and wants to revel anew in that anger. But instead she whispers, “Walter?” And then, “Iowa?”

Rainy Schulterman is in her own bunk, one just slightly less fetid as befits her rank. She is reading an Italian-to-English dictionary and whispering her attempts at pronunciation.

“Birichino . . . biscia . . . bloccare . . .”

A sailor passes by carrying a length of thick hose. He stops, walks backward, puts on a big, toothy grin, and rests his free hand on the side of her bunk.