Respect
Slow burn. All sexually active participants are 18+. No persons, living or dead, are portrayed in this fictional account.
I chickened out and changed the original draft so you, the reader, would get more enjoyment than the author and to allow chapter 2.
I walked the paddy dike, focused entirely on the tree line ahead of us...
Perhaps I should start at the beginning rather than the middle.
I'm James Paul Henderson, born in June 1951. I'm part of a twinset, with Connie Marie Henderson my other half. Growing up, I wasn't a giant footballer nor a shy academic (Nerd wasn't invented yet). I was big, slender, and quick. I ended up playing baseball from little league to lettering in it in high school. By my senior year, age 17, I was 5'10" and 175 pounds. Light brown hair, kept short, and brown eyes. I'd been told that I was good looking, but not outstanding. Although I had light brown hair on my head, my beard came in dark when I was 14. Likewise, my body pelt came in heavy.
Connie was cute, no, beautiful. Middling sized at 5'3" and slender like everyone in the family. Reasonably chest development, maybe C, at 15. She wasn't much of an athlete, nor interested in academics. She wasn't stupid, just not interested in spending the time to really learn. I called it intellectually lazy. She was a follower, not a leader.
We grew up in a home that was intensely patriotic. Dad was a marine, wounded on Iwo Jima, and then again in the Inchon landing in the Korean War after being called back in. Mom was a Rosie the Riveter during WW II. We lived in a red, white, and blue environment. It stuck with me, but didn't cling well to Connie.
Connie's and my relationship through our high school years wasn't a lot different from many others. We didn't have any other siblings and only two distant cousins our age. That's to say, our relations with each other were up and down. There were times when we were the best of friends. Nothing we wouldn't do for the other. Then there were times when we hardly spoke to each other. Certainly, until we reached junior high school, we were best buddies. Maybe puberty started pushing us apart, as we became less close. In high school, we seldom interacted outside of home. It was a big school, so not being in the same classes wasn't unusual. We never consciously avoided each other and did interact when we ran into each other.
I regret our relationship developed the way it did. I always had a place in my heart for her. Don't think I was in love, or anything like that, but what did I know? What does any 15 year-old know? I just liked to be with her. She didn't appreciate me trying to remain close. She felt I was smothering her. Guess I reacted by giving her more space. Think now that was a big mistake. If I kept trying, I think she would have realized that I only wanted to be brother/sister and friends. Water under the bridge.
We both started dating when we were 15 years old. Mom or Dad our taxi drivers. When we turned 17, our senior year, we were allowed to drive the family's second car. Of course, that mainly meant me since boys picked her up for dates. I don't know about her, but I was a virgin when we graduated.
We graduated from high school at 17, turning 18 two days later. Since the commencement ceremony had us sit alphabetically, this was the first and last time I sat next to her. Immediately after the ceremony, we each went our separate ways to meet up with friends (after hugs from Mom and Dad). This was before graduation parties became popular.
Two weeks later I was raising my right hand and saying I would defend my country against all enemies, foreign and domestic. Much to Dad's disappointment, I joined the army, rather than the marines.
From graduation till the morning I left, I only saw Connie for a few minutes. She was busy partying and enjoying the warm weather at the pool. That morning, Mom woke her up and told her to come down for breakfast. "Not hungry."
"Too bad, but you're still coming down. Brush your teeth and be down in 15 minutes."
"Why should I? I'm 18 and an adult."
"Well, miss adult, you still live at home, use our car and our money, so you'll be down in 15 minutes - and I don't mean 16 minutes."
Connie apparently got the message and showed up. I was dressed in real clothes, not shorts and a T-shirt. She walked in and looked at me. "Really? Kind of overdressed, aren't you?"
Dad said, "He's leaving for army basic training in two hours, so we thought you might like to say goodbye."
She did a double take, "What? You've joined the army? Are you nuts? What about college? Summer fun?"
"It's the right thing to do."
"They'll send you to Vietnam to kill people or get killed. What do you care about the Vietnamese?"
"We're in a war there. I believe in doing my duty, just as Dad and Mom did."
"No. No. You can't be doing this. You can't."
To this day, I'm not sure if she was going to miss me or just thought I was crazy. She jumped up and ran out of the breakfast nook. "Connie, wait, please. At least give me a hug."
She didn't slow down. I started to follow her, but Dad said, "Let her go. She needs to think about it. I'm sure she'll be here to see you off."
I didn't think she would be, but didn't want to argue with Dad. Turns out I was right. She didn't return. When they put me on the bus, she was nowhere to be found.
Dad was really pissed. Mom only slightly less so. When she finally showed up, Dad took the car keys. "You're grounded for two weeks."
"I'm an adult. You can't ground me."
"We can and we are. If you don't like it, feel free to find another place to live... What you did is so shitty that I have trouble believing any daughter of mine would ever do it. You couldn't find a single minute to wish your twin brother well?"
Mom piled on, "Please go to your room. We're not interested in seeing your face for the rest of the day."
Connie did as she was told. This was the 60s, so family still meant something.
Of course, this was all relayed to me later.
As soon as I got to basic, I sent Mom and Dad the address of my basic company. I got two letters at the end of the week. One from Mom and Dad, the other from Connie. She wrote "Jim, I'm so ashamed of myself for treating your last morning home as if it offended me. Please forgive me. I do love you and will miss you. If you can forgive me, please write. I promise to write back... Love, Connie"
Of course, I forgave her. She was my sister, and I did love her, too. We kept up the correspondence all summer, with her writing to me at least once a week. She was going to attend the University of Washington, so once classes started that fall, her letters became fewer. I could understand that, as she was busy with classes. I was also more engaged with the army: Completed basic and Advanced Individual Training (AIT) in infantry. Then shipped to Ft. Benning for parachute training (jump school).
I think it was a given that the next stop would be Vietnam. She seemed to understand that, as well. Her letters changed in kind of a funny way. On one hand she was worried about me being in a war, and on the other seemed to be angry at the war as if I were to be blamed for it. Of course, I could understand. She was at a college that had strong anti-war components. Enough so, that they blew up and burned ROTC buildings. Pretty sure she wasn't involved in that. I would have been surprised if she didn't get caught up in it the "movement". She was, after all, a follower. Think she tried to keep her feeling out of the letters, but didn't really succeed. She kind of solved the problem by writing fewer letters.
I got my orders for Vietnam. Didn't have time to go home on leave before shipping out. Only managed to find a phone and spent an hour talking with the folks. Connie wasn't there, of course. I tried to reach her at the UW but wasn't successful.
The problem with her sending me fewer letters was that what I wanted was more letters, not fewer. The spacing between letters only increased as my tour continued. She had great difficulty keeping her opinions on the war from intruding. It finally got so difficult reading them that by six months in-country, I cut back on the few replies I made to her.
So, here we are, back where I started. We were in open rice paddy country. Our platoon emerged from a wooded island into a set of paddies, maybe 200 meters across to the next island. The island presented a linear wood line, about 100 meters in width, just in from the paddy. We came out and aligned in a staggard line across, covering the full width of the opposing island. Wood lines are scary things when you're in the open and advancing towards them.
I walked the paddy dike, focused entirely on the tree line ahead of us... Suddenly, the trees erupted in a line of muzzle flashes and tracers. I saw a flash of light immediately in front of me and I was knocked over onto my back on the dike. I didn't hear anything but immediately felt pain in my left arm. When I tried to roll off the dike, I couldn't. Then suddenly, my hearing returned. I heard shouting and firing around me. One cry was "Medic!"
I looked at my arm and saw blood flowing from it, so I figured that maybe they were calling a medic for me. The platoon medic came sliding in next to me in splash of paddy water. "Hold tight, Jim. Don't move."
Managed to get off the dike as tracers were just over my head and I knew I'd be dead if I didn't get down.
Then, as if a curtain had been lifted, I felt great pain in my legs. I sat up onto my backpack. I almost threw up when I looked at my legs. Below the knees was a mass of blood and torn clothes and flesh. My feet, what remained of them, were pointed in directions they weren't meant to go. The medic immediately applied tourniquets to both legs and stuck a morphine syrette into me.
I looked around. There was an incredible amount of fire coming from the wood line and we were returning it. I saw two guys had also been hit. Then artillery started impacting on the wood line and it was quickly over. The rest of the platoon surged through the wood line, but the North Vietnamese were gone. They left behind three bodies. Remembered bits and pieces. Concerned looks on the platoon leader's face. Leeches crawling on my hand. Blood trickling down my face from a cut on my forehead. My rifle forestock shattered.
Meanwhile, the landing zone was secured and medivac called in. There were three of us wounded (WIA). Me from the mine and the other two from gunshots. There were also nine killed in action (KIA). The inverted WIA to KIA ratio was testimony of how exposed we were and how well the NVA unit exercised fire discipline.
I barely remember being loaded into the Huey, being on a morphine cloud. Don't remember much about the evacuation hospital as every time I made a sound they hit me with more morphine. Don't remember at all being put on a plane to Japan. The next thing I really remember was waking up in Japan in a hospital ward. My left arm was in a cast and hanging up from some sort of contraption. A couple of bags of fluid were dripping into a vein in my right arm. I looked down... My legs were gone from the knees down.
I looked wildly around. Am I dreaming? Oh, God, I hope so! Let it not be real! I slowly caught my breath, controlling my panic. Somewhere a monitor alarm was sounding. Almost instantly, a nurse was by my side. "Are you in pain?"
I shook my head no, "Where are my legs?"
"Let me get the doctor."
She turned around to find a doctor.
An unbearable time elapsed before she returned with a major wearing a stethoscope. "Sergeant Henderson, I'm Doctor Rawlins. You were brought in from Vietnam two day ago.
You may not remember much, but the casualty report says you were wounded after you stepped on a mine... Unfortunately, I need to give you the full story. It's not my way to sugar coat things."
"Sir, please give me a minute to catch my breath." I looked at him and slowed my breathing and regained some semblance of control, "Please go on, sir."
"The explosion shattered your lower legs. The damage was too extensive, the tissues and bone fragmented, and we weren't able to salvage much below your knees. The good news is that we saved your knees and a little below them. This will be of immense help with your prosthetics.
