Author’s note: I served in the relative peace of Korea instead of in the little understood US action in Viet Nam, and therefore ask the brave men and women of my generation who fought, cried, and bled there to forgive the inaccuracies in my depictions. I salute your sacrifice, and hope you may enjoy this story in spite of my errors.
* * * * *
As the Huey dropped quickly down to the bomb crater, we un-assed the bird and scrambled for the relative safety of the crater edge. While the rest of the three birds unloaded, we scanned the surroundings for signs of movement, and then started in the direction of our objective, the small knoll known to the generals as Hill 127, and to us grunts as just another piece of Viet Nam to be walked to, fought over, and then abandoned to it’s fate. With rifles cocked and unlocked, and all senses honed to a razor edge, we started the slow route step to the base of the hill. I was taking my turn at point, and was congratulating myself on drawing this task on a day when we seemed to be the only people around. I was so involved in being pleased that I didn’t see the thin wire stretched between the two of the trees on the paddy dike.
The homegrown VC mine was wired to the tree at waist level, and was designed to spray shrapnel at whatever tripped the wire, or at least that’s what they told me afterwards. All I knew is that there was a small explosion to my right at the same time that I felt my right thigh turn to hamburger and hurt like no pain I had ever felt before. I screamed, and fell down, my legs no longer able to support me. Quickly, Doc Macon was at my side, wrapping me in bandages to stop the bleeding, and shooting me up with morphine. As he wrote the time of the injection across my forehead, he smiled and said, “Don’t worry, Flanders, you’ll be OK. Just hang in there. The bird’s on the way to pick you up. You’ll be drinkin’ Jack and fuckin’ round-eye nurses in a couple days.” Then he was gone, on the way to join the platoon, and I laid on the ground slipping into the reverie of the dope, as a small rear guard waited to load me on the Huey.
I don’t remember much of the flight back to the field hospital, just some noise and unrelated sights. When they unloaded me, and took me to the hospital, I remember a doctor saying, “Well, this boy’s going to go home less one leg,” and then another voice saying, “Wait a minute. It’s not as bad as it looks. Let’s get the bleeding stopped, pack it, and send him to Saigon. Let them decide.” I went out just after I felt the needle slip in my arm.
There are more fuzzy sights and sounds that I recall if I think very hard, but the next thing I have actual memory of is waking up in a hospital bed, and looking down to see if my leg was still there. I couldn’t lift my head very high, and was cursing my weakness when arms lifted my head and chest up so I could see. “It’s OK, they’re both still there,” said the medic behind me. “It was close, but they think they’ve saved it. You’re going to Japan this afternoon, so don’t get too comfortable.”
After the flight to the hospital in Japan, I was placed in a ward with twenty other guys suffering from wounds serious enough that Saigon couldn’t take care of us. I was feeling pissed about being away from my unit. I was pissed that I had done something so stupid as to step on a tripwire and almost get my leg blown off, and was also feeling pretty sorry for myself. I was just waiting for someone to say something to me that would let me vent. I wanted to hit something or someone, just do anything to get this out of my system. Later the doctor’s told me that some patients reacted to the medications by becoming aggressive, and that I had been a real ass for a while.
“Well, welcome to Japan, handsome,” said the little red-haired nurse as she placed a clipboard on the hook at the end of my bed. She was about five-two, and her otherwise slender body was accentuated by the large breasts that thrust out the front of her white uniform. I figured her age at about twenty-five, and decided immediately that I didn’t like her. I knew I hated her when she stuck a thermometer in my mouth, and grabbed my wrist to take my pulse. I pulled my hand out of her grasp and yanked the thermometer out of my mouth. I said, “Hey, bitch, just get the hell away from me, and leave me alone.”
She just smiled, and said, “OK,” and walked to the next bed. I laid there feeling very satisfied that I had shown her she couldn’t make me do anything.
In about an hour, she came back with two orderlies. I was pretty weak, and couldn’t resist much as they strapped my hands and my one good leg to the bed. They stepped back, and she approached the bed, smiled again, and then leaned down to whisper in my ear.
“OK, Flanders, here’s how it works. I’m going to take your temp’ and get your pulse. Now, do you cooperate or do I have these guys sit on you while I do my job?”
I was furious, furious at being tied down like an animal, and furious that a nurse would say anything like that to me.
“Well, fuck you, bitch. I told you to go away once, so just fuck you!”
She smiled again, a little strained this time, I thought, and was again pleased with myself. Then, she motioned to the two orderlies. One held my head still and opened my mouth as she slipped in the thermometer. “I wouldn’t bite that thermometer, if I were you.” she said casually. “The mercury is poisonous, and if it doesn’t kill you, your hair will fall out, and you’ll be impotent.” The other held my arm as she took my pulse. She took the thermometer, read it and made a note on my chart. Then she motioned to the orderlies, and they released me. She came back to the side of the bed.
“I think I’ll speak to the doctor about your medication. It seems to be affecting your temper, but that happens sometimes. I’m going to keep you restrained until you calm down a little, but don’t worry, you’re going to be all right. Your leg was shot up pretty bad, and it’ll have to have some time to heal. When you’re ready, we’ll start rehab, and get you up and walking again.”
During the night, another nurse came to give me some pills, which I wouldn’t swallow. She just shrugged and produced a syringe, saying in no one to particular, “Well, they said you’d be a problem. We’ll see how you like this, instead.” She jabbed the needle into my arm and quickly pushed the plunger before I could react. “Now, go back to sleep. Rhonda will be back in the morning.”
The next morning, I felt a little different, not so much on edge, and not quite so ready to fight the world. My leg was hurting, and I was hungry. I saw the doctor’s entourage walking from bed to bed, and shortly they stopped at mine. One of them, the one in charge, I assumed, looked at my chart for a while, and then said, “Well, Flanders, how’re you feeling today?”
I said I hurt and was hungry.
“I changed your prescription yesterday after Rhonda said you were being a bit of an ass. Sorry about that, but we gave you what we thought was best. It turns out you reacted a little stronger than we anticipated. The new medicine will do about the same thing, and you’ll be a lot easier to get along with. I’ll have Rhonda get something for the pain, and breakfast is in about half an hour. Now, I want you to get plenty of rest, and don’t get out of bed for the next week. That leg’s got to have time to heal, or you’ll lose it, is that clear?”
I said it was, and the group moved on to the next bed. I tried to go back to sleep, but couldn’t. I could, however, lay there and stew in my own self-pity, and by the time the little red haired nurse came in with the cart of medications, I was pretty well on the way to a really rotten attitude, and my leg was hurting more than ever.
She rolled the cart up to the bed, and for the first time I realized she had a really nice figure, even in the nurses uniform. She also had a very pretty face with soft, deep eyes. She came to the edge of the bed, and looked me in the eye. “I’m going to take your temp, and check your pulse. Do I need to call those two big friends of mine again, or are you going to be good?”
“I’ll be good. The doctor said my medicine made me a real jerk, and you asked him to change it.”
She unstrapped my right hand, stuck the thermometer in my mouth, and checked my pulse while she talked. “Yes, sometimes certain medications cause temporary mental problems, and it’s hard to predict. I asked him to give you something else that might not affect you that way. You really weren’t a jerk. You were more of a totally obnoxious, self-pitying, uncooperative, asshole bastard, at least that’s the way I described you. That’s why he changed the meds.” She smiled innocently, read the thermometer, made a note on my chart, and then brought me a cup with six pills and a glass of water. Again, she looked me in the eye. “Jenny said she had to give you a shot because you wouldn’t take your pills. You going to take them this morning, or do I have to do the same?”
I silently took the cup of pills and tipped it down, and followed with the glass of water. “Is that better?” I asked.
“Yes, it was. One of those pills is to stop the pain in your leg, but it’ll take a little while to kick in. I think we can take the rest of these straps off now. I just had them tie you down because you were a little hard to handle, bad leg or not. You seem to be calmed down now.” She unstrapped my other hand and leg. She looked at me seriously. “Doctor Mills says you’re to lay still and rest, or you still might lose that leg. Do you understand?”
I nodded yes.
“OK, now I’ll finish my round, and then I’ll be back to change your dressings. Oh, and by the way, being still includes not getting up to go to the bathroom. If you need to go, just press your call button, and I’ll bring you a bedpan. OK?”
I nodded yes again, and she smiled and moved to the next bed.
Breakfast was actually pretty good after the months of C’s and mess hall chow. I had oatmeal that wasn’t like paste, eggs that were fresh, bacon, toast, and coffee. It wouldn’t have mattered; I was starved. About midway through my second cup of coffee, the pain in my leg started to go away, and I started feeling better. By the time she came back, I was feeling good enough to notice that not only was her figure pretty good, she was just a really pretty girl. The sunlight coming in through the windows highlighted her short, red-brown hair with glints of copper, and when she saw me staring, she smiled the most dazzling smile I’d seen in a long time.
She was pushing a cart again, this time loaded with gauze and cotton. It took her an hour to get to me, and when she pushed the cart up beside the bed, that smile blazed again. She produced a pair of scissors from the pocket in the front of her uniform, and said, “It’s time to change your dressings. This might hurt a little, but I’m pretty good at this, and I’ll be careful.” She flipped the sheet and blanket down to the end of the bed. I yelled “Hey”, and tried to cover myself with my hands. The standard issue hospital gown had slipped up during the night, leaving me naked from the waist down.
The little red head laughed, a full, uninhibited laugh that caused all sorts of delectable little jiggles all over her lush body. “My, my, my, aren’t we the modest one? Hmmm, I’ve seen a lot of uh,,,men, and you certainly don’t need to be modest. Now, just let me do my job, and then I’ll cover you back up. Think you can handle that? My friendly orderlies are still around, you know.”
It was useless to resist; she’d only call those guys again. It was the first of many lessons I would learn about military hospitals. There was no modesty in a ward of twenty guys; most of them were too sick or injured to care anyway, and the nurses showed no mercy. Modesty just got in their way, and caused them to get behind in their many tasks. I resigned myself to the fact that I was going to have to get used to this, and laid back while she worked.
She was gentle, although some of the bandages had adhered. She carefully teased the cotton and gauze away from the wound, and I felt little pain as she removed all the packing and bandages. When she had removed the last bandage, she began cleaning the wound. She finished and said, “Well, I’m ready to do you up again. Want to see before I do?”
I looked down at my leg, and a wave of nausea pushed my breakfast to the back of my throat. I’ve never been able to deal with blood very well, especially my own, and even closed wounds tend to make me queasy. I couldn’t look for very long, but from what I saw, I was a mess. A good chunk of my thigh was just gone. The skin had apparently survived, and they had pulled it together and stitched it, but there was a hollow where the muscle should have been. I fell back on the bed, my heart pounding in my ears, and the self pity rising again to new heights.
She looked at me, and said softly, “Don’t worry. You’re going to walk again. It’ll take a while, and you’ll have a limp, but you’ll walk. You know, lots of you guys who end up here, go home without a leg or an arm or both. Just think about that, when you get down, and you can always call me if a little talking will do you good.”
She became all business again. “Well, I can’t stand around here while you stare at yourself. I’ll just get you wrapped up again, and then you can cover up that little thing you’re so modest about.” She said the last part just loud enough for the rest of the ward to hear, and the embarrassment made me forget about my leg until she left.
Just after lunch, she made rounds with medication again. She stopped by my bed and handed me the usual cup of pills and glass of water. As I gulped down the pills, she sat on the edge of the bed. She waited until I washed them down with the water, took the glass, and said, “I’m sorry about this morning, but we’ve learned that the best way to get patients ready for rehab is to get them to accept their injuries. I had to show you that, so you would be ready when it’s time for you to try walking again. You had to see that you were hurt pretty badly, but that you still have a leg that can walk, if you work at making it strong again. You’re healing well, and I want you to look at your wound every day, so you can see how it’s getting better. You’ll be surprised at how quickly it heals, and seeing it will help you believe the rehab will help.”
I was a little astounded. This was the heartless bitch that had me strapped to the bed, and then threatened to have orderlies sit on me the next morning. She was the same uncaring nurse who whipped the blankets from my nakedness, exposing me to the world, and then had the nerve to laugh. And now, she was sitting on my bed, consoling me, and explaining her actions, even though I hadn’t asked. I felt that I needed to say something, anything, or I would break down and cry. I murmured, “What is your name?”
“Excuse me, you have to talk louder than that if I’m going to hear you.”
“I said, what’s your name?”
“Oh,” she smiled, “I’m Rhonda. Rhonda… well just Rhonda for now. I know your name, you know. It’s on your chart. You’re Terry Flanders, Specialist Terry Flanders.”
“Well, Rhonda, I don’t know what to say. You were such a bit-, so hard on me the first day, and pretty hard this morning. When you changed my dressings, you laughed at me. And now, you’re talking to me like a close friend. I’m a little confused here.”
“You were going to say bitch, weren’t you. That’s OK, lots of guys think that about me when they first get here. I don’t mind. When you hurt, or think your life has changed forever, you sometimes say things because you don’t understand. See, if we pamper you guys, you’ll never get well. The wounds will heal, but your mind won’t, and that’s the worst injury of them all. So, we treat you like you’re well, even make you mad, so you’ll realize your life isn’t over. We also talk to the guys, if they want to talk, because that helps. I’ll be glad to talk with you, but if you start feeling sorry for yourself, I’m going to be a bitch again, until you start to realize you’re fortunate to be alive, and start acting like a normal man. Now get some sleep, and I’ll be back to see you before I leave for the day.”
So began our relationship, Rhonda’s and mine. It wasn’t a very good start, really, but as I grew to understand this tiny nurse, I also grew to respect her skills, lightening wit, and intelligence. If I was happy, she was happy. If I was feeling a little down, she would sit on the edge of the bed for a few minutes and talk, and sometimes would hold my hand. If I dived back into the depths of self-pity, she was merciless, taunting, teasing, and laughing at me until I had to come back out of shame or anger. As soon as I returned to mostly normal, Rhonda would again become the friend who talked out my thoughts and worries, or who traded jibes with the skill of a fencing master teaching her student.
The first week passed slowly, but it passed. The Doc came every day and looked at my chart, but didn’t say much except ask how I was and if I needed anything. Rhonda came everyday, at least three times, to check on me, or bring my meals or medications, or sometimes just to sit and talk. That weekend, Rhonda was off, so I didn’t see her until Monday morning. I was feeling down again, because the Doc had said I had to stay in bed for another week. Staying in bed wasn’t so bad. It was just boring as hell, and also really embarrassing when Rhonda had to bring me a bedpan. She never seemed to mind, and always smiled, but I just couldn’t get used to that.
Mid-way through the second week, I started asking the Doc when I could get up. On Friday, Rhonda was all giggles when she brought my lunch, and I could tell she wanted to tell me something.
“Guess what?”
“I do’o, wha’,” I slurred around a mouthful of meatloaf.
“On Monday, I’m going to get your lazy ass out of that bed, and take you to rehab. They’re going to work you so hard you won’t be able to feel sorry for yourself anymore, and I won’t have to keep being a bitch. That’ll be fun for a change.” She giggled again, and then the soft voice returned. “Doctor Mills say’s you’re healing well, and wants to get you back on that leg as soon as possible. You start on Monday, only for a half hour, but it’s a start. Just do the best you can, and you’ll get stronger every day. Soon, you’ll be walking with a cane, and then you can go home.”
It was funny, but I really hadn’t thought of going home. I read the letters that had finally found their way through the Army mail system, and thought about home a lot, but just never thought of going back, until she said that.
It seemed that Monday would never come, and when it finally did, I woke full of anticipation. Then, after thinking about it for a while, the anticipation turned to fear. My leg was shot to hell, and I hadn’t walked in, what was it, almost three weeks now. I couldn’t do this, I wasn’t ready.
Rhonda brought me my breakfast and pills, and after she had taken care of the rest of the ward, came back to sit on the bed with me again.
“OK, Terry. I know you’re scared. Just remember, you won’t ever walk again unless you try. You’re wound is healed enough to start, but you have to want it; you have to want it more than anything you’ve ever wanted before, because it’s going to be hard. Your body is strong enough, but you have convince your mind, and that’s the hard part.”
A little later she rolled a wheelchair up to my bed. Between her supporting me and my effort, I managed to sit down in the chair. My wounded leg felt like so much dead weight, or would have if it hadn’t started hurting. Once in the chair, it calmed down a little, and she wheeled me through the ward door and down a corridor. We came to a door marked “REHABILITATION ROOM 1”, and she backed through, pulling me behind her.
The room was painted the same puke green as the ward, and contained a set of handrails about twenty feet long with mats underneath and on both sides. Along the wall were two walkers, like my great grandmother used to use, and some canes in a stand. There was a desk, and behind the desk was a chubby woman of about forty, with thick glasses and short, black hair. She rose, and walked over to us.
“Terry, this is Angie. Angie will be your therapist. She knows what she’s doing, so pay attention to what she tells you, and try hard. I’ll be back to get you in about half an hour.”
Angie seemed really nice, almost like your sister would be, for about a minute and a half. We started simply enough, just supporting myself between the hand rails, and putting weight on my injured leg. Then she wanted me to take a step forward. After two minutes, I figured she was a sadist. After ten minutes, I realized she must have learned her trade from either the Gestapo or the Viet Cong. After twenty minutes, I was sweating like a pig, in pain, and thought she must have trained the Gestapo and the Viet Cong. She wasn’t rude or loud, just insistent that I could and would walk down those handrails, and she wouldn’t listen to how much I hurt or how I couldn’t do it. She stayed right behind me, supporting me sometimes, and coaxing me to walk at others. I told her I was trying, but it wasn’t working, but she didn’t want to hear that. It was always, “Walk, one foot and then the other, one foot and then the other.”
I made it about five feet down the handrails before she said, “OK, that’s enough for today,” and helped me back to the wheelchair. About that time, Rhonda came in to pick me up.
“So, Angie, how’s this guy been doin’?
“Well, I don’t want to say he did too well, because he’ll think that’s all he has to do tomorrow, but he did pretty good. He made it almost a fourth of the way down the rails, and that’s better than most of them do. Lordy, you should have heard him whine about his leg, and how he couldn’t do it,” she laughed, “but he did, just like you said he would.”
Angie turned to me and smiled. “You really did do very well for the first day. Tomorrow, we’ll work on stretching the distance, and then do some exercises to get some strength back in that muscle. Terry, it’s going to be hard, and it’ll take a while, but today you showed me that you can do this. You’ll be walking on your own sooner than you think, as long as you give me the effort that you did today.”
So began my daily expeditions through the hell that Angie called rehabilitation. She was a driver who never let up on me, but she always told me when I had done well, and that helped, somehow. Rhonda always sat on my bed, afterwards, and praised my efforts as well, so I had to keep trying. You see, I was developing feelings for Rhonda that I’d never had before, for anyone. I didn’t tell her, because I figured it was mostly the close relationship that had developed between us as nurse and patient, and my gratitude for all she had done for me, but the feelings made it impossible for me to fail in her expectations of me.
After two weeks, I had managed to travel the length of the rails, turn around, and come back. Angie informed me that I could now graduate to a walker, and I was soon able to move around the hospital, admittedly very slowly, but I was no longer confined to the ward and Angie’s dungeon. The day I graduated to a cane, Rhonda told me it was time for her turn at the night shift, so another nurse would take care of me during the day. She said she’d still see me at night, but since I slept then, I didn’t think we’d get to talk much, and I was going to miss that.
On the next Monday, I met Linda, the new nurse for the ward. Linda wasn’t pretty, and her figure belonged on a man, but she was happy and efficient. She was so efficient that she hardly said anything to any of us, and by the time breakfast was over, I missed Rhonda a lot. By lunch time, I missed her more, and by evening, I was back to self-pity. At seven o’clock, Rhonda walked in the door, pushing the cart with evening medications. She took care of everybody, and then came to sit on my bed.
“Well, Terry, how did you do today?”
“Oh, OK I guess, at least Angie said I did well. I can get around with my cane now, and my leg hardly ever hurts. I walked outside for a while, and that felt good.”
“Hey, that’s great. You’ll be going home soon. I’ll bet that makes you happy, doesn’t it?”
“Well, I suppose so. I’m a little worried at what my Mom and Dad are going to think about the cripple they not have for a son.”
“Nonsense, you aren’t a cripple. Before you know it, you’ll be able to throw away that cane, and anyway, I don’t think that’s going to make any difference to them. They’ll just be glad that you’re home. ”
On Friday, Rhonda came in at the same time, but that night, I could tell something was wrong. As usual, she gave everybody their medicine, and then came to sit with me. She looked sad, and I asked her why. She just smiled and said, “Feel up to a walk?”
We walked down the corridor to the rehab room I had grown to hate, and then to love. Rhonda produced a key from her pocket, and unlocked the door. Other than the desk lamp, the room was unlit, and I hobbled inside trying to find the light switch. Rhonda followed me into the room, and then turned and re-locked the door. She quickly caught up with me, and said, “Please don’t turn on the lights.” She smiled and lead me to one of the floor mats beside the handrails I had hated so much that first day, and then helped me sit down. She took the cane from my hand, and placed it on the desk, and then came to sit beside me. She took a deep breath, as if getting ready for something she wasn’t going to enjoy.
“Terry, a lot of guys come to this hospital, and I have to take care of them. Some of them don’t make it, so I always try to stay a little distant. We all do, because if we let ourselves get too close, and the guy doesn’t live, the pain can be terrible. The person you see in your doctor or in the nurses is not the real person. It’s a person we invent to help us get through the days, and to help the patients get through theirs. I’ve always held firmly to that unwritten policy…until you. Something attracted me to you that first day, when you were raving away at me. I don’t know what it was, but as I got to know you better, I started to care more than I should have. That’s why I had myself transferred to nights; I thought I wouldn’t have to be with you so much, and I could get back to normal, but it didn’t work.”
I started to speak, but she pressed her fingertip to my lips. “Don’t say anything yet, I have to get this all out at once.”
“Terry, I only know one way to say this. I’ve fallen in love with you. At first, I thought it was just that it made me feel good to see you getting better, and to know that I had helped, but then I realized that I feel that way about all the guys who come through here. You were different, and it was a little scary, at first. The other day, when you came back with your cane, I saw a man, not my patient, walk into the ward. I found myself thinking about being with you somewhere besides the hospital, and realized I was also feeling warm and, well…, I wanted to be close to you. I wanted you to hold me, and I wanted to feel your arms around me. I’ve never felt that way about anyone before, and I knew then that I loved you. I knew I was just your nurse, so I tried to stop being around you, but every time I came into the ward, I had to come sit on your bed, just so I could be with you. I couldn’t say anything, and decided it would be best for both of us if I put myself on nights. I thought I would be all right, but after not seeing you much this week, I’m going crazy, and I had to tell you how I feel.”
She stopped, and stared at me with those deep eyes.
“Rhonda, I don’t know what to say. I care for you in a way I’ve never felt before. I didn’t say anything because I didn’t know if I was inventing the feelings, or if they were real. I also didn’t think you could ever feel anything for me; I’m still not right, and won’t be for a long time, if I ever am.”
She took my hand and held it tightly in her slender fingers. “Terry, I love you, and I want you. I don’t care about your leg, or if you can walk. I care about you.”
.Our first kiss was a little uncoordinated, but we made up for it with the second. As our lips met for the third time, Rhonda pushed me back onto the mat. She broke the kiss, and sat up. Her eyes met mine, and I saw the passion there as she unbuttoned the front of her uniform and then slipped it off her shoulders. The pants followed, and she sat there, illuminated by the desk lamp on the other side of the room, in her white bra and panties. She smiled as she reached behind her back for the bra clasp, and I caught my breath as the white cotton cups released her breasts. She slipped the straps off her arms, tossed the bra aside, and laid down beside me. With a trembling hand, she opened the hospital robe, and traced her fingertips across my chest before she pushed the robe to my sides. She raised to rest her breasts on my chest, and as her parted lips found mine, I felt the wonderful softness of her body against me. I held her close, and gently stroked the satin skin of her back as her tongue probed for and then found mine. My fingers found the waistband of the panties, and she stopped kissing long enough to help me slip them from her hips. Then, throwing her leg across mine, she snuggled her breasts against my chest and kissed me again.
I felt the soft, downy hair on her mound pushing against my thigh, and slipped my hand between us to caress the silky curls. As my fingertips slipped lower, Rhonda raised her hips to give me access, and I felt the soft lips that lay beneath the concealing hair. When I stroked down the silken inner surface, a small cry escaped from her lips, and she pushed back against my caressing fingers. I felt the moisture of her arousal on my fingertips, and as my fingertips glided across the inner folds of her sex, she broke the kiss with a sigh. She rose to straddle my thighs, being careful not to put her weight on my injury, and I felt slender fingers reaching for, then finding, and then caressing my rapidly growing manhood. She looked at me and giggled, “And you were so modest the first time I changed your dressing. It’s a good thing you didn’t swell up like this then. I wouldn’t have known what to do then…, but I do now. I need you, Terry, I need you now.”
She raised her body, and positioned my manhood at her entrance. She began to lower herself, a little at a time, and I marveled the sensation of her body enveloping me. In the dim light, I could see the small, soft lips of her sex sliding down my shaft, and it looked almost as if they were pulling me inside her. Whenever I felt resistance, she raised up to allow her body’s natural nectar to ease the way, and then began the slow descent over my shaft anew. At one point, I felt resistance that could only be the guardian of her virginity. I touched her soft thigh, and when she opened her eyes, I looked at her questioningly. She smiled, and a look of concentration swept over her beautiful face. I felt her bearing down, gently but firmly, again and again, until the filmy wisp of her womanhood yielded to her efforts. She gasped and cried out, but continued to sink over my hard shaft, finally settling with her soft lips pressing against my belly. We lay there for a while as she leaned down to kiss me, long and passionately. Her nipples were firm as she settled her weight over me, flattening her large yielding breasts against my chest.
Her passage rippled over me in tiny, uncontrolled contractions, and the sensation of the oily soft, satiny surface was exquisite. She was making small rocking motions now, gradually increasing her movements until she raised herself once again to sit astride my hips. Her large, sensuous breasts beckoned, and I lifted them and caressed the soft skin as she rocked up and down. As I gently stroked her nipples, she sighed again and closed her eyes, and when I gently tugged on one, she moaned in ecstasy.
She gently guided my right hand to her soft belly, and I slipped my fingertip between us to find her little throbbing button. I gently rubbed beside it, then around it, and then chanced a gentle touch on the little bud itself. My caress was rewarded by the sound of her tiny cry, and by an increase in the speed of her rocking motions. The sight of this beautiful woman making love to me, and the soft, sensual sounds that escaped her lips were driving me rapidly to the edge of passion. Rhonda was so wonderful, and as she began uncontrollably thrusting her body over mine, I allowed myself to become lost in her beauty, in her soft body, and in her passion. She shook, slightly, and then continued to rock as the first wave of pleasure swept over her, and only moments later, Rhonda cried out as her body convulsed in the throes of release. I groaned as her body beckoned for, and then received the seed boiling from my loins in a rush of screaming colors and sensations. She collapsed on top of me, smothering me with her soft lips as she ground her body into mine. We lay there, together in the most intimate of embraces, and she continued to gently caress my shaft with her body, and to rock slightly against me. As I slipped, spent but satiated, from the warm confines of her belly, she rested her cheek on my chest.
I don’t know how long we lay there in each other’s arms, but I know that I wanted her to never leave. We couldn’t say anything; words would have been useless to describe the feelings between us. We spoke to each other with our lips, with our fingertips, with our bodies. Then, kissing me one last time, she rose and dressed. She took my hand, and helped me to my feet, retrieved my cane, and walked me back down the hall to my bed. She helped me slip between the sheets, kissed me gently, and whispered in my ear, “Terry, just remember that I love you,” and was gone. I fell into the sleep of one who has found a great treasure, a treasure meant only for him, and woke only when hands shook me the next morning. Through sleepy eyes, I looked up, expecting to see Rhonda, and was disappointed to see Linda’s plain face. The disappointment must have been apparent, because she laughed and said, “I’m not all that bad, now am I?”
I made some wise crack about having a bad night, and raised to a sitting position so she could take my pulse. It was then that I saw the envelope on the small table beside the bed. After Linda moved to the next bed, I anxiously picked it up, opened it and began to read.
“Terry, I couldn’t tell you last night because it would have ruined the most wonderful evening of my life. You are going home on Monday. Doctor Mills will tell you today, but your orders came through Friday afternoon, and I had to get your file ready to send with you.
I knew we wouldn’t have much time, and I had to tell you that I love you, that I love you so very much. What happened last night was not something I planned; it just happened, but it was more than I had ever hoped to be able to share with you. I know now that I was right to try to separate myself from you, because now I have to try somehow to get over these feelings, and I don’t know if I can. I should have just stopped seeing you, or become just one of your nurses again, but I couldn’t, and now I have to live with the pain of losing you.
Terry, I have to stay here for another six months, and I don’t know where they will send me next, so I will probably never see you again. Just know that for one short moment in time, I loved you very much. I will always love you, I know now, but everything is pulling us apart, and there’s no way to stop it. Please don’t write, because reading your words will open my heart again, and I can’t take the agony of knowing you are out there when I can’t get to you.
I won’t see you again before you leave; the tears would do neither of us any good, and would only make it harder for both of us to part. I hope you loved me as you said, because that does help, and I want you to know that you were the first. They say a girl always remembers her first lover, and that will be both good and bad, I’m afraid.
Terry, take care of yourself, and don’t worry about me. I’ve learned to be tough, and I will learn to live without you, somehow. Go home and find a nice girl who will love you like life itself, who can give you a home and children, and forget this nurse who can’t be with you. You have a wonderful life ahead of you, so make the most of the second chance that has been given you.
With all my love,
Rhonda
I sat on the bed for hours, reading and re-reading the short letter. I walked the grounds. I asked the other nurses how to contact her, but they said she had told them she was going away and didn’t say where.
Monday arrived, and Doctor Mills told me the news that I already knew. I had to feign being happy, because I was not. That morning, I was issued new uniforms and got my orders. In the afternoon, the bus came to take me and a few others to the airport. I boarded the jet, knowing it was taking me away from the woman I loved, and in agony because I could do nothing about it. After hours of endless thoughts of how to find Rhonda again, the jet landed in Seattle, and by that afternoon, I was discharged from the Army and on another jet back to Tennessee.
I felt relieved when I walked up the ramp to the terminal in Nashville and saw Mom and Dad waiting for me. For a few minutes of tearful hugs from both of them, I forgot about the little red haired nurse who was so far away. When I arrived at home, the rest of the family was there, and it wasn’t until I went to bed that night that she came back. For the first time since I left Japan, the full feeling of never seeing Rhonda again hit me. I lay awake, thinking of her, until the first glints of sunlight peeped through the window shade. I finally slept, but fitfully, and only for two hours.
Mom knew something was wrong, something more than my injury. She asked, and suddenly I was her little boy again, spilling out the story of the wonderful nurse who made me a man again when I was just a broken body, and about how I had grown to love her. She cried for me, and tried to help, but in the end, I was still the same, lost and full of sorrow.
I managed to find a job, so I was now financially independent again, and the work took my mind off Rhonda, at least during the day. The nights were hell at first, then slowly the memory receded to unexpected visions of her face accompanies by tremendous bursts of emotion, late a night when I woke from sleep. After six months, these too mostly went away, and her memory became a picture out of focus, and carried only occasional twinges of longing.
I still had to go to the VA Hospital to continue my therapy. The nurses there were nice, and tried to help. I also had to see a psychiatrist, to make sure my injury had not affected me mentally. I could have told the fool that my injury didn’t bother me anymore, but he had his agenda to complete. He ultimately certified me cured, but I wasn’t cured of the little red haired beauty that captured my heart only to be parted by things out of our control.
I had gone to the hospital to get the last checkup before they released me. The doctor examined my leg and the X-rays, and watched as I paraded up and down the short length of the examining room. He pronounced me well, and explained that as time went on, most of the limp would go away. We were walking to the waiting room when I saw a red haired nurse walking ahead of us. I felt the twinge of sadness hit me again, and must have stopped walking, because the doctor touched my shoulder and asked if I was feeling all right. I said that I was, and was making some excuse about daydreaming, when the nurse turned around.
I dropped the cane, and began walking as fast as I could. At the sound of the cane hitting the floor, she looked up, and I knew for sure. She ran the short length of the hall, and I swept her into my arms.
“Rhonda, it’s you, it’s really you. How did you get here? Why didn’t you tell me? I’ve been so…oh, God, it is you. Rhonda…Rhonda…”
She just put her arms around my neck and kissed me, right there in the hall as the doctor looked on with mouth agape, and as other nurses passed and exchanged whispers. We parted, and both burst out laughing when we saw the doctor. Rhonda spoke first.
“Uh, I’m sorry, Doctor Ames. We haven’t seen each other in over six months. I’ll not let this happen again.”
He shook his head, and walked on down the hall. He turned before he opened the door to the waiting room, and smiled as he said, “Rhonda, I’m not that old, no matter what you think. I know what I saw here, and I’m happy for you both. Go take an early lunch. We can do without you for a while.”
Over coffee in the cafeteria, we held hands as she told me how she came to Nashville.
“After you left, I wasn’t the same. I still loved my job, but it was different. Since my enlistment was up at the end of my tour in Japan, I decided to get out. I did want to stay in government service, so I inquired about jobs with the VA. When this job came up, I remembered that you lived in Nashville, so I jumped at it.” She lowered her eyes, embarrassed. “I guess I was hoping you still remembered me. I ran across your file last week, and was working up the courage to call you.” She looked back up at me. “Terry, if you’ve found someone…well, don’t worry. I won’t cause any trouble.”
I squeezed her hand, and said, “Do you remember that night when you asked me if I felt up to a walk?”
“Yes, I remember. That walk is one of the things I couldn’t forget.”
“Rhonda, do you feel up to another walk with me? I don’t know where this one will lead, but I think it might be a very long walk. I’d…I would like it to last the rest of our lives.”
She smiled, and I saw a single tear begin to run down her cheek. “Let’s see if we’re still the way we remember, before we start that really long walk. After all, you don’t need me to take care of you anymore.”
“That’s right, Rhonda. Now, it’s my turn to take care of you.”