LITMIR.BIZ

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traded. “What’s your name?” I asked.

      “Melody.”

      “Melody, like a song.”

      “Yeah. My mom was a singer.”

      “Really?”

      She nodded and bit into the egg sandwich. “This is good.” She lifted the bread. “Your mom put mayonnaise, salt, and pepper on it.”

      “You’re ‘Charley Brindley,’” Patsy said.

      “Yes. Mom calls me ‘Charley Eye.’ You’re ‘Patsy McCarthy.’”

      “I guess everyone knows me because I’m so fat.”

      “I knew you because you’re in my science class. Do you read a lot?”

      “I love to read.”

      “Me, too,” I said. “This grape jelly is really sweet. I like it.”

      My brain seemed to warm as it hummed. It was very pleasant, watching it fill with memories. But it was also disturbing.

      Where is all this coming from? Has it been there all along and I just couldn’t find it?

      “Is your mind full of memories?” I asked Melody.

      “Sure,” she said. “I can remember everything back to when I was about two. Nothing before that.”

      “I’m the same,” Patsy said. “I wonder why we can’t remember things from when we were babies?”

      My memories seemed to be of the future, rather than the past.

      Things yet to happen? How can that be?

      “Do you have memories, like, from your future self?” I asked.

      “I daydream a lot,” Patsy said. “About things I want to do after high school.”

      “We better go,” Melody said. “It’s almost class time.”

      We walked together toward the building, going slow because of Melody’s braces.

      Inside the school, we were met with a chorus of ‘Pee Waldy Patsy.’

      “Hey,” I whispered to the two girls, “let’s throw it back at them.”

      I told them what we should do. They smiled and nodded.

      “Ember and Justin, sitting in a tree,” we chanted, “K-I-S-S-I-N-G. First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes Ember with a baby carriage.”

      It was a silly childhood ditty, but it had the desired effect. Several kids laughed.

      Ember was stunned for a moment. “Pee Waldy…”

      We sang the kissing song again and advanced on the four girls.

      Ember stopped, swallowed her next words, then turned to hurry away. Her three friends followed.

      “Good job,” I said to Patsy and Melody.

      “That felt good,” Patsy said.

      “Yes, it did,” I said. “Lunch tomorrow?”

      “Heck, yeah,” they said together.

* * * * *

      P.E. was the last class of the day. I hated it. I was almost six feet tall, strong, my muscles well-toned from working on the farm. But I didn’t know what to do with my strength.

      Sometimes we ran the track or did side-straddle-hops; anything for exercise.

      This time, we went to the gym to practice basketball.

      I sat on the bleachers, still trying to sort my stampeding thoughts. I was in a war, in a jungle, but it wasn’t World War II, the one that had just ended. This was unlike anything I’d seen in the newsreels. The uniforms were different; some were just flak jackets over green tees and fatigue trousers. And the weapons. They, or we, didn’t carry heavy M-1 rifles…they were smaller, lightweight.

      M-16s!

      An aircraft flew over us, low, just above the jungle canopy. Very fast. It dropped napalm on an enemy position ahead of us.

      That’s an Navy F-4 jet fighter plane. What the heck is happening to me?

      “Brindley!” Coach Jameson shouted. “Care to join us?”

      “Yes, sir.” I jumped up and ran onto the court.

      The coach was a great guy. He always treated me like a regular kid, even though I was awkward and clumsy.

      Coach tossed the basketball to me. I caught it and turned it in my hands.

      I’ve done this before. Where? When? Vietnam…Da Nang. What the heck?

      I spun the ball, then dribbled it.

      Crammer came to stand in front of me. He took a defensive stance.

      I watched his eyes as I bounced the ball.

      He grinned, then went for the ball.

      I stepped to the side. He followed my movement. I faked to the right, then went left, still dribbling. He was off-balance. I took a jump shot. The ball swished through the hoop.

      Everyone stopped to stare at me.

      I ran to get the ball, then dribbled it away from the hoop, turned, and made another jump shot. Perfect.

      Crammer ran for the ball, dribbled it out to mid-court.

      I ran for him.

      He grinned and started toward the hoop.

      I swatted the ball away from him, dribbled around two other players, and made a layup.

      When the ball came down from the hoop, I grabbed it and passed it to another player.

      Playing on a dirt court at the military camp in Vietnam. Very hot. Kabilis and I had cut our camo trousers into shorts. Six GIs on the court. Three of us had pulled off our regulation issue green tees and tossed them aside. Shirts and skins, we called the two teams.

      The boy I’d passed the ball to, dribbled, took a jump shot, and missed.

      I got the rebound, then threw the ball one-handed, bouncing it off the backboard. It ringed the hoop, then fell through.

      The Marine commander gave us two weeks’ furlough. Kabilis and I went to Bangkok. We met…

      Crammer bent his knees, raised the ball for a jump shot. Just as he released the ball, I jumped to take it out of the air, then dribbled out and made the shot he tried to make.

      We played hard for thirty minutes.

      The other players slowly dropped out, sitting on the floor, catching their breath.

      Crammer continued to dog me, trying to get the ball.

      I ran for the hoop, bouncing the ball. He tripped me from behind. I went down hard but held onto the ball.

      Gunfire, mortar exploding all around us.

      I stood, still holding the ball under my arm.

      We were cut off in the jungle. I was a medic, working on a wounded soldier. More gunfire from the edge of the clearing, Kabilis went down, bleeding bad.

      “Brindley!” Crammer said. “Come on.” He tried to swat the ball from my arm.

      I passed it behind myself, to my other hand.

      We fought the Viet Cong all night, losing three of our men, plus six wounded. What happened to Kabilis?

      I tossed the ball to Crammer and went toward the bleachers, where I sat with my head in my hands.

      “Charley.” The coach sat beside me. “You okay?”

      No, something’s wrong with me.

      “Yeah, I’m fine.”

      “Johnson,” the coach said. “Bring that exercise pad. I think Charley better lie down for a few minutes.”

      Pad?

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