He starts his next sentence, interrupting your train of thought. “My group was torn apart, so I went south until the dust season came and people began dying.”
“I guess,” he continues, meditatively, “I realized there was no way I could ever return home.” He pauses, smiling slightly. “So I made here home.”
I snort wryly. “Thanks, MacArthur. Damn him! Ridgway should have been running this show from the start.” The man looks offended.
“I'm sorry?”
“You heard me. Big Chief's head was too big. Wait,” I grin, “you don't actually think nuking the crap out of China was a good idea, do you?”
He frowns. “We couldn't just leave the North to the communists, could we?”
“Yeah, and that worked out so well. Glad everybody's living happily now, aren't they?”
“Nobody could have foreseen this.”
“He could have listened to Truman!”
He stews. You're annoyed that the conversation went this way.
You stand and place a hand on the rafter overhead. “You made a fine place. How long it'd take you?”
He looks uneasy. “Umm, a few months. The, uh, wood here helped.”
I nod tersely. Must've been building it since... one, two, three, maybe four – so March, February, wait. How'd he get down here so fast?
I frown and look at him. “When'd you say you got here?”
He shakes his head. “I'd rather not talk about it. It was... a bad time.”
“No, no, something's not adding up. Where were you stationed?”
“Look. I don't want to talk about it.”
“Don't remember, do you? Can you recall what branch you were part of?”
“Stop.”
“What are you, Army? No wonder you never got over MacArthur!”
He shakes his head and stands. “Get out of my house.” I stare him down.
“Navy, then? Huh? You look like you could be Navy.”
He walks to the far wall, murmuring weakly. “Stop. Leave. Get out.”
“Look,” I raise my voice and take a step towards him, “all I want to know is whether you're an anchor cla-” He turns around, gun in his hand, barrel pointed at me.
I stay where I stand, frozen. You watch with wide eyes.
“I said leave.”
Slowly, very slowly, you reach for your bandana and tie it around your face. Ace stands quietly and exits without a word. I blink, breaking my lock with man's unwavering gaze, and follow his suite.
The cloth door flutters closed after us and we stand squinting against the blinding light.
“Well,” I start, “that was rather unpleasant.”
Ace grumbles. “Bastard. There's more of us. Let's us shoot 'em first.”
No.
I don't care who he is, he was one of us. “We leave him.” I walk away.
“But he was gonna shoot us! He-” I don't have time for his rants. I get in his face and roar.
“We're! Leaving!”
I turn around and Nurse is behind me. She looks like she's about to give me lip. I glare at her.
Dad meekly hands you the empty water bags as you walk past him. You tie them to your belt and we walk along the river.
“Sooo,” Nurse complains, “we're not getting any water?”
You shake your head.
She scoffs. “I woulda drunk the laundry water.”
“We're going to that village,” I inform her. She grunts in vague approval.
The river curves and we come upon five somber planks standing watch over mounds of earth, each painted white with three squares of black characters. You sigh and look away.
Dad wonders aloud what happened back there.
“Ohae,” you mutter. He and Nurse both nod in comprehension.
I shake my head to clear my thoughts.
What do I feel right now? Mmm, I've not eaten since that rabbit. Too long ago. I'm hungry.
“Do you know what would be good to eat right now?”
You look at me with disgust.
“Rice.” I smile. “Delicious, light rice.”
You stare at me like I'm made of the stuff.
“Just a bit of vinegar, right? Sushi rice, like they had on base in Manila.”
I laugh and start singing.
“Sushi rice, sushi rice, sushi rice...”
We walk and walk. Walking's interesting, it turns out. You get to see the world.
When you walk, you're just putting one foot in front of the other foot. Until you trip, you guess. All the great people of the world walked at one time or another.
You've done a lot of walking lately. You used to think it was a bad thing, a thing that you shouldn't do, but you keep finding yourself enjoying it. It makes your body feel fresh and shows you everything you pass. You're not going so slowly that you get bored and stop watching, and you're not going so fast you cannot see anything.
You're glad you can still walk. It fills you with life and lets you realize that you're not like the eagles you used to watch. Walking is an adventure. Walking is powerful, far more powerful than any gun. Your best defense is your legs.
You used to dream about ghosts, but you'd just run from them and forget about them.
It's what you did in Shenyang, and it's what you've been doing ever since.
They say people used to hunt things long ago by just walking. Walking and walking, always behind the beast, so it could never rest or drink or eat. They would walk and walk until the spirit left the beast and it lay down and let the people kill it.
You wonder if you're the people or the beast.
Where are you walking, anyways?
You think for a moment, then decide.
You're walking to Busan.