Free Shooting the Moon by Frances O'Roark Dowell Page A

unit?”
    Private Hollister began pushing his mop along the length of the floor. “Rec center’s a temporaryassignment for me. I’m a radio operator, 1st Signal Troop, but they needed somebody here this summer and I was the one who got pulled for the duty. They got another guy coming from Fort Sill sometime in September; he’ll take over here and I’ll go back to where I came from.”
    Then he stopped mopping and looked over at me. “You think your dad knows who I am? I mean, have you ever mentioned me to him?”
    â€œYeah, of course. I’ve been keeping him updated on our games and everything.”
    â€œWhat kind of stuff do you tell him? I mean, good things? Things that would make him think I was a good guy or a good worker or whatever?”
    I laughed. “What are you talking about? Why do you care what the Colonel thinks about you?”
    Private Hollister put the mop away in the supply closet and walked over to his desk before answering me. He picked up our game notebook and held it like it was a good-luck charm. “There’s some rumors going around post. About how they’re going to send some guys from 1st Signal Troop over to Vietnam pretty soon. Radio operators.”
    My mouth went dry. “That’s you.”
    Private Hollister slapped the notebook against his knee. “Yep, that’s me. It’s just a rumor that’s been going around, but I wondered if your dad had said anything about it to you. Because he has some control over that situation.”
    â€œThe Colonel has some control over who goes to Vietnam?”
    â€œWell, yeah, from Hood, I mean. If they’re gonna move some troops, then Col. Dexter is part of the group that says who’s going. He’s the chief of staff, right? The adjutant general reports to him, gives him the list of who he thinks should go, Col. Dexter signs the orders. Your daddy’s a big-shot wheeler-dealer, I don’t need to tell you that.”
    Private Hollister put down the notebook. Then he walked to the pool table and picked up a stick, examining it as if it were an item of some interest to him. “If they send me to Vietnam, my mom’s gonna go nuts.”
    â€œThey won’t send you,” I insisted. They couldn’t send him. His brother had already died there. It wouldn’t be fair to send Private Hollister, too.
    Private Hollister looked up at me. “They will if they want to.”
    â€œBut I don’t want them to.”
    That made Private Hollister laugh. “I figured you’d think this was the opportunity of a lifetime for me. An all-expenses-paid trip to Vietnam. Maybe round trip, maybe not. Go live the life of a real soldier.”
    I looked down at my feet. “I guess.”
    â€œWell, do me a favor, okay? Let me know if you hear anything. Your dad might say something to you, since he knows we work together.”
    â€œThat wouldn’t be Army protocol. The Colonel doesn’t tell me anything about work. Nothing like that, anyway.”
    Private Hollister lined up a shot on the pool table. “Maybe you could ask him, then. I mean, ask him what he knows.”
    I looked at the clock. It was almost one. I needed to be at the Lorenzos’ house in fifteen minutes, to babysit Cindy while Mrs. Lorenzo went to the commissary. “I have to go now,” I said. “I have a babysitting job this afternoon.”
    â€œThink about it, Jamie. If it’s gonna happen, I need to know. I got to get prepared, you know, in my mind.”
    As I walked out the doors, the sudden crack of the balls scattering across the pool table made me flinch. I remembered something that Sgt. Byrd had told me, that he dreamed about Vietnam almost every night, and some nights he woke up to find himself crouched in the dark between the bunks in his barracks, his whole body alert, listening.
    Listening for what?
I’d asked him.
    The sound before the sound,
he’d