Seeds of Fear

Hadn't been for twenty-plus years.

You wan me suckee you good, GI?

Gil pushed away from the thin sheet-marble column and ran a shaky hand through thinning hair. Tried to force an even shakier smile to his lips, but found that particular action as impossible as trying to draw a long- forgotten gun.

To shoot a long-dead whore.

watching him

He would have laughed out loud if he'd been able to stop panting. The reaction and the (fear) memories had undoubtedly been the direct result of the '182nd Point 5' reunion dinner he'd just suffered through.

And wondered, again — for the hundredth time that evening, actually — why the hell he'd suddenly felt obliged to sit through an overpriced meal and down watery scotch alongside men whom he shared nothing in common with except the number 182.5.

The exact middle of the summer of '69 draft choice.

If you didn't count leap year.

Which Uncle Sam didn't.

Why after all these years? was still playing like a broken record in his mind when the evening's 'Reopening of Old Wounds' had drifted away from firefights and cheap pussy and focused on the current administration's brownnosing attempt to reestablish trade agreements with the Nam.

The boys of the '182nd Point 5 Club' thought that was a bad idea.

And Gil had kept quiet, sucking down three times his usual two-drink limit and making himself a promise he intended to keep this time: No more reunions with men incapable of putting the past behind them.

Like he'd done.

At least until tonight.

'So ya wanna suckee or not?'

Gil lowered his hand slowly, remembering the side arm at the last moment, and quickly grabbed the restaurant's brass handrail instead.

still watching him

'What?'

The vague female shape stepped away from the line of parked cars and started a slow, cautious advance — high heels clicking against the sidewalk like bamboo chimes, her body moving beneath the minidress like a snake trying to shed its skin.

Gil enjoyed the show until she stepped into the light and tossed her head. A flash of bright blue (the color of a peacock's breast) stabbed him in the gut.

You wan me suckee you good, GI?

'What?'

The heart-shaped face he remembered (expected) melted under the light into a haggard scowl topped with a Raggedy Anne fright wig. Sighing, the hooker tossed the fringed blue scarf back over her shoulders, exposing tired-looking breasts that had been cinched into a black leather vest, and stared up at him. Ran a jaundiced tongue over corpse-pale lips as she rolled nearly colorless eyes.

You wan me suckee you good, GI?

Gil felt his backbone mold itself to the smooth marble sheeting.

'Shit, man,' the hooker hissed at him, 'you from outta town or sumthin'? You wanna blow job or not?'

He couldn't tell her age — somewhere between twenty and death was as close as he could come — but the streets had already done a number on her. Gil could almost smell the coppery sweet stench of decay rising from beneath the short skirt.

Could almost hear the skin on his balls go snap crackle pop as they shriveled at the thought of her tongue and teeth closing over his —

'I'll do it for twenty-five,' she said, taking a step closer, running knobby-fingered hands down the front of her thighs. 'What'dya say?'

Gil shifted his weight, feeling the solid wall of protection at his back give way to a sweating chill as he focused on the bright

sun-faded palms already dripping onto the tin-roofed plywood stalls where bird-legged children ran between the coils of barbed wire and a heart-shape-faced whore in a blue dress walked past a stinking, dilapidated bar called the

San Francisco skyline towering overhead.

… as he tried not to breathe in air that suddenly seemed thick, heavy with the stench of urine and burning shit and fish drifting in from the Bay.

… as he rushed down the polished marble stair, ducking at the last moment to avoid the outstretched claws. As he listened to another voice whispering seductively in his ear.

you — wan — me — sue — kee — you — good — G — I became Gil's marching cadence as he crossed against the light and turned in to the deeper canyons of the Financial District.

He didn't even stop at the opposite side of the street to hail a cab — something he never would have done (considering the five-block technical climb back to his apartment) if it hadn't been for the booze. and the reopened wounds his «buddies» of the 182nd Point 5 had picked at all night.

'You remember those friggin' 'bars' down on Plantation Road?'

'Man, oh man. my wiener never ate so good.'

'Shit, yeah — them B-girls were the best, man. You remember, Gil?'

I remember.

'You remember, Gil?'

'I remember.'

'But ya gotta be careful, pal. 'cause you never know which one could be workin' for ol' Charlie. Right. gotta watch their eyes, man.'

'Right. Gotta watch their eyes,' he whispered, and caught the reflection of his own eyes in the subdued, night-lit windows of the district's «trendier» boutiques and storefront offices.

eyes watching

God, he was getting old.

Getting? Fuck, he was old. Despite the hand-tailored suits ('customized' to hang loose around the softness at his belt line and wide over his stooped shoulders) and weekly salon trims, Gil could see his father and grandfather where there had once been a hard-muscled, hard-assed boy who always thought he'd be that way.

Back when 'getting old' meant surviving your tour of duty.

The good ol' days.

Gil made a sound in the back of his throat that might have been a laugh if it had been any other night and he hadn't downed quite so many waterlogged whiskeys and smiled. Flipped his reflection the single-digit salute.

And momentarily forgot how to breathe.

you wan me suckee you good, GI?

The large poster dominated the travel agent's window, its young Vietnamese model — complete with straw 'Ah so' hat and white silk ao dai pajamas — holding a bouquet of jungle orchids: half- turned toward the camera. A shy smile on her lips. The pale green cast of her eyes a silent indictment to her racial impurity. Either Amerasian or Eurasian.

Gil was surprised the gooks had let her live, let alone become their country's poster child.

She looked about the right age, probably no more than

eighteen, GI. and she no do this much like other girls. I keep her special for you, GI. just eighteen

GI

twenty, and twenty years ago there was more than enough American DNA swimming in the ol' gene pool to