Deliverance - Hooch and Matt's Story (2 page)

“You have to tell me your name.” The voice insisted, the English…foreign, and Hooch, unable to find one single clear thought, couldn’t understand why he noticed the accent.

“Bozic, Hubert, Sergeant First Class, 546798362.” Name. Rank. Number. Hardly audible. That was it. Another round of interrogation, all a trick, but at least it didn’t hurt right now. Not yet.

But no pain followed, instead he felt himself moved, carefully, oh so carefully, and yet he cried out hoarsely. Hardly a sound came out, even though his screams reverberated in his head, and then he was placed onto something. Lying down. Flat. On his back. The moment he was horizontal on the stretcher and the pressure was taken off the broken pelvis, he passed out. Again.

When he came to, he was in a different place. A room. Lying on the ground. Space. No stench. After a moment he made out the woman’s face again, crouched beside him. Someone else, a man, touching him, and the touch felt strange. It took him a moment to realize the man was wearing rubber gloves.

“Can you understand me, Sgt Bozic?”

“Hooch,” he whispered.

She smiled and nodded. “Hooch, of course. Did you understand what I said earlier? I am a delegate from the International Committee of the Red Cross, and I brought a medical doctor with me, Dr Mirabeau. We are here to ensure that you are being taken care of, Sgt…” she stopped herself, “Hooch.”

“I…don’t…” so hard to form words beyond name and number, “have to…go back?”

“No, not if we can help it, and trust me, we
can
help it. The rebel force has contacted us to negotiate on their behalf and your country has agreed.”

Hooch nodded.

“Tell me what happened, while Dr Mirabeau is working on making you more comfortable.”

Hooch looked at her, hardly noticing how the soiled uniform was cut off him, and how he was cleaned down. Telling her, best he could, what had happened and what he knew; what had been done to him and how he’d survived. He was put on a drip, cleaned up and sponged down, fed water

clean, clear water

and given bites of food. Shot full with antibiotics, his arm was set and fixed with plaster, his wounds treated and bandaged, and powder and potions administered, to kill the parasites that had taken residence in his weakened body. His pelvis stabilized with a brace, after some clean and simple clothes were put onto him, Hooch was allowed to write an open letter. He hardly managed, his hand shook too badly, too weak to hold the pen, but she helped and they gave him time, precious time. A letter to his family, but how much he wanted to write to his lover instead. His family had to do, hoping that somehow, against all odds, it would reach the one to whom it actually mattered if he lived or died.

She folded the sheet of paper, to show it to Hooch’s captors for censor, before it was sent off to the American Red Cross. She briefly smiled down at him. “Hooch,” it was comforting to hear his name, he thought, no longer a faceless number, “your friends are thinking of you.”

Matt.
Matt
.

A ghost of a smile crossed his face as painkillers were shot into his body. By that time he was drifting, barely taking in how she explained they would make sure he was treated right while they were going to work as neutral intermediaries. When they finally left, he lay on his back, unmoving, a blanket over his body, and a bottle of water and edible food beside him. Clean. Lying down. No arms to hold him up, no fingers to feed him rotting scraps. No one. Just silence. Sleep. Exhaustion. The memory of someone so dear…the only memory that had survived. He slept, undisturbed, without those who had saved his life by holding him up and who continued to fight on every day and night to stay on their feet and stay alive, with no one to save them.

He didn’t know that she was throwing up outside. Didn’t hear her retch and didn’t see the doctor wordlessly handing her a packet of tissues.

He was asleep, for the first time in an eternity in hell, and he knew that from now on he would not simply vanish. He had a name, a face, and a number that was known to the world, not just to his captors. No corpse to be shuffled out in the morning. No nameless body, burnt or ditched, and no faceless being, contorted in pain, dying alone, to be missing in action.

He had a name. He had become part of the machinery. The old lady in Geneva, as she had called it, would take care of him. He trusted that old lady.

Because she was all he had.

* * *

Hooch was not aware of the negotiations that happened outside. With the ICRC as neutral intermediary, the rebels had already gained what they wanted: the humiliation of the US, via its military, and that humiliation was broadcasted across the world on the news channels that had been greedy enough to ignore the rules of ethical behavior.

It was push and pull for a while, until the rebels agreed his release, under conditions and demands that never saw the light of day outside of some US headquarters.

December 1997,
Military Hospital
United States of America

Matt sat on the plastic chair beside the bed. Legs braced, knees open, his cap on the small side table. Hands trembling so hard, he’d been gripping his own thighs since he sat down, to keep himself from touching.

Hooch. Pale, thin and haggard, with buzz-cut head and badly shaved face. Lying on a water bed to keep the pressure off the pelvic area, supine and still, the lower left arm in plaster, and all Matt could think of was how much Hooch hated to sleep on his back.

The pelvic brace was just about visible under the sheet that had been draped over Hooch, and a drainage tube vanished beneath the cloth. Matt could see glimpses of small burn wounds on the chest, looking closed but angry, and he wanted to hurt whoever had done that.

Hooch. Alive against all odds, and all he could do was sit there, push a small portable DVD player into the other man’s good hand and pretend he was just a buddy, paying a visit. He tried to come up with some stupid bullshit a buddy would utter

and failed. miserably. He couldn’t get a single word past that fucking lump in his throat that he couldn’t swallow down, no matter how hard he tried, and it hurt like a motherfucker. Couldn’t even look at Hooch, who was checking out the pack of DVDs by lifting each one to eye level. Looking at him caused the sting in Matt’s eyes to get worse and he stared at his white-knuckled hands instead.

“Thanks.” Hooch’s husky drawl tore Matt out of his catatonic state. The voice sounded disused and hoarse.

Matt wanted to touch, kiss, hold, reassure himself that Hooch really was there, alive, but all he did was press out a desperate: “shit!” He couldn’t keep it up anymore. Fuck the charade, he wanted to curse or cry, or maybe even laugh. Insanely.

Matt’s trembling hand raised to his face, his head dropped, elbows on his thighs, and he covered his face with his hands when he couldn’t stop the silent sobs that were heaving his chest and shaking his shoulders. He made no sound, except for one strangled choke. He couldn’t get his goddamned act together, despite being all too aware of having nothing but a thin cloth partition between Hooch’s bed and the next. In a ward full of nurses, soldiers, and their visitors.

Hooch remained silent, left hand in his lap, the right on his chest. Silent, as long as it took Matt before he finally drew in a shaky breath, fighting out of the breakdown with all the strength he could muster. Too much truth, too raw, too open. He rubbed his face vigorously, realizing that he couldn’t go back to pretending he was nothing but a goddamned buddy. Eyes red rimmed, Matt studied Hooch’s impassive face, the dark eyes, and the whole

silent

man. Don’t ask don’t tell had never been that much of an issue before, until now. He’d gone insane with the not-knowing and the fear of loss. Not just a buddy, not even a fuck-buddy, but the man he loved. He couldn’t deal with the lie any more, but he was tied to its confines.

Matt shook his head, unable to say what he thought, let alone what he felt.

Hooch didn’t say anything either, looking up at Matt, without a twitch.

Not that Matt had expected anything, and he shrugged, once again shaking his head. Suddenly feeling misplaced, as if this whole shit had happened to someone else and he had stumbled into a crazy soap opera. He was about to get up and get away, when Hooch opened his mouth, and Matt stayed put, leaning down, to hear the quiet murmur.

“When it got really bad, when nothing else got me through, I was thinking of you. How you tilt your head when you laugh; the way you eat your cereal really fast so that it doesn’t go soggy; how you squint your eyes and scrunch up your face into a grimace, every time anyone mentions eggs.” Hooch dropped his voice even more, until Matt had to lean closer to hear the whisper. “Your shit-eating grin when you wave your ass into my face, telling me to fuck you. The sound you make when you come, going straight to my cock and blowing my mind. The smell of your sweat right after sex
…
” Hooch paused, pulling in a careful breath. “When I wasn’t sure if I could make it through another hour, I thought of your face that looks so damned young when you’re asleep, and I remembered how you sometimes say my name, and how the sound of your voice makes me ache inside.”

Hooch fell silent and Matt stared at him. Wide-eyed, frozen in shock. Insides churning, a pain he hadn’t known before, travelling from his heart throughout his body, and it felt so fucking good. Understanding with every fiber of his being what Hooch had said in too many words. More than he’d ever used before, and without those three simple ones that would have sufficed.

Matt felt his eyes sting again but a smile grew on his face. Too much emotion again, but of an entirely different kind. “I don’t…” his voice trembled, “scrunch up my face.” Couldn’t trust his voice, as shaky as his hands.

Hooch grinned, he looked as if he had shrugged had that not hurt too badly.

“Alright, I do.” Matt whispered, “but it’s better than throwing your underwear onto the wet bathroom floor.”

Hooch let out a dry huff of laughter, grimacing at the slight jostling of his body.

Matt fell quiet again. Companionable now in the silence, looking at Hooch while vigorously wiping his eyes, then settling into a wobbly
grin. They sat like that for a long while. Hooch checking out the small DVD player, Matt helping him, a damn fine excuse to touch now and then, while every movement could be overlooked by the nurses.

“Five more minutes.” One of them announced as she walked past. Just a few more minutes before he had to leave and fly back to his own camp.

Hooch suddenly murmured, “I want to hear that sound again.”

Words and voice twisting Matt’s guts in the most delicious way. “You will,” he whispered.

Hooch nodded, lips quirking up in the customary half-grin, before he reached out and took Matt’s hand for a moment. Holding longer than a buddy should.

“Till then.”

February 1998, United States of America

Several weeks later, Hooch was let out of hospital and into subsequent aftercare. Refusing to go back to Fort Bragg, where he wouldn’t have anyone take care of him and would have to get hospitalized again, and equally refusing to be taken to his family’s ranch in Texas, he demanded to be sent to a friend instead. In his special circumstances, the request had been granted. That friend had a small apartment and time to take care of him

which he lied about

and who was willing to take over the task

which was nothing but the truth. He had been flown to the nearest town, then taken in an ambulance to the local hospital.

After having been checked over, signed in as an outpatient for physiotherapy and set up with crutches, walker, and been put into a wheelchair, he was given transport, which took him to Matt’s apartment. Matt was still on base, working, and would arrive in an hour. Hooch somehow managed to get into the elevator, and with the help of walker and crutches back out again, and into the wheelchair. Being able to get about, no matter how laborious and painful it was, gave him a sense of freedom that was unparalleled to anything he’d experienced since the mission.

When Matt returned home, Hooch was lying flat on the bed, fully dressed, but with the remote in his hand and channel surfing. He was glad that Matt had no idea how he’d cried out when he’d got himself out of the wheelchair and onto the bed, for the first time on his own and without any supportive aids. He’d succeeded, though, and the independence had made up for all the pain. Ignoring that he’d left the drugs in the living room and really couldn’t face getting up, not even for a piss.

“Hooch?” Matt called out from the hallway.

“In the bedroom.” Even shouting caused pain and Hooch rolled his eyes at the annoyance of it all.

A couple of seconds later Matt stood in the doorway. Still in uniform, running a hand over his scalp. The smile on his face grew bigger and bigger until it lit up his whole face, grinning from ear to ear. “Shit, never thought I’d be so glad to see you in my bed, even though you’re dressed.”

“Yeah, you try taking the fucking socks off with that.” Hooch pointed at the pelvic brace over his jeans. When his shirt sleeve moved up, Matt saw that the plaster was gone.