“Sgt. Bass, the escorts are here.”
“Thanks, Tim.”

It was hot and humid in the Kuwaiti air. Sgt Benjamin Bass stood from his seat on concrete ‘K-rail’ and moved towards the group of young medics and other non-infantry soldiers. As he neared them he stepped into the sun.

“Good afternoon. My name is Sergeant Bass. For the next eight hours, I will be your boss.” He spoke calmly with a half-hearted smile. “I’m a nice guy, though, so all is well.” Silence. “Well, anyway, I assume you all know what your job is right?” Silence again. “Well, your job is TCN (Third Country Nationals) escort duty. It’s simple. It means me and my men make sure the vehicles are clean and then one of you will hop in with the smelly bastards and ride around the base until they leave making sure they don’t try to blow shit up. Is that clear?” Silence yet again. “I said is that clear!”
“YES SERGEANT!”
“Good.” He smiled and lit a cigarette. “Now if you’ll all see my secretary, Specialist Messer, and give him your names, I’ll be in touch with you as you are needed.” He walked away to meet with the Staff Sergeant he was replacing as Sergeant of the guard. “Oh,” he turned, “there is cold water in the cooler, so, stay hydrated.”
“Step up and line up, people.” Tim Messer shouted.

Bass walked off as the grumbling came from the group. He laughed to himself.

“Fucking pogs.” (Pronounced with a long “o” sound)

He met with SSG Allen and made the proper hand off. It was currently 1500 hours and 3rd Squad of 3rd Platoon was now in charge of the main gate of the US military installation at the Kuwaiti International Airport. He returned to his seat on the k-rail and opened a bottle of water. His radio was crackle to life and he would respond and call for an “escort.” Over the first hour, he had only sent out six of the twelve. It was a slow Friday.

“Excuse me, Sgt. Bass?” A voice came from his right. He looked to see a short female medic standing at parade-rest to his right. Her boonie-cap seemed too big for her head, but it brought a smile to the sergeant’s face. He scanned her nametag for a name.
“Yes, Specialist…” He stopped, mid-sentence.
“Yes. It says Dickman.” The voice snapped.
“Wow. You guys got fucked at Ellis Island.” He laughed.
“I wouldn’t know, Sergeant.” She snapped.
“Sorry. Just trying to be funny. So, what can I do for you, Specialist…,” He stopped. “Do you have a first name?”
“I wanted… what?”
“What’s your name?”
“Uh… Angie. Sergeant.”
“Well, Angie, what can I do for you?”
“Oh… where’s the bathroom?”
“Right back there.” He pointed about 50 meters over her left shoulder, slightly hidden by the tower over-looking the main entry.
“Thanks!” She smiled and walked off, stopping about five feet from him. “I mean, thank you, sergeant.”
“You need to calm down, specialist. I’m not going to eat you.”
“Sorry, I’m just not a fan of you infantry guys… My best friend was in the airborne. And he… well, he got killed a few months ago.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“You all walk around like your shit doesn’t stink and people get killed.”
“I, too, lost a friend recently. And he wasn’t even a grunt. He was an engineer… Got shot by a sniper while trying to fix a generator.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“My point, specialist, is that we’re all just as screwed out here. Regardless of being a pog or not.”
“Pog?”
“Persons other than Grunts.”
“Well, you guys just walk around like you own the place. And most infantry guys are complete dicks who get their jollies from fighting.”
“Well, I’m not… but we do eat babies, my young medic.” He smiled jokingly.
“I hear they taste of chicken!” She half-laughed as she left for the port-o-john.
“Go pee.” He half-ordered. “Pogs.” He said to himself as he buried his head in his journal.

The next few hours passed slowly. The dinner truck came and went and the twelve escorts had each had at least one or two rounds with the TCNs. As the evening darkened he made his rounds to each of the six posts of the main gate, finally returning to his hardened concrete sofa. As he did, he noticed one of the escorts scribbling away in a notebook. It was the young specialist from earlier. He approached, trying to see what she was drawing.

“Whatcha got there?” He asked, taking a seat next to her.
“Nothing.” She snapped clutching the book to her chest.
“Come on…. I draw. Let me see.” He smiled. “I’m not really a baby-eating monster.”
“I don’t show anyone my drawings.”
“Then why do you draw?” He said, standing again to light a cigarette.
“What?”
“What’s the point of drawing if you’re the only one who sees them?”
“I… It’s just how I like it.”
“Well, you suck.” He laughed.
“Lies!” she smiled widely. Lowering the sketchbook.
“Sweet!” the tall sergeant mused at the now visible sketch.
“What?”
“You’re drawing. I like it.” He smiled as her face turned red.
“It’s… it’s my friend, Levi as a Jedi. I know, it’s stupid…”
“It’s not stupid. I like it.” He put one foot on the k-rail and leaned on it. “I told you… I draw too.”
“You gonna show me your drawings now?”
“Tell you what, I’ll bring my sketchbook next time I’m on duty… and if you’re lucky, you’ll see them.”
“Lucky eh? Are you some sort of Michelangelo or something?”
“Oh, hell no… I meant you’ll be lucky if we’re on the same shift again… because these other guys ARE baby-eating dicks.” He stomped his cigarette into the sand. “And they don’t like artsy people.”
“I’ll be sure to keep an eye out for evil, art-hating grunts.” She smiled.
“So,” he continued with the small talk. “Where’re you from?”
“Casketville USA.”
“Excuse me?”
“Batesville, Indiana…. We make caskets.”
“No shit? I’m from Shelbyville!”

His radio crackled on his chest.

“3-4, this is Bobby. We need three escorts.” The radio went silent.
“Roger.” He sighed. “Sending them out.” He looked to the young specialist. “According to my list… you’re up.” He smiled at her and turned to the eleven young men and women mulling around him. “As are Johnson and McDaniel! See specialist Montoya through the gap in the wall.”
“Will you be here when I get back?” Specialist Dickman asked as she stuffed her sketchbook in her bag.
“Depends on when you get back I guess.” He smiled. “But we do aim to please here in alpha company.”
“Uh-huh… I bet.” She grinned as she left the area and headed to the awaiting trucks.

The sergeant peered over the k-rail watching the three as they met up with his men on the other side of the wall.

“Sergeant Bass!” the voice of one of his men caught his attention.
“Yeah?” He turned to see Specialist Messer.
“Aww, are you oogling that girl?” he teased.
“Shut it, Timmy.”

The hours passed. At 2200 the men of 3rd squad were loaded into the truck and headed back to their tents for the night. No sign of the young specialist.

“You look upset, dude.” Specialist Messer shouted over the rattling of the 5-ton truck as it shook its way back onto base and to their tents.
“What? No. I’m just thinking.”
“About that skinny chick from earlier?” He smiled.
“If you must know, Tim… Yes.”
“Aww, big Sergeant Bass has a crush on some medic.”
“Tim, I will shoot you.”
“Yeah, well, can we go get something to eat first?”
“I suppose so.” He paused. “Tubby.”
“I’m not fat!” He laughed punching his sergeant on the arm.

The men returned to their tents and put their gear away under their racks. Within thirty minutes Sgt Bass met three of the men in his squad and headed off to the D-FAC (Dining Facility). They joked and made their way through the lines grabbing their food and finding a table close to one of the televisions. They ate and teased one another as the time passed. Soon it was 0130 hours and the men were grabbing an ice cream sandwich on the way out of the large, circus-tent to go play video games in their tents.

A few days had passed when the squad was finally on duty at the exit gate of the base. Here is where TCN escorts were dropped off before being returned to the main gate for their next escort job. The tall sergeant was sitting behind the 240-Bravo machine gun in the tower overlooking the gate.

“Peace out, dude!” A voice came from below as he heard the door of the large water truck. He looked down to see a small figure in an oversized hat standing in the dust of the parting truck, waiving to the truck driver.
“Quit flirting with the help, specialist!” The sergeant shouted from the tower with a smile.
“Well, hey there.” She looked up to his position. “Did you get demoted or something?”
“No, I’m just up here so Tim can eat dinner.”
“I see.”
“Hey, you’re a medic, right?”
“Sort of.”
“Well, would you mind coming up here and looking at my finger… I seem to have cut it a bit.”
“Uh… sure.” She made her way to the far side of the tower and climbed the sandbag steps to his position. When she arrived, he turned and removed a wad of paper-towel from his left index finger. “Holy shit!” She exclaimed. “Did you try a self-amputation or something?”
“No. I was trying to cut something and it slipped.” He looked at the finger. “It really only hurts when I bend it like this.” He curled his finger and pink, fleshy material squeezed out of the wound. “Is that supposed to happen?”
“Uh, no, not at all, actually. You probably need stitches or something.” She looked intently at the wound. “And I’d say sooner rather than later.”
“Eh, I’ll get around to it later.” He smiled, wrapping the finger in paper-towels again. “So, you have anymore drawings you don’t want to share?”

The two talked for over thirty minutes while awaiting the truck to return the growing number of escorts to the main gate. As they talked, Tim returned to his position and the two descended the tower talking about art, cartoons and Indiana. Tim leaned out the side of the tower and slowly shouted.

“Nerds!”
“Suck it, fat-boy!” Bass shouted back. Tim laughed as the two took a seat on the concrete barrier and talked more.

The radio eventually crackled on his body armor.
“3-4, this is 3-2.”
“Excuse me,” he turned from Angie and pressed the button on the radio. “Go for 3-4.”
“Roger. Inbound for escort and dinner pick up.”
“I’ve got five escorts for ya.”
“3-2, out.”
“You have six math-boy.” Specialist Dickman pointed out.
“I was kinda hoping you’d want to stay over here for a bit and chat some more.”
“Why, sergeant, are you hitting on me?”
“The entirely depends on if you like it or not.”
“Oh, I think I could deal with that.” She smiled as her face turned red.

She hid behind the wall as the others loaded up into the truck and were returned to the front gate. For the next hour, the two talked and laughed while the other three men at the gate laughed and made fun of their squad leader’s failed attempts to flirt with the young specialist. Eventually, she returned to the front gate, smiling from ear to ear.

Over the next week, the two met up regularly for dinner or lunch depending on their schedules. And Angie, no longer “specialist,” was a regular in the 3rd platoon AO.

Towards the end of October, the two were having a late-night meal in the D-FAC when she noticed he was not his usual jovial self.

“So, you gonna tell me why you’re all doom and gloom?” She smiled. “Or are you sad that I’m 29 and a wake-up from being out of this dump and you’ll be stuck here without me?”
“We got our redeployment orders today.”
“So we’re both going home?”
“I’m not going home…” He hung his head. “We’re being sent to Iraq again.”
“I…” words failed her. The cheer drained from her face.
“I’m sorry. We found out last night. We’re heading to some place called Kelso or Kalso or some shit.”
“But you can’t…”
“The Army would disagree with you.” He tried to smile. “We start training the group to take over for us here tomorrow and then we leave next Friday.”

He looked across the table as tears filled her eyes.

“I can’t fucking do this again.” She sobbed quietly.
“Relax,” he placed his hand across the table and touched her softly on the arm. “Nothing is going to happen.”
“You don’t know that. You could get blown up! Just like Chad!” She stood from her table and walked hurriedly towards the exit trying to hide her crying eyes from onlookers.
“Fuck.” He muttered as he rose to follow her.

He followed her out into the dark heat of the Kuwaiti night.

“Angie, wait!” He shouted as he caught up with her, pushing a young Lieutenant slightly as he grabbed her shoulder.
“Excuse me, Sergeant.” The lieutenant snarled. “Don’t you salute?” Bass turned and looked at the collar of the lieutenant.
“Not some pog-ass supply bitch, sir!” He turned and walked away, ignoring the protests from the officer.

He finally caught up with Angie and got her to stop walking. He grabbed her shoulders and faced her.

“Look, this is not something I can control. But I really like the time I’ve spent with you.” He paused. “I don’t want this bullshit to end all that.”
“I’m sorry. I just can’t do it. I can’t lay awake at night wondering if you’re alive or dead. I can’t… I just…” she sobbed.

She broke free from his grip and ran towards her tent.

Six days later, Bass found himself standing in the dark surrounded by the men of his platoon. He had not seen Angie since the night he told her he was leaving.

On the ground were piles of rucksacks, duffel bags and ammunition. It was 0300 and they would soon be headed north. The men were joking and trying to boost their own morale, but a quiet nervousness was present in the air. They all knew that things had changed drastically since their first tour in Iraq at the start of the war.

As he gathered his thoughts and re-checked his gear he heard a familiar sound floating across the air.

“Have you seen Sgt Bass?” He heard it again. “I’m looking for Sgt Bass.”
“Angie?” He turned his head to see a small figure pushing her way through the large, equipment-laden men. “What are you doing here?”
“I…” she stood facing him in the dark. “I’m sorry about what happened. But I meant what I said. I can’t go through this.”
“Then why are you here?”
“I wanted to tell you that if… when you get home. I hope we will see each other again some day.”

He stood looking at her in disbelief. He had spent the last six days trying, in vain, to put thoughts of this girl out of his head and now, an hour before his departure, she stood before him. He leaned down to his ruck and rummaged something out of it and placed it in her hands. She looked down to see a black sketchbook.

“I had this sent to me from home for you about two weeks ago.” He looked down at her. “I got it last night…. I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to give it to you.”
“I… I can’t.”
“You have to.” He smiled. “Because I frankly don’t have the room for it.” He lifted her chin with his fingertip. “Keep drawing, please. You’re quite good.”
“I… I have to go now.” She slowly pulled away from him. “I…” He grabbed her and kissed her.

Around the couple the group of men howled and made kissing noises.

“Get some, Sgt Bass!” Timmy yelled.

The two ignored them as the kiss continued. When it ended she looked up tearfully at him.

“Come home, safe.” She whispered.
“I’ll do my best.” He smiled. “Now go before these guys get too worked up.”

She didn’t speak as she walked away. Looking back several times, all the while clinching the sketchbook to her chest.

An hour later, the trucks were loaded and the men of Alpha Company were headed towards the gates in 5-ton trucks. Bass stood in the back looking out over their old home as the convoy lined up in the pre-dawn light. In the distance a figure sat on a concrete barrier watching the trucks roll towards the gate. As he neared, he could see it was Angie. She had tears in her eyes as she watched him roll passed her. He smiled a longingly at her.

“Sgt Bass!” a voice came from behind him.
“Yes sir?” he replied without taking his eyes from Angie.
“What’s this I hear about you calling some lieutenant a pog-ass supply bitch?”

Bass smiled as he blew the girl from Indiana a kiss and turned to his Platoon Leader.

“Well, sir. He was. I had shit to do and didn’t have the time or effort to stroke his ego, sir.”
“Fucking Pogs.” The Lt laughed.

He took his seat and the trucks moved through the exit gate and north towards Iraq.