A Stand

Hello, I like to write and I have recently began to do these short-short story contests (usually the ones at 500 words and at 1,000 words) The following one is too long for one and too short for other, but it feels correct where it is and is based on a young man in Hawaii I knew, I could not change it.

The young veteran was in uniform today. It was a marine uniform, with sergeant’s chevrons on the sleeve. With the shiny black shoes and the dazzlingly white gloves; most people would have never guessed of the prosthetic leg, and the prosthetic arm. The face they did see, the face with many scares and a missing eye. The young man obviously received the brunt of the blast on his one side. He still walked proud; he was satisfied to be alive. Recently that had not been so. It would have been all too easy to have ‘punched’ out. He had a daughter now and a new understanding of hope.

He was walking away from the gymnasium, where he had just given a motivational speech to a class of 10th graders. He felt very good about the speech and the reception he received from the teenagers. He really was not that much older than the students and it was not that long ago he was going to this very school.

As he rounded a corner to his left and saw the main portals to the building in front of him, he glanced to his right. What he saw, froze him mid-step. At first his blood boiled and he was ready to tear heads, and then it was gone, replaced by a renewed sense of loss and hopelessness.

He walked through the door to the classroom at his right and stood at attention. Two students had the American Flag on the ground and are dancing on it; they do not immediately notice his presence. He simply stood at attention and a tear began to well up in his remaining eye. The re-lived pains in his missing appendages as ‘ghost feelings’ came back five-fold. But, He stood.

Soon after all the other students had become quiet, the two dancing on the flag came to a stop and noticed the young military man in the room. Acting somewhat embarrassed, although it was probably exaggerated, the two immediately jumped off the flag.

The young marine walked over to the flag, which was when it became obvious to the class he was missing limbs, he had to kneel down on his good knee to pick up the flag. He brushed the dust gently from the flag and smoothed its wrinkles. As he prepared the symbol for folding a large boy, wearing a Boy Scouts of America uniform, came to his aide and took one end of the flag and at attention, he stood. This American with African ancestry stood there while a young marine folded the flag.

“I stood at my post, in a country where hate abounds. I stood and defended a class not any different from this one when the Taliban wanted to come in and kill them all, just as they would you. When I slid into the grenade intended for the students, I stood. For the likes of you, for that breath of air you just took. In a class room, the likes of which most of the youth in this world will never get to see. For the right you expressed today, to dance on a simple symbol of liberty. For your freedom, men and women like me, must stand.”

Yes these shorts are fun but this one was just 50 or so words to long, and I liked the ‘feel’.

The story is actually an ‘up to dated’ version of three interviews with different Veterans of the ‘Vietnam conflict’. One was a member the 299th a “Koa” in Hawaii National Guard he lost both legs. Another was a medic with two ‘bush’ tours, he saw an incredible amount of carnage, unadulterated war.

The last was based on the stories of a South Vietnamese regular Col. he and his family (9 people) became refugees and from tent city at Camp Pendleton came to stay with us in our house. I was 14/15 at the time.

Terror because of war had become a ‘norm’ for many of those in Vietnam for many years. And as always the children became pawns. Not whining here, just stating a fact.

Oh well to much again. Thank you for the response.

You obviously have the talent. Please keep your style. If you start adding long flowery descriptive fluff, it will become so boring. Many authors lose their own voice that way.

First of all, keep writing. Writers write.

I was going to do a rewrite/ edit-on-the-fly as the poster did for you in comment 8, but I am short of time as always.

Same observations as you’ve already seen, especially about mixing verb tenses & writing from inside your protagonist’s perspective. It is possible to write a tight composition - by that I mean conveying all the sensory info needed while not being wordy - that puts the reader *there*.

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