Redeployment

The narrator tells a man named Jenks that he is tired of telling war stories. Jenks has no ears or hair, and his face is covered in scar tissue. Jenks says he doesn’t tell war stories. His vehicle hit an IED in Iraq. The narrator thinks that “he’s me, but less lucky” (214). They talk about how war stories get women to have sex with them, but it no longer works for Jenks. The narrator says, “‘I’m just fucking tired of chicks getting off on it” (215). The narrator says he told a woman about Jenks once, and she started crying. He says he’d rather be with a prostitute.

Two girls enter the bar. Jenks jokes about how he is too ugly to find someone now and that “finding someone is bullshit” (217) anyway. He says no one even wants to look past him these days. But with Jessie and Sarah, women he knows more personally, it’s different, and he can just have a conversation with them. Having no chance with women helps him relax. Jessie and Sarah arrive. Sarah is tall and beautiful. Jessie is average looking and has only four fingers on one hand. The narrator is aware that she is on “100 percent disability” (219) but doesn’t know the reason. He knows that Jenks has fallen in love with her and doesn’t know why. Jessie goes to get them drinks, and Jenks talks to Sarah, who is an actress.

Sarah is there to hear about the IED as research for a play put on by the Iraq Veterans Against the War. She is one of the collaborating writers. She tells Jenks she wants to know what happened, in his own words. Jenks says that the narrator will remember the attack better, but what he remembers best is the pain afterward, which was so bad he has almost no memory of it. He reads her some of his account from a stack of pages he brought. When he describes what was happening to his body, Sarah interrupts and asks about the attack. He says two of his best friends, Chuck and Victor, died immediately in the vehicle. He remembers how quickly things went dark as he fell unconscious. The narrator remembers the smell of burning meat, which is why he is now a vegetarian.

Jenks reads a personal statement that ends his draft of the account; it details how he is not bitter and how he is grateful to everyone who helped save his life. Sarah looks bored with this part and asks him about the fifty-four surgeries that he had to have to reconstruct his body. The narrator wants to go outside and smoke. He says they’re all going to take a break. Jessie goes outside with him, and they joke about which one of them should have sex with Jenks. When they go back inside, Sarah says, “‘Hey, Jenks has been telling me how you and him are like the same person’” (235).

The story ends with the narrator saying, “‘He was a worthless piece of shit. No subject for a play, that’s for sure. Good thing he caught on fire, right?’” (236).