21-Feb-2004

Sons Of Saigon 3/??
Author: CleverYoungThief
Rating: R
Warnings: Language, violence, gore, psychological horror, situations in war, racial tension, drug use, and other controversial issues that involve the Vietnam War
Archive: GWA
Pairings: past 2xH, past 3x11, 2+1, 4+3
Genre: War/AU
Timeline: Late 1960's
Spoilers: None
Disclaimer: I don't own any Gundam Wing character, as usual, and any other character I do own.
Feedback: Please?

Thanks to - Merith especially, for helping me out along the way, and to the rest of the War Room, as usual. And to readers, of course. ^_^

Well, all the signs there said, "Welcome in,
Welcome, if you're white, my friend.
Come along, and watch the fights;
Well, we feed our dogs on Civil Rights.
We believe in segregation --
Negroes in one mob,
Policemen, politicians, dogs in the other!"
     --- Phil Ochs, Talkin' Birmingham Jam

"Hide it in a hiding place where no one ever goes
Put it in your pantry with your cupcakes
It's a little secret, just the Robinsons' affair
Most of all, you've got to hide it from the kids... "
     --- Simon And Garfunkel, Mrs. Robinson

Sons Of Saigon by CleverYoungThief

Part Three: Bama Shuck And Jive

Trowa woke slowly, like a deep-sea diver kicking his way to the surface, the dreams falling away into reality in small doses, like bad medicine taken just a taste at a time. There was a brassy taste in his mouth, and he felt as if his eyes had been rubbed with sandpaper. The first thing his eyes focused on was his guitar, propped up in the corner of the small apartment loft.

He started to sit up, but then realized that there was an arm thrown across his chest.

A woman's arm. He had forgotten.

Ah, hell. He sighed, trying to shift out of Anna's grasp, but the woman snuggled up closer to him, her face buried against his chest. One hand flexed gently in the sheets she was clutching, and the other was pressed against his stomach.

"Anna, let me up," he whispered. He moved gently away from her, and she made a soft noise of protest, sinking more deeply into the blankets. He swung his legs out of bed and padded naked across the room, heading for the bathroom.

He walked in and turned on the switch, wincing instinctively as the harsh light hit his eyes. The room was chilled, and he shivered, wishing he had just stayed in bed. When his eyes adjusted, he was struck with his own reflection in the mirror.

A three o'clock shadow darkened his complexion, and he reached up to rub at it, feeling the roughness of stubble beneath his fingertips. He thought briefly about shaving, but then decided he just didn't give a damn.

He touched the light scar that ran across his face, turning his head slightly to see how it looked in the light. A policeman's German shepherd had caught his face with one front canine, slashing him from cheekbone to jaw.

That was back in high-school, during the demonstration in '63. He got kicked out of school for just being there. Truancy, they called it. Wasn't until the feds forced them to reinstate all the expelled students that he could even go back.

But by then, it was too late. That scar may as well have been the mark of Cain.

He wasn't self-conscious about the scar across his face, but every time he saw it, it made him feel like breaking something. Or someone.

Expelled outta high-school, left college before they could do the same. Not making too great of a record for myself, he thought, smiling ruefully.

Although he had to admit, the circumstances were a little different the second time around.

As he grabbed a tube of toothpaste and his toothbrush from the side of the sink, brushing his teeth, he remembered how he had even met her. He had never meant to get involved with her; hell, he didn't mean to get involved with half of them.

It just sort of... happened.

But he could tell from the moment he shook her hand that it was going to be that way. Just another 'round and round.

~~~"Dear, I'd like you to meet one of my brightest students, Trowa Barton. He's going to be a great man someday. Already leading up the white civil activists, and only a junior in college. A man for his causes, and a great literary mind as well. Trowa, this is my wife, Anna."

"Pleased to meet you, Missus Une. Don't listen to what your husband says, ma'am, I'm not nearly as good as he makes me out to be."

"I'd hope not... so polite... and such a handsome young man as well. I bet you have all the young ladies swooning, don't you?"~~~

Around thirty or so, he had thought then, eyeing her firm hips and high breasts with a jaded, confident eye. Her perfume was rich and enticing. She met his eyes, and he could see the invitation as clearly as if she had spoken it aloud.

"Fuck," Trowa muttered lowly, spitting into the sink and running the faucet.

He had been over to her house the next week, when the professor went out of town for some kind of conference. Southern literature or something, it was. He had parked his beat-up old wreck of a pickup truck around back, where no one could see him.

She came to the door with her wedding band on, and nothing else.

~~~ "I know I shouldn't get involved with you, Trowa. I've... never done this before. You're just a boy... and you're John's student. But... somehow, you have a charm for me. I don't know how to explain it to you."
"I'm not a boy, ma'am. And your reasons don't concern me. I'm old enough to drink. I haven't been a boy for a long time."

"Don't call me ma'am, Trowa. Call me Anna; ma'am makes me feel like an old woman."

"Okay... Anna."~~~

Sighing, he rinsed out the sink and stepped into the shower, turning on the water. He startled a little as the cold shock of it hit him, but then eased into it as the water warmed up. He leaned his arms and forehead against the side of the shower, feeling hot water scald his back and drip down from his chin.

~~~ "I hear you're real popular with the ladies, Trowa. And a rumor goes around that the ladies aren't all you like."

"Did you now? ... Maybe. What of it?" ~~~

He should have just let it go, he thought; it wasn't as if he couldn't hunt up girls... and guys... his own age. But seeing the way she looked at him, with her long brown hair pulled back into a sensible bun from an attractive, angular face, looking him over warmly through her glasses...

...well, he wasn't about to turn down the offer.

That was the only time he ever met her at her own home. The rest of the times, she came to his apartment.

He knew it was only a matter of time before he got caught at it. When he got called into the professor's office after class one day, he knew that it was all over. He had been found out.

~~~ "Trowa, I always liked you. But this time, you fucked up, boy. How long have you been sleeping with my wife?"

"... "

"Answer me."

"'Bout two months, sir. Give or take."

"Two months... two months, you've been fucking my wife. And the whole damned campus knew but me. Well, Trowa Barton, you are through at this institution. You are finished here. You can just take this as some friendly advice, but I suggest you withdraw from this university immediately, or I will make your life a living hell."

"Sir, you can't get me expelled over this. What are you going to tell the Board of Directors, that one of your students is sleeping with your wife? Not exactly like I raped her, you know."

"You arrogant little bastard!"

"Just for the record, sir, I didn't 'seduce' your wife. She came on to me." ~~~

He had withdrawn from school and got a job at the library downtown, even though the job didn't hold any interest for him. He didn't want to make any trouble, and with his record, there was a lot of trouble that could be made for him.

But even after the professor and his wife got separated, Anna still kept coming to him. After all, when he kicked her out of the house, she didn't really have anywhere to go. At least not at first.

...He didn't mind.

Trowa leaned up against the side of the shower, letting postcoital depression slam into him like a bag of bricks. It felt like the end of everything to him.

Stories of what he had done got around town quickly, and the girls wouldn't have anything to do with him. The boys, who had always snubbed him, mostly for siding with the Negroes, now had a whole new reason to hate him.

He smiled a little. That problem was already taken care of. He was heading out for Camp Dawson, anyway. Leave old 'Bombingham' behind him. Heading for the Army... explore new cultures, meet new people... kill them.

I should be happy here, he thought, breathing deeply, feeling the steam penetrate his lungs. I have a steady job, a beautiful... girlfriend? Is that what she is? Most guys my age dream of a woman like her. But I lost something, too...

He turned the water off, listening to the pipes rumble as water swirled down into the drain. There was still no noise from the bedroom, but he wasn't surprised. Anna often slept late.

Missus Une, you mean... he thought, and a bitter grin crossed his face. He got out of the shower, dripping water on the floor and not giving a damn in the slightest. He grabbed a towel from the rack and rubbed his hair dry as he walked back into the bedroom, until it stuck out all over his head in strange damp angles.

His stuff was already packed, sitting in the corner next to his guitar. He slipped into a pair of jeans and a soft, worn flannel shirt, grabbing his jacket from where it was lying across the back of the chair to his desk. He saw his schoolbooks piled there and made a mental note to go back to the bookstore and return them before he left. He was sure he could get a little bit of pocket money if he turned them in, although no where near as much as they were worth.

He grabbed a pad of paper from the desk and sat down, rummaging in his jacket pocket for a pen. He never went anywhere without one; he had always been embarrassed to ask for one at the bank or the grocery store.

For what? he thought. For a few days? A few weeks or years? Forever? He had no idea. But forever sounded the closest to the truth, considering.

Satisfied, he quietly pulled the top page off the of the pad and picked up her glasses where they were sitting on the side table. He placed the paper on the table, then anchored it. He stood up and went over to the bed, just watching her sleep for a few minutes.

He quit when his heart started to hurt.

He leaned over and pressed a soft kiss to her cheek, smelling a faint whiff of her perfume there, like a wanton ghost. He smiled, pulling the covers up over her bare shoulders.

Trowa grabbed his bag from the floor and slung it over his shoulder, then zipped up his coat; it was freezing outside. He smiled, but there wasn't much humor in it. The last few weeks, he had failed to find humor in anything. But even so, the thought amused him a little.

He gave his guitar one final longing glance, then shrugged. It wasn't as if he could take it where he was going, anyway.

He opened the door and slipped out, taking the envelope and tack out of his pocket that he had put there the night before. Working quietly, so he wouldn't wake up Anna or anyone else, he held the envelope with the month's rent in it to the door and used the tack to hold it there.

He took one last look at it, lying stark and forlorn against the worn wood, before he turned his back and headed down the fire escape, making the last long and lonely walk to the bus-stop. He didn't want to think about the blocked print he had wrote across the front of that envelope in black marker, large enough for anyone walking down the hall to see without looking all too hard.

It had felt like a suicide note at the time.

TROWA BARTON
GOING TO NAM

End Part 3

(:./cyt/sons3)