Alice's Part 3

‘You’re new here, aren’t you?’ she asked. ‘My name’s Alice.’

‘This place yours?’ Ray asked.

‘It’s my baby.’

‘I just transferred from my basic in California,’ Ray answered. He smiled. ‘Could I get a coffee? With milk and sugar, please.’

‘Sure. How are the boys on the base doing? I used to take a bigger role in the goings on at the base,’ she said. ‘These days there’s no interest in the coffee houses, just lattes.’ Alice poured him his coffee, added milk and then stirred in the sugar. ‘Back before you were born, around ’67, my husband and I ran a newspaper for the boys,’ she continued. ‘They used to write about the officers, what it was like overseas, in the jungle, and why the war was wrong.’

As they talked, they walked to a booth, and sat down.

Ray scratched his head. ‘How’d you get away with that? There’s no way the Army would have liked it.’

‘Of course the command didn’t like it,’ she answered. ‘We got raided, fined, shut down, and thrown in jail. The soldiers involved had it worse, for the first bit anyway. Later, it got dangerous for the officers to resist the boys.’ The last was said with a certain amount of pride.

Ray was uncomfortable with the idea of resisting. ‘But, why? What’s the point? The Viet Cong were just a bunch of Commies anyways.’

Alice’s voice trembled, as she said, ‘The boys believed that the peasants were people, too, that they deserved peace, as much as anyone else.’

Ray apologized. He had never really thought about the whole thing, and the news never talked about the enemy as human beings, and all his training had demonized them. He thought she was wrong, but he needed someone to talk to.

‘It’s okay. You weren’t there.’ Alice smiled. It was a sincere smile; the type of smile shared between friends. She excused herself and went back to take the orders of some other patrons.

From then on, whenever he had time, he would head to Alice’s for coffee. If she wasn’t cooking breakfasts, she would give him coffee for free. Ray and Alice would talk for hours during the several months between when he moved to town and when he was called up. They mostly talked about his childhood in the city, and hers in the Midwest. There were some days though when news of the war in Iraq would creep in.

‘Ray, did you see the news last night?’ Handing him a cup of coffee.

‘Yeah. I can’t believe how well the WMDs are hidden,’ said Ray, scratching his head. ‘I thought they would have found some by now.’

‘Hmm, I don’t know,’ Alice said. ‘There were lots of searches before the war.’

‘I remember.’ He swilled his coffee, thinking about the lead up to the war.

‘I know it’s not really your thing, but there’s a rally at the base this weekend,’ said Alice. She looked hopeful. ‘You could come if you want. There’s a man coming to talk about the weapons.’

‘I would, but…’ Ray felt uncomfortable about being seen with the crowd. ‘I’d better not: I could get in a lot of trouble.’