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to see blood.”
    Private Hollister especially liked TJ’s pictures of the moon and of pretty nurses. “You think he’s got a girlfriend over there yet?” he asked one day, studying a blond WAC holding a cat.
    â€œHow would I know? He just sends me film. He doesn’t write me letters.”
    Private Hollister studied the photographs. “I’d say he’s writing you a letter with every picture he takes. Does he write letters to your folks?”
    I nodded. “They’re boring, though. Mostly they’re about the food and the bugs.”
    â€œSee? He’s sending you the real stuff. I bet you don’t show all these pictures to your parents, do you? I bet you hide some of ’em away.”
    â€œWhat makes you say that?”
    â€œâ€™Cause you know TJ don’t want your folks to see ’em. If he wanted them to see all this stuff, he’d send the film to your mom, get her to get it processed at the PX. Don’t cost but a few dollars.”
    Private Hollister was right. I’d only shown certain ones of TJ’s pictures to my parents, pictures of dogs and mess halls and big jungle plants. But I’d known without him having to tell me that TJ wouldn’t want me to show them everything. With each roll of film TJ sent me, there were fewer blond WAC’s and more soldiers missing arms and legs. More medevac helicopters. More dust and dirt and chaos.
    One day after I’d developed a roll of film and had the negatives hanging from the line to dry, I realized I was squinting as I examined them. It was as though I only half wanted to see what was there.
    It was as though I was scared to look any closer.
    I thought about waiting until the next day to print the pictures, even though it was early and Private Hollister said there wasn’t much for me to do that day. I had all the time in the world to printpictures, but I found myself cleaning up, wiping down tables, measuring out more fixer, inventorying chemicals.
    Finally I made myself slip the first negative into the enlarger. What emerged on the paper was a picture of a GI in a wheelchair, his right leg amputated at the knee and wrapped in a white bandage. He looked so much like TJ, I gasped and took a step backward. I had to force myself to look again and see for sure that it wasn’t my brother in the wheelchair, that it was someone I’d never seen before in my life.
    I decided to print the rest of the pictures later.
    Some of the soldiers who looked at TJ’s pictures had been in Vietnam, and the pictures reminded them of all sorts of things. “You ever heard of rice paddy stew?” one guy asked me, looking at a photograph of guys eating at the mess hall. “You take your C rations, like the beef and the franks and beans, throw in some cheese spread and crackers and rice, add a bunch of Tabasco sauce, and mix it all up and cook it. Nine times out of ten it’s better than whatever they’re serving in the mess.”
    The soldiers who had never been to Vietnam were the ones who got quiet when they saw TJ’s pictures. Pvt. Garza was like that. He was on the quiet side anyway, which made him a good sidekick for Cpl. Yarrow, but he got downright silent when he looked at TJ’s photographs.
    â€œThe war’s almost over,” Cpl. Yarrow told him one day when he was standing in front of a picture of a medevac helicopter lifting off, the sun setting behind it, dust billowing out in huge clouds beneath the propellers. “Chances are you’ll never get sent. Don’t worry about it, man.”
    Pvt. Garza shook his head. “It’s not over yet.”
    â€œAny day, that’s what they’re saying.” Cpl. Yarrow put his hand on Pvt. Garza’s shoulder. “Any day.”
    There were afternoons I’d feel shaky leaving the rec center, anxious and a little bit nervous, and I just needed to get it out of my system, so I’d go to