Today’s writing prompt: Find the draft of an old story you gave up on, read it over, then set it aside and begin revising it whole cloth. Don’t go back to the old draft.
Jack looked at his friends in the truck, men from his unit. Men he had bonded with during this time in boot, just before they would be shipped out to get the Germans. The truck had come to a complete stop, and now they shut it off.
“Jack,” said one of the men in the front, “Find out what’s wrong.”
Jack, being the last one in, jumped out of the back and stumbled on the ground – it was higher than he expected. The other men snickered. Jack hefted his gun and walked around the truck, heading down the trail. Other men from other units looked like they were doing the same thing. In fact, some men were just piling out of the trucks, but were getting bawled out by their CO’s to get back in.
After passing ten trucks, he got to a place where there was a truck in the mud. It was actually a truck, a tow, and another tow all stuck, and a small crowd of men had gathered around. The truck was sunk in up to its axle, the tow’s rear was sunk into just that much, and the other tow was spinning its wheels trying to get the first tow out.
Jack nodded to himself. He went over to a man with the most stripes on his arm and asked, “Sir? May I pull those trucks out?”
The man did a double – no triple – take. “What?” he asked in a high pitched southern-drawl voice. “What do you take me for, an idjit?”
“No, sir,” he said. “But I’ll bet you $20 I can do it.”
“$20? You got money to burn, kid.” The man laughed. “Go ahead, I dare you.”
“I’d best hold your money, boy,” said another man standing next to him. He took money from both of them – though Jack had to hand it over in chits and IOU’s. Jack set his pack and his gun down and went out to the mud.
He stood in front of the first tow and motioned for the man to get out of the cab. The man looked at him curiously and shook his head, but kept his foot off the gas. Jack set his feet in a wide stance and bent down, grabbing the hooks underneath the bumper, hooks that were attached to the chassis itself.
He grounded himself, rooted to the very ground. He made himself heavy, heavier than the truck, and he started to sink into the mud. He lifted one leg up and moved it back, sinking. Then he began to pull. The truck creaked. He lifted his other leg, stepping back again, and pulled again. The truck shuddered and moved, maybe a little bit. He did this again, seemingly inch by inch, until finally getting on solid ground, when he would lift a step, and SLAM to the ground, the weight shaking everything around them for a moment. He let the truck go, and the man behind the wheel pulled out onto the road.
“How’d you do that, kid?”
Jack only smiled and headed to the next tow truck.
By the time he got to the other truck, a group of men had dug out the fender and got those hooks exposed for him. Jack was covered in mud to the waist, after sinking in the heavier he was. This time he put a pallet down and stood on top of it, increasing his weight, making the wood crack even as it sank, but not as deeply.
Two privates put pallets behind him in a trail leading back to the road, and in about an hour, now covered in mud to his chest, he had the other truck out and on the road – though its engine had been flooded and needed to be towed away anyway.
“Damn good, boy,” said the man with the money and handed it to him. Jack reached for it with a muddy paw, but the man laughed and held it back. “Think you’d best get a shower, boy, you deserve it.”
“Yes, sir,” Jack said.
“In fact – Bastille! Take this guy to my quarters and let him take a hot shower.”
“Yes, sir, General McNair.”
Jack blinked. “Geh…General?” Jack stood up straighter.
“Don’t worry, boy, I put my pants on and take a piss the same way you do. And you’re a Corporal now. You in engineers?”
“No, no, sir. Infantry, sir.”
“Engineers. What’s your name?”
“Private Jack Simon, sir.”
“Corporal Jack Simons of the 42nd Engineers. Get your ass in my car – and put a blanket on the seat.” He dismissed him with a salute, and Jack gave him the best salute he could muster, while still covered in mud.
Words: 817