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“There’s my little buttercup. What can I do for you today?”
Six let out a playful giggle.
“Oh, Richards! It’s always so nice to see you.”
No matter how grim the camp might get, she could always find solace in his deep voice and warm smile, greeting her as though he were genuinely happy to see her, even amid amputee patients and bloody bandages.
“The pleasure is all mine, darling. Hope you’re here just to brighten my day and not because you need patching up?”
“Actually, I got you some presents from my last route. Thought you might put them to good use,” she said, rummaging through her pack and pulling out several books, needles, and other medical supplies.
“Well, look at you. Aren’t you a beautiful angel?”
In the corner of the tent, Boone stood with his arms crossed, spine rigid and jaw set, wearing the posture of a man determined not to react. His eyes remained fixed on a particularly interesting stain on one of the tent’s many patches, perhaps trying to determine whether the pungent smell came from the dried blood or the conversation behind him.
“Oh, Courier, you really do bring the hope to Camp Forlorn Hope, you know that?”
Boone stared at the patch even harder.
“How will I ever be able to pay you for your generosity, Buttercup?”
“How about some drinks whenever you’re free?”
Behind her, Boone became so still he might have been listening for a land mine.
“It will be my pleasure,” Richards said with a bright, sunny grin.
“Six. Reyes is waiting for the reports,” Boone barked, bringing her back from whatever she had drifted into.
“What?—Oh yeah, yeah. See you later, Alex!”
Boone tracked her as they made their way toward the command tent, with the same rigid scrutiny he might have given a recruit under inspection, while one word continued to circle through his mind.
Alex.
He disliked how easy the name sounded, stripped of title, surname, or any useful measure of distance. He ultimately decided not to give it much thought as they strolled through the old tents and exhausted soldiers; soon they would be back in the open desert, where his mind would focus on more critical things than forms of address. Six, however, had other plans.
“So, Reyes, where can a girl get cleaned up around here?” she asked once the sergeant had signed off on the assignment.
Reyes looked between them as if considering whether to withhold sensitive information, but then she took in Six’s dust-covered face and blood-soaked shirt. Denying her enough clean water to wash off the wasteland and feel like a woman again would probably qualify as some kind of war crime.
“You can use my tent if you need it. There’s water in the back. Just—don’t waste it.”
Reyes’s tent proved to be a little oasis compared to the piles of empty cans, worn-out tyres, and rubble scattered around the camp. It was clean enough, with neat piles of folded clothing on one side and an empty table with two battered chairs on the other. Behind a makeshift curtain, there was a small annex where a basin with clean water shone like a mirage.
Without much more than a grunt of appreciation, she rushed behind the curtain, shedding her gear along the way.
Boone scanned the room, then eyed a nearby chair as though assessing whether it could be trusted with his weight. It was probably the tiredness he had been carrying for days that made him take the chance.
He started working silently on his rifle: checking the action, wiping grit away, and inspecting its components with intense concentration. It had become something of a grounding ritual for him, though he would only have called it routine maintenance.
He only realised Six had emerged when the scent of soap drifted through the tent. Her pale skin was clean now, catching the dim light inside the tent. Wet copper curls framed her face, droplets sliding from their ends onto the white top fitted far too snugly across her body.
He stared at her, dumbfounded, taking in every newly visible curve of the woman who had apparently been hiding beneath the grime.
“Okay, I’m heading out.”
“Where?”
“Just… out.”
“Out where?”
“I have things to do.”
“What things?”
She waved him off, trying to catch her reflection in a dented metal tray.
“I just—”
She let out an exasperated sound, evidently unable to produce an excuse convincing enough to survive his interrogation.
“I’m going to see Alex, okay?”
“Alex? Who—”
He stopped.
“Oh.”
His expression tightened.
“Why? Can’t it wait until morning?”
“Because…”
She gestured vaguely at herself, the tent, and perhaps the entire situation.
“Because what?”
“Because I want to get laid, Boone!”
He stared at her, expressionless.
“With Richards?”
“Yes, with Richards!”
A frown settled over his face. He considered her for several long seconds, carefully assembling his next words.
“What do you even see in him?”
She looked away, trying and failing to conceal her mortification.
“He’s cute. He’s sweet. He’s—”
“Gay.”
The word came out louder than necessary.
“He likes men.”
“What? No, he doesn’t!”
“Yes, he does. It’s quite obvious.”
“How could you possibly know that?”
“I just know, okay?”
Her eyes widened.
“Oh my God. You slept with Richards?”
“No, I did not.”
But Six was no longer listening. She had already turned her outrage toward the canvas roof.
“What the fuck is wrong with men? Half of them want me dead and the other half are gay!”
An awkward silence fell between them.
Somewhere in the distance, a forgotten radio played “Heartaches by the Number.”
“I’m not gay,” Boone blurted before the silence could stretch any further.
Six turned to stare at him.
“What does that have to do with anything?”
She dragged the white top over her head and tossed it aside. Boone’s gaze caught, briefly and disastrously, on her bra before she pulled her old, filthy shirt back on.
“Get up. We’re leaving.”
He remained frozen in his chair, a faint flush working its way across his face while he tried, failing miserably, to rid himself of her image.
“Right.”