"Captain Buckman won the Bronze Star as a paratrooper with the 82nd Airborne.", said Marilyn.
The buzz got louder at that, and Marilyn got out her wallet picture of me getting the medal.
"Well, Doctor and Captain! We're two for two! Now, for number three! -... my final commitment is that when the time comes, every April 15th, to pay my taxes, I will do so with a smile... - So? Do you pay your taxes with a smile?"
"I think I was reaching with that one!", I answered, laughing.
"What about the part before that, about making some money?", asked Randy.
I glanced at Marilyn and the Tusks, and shook my head. I didn't want to get into that with these guys. Tusker sidestepped it a touch. "Okay, I am not going to go into details, but if you go out to the parking lot right now, there's a brand new Mercedes 380 SL out there that I know for a fact he paid for in cash. Does that qualify?"
"Thanks a bunch, buddy!", I protested.
There were a few whistles at that. I just waved them off as best I could. Then I stood up. "I need some more crabs and beer. Who's with me?"
The most curious event of the day occurred an hour or so later. I had been circulating around the room, meeting a few more people, and introducing Marilyn to them, and had returned to the table we had been sharing with Tusker and Tessa. Out of the corner of my eye I saw somebody approaching from my right. "Captain Buckman?", he asked tentatively.
The others eyed me curiously, and I swiveled my head. "Well, I used to be, but that seems a long time ago." I looked at this new person. He was a large man, blond, crew cut, heavily muscled, wearing a pair of worn fatigue pants and a very tight camo pattern tee-shirt. For some reason he looked familiar, very familiar. I slowly stood up, now favoring my right knee, and turned to face him. "You look familiar..."
"Yes sir, I'm..."
Suddenly his speech pattern came back to me, along with the Texas accent. My eyes opened wide and my jaw dropped for a second. "Corporal Janos!?"
"Yes, sir, you remembered me." He stuck his hand out and I reflexively shook it.
"Corporal Janos! I will be damned! What in the world are you doing here?"
"It's sergeant now, sir, and I'm attending the reunion.", he told me.
"Well, good Lord, have a seat. Sergeant? Well deserved, very well deserved. I thought you were from Texas. What are you doing here?"
He nodded and grabbed a seat across from Marilyn and I. Tusker and Tessa were at our side, and watched all this curiously, and Katie and Tammy came up as well, standing and listening in. I introduced Marilyn again, and then named my friends, and said, "Well, don't stop. What brought you here?"
"My wife. This is her reunion."
"Your wife?! She went to Towson High, Class of '73?"
"Yes, sir!"
"What was her name, then, I mean?"
"Jennifer Goodwin. Did you know her?", he asked.
I searched my memory in vain, but couldn't come up with anything. Neither could those around me. "Sorry, Sergeant, but it was a big school. Maybe if I saw her..."
Janos promptly popped to his feet and let out a shrill whistle, heads turned and when he spotted his wife, he made the hand signals for 'You', 'Me', and 'Regroup'. I noticed a woman working her way through the tables and come over. When she got closer, he said, "Jennie, this is Captain Buckman, he was with us in Honduras. I told you about that, right? He went to school here, too!"
I stood up to reach across the table and shake her hand. Her face looked marginally familiar, but not anything more than that. "It's Mister Buckman, now. You were Class of '73, also?"
She had a light alto tone. "Yes, but I'm sorry, I don't recognize you either."
"It was a big school. Don't worry about it. Your husband saved my bacon in Honduras.", I told her.
She grinned and gave him a one armed hug. "We had just started dating then. We got married last year."
"Jennie's actually a year older than I am, but it's not like it matters anymore. I was Class of '75 back home.", he said.
"What do you do, Jennifer?", asked Marilyn.
"Waitress and bartender in a restaurant near the base. It's a good job. No matter where he gets stationed, I can always find a job as a waitress or bartender." She had the look of a professional waitress or bar staffer. I nodded. She was right, there was always work like that near an army base.
"Congratulations. He's a good man." I turned to Janos. "So, still with the division?"
Janos sat down, and his wife made herself comfortable on his lap. He shook his head. "No, sir. Last year, after you got your medal, I put in for Ranger School. I made it through that and got my third stripe."
"I'll be damned!" I turned to Marilyn. "No wonder why we got back! We had an Airborne Ranger with us!" To Janos, I said, "Rangers Lead The Way, right Sergeant?", repeating the Ranger motto.
"You led us, sir. That numbnuts lieutenant would have gotten us all killed! What the hell happened with him, anyway? After you got arrested, he was never seen again. And what was with you getting arrested, anyway?", asked Janos.
The table erupted with questions! Arrested? What was that about? Well, I couldn't say specifically, and I didn't want to break the Top Secret classification, so I had to dance around it. I just waved it down. "That was just a misunderstanding, nothing more. That idiot lieutenant complained that I had taken command illegally, and I had led a mutiny. Once we got back to headquarters and they sorted it out, they cut me loose. A doctor took one look at my leg and had me flown to Walter Reed. It was nothing, really."
"And the lieutenant?"
I had to grin at that. "Last I heard he was sent to the Congo as military liaison to the cannibals. With any luck, he became dinner!"
That got me a laugh from Janos, who then said, "They probably got indigestion."
Tusker chimed in. "I have to ask! I know he got a medal and I've seen the picture Marilyn has, but he won't tell us what happened! He just keeps saying it's Classified! If you were there, what happened?"
I interrupted Janos before he could say anything. "Sorry, but it's Classified!"
"That's bullshit!", protested Tusker.
"Okay, I'll tell you a little bit." I drank a little more beer, and then leaned forward. I lowered my voice, and said, "You have to swear never to tell anyone!" I waited for a moment, and when nobody said anything, I pushed, "Well? Do you swear?"
Tusker gave me a startled look, and said, "Okay, I swear." Around the table, the others nodded and agreed. Across from me, I could see Janos starting to smile.
I nodded theatrically, and then glanced around to see if anybody else was listening. "Okay. This all happened in Honduras. The brass was very nervous about the health of the men, and the medal was because of that." I paused for as much dramatic effect as I could muster. "Our unit - we had the lowest incidence of venereal disease in the entire battalion!"
Around me the table exploded in laughter and outrage. I just sat back and smiled as Tusker sputtered. "It's true, just ask the Sergeant. He was there."
Janos was laughing too hard to do much, but he nodded and said, "Yes, sir, we were as clean as a whistle!", and then started laughing some more when his wife nudged him in the ribs. He laughed, and then picked up his Solo cup of beer. Holding it out towards me, he got serious, and said, "Absent companions."