“His kid’s one of us.”
Saturday, December 10
Taylor Anderson stopped just outside the doors of the New York VA Town Hall. Technically, it was called a community center, but as the wide and sprawling red brick building was home to admin, a health clinic, dorms set up to mimic the barracks they were all used to, a gym, meeting rooms, and a decent sized cafeteria that served lunch during the week, Taylor called it a Town Hall. There was a little bit of everything there and it was as good as a second home to him.
Actually, considering he slept there more often than he did his own ‘home’, maybe he should call it his first home.
Taylor shook off his thoughts of the slum of an apartment he rented off his disability check and hobbled his way inside, nodding politely to the Private that jumped in full uniform to open the door for him.
The inside of the Town Hall reminded Taylor of his old high school, and hell the place probably used to be a high school. There was probably some foundation shift or mold in the walls or something that made it unsuitable for students to inhabit but perfect for veterans.
Sometimes Taylor wondered if veterans got the short end of the stick on purpose or if it was all a happy coincidence.
Private First Class Amos, one of the guy’s in Taylor’s unit back at Fort Benning when he’d been going through AIT, had his own opinion about it all.
“Have you noticed that the majority of enlisted US soldiers are minorities?” he’d say while they ran laps together. “The benefits offered to enlist are all ones that are targeted to low income individuals too. Free college, sign on bonus, see the world? Those are dreams for poor kids.”
“I grew up poor and I’m white as fuckin’ bread,” Taylor pointed out.
“It’s the cycle of systematic poverty, man. Offer these ghetto kids all these amazing experiences, use them as canon fodder in the wars- acceptable loss to the supposed melting pot of a country -and if they survive, then they get the shittiest care in the country.”
That was before Iraq, that was before their base was infiltrated and hostile fire began.
That was before Amos bled out, died alone in a foxhole, and nobody found his body until he had to be identified by his tags.
Taylor noticed then the injustice and disparities in the military and being a soldier lost some of its shine for him. By the time he lost his leg, thanks to the helicopter crash and half-ass medical care, Taylor hadn’t expected Uncle Sam to care for one broken body and he hadn’t been disappointed.
The doctors called it an eighty percent disability and crunched the numbers until they discharged Anderson from the service with a monthly check for a little under two grand and a meaningless ‘atta boy’.
‘Atta boy, thanks for believing in our cause.’
‘Atta boy, thanks for signing up right out of high school.’
‘Atta boy, thanks for your dedication and service and the blood, tears, and sweat you shed in foreign soil.’
‘Atta boy, good luck with the disability and PTSD and the fact that you left part of your soul in Iraq with your leg.’
Damn was it disrespectful, but Anderson only had one place where Uncle Sam could shove his ‘atta boy’ and it wasn’t pretty.
Hobbling his way through the building, his crutches clacking and echoing in the halls, Anderson worked toward the meeting room they always used for Saturday mornings. It was a small group, only eleven regulars, but Wilson always brought donuts and coffee and Taylor was starving.
It had been a long night of tossing and turning, eyeing the prescription bottle of narcotics and forcing himself to ignore their call.
Taylor’s on and off again girl, Amy, said he was an idiot not to take the pills, but Taylor saw too many vets strung out and in worse shape than he was. Pain killers for a head full of PTSD was a slippery slope and Taylor was barely walking as it was.
“Hey, man.” Wilson was waiting inside the double doors of the meeting room and flashed a white smile at Anderson when he made it inside. “There’s a hell of a layout over on the table, help yourself, looks like there’s plenty.”
Taylor sniffed and then caught sight of the tables of food.
“God damn.” Taylor had never seen so much food in the meeting room before in his life. “Whose dick did you have to suck for this?”
Wilson laughed loudly, the sound filling the room and mixing with laughter from others. There wasn’t much to make a room full of disabled soldiers to laugh, but apparently a shit ton of food was a good way to start.
“It’s from Stark,” Wilson told him. “Tell the others to cool it with the crudeness, alright? We’ve got a kid coming today.”
“You convinced little Stark to come?” Taylor asked, surprised. He’d been ragging on the kid for weeks to join their group and he got shut down every time. Not to mention that little Stark had a nasty mouth of his own to go toe-to-toe with Taylor on his worst day.
“Nah, I convinced Tony to come and he text me this morning and said that he was bringing Harry.”
Taylor’s lips curled to the side in a crooked smile and he shook his head at Wilson. “Bribery or blackmail?” he wondered aloud.
“Knowing Tony it’s probably some of both,” Wilson laughed again. He checked his watch and then waved Taylor to join the other vultures swarming the food. “Grab some chow, tell everyone to cool it with the dick sucking shit and let’s pretend to be adults for a while, alright?”
“Yeah, we’ll see,” Taylor grinned. He did his hopping shuffle off toward the others that were there for group and his mouth was drooling at the full spread breakfast buffet that was set out for them.
Fuck God, Taylor was thanking Stark for his daily meal.
“Can you believe this shit?” Sanchez turned and grinned at Taylor when he joined them. He waved his left arm, what was left of it, toward the eggs and sausages, bacon and waffles. “What CSM took pity on us poor cripples today, you think?”
“Apparently it was Tony fuckin’ Stark,” Taylor said. He nudged Jones to the side with a playful shrug. “C’mon, Private, make room for your elders.”
“Oh, fuck off, Anderson,” Jones quipped. He aimed one of his forearm crutches at Taylor and pretended to take a knee shot. “And why would Tony Stark be buying us breakfast?”
“His kid’s one of us,” Godwin said. She had her prosthetics on both arms, clicking the metal ends of them together menacingly until Greene moved his wheelchair so she could grab some food. “Do none of you morons watch the fucking news?”
“Why would we watch the news when you’re here to tell us about it, Sarg?” Lawrence grinned. His ass was leaning against the wall so he could shovel down what looked like a dozen waffles in a single go. “I didn’t even know Stark had a kid.”
“I told you about him, dumbass,” Taylor reminded him, rolling his eyes. He nodded gratefully when Stokes used his left hand to help him load up his plate. “Fifteen, skinny, smartass? Left-sided above knee amputation? Ringing a bell?”
“Ooh,” Lawrence nodded as he remembered. “Fuck yeah, he can join the club.”
“The crips,” Simmons snickered. She threw up some dumbass gang sign with her right hand before helping Greene load up a plate.
“Poor kid,” Mendez said, saying what they were all thinking. “Fifteen’s a hell of an age to lose a leg.”
“Nah,” Lawrence laughed again. “I wish I’d lost my leg when I was fifteen, the pity pussy alone.”
“Gross!” Booker squealed. She grabbed a sausage link from the platter and threw it at Lawrence’s head. “Don’t ever say that shit again.”
“Yes, Private Booker!” Lawrence boomed, giving Booker a sharp salute and a wink. “Don’t mean it don’t work though.”
“Wilson said to watch your mouths while the kid’s here,” Taylor warned them all. “No need to have Iron Man on the news claiming his precious boy was dirtied up by the crippled vets.”
“Man, Iron Man says worse shit all the time,” Greene said. He started backing his chair away from the table, his lap covered in a plate overflowing with food. “We can’t say shit that kid doesn’t hear at home anyway.”
“He’s got a point,” Taylor agreed. He finished loading up his plate and began a careful shuffle to the regular circle of chairs in the middle of the room. Little Stark had a dirty mouth and anyone with a brain knew of Big Stark’s sordid history.
Taylor kind of doubted if they’d scare off Little Stark with their dirty jokes, it was all the missing limbs that would send the kid running.
Everyone slowly filtered over to the chairs, each of them with food for themselves and laughter and jokes being tossed about. By the time Taylor finished eating, he finally saw Little Stark wheeling himself in the room in his high tech red and gold wheelchair.
“Let’s hear it for our hero,” Greene announced from his chair when Tony Stark himself stepped in the room, followed closely by Wilson. “If you’ve got two hands, put them together for Stark!”
There were a lot of good natured cheers and claps, a few whistles from those that couldn’t clap, and Taylor winked at Little Stark when he looked surprised by their group.
“If I knew food would get me a standing ovation then I’d deliver it every week,” Big Stark said with an easy smile. “Anyone leave any coffee?”
Taylor nodded his head to the open space beside him when the kid seemed unsure of what to do once his dad wandered off with Wilson to grab coffee.
“Hey, kid, welcome to the crip club,” Taylor said. He waited until Harry was beside him to start the round of introductions. “Hey, dumbasses, this is Harry, left sided-AKA.”
“Hey, welcome.” Jones reached over and shook Harry’s hand with a grin. “Private Jones, right sided-BKA.”
The others went around their circle introducing themselves and Harry full on twitched when Godwin introduced herself by waving her prosthetic hands.
“I- I shouldn’t be here…” Harry said, looking anxious as fuck. He was twisting his fingers around on his lap, his eyes flicking uneasily from each of them, lingering on their boot merch and tattoos and dog tags. “I’m sorry. I’m- I can go…”
“Hey.” Taylor quickly stuck a crutch in one of the wheels on Harry’s chair. It wasn’t cool for the kid to feel like he was out of place just because they were the idiots that enlisted. “You should be here,” Taylor told him seriously. “Wars aren’t always on foreign soil, Stark. That stump of yours? That’s all you need to join our fucked up club.”
“Should have tried to lose your arm instead, it’s easier to walk when you’re just missing an arm.” Stokes waved his own stump around, clearly trying to set the kid at ease. “Try and fail better next time.”
There were a few laughs at the old quote every damn Drill Sargent in every basic ever had yelled at them all until they dreamt about it. Harry relaxed though, his fingers quit twisting, so Taylor pulled his crutch out of the wheel.
“How’d daddy convince you to come anyway?” Taylor asked Harry once he was sure the kid wasn’t going to bolt. “I thought you said you’d rather lose your right leg than come here?”
Harry was a fucking riot, in Taylor’s opinion. Taylor knew he’d fit in the first time they met- the kid had a foul mouth, he was jaded as hell, and Taylor didn’t need to be a shrink to see the PTSD that lingered in the kid’s green eyes.
Taylor did a bit of research, and by that he meant he googled the kid’s name, and read a bunch of news articles about the kid. Apparently the kid got kidnapped before he lost his leg, something most news pages loved comparing to his dad being kidnapped back in Afghanistan. Before that though, nobody even know Harry Stark existed until back over the summer.
So Taylor wondered what kind of shit the kid dealt with before he showed up or if all that trauma floating in his crazy brain was from being kidnapped by the Winter fuckin’ Soldier.
Harry was glaring at Taylor then and he glanced toward his dad‘s back and rolled his eyes. “Guilt trip,” Harry told him. “‘I really want to go but I don’t want to go alone- we never spend time together anymore’.”
Taylor and Sanchez laughed at the oldest guilt trip in the world.
“And you fell for it?” Taylor asked Harry. “Man, I thought you were smarter than that.”
“He’s got very sad puppy eyes sometimes,” Harry muttered. He fell quiet when his dad and Wilson came up to the group. Tony Stark fell in a chair beside Harry’s wheelchair and Wilson took his usual spot between Godwin and Mendez.
“Making friends?” Tony asked Harry brightly. He reached across Harry and shook Taylor’s hand. “You must be that ‘bloody prat’ I’ve heard so much about.”
“Yes, sir,” Taylor grinned. “It’s my job to give little Stark here just enough bullshit that he doesn’t start throwing pity parties.”
“Pity parties are the best kind of parties,” Greene said from his own wheelchair. “Get a bottle of vodka, a couple packs of cigarettes, turn the radio up and just throw the best pity party in the world.”
“He’s fifteen,” Wilson said, jumping in with a sharp look at Greene. “Everyone should find a chance to vent their feelings about their new life, but what do we do afterwards?”
“Drink water and hit up a meeting?” Lawrence grinned. It wasn’t actually funny, not coming from Lawrence. That poor son of a bitch had been struggling with alcoholism as long as he’d been struggling to adjust to civilian life without his right leg.
“In a way, yeah,” Wilson said. “You throw your healthy pity party and then you get your ass up and get back to life.”
“What if you can’t exactly get up?” Greene asked as he wiggled his bilateral stumps.
Harry laughed then and then he looked horrified when Greene looked at him. “Shite. I’m sorry,” Harry said, eyes wide. “I just—”
“No need to apologize, we settle our issues with races here,” Greene smirked. “You should have added some flames to your chair with that paint job, Stark, it’s scientifically proven to make you go faster.”
Everyone laughed and Harry relaxed some after glancing toward his dad quickly and then nodding at Greene.
“I’ll remember that when I get crutches,” Harry said seriously.
“Ignore Greene, man,” Simmons told Harry. “He’s a fucking idiot, he left all his brain cells with his legs in Iraq.”
“That’s not fair,” Booker said, “Greene never had any brain cells.”
“Did any of us?” Taylor laughed. “We all enlisted here.”
“Hey, now, some of us made a pretty dime off Uncle Sam’s back,” Godwin said. She clacked her claw hands together then and laughed bitterly. “Then he made quarters off our limbs.”
“Did- were you all…” Harry looked around the circle and cleared his throat. “Were you all in war?”
“That’s a great question,” Wilson said quickly. He leaned his chair back on two legs and looked at Mendez on his right. “Who wants to share their superhero origin story?”
“Not you,” Jones said, tapping Stark’s ankle with his crutch. “We all know you just dreamt up Iron Man in a fucking cave in Afghany.”
“But superhero origin stories are my favorite,” Stark pouted before wiping the look away with clear practice. He winked at his son, and Taylor saw that the kid relaxed some at the look.
That was cool, actually. Harry was a bit of a defensive jerk, Taylor never knew how he actually felt about his dad.
Taylor absolutely wasn’t jealous that Harry Stark had a dad that clearly supported him and was helping him get back on his feet, pun intended.
“I didn’t have any bombs or any cool story to pull the ladies with,” Mendez said, starting the story time. “Man, I was just walking through the damn forest with my battalion and when we stopped, I went to adjust my boot tuck and this damned snake made its way up my pant leg. The little bastard bit me and by the time I made it back to base, my whole fucking leg was red.”
Everyone knew the end of that story- Uncle Sam and his cracker jack camp clinics cost a twenty year old Private his leg then shipped his ass back to the States for a discharge and a disability label.
“From a snake bite?” Harry asked with his eyebrows flying high up on his forehead. “Bloody hell.”
“It’s those foreign snakes, man,” Mendez insisted. “They’ve got something extra in their venom, I swear.”
“Boy, bullshit,” Lawrence laughed. “You just forgot all those safety briefs about snake safety.”
“Nah, I got that down. Wrap it before you tap it, right?”
“Moving on,” Wilson said loudly, shaking his head at Mendez and Lawrence.
Taylor didn’t think either Stark minded, Harry was grinning even with a little redness to his little innocent fifteen year old cheeks and Tony was smirking in a way that only men who got laid a lot could do.
“Anyone else want to share?” Wilson asked, looking pointedly toward Godwin. It was the pain of her rank, if she didn’t want to be expected to be the shining leader of the group, she never should have became Staff Sergeant.
“Routine rounds in the T-54, a tank for you civies,” she told Harry with a wink, “we got hit with hostile fire. The damn tank blew, took my left arm with it and there was shrapnel through my right forearm. So when the medics found me, they flew me to the closest camp and took that arm too.”
Everyone fell quiet for a minute, thinking of their own injuries. Taylor’s had been bad; one minute he’d been in the air, on top of the god damned world, and the next minute a rocket hit the blades of the chopper and he was crashing to the ground.
“ANDERSON! ANDERSON!”
Taylor couldn’t even talk… he thought he’d die under those sheets of burning metal- choking on the flames and the taste of blood in his mouth.
Some days, more days than not, Taylor wished he’d died out there. Dying would have been a hell of a lot less painful than the bullshit life he was leading.
“You good?”
Taylor looked over and saw Harry staring at him with understanding eyes. Which, fuck that, some kid shouldn’t understand the feeling of smoke and flames filling your brain and dragging your ass back to a place that you shouldn’t have been in the first place.
“Fine,” Taylor lied easily. He grinned and waved a hand at Harry. “Let’s hear your story, Trainee.”
“Trainee?” Harry asked, obviously stalling. “What? Am I auditioning to be in your cripple club?”
Taylor wasn’t the only one who laughed his ass off at that. Harry would have fit right in on the field, but he shouldn’t.
Fifteen year old Taylor never would have fit in with a bunch of PTSD-riddled, pissed off at the world, cynical vets.
“Come on, pussy,” Taylor taunted Harry, pushing him then just like he did during physical therapy. “Let’s hear how you tripped on the sidewalk, broke your ankle, and overreacted by having your leg cut off.”
“Oh, piss off,” Harry snapped at him. “I didn’t trip on the fucking sidewalk, I jumped out of a car.”
Taylor chuckled and shook his head at the hothead kid. “That’s worse, you get how that’s worse, right?”
“Says the guy who played pararescue without a chute,” Stokes scoffed.
“Would you animals shut the hell up so we can hear this?” Godwin said, shaking her head at them all. “Go on, Stark, let’s hear about your origin story.”
Harry coughed quietly and Taylor and the others politely pretended not to notice when Tony Stark reached over, easy as fuck all, and wrapped an arm over his son’s shoulders.
Taylor knew he wasn’t the only one who was jealous of that. Sometimes kids with good homes and happy childhoods grew up to enlist, but more often than not it wasn’t the case. Taylor hadn’t seen his own father since the prick beat his mom and had to be taken from the house in handcuffs.
Taylor knew for damn sure that his old man never would have shown up at one of these meetings and wrapped his arm around his shoulder, all supportive and friendly, and helped hold him together long enough to get shit off his chest.
“Some bloke knocked me out, put me in his car, and when I came to I jumped out,” Harry said quickly. He spit it all out like poison. “I broke my leg and when I went to the hospital, they had to cut it off.”
“Bro, what?” Greene was leaning forward, his elbows on his thighs, with his dark eyes locked on Harry. “Who the fuck knocked you out?”
“And how did a broken leg turn to an above knee amputation?” Mendez asked. “You live in the US, my guy, medical care is like top notch for rich white boys.”
“Hey—”
“Oh, piss off,” Harry snapped at Mendez, cutting off Wilson. “I’m not some posh rich kid with the best medical care. I was laying in a motel for bloody days until my leg turned black and I was fucking hallucinating. The whole damn thing rotted off. D’you know what it smells like when your body is rotting off?”
Everyone went still for a beat.
Yeah, most of them did know how that smelled.
“What’d you hallucinate?” Sanchez asked. He held up what was left of his left arm when Simmons threw a piece of egg at his head. “Hey, Private, calm the fuck down, I’m just curious.”
Harry had been all fire for a moment, but he fell quiet then, looking little and meek while he was locked in his thoughts. Everyone gave him a minute, all too used to those thoughts getting so tangled up that they couldn’t keep track of what was real, what was fake.
“My friends,” Harry finally said, blinking quickly to hide the shine in his eyes. “I dunno, I thought I was dying, I guess, so it was easier if my friends were there.”
“It’s never easy to die, even if you’re surrounded by friends.” Greene only said what they were all thinking. How many of them saw their friends die?
How many of them tried to save their friends and instead wound up being delegated to calling their family or delivering their flags?
“You know what’s harder than dying? Living,” Wilson said soberly, like a broken record. A few of the guys nodded, but just as many of them rolled their eyes. Taylor was a nodder, he wanted to start living again.
“You know what’s harder than living?” Booker looked around until she had everyone’s attention. “Walking.”
Wilson rolled his eyes and Simmons muttered ‘speak for yourself’, but Taylor looked over and saw that Harry was laughing his ass off with Booker’s dumb ass.
“Man, you know what’s harder than walking?” Taylor smacked Harry’s foot with his crutch. “Running.”
“But you’re such a success case,” Harry drawled sarcastically once he finished laughing. “Stupid Anderson and his stupid crutches and his stupid showing off.”
“Hey, Anderson, I think he’s calling you stupid,” Stokes said. “You know what you should do? Fight him over it.”
“Cripple wars!” Taylor cried, raising a crutch up in the air. “May the least handicapped win!”
“The kid would kick your ass,” Lawrence said confidently. “He’s got that fancy chair, he’d just run you over.”
“He’d have to catch me first and I’m fast,” Taylor grinned. “You should see Harry on his foot, the kid’s clumsy as fuck.”
“Oi! I did the bloody stairs!” Harry scowled. “I went up and down the damn things!”
“Well let’s get you a Medal of Honor,” Lawrence joked. “Stairs in PT? Damn, kid, you’re making us all look like cowards.”
Harry twitched then, his smile fading and his blood draining. “You lot are heroes,” Harry said quietly. He looked around and must have seen people a lot tougher than they were. “I jumped from a bloody car, like a coward. I ran from a war, like a coward. You- you lot ran toward a fight, I ran from it.”
“Hey, Tony, you bring those prototypes with you?” Wilson asked swiftly, giving Godwin a pointed look. “I’ll help you grab them.”
“Sure,” Tony agreed after a moment of hesitation. He tightened his arm on Harry’s curled up shoulders for a moment before climbing to his feet. “I’ll be back, kid.”
Harry nodded and suddenly looked like a lonely little island when he turned to watch his dad walk out with his head bent toward Wilson, the two of them whispering about something.
“Your turn, Greene,” Godwin said with authority once Harry’s safety blanket was gone. “Tell the kid how you lost your legs.”
Greene fidgeted in his chair, his face coloring with his old shame. “Man, it was some bullshit,” he said. “You heard of the Battle of Umm Qasr? It only lasted four days,” he said when Harry shook his head. “They were open firing on us, and- and other guys holding their spot, and they were fucking dying, my guy. So… so I took off.”
Taylor hadn’t been there, it was before he got to Iraq, but he heard enough about it from the POW’s they got back.
“I took off, feeling like a little bitch, and hid my skinny white ass in a nearby building. And you know what happened? They blew the fucking thing up.”
Harry’s eyes were wide, shocked, and the others were quiet.
How many of them wanted to run? How many of them wanted to hide?
“But if I’d stayed I would have died,” Greene stressed. “So I didn’t get a fucking Purple Heart, and there’s plenty of douche bags that look down their nose at me, but I’m living, man. I ran and they can call me a coward, but I’m alive.”
Harry stared at Greene hard and everyone saw what question was about to come out of his mouth. “Do you want to be?” he asked. “Did you want to live a coward or die a hero?”
“Kid, you fucking listen to me.” Greene pushed his chair closer, staring Harry down hard. “When your life is on the line, when it’s standing in the fire or fleeing, you fucking flee, got it? You do whatever the hell you have to do to live, because you don’t get anymore sunrises or orgasms when you’re dead.”
Harry chewed on his bottom lip for a moment, just staring at Greene and his story and his advice.
“I’m not so great at fleeing anymore, I could try hopping away.”
Taylor laughed hard and he clapped Harry on the shoulder, feeling the little twitch beneath his hand.
“Guy, you fit in here just perfect,” he told Harry. “Just keep coming back and making your dad buy us breakfast and we’ll whip your ass in shape.”
Harry looked over and Taylor imagined there was one less shadow in the back of his eyes when he nodded at him, a hint of a smile curling his lips up in the side.
By the time Tony came back with Wilson, their arms filled with metal limbs that were shined to perfection, Harry was trading barbs with the rest of them.
“Who wants a leg?” Tony Stark asked, waving a sparkling silver leg in the air. He zeroed in on Taylor immediately, setting off an explosion of nerves and excitement. “You wanna give it a go, Specialist?”
Taylor hesitated, his chest heaving while his heart lodged somewhere in his throat. That leg… that leg was everything. That leg wasn’t his, but damn if he wouldn’t make it his own. But it was terrifying too, because if it didn’t work then Taylor was just getting his hopes up for nothing.
It was the kid that prompted him to his foot though. The kid just looked over and scoffed at the torn expression on Taylor’s face.
“Go get a leg, pussy,” Harry said with something between an arrogant smirk and an easy grin.
Taylor laughed and shoved himself to his foot, hobbling over to where Tony Stark was setting up shop. “Stark, when I’m running laps on two legs, I’ll give you my crutches.”
“I don’t want your sweaty crutches,” Harry said, curling his nose while his eyes shimmered happily. “I’m a rich white boy, I’ll get my own.”
Man, Taylor didn’t know when, he was a soldier, not a fucking psychic, but that kid was going to be just fine.