Raised Up From Clay

Disclaimer: Gallipoli, the Peter Weir film, is the property of Paramount Pictures. I am not affiliated with them and am making no money from this piece.


RAISED UP FROM CLAY

Then something began to hurt Mowgli inside him, as he had never been hurt in his life before, and he caught his breath and sobbed, and the tears ran down his face.

"What is it? What is it?" he said. "I do not wish to leave the Jungle, and I do not know what this is. Am I dying, Bagheera?"

"No, Little Brother. Those are only tears as men use," said Bagheera. "Now I know thou art a man, and a man's cub no longer…. Let them fall, Mowgli. They are only tears." So Mowgli sat and cried as though his heart would break; and he had never cried in all his life before.

"Now," he said, "I will go to men."

--Rudyard Kipling, The Jungle Book, as read in Gallipoli


***


Frank knew that something was wrong as soon as he woke up. The bed was too soft--too comfortable--the sheets too clean. It was far too posh to be his work tent or even his parents' home in Perth.

Then it came back to him. He was in an inn somewhere in the middle of the Kimberly. On the dresser was a flyer for the first footrace he had lost in over three years. In his trouser pocket was exactly five quid and two bob--twenty quid less than had been in there when he signed up for the bloody race yesterday.

On his mind was the fact that he had nowhere in particular to go and absolutely no idea what to do from here.

He eased down the stair. The innkeeper stopped him with a cough and waved the bill. "Three and six."

Make that one and eight in his pocket now.

Frank was a man who was used to getting what he aimed for--in sport, in the dealings he euphemistically termed "business" and from life in general. Right now he wanted breakfast and he couldn't afford to pay.

Through the tearoom window, he saw the kid who had won the race in nine and five-sixteenths--near world-record time. Hamilton. Arnold? Albert? Alfred? The kid had money--the gift from the race certainly, and likely a big chunk of the bets that had been placed as well. It wouldn't really be like mooching. After all, Frank figured, part of it had been his money once.

Frank stepped into the restaurant and extended his hand along with his most charming smile. "Sorry about yesterday, mate. It just threw me to be beaten like that. Won everything there was to win in Perth. Frank Dunne."

Archy lifted his baby-face to Frank's greeting. After a long pause, his fresh lips turned up only half-reluctantly and he took the hand. "Archy Hamilton."

Two minutes later, Frank was eating breakfast.


***

You don't have to be best mates to decide to run off to war; to lock yourselves together in a freight car headed to god-knows-where in the middle of the night with nothing to do except think and talk; or to decide to trek across fifty miles of dry, snake-infected lake bed with neither map nor compass and with minimal provisions. You don't have to be best mates to do these things, but if you are lucky enough to make it through them alive, you probably will be best mates in the end.

The first day on the desert lake wasn't so bad. They had water and they had the sun for direction. Archy had weathered worse treks than this many times rounding up lost cattle from the station. It didn't seem like a bother at all. For the first time in eighteen years he was doing something not for his dad or mum or Uncle Jack, but purely for himself.

When the sun went down, they had to stop. No sun meant no direction. They could easily walk thirty miles backwards during the night. It was only May, not yet full winter here. They must still be fairly far from Perth. The night was crisp, but not yet cold and pulling all their clothing over them, they made a decent bivouac on the sand.

Still Archy couldn't sleep. It wasn't fear of scorpions or snakes. Although he had his fun baiting Frank, the city-boy, into a fair state imagining their nocturnal affairs, Archy knew that they were loath to bother with any human who didn't bother with them first. No, it was pure excitement that kept him up. Wherever it was that they were, it was the farthest he had ever been from home and it was Frank who had brought him here.

Archy pulled the jacket up beyond his chin and rolled over on his side, Frank's sleeping form now only inches away from his. It no longer seemed to matter whether or not he could sneak into the cavalry underage; his life had changed forever. Somewhere between yesterday and today he had become a man of his own.

He had never met anyone like Frank--far from fearless, but willing to take wild chances all the same. Frank blew with the wind, did what he wanted, got what he wanted out of life. What would that be like, Archy wondered?

He watched Frank's face as he slept, so peaceful and serene. No, the word was "beautiful." Archy inched a little closer, watched the lips breathe in and out, the eyes twitch under the lids enjoying some private dream-time show. Excited in an entirely different way now, Archy raised a tentative hand to touch a cheek, but at the last second he drew it back.

Eighteen or twenty-one didn't matter--as he'd tried to tell Uncle Jack--he was no longer a child; he was a man. That truth had been decided that the moment he'd run away. Some things men did that boys could not--like go to war--and some things worked the other way round.

Boys might play with other boys. Everyone knew real men did not.

Archy started to touch himself to relieve his discomfort, but after only a few strokes he stopped. The real ache was not between his legs, but some where, deeper within the soul. As he watched Frank's eyelids twitch and dance in the moonlight, he realized he could wank all night and never ease off that deeper need.

Somehow he had thought that these feelings would be different--gone--when he became a man. It wasn't fair. He'd tried so hard to grow up right.


***

When the sky lightened, Archy was already packed to go. "Come on, sleeping beauty, we've got to be off." He nudged Frank's side with his boot.

"What's your rush?" Frank hugged his jacket closer and rolled over once more.

"We're almost out of water. I want to be shed of the desert by mid-day."

"This was all your idea," said Frank as he pulled himself up.

"Don't start. You said the train was going to Perth."

"Bugger it," said Frank as he finished emptying a pathetically few drops from his bladder. He shook it off and buttoned his trousers.

"South should be about here," said Archy aiming his arm across the sand. "Come on."

"Bugger it," repeated Frank as he gathered up his belongings and followed.


***


In Perth, Frank gave him his first drink of whisky. In fact he gave him half a bottle while they worked at the kitchen table. Making the Archibald LaSalles birth certificate look legal was the easy part. Making Archy look legal was a bloody sight harder.

Archy's eyes flopped around in a drunken haze and his head lolled back against the wall as Frank's hand came up with another glob of hairy glue. It smelled like chemicals and it itched his lip where it dried.

"No, no!" Archy rolled his head to the side.

"Here, here," said Frank and began to smooth the mixture over his cheeks and chin. Frank's fingers were warm and his touch was strong and even as it stroked to work the stubble along every line, into each crease, against each tender nerve.

Archy moaned a little and his lips parted. His head was already reeling from the whiskey, and the touch of Frank's hand made the dizziness ten times worse. "Frank--" Archy spread his legs and shifted in his seat against the acute irritation there.

"Just a minute," said Frank and passed his thumb slowly just under the lower lip. Archy groaned and extended his tongue.

Frank pulled away. "Watch it, mate. You'll get hair in your mouth. And not the good way either."

Frank's dad appeared in the doorway. "Well, I never."

Frank yanked Archy's head up by a fistful of hair. "How's he look?"

Archy grinned a silly smile. He hiccuped once before falling into a drunken sleep.


***

The forgery had worked; the other part had been a stupid idea. You can't teach someone to ride in a day. Archy had made the cavalry easily. Frank had failed by just as wide a margin.

Archy's eyes shone bright as they shook hands. "I'll see you when I see you then."

"Right." Frank watched him walk away.

"Hey!"

Archy looked back over the shoulder of his new 10th Light Horse uniform.

"Not if I see you first." Frank tried an insincere smile.

Archy raised a real one. He waved. It wasn't the way he'd wanted to say good-bye, but now he was a man--a soldier--and he must put those childish things aside.


***


Maybe it was the sun. Maybe it was excitement of the battle simulation. Maybe it was the three months that had passed since they had parted, but whatever the reason, when the cavalry met the infantry in the training camp in Egypt and they were reunited, Archy embraced him with all the passion he had saved.

Then they did what men do, of course. They went into Cairo. They got whiskey. They got women--no, they'd gotten *ladies* as Frank groused when the ladies dropped them off cheerful but unsatisfied. Frank had called that a serious and ball-busting mistake when the alternative was so easy to come by here.

They got drunk, they got silly, they wrapped arms around each other and told stories. When they cleared the edge of the city and neared open ground, they did what came naturally two healthy young lads.

Archy's eyes took on a gleam. "Race you to the pyramids." He dropped to a crouch.

"You're on." Frank assumed his stance.

"Go!"

Archy's legs rolled with the easy motion of steel springs. It felt so good to be running again--and best of all, with someone who understood.

***

They hit the lower blocks of the great pyramid at the same time and collapsed in helpless laughter. "Mad!" Archy gasped. "We're…both…"

Frank finished the thought. "We're both utterly mad!"

They lay against the rocks letting their breathing settle down. Frank pulled a brandy bottle from his jacket, took a swig and passed it over. Archy took a decent gulp and tipped his head back to the sky. It was a brilliant sapphire blue and unmarred by even a wisp of cloud. The glare of the sun burnt his eyes, but he couldn't turn away. That very same sun was shining down on the cattle station back home. If you just looked at the sky you could be anywhere in the world you wanted to imagine, even home.

He was glad he had joined up, but that didn't mean he couldn't miss home too.

There was a tap upon his shoulder, breaking into his thoughts. "Race you to the top, mate." Frank turned and scrambled up the pyramid face.

Laughing, Archy called him a cheat and took off right behind.

***

By the time they neared the top the sun was setting in splendid hues and they had forgotten about the race. They passed the brandy and watched the colors blend and merge and die.

Frank took out his knife and began to carve. The spot he found was under a 1799 inscription--the man who carved that was long dead. The stones were covered with names and dates. After the thousands of years the pyramid had stood here, it was a fair bet that the vast majority who had ever made a mark on it were dead.

"Give it here," said Archy and added his name next to Frank's. Together they finished and shook hands over the new inscription. "AIF 1915, Frank + Archy."

It looked bloody good.

They sat back to have another drink.

"Do you think she liked me?" asked Frank.

"Who?" said Archy. He took another swallow of brandy.

"What do you mean, 'who?' Emily. One of the only two female people we have seen all day. I think she liked me. She kept looking at my chest." Frank took a swig from the bottle and passed it over again.

"That's because you have a stain."

"I do not," said Frank and puffed out his chest as if to make some kind of a point.

"Do so." Archy took his finger and ran it down a pec and over a nipple. He circled in the general vicinity of the stain, and felt the nipple grow hard beneath his touch. After too long he moved his fingertip.

"See?" Archy took another drink. A dribble ran down the corner of his lips.

"You put it there," said Frank his voice perhaps a fraction rougher than it had been.

"Bugger all," said Archy. He let his hand drift down Frank's chest and left it resting on his thigh.

Frank grabbed the brandy and took another drink. "Anyway, I still think she liked me. Do you think they'll put out?"

"I dunno," said Archy moving his hand over Frank's thigh.

"They ought have to, you know. It's their patriotic duty, us going off to war and all. One last snog before you die."

"I think that's a cigarette--and that's for executions," said Archy.

Frank took a swig. "Maybe, but I'd rather have the snog."

Archy nudged his hand a little higher. He could feel Frank's heat through the cloth.

Abruptly Frank stood up on the rock. Archy pulled back his hand.

Looking out across the desert, Frank loosened his trousers. "Actually, right now I need to have a piss more than anything. Come on, Arch; go with me. Let's see who can pee the farthest."

Archy hugged his knees against his chest. "You go; I'll watch."

"Coward," said Frank. "Come on, you know you want to. How often do you get to pee off of something like this? I bet I can hit Cairo." Frank let loose and sighed in satisfaction as the stream slacked down to nothing. He shook it off, and started to tuck it in.

Frank sat back down on the rock, still toying with his fly. He leaned his head back, closed his eyes and let his hand continue to move. "Crikey, mate, do you ever have trouble knowing if you want to get off or pee?"

"No," said Archy, his eyes fixed to Frank's hand where it worked at his crotch.

"'Course not. You're eighteen. You always want to get off."

"It's not like that," said Archy.

Frank looked sideways at him. "You can't fool me. I remember being your age. I had a third leg for five years straight starting when I was fifteen. Mum would have sold me to the circus if Dad hadn't talked her out of it. I know you want to."

Frank readjusted his position and pulled his member out fully. "See if you can shoot farther than me." Frank took another slug of brandy and began to thump.

"Frank, you can't do that here!" said Archy in dismay. Belying his outburst, Archy's eyes were transfixed on the sight.

"You know you want to Arch. Come on, don't make me do this alone." Frank's breathing fell into rhythm and his pelvis rolled beneath his hand.

Frank's grunts grew rough and his eyes rolled back, his hand moved fiercely, but then--with a curse-- he let go and flung his hand out wide. "Bloody hell!" His hand hit the empty brandy bottle, which went clanking down the side. Frank's shaft stood out stiff and straight from his trousers. "I can't get close enough."

Then Archy moved. He slid down to the next block and wedged between Frank's knees. He put his mouth over Frank's shaft and inhaled a great breath, and then he began to suck in earnest.

"Oh, God!" Frank screamed out and clutched Archy's head in closer. His hips rocked and they both banged against the stone, both too far gone to care.

"Coming!" cried Frank, and tried to pull away. Archy strained to stay with him, but in his fervor he slipped and slid belly first down the rocks.

"Arch!" Frank grabbed at him, caught him by the shoulders, pulled him back up to his knees.

They stayed there for the longest moment, faces flushed, panting heavily, both so hard it hurt and just stared into each other's eyes.

Archy bent his head back down. Frank kept hold of his shoulders. "You don't have to do this, mate."

Archy's face dissolved. "I want to. Very much." The tone of his voice was unmistakable. Frank let him go; Archy took him back in his mouth and within ten seconds, Frank was spewing down his throat.

It was only when it was over that Archy realized he had come sometime in his trousers--without ever touching himself at all.

"I love you, Frank." Archy said as he lay against his chest.

Frank shifted where he sat and buttoned himself. "Crickey, mate, why do you have to go talking like that?"

"What do you mean?" asked Archy. "It's true."

"It's just the brandy talking," Frank said. "Trust me, I've been there myself." He paused. "Well, maybe not *right* there, but…you know…with girls. It wears off in the morning."

Archy's face was unreadable as he turned his face away. "Sure," he said into the night. He wiped the remainder of Frank's seed away with his handkerchief.

They climbed down the pyramid in silence, giving each other a hand here and there in the dark.

"So, you still want to see Major Barton for a transfer?" asked Archy.

Frank blinked in surprise. "'Course I do. We're mates, aren't we?" He clapped Archy on the back.

"Right. He takes interviews at ten hundred hours each morning. Meet me at his tent then."

"Right-O," said Frank. "Ten hundred sharp. I'll see you then." He swaggered off towards his own tent, whistling as he walked.

Archy silently watched him stride away.


***

Frank transferred into Archy's unit. The rest is recorded in history. They sailed for ANZAC. The 10th Light Horse cavalry was slaughtered almost to a man by machine guns at The Neck. Frank's old infantry unit was all but wiped out at Lone Pine.

What isn't recorded in history is that Frank never entered combat.

"I need a runner," said Major Barton looking Archy square in the eye.

"Take Frank," said Archy. "He's as fast as I am."

The major did.

The rest of the 10th light horse stayed for the assault.

Gasping and sweating, Frank made it back just in time to see the last wave--with Archy and the major both in it--get sliced down by the Turks.

***


Archy woke up in the dark on a hospital ship, pitching violently in a storm. It was only the third ship he had ever been on in his life, and the first two certainly did not bear him to good fortune. He gathered he must be somewhere below, near the stern, for even through the rolls and pitches, he could feel the thrum of the ship's engines beating with the constancy of a human heart, never breaking despite the storm.

He peered through the gloom to see his surroundings. The air tasted of vomit and of gangrene. He had no strength left for horror when he looked down and saw that his own body lay covered in them both. A tube stuck out of his chest and drained down somewhere--presumably onto the deck. A soggy sheet was twisted hopelessly around his right leg. His left leg lay bloated impotently in a pool of foul secretions. When he tugged at the hip, it shifted just a little. The most horrific part was that it didn't even hurt.

At one point he cried out and a gray skinned-nurse in a bloody uniform stumbled across the pitching deck. She came armed with a syringe of morphine--the only available solution to anything medical.

Archy tried to stay her hand. As long as he was awake he could choose to draw another breath, and as long as he drew another breath, he would live. Should he sleep and leave his rotting body to its own devices, who knew?

In a sluggish mumble, Archy tried to explain, but the nurse didn't understand, or perhaps she understood too well. Her exhausted face spoke volumes of the boys she had already tended--and still she fought her way across the deck in the storm for one more.

Archy lost the will to stop her; he was so tired. He would accept whatever future the syringe might hold. The sting was a peculiar pleasure when it pierced his skin.

He slept, and in Morphia, Frank came to him.

***

"G'day mate!" His smile was as brash and free. Tight little running shorts showed off his body to its finest, leaving only the most secret spots still to be uncovered. He wrapped Archy in his arms and held him close against his bare breast--close enough to feel the beating of his heart.

Archy was in his running kit, two legs toned and healthy, a bulge between them beginning to rise and vie for size and strength. "Are we dead?" Archy murmured into his neck, not truly caring about the answer, just curious in an abstract sort of way.

"Not me!" Frank's laugh rippled through his torso. Archy rolled with the movements, his body slaved to Frank's.

"I'm not dumb enough to go and get myself shot up," said Frank. "Can't say as much for you, though."

"That doesn't make any sense," Archy said. "Either we're both dead, or neither of us are."

"Blimey, do you always have to have all the answers? You remind me of my mother's priest."

Archy nipped playfully at a nipple located conveniently next to his mouth. "Oh really? Do I still?"

"And if I said, 'yes?'"

Archy laughed. "Good. Religion can't very well be a sin." He sucked the whole nipple into his mouth.

Warmth suffused Archy's body, seeming to come straight from Frank. Frank rubbed the arm where the morphine shot had gone, and pressed himself against Archy's side. Through the shorts, Archy could feel the girth of Frank's want dig in, but the only moves Frank made were his arms against Archy's arms and torso, holding him, sheltering him from all else.

"What are you doing here, Frank?" Archy asked, not finding it at all queer that he could speak with his mouth still full of his nipple.

"I came back for you," Frank said, smoothing Archy's hair away from his forehead.

"Just for me?" Archy asked, moving his ear across his chest, over his heart, to better hear its beat. It stayed eerily even with an almost mechanical precision.

"For us," Frank said. "I couldn't very well leave my mate." He stroked Archy's head like a parent would, protective, strong and sure.

The ship lurched; Archy's stomach roiled. His body pitched to one side of the bunk and back. He tried to move, but Frank just held him tighter.

"Shh," Frank said. "I'll stay; it'll be all right."

"I love you, Frank," said Archy. His head grew heavy and his hands were so strong and warm. Archy could no longer see the face, but he could smell the scent of his body--a smell that could be no other. Poets speak of vision growing dim before one dies. Archy wondered which was the last of the senses to go.

"I know," Frank said. "Now go to sleep."

Amidst the chaos of the storm, he did. He could still feel the pulse of the heartbeat beneath him as he slept.


****


Archy woke up next with a sister in white hovering over him. The walls were white. The room was white.

"Am I dead?" he asked.

"Not hardly, lad. You're in the Fourth Auxiliary, Egypt," she said.

Then, again, it all went black. Archy was not particularly disappointed; he had had quite enough of Egypt.


***


He woke up the next time to the same white walls, to see Frank there, sitting right beside him.

"'Bout time, mate," said Frank. "I was getting bloody bored watching you snore."

"Frank!" Archy tried to sit. His right leg shrieked in protest and his body moved barely at all.

Frank leapt up and put his arm around his shoulders, propping a pillow behind his back. "Easy, mate. I'm here only on the condition that I don't upset you. It took me five weeks to track you down. It would be a shame to get thrown out in three minutes."

"Frank." Archy said the name just to hear it. "It's really you?"

"Last I checked. You're the one with the crooked name, 'LaSalles.'"

Archy chuckled, but it hurt his chest. Frank eased him back down on the pillows, eyes glued tightly to Archy's face. Archy's smile drooped a little when Frank removed his arm.

Frank's metal chair made a caustic scraping noise against the tile as he scooted it closer to the head of the bed.

Frank looked older than when he had last seen him. Archy supposed he himself must too. He was to have had a birthday in August. For all he knew he was nineteen now. Bugger, he might be twenty-nine for all he remembered. He looked around the room. So many beds. So many blokes. None of them looked familiar--except Frank.

"Where are we?" Archy asked.

" Fourth Auxiliary Hospital, Abassia, Egypt."

"Abassia? How did you find me?"

Frank chuckled and assumed an air. "Don't you know you can find anything with a watch and the sun."

Archy tried to laugh, but it hurt his chest. He winced and squeezed his eyes shut until the spasm passed. When he opened them again Frank was watching him with unabashed concern.

"You all right, mate?"

"I was hoping you could tell me. My chest hurts like hell."

"They say you'll make it fine, though you had a rough patch back through the winter. Johnny Turk about blew out half your lung. They say if you hadn't been an athlete, you wouldn't have made it on what was left."

"I'll have to thank Uncle Jack for that training, then." Archy smiled and poked at the bandages on his chest. The bed sheet slipped lower. He was wrapped around the belly too.

Frank nudged his arm. "Yeah. Hey, Arch, about Uncle Jack, and that watch and the sun and all…" The old pocket watch dangled from Frank's hand.

"Frank!" Archie snatched at the watch in glee. "You found it! How?"

"I told you, I can get a hold of anything once I learn the ropes."

Archy turned it over in his hand. He had left it in the trench with his medal knowing for certain he would never see them, or Uncle Jack, or anyone else in this world again. He had said his goodbyes, but now--"

Frank cleared his throat. "And, uh, this was with it." He held the Kimberly Gift first place medal. "I thought of keeping it--bloody well should have been mine in the first place--but it didn't seem right." Frank winked a little ruefully.

"Keep it," said Archy, pressing it into his had.

Frank pulled back. "I was just joshing you Arch. It's yours."

Archy's eyes were so intense. "I know. It's mine; it is one of the two most precious things I've ever owned, and now I want to give it to you."

Frank nodded. He slipped the medal into his pocket brushing his hand against the little diary he still had to deliver to Snowy's mum. "Thanks." He had to clear his throat again before he would trust himself to speak.

When he looked up, Archy was holding out the watch.

"No, mate--"

"I don't mean for you to keep it, but would you hold on to it for me? I'm afraid that in here, maybe--" Archy nodded to the orderlies.

"Sure," said Frank and tucked it into another pocket.

As Archy watched it disappear, he realized what had been wrong. Frank was not in uniform.

"You're out," said Archy.

"Huh?"

"The war. Your clothing. You're not in it anymore. Is it over?"

"Not by half, and it's not good either." Frank licked his lips and his voice was very soft. "Archy, they're all gone. Billy said to tell you--" Then Frank's voice broke completely.

"Tell me later," said Archy.

Frank squeezed his shoulder and blew his nose into a handkerchief. When he drew it away, he was the same old Frank again.

"But you're still out," Archy pressed. "We're you wounded?"

"Depends how you look at it," said Frank. "Trench foot."

Archy started to laugh before his chest made him stop.

"It's not bloody funny mate. I was in hospital for a month with gangrene. They had to amputate three toes."

Archy's face fell. A runner needs his toes for balance. "I'm sorry."

Frank shrugged. "I got off easy. A lot of folks had it worse. They're only toes."

"Right." Archy redirected. "A month you say? When are we now? I never asked."

"October sixth. You've slept a quarter year away--on and off. You had it pretty bad, Arch." Frank's face was dead set serious. "The field ambulance thought they lost you at least twice--as did the sea transport. The doctors can't explain why you made it."

Archy shrugged. Who could make sense out of any of this. "Well, I did and I'm better now, and you'd better not plan on using a few little toes as an excuse when I beat you at our next race."

Frank's face held an unfathomable expression. His eyes darted to the sheet.

His legs! Archy scrambled for the sheet. He had forgotten about his legs!

He ripped away the sheet and underneath his right leg was a sickly shade of mottled grayish-yellow. It had atrophied to a spindly bundle of sinew and skin. In terror, he tested it. It moved painfully and stiffly, but it moved where he directed it.

His left leg was wrapped in bandages waist to toe. He tried to shift it. It wouldn't budge.

"Frank, what's happened to my leg?" Archy tore frantically at the foul cloth strips stuck to his limb, but his fingers were too weak to do the job.

Frank covered him with his body, laid his hands over his until his movements stopped. It was no contest. Archy was weak as a kitten and soon lay back down. They held together for a space of heartbeats, then Archy looked up and met his eyes.

His voice was even and unafraid, but his face told of the silent plea and his eyes searched desperately for the reassurance that they already knew they wouldn’t find. "Frank, please tell me what's happened to my leg."

"It's bad, mate."

"Frank--"

"You were shot up crosswise: in the chest, the pelvis, the leg. Your pelvis was shattered on the left. On anyone else they would have amputated right away but the doc recognized you and couldn't bring himself to do it. He tried to save it--"

"Tried?"

Frank shook his head. "It doesn't look like it took, mate."

Archy poked at the bandages and felt nothing at all.

Frank looked out the window. "Dry gangrene. They're saying, 'mummified' now. It didn't take, Arch."

Archy banged at the mass of bandages where he knew his left thigh should be. He felt absolutely nothing at all. He shook it impotently with his hands, then fell back on the bed.

"I was a runner, Frank." The words were more breathed than spoken.

"So was I."

"It's not the same!" Archy choked back the tears in his throat. "I can't even bloody walk."

"You will."

"How can you be so sure? You can't even hop the proper bloody train for Perth."

"I know you," said Frank, his voice so steady. "You will."

Archy wiped at his face. To his surprise, his hand came back dry. "I was a runner. That's all I've ever been. What am I now?"

"Alive," said Frank. "Which is more than our mates can say."

Archy nodded and tried again. "Does my family know?"

"I don't see how," said Frank.

"Good." Archy leaned back and closed his eyes.

They say your life passes before you when you die, and so Archy Hamilton's did. He relived every special moment, every race, every story at Uncle Jack's knee, every josh with his mates, every dust up with his dad, the night in the train, the night on the desert, the night on the pyramid, the nights in the trenches.

And then he let it all go.

Archy Hamilton died and Archy LaSalles was born anew out of the clay of the field of Gallipoli. He had no earthly idea what his future would hold. From here it would be a clean slate.

When he opened his eyes, Frank was still there.

"Archy extended his hand. "Will you stay with me?"

Frank rolled his eyes and swore. "Bugger all, mate! What the hell do you think I'm still doing in bloody Egypt when I could be back home with me pension and a nice little shop? Crikey, the outback sun must have baked all the sense out of you."

Frank took the hand in mock intensity. "You need me mate, I'm telling you."

"Right." Archy squeezed the hand right back. This time he did manage a little laugh, and it didn't hurt quite as much as he thought.

***


One day during the third week Frank came whistling in.

"You're awfully cheerful," said Archy.

"I hear you're going home."

"Not home: Fremantle, Eighth General Hospital."

"Close enough," said Frank.

"For you," said Archy. "My home is still two-thousand miles away."

"Yeah, right."

"So I guess I'll see when I see you then."

"Embarkation oh-six hundred," said Frank.

Archy sat up in bed. His face grew puzzled. "You don't have to see me off."

"Not planning on it. I'm going too, mate."

"How can you? It's a hospital transport?"

Frank winked at the nun across the room. "Made a few friends here, I have."

Archy fell back against the pillow. "I don't bloody believe this."

Frank chuckled. "What? Don’t think I still have it in me?"

"You don't want to know what I think," said Archy.

"Probably not. See you in the morning, though."

"Oh-six hundred," said Archy.

Hospital transport or not, they managed to pull neighboring berths.


****

The left leg had to be amputated near the hip and the right one was in grave condition as well. The rehabilitation for it was long and not pleasant. By December Archy was trying out a wooden limb. That wasn't easy to do under the best of circumstances. With a shattered pelvis, and a crook right leg as well, it was nigh impossible.

Of course, that's what the cynics said about running the hundred in under nine and a half seconds. Archy hadn't listened then either.

On Christmas Eve a nurse came to him in his wheelchair. "The doctor says you can be discharged."

"I'm not ready," Archy said. "I can't go home until I can walk."

"Oh, we'll set you up for daily therapy, here or elsewhere--maybe an orthopedic hospital--but we need to get you home. No one wants to spend Christmas on a ward," she fussed.

"I didn't want a lot of things I got."

She gave him a queer look and made a sharp mark on her chart. "At least you'll have many more years not to be getting what you want. My son was at ANZAC too, and he wasn't as fortunate as you."

At least Archy had the grace to blush. "I'm sorry."

"So am I." She reached for the necklace beneath her uniform and opened an oval locket. "He looked a bit like you in the cheeks, don't you think?"

"I'm sorry," was again all Archy could manage.

She snapped the locket shut and nodded at him, not unkindly this time. "I know where he is, and I know he's in a better place, but it gets so lonely down here sometimes." She brushed his shoulder. "Think about it. Your parents will be awfully glad to see you again."

Archy snorted. "I doubt it. I ran away. I'm sure they haven’t forgiven me, and if I come home a cripple--" He shook his head.

Her eyes were very bright. "Trust me. They've forgiven you."

Archy shifted in the wheelchair. "Anyway, their station is clear up in the Kimberly. I wouldn't get there for two days at best.

"Oh," said the nurse, "The way your mate talked, I thought you lived in Perth." She flipped through her charts.

"He does. I don't," said Archy. His lips set into a line. "Never mind. It's only another day to me. I might as well stay."

Archy grabbed a set of crutches and wheeled off down the hall.

"Where are you off to?" the nurse called after him.

"Outside," he said. "To practice walking. It's too bloody stuffy in here."


***

That was how Frank found him: prosthesis on, crutches under his arms panting and stumping around the hospital lawn.

"G'day, mate."

Archy looked over, nearly stumbled. Frank caught him but arm. "Sorry mate, didn't mean to startle you."

"I was concentrating," said Archy.

Together, they concentrated on getting him back to the chair.

Archy tugged at the collar of his shirt. It must be nearly ninety degrees already and the sun was out full force. Archy was breathing hard and sweat stained his shirt. They hadn't even gone that far.

"Chest still dogging you?" Frank asked.

"Just a little," Archy lied.

Frank cleared his throat. "They say you're ready for discharge."

"Does it look like it?" Archy sniped.

"You looked pretty good out there, mate."

Archy shook his head. "I don't want to go home like this. I don’t want them to see me until I'm better--walking. No. Can't you understand?"

Frank shuffled his feet. "Right-o, but--I thought maybe you could come home with me."

Archy stared.

"It's not much," Frank continued, looking straight down at his boots, "not compared to the dust and droughts and scrub of a cattle station, of course, but it's just down the road from the hospital. You could continue your treatments there.

"I talked to my mate with the bike shop. He has an extra room behind the shop. He says I can work off the lodging, keep an eye on the place. It's a little small for two, but it's just until I make enough to open my own place." Frank paused. "If you want."

Archy turned his lashes upwards. "How did you see this working. Flatmates?"

"Like that."

"Like what?" Archy pressed.

"Crikey, mate!" Frank kicked the dirt with a vengeance. "Do we have to talk about this? Why can't we just do it and see what happens?"

Archy's lip turned up at one corner. "I thought it was the 'what happens' part that got under your skin?"

"Bugger all." Frank sank onto the bench. "I liked you a lot better when you had your legs," he griped.

Archy's mouth hardened. "Yeah. Me too."

Shit. Frank put a hand on his thigh. "I'm sorry, mate."

"It's all right." Archy covered his hand and squeezed. "I've got to get used to it some time--no matter how strange it might feel." Archy pulled a little smile out of somewhere.

The intensity of Archy's gaze was almost too much. Frank tried to pull his hand back, but Archy held it there. "Right? This war has changed everything, and whatever we've come away with, we have to get used to, no matter how strange it may feel."

This time Frank did snatch away.

Archy's eyes did not. "I deserve to know, Frank. You know how I feel about you and I'm glad. If I had died--or you had--and I hadn't told you, it would be like…like starting the most important race of my life and quitting shy of the ribbon. Either way, I'm glad I told you. But if we're going to be flatmates, don’t you think I deserve to know?"

"What else is there to know, mate? I'm here, aren't I? I found you. I stayed with you. I pulled you out--"

"Pulled me out of where?"

Frank stopped.

"Pulled me out of where?" Archy's voice was insistent; his tone was so soft it hurt.

Frank sank back down on the bench. His face seemed to try a few times before the words finally came. "The field ambulance wouldn't even try to go in until after dark, so I pulled you back."

"What?" It hadn't been a combat zone; it had been a massacre. Five machine guns at point blank range had mowed his mates down almost as soon as they'd cleared the trench--often before.

"Well I couldn't bloody well leave you there--not knowing--could I?" Frank turned his face away.

"How?" Archie had watched two waves of his mates go down before him. He had heard them moaning as they bled out, their bodies lying on top of other fallen bodies. A few had managed to crawl or fall backwards into the trench, but most-- But most had bled out and died where they lay.

"I crawled underneath."

"Underneath what?"

"Underneath--them."

"Dear God." Archy raised his hand to his mouth.

"Well I had to know, didn't I? The others were all dead. Barney, Snowy, even Les and Major Barton. They're all dead Arch. I couldn't leave you there. I couldn't--"

Frank's voice broke in pieces and in astonishment, Archy realized why. "Frank come here." He extended a hand, his voice more a plea than a command.

Frank came and fell to his knees, his head in Archy's lap. "I couldn't leave you out there, I couldn't." The sobs came harder now. "Bugger all," said Frank and swiped angrily at his face.

Archy stroked his hair. "It's all right. Blokes do that a lot here."

"Not like this, I don’t think," said Frank, wiping his nose.

"How do you know?" teased Archy.

Frank gave him a funny look.

"And why does it matter. We're alive. Why does it matter what anyone else does? Why does anything else matter?"

Frank shook his head and laid it back limply on Archy's thigh. "It doesn't," he said. "Nothing else matters besides this."

Archy stroked his hair, his face, his cheek, his lips, and perhaps for the first time in six months, Frank relaxed at last.

"What do you think the blokes would think if I kissed you here?" said Archy.

"What?" Frank bolted to kneel upright. "Have you gone daft? Did you take blow to the head that I don't know about?"

"No," Archy laughed. "You just look so good that I wanted to."

Frank blushed. "Crikey, mate." He stood up and brushed off his trousers. "Keep talking like that out here and I'll give you a blow to the head."

But he didn't look all that mad. Truth be told, he looked rather pleased with himself.

"Later then?"

Frank nodded. "Later.

"Come on, I'll wheel you in."

"No, I'll do it myself."

Frank collected the crutches and followed behind as Archy wheeled back towards the door.

From the window, a nurse watched. As she turned back to the ward she called out to a clerk. "Go ahead and make out those discharge papers for LaSalles. That's one more home for Christmas."