Traveller by L.W. Samuelson (reading comprehension books .txt) 📖

was going to watch her, him play twenty-one, but it’s just too eerie being around a man who’s so fantastically beautiful as a woman.”
“I hear ya Bro’. He be all comin’ in the bar givin’ me a kiss on the cheek. I wanna kiss ‘im back. I be thinkin’ I sick or somthin’. I swear I ain’t gay.”
“I’m not gay either. I say we stay away from him. I don’t want him to see me going all googly eyed when I ogle him,” said Jesse. “I don’t know how Tim can handle being around him. Let’s get something to eat and take it back to the room, watch some T.V.”

Chapter 41 - Loaded and Headed Home

When Tim and Traveller got back to the hotel room, Willy and Jesse closed their eyes and pretended to be asleep. They tried their best not to look longingly at their alien friend dressed in drag.
Traveller turned the bathroom lights on while Tim turned the bedside lamps off. “I can’t believe Jesse’s sleeping,” he whispered.
“I thought they would wait up to see how much we won,” Traveller said quietly. “My feet are killing me. Why anyone in their right mind would wear high heels is totally alien to me.” He kicked them off.
“And this dress is like being wrapped in a bandage. It’s hot, uncomfortable, and I hated the way everyone stared at me when I walked by.” He piled the dress on top of the heels then removed the bra. “And this contraption was killing me,” he said throwing it in the garbage can.
“But the worst part was being bound down there with tape. I can’t begin to tell you how awful that was,” he said unwrapping his crotch.
He removed the wig, washed the make-up off, and slipped into sweat pants. When he came out of the bathroom, both Jesse and Willy had awakened. “Let’s count the money!” Jesse exclaimed careful not to look at Traveller.
“Yeah, get it all on the table, see what we got,” Willy agreed keeping his eyes straight ahead. “You lay on the bed Travis, so we don’t have to loo . . . so you can rest.”

They awoke late the next morning. “Over seventeen thousand dollars. Man, I ain’t never seen so much money at one time. Lori gonna be pleased,” Willy said looking straight ahead.
“Not so fast,” Jesse cautioned glancing sideways at Traveller. “You give her a bunch of money all at once, she’ll ask where it came from and find out we were doing a little under-aged gambling.”
“Tim won two thousand of it,” Traveller said trying to get a little eye contact from Willy or Jesse. He couldn’t tell what was wrong. I think they’re mad at me. What did I do? I’m going to give them some of the money.
“I thought you two should get a thousand dollars. I’ll trade my amplifier in for a better one. Lori can have the rest,” he told them.
“A thousand dollars! I can pay some of my debts,” Jesse said.
“Yeah Bro’ that’s awful generous,” Willy agreed.
“I was depressed until you guys brought me here. It’s the least I can do,” Traveller said repositioning himself in an attempt to get Willy to look at him. When Willy quickly turned his head in an obvious effort at avoidance, the alien asked, “Is something wrong?”
“Wrong? Nothing wrong here Bro’,” Willy blurted.
“Jesse?”
“Travis, you know me. If something’s wrong, I’ll tell you,” Jesse said looking away.
Tim smiled knowingly. “They’re probably just embarrassed that they found you so attractive,” he said chuckling.
“Attractive? I seen better looking on the back end of a horse,” Willy countered as he darkened.
“I could tell it was him. He looked like my grandma,” Jesse blushed. “The way he was wobbling on those high heels, I thought he was going to fall over and break a hip,” Willy commented.
“Yeah right,” Tim said knowingly.

On the way home, Jesse stopped at a gas station to fill up. Both he and Willy bought a pair of mirror sunglasses so that Traveller couldn’t tell where they were looking. When they climbed back in the Scout, both seemed more relaxed. Neither of them noticed Tim shaking his head and smiling.
As they approached the city of Burley just off of I-84, Jesse saw an old man standing on the side of the freeway with his thumb out. He looked fragile and road worn. Grey hair stuck out from beneath a red stocking cap and his dusty black raincoat billowed in the breeze. “Shall we pick him up?” Jesse asked.
“That would be the Christian thing to do,” Tim said.
Jesse immediately pulled over. When the rather pungent old man got in beside Traveller, he scooted over until he was touching Willy who flattened himself against the door looking very uncomfortable.
“When’s the last time you ate?” Jesse asked.
“Yesterday,” the old man said.
Jesse pulled off at the north Burley exit. He drove to McDonald’s. “We’re hungry, too. I’ll buy your dinner,” he said. “My name is Jesse.”
The hitchhiker’s face brightened. “God bless you friend,” he said. He shook hands, “I’m Austin.”
Jesse held the door open for him as they entered. He held the hitchhiker by the arm to steady him and walked him to the counter. After the two of them ordered, Jesse paid for it.
Traveller stood behind them examining one of the world’s wretched. He smelled. He was dirty, homeless and downtrodden. Why? he thought. Why?
The bright yellow tables only seated four so Willy and Tim took the opportunity to sit across the aisle where the air was fresher. Traveller and Jesse sat with Austin. He had ordered a chocolate milk shake with a Big Mac and fries. He ate slowly relishing each bite, oblivious to anything else in the restaurant.
As he was finishing his shake, Traveller asked, “So where are you headed for, Austin?”
“Don’t know. I just head.”
“If you don’t know where you’re are headed, where did you come from?”
Austin sipped his shake, didn’t say anything for a long time. Traveller watched as a storm so violent raged inside of him that lightning flashed in his eyes. “You don’t want to know,” he said turning his head away from Traveller’s searching gaze.
“I do want to know. I’m trying to understand what it is to be human.”
Austin hugged himself, shivered, and shook his head no. “I live in the hell of images that plague me like a swarm of locusts,” he said cryptically. “I’m no more than a replay of a nightmare.”
“This isn’t the time or place,” Jesse said to Traveller. “Let’s get back on the road. He then looked at Austin, “We’re going to Pocatello. Is that okay?”
Austin shrugged without answering. When they got up and left, he followed them. Willy got in the front seat with Jesse while Traveller sat in the middle of the back seat with Tim behind Jesse and Austin to his right.
Traveller was overflowing with Benwarian curiosity. This man sitting by him differed from all those he had met before. He sensed that Austin’s inner turmoil had caused him to be apathetic to the world around him. While he existed in the world physically, mentally he lived in a different place and even at a different time than today.
Traveller placed a hand on Austin’s knee. Using his Benwarian gift of pathos, he psychically sent Austin a message to relax, that he was sitting by someone with not only sympathy, but with empathy, someone who could lessen his suffering by understanding what he had gone through.
Austin started speaking as they merged onto I-84 going eastward. “I never wanted to go to war. When I got my draft notice, what was I going to do? My parents taught me never to question the United States of America. My dad is a WWII veteran. He preached love of country and flew the American flag on a pole in front of the house.
“My parents also taught me to be a Christian. I was raised with the Ten Commandments, ‘Thou Shalt not Kill’, and to believe in the teachings of Christ, ‘Love the neighbor as you would yourself’. I was told to follow the Golden Rule, ‘Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.’ I tried to follow those teachings.
And then there was boot camp. We were trained to believe that the Viet Cong were Godless communists. They deserved our hate and scorn. Many of those I served with didn’t think the Vietnamese were human by the time our training was done. We were taught they deserved to die.”
“I was assigned to Charly Company. When we got to Vietnam, we found ourselves in a different world. A hot, humid world of jungle and insects. A world where booby traps and ambushes maimed and killed. We took causulaties without ever seeing the enemy. Our hate grew with every death.
“And then we were given targets for our wrath. A series of villages called My Lai and So’n My were reported to be full of Viet Cong. We were ordered to destroy these so called Pinkvilles.
“We went in after cannon barrages and helicopter gunships had attacked the villages. I followed the first wave of soldiers. They attacked anything that moved. Humans and animals were gunned down with rifle and machine gun fire. Grenades were thrown into huts without warning or burned to the ground, any Vietnamese inside were shot as they came out. I saw several women and children bayoneted.
“There was no return fire, no enemy soldiers with weapons, only old people, women and children. When they were rounded up and herded into an irrigation ditch, I tried to stop the madness. “Get out of the way or we’ll shoot you!” someone yelled at me. Two soldiers forcibly removed me from in front of the villagers. The automatic weapon fire lasted for minutes. It ended with a ditch full of dead women and children.
“We moved further into the villages with no resistance. A young girl emerged from behind a burning hut. Her arm was half shot off dangling from a piece of flesh. The bewildered look on her face asked why is this happening to me. My platoon sergeant ordered me to shoot her. When I refused he grabbed my rifle. Her head exploded before I heard the shot. It was wrong. It was horrible. There are no words strong enough to describe how bad I felt.
“This is murder! I shouted. This is murder! This is murder! Stop! I shouted. Fall back soldier, I was ordered. Let us do our work, I was told. I ran back the way we had come trying to find a commanding officer who could get control of the situation. I ran through the screams of the dying and the burning huts, through mangled bodies and shot off faces.
“This is the hell I live in. I sleep with it and wake up to it. And the worst part of it all? Do you want to know what destroyed me?”
Traveller couldn’t imagine anything worse. He had led a sheltered life, free of violence. He was wrong to think he could understand this man’s torment. It was beyond his realm of experience. “What?” he asked anyway.
“I and two others who tried to stop the killing and protect the villagers were denounced by the United States Congress when we got back home. I received hate mail from those who supported the war.
“I quit answering the phone after several death threats. One day I found a mutilated dog on my doorstep. For days afterward, I practiced suicide with my .38. I would put the gun in my mouth and pull the trigger. Once