The Prisoner of Guantanamo by Dan Fesperman Page B

one’s likely identity and role, and she wanted to nail it down ASAP. Falk gallantly stepped aside, feeling a bit like Sir Walter Raleigh letting the queen cross the mud on his cape. He knew better than to make a big deal out of it. She’d know where to find him later.
    That night at the Tiki Bar she detached herself from her circle of admirers long enough to say thanks and buy him a beer. He saw right away why she would be effective at her job. Engaging enough to draw you forward, and open enough to respond in kind. Falk found himself talking easily about things that he hadn’t mentioned to anyone in years. He nearly even slipped up and told an old story about his father. The next morning he woke up thinking it must have been the beer, or the lure of her blue eyes, or the way she kept flipping a drooping curl off her left eyebrow, with an endearing grace that showed off the fine line of her neck, a seeming invitation to plant a tender kiss on the smooth skin beneath her ear. Right next to where she’d dabbed that spot of perfume he could still smell the next morning, even though his room was redolent of sweat and grime and old newspapers.
    He sometimes wondered if he would have even noticed her in another setting—amid the rich pickings of Washington, for example. At times she could be a little rough around the edges, an affliction Falk had often observed in military women. It was a survival skill in their environment, particularly for the officers, the tough front that signaled they wouldn’t easily be pushed around. Well and good, he supposed, although at unguarded moments he found himself testing this facade, as if to measure its hardness. When Pam burst out with a stream of profanities while discussing the subject of Nebraska football—as a Sooner, she hated Nebraska—Falk was curious enough to ask, “Did your dad teach you that language, or your drill sergeant?”
    He could have sworn she blushed slightly, but then she forged ahead.
    â€œMy dad
was
my drill sergeant. My first one, anyway. Or might as well have been.”
    â€œHe’d be proud.”
    â€œOh, he would be, as long as he knew I was defending the Sooners.”
    Far more disconcerting to Falk was the idea of dating someone who actually gave a damn about the chain of command’s approval.
    Considering Gitmo’s male competition, he sometimes wondered what she saw in him. He wasn’t remarkable to look at. Plenty of people who met Falk were convinced they’d seen him before—at the office cafeteria, in the back pew at church, or on the sidelines at their kid’s soccer game. He had that kind of face—pleasant enough, someone you didn’t mind having around, yet well suited to hiding in plain sight. His eyes, a stonewashed blue, invited trust even as they politely requested distance, with webbed lines at the corners that could have come from either laughter or worry. Around thirty, most people guessed, falling short by only a few years. But by the time they thought to probe beyond his Everyman qualities he had usually moved on, leaving them to wonder whether he was a not-so-young man in a hurry or just a man who preferred not to be pinned down.
    Whatever the case, the reality now was that he was hooked, and apparently she was, too, no matter how events might have transpired elsewhere. If context was the magic ingredient in their romance, he supposed they would both find out soon enough after returning to the mainland. But lately he found himself hoping that wouldn’t be the case.
    â€œHeard you took a little walk on the beach with the general,” she said as he sat down.
    â€œYou and everyone else.”
    â€œSolve it yet?”
    He shrugged.
    â€œI still say he’s drunk in some young lady’s bunk, passed out with her panties around his head.”
    She smiled with a hint of a blush, which had been his objective.
    â€œYou’re assuming he’s like