The old man asked him again, “Are you sure you want to do this?” B.
L. Mcshane just nodded, stepped off the bus and sank almost to his shoe
tops in the sand. He could understand why the old bus driver was
concerned since he was doing B. L. a favor by making the stop, here on
the beach road, in the middle of nowhere. The driver had been reluctant,
at first, to stop. He soon changed his mind after acknowledging that he
guessed it would be ok since B. L. was a soldier just getting back home.
Stopping for those few extra minutes gave B. L. the chance to get his
huge duffel bag, knap sack and trunk out of the bus storage compartment.
It also gave the half dozen other passengers a chance to get a breath
of sea air and stretch their legs. Most of them were familiar with the
Texas Gulf Coast in August so they wouldn’t be standing long in the 95
degree heat even when the south winds were blowing around fifteen knots.
For B. L., the weather was like a cool front after the 125 degree days
in full body armor he was accustomed to.

The kindly old bus driver reminded B. L. that the bus only made the
trip, on the beach road, once a week but B. L. just looked at the Gulf
over his shoulder. He then turned and headed for the beach. The bus
pulled away and B. L. imagined most of them were thinking he was crazy.
He just smiled to himself and decided he would make his camp before it
got dark in the next few hours. It turns out that was a good decision.

When the sunlight died, the darkness fell, the winds gave up trying to
push the waves on to the beach and he heard them before he saw them.
Mosquitos, millions upon millions of them and it sounded like he was the
only source of food for miles. Apparently, they all wanted him for
dinner that night. Of course this wasn’t a surprise to him. He had
expected it and was prepared for it with his netting and the burning
smudge pot. He just knew it was going to be a long night without much
sleep. He also knew there had been many such nights before this one.

It was the reason he had told all his buddies, before he left the war
zone, that the next time he was on any sand, there would be a whole lot
of water attached to it. It is why he had returned to his home town of
Galveston. For some reason though, Galveston no longer seemed like home.
It was too quiet and too noisy at the same time. In reality, what was
different was him, B. L. Mcshane. He slept better with a rifle in his
hands now and maybe one eye open. A car door closing on the street now
sounded more like a mortar round going off. What ever the sounds, he
knew he didn’t want to hear them for a while, so here he sat in his camo
tent, in the dark, with his netting and insect repellent going, all
courtesy of his Uncle Sam. He only looked at the M16A2 rifle laying next
to him. He knew it was sighted in for 300 meters but he wouldn’t need to
use it on anything that far away ... on this trip.

The next morning and the following three were uneventful. If by
uneventful, you meant a beautiful sunrise, great luck fishing for
breakfast, 97 degree temperatures with sun, wind and water that seemed
to peel layer after layer of stuff off you that you didn’t know you were
carrying around. After only four days, B. L. was starting to feel more
like his true age of 29 instead of his usual 40 year old self. People
often told him he was mature for his age and an old fortune teller in
Amsterdam had even told him he was an old soul in a young body. He had
laughed at that and hoped there was no such thing as Karma. She
supposedly was a ancient Romanian gypsy who had lived all over Europe
and knew such things but her name was Rose. Go figure that one!

Maybe this beach trip was truly what he had been needing for so long, to
turn things around. The only strange thing is he was now thinking and
talking of himself as B. L. instead of his real name. His friends and
family had started calling him B. L. when he was kid and some how it
had followed him around the world to every country and continent he had
traveled.

When had he stopped being Chris Mcshane? All this free time and no one
else to talk with had led him to think about things that had not crossed
his mind in ages.

They may have started calling him B. L. that time he was running across
the field and found the only piece of metal in that field sticking out
of the ground. Too bad he found it with his foot but he did get a trip
to the E. R., in an ambulance, out of it and the 15 stitches made for a
cool looking scar and he was the envy of the neighborhood boys that summer.

He did recall it later for sure the time he tried to jump the manhole
cover with his bike and only succeeded in ruining the front wheel of his
bike and his left ankle. Some one said they knew he was in for a hard
life when they saw him walking, all scratched up, limping, while pushing
a broken bike, uphill, toward home. Things hadn’t changed much when he
went to college and ruined his knee sliding into second base. He had
done that a thousand times before but it looked like it was literally an
unlucky break. The knee healed fine much later but not in time to keep
his scholarship. With his scholarship gone, he resorted to flipping a
coin to determine his method of paying for college. Go into the army or
try to get a job. He had spent almost five years now, learning not to
gamble with his future anymore but he had also learned other skills
while marching his way around the world. He was also proud he had tried
to make the world a better place. Not everyone agreed with him but that
is why he had risked his life in all those places when he “re-uped”
after his first tour was over. So folks could disagree with him and the
President if they chose too. It is called Freedom and he was starting to
feel it more and more.