Simon Skinner's Collection of Random Short Stories

The Camper

"Home is the starting place of love, hope and dreams."

At least it is for most of us.....

Today I'm going to tell you a story about a person that wasn't "most of us", but "some of us."

Nicolas Gray was his name. A Vietnam soldier. He joined The Vietnam War in 1960. Five years after the war started. He was immediately put to work.....

One day as he was at Target Practice he got some news....

Some teenagers burned down his parent's house......with his parents still inside..... Apparently his Dad stopped the teenagers trying to rob a nearby gas station.....the teenagers got away before the cops got there. A few hours later they burned down their house. His Dad tried to save himself and Nicolas' Mom, but every exit and window were blocked by hot orange fire. The police found their bodies curled up on the ground right beside each other. They eventually found the teenagers and sent them to The Juvenile Detention Center.

That not only depressed Nicolas, but also lost a home.....his only home....

His parents were his last family. He had no where to go.....

After the Vietnam War, Nicolas moved to Virginia. His Grandfather took him there every summer to see Mount Vernon. It was so..... soothing, so..... peaceful. His Grandfather was the only family that was nice to him. His parents abused him, his Grandmother hated him, and his Aunts and Uncles were jealous of my parents because they had children before any of them.

He hoped that Mount Vernon would give him that same feeling as before.....

He moved into a trailer in the woods. He had so much stuff from Vietnam, he built a shed and got two more campers

All he kept in his trailer were; military crates, a bed, and a stove. He always kept as neat as possible. Messy rooms reminded him of his rooms back in Nam. Those days were the worse days of his life......

One day a neighbor moved in a couple yards away from him. They also brought a camper with them.

Nicolas starred at the neighbor as they got out of their camper. It was a woman. She started to take stuff out of her camper; wood, nails, and a drill. She was wearing a full camouflage suit, just like the one he wore.

He normally wouldn't introduce himself, but she looked interesting. He walked over to her just that second.

She saw him coming toward her. She put her hand on her pistol she had in her belt.

He waved to insure he was friendly and he wasn't going to hurt her. She still kept her hand on the gun

As Nicolas was about to greet her, she picked him up by his collar and whispered in an intense voice,

"I just came back from the war, so don't think you can try anything on me. Now! What do you want?"

Nicolas was a little surprised at this action, but he understood. Vietnam can do stuff to people.

He spoke in a soft tone,

"I'm from the war too. I just moved in a few weeks ago. I just wanted to introduce myself."

She put on a face that said, "Whoops! I screwed up!"

"I'm sorry," she apologized. "I'm still getting used to being out of Vietnam. My Chief always told me to never trust anybody but your team."

He tried to put on an understanding face, and replied with,

"It's totally fine. I get it. Say, where have you been for the first few weeks?"