When he got home, his mother said, “Some man from the hospital called you. He wants to know if you’ll come and talk to people who’ve lost limbs. I think you’re supposed to encourage them. Here’s his number and name. You can call him in the morning.”
Jimmy took the piece of paper from her. He glanced at the name: Fred Saxon. It meant nothing to Jimmy. He stuffed the paper in his shirt pocket and turned to go up to his room.
“Maybe they’ll pay you,” his mother said. “That would be good. It would be a job.”
“That would be good.”
“There’s a present waiting for you on your dresser.”
“A present? What is it?”
“You’ll see.” She looked pleased with herself.
Jimmy saw the small package on the top of his dresser as soon as he entered the room. The dresser top was normally cluttered, but now it was empty except for the present. His mother had cleaned it while he was away, he assumed. Before going to war, he would have been angry at her for coming into his room and touching his possessions without his permission. Now he didn’t care. It didn’t really feel like his room anymore.
The bow was attached to the wrapping paper with two–sided tape. He pulled it off and tore away the paper. Inside was a small red box with the name of a local jewelry store written on the cover in gold lettering. Inside the box was a watch. Jimmy was no judge of such things, but he guessed from the gold band and the small jewel — a diamond, he supposed — set in the watch face just below the 12 that it was an expensive watch.
His own watch, his original watch, had been blown away with his left arm. Perhaps it still lay out there on the battlefield, along with what remained of his left arm, covered with sand. Or perhaps one of the enemy was wearing it now. He had told his parents about it, and this was their response.
Jimmy felt a wave of love and gratitude wash over him. They were annoying as hell most of the time, but they tried hard.
He took the watch out of the box and put it on the wrist of the artificial arm.
An expensive watch on an expensive machine, he thought.
He stared at the watch for a while. It seemed to belong on the arm, which meant that it didn’t belong on him.
He took the watch off again, put it back in the box, and put the box in the top drawer of his dresser.