Many people who’d learned he was a veteran seemed genuinely respectful, and the young man hated the thought that the shitbags he’d known, the useless, incompetent ones, were getting the same. He didn’t accept their respect/praise/pity, because they gave it without knowing what kind of soldier he’d been. The past seemed to pale in importance to the front he did or did not put up. It was all Hollywood.
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“You ladies are acting like any of this matters,” T-Bone said. “You want to give her mouth-to-mouth? Hell, the thing’s dead.” He moved Farensteen out of the way, felt the deer ’s chest, located a space above the heart where the ribs separated, and using the knife from the truck, pushed the blade down.
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