A soldier's grandma

The scene has been shown many times.

A military man in a hospital room surrounded by family members — all hoping he’ll recover from a missing leg.

Except this time, it’s U.S. Army Pfc. Manuel Hernandez keeping vigil, while his grandmother, Chris Rubio, lies in bed after a surgery to amputate her left leg.

Hernandez, who lived in Odessa until age 10, visited his grandmother during a 10-day leave. He’s expecting to be deployed to Iraq in November.

“It meant a lot to me to come down and see her,” Hernandez, 20, said. “”But she’s fine — she’ll be fine.”

Rubio said she had her leg amputated as a result of cellulitis, a bacterial skin condition that was a complication of her diabetes. She’s also temporarily blind.

“I’m real happy to have him here,” she said. “I don’t want him to go.”

Hernandez also attended the University of Texas of the Permian Basin for his freshman year of college shortly before signing up for the Army in July 2006. He was planning to leave Tuesday afternoon to head back to Ohio for training.

“To come to the place where you were born, where all your family is,” he said, “when I talk about visiting family it means coming back to Odessa.”

It also gave Hernandez a chance to show his hometown to his girlfriend, Brittany Suttles.

“It’s a totally different experience,” she said. “There’s no flowers or green grass.”

Hernandez, who will be deployed overseas for the first time, said he’s looking forward to going to Iraq.

“If I didn’t want to go over there, I wouldn’t have signed up,” he said. “We’re definitely over there for a reason.”