March 14, 1941 (Later)

The boys try to stick together while planning the raid

Hersch "

Later

Well I’ll be goddamned. I should have known this would happen. Today, I was coming out of the showers (thank God we figured that out, by the way. The room was starting to smell worse than the ghetto), and those a******s from the West Block had Jim cornered. And, yeah, they were after me, too, but the thing is that it wasn’t only me this time.

We’re the targets; it’s not just me. I feel so stupid! This whole week I’ve been under the impression that I’m still the one being persecuted here. But I’m not, or at least I’m not the only one. They’re after Jim and Erich and Gabe as much as they are after me. If it’s not simply because we’re the new guys it’s because we’re different, and apparently even here it’s the different people who get the short end of th stick. Well I saw enough of that happening back in Poland and I’m not going to let it happen here too. If those dupki knew what I was capable of, who I was back home, they would have thought twice before starting this. Believe me, they will regret this.

Gabe didn’t want us to listen to them. But he wasn’t there. He didn’t see the way they looked at us or hear what they called me. Plus Erich’s on our side, if for no reason but his damaged pride, and he’s the one who might actually be the able to intimidate those wankers if the opportunity arises. And by “intimidate” I mean “beat the s**t out of.” The guy still scares me, but as it turns out he’s a great asset to have on your side. Gabe got on board after some persuasion, so we’re all set.

It’s time for dinner. We’re all walking out together for the first time, and I assume we’ll probably eat together if we’re going to work out a plan. Maybe this means the four of us are headed down a better road, but all I can say right now is that tonight is definitely going to change things.

…

Gabe "

            I had narrowly escaped the showers, but not before I wound up naked. It had been a tough spot. Bowing out completely definitely would have aroused suspicion, but the other option was no better.

How could I stand there with them? What if they thought I was looking at them the wrong way? What if one of them looked at me? Oh, God, what then? I couldn’t let that happen, and I was trying to convince myself that if I didn’t let myself worry about it, they wouldn’t think it either.

            I half-ran back to the dorm, scared that one of them would come after me. I kicked the snow and cursed at myself for caring so much. Why do I give a f**k what they think? I wasn’t sure if I was muttering or just thinking it, but either way I was angrier with myself than anyone else. Anyway, I knew damn well why, so it wasn’t a very helpful question to ask.

            I was glad to be back in the room; I was starting to feel like I was never alone. I flopped down on my bunk, buried my head in the pillow, and groaned. The paranoia was impossible to ignore. I didn’t know what was wrong with me. I had lived in England for my whole life before going to Italy, and, though the way people saw me probably hadn’t changed, I knew I had not been so preoccupied with it before.

It was so hard not to think about what happened in Italy, and being alone only made it worse. The emptiness was everywhere, and, when I let myself dwell on it, I felt like I was being smothered.

Then the door opened and I sat up as fast as I could, quickly realizing that some of the suffocated feeling had come from the fact that my face was still submerged in the pillow. The other guys stalked in, shivering and looking powerfully pissed.

“God f*****g damn!” cursed Jim. “Goddamn it, man! What are we going to do about those guys?” He kicked the desk.

“Fucked if I know,” grumbled Hersch, who leaned against the wall and let his head fall backwards against the brick.

“Wait, what’s going on?” I couldn’t tell if I was glad or disappointed that I had missed whatever they were talking about.

“We got ambushed,” Erich growled as he dropped angrily into the chair, slouching with his arms across his knees. He looked at the floor as he spoke, “or, they did, I guess,” he said, motioning to Jim and Hersch, “I missed it, but seems like we’ve all signed on for more than we bargained for here.” He looked up at me and went on before I could question him again. “Those arschlochs from the west block are after us.”

“What the hell does that mean?” I asked, getting frustrated that I still didn’t understand.

“God, Erich would you just spit it out?” Jim yelled, obviously irritated too. It surprised me that he was able to talk like that to the one guy we were all definitely afraid of. “Gabe, they want to test us by making us break into Knight’s stash.”

Great. Just when things couldn’t get any worse. I ran my hands through my hair nervously. “S**t,” I said, “so… what will they do to us when we don’t do it.”

Erich’s head snapped up and a recoiled automatically. “When?” he roared, making me automatically regret saying anything. “‘When we don’t do it?’ Are you kidding me, Moretti? You think we’ve got a choice?”

I made myself look him in the eye, trying not to seem intimidated. “Erich, we can’t get on Knight’s bad side. In case you didn’t notice, he’s already not too keen on us and he’s the one who can get our asses kicked out of here.”

            “Hey, you weren’t there!” said Jim, spinning around and kicking whatever was in his way. “You should have seen how they looked at us, what they… s**t!” He stupidly kicked the boiler we watched him hop across the room holding his injured foot.

            “I’m sure it was bad, but I don’t see how we can pull it off. Besides, I don’t know about you guys but I don’t have another option if I get expelled.” They all shut up for a second and looked at the ground. That was the first time it occurred to me that maybe they didn’t have anywhere else to go either.

 

            Jim surprised me by taking my side. “Maybe he’s right. I mean, if Knight catches…”

            “Guys, don’t worry about Knight,” Hersch cut in unexpectedly. “I’ve got him covered. I… I know how to deal with him.”

            The three of us looked at him in silence for a second, confused as to what he meant by that.

“F**k yes!” exclaimed Erich, standing up and slapping his leg. “See, kamerad,” he said, pulling me to the feet and pounding me on the back. “We’ve got this in the bag.” It was the first time I had seen him smile, and when all this coldness in his eyes melted away I knew I couldn’t say no.

            I couldn’t help but grin back at them. “Let’s show those West Block Wankers what we’re made of!”

…

Jim "

            A few hours after our run in with the west block boys, Hersch tracked me down and told me we had better think about eating together, since none of us actually knew what the plan was. And I’m not going to lie, as much I had thought I disliked my roommates, it felt pretty damn good walking into the dining hall together. I think we were all getting tired of being loners, and even Erich and Hersch were laughing at the surprised faces of just about everyone in the room.

            We grabbed our food and sat down together at the end of a table that was quickly abandoned by the other inhabitants. “All right,” Erich said, immediately commanding our attention, “what are we going to do about this?”

            “Don’t know,” answered Gabe. “Does anyone actually know where Knight’s room is?”

            “Third floor,” Hersch replied quickly. “All the professors live up there. His is probably the biggest one.”

            We all gave him a confused look, still perplexed as to how he knew so much about the school. But it was obvious that, as long as he being helpful, no one was going to run the risk of insulting him.

            “Great!” I grinned and slapped him on the back.

“Yeah, spot-on,” Gabe said, “Now where do you suppose he keeps the booze?”

            I answered first this time. “Those fuckers wouldn’t want us to take it if it was an easy steal. It’s probably locked up somewhere.”

“Maybe a cabinet,” offered Gabe.

“Nah, too obvious,” Hersch pointed out. “Everyone’s got it in a cabinet.”

“Not my old man,” Erich mumbled bitterly, “he took to hiding his once he figured out I was the one taking it, kept it at the bottom of some nasty old chest. If Knight’s guarding his stash carefully, it’ll be somewhere like that.”

Hersch took a bite of his sandwich. “Has anyone actually thought to figure out what we’ll actually do with this stuff when we get it?”

“If we get it,” Gabe corrected him, with a mouth full of bread, as he pointed at Hersch with his fork.

Erich smacked him on the back of the head and Gabe gagged on his food. “Where’s your pride, kamerad?” he said almost playfully, giving Gabe a thump on the back to compensate for the choking. “We’re going to get this done.”

“Or die trying,” I added with a smile.

“Hey, speak for yourself,” Hersch interjected. “There’s no way in hell I’m dying here.”

“Guys, how about we take it one ridiculous task at a time, huh?” Erich broke in with a mischievous smile. “We can work on keeping the Jew alive later.”

“Last I checked, you were the only one thinking of killing any of us,” Gabe said daringly, once he regained the ability to breathe.

Erich turned sharply to look at Gabe, who, for once, didn’t cringe away, but looked at him with one dark eyebrow raised skeptically. No one seemed more surprised by this than Erich, who suddenly seemed to shrink at this new lack of fear. “Yeah, I guess I shouldn’t have gotten into it…”

“Gotten into it?” snarled Hersch, who suddenly looked ready to leap across the table at him. “Maybe you shouldn’t have started it!”

We all started forward out of our chairs, Erich and Hersch to leap at each other, Gabe and I to pull them apart, nearly knocking over our chairs. I grabbed a hold of Hersch’s arm and Gabe awkwardly, if effectively, threw his arm across Erich’s chest to restrain him. We pushed them back into their chairs and I noticed more than a few pairs of eyes that had come to rest on us.

Hersch and Erich glared at us as we shoved them back into their seats, as if we had been the ones to start the whole thing. “S**t, guys,” I hissed once we had all had a second to calm down. “Can’t we just sit here for five minutes without going for the throat?”

“Jim’s right,” Gabe said, more forceful than I had ever seen him. “Come on, we’re never going to get through the term if it’s going to be like this.” He looked Erich meaningfully in the eye, “We can work that out later, but right now we have to be together on this. Now, would you just back off?”

For once it seemed that Erich calmed down before Hersch did. “It’s not to say I won’t kick your a*s again this term,” growled Erich, “but tonight I want that stash, and if I have to work with you b******s to get it, then I’ll try not to kill you.”

We all cowered silently for a minute, afraid of what Hersch would have to say to that. He sat there like a livid, glowering rock. “I want your word,” he snarled, “I need to know you’re not going to turn on any of us tonight.”

After a long, tense second, Erich stretched a thick arm over the table, still glaring at all of us. He and Hersch shook hands harshly.

“Can I get in on this?” Gabe asked.

 He sounded so innocent, so utterly trusting that, despite the circumstances, I started to laugh. For a second I thought they were all going to kill me, but then Hersch cracked a smile, one of his first that I could remember. I could see Erich was trying to continue looking fearsome, but he couldn’t fight the grin as he slapped the table and said, “Sure thing, kamerad!” He shook Gabe’s hand so fiercely the poor guy almost toppled out of his chair.

“Brilliant,” said Gabe, clambering back up the table. “Now, really, what’s the plan?”

…

Erich -

We ended up spending a good length of time in the dining hall that night, bantering back and forth about our approach and strategy. I seemed to be the only one who knew anything about pulling of something similar to a military attack, and I tried to be as much help as I could without thinking too much about how I had come to know it. It was past nine when the prefect, though not the west block one, thank God, told us we had to clear out.

By the time we got back to the dorm, the incident in the dining hall was forgotten and we were all laughing again. It was a strange experience, living with three other guys. Five days in and we had already come close to tearing each other’s heads off, but we all seemed to be able to put it from our minds within minutes. Not to sound stupid, but I have to say that I actually kind of enjoyed it.

Back in the room, we decided it would be better to get out of our uniforms. They went for dark clothes, but the only black shirt I owned was one I didn’t want them to see.

It had the patch, the black, bent cross surrounded by red and white, the mark that proved who I was back in Germany, though I was pretty sure they already suspected me of it. I couldn’t let them see it, not after I’d promised not to cross them again, but I could hardly borrow one. I had more than a few inches on Gabe and Jim and I somehow doubted Hersch would want to share clothes with me any more than I wanted to share with him. So, when the rest of them were changing awkwardly in their corners, I tried to tear it off the sleeve.

It made and audible ripping noise and I knew I had been caught. All three of my roommates looked up at me curiously. “Oh… damn it…” I said, trying to sound angry about the torn shirt while my eyes darted around the room. I clutched the tattered patch in my fist and dropped in inconspicuously into my bag. “Piece of s**t tore out…” To my luck, they shrugged and went finished changing. I got dressed slowly, realizing too late that I had lost almost my entire sleeve. It dangled off my arm pathetically and the other guys snickered when I turned around.

“Smooth,” observed Jim.

“Hey, you shut up about it,” I warned.

“Come on guys, this isn’t the time,” Gabe hissed from his corner, looking up from his shirt buttons. “We’re together on this, remember? Now, Knight’s either taken whatever’s in his stash, meaning he’s already down for the night…”

“Or he’s out doing whatever the hell a headmaster does on Friday night,” Hersch finished for him.

“Right,” said Jim, “and either way we’ve got our best chance if we go now.”

“Exactly,” I smiled unintentionally as I said it, “Let’s do it.” This was going to be fun.

Reviews

[Arianna]

i like it,
i really do want them to be friends... but its so entertaining when they fight
i really want to know what happend to Gabe in italy.
like.....a lottt!
great chapter.
i loved it...
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[Coyote Poetry]

A amazing chapter. Problems can cause people to be friend. I like how the hatred of others are bringing the boy into a odd team. The story is outstanding. Thank you.
Coyote

[Jake Donald Stephens]

I want to read the next chapter so badly now! You've done an excellent amazing job on this story and I'm loving it!

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[hannah]

what was the deal with erich back in germany? mysterious ;) i still enjoy jim the most, but hersch is growing on me.... WILL THEY GET THE STASH OR NOT?! :)

[LostinKristina]

you're amazing at details, a lot of people lack the skills to do that
just right and you manage to do it.
I really love this story thus far, and will keep a look out for the next chapter.

[trish420]

I love how you let the backstory slip out just enough to pique my curiousity :-) What happened in Italy and just how bad was Erich in Germany that even he is so ashamed? I am so hooked!