March 16, 1941

The boys try to wind down after their eventful friday night

 

 

Hersch-

Sunday March 18, 1941

            It’s been a long weekend. Saturday we slept all day and didn’t eat anything. We were starving all day (apparently cigarettes and whiskey don’t make a good meal). To make matters worse, we had to stash the stuff and wash our uniforms so we could pass the monthly “Dorm Inspection Saturday,” of which we had no warning.

            We finally figured out what the big f*****g deal was on Sunday, which was family visitation day. That was depressing as hell, since none of us have any sort of family that would or could come see us. However, there are a huge amount of dames to be found in the visiting crowd. The rest of the guys are out chasing skirts, but I didn’t have it in me.

            I told them about Kristen. Not the whole story, but just the fact that she existed. I didn’t think I would, but I really couldn’t help myself. Actually, I don’t think they believed me. I guess I don’t seem like the kind of guy with a serious girl, or any kind of girl. I think I’m coming off as kind of a heel when it comes to broads, but I can’t help it. I just miss her.

            On the plus side, things are going great for the four of us. Somehow practically getting killed up in Knight’s room brought us together. Jim has been great, almost the kind of friend I used to have before the war started. I mean, he’s not exactly the kind of guy you trust your sister with, but he’s turning out to be a lot smarter than he looks, like he could actually be the brains of this group if he got his act together. Gabe’s finally coming out of his shell, at least enough to admit he was a damn virgin! Actually, I’m not totally sure he’s telling the truth about that. I got a different impression from him, but it’s not the kind of thing a guy would admit to. Erich hasn’t threatened to kill any of us, which is a serious improvement.  I can see his life is pretty fucked, and that strangely makes me feel closer to him. It’s really making everything a lot easier, now that I don’t feel like I have to watch my back all the time (and the supply of hooch doesn’t hurt either). I’m really starting to think that we could rule this school if we wanted to.

            Anyway, I’ve still got some things to do for class tomorrow that I’m hoping I can go steal from Jim while he’s out chasing skirts. More tomorrow.

…

Erich "

            I had never been good at sleeping off long nights, and Saturday was no exception. I woke up in the morning to the realization that I still had a cig in my hand that, thank God, had only singed the sheets. The smell of smoke was still heavy in the air and, now that I was fully conscious, made it impossible to get back to sleep.

            Since there were no windows and the lamp on the table had inexplicably gone out, the room was totally dark and had no idea what time it was. Feeling bored and restless, I climbed out of bed. No one else showed any signs to stirring: Gabe slept with his knees pulled up to his chest, Hersch on his stomach, and Jim curled around his bottle of whiskey. I snickered quietly at them and headed out of the room.

            Outside, it seemed to be late morning, but no one was around. I figured they were at breakfast, an event I could afford to miss, and took the opportunity to enjoy my solitude.

            The night before had not exactly gone as I had planned. I mean, I guess it worked out, since we beat the Wankers, but I hadn’t expected to get so friendly with the guys. I was a little concerned that I was headed down a path too much like the one I had ended up on back home; the combination of alcohol and guys I wanted to impress hadn’t exactly added up to success in Germany. But I had the feeling that this was different, that I knew better than to sink that low again.

            Much to my annoyance, my isolation was interrupted when a guy from Biology came racing down the path from behind me. He did a double take when he saw me, and I had the sudden feeling that I was somewhere I wasn’t supposed to be.

            “Amery?” he asked. I nodded. “Well, what the hell are you doing out here?”

            “What?”

            “It’s inspection day,” he yelled, already nearly running again, “Knight’s making his rounds, and he’s pissed!”

           

Jim "

            “Guys, f*****g wake up!”

            I was sleeping like a goddamn rock when Erich barged through the door and roared his orders, and nothing could have possibly scared me more. I jerked awake, tossed my pillow across the room and shrieked: “What? What? What?” in a pitch higher than I knew I could yell.

            We all tumbled out of bed and looked around wildly. It made me feel better to see that Hersch and Gabe had similar reactions, but in those two seconds I realized how much my head hurt.

            “What’s going on?” Gabe asked sharply.

            “It’s Knight!”

            “F**k! Is he after us?” Hersch yelled. Nothing was sinking in for me yet, so I just stood back and clutched my forehead while I tried to figure out what they were saying.

            “I don’t know,” Erich said, “but he’s coming around. We’ve got to hide the stuff!”

            At that point it hit me and my first reaction was to dive onto the floor where we had left the sacks. It wasn’t very effective; all I managed to do was smash my face on the floor and knock the wind out of myself. The other guys had more competent responses. They rushed around the room trying to get as much done as they could while I wheezed on the floor. Hersch and Erich took over, barking orders at us faster than we could move.

            “Get up!” Hersch hauled me to my feet. “Help me move this stuff, get it back in the sacks!”

            “Gabe, make up the beds!” Erich snarled, “Jesus, it’s dark in here; where’s the f*****g lamp?”

            “S**t! Jim, watch where you’re throwing that thing!” I had swung the sack of cigs around and bashed Gabe in the back of the head.

            “Where the hell are we going to hide this stuff?” I cried as the light came on. Our eyes fell on the boiler at the same time, “Erich, get that open!” He dragged the rusty boiler door open and we tossed the sacks inside just as a knock came from outside.

            “Inspection!” The voice came from outside and was followed by three more angry raps on the door. We all surveyed the room and each other in an attempt to make sure nothing was out of place. Then I lunged for the door.

            Knight was waiting on the other side and his presence hit us like an ice storm. He looked ready to kick some a*s, and it was our unfortunate asses that were standing in front of him.

            I ducked my head and avoided his eyes. “Professor Knight, sir, come in. We never heard anything about an inspection, but here you are. Oh, sorry about that door, sir, it’s broken, see.” I looked back at the guys, who I thought would certainly be in hysterics over my pathetic babbling, but they followed suit.

            “Sorry for the dark, Professor Knight. I’ll just get the lamp.”

            “What can we do for you, Professor Knight?”

            “Professor Knight, won’t you sit down?”

            He turned his icy look on Gabe, who had asked the last question and offered him a chair. “No, Mr. Moretti, I would rather not. Surely you boys knew about inspection?”

            We actually didn’t have to lie this time and answered in a chorus of: “No, sir.”

            I could tell he sensed our insincerity but he couldn’t prove it. “Yes, well,” he said, “you should keep yourselves better informed.” He turned back to us, “Good Lord, Amery, what happened to your sleeve? Where are your uniforms?”

            As if on cue, we all shot a look down at our outfits to find that we still had on our clothes from the night before. I opened my mouth but nothing came out. Hersch got there first.

            “Well, sir, they, um… they were in…”

            “… Need of a washing!” I finished, seeing that nothing else had come to him.

            “Rough business, this school,” Gabe added.

            “But we couldn’t seem to find the laundry…”

            Knight looked unconvinced but didn’t ask questions. “Why, that’s your basin there,” he said, motioning to the large wooden barrel in the corner, “It’s old fashioned, yes, but I assumed you would know how to use it,” he said condescendingly. None of us said anything to that and Knight continued to survey the room with an indifferent eye.

            “This boiler,” he began, tapping his fist against the metal. The second the words were out of his mouth, we shot each other desperate glances, “it’s only lit on particularly cold nights. I’m afraid it won’t be too comfortable for you boys.”

            It looked like he was going for the latch and I sprung into action. “Sir,” I said hurriedly, “you seem awfully on edge. Is something wrong?” The guys looked like they wanted to rip my throat out, but I had an idea. Something had hit me: Knight would never admit that someone had taken his stash. He would never be able own up to having the booze, more so that it had been taken by a group of students, while he was in the room. He couldn’t do anything about it, and if we acted like we knew something was up, he would back off.

            It worked. Knight’s head whipped up and he stepped away from the boiler. “Why, no, what would make you think that.”

            The other guys seemed to recognize that I had a plan and followed suite, “It’s nothing, sir,” Hersch said, “but it would seem that you had a rough night.”

            Knight scowled and shook his head. “Preposterous,” he growled. “I’m absolutely fine. Now, if you’ll excuse me, gentlemen, I have many more inspections to do.”

            We grinned at each other slyly as he made his way towards the door. “Of course you do, sir,” Erich smirked, opening it for him.

            The second he was out of sight, we slammed the door and stood there looking at each other. It seemed like we couldn’t figure out what had just happened. In the period of about five minutes we had gone from dead-asleep to frantic to a*s-kissing. It was Gabe that broke the silence.

            “What the hell was that?”

            A smile crept across Hersch’s face and I thought he almost looked impressed. “I have no idea.” He turned to me, “Jim, what the f**k did you just do?”

            I felt smug. It occurred to me that it was probably the first time I had managed to make an impression on them. “I had a hunch.”

            Erich grinned, “Yeah, a f*****g brilliant hunch!” He clapped me on the shoulders, “Hey, what do you know! You’re not an idiot, Banhart!”

            I laughed. “F**k that,” I said, “I’m going back to bed.”

 

Gabe "

            We basically spent Saturday sleeping off Friday night. It wasn’t even that we were ridiculously hung-over; we were just completely out of energy. After the rush we got from our unexpected visit from Knight, we were absolutely beat for the rest of the day. Throughout the afternoon, we would periodically get up and have a smoke, grab a drink, then lie back down.

            Before I knew it, it was Sunday morning. It was cold in our room, and I had no way of knowing what time it was. I couldn’t go back to bed though, after the entire day of sleep we had pulled off. So I just laid there and waited for the other guys to get up.

            There’s no other way to describe it: Friday night had been insane. After being chased back to the room by the Wankers, we basically drank our way into friendship. And, as it turns out, it seems like I’m not the only one with a messed up past.

            However, I was essentially forced into telling them I was a virgin, which, oddly, was better than the alternative they offered when they found out I was inexperienced with girls. Nothing could have been worse than actually hearing the accusation actually come out of Hersch’s mouth. I would have made any other excuse, even if the one they offered was almost equally humiliating.

            And as weird as the whole thing was, I felt like I was a part of something. I’d never had a group of friends like them before; other guys had always intimidated me. So now, even if I was officially “The Virgin,” even if the idea of opening up to them terrified me, I was glad to have them around.

            The bunk above me shuddered as Erich sat up. I rolled over and faced the wall, feigning sleep as he climbed down out of bed. I heard him yawn and stretch, listened to him make his way across the room and open his trunk, shuffling around in search of an outfit.

            His clothes hit the floor. I pulled the blanket tighter around me and squeezed my eyes shut, commanding myself not to turn around. I couldn’t look at him. He would think I wanted to. I had to get a hold of myself. In my mind, I repeated my hymn over and over again: I can this handle this. I can handle this. I can handle this. I can handle this. I can handle this.

            “Gabe?” The word surprised me so much that I shot up in bed without thinking about it. Erich was standing, bare-chested, over me. “Hey, kamerad, I’m out of shirts. Can I borrow one?”

            I closed my eyes and threw the sheets back over my head, as if he was only just waking me up. “Sure,” I muttered, “but I’m not sure I’ve got a clean one.”

            He glowered at me. “F**k that,” he muttered. I heard him shuffle around the room for a few more minutes before slamming the door on his way out.  Jim and Hersch both shot up in bed at the sound. They looked at me curiously. “Go back to bed,” I grumbled, “Erich just…” I didn’t get the chance to finish, because suddenly he was back in the room. His eyes were wide, his face completely perplexed. We just looked at him, but he didn’t say anything.

            “Man, what the hell is going on?” Jim demanded finally.

            Erich opened his mouth, but nothing came out for a second. “There are dames out there.”

            Hersch’s eyes narrowed, Jim’s brightened, “Dames?” he asked, “How many?”

            Erich smiled, “Lots.”

            Jim was on the ground in seconds, rooting through his luggage. He came up with a mirror, a shaving kit, a comb, and a jar of hair product.

            “What the hell is that?” Erich asked as he threw on a shirt.

            “Ha! You’ll wish you had it, too, by then end of the day!” Jim replied as he swept the gel through his hair.

            Erich snorted, “Unlikely, wethead. You look like a moron.” It was true. His hair looked like it had just been tilled by a plow. “Gabe, come on!” Erich said, examining himself in Jim’s mirror.

            “Me? Why not Hersch?”

`           “Hersch is excused on account of his invisible girl,” Jim said, “but we promised to get you a broad to screw. What kind of friends would we be if we didn’t give it our all?”

            “Guys, I…”

            Erich pulled me to my feet, “Come on, little virgin,” he rubbed his fist into my hair, “it’ll be fun!”

Reviews

[Arianna]

oh dear, poor Gabe....i mean god, don't torture the poor boy!!
i liked this chapter :)
it made me laugh:)

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[Jake Donald Stephens]

Apparently, cigarettes and whiskey don't make a good meal. Quite true.
Now boys, drinking is not the answer to things.
Oh Gabe, Gabe, Gabe. What are you going to do now?
Better reach for that alcohol again.
. It's dame time.

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[hannah]

awwwww jim is so smart! :) who would've guessed

[trish420]

This should be good!