The Box - 11. Chapter 11

July 6, 1999

“Wow. I think I’d be pretty pissed off if someone bombed us,” Brad said philosophically.

“There’s a revelation. You are not noted for your restraint,” JP teased in his deadpan way. Brad glared at him while I just smiled.

“Some people are better at repressing their emotions,” he shot back. JP just looked at him blankly, perfectly repressing his emotions, and that made me laugh.

“You told me I was like him when I was a kid,” Brad said to me accusingly, but in a good-natured kind of way.

“I was wrong. You were just trying to be like him,” I told him candidly. “Imitation is the highest form of flattery.”

“There were times when you were able to keep your emotions in control quite effectively,” JP said. “I really don’t think I could have done as well as you when you had to handle Robbie being with Neil.” Brad stared at him, pretty stunned by that admission, but Robbie, seemingly summoned by the mention of his name, came walking out.

“What about me?” he asked groggily.

“JP was just commenting on how tolerant I was of you when you brought Neil home for Christmas that year,” Brad said. There was a twinkle in his eye that said he was causing trouble.

“I did it to piss you off,” Robbie said. We all stared at him, kind of amazed.

“You did it to piss me off?” Brad asked. “You were trying to hurt me? Well it worked!” He had gone from playful to pissed in no time at all.

“As I said,” JP observed drily, “you are not noted for your restraint. Why did you do that Robbie?”

Brad opted not to flay JP alive, so interested was he in Robbie’s answer. “I wanted to see if you were over me, at least at first that’s why I did it,” he said. He was looking at Brad, opening up about these things that were years in the past. It was as if the diary was making all of us retrospective. “It bothered me that you had moved on or that you seemed to. I kept trying to get a reaction, but I couldn’t. I guess that’s when I figured I had totally fucked us up and we were done.”

“You are so fucking stupid sometimes,” Brad said, rolling his eyes. But he smiled too, to let Robbie know that he still loved him.

“So where are we?” Robbie asked.

“The war started. Your uncle wants to go off and fight. He’s being impetuous. Stef’s father just wants to hang around and fuck,” Brad said. We all laughed at that, and then I started reading again.

March 8, 1942

Well at least nothing got sunk or captured in the last few days. That’s saying something. I had a pretty eventful weekend. Barbie cornered me after school on Thursday and asked if we could talk. Her eyes were red like she’d been crying, and she looked so sad, that even if I were still mad at her, which I wasn’t, I’d have caved. So I’d flashed her my best smile and taken her to a nice little restaurant in town and we had something to eat, even though it wasn’t lunch or dinner time. That was pretty extravagant of me, considering they were talking about rationing everything from gas to dungarees. We kept our tanks full, and even had an extra drum or two of gas stored in the garage. I was nervous that it would blow up, but there were enough other things to worry about, so I just decided that was Randolph’s problem.

So we sat down and she started crying. “I’m so sorry I’ve been so cold and distant.” I wanted to make some smart-ass remark, like maybe she could put out to make up for it, but I didn’t. She was being sincere.

Still, she deserved a little emotional jab for being such a bitch. “Yeah, what’s the deal with that? I really like you, and you act like you don’t want me around.”

“I’m scared,” she’d said.

“Scared of what?” I didn’t get that. I mean, there were lots of things to be scared of, but being with me shouldn’t be one of them. I’m not scary, am I?

“Scared of being close to you and having you go away,” she said.

“You mean to fight?” I asked. She just nodded. And then I got it. She was worried that if she really let herself go, let herself fall in love with me, and I went off and got killed, it would hurt pretty bad. “You think it’s that easy to kill me?” I tried to joke, but it fell flat.

“Don’t joke about it Steven,” she’d snapped. She only called me Steven when she was mad.

“So you’re going to be this cold, mean person so we end up hating each other, and that way when I go off to fight you won’t miss me and you won’t worry about me?” I asked.

“I thought it would at least make it bearable,” she said softly, the guilt palpable.

This really snapped me. So she was going to be a total bitch, make my life hell, just so she didn’t have to feel bad. “That’s not a very nice thing to do to me. I like you. You’re my girl. And you just dump me because you’re afraid I’ll go off and fight and leave you. Wouldn’t give me a whole lot to live for, would it?”

“I was being selfish. And it isn’t working anyway. I’m sorry Steve. I’m sorry if I hurt you, and for being so cold and mean.” She was crying now, and I hate that. Not that she shouldn’t, I just hate it that she’s so sad she cried.

I could kind of see her point. I guess I was kind of mad at Aaron for the same thing, in a way. For wanting to run off and fight and leave me behind. Only he said now he wanted to go off together. Barbie and I could never do that. “This is a tough time for everyone,” I said. I flashed another smile at her and gave her my most charming look. “Does this mean you’ll go to the dance with me on Saturday night?”

She smiled then, and it was neat to see her happy now that she knew she hadn’t lost me. “I guess I have no choice if you’re going to be my boyfriend.”

“I guess you don’t,” I’d said, continuing the playful tone. “I’ll pick you up at 7:00.”

Saturday, during the day, I hung out with Aaron. He seemed kind of jealous that I was going out with Barbie, jealous enough to make some comment about it. “I was thinking we were going to goof around, just the two of us, since you didn’t have a date.”

“Well, you didn’t say anything,” I snapped. It pissed me off that he didn’t love me, yet he’d play these games with me. “If you want, we can hang out tomorrow.”

“Yeah, that will work,” he’d said unenthusiastically. All these people in my life were gunning for Academy Awards.

Barbie and I went to the dance and had a swell time. We danced so close during the slow dances the chaperones had to break us up three times. Barbie looked embarrassed by that, but I just wore it like a badge of honor. Then after the dance we drove up on Skyline and parked. It had been a while since we had sex, but she was into it, she really wanted to, so it was really good. I was on cloud nine when I finally took her home. It was such a good feeling, to be back on good terms with her, to have my life kind of settling back down again after the fucking Japs blew up our whole navy.

Aaron spent the day with me on Sunday and we did our normal thing. We goofed around, we fucked, and he worked on his car. He stayed over for dinner, though, and it was one of those dinners that start out real nice but end up being real tense.

My mother started it off, all snapped because the government was planning to intern a bunch of Japanese-Americans and take all their stuff. “I can’t believe they’re seizing their property and hauling them off!”

“They bombed us,” Aaron said simply.

“They’re US citizens. They’re Americans. They didn’t bomb us. The Japanese did,” she’d said back sternly.

“It was a sneak attack, so that means that they’re all suspect,” my father had said calmly.

“Oh really?” She’d said, getting a good head of steam on her argument. “Our last name is German. Which camp would you like to go to?”

“The Germans didn’t bomb our fleet at Pearl Harbor without warning, the Japs did,” he said firmly.

“So,” she said, undaunted. “What difference does that make? It doesn’t mean they’re disloyal.” I could kind of see her point. I mean, if they did that, if they interned all the Jap-Americans, what was to keep them from rounding up all of us who had German heritage?

“Gail, you have to let this one go,” my father said firmly, almost severely. When he called her Gail in front of us, with that tone, it meant he was serious.

“How can I just let it go, just ignore all of those people being hauled off?” she demanded.

“Because they’re going to do it no matter what you say. If you do this, if you make this an issue, it will ruin you in the community. They’ll think you’re anti-American,” my father said.

“Barry is right,” my grandfather chimed in, something he never did when my parents were arguing. “You will make life hell for all of us, including Steve and Billy, and you will accomplish nothing.”

“Don’t you people have a conscience?” she demanded, pissed off now.

They were really angry, all of them, so I jumped into the fray. “They’re just saying you need to pick your battles, and you can’t win this one, Mom.” She glared at me. “We’re getting our asses kicked in this war. We have to stick together, even if we don’t agree with everything that’s going on.”

“That’s why I’m going to enlist as soon as I turn 17,” Aaron announced. “Steve’s going with me.” I just stared at him, stunned.

“You can’t go anywhere until you finish high school,” she said authoritatively. I agreed with her. And wasn’t that the plan anyway?

“You can enlist when you’re 17 if you have parental consent,” he told her.

“Your parents are going to let you go join up when you’re 17?” she asked. I was wondering that too. Did he ask his parents?

“I’m sure they will,” he said, although he wasn’t so sure, I could tell. “Even if they don’t, the recruiters don’t check too much. Heck, we could probably sign up right now.”

She stared at him, horrified. “You’re going to break the rules and go fight now?”

“No, I’m going to wait until I’m 17. Then if my parents won’t sign off, I’ll go join up anyway,” he told her. He was being pretty tough, facing my mom like this.

“Well you’re certainly not doing that,” she said, turning to me. I didn’t want to have this discussion now, and I really didn’t want to have it in front of my whole family.

“I’m not 17 yet,” I said simply.

“I don’t care, you’re not joining up until you’re done with high school,” she commanded.

“In any event, this isn’t something we need to argue about right now, is it?” my father asked, coming to my rescue. “It would be nice to finish dinner without arguing.” So we all shut up and ate in silence. Billy looked at me with his big eyes and didn’t say anything, but I smiled and winked at him to let him know things were OK. His face broke into a grin when I did it.

After dinner we headed up to my room to goof off. “How are you going to enlist if your parents won’t let you?” he asked me.

“I don’t know,” I told him. “I’ll have to work on them.”

“I thought we were going to do this together,” he said.

“I want to. But I have to deal with them first. You just sprung this on them, and this is the first time they’ve heard about it.”

“You mean you haven’t talked to them about it yet?”

He was pissing me off. “No, I haven’t. Why would I?”

“I’m starting to think you don’t want to go with me,” he said. “You want to stay here.”

“That’s bullshit,” I told him, even though it wasn’t. “It’s not happening for another six months, and I wanted to work them into it slowly. You messed that up.”

“I just figured that if you were going, you’d have mentioned it,” he said unrelenting.

“Well I didn’t. But you did. So now I’m going to have to deal with shit from them for the next six months instead of only having to deal with it for a couple of months,” I told him. “You know my mom. She’ll be on me about this night and day now. Thanks a lot.”

He finally got it. “I’m sorry. I guess I’m just keyed up to go kick some Jap ass.”

“Yeah, I know. It’s all you fucking talk about. So now I have to hear it from you, and then I have to hear it from her,” I said, really pissed off.

“It’s important,” he whined.

“I know it’s important. I read the news. I watch the Movietone reels before the movies. I see the ships blow up. I know it’s important. I’m just not convinced that my contribution is going to be the one thing that tilts the war in our favor, and you are.” I realized after I said that that we were heading for a major battle, so I tried to put some levity in. “You’re not Douglas MacArthur are you?”

“No, but I want to do my part,” he said sullenly.

“Look, there are thousands of guys, guys who are over 18, who are enlisting and training right now. We’d just be in the way. Settle down and wait our turn. Then we’ll go do what we have to do,” I told him.

He pondered my words then got a big grin. “I think we should join the marines.” I fucked him to avoid the rest of that conversation.

April 20, 1942

We finally did something right! We finally kicked some ass! The news reports said that American bombers attacked Japan! We are all wondering how they could have flown that far, but the reports didn’t tell us anything more. My dad thinks that they flew from some base in China. I didn’t even know we had bombers based in China. Anyway, they bombed Tokyo, blowing up all kinds of shit. My grandfather says they didn’t do all that much damage, but the fact that we did something right, well, that was pretty swell.

I spent a long time with him today, talking about it. He says he thinks it will really upset the Japanese people, because they’re sitting there on their island, having sunk pretty much our whole fleet, and all of a sudden there are bombs falling from the sky. For us, it’s finally some good news, which is a good thing, since there sure as hell hasn’t been much lately.

Our troops in the Philippines had surrendered after a long, nasty battle. They’d held out on Bataan for as long as they could. We couldn’t save them in time, so now most of them are prisoners. The Japs were blowing up the Royal Navy in the Indian Ocean, and the Germans were sinking our ships in the Atlantic like they were shooting at ducks. I think we were all really starting to feel like we couldn’t win this thing, like we might end up being invaded after all, and that was pretty depressing.

Our raid wasn’t the only good news. The Brits pulled off this slick raid a few weeks ago too, at a place named St. Nazaire in France. They sailed this old destroyer, originally a US destroyer, into the harbor, rammed the U-boat docks, and then blew it up. That takes some balls. So between that raid, and our Tokyo raid, it looks like we actually have the ability to win once in a while. We may actually pull off a victory after all.

I figured that with the raid on Japan, and signs that we were starting to turn things around, that Aaron would stop the constant drumbeat to go fight. I was wrong. Today he’d been worse than ever. He’s driving me fucking crazy. I swear, it’s all he talks about. One minute he’s going to be a marine, then a sailor, then in the army, then in the army air force, then in the marines again.

We both joined the Civil Air Patrol and got little books with silhouettes of planes so we could spot any enemy planes that happened to fly over Ohio. I thought that was kind of goofy, since we hardly ever saw our own planes fly over, but it gave us something to do, and I figured that if we went off to war, we’d know what to look for. The other thing we did a lot of was recycling. It seemed like they were always collecting stuff. Tin cans, aluminum, scrap iron, anything that could be melted down or re-used we were supposed to save and turn in. This was a big deal at school, and there was a contest to see who could bring in the most scrap iron. Some goofy guy from West Claremont named Joe Brosef won.

Then there was the rationing. First thing they restricted was tire sales. I guess rubber supplies were hit pretty hard with the Dutch East Indies gone or at least with the battles there, but whatever the reason, there wasn’t enough rubber, so we had to ration it. It took an act of God to get new tires now. Gas was rationed, meat was rationed, sugar, nylons, coffee...damn near everything was rationed. For me, the gas rationing was the toughest. My father managed to score a ‘B’ sticker for his car, which was better than most of us with our ‘A’s. Farmers got ‘C’ ration stickers so they’d have enough gas to plow their fields, I guess. We all had to really watch where we went to keep our trips to a minimum.

Then there was the speed limit. The speed limit had been lowered to 35MPH for everyone, everywhere. The story is that going slower saves gas and tires. It was kind of frustrating to have this big, fancy Packard 8 that just sucks up gas but then to be limited to only going 35MPH. Aaron’s been giving me shit about how much better his Dodge is, because it sips gas.

More guys are leaving for the war all the time now. Damn near the whole senior class is planning to enlist as soon as they graduate. It gives school this really eerie feeling. I really want to finish high school before I go off to fight, but I doubt Aaron will go for that, and it would really be bad to be there without him. I don’t know what I’ll do when the time comes for us to enlist.

June 14, 1942

It’s a whole new ball game in the Pacific. We just kicked some serious ass at a place called Midway Island. We’ve all been celebrating like crazy, and my mom even let me have a big swim party at our house this weekend. I got completely drunk and so did Aaron and most of my friends. My parents had to burn through some serious ration coupons for that party, but they told me that since they hadn’t done much for my birthday, it was just fine. I guess I should go back and catch up on where I left off in April.

There was a battle in the Coral Sea that the newspapers keep trying to tell us was a victory, but I don’t see it. The Japs lost one little aircraft carrier, while we lost one of our big ones, the Lexington. That, and they really fucked up the other carrier there, the Yorktown, but we managed to repair her really fast, fast enough that she fought at Midway. So even though we lost more ships, they’re telling us it’s a victory because it stopped the Japanese invasion of some island or something. I don’t know about that. It sounds like we got our butts kicked, but that’s just me looking at it from Ohio.

The Russians are in the middle of some huge battle around a city called Kharkov. It sounds like there are millions of men and tanks slugging it out there, but it’s hard to tell who’s winning. One minute it seems like the Russians are making progress, the next minute it’s the Germans.

Then, a couple of days ago, the newspapers had this big headline about a major victory at Midway Island. At first I thought they’d be full of shit, that it would be like the Battle of the Coral Sea, where we called it a victory but it wasn’t really a victory at all, or if it was, it wasn’t much of one. But then the details came out, and it really was a major win for us. We were practically dancing in the streets.

Seems like our admirals guessed what the Japs were going to do and ambushed them. The Japs were attacking Midway with four big carriers, four of the same bastards that launched the attack on Pearl Harbor, and we found them and sank all four of them. Four big Japanese carriers, all sunk! That’s unbelievable. Our side lost the Yorktown. I guess she was still damaged from the Coral Sea, but whatever the problem, they finally got her. Still, they’re saying this one battle has turned the tide in the Pacific, and that soon enough it will be us attacking the Japanese instead of the other way around. It feels so good to win a battle, to really win a decisive victory.

The mood has completely changed now. It’s as if people suddenly realize that we might actually be able to win this thing. Everyone’s smiling on the streets, being all friendly where they were dour just last week. It seems as if the whole nation has suddenly recovered from being depressed.

The party was a blast. I got really drunk with a bunch of my friends, and I guess we were obnoxious enough that most of the girls went home, including Barbie. That kind of made me sad, because we’ve been spending a lot of time together and I really like her, but it was fun to just drink with all the guys. Then after the party, Aaron and I fucked like rabbits, and it was a blast. I discovered that when I’m drunk, it takes me longer to blow, and him too, so that made it really fun. I’m saving ration stickers so we can go to the lake this summer for a week, just the two of us. I can hardly wait.

Around town, everyone is completely focused on winning the war. The one good thing to come from the war is that all those people who didn’t have jobs, well, they’ve got them now. The mill is running twenty four hours a day now, and they’re hiring people like crazy. They’re paying so much for people to work there that school teachers, plumbers, guys like that are quitting their jobs to go work in the mill.

There’s always been this rivalry between the three richest families in Claremont: Us, the Cramptons, and the Hendricksons (who own the mill). My parents don’t own a business like that, but I talked to my grandfather and he says they own acres and acres of land in Ohio. I didn’t really know how much until recently, when we were just goofing around and talking. He said my father has been really big into buying stocks too, and that’s made them a lot of money. So I guess we’ll be fine, no matter what. Still, I kept thinking that with this war, and with the mill running constantly, this would give the Hendricksons the big lift and give them a lot more money than the rest of us, but I’m not sure about that.

I figured that the construction business would dry up, that we’d be too busy fighting to build stuff, but that hasn’t been the case at all. My grandfather told me that Crampton Construction has been busier than ever. When I asked him why, he told me that all the factories they need to build have to be built by someone, and that my relatives have really close political connections so they usually get the contracts. Everything from shipyards near Cleveland to tire plants in Akron: the Cramptons are building it.

Jim and I pretty much avoid each other now. He’s gotten a little bolder now that a lot of the guys are gone, but I think he still knows I can kick his ass, so he steers clear of me. I don’t know what his deal is, or why he’s such an asshole. They came over for my birthday and it was weird. My aunt seemed real uncomfortable, probably because she’s fucked both me and my mother, but my uncle was uncomfortable too, probably because he knows I don’t like him. The only one who seemed happy to be here was JP, but that’s no big deal, since he’s here all the time anyway. I’ve really grown to like the little kid, although I still don’t know how he’s going to turn out normal living in that fucked up family.

I’m really nervous about this summer, about August. Aaron turns 17, and there’s no way any of us are going to stop him from enlisting then. I don’t see why we can’t finish high school first, that way when the war is over, we can go to college straightaway. I tried to talk to him about that, but he treats me like I’m some sort of traitor, like I’m betraying our pact to go off together. I feel like I’m being bullied into fighting before I’m supposed to, only instead of using his fists, he’s using emotions. I thought about having my mom and dad pull strings to make sure he can’t get in, that they won’t let him enlist, and they’d do it for me if I asked them. Hell, they may do it even if I don’t ask them. They think of Aaron as part of our family. But I can’t do that to him, I just can’t. I really love the guy, and if he wants to go off and fight, I have to do what I can to support him. I’m just not sure if I have to go with him.

What would that be like, though? I mean, I have friends here; I wouldn’t be goofing around on my own. I’d probably spend even more time with Barbie. We’re doing really well; we have a routine. I go out with her on one weekend night, and then goof around with Aaron on the other one. Then we usually get together and do homework or something during the week. She usually lets me fuck her once a week, and that’s really nice. We’re getting good at it, really good. I can tell by the way she lets herself go, by the way she has orgasms as strong as mine, and by the way our orgasms sometimes even come together.

I’m rambling, talking about sex with Barbie, when I was trying to visualize life here in Claremont without Aaron. I know why. It’s because I can’t imagine what it would be like. He’s really the center of my life. I love the guy, I really do. I’d do anything for him; I know that, so if he makes me honor our pledge to run off, I will. But I don’t want to, and I don’t want him to.

1999

“That’s a pretty tough decision to make,” I told them, pausing after this last entry. “Would you go off to fight with the man you loved even if you didn’t want to?”

Everyone got introspective, thinking about my question. Surprisingly, JP was the first to answer. “No. I wouldn’t. I love you Stef, but if I wasn’t ready, or I thought it was wrong, I couldn’t go.”

I hadn’t stopped to think how hard that question might hit him, that he’d lost Billy and André, the first men he’d loved, to the military. I was being insensitive, and I felt bad. I tried to ease the pain with some humor. “You are lucky that I am a lover, not a fighter.” That got a chuckle and a loving smile from JP.

“I would,” Robbie said automatically.

“I wouldn’t have to,” Brad joked. “He’d do what I wanted anyway.” Robbie smacked him playfully. Yet none of us had answered the question except JP.

“Let’s find out if Aaron and Steve go off together,” Robbie said impatiently, so I read on.