by B. K. Dell
Caleb’s platoon had won phone privileges by outperforming Sgt Ward’s men in marksmanship. They had thirty seconds to call as many people as they wanted. It had been ten days since he mailed his first letter to Stacy, and he had yet to receive any from him at all. Caleb was anxious to hear his voice. Just the opportunity to call Stacy made him realize how much he missed him.
When it was his turn, he dialed Stacy’s number and tried to calculate how much later it was in Texas. He could hear it ring. It had only been two months since he last saw him, but so much had changed. Caleb felt like he had become a much different person, a better person. But, despite all of his achievements, as he listened to Stacy’s phone ring, he felt like he was the same old Caleb he had always been. It kept ringing. Please don’t let the call notes pick up! Caleb pleaded. Caleb always hated Stacy’s call notes.
The first few notes of C+C Music Factory’s Everybody Dance Now came blasting through the phone. Caleb rolled his eyes and hung up. He didn’t even get to the part where Stacy started talking.
Caleb instantly picked the phone up again and called his mother.
“Hello?”
“Mom, it’s me. I only have like twenty seconds to talk.”
“Caleb! I can’t believe it is you. I miss you so much. I know that we have gone this long without talking before, but this feels different. I miss you more than ever. Tell me about everything. How are they treating you?”
“Actually Mom, I just wanted to hear you talk. I need to hear your voice.”
There was silence on the other end. The very first thing that she thought to talk about was to vent about all the coverage of him in the press that she was trying to avoid seeing, and perhaps a word about how she never liked Stacy. But she knew that would be wrong. She tried desperately to think of something else to say. “Oh Caleb,” she said, then started, “I won a scratch-off last week. It was fifty dollars! Well, that’s far less than the balance on my credit card that is costing me all of that interest, but it’s a start. Every little bit helps.”
“You didn’t use it on the credit card,” Caleb laughed.
“No, I got my nails done.” His mom laughed. “You know what the lady at the salon said? She said she’d never seen-” the line went dead and the next recruit walked up for his turn.
Caleb looked at the silent phone and said, “I love you, Mom.”
***
Stacy was feeling light headed. He was drinking Patron. The alcohol had made him lonely so he called Martin. They had been talking for ten minutes when Martin casually dropped the name, Jerald Schaefer – a man he met at a protest rally. Jerald Schaefer was an activist, socialite, and millionaire.
“Oh sure, no one has heard of him in this one gay town, but he is practically a god in L.A.,” said Martin.
“Sounds like you need to jump all over that.”
“Trust me, I want to. It’s just-”
“Hold on, someone’s calling on my other line.” Stacy drew the phone back from his ear.
Unknown Caller
“Forget it. It’s probably just some idiot telemarketer. I am so sick to death of all these boot-licking telemarketers. I am so sick of everyone trying to sell me something. It’s everywhere you look these days. You can’t go anywhere without seeing some garish ad for a stupid pet shampoo. Like I have time to shampoo my cat’s hair, you know. I might as well give him a pedicure while I am at it. I know, I could give my cat a perm.”
Martin could tell that Stacy was drunk again. Martin had been heart sick all day about the new potential man in his life. He was wondering if Stacy would let the conversation get back to it. He wondered if Stacy just heard him quietly sigh.
“I mean, what is this guy’s problem?” Stacy shouted it with so much passion that Martin figured he was probably talking about some guy he saw on the TV or something, probably some guy with buck teeth, or a mullet, or wearing a Hawaiian shirt.
“Which guy?” Martin dutifully asked.
“Jerry, the Jolly Activist. Is he into you or not?”
“That’s just it; I am not sure. He keeps giving me mixed signa-”
“I am so sick of all these ads!” Stacy screamed over dramatically. “I am looking at my mail pile – yeah, I know, I let it pile up – and the whole thing is junk mail. Like I’ve got time to go through a bunch of junk mail.”
Martin sighed more loudly this time. “Well, anyway, he wants me to come out to a party at his beach house this weekend.”
“In California?”
“Yes.”
“Well, of course he is into you!”
“I’m not sure, you see, he wants us both to come.”
“What are you talking about?”
“He wants to meet you. He’s heard about Caleb.”
“Oh, my God. Are you serious? Sand, waves and gorgeous guys; we are so there!”
“How is Caleb, by the way? Have you heard from him?” Martin asked tactically, as if to remind Stacy that he has a boyfriend.
“Of course, we send each other letters all the time. Not to mention, we talk on the phone for like an hour every night.”
“How are they treating him?”
“How do you think? They’re a bunch of savages,” Stacy said as he stood up wobbly with a glass in one hand and a large stack of junk mail in the other, holding the phone with his shoulder. He walked to the trash can with much effort and tossed in the whole pile, then he made it back to the couch before performing a controlled collapse. Stacy let out a large moan.
“Did you need me to let you go?”
“Honey, I think I am going to pass out right here.” Martin could always tell when Stacy was too drunk because he started calling him honey.
“I guess I will talk to you later.”
“California, baby.”
Stacy didn’t know it, but in-between a flyer for a hardware store and Stacy’s electric bill, Caleb’s first letter from boot camp had just been thrown in the trash.
CHAPTER TWELVE
SSgt Folsom brought the men to the same field as before. Everyone knew that they were in for another round of Semper Fu. This lesson would cover techniques in ground fighting. There was a knot tightening in Caleb’s stomach and it was starting to rain.
This time SSgt Folsom did not ask for a volunteer, and Caleb was surprised and relieved when he picked a recruit to abuse other than him. SSgt Folsom spoke calmly as he manhandled the ill-fated recruit, “Once you have one arm around his neck, you bring your other arm over to where you can grab your own bicep, and place your other hand behind his head.” As SSgt Folsom did this, the recruit with his delicate neck inside SSgt Folsom’s muscular forearms had a despondent look on his face. “From here, most people think that they should waste all their energy trying to squeeze with their arms. Don’t make that mistake. Your arm strength is limited. From here you will make the most difference if you simply arch your back.” As soon as SSgt Folsom did this, there came a frantic tapping from the recruit almost instantly.
The rain began to come down harder, but every man there acted as if he didn’t notice.
SSgt Folsom rolled swiftly to his feet. He said, “This is a serious hold. It is not meant to cut off the passage of air to the body. People can live a relatively long time without air. It is meant to cut off the passage of blood to the brain. With no blood circulating to the brain, a person cannot live. With your fellow recruits, you must let go as soon as your partner taps out. With the enemy, you must be aware of the logistics – when you have a good hold on your opponent, it takes only three seconds to cut off all blood to the brain. Once that happens, first they will gag, then they will pass out, then they will die. Do you have any questions?”
Everyone stood completely silent and completely still.
“Good, then everybody pair up. Find a partner. You and your partner will take turns putting each other into side headlocks. Using the moves I showed you, you must break out of the headlocks and put your attacker into the choke hold until he taps out.”
Trey had just chosen a partner when SSgt Folsom barked out, “Tucker, you’re with Hertz!”
The knot in Caleb’s chest tightened again. Rain streamed down his face.
“Sir, yes, sir,” Trey called out louder than usual, the only way he had to voice the resentment. When Trey stepped over to Caleb, he had a look of disgust on his face. It was the same look that he had first used to try to stare Caleb down on the bus. Trey repeated SSgt Folsom’s warning from before, “Try to act like a heterosexual.”
Hearing this, SSgt Folsom called out to the platoon. “Yes, remember to act like the enemy. You are not helping to train your partner if you roll over and go limp.”
Trey lowered his brow, looked at Caleb and chuckled. The smirk on his face indicated that he had taken SSgt Folsom’s words to heart. He had no intention of letting Caleb put him into the choke hold. Standing that close to Trey was the first time that Caleb fully understood just how amazingly large he was. Trey lunged out and put Caleb into a head lock. They both dropped to the ground. Caleb was able to create a frame with his arm against Trey’s neck just like SSgt Folsom had shown them, but he could not seem to pry him far enough away. He struggled but he couldn’t break Trey’s grip, despite the fact that SSgt Folsom had stressed that good technique would make up for any disparity of physical strength.
Caleb’s face began to turn red as he continued to squirm. While Caleb struggled as hard as he could, Trey acted rather bored and aloof. Finally, Caleb loosened the headlock just enough for him to roll his body out of the way and flip Trey over. But Trey resisted. Caleb tried and failed. He tried again and failed again. By now their clothes were nearly completely covered in mud. Finally, with a loud grunt, Caleb lifted Trey off the ground and thrust him face down with a splash and a hard thud. They both heard a surprised groan from one of the recruits. A few men had stopped their own training to watch Caleb and Trey struggle. SSgt Folsom did not discourage the gawkers because he was watching so intently himself.
When Trey heard that people had seen Caleb’s first successful move, he became enraged. As Caleb leaned on top of Trey’s body and began to wrap his right arm around his neck, Trey bucked him off and threw him to the ground. It wasn’t any specific training that allowed Trey to turn Caleb face down and climb on top of him, it was a furious strength. When the other recruits saw Trey’s face, it was one solid sheet of black mud with just the white of two angry eyes glinting from behind it. Trey was taking SSgt Folsom’s advice and treated this like actual combat. He began to put Caleb into the deadly choke hold, even though it was supposed to be Caleb’s turn for the new technique. Caleb realized what Trey was about to do and franticly fought his way out of it. He had enough speed to nearly fight his way back to his feet, but Trey had managed to grab both legs out from under him. Caleb hit the ground face first, splattering mud onto a few recruits. By this point the whole platoon was gathered around watching.
Trey quickly advanced on top of him and tried the headlock again. He was able to get his arm around Caleb’s neck, but Caleb frantically pulled it loose. In the end, however, Trey was just too strong for him. Trey established his arms in the correct position and began to squeeze. Due to all the exertion, he had temporarily forgotten the last piece of it. Just as Caleb was about to break Trey’s grip, Trey arched his back. To Caleb, it felt like he had a thousand inflatable blood pressure monitors wrapped around his neck and they were all inflating at once. His hands still frantically searched for a weak spot in the hold. He yanked on Trey’s forearm with both hands, but it didn’t budge. Caleb felt like he was being held by King Kong, futilely trying to loosen his giant thumb. A deathly sound came out of Caleb’s mouth as he began to gag. He saw dark clouds enter into both sides of his vision, and although he felt certain that he had his eyes open, he soon saw nothing at all.
His hands still fought. Underneath Trey’s massive body, none of the recruits could see Caleb’s face. His hands tried different grips on different places on Trey’s arms, but his movement was slowing down.
“Tap out, you idiot!” shouted SSgt Folsom. “Tap out. Tap out!”
Caleb did not tap out. His weak arms were even further weakened, but he tugged and tugged for his life. Angry blind adrenaline was coursing through Trey’s heart.
“Tap out!” more recruits began to yell, one after another, “Tap out!”
“Tucker, let him go!” shouted Jackson.
“Let go Tucker; you’ll kill him!” shouted more recruits. “Tucker, let go!”
Trey felt Caleb’s fingers go completely limp and fall away from his arm. Trey then felt two strong hands on his shoulder and bicep. It was SSgt Folsom lifting Trey off Caleb. Realizing who it was, Trey quickly let go. SSgt Folsom pushed Trey aside and rolled Caleb over. Everyone looked accusingly at Trey Tucker. Trey cried out in his defense, “He didn’t tap out! Why didn’t he tap out?”
SSgt Folsom checked Caleb’s airway, his breathing and his pulse. He began to clap loudly only inches from Caleb’s face, trying to wake him up.
Trey watched his limp body and unconscious face – now covered in mud, anonymous. Trey’s voice sounded hollow and thin when he asked completely amazed, “Why didn’t he just tap out?”
To Caleb, “tap out” was another term that meant “quit.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The next spare moment for Jackson came at the end of that week. At his first taste of square away time, Jackson had something that he felt he had to square away. He quietly slipped out of his squad bay without anyone noticing. He ignored the questions and heckles as he walked through the upstairs squad bay of Sgt Ward’s platoon. Jackson was on a personal mission and that required Sgt Ward. It didn’t take long to find him and Jackson boldly requested an audience.
Sgt Ward addressed him mockingly, “A nasty little church mouse, nosing around in my holy sanctuary; what is that church mouse thinking?”
“Sir, the issue pertains to SSgt Folsom, sir.”
“Well, do you expect me to guess? Get on with it.”
“Sir, this recruit worries that he is treating one of his recruits unfairly, sir.”
“Unfairly? Who told you that the Marine Corps was supposed to be fair? Is war fair? Will the enemy treat Hertz fairly?”
Jackson was initially shocked that Sgt Ward could infer that he was talking about Caleb, but then realized that he should not be shocked at all. “Sir, no, sir.”
“Anything else, recruit?”
“Sir, yes, he has Caleb Hertz do incessant duck walks, sir.”
“So?”
“Sir, the duck walk was banned from military boot camps because of severe damage to cartilage and tendons, sir.”
“Do I look like I need a lesson in military history from a recruit?”
“Sir, no, sir.”
“The duck walk has been known to cause serious and irreversible damage to one out of every fifty men.” From Jackson’s best estimate, it seemed that Sgt Ward just made that up off the top of his head. “SSgt Folsom’s platoon has only forty-eight men and only one homosexual. So, nothing to keep you up at night, recruit.”
“Sir, that brings this recruit to another concern. This recruit is concerned about the way that SSgt Folsom refers to Recruit Caleb Hertz as a homosexual, sir.”
“I hate to break this to you, recruit, but that man is a homosexual.”
“Sir, yes, sir, but this recruit is not sure if he should call him that, sir.”
“Is there something derisive about the term homosexual?”
“Sir, no, sir.”
“Is there a more po-litically co-rrect name that you would like for SSgt Folsom to use when referring to Recruit Hertz’s sexuality?”
“Sir, n
o, sir, but that’s just it. This recruit is not sure why we need to refer to his sexuality at all, sir.”
“You mean to say that we, as Marines, need to get to the business of killing the enemy and not concern ourselves with the details of another man’s libido?”
“Sir, yes, sir.”
“You mean that we should not ask, and he should not tell?”
Jackson was confused. “Sir, well…no, sir. Not exactly, sir”
“Well, then what exactly?”
“Sir, this recruit supposes he doesn’t know, sir.”
“Well, then I guess you should get back to your own squad bay and forget all about our little talk here.”
“Sir, yes, sir.”
When Jackson got back to his squad bay, a few members from Sgt Ward’s platoon were there talking with Trey, Terrence, and some others. They were all clustered around Trey’s rack, which was right next to Caleb’s. Jackson could tell that they had been giving Caleb trouble because he was sitting against the wall on the other side of the room pretending to read the letter from his mother, which Jackson knew he had already read. In Caleb’s hand was a pink envelop that, for one reason or another, he hadn’t opened yet.
“So, this is what you guys do with yourselves while I am at church?” Jackson chided them in lieu of a hello.
“Why aren’t you there now?”
“I had something that I thought I could do.” Jackson wished he had said should do, but he noticed no one was really interested anyway. On the other side of the room he saw a recruit sitting with a letter that he seemed to have just opened. “Did we get mail today?” Jackson asked perplexed. The day before, SSgt Folsom hadn’t bothered with mail call.
Saying nothing, Trey motioned over to Jackson’s rack where they had left a letter for him. Jackson saw the fiery red envelope and knew right away who it was from. His face immediately lit up when he saw the glorious return address in the upper left hand corner.
