The Lonely War

by Alan Chin

  Stokes seemed even glummer than usual. Every day that passed he slumped deeper into depression. He was convinced that Chew-Gin had given him up for dead and started dating other sailors. The fact that they hadn’t had time to marry meant that she was not family, so she wasn’t notified that the ship had sunk. Andrew wished for the hundredth time that he could do something to cheer up his friend. Then he remembered something Tottori had said.

  “Say, John, you think you can scrounge up some paper and an envelope?”

  “Depends. What’s it for?” His tone sounded suicidal.

  “If you write a letter to Chew-Gin, I can get Tottori to mail it.”

  Stokes leaped to his feet, seized Andrew by the shoulders, yanked him up, and pushed him against the wall. “You mean it? You aren’t fuckin’ with me?”

  “If Tottori won’t mail it, I’ll get Do-Han to do it.”

  Stokes hugged Andrew mightily, squeezing painfully hard, to the point that Andrew struggled to breathe. Stokes finally loosened his grip and Andrew sank to a squatting position next to Cocoa.

  “I’ll have it before you leave camp. I… I mean, I don’t know how to—” Stokes turned his head away and covered his eyes with the crook of his elbow. A moment later he sat beside Andrew with a quiet grin.

  Cocoa grabbed the nape of Andrew’s neck and squeezed.

  The men devoured their gruel to the sounds of spoons scraping metal. Stokes passed each man a cigarette and they all lit up. Andrew told them that Tottori was placing the British officers in charge of everything inside the wire, and prisoners could grow vegetables and raise chickens.

  “Where we gonna get chickens?” Grady asked.

  “Buy them from Little Sister Wu. We’ll need wood and chicken-wire to build cages.”

  “That takes money we haven’t got,” Stokes stated flatly.

  “We’ll sell our balachong,” Hudson said. “I’ve got an Aussie buyer all lined up. Too many people have seen us gathering roaches, but if we wholesale to this Aussie, no one will link him and us, so nobody’s the wiser.”

  “S’matter with you?” Grady said. “An Aussie won’t sell bugs to his own.”

  “This bum would sell to his mother for a twenty-percent cut.”

  “Sounds like the right kind of business partner,” Cocoa said.

  Hudson asked, “Is it time to make another midnight roach run?”

  “Jesus, Hud, not after I’ve eaten,” Cocoa groaned. “And why am I always the one who has to wash those damned things?”

  “Why do ya think we let you in this unit? Sure as hell wasn’t for your Hollywood good looks,” Hudson snapped. “You gotta pull your weight, or what’s left of it.”

  Grady removed a slip of paper from his hip pocket and studied the pencil markings. He announced that tomorrow they would gather a new batch, but today was two months since they’d buried the first batch.

  “Jesus, no kidding?” Stokes said. “It’s harvest day?”

  Cocoa told them that he could rent a hotplate, spatula, and frying pan for a half dozen Kooas, but asked how they could keep it secret. Once they cooked that stuff, the smell would give them away. They needed a diversion, he added, something to mask the smell.

  “Say,” Grady said, “you know what waters my eyes? When those limeys drag their bedding out and burn away the bedbugs. We could carry out a few beds, start a fire under them, and burn our own bedbugs. Kill two birds with one stink.”

  “Good God, boys,” Hudson said. “We got us a fucking Albert Einstein here.”

  Andrew didn’t want to rent the cooking equipment, because they’d need it every week and the Brits might get suspicious. He suggested trading his old uniform and combat boots at Little Sister Wu’s for what they need.

  Cocoa scratched his head. “For good boots, sure. I could even get her to throw in more pots and some grub. Are you sure you want to give up your clothes?”

  “I’ve got these new clothes now. See if you can get us some coffee beans and a grinder. We’ll open up a coffee shop.”

  Cocoa’s smile split his face in half. “Hot damn, boys, I’m in charge of the galley again!”

  A chorus of groans erupted, followed by laughter. Grady snubbed out his cigarette, opened the unit’s tobacco box, and dropped the pinch of unused tobacco into the box. “I’ll go and dig up cans one and two. I’ll leave the holes cause we’re gonna bury two more cans tomorrow.”

  Hudson nodded. “Right. Stokes, you scrounge up some coconut husks. I’ll pull KP and go contact our Aussie wholesaler. We’ll meet here for lunch and cook the bugs after we eat.”

  “We better wait for an hour after we eat,” Andrew said. “You can’t believe what that smell is like.”

  “What are you going to do, rookie?” Hudson asked.

  “Sit here and enjoy the morning. Don’t worry, I’ll be plenty busy come cooking time.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  July 15, 1942—1000 hours

  ANDREW hunkered in the shade with his back against the hut wall as he watched thin-blown clouds creep across the sky. His mind drifted in a sphere of emptiness as his chi expanded. His essence was about to take flight when he noticed something moving toward him. He felt it more than he saw it. When he narrowed his attention on it, Mitchell adjusted into sharp focus while everything else faded away.

  The lieutenant limped down the line of go-downs, flanked by Moyer and Fisher. He wore a sweat-stained officer’s hat and his soiled uniform hung loosely on his gaunt frame. Hunger and sickness had reduced him to leathery skin stretched taut over bones, leaving deep valleys at his temples and under his bony cheeks. His skin’s curious, sallow glow was a result of taking the antimalarial drug, Atabrine, which Andrew had been able to get from Tottori. Dark rings surrounded those clear and discerning eyes, which were still the color of pale jade.

  Mitchell smiled, his first smile since standing on the Pilgrim’s deck. His teeth seemed too big for his mouth, as if they belonged to some larger animal.

  Andrew sucked in his breath. For him, Mitchell’s face had become shatteringly beautiful.

  The officers strolled up and stood before Andrew, studying his fleshy chest, sea-blue sarong, and leather sandals.

  “You’ve gone native,” Fisher said. His smile seemed friendly, but his voice carried a disapproving undertone. “Fine cloth like that could only have come from one place.”

  Mitchell pressed his hand against Fisher’s shoulder to stop him from exploring the obvious.

  “Fatigues are too hot,” Andrew said, fingering the cloth. “This is more comfortable.”

  Moyer nodded. “I’ll have to keep my eye out for one of those.”

  “I don’t have an extra sarong, but this came my way.” Andrew lifted a black book from his shoulder bag and handed it to Moyer.

  Moyer’s eyes opened wide. “Praise God, a New Testament? Where on earth—” After a pause he said, “Bless you, Andy. God bless you. We’re here to conduct the morning prayer. Will you join us?”

  Andrew shook his head.

  Moyer grasped Fisher’s elbow, guiding him into the hut while Mitchell eased himself to the ground. He leaned against the hut and exhaled a deep breath.

  Andrew’s senses were keenly alive. He noticed everything—Mitchell’s body so deliciously close, Moyer’s voice murmuring thought the hut, the prisoners who paraded by with exaggerated slowness, buzzing flies, and sweat sliding over his skin. This existence would last only as long as it took Moyer to utter his prayers. Then they would depart, leaving Andrew with an intense sense of loss. He wanted to fully experience the moment, every attribute of this coming together. It was the moment’s mortality that made him so desperate to savor it.

  They smiled at each other.

  Mitchell seized Andrew’s hand in his with a gentle pressure. He curved an arm over Andrew’s shoulders and pulled him nearer, staring out at nothing with a look that showed poignant emotions churning within, either joy or sadness or both. The intensity of that stare terrified Andrew. He
felt the officer’s heart thumping.

  Andrew let Mitchell have his silence while the officer visibly struggled with a puzzle, trying to fit the pieces together. Andrew made himself wait until enough pieces fell into place.

  “I saw Cocoa this morning,” Mitchell said. “I swear, every time I see that stump I go crazy thinking how close I came. I don’t know how to thank you.”

  “You’d do the same for me.”

  “You nursed me, smuggled me drugs, and cleaned my diarrhea. I wish I could repay you.”

  “All that was easy. Easy as falling in love. I can’t explain how, but caring for you has made me happier than I’ve ever been.”

  Mitchell edged closer. Their bodies pressed together until their faces brushed against each other. Andrew tried to pull away, but Mitchell’s eyes held him there. They kissed. Andrew focused his entire being on those lips. He ceased to exist, becoming nothing more than the glorious feel of skin touching skin.

  When they pulled apart, Mitchell wore a sad grin. Andrew tried to say that he loved Mitchell, but before he could, the officer covered Andrew’s mouth with his fingertips. He is right, Andrew thought, words will only diminish this passion.

  They passed through several minutes of living silence.

  Inside Hut Twenty-nine, voices gathered into song. “Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me….” Moyer’s voice carried the others and gave each note its full measure.

  Andrew pulled three rice balls, two eggs, and a pack of Kooas from his shoulder bag, passing them to Mitchell, who quickly hid them in his own bag. Contraband should only be shared with one’s own unit, and supplying the officers’ unit (Mitchell, Fisher, and Moyer) with food and smokes would have landed him in a world of hurt with his own unit. He remembered something else. He lifted a metal can from his bag and pressed it into Mitchell’s hands.

  “Talcum powder?” Mitchell asked.

  “I miss that smell on you.”

  Mitchell took a cigarette from the pack and lit it. He waved the match out and dropped it in the dust as he exhaled.

  “You seem so content,” Mitchell said.

  “Of course—the war is over for us. We follow the rules and we’re okay.”

  “Don’t you long for home?”

  “You are my home.”

  Mitchell seemed puzzled, but he didn’t linger on it.

  “Don’t you miss the outside world?”

  “What’s to miss?”

  “Strolling down city streets, rare steak dinners in restaurants, taking your girl to the movies, baseball and beer on Saturdays, Sunday dinners with the family.”

  “I’ve never done any of those things. Most people need all that outside activity. I do most of my living inside, so it doesn’t much matter what’s going on around me. Guess I’m simple.”

  “There’s a beautiful, exciting world out there. Remembering it is all that keeps me living from this moment to the next while we suffer through this hell.”

  “That outside world kept me silent when I needed to talk to you, drove me to nearly kill Lieutenant Hurlburt, beat me senseless and raped me while you watched. Here I can live, and love, and help people. Here I find moments of genuine happiness. Out there I’m a failure. Out there is my shame.”

  “Happiness? Do you mean cooking for Tottori? Do you enjoy being with him?”

  “I’m happy right now, sitting with you.”

  “What’s he like? What kind of man is he?”

  The question hung between them. Andrew fumbled for a response, but his words caught in his throat, like a sparrow trapped in a cage. This blockage was not caused by shame. He no longer felt guilt about Tottori, and he didn’t feel he betrayed one man for the other. They simply lived in different worlds. His feelings for both men were reconcilable. In fact, they were both necessary. Without Mitchell and Tottori, both worlds would collapse. But even secure in that knowledge, Andrew couldn’t bring himself to speak about one to the other. He needed to keep those two worlds separate and distinct.

  “Speaking of Tottori, I think I can get him to send a letter to Stokes’s girl so that she knows he’s alive. I can do the same for you. It shouldn’t be difficult to get some paper and an envelope.”

  “Thank you, Andy. Sure.”

  “Can you have it ready by sundown?”

  “I’ll do what I can. Now tell me about Tottori.”

  Hudson walked around the corner of the hut with his arm slung around Clifford’s slim waist. “Look who I found on my way back from the Aussie blockhouse,” he said.

  Clifford smiled at the sight of Andrew and Mitchell crouched together. When he noticed Andrew’s new sarong, his eyes widened and his chin trembled.

  Andrew wished that there was some way to give the cloth to Clifford without insulting Tottori, but that was not possible. Andrew and Mitchell rose to their feet. Andrew leaned into Clifford and hugged him, whispering, “Looks like you two are quite an item.”

  “W-w-w-well, he’s not giving me expensive presents,” Clifford said while fingering Andrew’s sarong.

  When they pulled apart, Mitchell took Clifford’s hand and said, “I know I’ve thanked you a hundred times, but every time I see you I want to thank you again. The only bad part of being back on my feet is that I no longer have you caring for me.”

  Clifford blushed and leaned into Hudson.

  “My Aussie friend will show up an hour after lunch,” Hudson said. “So we’re all set.”

  “What’s going on?” Mitchell asked.

  “Clifford,” Andrew said, “can you take our lieutenant and find some paper and an envelope?”

  “W-W-With pleasure. Co-co-co-come with me, Lieutenant.”

  AS LUNCH settled, Hudson cleared the hut and posted Banks, Cord, Allard, and Nash as lookouts. Stokes and Grady carried their iron-frame bunks out to the open area in front of the hut. With Ogden and Baker helping, they dismantled the posts on the top bunk, which fitted into slots in the lower bunk posts, and built a fire with dried coconut husks.

  When they had enough coals, they spread the fire into a cigar shape, five feet long and as wide as a bunk. Keeping the flames low, they placed a bunk—support slats, kapok-stuffed mattress, and frame—over the coals. Quick as that, tiny bugs began falling into the flames, so many that smoke spewed up, smudging the afternoon air. The stench became noticeable. It drifted on the breeze and spread over every hut by the southern wall.

  Stokes took a burning palm frond and passed it close under the mattress to burn out even the most tenacious bugs. When they had finished with one bunk, they lifted it off the fire and set the next one over the flames.

  Meanwhile, Cocoa plugged a hotplate into a dangling light socket and heated a large skillet. Andrew and Hudson pried the lid off a balachong can, jumping back as the odor escaped. They had filled that five-gallon can to the brim with mashed cockroaches, each one as large as a man’s thumb. After two months of decomposing, there was only four inches of black goop at the bottom of the can.

  “Hell’s bells. That smell would gag a maggot,” Cocoa choked.

  Andrew used a spatula to scoop up a generous portion of paste into the frying pan. Hudson quickly closed the lid. The paste emitted an explosive, rich, earthy stench, like a newly fertilized field after a spring rain, but powerful enough to water the eyes of everyone in the hut. The reek traveled through the walls and wafted over the southern end of the camp. Everyone within a ten-hut radius took notice.

  Andrew mashed the paste flat in the pan and stepped away to wipe his eyes.

  “That’s the right thickness,” Andrew told Cocoa. “Cook it gently under low heat and turn it every two or three minutes or it will spoil. It’s got to be just right, not too dry and not too moist.”

  Hudson paced the floor several feet away. He growled, “Well, is it two minutes or three? For Christ sakes, rookie, we’ve got to be exact.”

  “Relax, Hud,” Cocoa said. “You’re squawking like an old hen. We know our way around a skillet.”


  A high-pitched whistle cut the air.

  Hudson whispered, “Someone’s coming. I’ll handle it.” He dashed to the doorway and saw Mitchell limping toward them. Hudson hurried to intercept him, taking him by the arm and leading him up the path away from Hut Twenty-nine.

  “Sir, you don’t want to go down there. We’re burning bedbugs and it smells god-awful.”

  “No kidding. Never smelt anything so bad. I have a letter I want to give to Andy. Is he here?”

  “Ain’t seen him, sir, but you hand over that letter and I’ll see that he gets it.”

  Mitchell was reluctant, but he passed Hudson the letter before limping toward his hut.

  Hudson scurried into the hut in time to see Andrew turning the paste.

  “How much longer?” Hudson asked.

  “Three minutes, thereabouts.”

  A cloud of flies grew thick over the pan. The drone became loud. After three minutes, Cocoa lifted the pan off the hot plate and flopped the balachong onto a metal plate to cool. Andrew scraped a pinch off a corner with a spoon, mixing it with his lunch rice. Hudson and Cocoa watched as Andrew ate a spoonful of rice.

  “Good God, I’m going to be sick,” Cocoa said.

  “Well, be sick outside, damn you,” Hudson snapped. “How is it, rookie?”

  Andrew swallowed and nodded his head. “Perfect.”

  “Let me,” Hudson said. He grabbed the rice from Andrew, stuffed a spoonful into his mouth, and chewed thoughtfully. He swallowed. “Not bad. I mean, it adds a ton of flavor, and you wouldn’t think that fucking cockroaches could taste so good.”

  Cocoa grabbed the mess-can and shoveled rice into his mouth. His eyes looked to the ceiling as he chewed. “Needs sugar. If it had a smidgen of sweetness, we could double the price.”

  Hudson spit. “Jesus, what the fuck do you know? It’s fucking perfect the way it is.”

  Hudson took another spoonful, followed by Andrew and Cocoa. Each man became a connoisseur as they thought of ways to improve the taste.

  “You’re right, Cocoa,” Andrew said. “But where can we get sugar?”