Mare's War (26 page)

“I’m not really hungry,” I say faintly. “You can look at my menu.”

We are so quiet now I can hear the conversations from other tables and the tinkle of piano music. The cute guy with the tight jeans sits down at the table closest to ours, but Tali, burying her face in the menu, doesn’t even notice.

The server comes, and Mare orders a seafood omelet and a salad. Tali orders a basket of onion rings and a grilled panino sandwich. I choose a small plate of nachos and guacamole. When my stomach gurgles, I reach for my drink and take a sip.

“Good?” Mare glances over at me.

I consider, then nod. “I’ve never had the coffee syrup. You want a sip?”

“Lord, no.” Mare shudders. “I want to go to sleep tonight.”

“Well, there’s only a little coffee in the
syrup.”
Tali rolls her eyes. “It’s flavoring.”

“A little is still some.” Mare takes a sip from the water glass closest to her and nails my sister with her eyes. “Don’t fool yourself, Talitha.”

We have a quiet dinner. Mare shares the hash browns
that come with her omelet with me, and she scoops my guacamole onto her omelet. Tali moodily munches her panino crusts, looking sullen. My grandmother doesn’t say anything when Tali finally touches her glass and pulls it toward her, sipping it carefully while eyeing Mare for a reaction. When the server comes by for Mare to sign for our meal, she scans the charges, then signs slowly. I push back from the table and head for the elevator, relieved that the ordeal is over.

“You owe me eight dollars,” Mare says to Tali, who is walking behind me.

“Eight dollars? My drink was only four!”

“That’s the markup for working my nerves,” Mare says flatly. “I am not paying for you to break the law, Talitha Marie, and if you’re going to pull this kind of bull, you can just go on home, and Octavia and I will go on without you.”

“I wasn’t pulling anything. Mare, I am almost eighteen. It was just some Kahlúa. It’s not that big a deal.”

“Eighteen isn’t twenty-one, Miss Thing,” Mare shoots back, then drops her voice and says something I can’t hear. The elevator bell chimes before Tali can answer.

I push the number for our floor and wait as Tali walks in and stands with her arms crossed, her expression smoldering, stubborn, and hard. Mare comes in and smiles, looking relaxed as a family wheels in their luggage and their dog carrier. They stare at us curiously.

“We’re starting off nice and early tomorrow, girls. You
going to watch movies all night, or are you going to be ready?” Mare nudges my shoulder.

“I’ll be ready.” I relax a little.

“Good.” Mare smiles and jiggles the car keys in her pocket. “Very good.”

“So, have you ever been to New Orleans?”

The V-Disc records are too loud, and we are packed in the recreation hall sardine tight. It’s an enlisted WAC party, and we invited all the men around to join us.

“Never been anywhere till I joined up,” I say, and sip my drink. Peach dragged me to this thing, talking about I just have to meet this fella and if I don’t like him, it might be that she has got another friend for me, but I don’t see neither one of them. Now this lanky Louisiana boy has been holding up the wall next to me, just talking. If Peaches don’t hurry up, I’m going. I’ve got less than an hour before I’m on duty, and she was supposed to be here fifteen minutes ago.

“My family came from down New Orleans way, but my grandparents moved us on to Chicago.” The boy keeps talking, and I look at him sidelong, with his copper color skin and his high cheekbones. Mama would call him a redbone because of his skin. His hair is light, crinkled brown, and he has got eyes like a calico cat—almost green and a funny
yellow-brown. Behind the GI-issue horn-rimmed black glasses, you can hardly see those eyes unless you look really close. No wonder he says he works in the chemical division. They don’t let anybody that blind shoot.

“My great-grandfather was Greek, they say”—he goes on with his history like somebody asked—“which is why my mother named me George. She called me after that grandfather, George Eneas Hoag. The guys call me Diego, though.”

I put down my cup. “Well, George, you want to dance or what?”

George blinks like a turtle behind those glasses. “Well, sure. Sure,” he says. He has a big slow grin.

“Don’t step on my shoes,” I tell him as he puts his hand on my back and we walk out onto the floor. “I don’t mean to take the time to polish them again before I go on duty.”

“Do you like working in the post office?”

I sigh. “You sound like that reporter from Chicago we had in here yesterday, talking about, ‘How do you like this place?’ and getting all in the way. Don’t know why these newsmen are still here. The war’s in the Pacific; that’s where they ought to be.”

“What else did he ask?” George hasn’t stepped on my shoes yet.

“Oh, all kinds of dumb stuff, like don’t we want to stay on in Europe since there’s so much discrimination back home and don’t we all like it here.”

George frowns. “It’s nice here, but back home’s where we
ought to be. Besides, once the Nazis are all chased down, the French folks will want their country back.”

I look up, nodding in agreement. “That’s what I say. They’re real grateful, and Geneviève and all the others I work with at the post office are nice and all, but I just can’t see staying here forever.”

George clears his throat. It is hard to holler over the new record and have a serious talk, but he ducks his head in close, right next to my ear. “Have you been around Rouen yet?” George say “Roo-ah,” like the French.

I shake my head and pull back, embarrassed to feel his breath on my ear. Where is Peaches? If this boy asks me to go out with him on a pass, I’m gonna wring her little neck. He is tall and skinny, and I don’t see myself getting friendly with a cat in specs.

“I met some farmers,” George starts to say, and I just about cross my eyes.

“George, nearly everybody is a farmer around here,” I tell him. “I aim to get out of the country and into Paris on my leave.”

George smiles a little. “Well, sometime maybe you’ll get around in the country,” he says, clearing his throat again. “They’re starting to harvest a few things.”

The song ends, and I step back. “That’s real nice,” I say. “Look, George, thanks for the dance, but I got duty at oh-eight-hundred, and I’d better run.”

“May I see you again, Miss Boylen?” George asks me, and my stomach knots. I am going to hurt that Peaches Carter.

“Why, sure, George, but right now I’d really better rush off.” I put out my hand. “Goodbye.”

Ooh, that Peaches. Just as I stomp out the door of the rec hall, Peaches runs in, looking all upset. “Gosh, Marey, I forgot—”

“I’ve got duty, Peaches Carter,” I say. “You see that lanky cat with the crooked tie over there? I told him you’d save him a dance.” Peach follows my finger to where George is standing against the wall again. “He’s just what the doctor ordered,” I say, and move to push past her.

Peaches doesn’t hardly give him a glance. “Marey, wait. I’m sorry to stand you up. Something’s happened.” She sighs, her face sad. “If you see Gloria, will you tell her—”

Heat pushes into my face. “Peaches. I don’t expect to see your little friend Gloria Madden anywhere near me anytime soon. I don’t have time to be your errand girl, all right? I’ll see you later.”

Peaches’s expression gets all pinched up. “All right,” she says. “You be that way.”

I walk off, feeling irritable and hot. There is just time to stop by the mess hall.

When we are on KP, we see that our food comes out of dark green cans, and it is the same stuff as always. When we first got to France, we had all kinds of good food. Fried chicken, mashed potatoes, fresh carrots. Ruby says it was to make up for them straw ticks on our beds, but Ina says the supply sergeant said we was getting hospital issue. They figured that all women in one place must mean nurses, even
though nobody told them that. This man’s army still forgets there are more than men around these days. Well, soon as the supply depot figured out we weren’t running a hospital, they busted us back to C rations—pork and beans, dehydrated eggs, and Spam, Spam, and more Spam.

I am sick to death of Spam. Today, I am sick of the entire U.S. Women’s Army Corps.

Édith practice her English on me while we work. “I would like
une bif
… a
bifteck,”
she say.

“I want a beefsteak,” I tell her. “And some collard greens and fried green tomatoes. And a baked potato.”

Édith looks at me and smiles, but I can tell I lost her a while back. “Um, I want …
une pomme
…”

“Ah. Pomme de terre?”

I shrug. Sounds good to me.

Somebody turns the radio on, and we listen to them read the news. The GIs in the Pacific are still having a rough time with the Japanese, and they have been pushing and being pushed back for a while now. The Allied nations are calling for the Japs to surrender. Ruby still talks about heading out for the Pacific, but I don’t know about that. A couple of GIs ran across a land mine last month, and there were some bad injuries. I have had my fill of bombs in England, and anyway, Captain says she has a feeling it will be all over soon.

“Hey, Marey.” Maryanne Oliver leans against the counter. “You hear Lieutenant Bothwell is opening up security training?”

I shrug. “I saw something about that. You going?”

Maryanne nods. “They’ve got a British lieutenant to teach us jujitsu.”

I widen my eyes. “Ju-what?”

“Jujitsu. It’s Japanese. Bothwell says it’s a way to fight. Doesn’t matter how small you are; they can teach you how to take down somebody even bigger.”

I shake my head. “Can you beat that? We Americans are gonna fight like the Japs?”

Maryanne shrugs. “Our commanding officer requested we be issued sidearms when we go on duty, but the brass told her no woman’s gonna be carrying firearms in this man’s army. The villagers complain we’ve got men at the gates at all hours, and the captain says we have to call regular MPs too many times for help with the drunk and disorderly. We’ve got to do something.”

“All right, I’ll go,” I tell Maryanne, “but nobody will believe we’re learning Japanese fighting. I can’t wait to tell my sister, Feen, about this one.”

The 6888th is getting homesick. First Annie went, then in June, Dovey’s young man asked her to marry him. They left at the beginning of August, just after we started bombing the Japs. Charline says she doesn’t see why she shouldn’t go find herself a man now that the war’s over, and she went on back to Tennessee. Dorothy Rogers is going home at the end of this week, so there won’t be anybody left but Ruby, Ina White, Maryanne Oliver, and me from our squad. Phillipa’s squad lost Linda Travis and Junella Morgan, too. Out of eight hundred enlisted women, about half of them have gone back to the United States.