Aim (15 page)

“Dead possum? Dadgummit, Catfish. Is that the best you could come up with?”

Dudley laughed so hard he nearly choked on his cigarette smoke. And that got me to laughing, too.

“Junior Bledsoe!” That was the recruiting officer standing at the door. “Thought you wanted to talk to us.”

“Yes, sir.” I turned. “See ya later,” I said to Dudley.

“Oh, no. I'm coming too.”

The officer held up his hand. “One at a time.”

Dudley spoke up. “Sir, we came together. We plan to stay that way.”

We did? I didn't remember discussing this. But maybe Dudley was scared too. Maybe he needed me to make him feel brave. “If you don't mind, sir,” I said.

The officer frowned. He stood there tapping his foot for a minute. “Follow me.” He took us to a small office with no windows—just a desk with a chair and a short bench on the front side of it. “Sit.”

I couldn't help but feel how close Dudley was on that bench. But it felt good. Like it wasn't just me facing the officer and his questions. If I didn't have the right answers, then more than likely Dudley would.

The officer left us there and we waited some more. “This is what it's like in the army,” whispered Dudley. “They tell you to hurry up, and then they make you wait.”

The desk had a metal lamp on it with a green glass shade and a pull chain. The lamp was off and the bare bulb in the ceiling didn't light the place up so well, but I could see a world map on the wall—marked with all the places the Germans, Italians, and Japanese were causing trouble.

Finally I heard footsteps coming down the hall. When the door opened, the officer had another man with him. He explained, “Two of you, two of us.” As if this was some kind of contest we were in. As if he needed help to win.

I wished they had two chairs on that side of the desk, but they didn't, so the second officer just stood there
with his arms folded across his chest. “What brings you here today?”

“The war,” said Dudley.

The officer looked at me. “Yes, sir,” I said. “The war.” I pointed to the map on the wall. “The gangsters are trying to take over the world. We're not gonna let 'em.”

“We?” asked the officer. He stared into my eyes and I knew he wanted me to explain.

“Me and my pal.” It sounded strange to call Dudley
my pal
. But sitting there shoulder to shoulder, it seemed right, too. “President Roosevelt said we're all in this together. We aim to win this war, and it will take every last one of us.”

“How old are you?” asked the second officer.

I hesitated just a second. I knew I wasn't a good liar. Dudley spoke up. “Eighteen, sir. Both of us.”

The officer narrowed his eyes at Dudley. Then he looked at me.

I nodded.

The officer came around the desk, and what he did next surprised me. He put his hand on my face and rubbed at my chin with his thumb. I jerked my head away. He laughed. “Maybe you're growing a couple of whiskers there. Maybe not.” He stepped in front of me and reached for Dudley. “What about you, pretty boy?” He turned to the other officer. “Can you give me a light here?”

At first it sounded like he was asking to light a
cigarette, but then I realized that no, he was mocking Dudley. Asking the other officer to pull the chain on the desk lamp and turn it in Dudley's direction. So he could search for facial hair.

Well, Dudley was kind of blond, and I reckon that made a difference. The officer rubbed on his chin. “I don't believe this one is eighteen,” he said. I could feel Dudley tensing up beside me. He scraped his shoe against the floor, making that figure eight again, and making little growly sounds in his throat. The officer smacked him a little on the side of the head and went back around the desk. “They're just a couple of cubs. Momma bears won't like them leaving home.”

“Tell me,” said the other one. He looked at Dudley. “What do you have that this army needs?”

I heard Dudley swallow real hard. And I could feel the bench shaking. Maybe it wasn't him shaking it. Maybe it was me. But his foot was going like crazy against the floor. I watched it until I could almost see the number eight laying there sideways on the boards.

Finally he spoke up. “Sir, I'm a fighter. Just ask him.” He jabbed me with his elbow. “I know how to go after the enemy. Put me in this army and I will track the enemy down and make him wish he was at the bottom of the sea.”

I almost laughed when Dudley said that. I don't know why. Maybe it was nervousness. Then I realized
it was my turn to speak. I had to convince them I was qualified to serve in the United States Army. “I've been hunting all my life, sir. My aim is dead-on perfect. I can shoot a turkey from forty yards. You know Sergeant York, sir? I'm that good.” Of course it was stupid for me to say such a thing. But in that moment I was grabbing at whatever came into my head, and that's what showed up. After all, Alvin York learned to shoot the same way I did. It wasn't the army that taught him. He learned from living in the backwoods of Tennessee. “My pop taught me,” I said.

The officer nodded. He picked his cigar out of the ashtray on his desk and blew a few puffs our way. He didn't say anything. The other officer didn't either. They both just sat there staring at us. Nodding.

What did that nodding mean?

Dudley lit up a cigarette. Everybody was smoking except me. And for some reason, all of a sudden, I had to have me a cigarette too. Maybe that would prove something about my age. I bumped Dudley's arm with my elbow. “How about a smoke?”

He squinted, and I knew what he was thinking. He was remembering how I told him I didn't smoke.

“I was lying,” I whispered.

Dudley put the cigarette in his mouth and dug into his pocket. The one he brought out was bent, like all his cigarettes. Dudley leaned toward the desk and tapped the
ashes of his cigarette into the ashtray there. He held the tips of those two cigarettes together until mine caught the light. Finally he handed it to me.

I put it in my mouth, and the sharp taste of tobacco set me back for a second. I let it sit there until I got used to it. I thought about eating lima beans—I didn't like them either when I first tasted them. That was years ago. But now I loved limas. I could learn to like tobacco too. I inhaled.

Oh, boy. I should have just let it sit there. Because holding a cigarette between your teeth is not the same as sucking in the smoke of it. It took me back to the first time I fired Pop's shotgun. I'd braced myself for the recoil like he said—but still, the kick knocked me backwards.

At least Pop was there to catch me and set me up straight again. Now, there was no Pop, only Dudley, making worried sounds in his throat. I yanked the cigarette out of my mouth and told myself to just suck it up and look smooth. But I didn't have control now. It was like the smoke was a giant hand squeezing my throat shut. I sat there coughing and pounding myself on my chest. Trying to catch some fresh air, but there wasn't any such thing in that little room.

Above all the commotion I heard the officers laughing. And Dudley was slapping me on the back. “What happened?” he was saying. “You smoke all the time and all of a sudden you start choking? Are you sick?” I knew
he was trying to convince the officers that I knew how to smoke a cigarette.

But they weren't believing him. Even I could see
that
through the cloud between us. They waited. Arms folded across their chests. They looked at each other, and I reckon they had some kind of secret signal because they both shook their heads. Then the one who brought us in there spoke up.

“Smoking don't make you a man,” he said, and he looked at Dudley when he said it. “I'll give you thirteen or fourteen years. Not eighteen. Not old enough to go clear around the world without your momma's apron strings to hang on to.”

He looked at me. “And you with the perfect aim. Just be careful what you point at. Because what if you hit it and it's not what you thought it was?”

March 1942

Dudley didn't say a word after we left the recruiting office. He marched out ahead of me, and I followed his trail of cigarette smells. I told myself I didn't
care
if he was mad. What was he to me?

Finally, after we were back in Brookford and had crossed the swinging bridge and were pulling our books out of the hollow log, he decided to talk to me. “Bledsoe,” he said, “I never should've taken up with the likes of you. You're a moron, is what you are.”

“Huh. If I'm a moron, then I guess that makes you an oxymoron.”

He snorted. “You don't even know what that means.”

“It means you're a bigger moron than I am. That's what it means.” I did feel bad about messing everything up with that stupid cigarette, but I didn't let on. “They weren't going to take us anyway,” I said.

“They would have. If you hadn't tried to act all manly when you obviously aren't.”

“Oh, yeah? At least I can grow a beard if I take a notion.”

That shut him up. At least for a little while. “Our goose is cooked,” he said. “We played hooky and we can't even tell Old Lady Hinkle we joined the army. What're you planning to say?”

I shrugged. “I'll think of something.”

We would barely make it in time to catch our buses and the younger grades would soon be pouring out of the building. Just ahead of us was the road bank that sloped up to the schoolyard and the area under the trees where Mr. Hollar and the teachers parked their cars. We waited for a car to go by and then we ran across the road.

Dudley dashed to the trees, but I waited so the two of us wouldn't be seen together. He moved from one tree to the next and then swaggered out into the open, holding his books with one arm so they bumped against his hip when he walked to the buses. He threw his head back, and I could tell he was whistling. Trying to act like it was every other day.

He rounded the corner of the school near the buses. I decided to go the long way. On the back side of the building was a set of steps going down into the furnace room. Wouldn't you know, the janitor was coming up with his mop bucket. “Bledsoe,” he said.

I stopped. “Yeah.”

“Mr. Hollar is looking for you. He said if I see you to
tell you to go on to his office and wait.”

“Uh. Okay.” I was almost at the back entrance of the school. I could go in, march up the hall, and make a few turns to Mr. Hollar's office. Or I could keep going. Take my chances at getting on the bus and riding away before Mr. Hollar figured it out.

I decided to take my chances. My bus was at the back of the lineup, and I was almost there. I picked up my pace—practically running—and hopped onto the bus, quick as I could, after some younger boys climbed on.

Mr. Hollar was in the front seat. Waiting for me. It was too late to turn and run. No matter what I did next, I was in trouble. So I just stood there, hanging on to the metal pole, and waited.

“Did you have a good day, Junior?”

I stayed quiet. What was I going to say?

“I asked you a question.” Mr. Hollar's eyebrows pulled together, making deep lines that ran up into his forehead.

“No.”

“No what?”

“No, sir. I did not have a good day.”

“Off the bus, Junior.”

Oh, boy. Looked like me and Dudley would be riding home with Mr. Hollar this time. I turned, and at the bottom of the steps, fixing to climb on, was Ann Fay. She threw her hand over her mouth when she saw me with the principal.

I glared at her and she kind of whimpered like a hurt puppy. She wouldn't have to ask if I felt mean today. I couldn't hide it if I tried.

Mr. Hollar stepped out in front of me and stalked into the school. I followed him up the wide concrete steps, staring at my feet and trying not to notice the students coming out at the same time. But I knew right when Janie Aderholt was beside me because I recognized her blue skirt and the penny loafers going past me down the steps.

“Hey, Junior,” she said. “Where were you?” But I didn't answer or even turn to look because I had to keep following Mr. Hollar. And anyway, what would I say?

The principal's office was just inside the front school door.

Mr. Hollar pointed to a heavy wooden chair. I sat and waited. In just a few minutes Miss Hinkle came, sour as a pickle, through the door, and right behind her was Dudley. He didn't look at me, though.

Mr. Hollar demanded an explanation. I figured honesty was the best policy. “Sir,” I said, “we volunteered for the army. Uncle Sam needs us.”

“You did what?” He sounded surprised. Maybe he was even impressed. “How did that go?”

I shrugged. “Not so good, I guess.”

He picked up that paddle on his desk and tapped it against his palm, making steady smacking sounds.

I could almost feel my backside stinging. I wished he would just get it over with.

“I should whup you both, but I suppose I'll let your parents figure out what kind of punishment you deserve.” He handed us each a folded paper. “Bring these back signed by a parent. And since you like walking so much, you can find your own way home today.”

That's how we ended up walking again—this time with cars and school buses blowing exhaust in our faces. Miss Hinkle drove past. She'd make it home a good half hour before I did.

I was bone tired and real grumpy. And worrying about upsetting Momma.

“My old man would beat me black and blue if he saw this note,” said Dudley. “I'll tell my mother I missed the bus, and later, when Daddy ain't looking, she'll sign that paper for me. He won't know the difference.”

Him saying that put me in mind of Momma standing between Pop and the rest of the world—making excuses for his behavior like she was protecting him from what people would say and think. But at least Momma never had to protect me from Pop. He just didn't have it in him to beat his family; I was sure of that. Probably because of Granddaddy whupping him. And besides, I did my level best not to cause Pop or Momma a minute of worrying.