longer line, and then a pause again. Sounding as lonesome as I was. Like a broken heart. Or hunger. Or jail.
Then it stopped. I waited and listened. But there was no other sound except the insects and the muffled engine of a lone helicopter: chumpchump chumpchump chumpchump .
I lifted the sea bag and started up the path to the barracks, my feet crunching on the gravel. I opened the screen door, and went through into a cool gray room with a picture of Harry Truman on the wall. He was still president; Eisenhower had been elected the previous November, but wouldn’t take office until January. To the right was a corkboard covered with Navy bulletins; a small wooden table and chair were shoved against the wall. Through an archway, I could see double-decker bunks divided down the center by a row of high metal lockers. The floor was scrubbed almost white. Sunlight knifed through the windows, making glaring patterns on the floor. I laid the sea bag down and stepped into the room. Therewasn’t a single person in sight. I remember feeling like a burglar.
“Hello?” I said. “Anybody home?”
There was no answer.
Then I heard a toilet flushing at the far end of the row of bunks and walked toward the sound. Names were stenciled on some of the lockers. Each bunk was made up like the next, the mattress covers pulled taut and rough Navy blankets folded at the foot. I heard water running, then stopping. And then someone whistling: “Cry.” By Johnnie Ray. A big hit in ’51. Even if you hated the singer or the song, there was no way to avoid the words, because for most of a year you heard it everywhere:
If your sweetheart
Sends a letter of good-bye …
A man in faded blue dungarees suddenly walked out of the head, whistling the tune. He stopped and smiled. Lank brown hair, freckled skin, crooked smile.
“Hey, whatta ya say?” the man said.
I fell into the response: “Airman apprentice Michael Devlin reporting for—”
“Jack Waleski,” he said, shaking my hand. “You just get assigned here?”
“Yeah.”
“What did you do wrong?”
“Well, I didn’t ask for it,” I said. I didn’t mention Port Lyautey; that might truly sound weird. “They—”
“Yeah, nobody ever asks for Pensacola.”
He took out a pack of Chesterfields, laughing to himself. He offered me one and I turned it down. He lit a cigarette.
“The thing to know,” he said, “is that about the time you realize this is the asshole of the earth, it gets worse.”
He laughed in a wheezy way. I asked him how bad it could be, and he shook his head.
“Look, I got the watch here today,” he said, cupping the cigarette to keep the ashes from falling on the floor, “but I’ll tell you what: Get out of those blues and into a shower. Then pick yourself a rack. When you’re settled, come down to the office and I’ll give you the gouge on Pensacola.”
“It didn’t look too bad coming in.”
“Pal, It makes Shit City look like Paris.”
I smiled as he walked away. Okay. This guy was okay. The place was gonna be okay. Waleski stopped and shouted:
“I was you, I’d get in that shower real fast, sailor. You’re a little ripe.”
“I sure am,” I said, and thought about the woman with the curly hair.
Away off, I could hear the saxophone again, playing the blues.
Chapter
8
I picked an empty top rack on the shady side of the lockers. I unlocked my sea bag and found a pair of whites. Then I stripped off the gummy woolen blues and for the first time felt the hot damp air of the Gulf on my skin. The horn player’s sadness drifted through the screened windows of the barracks. He was playing “Boulevard of Broken Dreams,” in a jazzy, middle-of-the night way. I wiggled my hot sore feet into rubber thongs, humming: I walk along the street of sorrows …
In an empty locker opposite the bunk, I hung up the pea jacket, then stacked my skivvies, T-shirts, socks, dungarees. The locker was narrow but deep. I turned my blues inside out to let
Then it stopped. I waited and listened. But there was no other sound except the insects and the muffled engine of a lone helicopter: chumpchump chumpchump chumpchump .
I lifted the sea bag and started up the path to the barracks, my feet crunching on the gravel. I opened the screen door, and went through into a cool gray room with a picture of Harry Truman on the wall. He was still president; Eisenhower had been elected the previous November, but wouldn’t take office until January. To the right was a corkboard covered with Navy bulletins; a small wooden table and chair were shoved against the wall. Through an archway, I could see double-decker bunks divided down the center by a row of high metal lockers. The floor was scrubbed almost white. Sunlight knifed through the windows, making glaring patterns on the floor. I laid the sea bag down and stepped into the room. Therewasn’t a single person in sight. I remember feeling like a burglar.
“Hello?” I said. “Anybody home?”
There was no answer.
Then I heard a toilet flushing at the far end of the row of bunks and walked toward the sound. Names were stenciled on some of the lockers. Each bunk was made up like the next, the mattress covers pulled taut and rough Navy blankets folded at the foot. I heard water running, then stopping. And then someone whistling: “Cry.” By Johnnie Ray. A big hit in ’51. Even if you hated the singer or the song, there was no way to avoid the words, because for most of a year you heard it everywhere:
If your sweetheart
Sends a letter of good-bye …
A man in faded blue dungarees suddenly walked out of the head, whistling the tune. He stopped and smiled. Lank brown hair, freckled skin, crooked smile.
“Hey, whatta ya say?” the man said.
I fell into the response: “Airman apprentice Michael Devlin reporting for—”
“Jack Waleski,” he said, shaking my hand. “You just get assigned here?”
“Yeah.”
“What did you do wrong?”
“Well, I didn’t ask for it,” I said. I didn’t mention Port Lyautey; that might truly sound weird. “They—”
“Yeah, nobody ever asks for Pensacola.”
He took out a pack of Chesterfields, laughing to himself. He offered me one and I turned it down. He lit a cigarette.
“The thing to know,” he said, “is that about the time you realize this is the asshole of the earth, it gets worse.”
He laughed in a wheezy way. I asked him how bad it could be, and he shook his head.
“Look, I got the watch here today,” he said, cupping the cigarette to keep the ashes from falling on the floor, “but I’ll tell you what: Get out of those blues and into a shower. Then pick yourself a rack. When you’re settled, come down to the office and I’ll give you the gouge on Pensacola.”
“It didn’t look too bad coming in.”
“Pal, It makes Shit City look like Paris.”
I smiled as he walked away. Okay. This guy was okay. The place was gonna be okay. Waleski stopped and shouted:
“I was you, I’d get in that shower real fast, sailor. You’re a little ripe.”
“I sure am,” I said, and thought about the woman with the curly hair.
Away off, I could hear the saxophone again, playing the blues.
Chapter
8
I picked an empty top rack on the shady side of the lockers. I unlocked my sea bag and found a pair of whites. Then I stripped off the gummy woolen blues and for the first time felt the hot damp air of the Gulf on my skin. The horn player’s sadness drifted through the screened windows of the barracks. He was playing “Boulevard of Broken Dreams,” in a jazzy, middle-of-the night way. I wiggled my hot sore feet into rubber thongs, humming: I walk along the street of sorrows …
In an empty locker opposite the bunk, I hung up the pea jacket, then stacked my skivvies, T-shirts, socks, dungarees. The locker was narrow but deep. I turned my blues inside out to let
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