Trainee Macmillan (known affectionately as "Peaches", a nick name given to him by Drill Sergeant Cooper on the first night of Basic Training, on account of his perpetually rosy cheeks and red hair), did another lap around the barracks to keep himself awake. The rows and rows of bunk beds contained a mass of blissfully snoring trainees, and as he passed by each bed he silently envied the sleeping forms. He looked at his watch and noted that he only had ten minutes to go before he could join them.
The snoring was unearthly loud. Many of the trainees had gotten colds from being so run down those first few nights of basic (two hours of sleep plus crazy exercise and heat will do that to a body) and the colds had been passed around the close quarters of the barracks till almost every trainee had fought a bought with it. The only thing louder than the snoring, thankfully, was the ancient air conditioning system, without which trainees would not have gotten any sleep at all during these one hundred degree nights in their concrete building.
Actually, the trainees probably could have slept through anything at that point. The brutal schedule of calisthenics, weapons training, classroom time (where many trainees battle against fatigue was lost, to their great sorrow as they were promptly woken up by the Drill Sergeant and washed back one week in training) and just plain old marching around the parade ground in the noon day sun and triple digit temperatures.
Peaches felt every moment of his day as he finished his perambulation around the beds and returned to the podium that was located directly beside the main entrance of barracks 13-B. His field manual was open in front of him and he tried gamely to read the next section on treating battlefield wounds on your own.
As he read he scribbled mindlessly in the margins of the page. Doodling in the sacred field manual was an infraction punishable by pushups if you were caught doing it by the Drill Sergeant, but Peaches had calculated his odds a few weeks ago of having his field manual inspected. It was already getting pretty grimy from being wet several times and being flopped down in the Texas dirt as Peaches and the rest of the trainee squad had dropped to the deck to do a series of pushups for a mistake made somewhere in the ranks.
Besides, doodling was keeping him awake this very moment and he reasoned that falling asleep on guard duty was a much graver crime in the barracks than defacing his field manual.
With five minutes to go before the end of his shift Peaches closed his manual and carefully returned it to its rightful place in his field pack (an item that could be inspected at any time for orderliness and readiness). He then walked over to a bottom bunk at the end of the "bay" and got down on his knees as he shook the shoulders of the body that was peacefully snoring away.
"Hey Shakusky, you’re up to bat in five minutes. Look alive."
Trainee Shakusky didn’t register any change in status at first, and this was not unexpected. The trainees were so worn out at this point in their training that many were even sleeping through the morning reveille music that was piped into the barracks at an absurdly loud volume at 4:40am each day. The trainee who slept through this most important of all events was often soaked with the contents of a canteen by the Drill Sergeant if he was lucky and washed back a week in training if he wasn’t.
Peaches shined his flashlight directly in Shakusky’s face as he shook him again.
"Hey ‘Cuss’, you gotta’ get up dude, it’s time."
Trainee Shakusky finally opened his eyes and stirred to life. Satisfied, Peaches went back to his post by the door as Shakusky wearily swung his legs off his bed and headed for his locker to get dressed.
Actually, he had something to do first. He had to hit the head.
As a piece of wisdom handed around the barracks, it was known that if you were pulling guard duty on a particular night it was advisable to drink your self full of water right before bedtime as a way to ensure you got up to man your post when it was time. Woe to the trainee who was not in the exact spot beside the door when they were supposed to be.
Shakusky managed to get his entire uniform on in the three remaining minutes. He carefully rolled up his pant legs and bloused them with the rubber band like objects he had been given that third day at the uniform depot. Carefully rolling his pressed uniform pant legs just right he applied the bands and made sure the bottoms of his pants were flush with the top of his combat boots.
Some trainees had thrown their blousing bands away on that first day after getting back from being fitted for a uniform because they had not known what they were for. Now they had to tuck their pant legs into their boots to get the required uniform look just right. Many of them had sores on the backs of their ankles from marching around with bunched up camouflage material rubbing around between their tight fitting combat boots and their skin.
It was all about the feet actually. Trainees were issued a series of wool and cotton socks to be worn together in tandem to ensure that sweat was properly wicked away from the feet while wearing combat boots and marching for endless miles around the perimeter of the base in the extreme heat. One hundred years of boot camp in that spot had created a lot of little particularities like the two sock layers requirement. Drill instructors were no-nonsense on this point, yet many trainees, in their hurry and rushing to get ready to go on the day’s assignment, did not always follow the manual on points like these. But usually one day and one giant blister later most fell in line.
In the dark Shakusky finished up dressing and grabbed his field pack. He made it to the podium and exchanged a fist bump with Peaches as they passed each other in the hall.
"Any activity tonight Peaches?’
"No, the desk downstairs called on the box at the bottom of the hour for me to do a head count. That’s probably going to be it for the night. You should be all set."
"Was everyone accounted for?" Shakusky asked.
"Yep, we haven’t lost anyone since Johnny Cash snuck that candy bar last week. A whole week without losing anyone. That’s a new record for us as a unit I think. Well, anyway, goodnight dude."
"Goodnight Peaches."
Within three or four minutes Shakusky could hear Peaches snoring away from across the bay. Sometimes the snoring would be so loud that the trainee on guard duty would flip over their sleeping comrades just to have a few minutes of peace and quiet while on the clock.
While he silently pulled out his field manual to study, Shakusky took a look at the corkboard that was located on the wall directly above the podium. In the top left corner was a single piece of paper with the word TORNADO printed in capital letters with that day’s date printed below it. A new entry password was printed out each day at midnight and brought up to the trainee taking over the twelve o clock shift by the trainee manning the building’s front desk down stairs. If barracks door guard duty was sometimes stressful it was nothing compared to pulling duty downstairs at the main entrance to the barracks building. That duty was reserved for trainees almost ready to graduate and who were at the top of their respective training groups. It was a tough gig because you were at the mercy of every drill sergeant in the entire building and not just your own. And occasionally an officer would come by the desk and there was a whole set of protocols to observe in that situation. Shakusky couldn’t even imagine pulling that duty. He was a nervous wreck just manning the door, and he had not even really had any action during any of his shifts yet. But he had observed fellow trainees bobble the password drill when the Drill Sergeant presented himself on the other side of the door.
Shakusky then stole a glace at the week’s duty roster that had been posted previously that evening. He saw that he only had one more shift before graduation next week, and that duty came between 1 pm and 2 pm, a much easier shift because he didn’t have to wake up for it and because the squad and their drill sergeant would most likely be out on a training exercise and it would most likely be a zero incident duty. The most stressful part of that duty was marching across base alone to join his squad after he had been relieved of door guard duty by the next guy in line. A trainee marching alone was open to being stopped and quizzed on the manual or having his uniform inspected by any drill sergeant who felt like it.
As Shakusky was drifting off in his thoughts a bit, staring at his manual in front of him yet dreaming of graduation and the big trip into town with his first paycheck in his pocket, there came a violent knocking in the door.
Snapping into action, Shakusky closed his manual and turned to look out the small window that was carved out at eye level in the thick metal door.
Standing with his nose pressed against the glass and the standard angry look on his face was Drill Sergeant Connors.
Sergeant Connors, who was a short man who wore high boots with metal taps on the bottom to give him a few inches, had to stretch a bit to look in the window, and this gave him a perpetual bad attitude when it came to whatever trainee was on the other side of the door. His eyes located Shakusky in the dim lights of the barracks’ hallway on the other side of the glass and bellowed "Shakusky, open this door immediately!"
Shakusky, faced with his first real test of guard duty, immediately started sweating in the cool air of the barracks. But he stood at attention and said with a force born of hours of repetition "what is the password for this evening Drill Sergeant Connors!"
"This evening? This evening! Where do you think we are Shakusky? A fine restaurant? A Broadway show? What do you mean this evening?"
Shakusky took a second and repeated himself, with one minor change.
"What is the password for the date 20 June Drill Sergeant Connors?"
"Hurricane! Now let me in Trainee Shakusky, or so help me I will kick out this glass and pull your skinny carcass through it one limb at a time!"
Shakusky swallowed hard. Why him, why now. Why couldn’t Sergeant Connors come one shift before or one shift after?
"I’m sorry Drill Sergeant Connors, but that is not the password for today. I can not open the door for you at this time!"
The door started to rattle violently as Sergeant Connors was obviously pulling the handle on the other side with everything he had in him.
"Shakusky, If you do not open this door immediately I’m going to wash you back to the first week of training with those sorry maggots who got off the bus ‘this evening‘. Is that what you want Shakusky, to do this all over again?"
"No sir, but as instructed by you and the other Drill Sergeants, I can not open this door unless the proper password is presented."
"Hurricane!"
"That is not the provided password for this date sir. I’m sorry, but I can’t open this door for you."
Sergeant Connor’s face was flush with rage as he pounded both fists on the glass.
"Shakusky! It’s obvious that I don’t have the password for today! That worthless trainee at the desk downstairs didn’t know what the new password was, so I order you to observe yesterday’s password. Yesterday, which I may remind you was only three hours ago!"
Shakusky took a deep, painful breath and again repeated "what is the password for today, 20 June, Drill Sergeant Connors?"
Drill Sergeant Connors stopped pounding on the glass and lowered his tone a few decibels as he said "Trainee Shakusky, you know who I am. You are in your 11th week of training with me. Please open this door so that I can go to my office, get the file I need and go home to bed. The password drill is mostly for unknown entities that might present themselves at the door. You know who I am."
Shakusky did know who Drill Sergeant Connors was. Because of his nervous nature Shakusky had quickly stood out in his squadron of sixty trainees by throwing up every meal eaten at boot camp during his first two weeks.
The mess hall was a nightmare for someone with a nervous stomach like Shakusky. Drill Sergeants would wander from table to table screaming at trainees as they ate in a rush. Three minutes from the moment you sat down to when you needed to finish your meal was not a lot of time, and most trainees didn’t even really take a breath as they bolted their food down. Shakusky had managed to make it out of the chow hall before he threw up his food, but he promptly lost it in the close troop formation the trainees stood in before and after every meal.
Needless to say this caused great frustration to the trainees standing near him in line and it caused undo attention from the drill sergeant in the first few days of training.
That’s where the nickname "Cuss" had come from. Drill Sergeant Connors would emerge from the chow hall twenty minutes after the last trainee had finished eating and stare at Shakusky and the mess at his feet.
"Cuss! Did you puke on my deck again?"
"Yes Drill Sergeant Connors!"
"Cuss, you go get the hose over there and clean up that mess while the rest of squad drops and gives me as many pushups as they can while you clean up my deck as good as an aircraft carrier!"
After a few days of this scenario an internal solution to Shakusky’s nervous problem presented itself. Another trainee named Jenkins started sitting with him during mealtimes (all three minutes of them) and talked him through every bite of food.
"You can do this Cuss. You are going to keep every bite of this food down. You have an iron stomach. Nothing is coming back up, you hear me! Nothing. You will not see this food again for 24 hours."
Somehow, this act of generosity (Jenkins singled himself out for trouble for publicly helping Shakusky try and keep food down) got Shakusky through the worst of his food problems and after a few more days he was past the worst of it. Soon Drill Sergeant Connors started focusing on other trainees and Shakusky faded into the group, just one more bald-headed trainee in an identical uniform.
He was going to find a way to pay Jenkins back someday.
Sergeant Connors waited for Shakusky to reply to his more reasonable entreaty.
"Drill Sergeant Connors, I can not open this door without the proper password."
Shakusky braced for another round of verbal abuse but to his surprise he heard Sgt. Connors simply say "Tornado" in a loud voice.
He was almost too shocked to act, but before Sgt. Connors had to say it again Shakusky pushed the button on the wall that released the door’s locking mechanism.
Sgt. Connors pulled open the door violently and marched straight at Shakusky, backing the trainee into the cold concrete wall behind him. As Shakusky stood at attention Sgt. Connors put his nose directly in line with the trainee’s nose and stared him down.
"Shakusky, that was good work. I’ve been to three other doors in this building tonight and all of them let me in without the password. It’s makes me happy to know that my own squad can pass the test when so many of the other squads are filled with jelly eating trainees who open the door the first second I raise my voice. I don‘t have to tell you how important it is to maintain password discipline. One of these days you’re going to find yourself in a hostile environment and the only thing between your sleeping body and an enemy who wants to do you bodily harm is the man on duty at the gate."
"Yes Sir Drill Sergeant Connors!"
Sgt. Connors took a step back and said "carry on Shakusky."
With that Sgt. Connors went to his office, retrieved a file from the top of his desk and exited the barracks without another word.
Shakusky collapsed against the podium and tried to read his field manual, but he was much to wound up to really concentrate.
With five minutes to go in his shift Shakusky took a look at the duty roster and went to wake up Trainee Cook.
Trainee Cook did not wake up easily. The shifts at the middle of the night were the hardest because that was when the trainees hit their deepest states of sleep, and waking up then became even more arduous than at other times.
Shakusky furiously shook Cook’s body until Cook finally opened one eye and stared up at Shakusky.
"Cuss, what are you doing?"
"Cook, you’re up for duty now, you’ve got five minutes."
With that Shakusky returned to the door and packed up his field pack.
When five minutes had passed and there was no sign of his replacement, Shakusky returned to Cook’s bunk to find him blissfully asleep again.
Perturbed, Shakusky shook his fellow trainee again.
"Cook, you need to get up now! It’s your shift at the door and I need to go back to bed."
"So go back to bed already" Cook mumbled, turning over.
"What do you mean by that? You can’t sleep through your shift. You know what happens if Connors finds out don’t you?"
"Is he around tonight?" asked Cook, his eyes still closed.
"He was just here. He just about gave me a heart attack!"
Cook opened his eyes and propped himself up on one elbow.
"So he was already here tonight? That’s great! That means we’re in the clear. Go back to bed man. Connors in long gone by now."
Shakusky, letting his frustration of the night spill out into his voice pulled Cook’s blankets back and said in the most menacing voice he could muster "Cook, if you don’t get over to your post I’m going to call downstairs on the box that the door is unmanned. I’m not getting in trouble because you won’t get out of bed for your hour shift!"
"Okay! Okay! Get a grip will you!" said Cook getting to his feet. "I’ll be there in a minute."
"You have two minutes before I call downstairs Cook!" said Shakusky as he headed back to the door.
Cook made it to his post in time, but he was only half dressed in his uniform and he had bare feet and no field pack with him.
Shakusky, satisfied that the door was manned, went back to bed and despite the excitement of his shift fell asleep right away.
Trainee Cook stood at the podium for just a few minutes until he was satisfied that Shakusky was asleep, then pushed the button on the call box.
"Front desk, this is Trainee Cook in 13-B. It’s three pm and all is well."
A gruff voice echoed back on the speaker.
"Trainee Cook, it is not necessary to call down with hourly status updates. We will call you if we require any information about the status of your squad."
"Okay, sorry about that. Goodnight." said Cook releasing the call button with a smile on his face.
Cook then did an about face in his bare feet and went back to his bunk and grabbed his blanket. He walked into the squad room that was located next to the barracks entrance and made himself comfortable on one of the benches that trainees used for classroom time.
It was only twenty minutes later when another knock came at the door and the livid face Sgt. Connors appeared in the glass.
Furiously knocking, Sgt. Connors craned his neck to get the best view of the barracks that he could through the window. He bellowed out for whoever was on door duty to show themselves, but no one presented themselves.
It was then that Sgt. Connors made eye contact through the window with a trainee named Hernandez who was sleepily making his way back from the head to his bunk. He was dressed only in his underwear and had the misfortune of simply picking the wrong moment to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night (the one and only reason trainees were allowed to be out of bed at night, except of course for guard duty).
Sgt. Connors made a furious motion for Hernandez to come to the door.
"Tornado" Sgt. Connors forcefully.
Hernandez took a look at the board and opened the door. He then, despite being in his underwear, came to attention.
"Hernandez, you better not be on duty in your skivvies!"
"No sir! I was just hitting the head sir!"
Sgt. Connors took a quick look at the duty schedule on the board and said "Hernandez, you stay right there."
The sergeant quickly took a walk around the entire barracks, the metal taps on his boots clicking away. He immediately located the sleeping form of Trainee Cook slumbering on the bench in the Squad Room.
Returning to Hernandez, who was still standing at attention by the door, he said "Hernandez, I want you to get every man up. But do it quietly and quickly. Have everyone fill their canteens and line up in this hallway in five minutes."
"Do you want them fully dressed sir?"
"No, just get them out here and be quiet about it. And get a full canteen for me too."
Hernandez, scared out of his mind, but still compliant, rushed from bed to bed, pulling back covers and rousing the squad one by one. It was an immense amount of work, but to their credit most trainees sensed that something big was happening and got up immediately.
In just over five minutes the trainee squad, in various states of dress, was standing at attention against the hallway wall with full canteens in their hands.
Sgt. Connors made a motion for the trainees to follow him silently into the Squad Room. He then bent over the sleeping form of Cook, took out his drill sergeant whistle and blew a blast right next to Trainee Cooks’ ear. Then he emptied his canteen on him and motioned for the gathered squad to do the same.
The desired effect was achieved. Trainee Cook, roused by the piercing sound of the whistle and doused with gallons of cold water sprang up from the bench like a jack-in-the-box and stood blearily staring into the face of Sgt. Connors.
Sgt. Connors bellowed "Trainee Cook, stand at attention! Trainee Squadron 13-B, formation! Now!"
The squad immediately formed ranks of concentric rows in the large room while Trainee Cook stood in front of them.
It was a long time before he spoke, but when he did, Sgt. Connors assumed a much lower, much more threatening tone.
"Trainee Cook, please clean out your footlocker, pack up your duffel bag and report to the door in ten minutes fully dressed." Then, turning to the rest of the assembled squad he said "the rest of you remain at attention except for your Hernandez. You go get dressed and assume Cooks’ shift until the top of the hour. Then proceed with the regular duty roster."
Hernandez immediately left the room and the squad was left to stand in formation while he and Cook got their uniforms on.
Hernandez, field pack in hand, took his place by the door while the squad listened to Cook moan aloud as he stomped about his bunk area, tossing items here and there as he cleaned out his space. His state of shock was palpable.
Not satisfied with Cook’s progress, Sgt. Connors selected another trainee to help Cook pack and soon Cook had his full duffel pack on his back and his locker and bunk stripped bare.
"Trainee Cook, please follow me downstairs. The rest of you may go back to bed for the hour of night time you have left, then I will see all of you for P.T. after that."
Cook, his feet leaving wet footprints on the floor from his soaked uniform, miserably followed Sgt. Connors out the door while the trainees shuffled back to bed.
Hernandez then looked at the clock above the board.
Just twenty minutes to go till the top of the hour.
It had been a really good year.
As Mr. Desouza leaned on the rail of the front porch of the newest store in the "Corner Grocery Store" family, he quietly sipped his coffee and looked out over Main Street.
The porch on the front of all of his stores had been his idea; his baby.
Growing up in the rural south, the local market in his town had always had a porch out front where folks could gather to talk and catch up with each other and while away the hot days. A few old timers would whittle little animal carvings for children with their pocket knives and make strange, cryptic proclamations about the weather, like "looks like it’s gonna’ be a hog fat winter this year."
The front porch of all Mr. Desouza’s stores had a fleet of rocking chairs, all designed to get folks to sit and relax a bit.
He had been told that this was a poor idea for New England towns, because people here were not given to sitting around much, and certainly not in a public place where they may be forced to interact with strangers. People here like to be in and out.
But against all odds, folks had started sitting around.
At first it was just teenagers, and Mr. Jones, his executive assistant, had warned him that the high school students who had taken over the rocking chairs were going to drive business away.
But was Mr. Desouza was resolute, and after he had hired the ring leaders of the teenage mob sitting outside his stores to part time, after school positions, the makeup of those hanging around outside on the front porch became more mixed, and even seemed to be enjoying themselves. (The free peanuts and pretzels had been a good touch as well.)
The grocery store front porch idea had been such a novelty hit in the area that a few local and regional newspaper reporters had come out to write articles about the phenomenon, and snap pictures of local residents, happily sunning them in the rocking chairs while eating free peanuts.
And so, Mr. Desouza, himself standing on the front porch of the third and newest "Corner Grocery Store" had decided, on account of the good year on the books, the newly arrived sunshine and the article on the grocery store chain in that month’s issue of New England Magazine, that he was going to throw a party.
He was a savvy enough businessman, and had been a veteran of the grocery business long enough to know that you shouldn’t get too excited about a particularly good year on the books, because things in this business can change so fast. A big flood in the Midwest can make produce prices rise absurdly high, or fuel or energy prices can suddenly skyrocket because of some hiccup somewhere in the world make investors a little nervous. Or one little downturn in the economy can make folks re-assess what is really important on the old shopping list, and all of the sudden people aren’t buying high end produce items like arugula or taking a chance on that package of gourmet coffee in lieu of buying toilette paper and tuna fish.
All the same, when he and his assistant, Mr. Jones, had finished up balancing the books for the previous year that particular spring day, the sun had just come out of hiding for the first time in weeks and Mr. Desouza turned to his assistant and said "Jones, I want to throw a party, and I want you to organize it and arrange everything."
Jones, a shy and bookish accountant, who had been working with Mr. Desouza for almost a year now, just stared at him.
"A party sir?"
"Yes Jones, a good, old fashioned hoedown, like I used to go to back when I was a boy in Tennessee."
"A hoedown sir?"
"A party Jones!" Haven’t you ever been to a party?"
"Yes Sir, Mr. Desouza. But what would it be for?" said Jones after a minute.
"Do I need a reason to throw a party Jones?"
"No sir, it’s just that people usually want to know what kind of party they are going to, you know, what it’s for."
"Oh, okay. Let’s call it a grand opening celebration for the new store."
"But the store’s been open for six months sir."
"Jones, if you will stop arguing with me about this I’ll put you in charge of the whole affair, and if you can pull it off I’ll give you your own store to open. You can do whatever you want to with it."
"My own store?" said Jones, hesitantly.
"If you pull off a barn-burner of a party, if you can dazzle me with a shindig so grandiose that it will be talked about for years, then I’ll give you your own store to run" said Mr. Desouza, standing up from his chair, as if to punctuate his point.
"I know how we’ll do this" he continued, not waiting for Jones to respond. "You plan the party, I’ll prepare the space. I’ve been wanting to do something with that empty lot out back ever since we opened here. Jones get a band and I’ll have a bandstand ready for them!"
"What kind of band sir?"
"Jones, are you going to shower me with questions about this are you going to show a little initiative? Are you a man, or are you an ameba?"
Jones suddenly stood up, as if to match Mr. Desouza’s action and said "I can do this sir; I’ll use the invitation list from the company Christmas party."
"That’s the stuff!" said Mr. Desouza. "Oh, why don’t you invite that new lawyer and his family who just moved into the old Anderson place on the hill."
"Will do" said Jones, a new resolve in his voice. "No budget, right sir?" was the last thing he dared ask.
"No budget Jones! Let’s see what kind of party that will get us."
True to his word, Mr. Desouza did not ask a single question of Jones about the party in the weeks following the conversation. Instead, he busied himself with the vacant lot.
The very next Monday, a fleet of landscaping trucks appeared in the rundown field out back of the store, and a small army of workmen cleared the brush and started building terraced gardens with winding paths along side them. Every few feet a park bench was placed for viewing purposes, and by the end of the week a remarkable manicured park emerged from the ruins of a once vacant lot.
The landscapers also brought a few carpenters with them, and little by little an elevated bandstand appeared, followed by a large wooden dance floor that could comfortably fit a large dancing crowd.
A few decorators followed the carpenters, and lanterns and strings of lights were hung over the dance floor, while a few water fountains were installed along the paths of the park to give the whole affair a dignified touch.
Jones, despite all his previous hedging, grew into his side of the task as he saw the park going up outside his office window. He was constantly on the phone; ordering this or that, and he could even be heard humming to himself as he worked out something or other on the lined legal pads that started piling up on his desk. And once in a while snippets of phone conversation could be heard coming out his office, with phrases like "is that price for both the caviar and the toast points, or are they billed separately" and "would you be able to play all day, or do you have an end time that you would need to stick to?"
Yes, there was definitely something in the air.
On the morning of the big party Mr. Desouza, resplendent in best white seer sucker suit and jaunty straw hat, went to pull into his usual parking spot at the new store and found that there was a large delivery truck with New York license plates blocking his spot. There was also a catering van from Connecticut parked across two other spots as folks in starch white clothing unloaded crates and tables. Jones was on the porch of the store talking on a cell phone while gesturing a third truck to pull around the store to unload.
"Jones" said Mr. Desouza, "did you get caterers from out of state for this party?"
"Yes sir, they came highly recommended by a few of our suppliers, and I worked our a few special deals to get them here for the day."
"What sort of food are we going to have?"
"Well sir, I could tell you, but I’d rather it be a surprise."
"Fair enough Jones," he replied. "I’ll be in my office for a few hours before we kick this thing off at noon."
"Yes sir, this is really going to be something."
About an hour later, Mr. Desouza was looking at some invoices when the loud sound of bluegrass music broke his concentration and he got up from his chair and walked over to the window to look down into the park. Party preparations were at full tilt, judging by the small army of workers busily scurrying around. There on the bandstand was a ten piece band just starting up an old bluegrass standard for a sound check, their instruments filling the entirety of the newly constructed stage.
"Jones" he yelled from the window, "is that a bluegrass band?"
"Yes sir, they're ‘The Footstompers’ from Memphis Tennessee."
"Jones, did you know that I love bluegrass music?"
"Yes sir, you’re always playing it in your office."
Mr. Desouza smiled a wide smile and said "carry on, carry on. One hour to go."
At exactly twelve noon the "Footstompers" started off the festivities with a rousing tune and the small army of caters stood at their stations, ready to serve. There was real caviar, served with toast points and a station for making real Italian sandwiches, with ingredients and sandwich making professionals straight from Brooklyn, New York who had names like "Big Louie" and "Little Al." There were pastries from the best shops in Manhattan and lobster and fresh clams from Maine and oysters straight out Long Island sound. There were bowls of pasta so deep a small child could be lost in them, and a twenty gallon chocolate fountain for fondue. There were professional waiters who stood at attention, their linens draped over their forearms and a roast pig slowly turning around on a spit. There were bottles of wine from Italy and France that were more expensive than Mr. Desouza would want to know, and enough fresh bread to make a cathedral out of.
And no guests.
"Jones" said Mr. Desouza as they stood by the new stone pillars that marked the entrance to the park to greet their guests, "where is everybody? It’s almost quarter 'till one.
Jones was visibly upset.
"Sir," said Jones quickly, "we sent out the invitations weeks ago. They were professionally done and there were over one hundred RSVP‘s"
"But there is no one here Jones, not one guest has come yet."
"I know sir, but I trust they will come, we just need to give them some time."
But they did not come.
At two pm Mr. Desouza look around and said to Jones "why don’t you call the other stores and have them close early today and invite all the employees over."
"Close all the stores seven hours early sir?
"Yes Jones, close them all and invite every single employee over here. But don’t stop there, call every employee and former employee on the books and invite them all over. And tell them not to worry about getting paid; I’ll pay them for the whole day."
"Yes Sir Mr. Desouza."
But four pm rolled around and the park was still devoid of guests. The band had played their hearts out for the first three hours and went through their entire set list twice before Jones let them take an extended break.
Mr. Desouza, who did several perambulations around the park and was obviously doing some thinking, came over to where Jones was miserably drinking a glass of champagne, his bowtie loosened and a cell phone open on the table in front of him.
"I just talked to the manager of store number two sir, he thinks most employees will probably just go home for the day and relax. Some may come, but I think some are apprehensive about coming to a party with you sir, like it’s some sort of job performance evaluation."
Mr. Desouza sat down next to Jones and was silent for a few minutes. Then he stood up, straightened his jaunty straw hat and said "Jones, you have outdone yourself with this party. This food! This music! It should be enjoyed by somebody. I want you to take the company van and go around town and invite every single person you see to come on over.
"Every person I see sir?"
"Yes, and I mean everyone! I want you to go to the old folks home over on Prospect Street and over to the trailer park on High Street. Fill up the van and come back here, and then go out again. If you can fill up this park with guests then I’ll give you that store to manage."
Jones, who needed a moment to take in this wild idea, finally sprung to action. He tore out of the store parking lot and returned with a van full of passengers in less than twenty minutes.
Mr. Desouza greeted each and every one of the guests that spilled out of the van and escorted the group over to the food tent.
To say that this was a "diverse" group of folks would be an understatement. There were residents from the Old Folks home, along with a few dazed hikers who Jones had found making their way back to their cars after the day’s hike. There were teenage skateboarders from the local skate park and a hitchhiker who had found perhaps the best destination he could have imagined.
The band, sensing a change in the air, took the stage once more, and thrilled to have an audience for the first time that day, tore into their set list with abandon, fiddles blazing harmonicas wailing and the upright bass guitar thumping away.
Jones continued to make the rounds about town and within an hour and a half he had brought fifteen van loads of passengers to the party.
That was not the end of it.
The old folk’s home brought over many more residents in special busses, and Jones and Mr. Desouza wheeled those in wheelchairs to the food tent where they tasked waiters to attend to them. And just about everyone started making phone calls.
At six pm the lights above the wooden dance floor were switched on revealing a park jammed full of partiers, dancing to zippy bluegrass music and eating food more refined and expensive than they ever could have imagined.
The band eventually ran out of songs to play and energy with which to play them, and when they announced that this was their last song the crowd called for more.
Mr. Desouza, a little delirious with the excitement from the festivities, took the microphone and asked if anyone else wanted to play some music.
A group of teenagers shyly raised their hands and Jones ushered them up onto the stage.
The leader of the teenage group borrowed an electric guitar from one of the Footstompers and another teen took the seat behind the drum set. They then proceeded to play an abrasive punk rock song that made Jones wince and look over to where Mr. Desouza was standing at the side of the stage.
But then a man from the old folk’s home walked to the center of the dance floor and started to dance a wonderful little shuffle to the punk rock music, a wide smile on his face. He was promptly joined by the group of hikers and the hitchhiker, and then by Mr. Desouza himself.
By the second punk rock song the entire dance floor was filled with bodies in joyous motion. It was most definitely the best audience the young punk rock band had ever had.
The party showed no signs of waning as the hour approached midnight. Many more folks went up on stage to play music, including Jones, who sang a sad country song on an acoustic guitar while couples slowly danced under the stars.
It was by far the best party that anyone attending had ever been to, and as the dawn approached the attendees started slowly filing out of the new park, tired but delirious with the sort of joy that follows attending the party of their lives.
As the sun rose over sleeping waiters and plates half full of food, Jones was just waking up from a spot on one of the new benches that had been installed just weeks before. He was using his fine dinner jacket as a blanket, and as he came to he saw the smiling face of Mr. Desouza, who was sitting on the end of the bench.
"How are you Jones?" he asked, tipping his straw hat back on his head.
"Fine sir" Jones replied, propping himself up on his elbows.
"Jones" said Mr. Desouza, "I have something for you."
"For me sir?"
"Yes" said the older man holding an object in his hand out to Jones.
"A key sir?" said Jones, squinting in the morning light at the object.
"It’s the key to this store Jones. It’s all yours now. You can run it in any manner you see fit, make all decisions, set any course you want for its future. This was some party."
"Thank you sir" said a slightly groggy, but happy Jones.
A week or so later Mr. Desouza got a phone call from the new lawyer in town, the one who had bought the old Anderson place on the hill.
"I hear there was quite a barn burner down at the store last week" he said. "Everyone I have talked to in the last few days is taking about it."
"It was quite something all right" said Mr. Desouza.
"Why weren’t we invited" asked the lawyer, I hear there was caviar and lobster and Belgian chocolate."
"You were invited" replied Mr. Desouza. "It was an old fashioned "hoedown" themed invitation. Didn’t you receive one?"
"Was that the thing that everyone is talking about? It seemed a little hokey to me when I saw the invitation, besides I had a trial on the following Monday and I had to prepare all weekend for it."
"That’s really unfortunate" was Mr. Desouza’s reply. "It was some party."
There was no way for the man to know this, but the large piece of metal that he was trapped under had recently belonged to the jet engine of a commercial airliner.
As he lay there in the prone position, his face pressed against the asphalt of the street and his arms spread out like a scarecrow, he could see the world in front of him in the same way that you would view a photograph turned sideways. He could vaguely make out feet and legs moving around him and somewhere in the distance the shrill noise of sirens could be heard. There was also the steady rainfall of paper all around him.
He watched as one piece of paper slowly made its way into his field of vision with its lazy, side-to-side downward motion, until it settled neatly onto his face, nestling perfectly just over his eyebrows and under his chin.
Panicking because his limited visual scope had just become completely obstructed, the man puffed out his cheeks and attempted to blow the piece of paper away from his face. But the heavy piece of metal debris pressing in on his torso precluded him from taking a necessary deep breath. What came out was more of a weak whistle than anything else. The bright morning sunlight on his face allowed for the viewing of shadowy shapes through the piece of paper, but despite this, his sensory deprivation was now almost complete.
He had started out this morning a few minutes late, his time exiting his home extended by his young daughter’s inability to find her school library book to return that day. He knew that it was under her bed, where they always put it after reading at bedtime. But he was determined to have her find it and retrieve it this time because he wanted her to start to become responsible for her library loans.
When she came downstairs almost in tears from not being able to find it he relented and helped her search her room for the book. It was not under the bed. And after a thorough taking apart of her room the book was located by his wife in his daughter’s backpack. The very place that his daughter had thoughtfully placed it earlier that morning and then forgotten about it. As he fought traffic and rushed to make train connections so as to avoid being late to work he had no way of knowing that those lost ten minutes had saved his life.
Well, had saved his life so far.
As he lay there he absentmindedly thought about the baseball game tickets that he had in his pocket. They had been a gift to the folks in his division from his boss for the successful completion of a recent deal. The whole group was planning on attending the game tonight after work and he had been looking forward to it for almost a month. The game had playoff implications and he had brought along a few dollars from the family’s "fun account" that was located in the piggybank near the front door of his house to buy a t-shirt for his daughter to wear to "team jersey" day at her school.
His mind snapped back to the present, and his predicament, and he tried to take stock of what was happening to him. He took three shallow breaths and tried to clear his mind for just a second. The breaths hurt incredibly and he wondered if maybe he had broken a few ribs. Back in high school he had broken a rib playing soccer and he remembered how difficult it had been to breathe. This felt like that, but a thousand times worse. His necktie was also draped across his face in what would have been an odd, gravity defying position if he had been standing upright. The tie across his face had already been making his breathing more difficult when the piece of paper had arrived. If he could have moved his arms for just one second he would have brushed the tie and paper away from his face. But his outstretched arms were pinned down like he was a butterfly in a collection somewhere.
Breathing and vision he thought, two things you don’t really notice until they are gone.
Whatever it was that was on top of him was heavy, but not so heavy as to completely crush him. So maybe he could get out from under this thing if he attempted to move in just the right way. He tested his fingers and his toes and found to his relief that he could wiggle them, though not without causing small, sharp pains to his chest area. He also found that when he went to wiggle the fingers of his left hand they were stilled curled around the handle of his briefcase.
When he had heard the initial explosion and the screaming he had done what comes natural to human beings. He had ducked down behind a parked car and that had saved him. The flying chunks of debris had ricocheted around once they had hit the street, and though he had not seen it, the piece of engine that was pinning him down should have killed him outright. But by the time it had made its way over to where he was crouched down it had lost most of its killing momentum and simply knocked him off his feet against the side of the car and then come to its final resting place.
Well, that had saved him, so far.
Others near him had not been so fortunate. It the first few seconds after he had come to he heard a woman screaming in pain, and then go silent. He had tried calling out to her but his breath would just not come, and he could produce no sound louder than a choked whisper.
The strange thought came upon him to test all his senses. He sniffed weakly and came up with the scent of the street directly beneath him and the increasingly strong smell of gasoline. He could feel the rough pavement under his face and his fingers brushed small stone-sized debris all around his hands. His sight was still obscured by the piece of paper, but a breeze had shifted the paper slightly to partially uncover one eye. Through this limited tunnel of vision he could see down the boulevard a few feet. The most immediate thing in his vision was a pair of feet in high heeled shoes. They were attached to a pair of legs, but he could not turn his head to see the rest of the figure lying just a few feet from him. He guessed that these shoes belonged to the woman he had heard screaming.
There was also the strong taste of blood in his mouth. He thought back to his days as a teenage lifeguard at a summer camp and he wondered if the blood he tasted was from a mouth injury or some sort of internal, crushing injury. One sort of bleeding he thought was infinitely better than the other.
As for sounds, there was still the distant wailing sirens and not much else. Sirens were a constant in the city, and most people gave them no more thought than they gave a rotating ceiling fan in the office or the sound of conversation in a restaurant. But as he listened intently he heard the distinct sound of boots clomping on the pavement near him. And not just boots, but a collection of boots stomping in a rough formation.
He could identify this sound because for ten weeks of boot camp the sound rhythmic clomping boots had been his constant companion. The sound had signaled that his training squad was moving somewhere; out to train on the pt field, marching on thirty mile treks across the desert plain, in formation in front of the general for graduation exercises; the sound was woven into his memory in a way that he had not realized until that moment.
And then the boots were upon him, passing just through his field of vision. As they passed their collective momentum caused a slight movement of air that moved the paper from his face completely. This sudden restoration of vision (and the slight blinding caused by the sunshine hitting his face directly) gave the paper’s movement a religious overtone and that was enough to cause him to call out with a force that he did not expect.
He immediately felt the impact of the breath he had taken to make the loud sound that he did. His insides shot up a pain into his head that caused him to trail off his call for help. His eyes closed for just a second to deal with the pain, and when they opened again he saw a pair of boots separate from the pack and take two steps to where he was laying face down. The pair of feet turned into a knee, and then a helmeted face appeared in his line of site.
"Sir, can you hear me?" the fireman said as he placed one hand on the man’s shoulder.
The man could not speak, but he weakly nodded his head in the affirmative.
The fireman took a quick stock of the situation, the piece of engine on top of the man, the woman lying dead at his side, the dust that was starting to settle on every available surface.
"Try not to move sir; we’re going to get you out of here. Just lie still while I radio in our coordinates."
The man heard the distinct beep of a walkie-talkie and the fireman’s voice talking to a dispatcher. He also felt the reassuring hand of the fireman on his shoulder and for the first time that morning he felt a sliver of peace. He would see his family again; he would have another morning to see his daughter off to school. He would have another evening to read to her. There would be other ball games to go to.
And then in mid-sentence the fireman’s voice trailed off as the sound of another explosion rocked the street, causing the pieces of debris around the man to jump into the air like popcorn and then settle down again into the rising dust.
The fireman’s hand clenched tightly on the man’s shoulder and then released. A voice in the distance screamed "Jon, we’ve got to go now!" and the fireman leaned down and spoke into the man’s ear "I’m so sorry sir, but I have to go. Hold tight, dispatch knows where you are and someone will be right back for you, I promise!" And with those words the fireman stood up and rejoined a second pair of boots and the man heard them running away towards the sound of the explosion.
And then, as quickly as it had come, hope vanished from the man, like a wave of the ocean that arrives violently and then departs in the next motion.
The man balled his left hand into a fist and pounded the pavement with all the force he could muster. This action again sent shockwaves through his broken ribs and caused him to momentarily black out from the pain.
When he came to again, he cried. He cried like he never had before. Weak sobs echoed through him and tears traced little rivers through the dust that was caking on his face as he lay there. He cried for the daughter he would never see again, he cried for the silly argument that he had had with his beautiful wife that past evening. He cried for the dead woman that lay there beside him in her five-hundred-dollar designer shoes that were twisted at a grotesque angle.
Hours passed. They could have been minutes; there was no way to tell. The dust was so thick and fierce now that it reminded the man of flying through a dense cloud in an airplane. He had once flown with his daughter and she had been delighted the moment that they broke out of the clouds and saw the sun again. She had said that they were flying through marshmallow skies. The other passengers around them had been delighted with this comment, and the stewardess had even found some small marshmallows from a hot cocoa packet to give her in honor of her first flight.
The memory of this happy event sent a fresh wave of tears through the man. He was normally a composed individual, not given to much outward emotion. This had made him good at what he did for a living, and had earned him that corner office that he had been craving ever since he joined the firm on the seventy-third floor.
As the man daydreamed these thoughts about his family and life in the corner office, he became dimly aware of the smell of latex and of a gloved hand brushing the thick dust off his face.
The paramedic then placed two fingers on the side of the man’s throat and called out to someone "hey, we got a live one over here!"
There was a rush of movement and two sets of boots joined the paramedic beside the man. The first paramedic leaned over into the man’s face and roughly pulled his eyelids up and shined a pencil flashlight in his eyes.
"This one’s doing okay, but he’s not gonna make it much longer breathing all this dust. Maybe if we can get this thing off of him he might stand a chance of getting out of here."
Another voice chimed right in. "I don’t know man, that metal looks awfully heavy, I’m not sure it’s worth the time."
"What do you mean ‘worth the time?‘" the first paramedic replied. "This guy’s still breathing, we’ve just got to get this thing off him and we can get him out of here!"
"Sam" said the second voice, "I know that you haven’t been at this very long, but remember your triage training. You look and access a situation, in this case, this dude right here, and then you determine if your time is best used here or somewhere else."
"We cannot just leave this guy here!" said the first paramedic. "I’m tired of losing people today! We can get this guy out; just help me with this debris!" The man then felt a shifting of the metal on top of him as the first paramedic frantically tried to move the object by himself. He heard the first paramedic grunt with excursion.
"Sam! Sam! Listen to me" the second paramedic yelled, "this guy’s not going to make it. Chances are that he has crazy internal injuries and he’d die a few minutes after we got him out of there. It would take at least four of us to move this debris and then how many more people die because we took the time to get this guy out? Use your head Sam; we’ve got to move on. Remember, it’s a game of numbers now."
It always amazed the man the way that medical people talked about a patient like they were not even there. He could hear every word clearly. Did they know that it was his life they were talking about? Did they have daughters? Did they like baseball?
The first paramedic leaned his face down into the man’s line of sight and he could see that the young paramedic was crying hard.
"I’m so sorry man. I have to go! Is there anything I can do for you?"
The man could not speak, but he nodded towards his back pocket. He wanted the young paramedic to pull out his wallet and get his identity. He wanted this young kid to tell his family exactly what happened. If he could have talked he would have given the paramedic a message. But all he could do was nod painfully towards his waist.
"Your back hurts?" said the young paramedic.
The man slammed his head on the pavement out of frustration.
"I’m sorry, I don’t know what you want me to do." said the young paramedic desperately, the anguish plain to see on his face.
"Sam, on your feet now! Let’s tag that guy and go. I need you to focus here if we‘re going to get through this day."
The first paramedic pulled out a black tag and wrapped it around the man’s outstretched wrist, and then he was gone.
The man stared at the black tag for a long time. He had no illusions now what was going to happen. He didn’t feel the sudden despair that he had with the fireman, he just felt numb.
As the day progressed the man slipped in and out of consciousness. At times the sounds of footsteps near his head would awaken him out of his stupor, but they would always be moving past him. The black tag on his wrist said it all. He tried to remove it a couple of times, but with his other armed pinned down he could not remove the tag with just the use of his one hand. The exertion of trying to bend his hand up to his wrist used up whatever reserves of strength he had left, and once again he drifted off into a half-awake state.
He was suddenly brought to by the splashing of water on his face. This so shocked him that he assumed that he had finally awoken from his long nightmare and was ready to start his day.
As his eyes desperately attempted to focus, he was shocked to see a grizzled, unkempt face looking directly into his. The face was missing many of its teeth and reminded the man of his daughter, who was in the midst of loosing her baby teeth and currently looked like a hockey player.
The homeless man cracked a broken smile and said "good morning, my good man, you look like something the cat dragged in! I seen some folks who looked bad today. You ain’t even the worse I seen. I don’t think that ones gonna make it though" he said, pointing to the woman in the designer shoes.
The homeless man continued to talk to himself as he poured water gently over the man’s face and cleaned away the caked dust with a rag he pulled out from a shopping cart that was next to him.
"Now there was this kid in ‘Nam’ who I remember got himself squished under a helicopter skid. It almost cut him in half! That was the second week I was there and I had to see something like that. That chopper was coming in hot because it was taking fire from Charlie who was holed up at the tree line. That kid didn’t even see what was coming. I think he and I came over together on the same flight, but I don’t remember."
The homeless man was chuckling to himself now.
"Imagine that, one minute you’re standing there looking out over a rice paddy, wondering how in the world you got there and the next thing you know, ’bam’, you’re jellified! Three tons of Heuy coming down on you like the wrath of God."
When he finally finished washing the man’s face, like a mother washing her small child, he stood up and proclaimed "you don’t look half as bad as that kid did. No sir. We had to get two body bags for that kid. You only gonna need one!"
This set the homeless man off laughing again and he had to lean against his cart for support.
The man, more awake now than any time in the past few hours, summoned the breath for one request.
"Water…please."
The homeless man fished around in his cart for a second and produced a six pack of bottled water. He wrested one from the plastic webbing, opened it up and held it to the man’s mouth.
The man coughed on the first sip, and spewed water onto the pavement in front of his face.
"Slow down son, there’s plenty of water to go around. There’s folks just giving it away today, all over the place. You watch, tomorrow it will be ten dollars a bottle. But today it’s free, just walk right up to the tent with the red cross on it and they’ll give you a pack to take with you. They say they’re gonna serve food soon too, just got to wait a couple of hours."
He put the bottle back to the man’s mouth and he drank his first successful drink since that cup of coffee he had at home that morning. The homeless man cracked open a bottle of his own and sat himself down cross-legged, opposite the man.
"What you got here is a situation, my friend; I might be able to help. I got this crowbar in my cart for warding off the punks. They see crazy old Joe swinging his crowbar around and most of them got the sense to back away."
With that Joe stood up and fished out a long crowbar from underneath his shopping cart and walked around the man, out of his sightline. He then heard old Joe call out.
"What you need here is to create a fulcrum. Once you get that everything else is simple. Even an old fella like Joe can move a big bolder once you get your fulcrum set up. That’s what this thing is, just a big bolder make out of metal. I had to move rocks back in the Corps, used to have to make those landing strips every month. Got so good at moving stones that I should have gone to jail. Breaking rocks on the chain gang is nothing compared to moving rocks in Da Nang."
This statement caused Joe to chuckle again, and as he laughed the man felt the weight of the debris lift off of him and he heard it crash to the ground next to him.
"Woo hoo! That did it!" said Joe, his voice cracking in exuberance.
He came back around to the man’s head and leaned in close.
"You and me gots to get out of here brother. This dust is gonna kill us both. That doctor down at the VA told me to quit smoking ten years ago, or I was gonna die of lung cancer. Well if that Doc could see me now!"
This statement again caused Joe to laugh so hard that he coughed raggedly. He then reached down and grabbed the man under both of his arm pits and hauled him into a standing position. The man cried out in pain, but found that he could stand with help from Joe.
"It’s a long way out of here brother, do you think you got it in you to walk?"
The man nodded and attempted to take a step. As he stepped forward his legs collapsed under him and Joe was again holding him up.
"Well sir, if you can make it over to that curb over there I think I’ve got an idea."
Joe pointed over to a sidewalk curb a few feet away and the man, with Joe’s help, shuffled painfully over to a lamp post. The man was left to support himself on the lamp post while Joe went back to collect his cart. Joe then wheeled his cart to the curb and indicated for the man to step off into the shopping cart.
That would be the last activity that the man attempted that day. His body had used up it’s last reserve of strength. The adrenaline had run its course and he was as limp as a pillow once his body was settled into the shopping cart. Old Joe wrapped a dirty blanket around the man, the way a mother would tuck in a child for a long car ride, and then turned the shopping cart towards the river and wheeled away.
After a few blocks Joe, the man and the shopping cart met a stream of people heading for the bridge. The crowd was so diverse and shell-shocked that a homeless man with a banker in his shopping cart wasn’t even the strangest site among the sea of humanity. There were businessmen and hipsters, college students and construction workers, people with their pets in cages and whole families still in their pajamas, holding tightly onto each other; all silently crossing the bridge.
Midway across the bridge a cool breeze coming off the river momentarily revived the man and he woke up to see the sun setting over the city. In his delirium he murmured "it’s time to go to the game, is this the way to the stadium? It’s over isn’t it? Did we win?"
Joe, smiling to himself, replied "You should have seen it. Babe Ruth hit a line drive to center and drove in Derek Jeter from second base in the bottom of the ninth to win the game."
"Oh good, the man replied sleepily. Make sure to get my daughter a t-shirt for me, will you?"
"You bet" said Joe.
