Korea Strait

by David Poyer

  O’Quinn stood silent a few paces distant, nursing a soda. Dan nodded to him. “Joe. Feeling better now?”

  “Sure,” the retired captain said.

  “Rit ‘n’ me are going downtown after this. Down to Texas Street,” Wenck said eagerly. “Want to come?”

  “I’d better touch base with the commodore. Jung, I mean.” He looked around but didn’t see the Korean.

  Henrickson said, “He’s having dinner with Leakham and that female captain.”

  Dan was confused, not recalling any female captain in the exercise, until the analyst added, “The little one with the black hair.”

  “Just the right size to—” Carpenter started, then fell silent as Dan turned his gaze to him.

  “What’s that, Rit?”

  “Nothing, sir.”

  “Monty, you mean Captain Owens? Carol Owens. She’s the naval attache.”

  “Well, they’re getting together for dinner.”

  Dan wondered if he should try to join them, then decided to let the four-stripers have their private party. Of the three, he was pretty sure Jung and Owens were on his side. If he had a side. He didn’t as far as the political issue went, whether the U.S. should withdraw or not. He’d come to admire the hardworking, gung ho Koreans, but that didn’t mean he’d slant the outcome of the SATRYE. He didn’t believe in abandoning an ally. But the U.S. couldn’t do everything. At some point, its friends had to shoulder their own burden. Whether this was the time or not he was willing to leave to those who were getting paid to make those decisions. Like the civilian appointees he’d worked for back at the National Security Council.

  Though their decisions had seemed to have more to do with domestic politics than anything resembling a national strategy.

  He blinked, becoming aware they were waiting on his answer. “What?”

  “Texas Street?” Henrickson prompted. “International Market? Whaddya say? Be nice to get out and walk.”

  Dan tilted his wrist, checked his Seiko, feeling the tension in his legs from too long cooped up aboard ship. “Oh—sure. Just give me a couple minutes to shower and change. No showers aboard Chung Nam.”

  Carpenter shuffled his feet. “I, uh, I got somebody to see. Maybe catch you guys down on the street.”

  “You still after that Korean girl, Rit?” Henrickson asked him.

  “What if I am?”

  “Better watch it,” Henrickson warned him. Dan looked at the former submariner too. He considered taking him aside, then remembered: Carpenter wasn’t in the military anymore. He didn’t need a big-brother act. The contractor waved and faded.

  “Meet you in the lobby, then? Sir?”

  “You got it,” Dan said. “And I told you: just call me Dan.”

  O’QUINN suggested a taxi, but Dan and the younger techs wanted to walk. O’Quinn grumbled and said he’d see them down there, he was taking a cab. “Come on, Joe, walk with us,” Dan told him. “We’ve been cooped up for a week. Get some fresh air.” But O’Quinn shook his head and stayed behind, looking back and forth along the street in front of the hotel.

  Oberg said he wanted to get in a weight workout at the hotel gym. So that left three of them. Dan, Wenck, and Henrickson rolled downhill through narrow streets that Henrickson seemed to know, though Dan lost his bearings quickly.

  He thought again how Asian Pusan looked compared to the capital. Tiny stores, tiny homes, warrens of walls behind which invisible radios blared and invisible children shouted. Street vendors hawked fresh fish, cooked fish, pickled fish, salt fish, fish spitted on sharpened sticks. The Americans didn’t get a second glance from the swarms they moved among.

  The streets leveled and widened as they neared the water. Past the train station the smell of the sea, or at least of the fish market, grew stronger. Henrickson pointed out a sign that read Texas Street. “Named after—you got it—USS Texas.”

  Down here the streets were for pedestrians only. They looked into Chinese restaurants, companion bars, massage parlors, questionable-looking “barbershops,” soju joints. Sweating little men in cheap rayon shirts piloted rattling carts jammed with racks of clothing and boxes of microwave ovens and toasters and fans and toys past them on the asphalt, forcing them to step aside or be run down. A lot of the neon was in English, but the newest signs were all in Cyrillic.

  Gradually Dan realized that the pasty, scruffy-looking Europeans pushing carts, setting out displays, and calling to them as they passed, trying to shill them into karaoke bars and storefronts glittering with cheap jewelry, were Russians. The pale women looking down from second-story windows in lingerie or lopsided bridesmaid dresses, or parading the street in skintight pants or leather slit skirts, bra tops, and fuck-me shoes, were Slavic, not Asian. Dan swiveled, checking their six, looking for MPs or the blue-and-gold armbands of the shore patrol. Only a single black man in an NFL cap who might or might not be military.

  He blinked, trying to process it: American sleaze and decadence being replaced by Russian. Was that progress? Or some obscure form of conquest from below?

  “Where are we meeting Joe?”

  “Meet him?” Wenck drew his head back and bulged his eyes. ”Meet him?”

  “He said he was going to catch up with us.”

  They exchanged glances. “Old Joe doesn’t go out steaming much,” Monty said. “He just said that to get you off his back. He’s back at the hotel, curled up with one of his science fiction books and a nice fifth of gin.”

  “Hey, you guys.”

  Dan and the others turned. It was Carpenter, accompanied by two girls. Beside Dan Donnie Wenck breathed, “Oh, man.”

  Dan had to second that. The girl beside the stocky ex-submariner was slim and young, with legs so long under the midthigh skirt you couldn’t look away, and flawless skin. Her eyes were bigger than they ought to be, like a manga heroine’s. She couldn’t be over eighteen, though on her cork-soled platforms she teetered above Carpenter.

  “This here’s the guy in charge,” Carpenter told her, speaking loudly and spacing his words. “Dan Lenson. Dan, this is Lee Yung-Chul. Teaches English at Pusan U.”

  Dan doubted that. Henrickson’s version, that she was a college student, rang truer. As he shook her limp cool fingers Carpenter reached behind her. He dragged another girl forward, neither as tall nor as impeccably beautiful, but sexy enough in her way. And even, Dan guessed, younger. “And this here’s a friend of hers. Chang Joon-Yung.”

  “Wow,” Wenck said again, flinching and jerking nervously. “Hi! I’m Donnie.”

  “Monty,” said Henrickson. Both men smiled at her, but Chang wasn’t looking at them. She was smiling through long lavender- and cherry-tinted hair, up at Dan.

  “How do you do,” she said in a soft voice that came clearly through the hubbub of Korean and Russian around them. Dan swallowed, looking at her pale slightly chubby legs. The slit skirt wasn’t as short as those of the hookers, but it made her look more vulnerable and thus that much more seductive. The freckles across the top of her breasts looked strangely regular. He leaned in, trying not to stare but failing. They weren’t freckles. They were some sort of de-cal, or maybe applied with a felt-tip marker….

  Four men chose that moment to push between them. They were unshaven, sloppily dressed, so drunken they reeled. Too unexpectedly for anyone to stop him, one made a sweeping and regal flourish in the air that ended with his arm thrown around Chang’s shoulders. She pushed it off with a look of disgust.

  Henrickson shouted at them in a sudden torrent of Russian so violent heads snapped their way all along the street. The drunks hesitated. Then one said something in a low voice to the others. They about-faced raggedly and lurched off.

  “Well done, Monty,” Dan told him. “Where’d you learn to speak Russian like that?”

  “Oh, you pick it up.”

  “Uh-uh. What’d you just tell them?”

  “I said these girls were, uh, ours, and they’d do better down at the Club Havana.” Henrickson looked down the
alley thoughtfully. “They’re starting to call this Russian Street now.”

  “I can see why. I thought we’d see more troops here. Ours, I mean.”

  “They stay close to base these days. The girls won’t have much to do with them anymore. Rather snuggle up to the rich Koreans, or even the Japanese.”

  The girls turned back to them, and Henrickson changed tack instantly. “Where you guys headed? Want to get something to eat? Or go to a blowfish restaurant?” They made faces, simultaneously, and Dan revised their ages downward again. But Wenck joined in, he couldn’t keep his eyes off them, and they didn’t seem to mind; Carpenter’s girl clearly loved the attention.

  Finally they nodded reluctantly. Dan coughed into his fist and said he needed to log on to TAG and get his traffic, make sure everything was coming on okay on that end. Maybe he’d split early and catch them back at the hotel.

  They didn’t seem sorry to see him go.

  WHEN they were out of sight, instead of going back to the hotel he doubled back to the bazaar area and did some shopping. He found silk scarves for Blair. Got his daughter a lacquered box she might find a use for in her dorm room. He noticed the familiar logo of a Baskin-Robbins and stopped in for rocky road, but his stomach wasn’t feeling that great and he threw it away unfinished. He felt bloated and uneasy. The uphill back to the hotel was steeper than he’d noticed coming down. He should get out and run a couple of miles before dark.

  The thought of a workout improved his mood, which had grown dark after seeing the Korean girls and the available flesh all along the red-light street. And the whole inexplicable thing with Leakham. He was starting to put together what the guy had insinuated in his message, that he and Jung were getting it on together, with the fact that a couple of senior officers he knew were gay. One of them had once been his commanding officer. Cabals, countercabals. He’d hoped it wouldn’t all follow him out here, but it looked like he’d hoped in vain.

  He changed in his room and went out again. He warmed up and stretched in the parking circle, ignoring the looks of the valets and lobby staff, then shook the tension out of his shoulders and headed out.

  He went uphill at first so it’d be easier to find his way back. The streets steepened till he was puffing. His wind wasn’t as good as when he’d been able to run every day. Then the buildings ended. The hillside became a wooded park. He slowed at the top and jogged broad, quiet paths shaded by tall, perfectly straight trees he couldn’t identify—their leaves looked like beeches’ but their bark didn’t—swerving to avoid elderly couples and strolling lovers. He got a pretty good run in, and when he got back as dusk fell he was sweating and felt less logy.

  He was jogging in place in the lobby, waiting for the elevator, when someone plucked at his soaked shorts and giggled. He turned to see the younger girl smiling up through her ridiculously colored bangs.

  “Uh—Hi! What are you doing here?”

  “We all come back hotel.”

  “Uh-huh. Where’s Rit? And Lee?”

  “Lee up with Rit. Don-ee and Mont-ee are in the bar. Then I saw you.” She rubbed the fabric of his shorts between thumb and forefinger and made a face. “Wet.”

  “I was out running…. You say your friend’s with Rit?”

  “They went to his room.”

  “I bet they did.” Dan scrubbed a hand over his face, wondering exactly how old Lee was, what the legal age was in Korea, what would happen to Rit Carpenter if they got busted bare-ass in a hotel room. He regretted now he hadn’t taken a more proactive role. He still wasn’t sure how old these girls were. They could be fifteen. They could be fourteen. TAG was a military command, even if it was supported by contractor personnel. If Carpenter got himself in the papers, it’d embarrass the country just as much as if he were still in uniform.

  Meanwhile Chang was running her hand down the inside of his leg. He was afraid he liked it. “I like practice English,” she murmured. “You will talk to me? In your room?”

  “No. Sorry. I don’t really have time. Maybe Bonnie could help you with that—”

  “He sounds funny. Can’t we talk?”

  She smelled like candy. He swallowed and looked away. “I really need to do some things on the computer. Thanks, but I’d better not.”

  He craned toward the dining room, wishing Henrickson would come out looking for her, or better, Wenck would—the South Carolinian was closer to her age. Single, too. Why had she attached herself to him? He couldn’t help looking down her blouse. No, they weren’t freckles. Damn it! He suddenly realized his erection was clearly molded by the damp thin nylon shell of the shorts. And the hell of it was, she couldn’t be any older than his own daughter.

  She laughed, turned to put herself between him and the corridor, took a grip on his handle, and squeezed. “You are afraid of me? Why? I am just little girl.”

  “Let go of that! That’s pretty much the problem. By the way—I’m married. So’s Rit, actually.” He glanced toward the elevator. Third floor and coming down. “Does your friend know that?”

  “I don’t think matters to her.” She looked at the elevator too, and a mischievous smile tugged at her lips. She squeezed again, then bent him as if she were working a slot machine. It didn’t feel too great, but the thought kept suggesting itself that it might be nice to teach her what did. “What floor your room is on?”

  “Look, you seem like a nice person. A very beautiful girl. But I just can’t,” he told her in his firmest Dad voice. “Go find somebody your own age and have a good time.” He patted her arm and got hold of her wrist and peeled her fingers off his dick.

  The doors pinged and slid open at last. He got on quickly and jabbed the button with the “close” symbol on it. They slid shut on her pouting lips, her saucy ass as she whipped around and flounced off, flipping up her skirt behind her to show him peppermint-striped panties.

  HE was wondering if that had been the right decision, half sorry he’d turned her away, as he got his key out of where he’d tied it into his shoe and let himself into his room. Shit, if Leakham got wind of that, the bastard would know he was gay. His erection wasn’t going away. He fingered it through the nylon as he kicked off his running shoes. Time for a shower, all right.

  Then he noticed it was already running, a hollow roar behind the thin partition. He smelled the hot water.

  He froze as the door clicked shut behind him. Was he in the wrong room? That was his hanging bag on the rack. His uniform cap on the side table. His case with the Compaq and power supply brick. This was his room.

  So who was in the shower?

  Just at that moment the water went off. He frowned. Tapped at the door, then tried the knob.

  The air was opaque with steam. Suddenly he knew who it was. The other girl. Yung-Chul. They were double-teaming him. And he was giving way. Those legs. He couldn’t resist those legs. He coughed into his fist, feeling his stomach go light, noting as if from far away as his last inhibition or scruple snapped from “on” to “off” like the last binary “fire inhibit” signal in a launching system. He was good to go.

  “Uh—Miss Lee?” he said.

  His wife slid open the frosted glass. She glanced up and started, then blinked back at him, her hair stuck wetly to her cheek, eyes slightly vague, slightly myopic without her contacts.

  “Blair! What the hell are you doing here?”

  She laughed. “What a great expression! You should see your face!”

  “Well, I’m—I’m flabbergasted. You never said anything about coming to Korea.”

  “They needed an official body for the events tomorrow. Naturally I had to volunteer.” She narrowed her eyes as she stepped carefully over the rim of the tub onto the wet slick tile, steadying herself on his shoulder. “Hand me that towel, will you? What was that you said?”

  “When?”

  “When you opened the door. What did you say?”

  “What did I say? Uh—I forget. I just wondered who was in my shower. Events tomorrow? What events tomor
row?”

  She gave him a hot damp kiss and told him the next day was the annual commemoration of the Korean War. “Nine a.m., at the International Cemetery. The ambassador will speak, and the Korean MOD.

  I’m representing DoD. Wear your uniform, you can represent the U.S. Navy.”

  “Sounds good to me. We’re not getting under way till the day after. Last I heard, and considering the weather east of Japan, it might be longer than that.” He ran his lips along the side of her neck. Her damp short hair tickled his nose. His erection had shifted gears, but it was still on the same interstate. His hand slid up under the towel, up smooth damp skin into an even smoother slickness that parted before a probing finger. “Good shower?”

  “Great shower,” she said. “Ow… ow. But do me a favor and just file those nails a little, okay? I’ll give you an emery stick.” She scrubbed at her face, then rummaged through the cabinet over the sink.

  “What are you looking for?”

  “Just seeing who else left her mascara. You know what they say about sailors in foreign ports.”

  He kept his face bland. “Sorry. One woman’s all I can handle.”

  She loosened the towel, eyeing him. “Miss me?”

  “Do you have to ask?”

  “Just checking. The indicator pointer looks like the answer’s yes, though.”

  “Come over here and I’ll show you the reading up close.”

  “Oh, no,” she said, and reached back to turn the shower on again. “You’re all sweaty, and I am not going to rub up against that. Get over here. And let’s see what a little soap and hot water can do.”

  With a whisper of cotton, the towel hit the floor.

  She soaped him up thoroughly: chest, armpits, his neck, his hair. Her nipples were already erect and he ducked his head to kiss them, one after the other, nipping gently and circling them with his tongue. Her fingers circled him and he closed his eyes. He pressed against her slick belly.

  Her fingers went away and soaped down his back. They moved in slow circles. Then they came around his hips and met beneath his balls and slowly closed where another woman’s had only minutes before.