[Conduct Unbecoming 01.0] Conduct Unbecoming

by LA Witt

  “Yeah, about that.” He shook his head. “It’s off-limits. So unless you want to get hemmed up for failure to obey a general order and disobeying that order with me…”

  I laughed. “Okay, maybe not. Besides, then everyone would know I associate with a Nikon man.”

  He scowled at me. “Whatever, Canon whore.”

  I clutched my camera protectively to my chest. “Your jealousy is so transparent.”

  We exchanged playful glares. Then he chuckled and gestured at the hotel again. “Anyway, it’s a pity we can’t go in there anymore. I went in with a buddy of mine before we knew about the general order, and it’s cool as shit.”

  “Really?”

  “Oh, yeah. I mean, it’s creepy as all hell, but there’s some graffiti in there that’s just amazing. Not to mention these huge murals someone painted as spirit wards, plus the altar that a monk set up to appease the spirits.”

  “An altar?”

  “Some monk put up a shrine and altar, and I guess he goes in and prays at it to keep the spirits happy.”

  “That almost sounds like an urban legend.”

  “Oh no. I’ve seen it.” He gestured toward the tower at the top. “It’s at the base of the tower, right outside one of the entrances.”

  “You have pictures of it?” I asked. “And the rest of the interior?”

  “Hell, yeah. Remind me next time you’re over, and I’ll show them to you. There’s some seriously cool shit in there. Like a real-life haunted house.”

  I eyed him. “You actually believe it’s haunted?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t know. But it is creepy. I mean, there was a fire at one point, so a bunch of the rooms are burned out. There’s broken glass everywhere, busted-up furniture, all sorts of shit. It’s just kind of…otherworldly.”

  “You’re not doing much to convince me to obey that general order, you know.”

  We exchanged glances and both laughed.

  From there, we continued through the castle ruins. There was a prayer garden near the rear, and several of the shrines had coins laid on their tiny altars. Since Shane didn’t stop to leave any, I assumed that must have been a habit reserved for those who adhered to that religion, and didn’t leave anything either.

  Just beyond the prayer garden, we stopped to take pictures of a bird that had landed on the corner of the wall. It was a red-breasted blue bird with a black beak, and though they were everywhere on this island, this particular one made for an interesting shot against the stone background.

  After we’d each gotten a couple of pictures, the bird flew away, and we continued down the path. The path eventually led us out of the castle and down to a strip of asphalt that, once it crested a hill, connected with the paved road I’d taken to meet Shane earlier. We followed it down to the parking lot, which was now completely deserted except for our cars.

  “You have plans for dinner?” Shane asked when we stopped beside my car.

  “Not yet.” I set my camera on the passenger seat, then rested my forearms on the roof of my car. “Your place or mine?”

  “Actually, I was thinking we could go out somewhere.”

  I stiffened. “Shane, you know we can’t take that chance.”

  He smiled and put up a hand. “The place I have in mind? No one will see us.”

  I chewed my lip. He was right about Nakagusuku. No one gave two shits about who we were or why we were here. Still, eating dinner together struck me as a little more intimate than wandering around castle ruins.

  “We really shouldn’t,” I said.

  “Tell you what,” he said. “Meet me there, and if you’re not comfortable staying, we won’t. You can even text me from outside if you don’t want anyone to see us talking.”

  I considered it for a long moment. Finally, I released a breath and nodded. “Okay, if you’re sure no one will see us. Where are we going?”

  “You’ll want to take a cab. Just give them…” He paused, pursing his lips. After a moment, he pulled a pen and notepad out of his camera bag and set it on my trunk lid. He jotted something down, tore off the page and handed it to me. “Give this to the cab driver.”

  I looked at it. It was five kanji characters, so of course I had no idea what it meant. I eyed him. “And this means…?”

  “It’s the name of the restaurant. The driver will know where to go. They all do.”

  “What’s it called in English?”

  He shrugged. “It isn’t, as far as I know. In Japanese, I think it’s the name of the family that runs it, but everyone just calls it the Blue Roof Izakaya. Anyway, take a cab there, and we’ll take one back to your place or mine afterward if we feel like it. I don’t know about you, but I plan to have a drink or two, and you don’t want to fuck with the DUI laws here. The JPs will bust you if you’ve been standing downwind of a bottle of mouthwash.”

  “So I’ve heard,” I said, laughing softly. “But you’re sure any driver I call will know how to find it?”

  “Absolutely. And then when you get there, give the hostess my name.”

  I smirked. “Will you be wearing a red carnation, or do I need to say a secret password?”

  Shane laughed. “Nah, you’ll find me.”

  Our eyes met, and we both smiled, but worry tightened my chest.

  More serious now, I held his gaze. “Are you sure about this?” I whispered, as if there was anyone around to hear. “We can stay in tonight, we don’t have—”

  “Trust me,” he said just as quietly. “You’ll understand when you get there.”

  ~*~

  The cab driver took Shane’s note and nodded, saying something Japanese. Presumably he was telling me he knew where to go, because as soon as I was in the backseat, he drove off.

  The restaurant was fifteen minutes or so from my place and a few blocks off the main road. It didn’t take much to figure out where the Blue Roof part of the nickname came from--the restaurant had the peaked terra cotta tile roof I’d seen on so many buildings around the island, but it had been painted bright glossy blue. I didn’t know if I could ever find this place again with a gun to my head, but if I stumbled across it, I’d sure recognize it.

  I paid the driver and went inside.

  A beautiful Japanese woman stood behind the counter and greeted me in her native tongue as soon as I came in. In English, she said, “How many?”

  “I’m meeting someone. Name is Shane.”

  She cocked her head.

  “Um, Connelly?” I said.

  She furrowed her brow, then picked up a clipboard from beside the cash register and showed me the list. I scanned it, looking over names written in kanji and a handful in English—Jesus Christ, Shane, there are other Americans here!—until I found Connelly, Shane. I pointed to it, and she nodded vigorously. She set the clipboard on the counter and gestured for me to come with her. In spite of my uncertainty—I had no doubt I’d be texting Shane from out front within the next five minutes—I followed her.

  We stepped through some hanging beads into a narrow, dimly lit hallway, and I realized this was unlike any restaurant I’d ever been in. The usual sounds of chattering voices and clattering dishes provided familiar background noise, but there were no visible tables. Instead, the hallway was lined with wooden doors, and the sounds came from beyond those doors.

  A waiter balanced a tray of pint glasses as he opened one of the doors. When he stepped through it, I glanced past him. On the other side was a tiny room with a low table covered with dishes and glasses, and half a dozen people sat around the table on tatami mats instead of chairs.

  About halfway down the hall, the hostess stopped in front of one of the doors and tapped twice with her knuckle. Then she gestured for me to take off my shoes, and as I did, she slid the door open.

  Beyond the doorway was a smaller version of the room I’d glanced into a moment ago. Shane sat on one side of the table and grinned as I stepped into the room and took a seat across from him.

  “See what I mean?” he sai
d, his voice low. “Your entire chain of command and mine could be eating here, and no one would have a clue we were here.”

  “Yeah, well. I’d rather not think about them being here while we’re here, if you don’t mind.”

  He laughed. To the hostess, he said something in Japanese. She bowed, then slid the door shut, sealing us into the tiny room. To me, Shane said, “She’ll be back in a minute with some ice water.” He slid a laminated spiral-bound menu across the narrow table.

  I flipped open the menu. It was a good thing it had pictures, because it was written entirely in Japanese. And even the pictures didn’t tell me a whole lot. I recognized the rice, eggs, beef, sushi, chicken—or was that pork?—but some things were…I didn’t know what the fuck they were. The sauces and soups were anyone’s guess. A few dishes were marked with hot pepper symbols, which I appreciated. I liked spicy food, but damn it, don’t blindside me with it.

  “So what do you recommend?” I asked.

  “You can’t go wrong with most of it,” he said. “The katsudon is pretty good, and their gyoza rolls are excellent. Not a fan of the yakitori, though.”

  I eyed him. “For all I know, you just told me the goat brains are pretty good, the octopus rolls are excellent, and you’re not a fan of gecko soup.”

  Shane laughed. “Sorry. Katsudon is a rice bowl with fried pork and a fried egg over it. Gyoza rolls are…” He paused. Then he pulled the menu toward him and flipped to one page. He gestured at a picture of something that looked like a pot sticker. “They usually have meat and stuff in them. And the yakitori”—he turned to the next page—“is kind of like a chicken shish kabob. I usually like yakitori, but this place fucks it up something awful.”

  “Duly noted.” I skimmed the page, then turned to another. Curry, that was something I needed to try while I was on the island. I’d heard Japanese curry was a lot different from Indian. Less spice, more flavor.

  This place had a few pasta dishes too, and, my God, they had no shortage of rich-looking desserts. I turned another page and laughed. “They even have pizza here?”

  “Oh, yeah. And it’s awesome.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Yeah, their pasta is about as good as that beefaroni crap they fed us in boot camp, but—”

  I snorted. “Says the officer.”

  “Hey, we weren’t exactly living or dining in luxury.”

  “Yeah, but somehow I think the conditions were a wee bit better in your ‘boot camp’ than ours.”

  Shane chuckled. “Oh, come on. It’s not like you went through Marine Basic or anything.”

  “Well, no. Seeing as I joined the Navy, not the Marine Corps.”

  “Smart man.” He gestured at the menu. “Anyway, their pasta’s nothing to write home about, but the pizza on this island? Oh my God, Eric. It’s incredible. This place? Not the best. But there’s a place up in Nago that makes the most incredible pizza on the planet.”

  “What’s so great about it?” I asked. “I mean, what’s different?”

  “I couldn’t even tell you,” he said. “It’s just…it’s different. You have to try it. But not here.”

  The door slid open, and our waitress appeared with two glasses of ice water. Before she left, Shane ordered a few things off the menu, and then we were alone again.

  After she’d shut the door, I looked at Shane. “I’m assuming you didn’t order some unholy thing that’ll make me gag?”

  He laughed. “No, of course not. Just gyoza rolls, some katsudon, and some fries.”

  “Fries? Really going for the authentic Okinawan experience, aren’t you?”

  “Just ruining fries for you forever.”

  I stared at him. “How so?”

  “These are awesome. You’ll never be able to eat McD’s fries again.”

  “Now there’s a great loss.” I wrinkled my nose. “I don’t eat that crap anyway.”

  “Well, you’ll probably like these. Oh, and one of the other perks of this place?” He reached for the end of the table, and from beside the chopsticks and condiments, he picked up a small box with a white button on it. “Waitresses won’t come in here unless you page them or they’re bringing you something you ordered.” He set the box down and winked. “Complete privacy.”

  “Nice,” I said. “Nothing worse than a waiter coming up to ask how everything tastes when you’re in the middle of chewing something.”

  “Exactly.”

  Five or ten minutes later, the waitress returned with a couple bowls of katsudon, a bowl of french fries, and a plate of gyoza rolls. Shane was right about all three. The fries put to shame anything I’d ever had in the States, and the katsudon was decent. The gyoza rolls weren’t bad, but everything I’d eaten so far was salty as hell, so we paged the waitress for more water.

  I took a drink. Much better. Now I could eat more. As I took another gyoza roll from the plate, I said, “You’ve obviously picked up a lot of Japanese since you’ve lived here.”

  He gestured with his chopsticks. “Oh, I’ve lived in Japan off and on for a few years now. And I dated a local national up in Sasebo for almost a year, so believe me, I learned.”

  “He must have taught you a lot.”

  “She did.” He must have read the confusion in my expression, because he smiled and added a nearly inaudible, “I’m not gay; I’m bi.”

  “Oh.”

  Almost whispering, he said, “To be honest, I really haven’t dated many guys at all since I’ve been in the military. Had plenty of one-nighters, but with DADT and all of that…” He shook his head. “Not many relationships.”

  “Me too. I’ve had a few relationships since I got divorced, but the secrecy…” It was my turn to trail off. Our eyes met, and the silence took an ever so slightly awkward turn.

  Shane cleared his throat. “That why you’re divorced? Because you were…you know.” Couldn’t be too careful in places like this. Never knew which walls had how many ears.

  I nodded. “I didn’t figure out till a little too late in the game that I was. And I waited a little too long after that to tell her.”

  “How did she take it?”

  “Better than I ever could have expected.” I blew out a breath. “I thought she’d be pissed, but…” I trailed off, staring at our food with unfocused eyes for a moment. Then I looked at him. “She said she knew there was something wrong for a long time, and it was killing her that she couldn’t do anything about it. When she realized it wasn’t her, it was me, it was a huge load off her shoulders.” I laughed softly. “Which, of course, made me feel guilty as fuck for putting her through that.”

  “You’re lucky,” he said. “Sounds like it ended better than most people would expect.”

  “It did, definitely,” I said. “It could have ended badly, and it very nearly did.”

  He cocked his head. “How do you mean? I thought you said she took it well.”

  “She did, but…” I poked at a gyoza roll with my chopsticks as I tried to figure out how to explain what’d happened. “The thing is, we were parents when we were eighteen. We got married when we were nineteen. Twenty-four, and I drop this bomb on her. I mean, we were kids, so what the hell did we know about dealing with something like that? We tried to make it work. You know, for our daughter. I’d only been in the military five years at that point, but I was planning on staying in, so we figured we could stick it out until I retired, and then divorce once we weren’t getting moved around all the time.” I sighed. “This was exactly what we wanted to avoid-- having me PCS to another state or another country, and be this far away from Marie.”

  “That must have been miserable, though,” Shane said with a sympathetic grimace. “Especially if you were planning on staying married for a few years.”

  “It was. I mean, we both knew nothing could change what I am, so we had an open relationship. We both dated other people and just kept it out of our daughter’s sight and didn’t rub it in each other’s faces.”

  He blinked. “Wow, ser
iously? And it worked?”

  “For a while. There’s only so long you can date someone else and keep going home to the person you’re stuck with. We started resenting each other, fighting…” I shook my head. “So we finally just decided we couldn’t pretend we weren’t miserable, and we divorced.”

  “How do you and your ex get along?”

  “Oh, we get along great now. Honestly, the worst of it was while we had the open relationship. Seeing other people just reminded us of our situation together, and I think we both felt so damned trapped, so we took it out on each other. Now that we’ve both moved on, we’re good friends. I think I talk to her on the webcam almost as much as I talk to my daughter, and to be honest, I don’t think I’d have made it through my combat tours without her.”

  “I envy that,” he said quietly. “The relationship you have with your ex, I mean.”

  “You ever been married?”

  He nodded and held up two fingers. “And we weren’t nearly as amicable, let me tell you.”

  “What happened?” I paused. “If you don’t mind my asking, I mean.”

  He looked at the table between us with unfocused eyes. “My first wife and I…” He was quiet for a moment, then waved a hand. “Oh, hell, who knows what happened? We were young, we didn’t know how to be married, things fell apart, and here we are. Now, my second wife…” He paused again, folding his hands in front of his glass, and when he spoke, there was a subtle note of bitterness in his voice. “I don’t think our marriage was cut out for the military life.”

  “It wasn’t because you’re…you know…” I inclined my head.

  He shook his head. “Nope. She didn’t like being alone.” The bitterness was unmistakable this time. “So while I was in Iraq, she found someone to keep her company.”

  “Oh, ouch.”

  “Yeah, tell me about it.” He shifted a little and reached up to scratch the back of his neck. “She’s known since before we got married that I go both ways, so that was a nonissue. She just…” He exhaled, but didn’t finish the thought. “On that note, I think I could use something a little stronger to drink.”