Missing in Action

by Dean Hughes

  Ken laughed. “What else?”

  “Gordy’s dad said you’ll need cars, and you’ll steal them in Delta. You’ll cut people’s throats at night and then take their cars.”

  Ken laughed hard at that, but his voice was tight, not easy, the way it usually was. “What about Gordy? Does he think that too?”

  “I think so.”

  “What do you think?”

  “I don’t think you’ll cut anyone’s throat.”

  “Hey, I might. Maybe I’ll start with you. You better sleep with one eye open.”

  Jay finally smiled.

  “So you and me—Jap and Indian—are we okay? You like me all right, don’t you?”

  Jay thought of saying that he wasn’t an Indian, but it didn’t matter. “Yeah. We’re okay.”

  Ken tried to laugh again, but it didn’t come out too well. “Do you know who those people are out there at the camp?”

  Jay didn’t know what Ken meant.

  Ken twisted in his seat, then leaned forward with his gloved hands on his knees. “They’re mostly farmers. Or they owned little shops. They don’t cut people’s throats. My dad is Japanese through and through, but his heart is broken right in half. He was making a go of things, running his little farm, and he could see how me and my sisters could do better here than back in the old country. Now he has nothing.”

  “Gordy and those guys were just talking, mostly.”

  “So what did you tell them?”

  “Nothing.”

  “That’s what I thought. Did you tell ’em you’ve been working with a Jap?”

  “No.”

  “That’s all right. I don’t blame you. But look at me, Jay.”

  He looked up at Ken, who was still leaning down. “My dad would never hurt anyone. He couldn’t do it if he had to. And that’s how the other men are. They’re not like me. If they came into town, they wouldn’t say hello to anyone. They would get off the sidewalk and let people go by. I know what you hear about the Japanese army, and how they do things, but the people I know, the ones out at the camp, aren’t like that.”

  Jay nodded.

  “My whole family lives in a place sixteen feet wide and twenty feet long. Two more families live in the same barracks, and there’s hardly any walls between us. If we were troublemakers, we’d be having riots. We’d be standing up for ourselves, saying we won’t put up with that stuff. But everyone’s just doing what they have to do to get by until the war’s over. After that, no one’s going to keep us down—at least not me.”

  Ken turned the key and pressed the starter button. The engine caught and started to grumble. “My name’s not Kenji,” Ken yelled over the sound. “Not anymore. It’s Ken. I’m an American. If you tell those boys anything, you tell them that.”

  CHAPTER 6

  “DO YOU CARE IF I play in the infield tonight?” he asked Gordy.

  “Shoot, no,” Gordy said. “Give it a try. You can’t be any worse than Dwight. Play second base.” Then he yelled to Dwight, “Play right field for a while. The Chief’s going to give second a try.”

  “Hey, I’m a second baseman,” said Dwight. “I don’t like the outfield.”

  “It don’t matter. Just trade for a couple of innings.”

  “Who made you the boss?” Dwight asked, but he was already walking backward, giving way.

  “I ain’t the boss. I never said I was. But fair is fair, you know what I mean? We might as well trade sometimes.”

  But Gordy was the boss. He knew it and so did everyone else. He was one of the captains who chose the teams every night, and his team always won. He always said he got first choice because he’d won the night before, and then he started by choosing Lew. Lately, he had started choosing Jay right after that.

  Jay wanted to remember all the stuff Ken had taught him about fielding ground balls and throwing to first. Ken had been helping him practice his hitting, too. His stance was better, and he was learning not to swing at bad pitches. He had cracked a few long ones out at the farm.

  He didn’t have any ground balls come his way in the first inning, but he got up in the bottom of the inning and poked a nice line drive over the shortstop’s head. Gordy would have stretched the hit into a double, but Jay didn’t take any chances, even though he was pretty sure he could run as fast as Gordy.

  “Hey, Chief, way to go,” Gordy was shouting. “That’s the best swing you’ve taken all summer.”

  Jay had driven in a run, too, and then he scored as the other guys kept hitting. When he returned to the field, right off, Albert topped a ball and sent a slow grounder toward the right side. Jay charged the ball, got low, watched it into his glove, spun and set his feet, and then threw to first.

  The throw was a little high and Henry had to reach for it, but he made the catch. “Out!” Henry yelled, and so did Gordy, who was pitching. Albert thought he had beaten the throw, but all the guys in the field told him to get off the base, and his own team didn’t argue much. Everyone except Albert knew he was out. Albert mumbled a few cuss words, but then he gave up.

  Gordy walked over to him. “Hey, Chief, where’d you learn to do that? No one around here—except me—ever charges the ball like you’re supposed to.”

  He didn’t answer, but he was smiling a little. And in the next few innings, he handled most of the balls hit to his side. He bobbled one that he should have made a play on, but he made some good stops, and his throws got better and better.

  When nine o’clock came, he didn’t stop playing. He’d been pushing his time a little later pretty much every evening he played, and Mom hadn’t been watching quite so closely as she had at first. She had met some of the guys he played with, and Grandpa was always saying they were okay. She seemed a little more settled down, too, not in such a bad mood all the time.

  When the game broke up, it was almost ten o’clock. He and Gordy walked back through town. “What’s going on, Chief?” he asked. “How come you’re getting so good?”

  “I’m not that good.”

  “Better than most of the guys. Have you been practicing or something?”

  “A little.”

  “Who’s teaching you?”

  He wasn’t going to talk about that. Gordy had found out that Ken was working for Grandpa, and he had said how bad that had to be, working with a Jap. Jay hadn’t really agreed with him, but he hadn’t dared to say that he didn’t mind it too much.

  “My dad taught me a lot about baseball before he went into the navy,” he said. “I’ve been trying to practice a little and do what he told me.”

  “Who hits the ball to you? Patriarch Reid?” Gordy laughed at the idea.

  “No. Sometimes I throw a ball at the garage out back, and then field it when it bounces back.” That was true, but it didn’t work very well.

  “So was your dad really good at baseball?”

  “Yeah, I think he was kind of a star in high school. He was good at football, too. He played in college.”

  “Then you’re going to be good. Stuff like that comes down through families. My dad didn’t play sports much, but he could break a horse when no one else could, and you’ve gotta be tough and have good balance and everything to stay on a horse when it’s buckin’. Take you.” Gordy started laughing, his voice scratching like a rusty saw. “You could probably shoot a bow and arrow like nobody’s business, if you tried.”

  “I don’t think so,” was all he said. He was thinking, though, that he would tell Gordy sometime to lay off that stuff.

  “Maybe what we should do,” said Gordy, “is tomorrow night, not play a game, but teach all the guys how to play right. It sounds like you know what to tell ’em.”

  They were walking past the show house. A poster out front said what was playing—a stupid show with lots of girls dancing in fancy dresses. “I remember quite a bit,” Jay said. “You’re supposed to get in front of a ground ball, get your rear end down low, and watch the ball all the way into your glove.”

  “Now see, I didn’
t know that. Not about getting my butt down.” Gordy stopped and tried the motion, maybe hunching down a little too low.

  “You do it about right. I’ve watched you. You don’t need to change anything.”

  “I’m a natural,” Gordy said. “And I don’t mean my face and my butt look the same.” That got him laughing again. He gave Jay a little slug in the shoulder. Skin was still peeling off his nose and forehead. It seemed like he was always sunburned. “I was born knowing what to do. There’s no stopping me.”

  “That’s right.”

  Gordy stopped again. “I’ll tell you what, Chief. Let’s both work like crazy and get really, really good, and then let’s make it to the majors—maybe play on the same team and everything.”

  “I doubt I ever could.”

  “Hey, don’t say that. We can do it. We got the ability, and maybe a lot of other guys do too, but we’ll work harder than them.”

  Jay liked that idea. All of a sudden, it seemed like what he wanted to do.

  “I’m good at basketball, too,” Gordy said. He made a motion like he was dribbling, and then he pretended to take a shot. “Gordy Linebaugh sinks another basket!” he said, in a voice like a radio announcer. “That boy never misses. And they tell me all the girls want to smooch with him after the games.”

  Jay was laughing now. He couldn’t help it.

  “Did you ever kiss a girl, Chief? You know, someone besides your mother?”

  “No.”

  “I kissed Elaine Gleed one time. I chased her down at recess, back in fifth grade, and I tried to kiss her on the lips, but she turned her head. She slapped me too. But at least I sort of got her. She says she doesn’t like me now, but she does. Someday she’ll be standing in line after a ballgame, just hoping I’ll take her out and smooch with her.”

  Gordy walked all the way to Jay’s house, even though it was out of his way. “Don’t you have to get home?” Jay asked him.

  “Naw. My parents don’t pay any attention to what I do. I drive ’em crazy when I’m home. They say I talk too much. I don’t know why they’d say such a thing. You never noticed it, did you?” He grinned.

  It was turning out that Jay liked Gordy about as much as any friend he’d ever had.

  When he walked into the house, he was a little worried. Mom was in the kitchen, sitting at the table with Grandma. “Aren’t you awful late?” she said. But she wasn’t mad. He could tell from her voice.

  “The game was going good. I didn’t want to quit and mess up our team.” He had thought it over and decided that was how he’d explain it. It was true, too.

  “Going well,” Mom said.

  He nodded.

  “You told me before that it didn’t matter if you left, that you couldn’t play very well anyway.”

  He could tell that Grandma had been baking bread. The smell was thick in the kitchen. He liked seeing his mom this way—not so mad and nervous and everything.

  “I’m getting to be a better player,” he told her.

  “Really?”

  “Yeah. I got some hits tonight and made some good plays in the field. I’m the second baseman now. Gordy said I won the position by playing so good.” He didn’t dare say that he was going to make it to the major leagues.

  “That’s nice,” Grandma said. “Have you gotten to like these boys down here?”

  “Yeah. Pretty much.”

  Jay could see how pleased his mother was. She was leaning with her chin in her hand, but smiling. It was hot in the house, but she looked relaxed, like the heat wasn’t bothering her as much as it had at first.

  “Well, go get a bath,” Mom said. “You’ve got dirt all over you. Once you’re cleaned up, maybe Grandma will cut a slice of bread for you.”

  He noticed that his mother had been eating a slice of bread with chokecherry jelly. Grandma must have opened one of the last jars. She always said there wasn’t much left from the year before, and not much sugar to make any this year.

  Mom was smiling, maybe because she saw him staring at the bread and jelly, or maybe about his dirty shirt. She was wearing an old brown housedress she put on when she got home from work at nights, and her hair had come loose from where it had been wound up in back. It looked nice that way, especially with her eyes looking so soft. He wished she would be like that all the time. He remembered how nice she’d been, back when he was little. Back before so many things happened.

  He took a bath and got his pajamas on, and then he ate his bread and jelly with Mom and Grandma. After, he went to his bedroom in the back of the house. There was a little air moving through the open windows, not exactly cool, but nice. Outside he could hear the crickets putting up a racket, the way they did every night. He didn’t want to go to bed. He wished he could have sat around with Gordy for a while, and they could have talked more about making it to the majors. He liked what Gordy had said about him being a good player because of his dad.

  Jay got out some comic books and sat on his bed. He’d read them all lots of times, but he thought he’d look through them again. After a while Mom showed up at his bedroom door. “Jay, you better get to sleep,” she said. “Aren’t you working in the morning?”

  “No. Ken can’t come over for a couple of days, and we got the hay all put up anyway.”

  “Well, that’s good. I hate to see you have to work so hard all the time. You still seem like a little boy to me.” She leaned against the door frame. She was still looking sort of peaceful.

  “I don’t mind working too much.”

  “I know you don’t like to work with a Jap. I’m sorry you have to do that.”

  He thought about saying that Ken wasn’t so bad, but he didn’t. He rested his back against the headboard of the big old bed. Everything in the room was old-fashioned: the big chest of drawers, the table by his bed, the rolltop desk and chair—all of it made out of dark wood with fancy carving. He sort of liked everything that way. In Salt Lake, his parents hadn’t had much furniture. They’d had to make do however they could.

  “Well, anyway, you probably ought to—”

  “Mom, was dad a really good ballplayer?”

  “You mean baseball?”

  “Any sport.”

  She walked in and sat down on the bed, but she didn’t twist around. She looked across the room toward the window, where the breeze was blowing the white curtains. “He played baseball, but he got into some kind of quarrel with his high school coach, so he quit. But I think football was his best sport anyway.”

  “Was he a star at football?”

  “Well, I guess he was pretty good. He played at West High in Salt Lake, and then he made the team at the University of Utah. That’s when I met him, when he was on the freshman team. But after that season, he decided to quit college and get a job. He just didn’t have enough money to keep going.”

  “Did you graduate from college?”

  “No, honey, I didn’t. I about broke Grandma and Grandpa’s hearts when I quit. My brothers and my sister all finished. Your uncle Max even has a master’s degree. Not many people from down here go to college, but my parents always said they wanted us kids to go.”

  “Why did you quit?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t study the way I should have, and I didn’t really like college that much. I finished my second year, but I was spending way too much time with your dad. He finally talked me into marrying him. Grandpa liked him all right, but he didn’t think he was a very good choice for a husband, and I guess that made him seem all the better to me.”

  “How come?”

  “I don’t know, honey. Young people get to an age where they want to be independent. Anything their parents tell them not to do seems just the thing they want. Do you know what I mean?”

  “I don’t know.” He was surprised. His mother had never said anything like that. It was like she thought he was growing up.

  Mom twisted to look at him. “Well, don’t get it in your head that it’s a good idea. Don’t be the way I was. I grew up down
here, where things were pretty simple, but I got to the university and I started to think my parents didn’t know much. Gary wasn’t a Mormon, and that bothered Grandpa, but to me, he was exciting. He really knew how to have a good time. I hadn’t ever known anyone quite like him.”

  Maybe later on she was sorry she married him. Jay thought about asking her if she had been, but he was afraid what she might say. “If Dad had stayed in college, do you think he would have been a star player?”

  Mom looked away again, and he heard her take a long breath. “I don’t know, Jay. He probably would have gotten into an argument with that coach too—or something would have happened. And then he would have quit. That happened to him a lot with the jobs he had. He’d do all right for a while, and then he’d get so he didn’t like the people he worked for. He was out of work a lot. You know that.”

  Jay remembered that more than anything—how worried they always were about money. Dad was home a lot in the daytime, and Mom was the one at work. “He tried to find jobs,” he said.

  “Or at least he said he did.”

  “He did try. I know he did.”

  Her head came around fast. “Jay, you don’t have to—” But she stopped. She turned back and took a breath. She didn’t sound mad when she said, “Your dad was restless, Jay. Maybe he couldn’t help that. But he always wanted some kind of change. And then, when he was feeling tied down, he would drink too much. You know how things were.”

  Jay did remember him drinking, and he remembered how angry his dad could get. And some of the things he’d done. “He didn’t drink all the time,” he said.

  “Oh, no. I don’t want you to think that. He could be the sweetest man who ever lived. And remember that big laugh of his? Remember how much fun we had that time we drove up to Yellowstone and stayed in those little cabins up there?”

  Jay nodded. He loved to remember that trip. He and his dad had fished in Yellowstone Lake and caught big trout. He had a picture of the two of them, standing in front of the log cabin they had rented. Between them they held a long string of trout, some of them almost half as tall as Jay had been.