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by Charles Carreon
You can't stay in bed,
though the last thing you want to do when you hear that bugle racketing
out reveille in the laundry room is get up. Dormitories one, four, and
eight get serviced with a single raucous blast when the bugler stands in
the laundry room all three share and cuts loose with the bright, awful
notes you love to hate. Upstairs five and seven are getting the same
treatment. Bleah! After listening to the steam duet for boiler and heating
system all night long, forty-eight little boys lined up in three rows on
army cots are hauling themselves out of bed, sneezing and looking groggy
as only little boys can.
Charles was sneezing. He had no slippers, so every morning when his feet
hit the cold, brown linoleum his body erupted into a sneezing fit. He was
in row number two, so he had to get his bed made, sneezing all the while,
before row number one came back from the bathroom. He tugged at the
sheets, pulled the blankets tight over them, and made his corners
carefully. He had just finished smoothing out his pillow when Miller, the
officer for row two, a first lieutenant remarkably free of sadism, looking
affable and relaxed in his crew cut and blue bathrobe, called out in a
bored military tone "Row 2." Charles grabbed his toilet kit off the
folding chair next to his bed and hurried into bathroom, managing to avoid
being stopped by Sister Stephen or some observant officer for having no
slippers.
In the washroom there were seven sinks, a length of mirror, five toilets
and two windows that let in the light of day. Charles took a sink next to
the window. Warm water splashed into the shiny porcelain bowl, and Charles
settled his arms into it up to the elbows, closing his eyes for a last sip
of unconsciousness as the swirling warmth caressed his forearms. He came
back quickly, as one does from such unauthorized naps, and splashed his
face, checked his fingernails and teeth, and dried off. Looking in the
mirror he saw a round face with a pug nose, a hairline with the widow's
peak accented by the now-familiar crew-cut. Outside the window a mean wind
was kicking the bare trees, smacking off the last few leaves and carrying
them away. At least it was Tuesday; there would be no drill. Drill was a
real torment, because you couldn't put your hands in your pockets and the
temperature was officially between twenty five and eighteen, not
considering the chill factor, and that sonofabitching Collins kicked you
in the ass every time you got out of step till you were just marching
along, freezing, gazing through your tears at the back of someone else's
head. And it was Tuesday, and there would be no drill until tomorrow, and
if he was lucky then it would be warm and he wouldn't get out of step. Oh
shit he wished this damn winter would hurry up and get over with. The cool
days of spring were so much easier, and after Military Day in May there
was no drill at all, and you could spend the days with your friends as you
pleased, eating popsicles in the black summer tee-shirts with gold
lettering that were like the uniforms of freedom. But this day was like
one link in a long chain of days, like one-step down a long, long hallway
you had to walk the whole length of. At the end the gleaming, effusive
light of summer shone through the institutional double doors thrown wide
open, but right now there was the long, long walk that slowed you down
like in dreams to where you thought you weren't moving at all, in time
grown thick and sluggish, and were grateful just to get to the dining hall
for breakfast.
The way they got to the
dining hall was like this. In each dormitory the forty-eight boys would
line up by the door in two files, and at the order of their dormitory
leader, they headed for their stairs at a half step. They began at their
own time, and Sisters stood on each of the landings to direct traffic.
Soon the stairs were full of boys proceeding "in an orderly fashion," two
hundred and fifty strong, in heavy cork-soled boots with two buckles that
fastened above the ankles, wearing khaki pants, khaki shirts, black ties,
and blue sweatshirts with gold lettering in a circular pattern. Their
faces were clean, their hair didn't need combing, they kept their eyes
straight ahead as they half-stepped down the stairs, in time with the
whole, creating a sound that shook the building like an immense drum made
of bricks and wood. In two files they proceeded down the hall from the
opposite ends of the building, converging on the two entrances to the
dining room. There they stopped, and filed quietly in.
Charles picked up a steel tray and held it out to the kitchen help on the
other side of the bar. He got a pint of milk, two boxes of Puffa-Puffa
Rice (registered trademark), two biscuits with butter, and a spoonful of
peaches. Excitedly he whispered back in the line, "It's Puffa-Puffa
Rice!" and soon everyone out in the hall knew it was Puffa-Puffa Rice.
As he carried his plate to the table he walked past the Commandant, a
stocky, bullnecked ex-Marine Master Sergeant with military charm. He was
smiling and talking to the Principal, Sister Mary David O.S.B. She stood
tall and square in her black habit, and the stiff white brim of her veil
was placed impeccably on a high, smooth forehead, accentuating the regal
appearance of her clean eyebrows and strong cheekbones, her piercing eyes,
and a high-bridged Roman nose that for sheer impressiveness has never been
rivaled anywhere.
When she surveyed the boys with her calm, steely eyes, she seemed already
to be swinging her paddle easily from side to side, as she did whenever
there was business to be dispatched. Said to be from Richmond, Virginia,
one would have sworn she was born in a sacristy, full-grown, from some
strange, white Catholic egg. Charles sat down at a table with a group of
friends.
"---Jeez," said Murphy, his black horn rims sliding down his nose as he
chewed and talked, "I wish we could be in Dormitory One. They never miss
their lunches (an evening treat), but Midge always takes ours away for
some reason." We called Sister Stephen, blessed with a troll-like
physique, Midge, short for "midget."
Referring to the missing lunches, Charles said, "She eats 'em."
Despairingly, fat Villanueva responded, "How could she eat them all? She's
got dozens of boxes in her room!"
The classrooms were at the far west end of the building, and boys were
allowed to find their way to class individually, supervised only by the
ringing of a bell. The windows of the sixth grade classroom looked up a
hill, across the broad lawns, to the convent mostly hidden by a circle of
trees. Charles was looking in that direction as old, fat, wire-spectacled,
hunched-over Sister Bernadette, sweet in her boredom and rumpled black
robes, began a class in History and Geography. That wind was still
blowing, maybe they would open the gym, maybe it would be a good supper
... his thoughts roamed everywhere as he gazed out the window, played with
the buckles on his boots, or leafed aimlessly through the big book,
reading the captions under the illustrations that were meant to capture
one's attention, but Charles just sucked the sugar off them and went on to
the next one. Alligators in the everglades, wheat-fields in the Ukraine,
steel mills and tugboats flowed through his mind as the class continued
upstream under Sister Bernadette's dogged lead, with all the excitement of
a barge-load of pig-iron.
The classroom was a sort of
trap, a manufacturing place for future misery. Charles had never gotten
fully into the idea of schooling; it jarred against him, he could not
bring himself to study, to devote himself to absorbing facts that had no
relationship to life as he saw it. He learned naturally, without effort,
and he understood as little as an imbecile what all the fuss about
learning was. He pretended to understand when teachers frowned and shook
their heads about his talents going to waste, but he never really caught
their idea. Pleasant, polite, bright and cheerful, he proceeded day after
day to not do his homework, to daydream in class, and, when the mood was
upon him, to play the clown. And this last, this playing the clown, this
was the death of his innocence. As he learned to hide his academic laxity
behind a show of humor, at the same time he learned shame, he learned the
lie that his teachers believed, that he was indeed deficient, that he
could and should do better, as if to join the plodding, memorizing crew of
embryonic office workers were really the right path.
But he couldn't do it. It never was possible for him, because somewhere
over his shoulder a little monkey was whispering in his ear, "Bullshit!
Bullshit!" and kept him on his dreamer's road. The nuns watched him; they
talked among themselves. His father was pushing. His earnest father who
worked in a government job in Washington D.C. and wore his suits well, who
smiled graciously, who had reserve, who inspired respect, was pushing.
There in the classroom the days filled up with poor grades and carried him
inexorably toward his father who stood imperiously at the end of a long
tunnel with hand extended, waiting for the report card, the miserable
scattering of C's, B's, D's, and occasionally, like a blot on the family
name, a good stiff F. The monkey was never around when things got hot,
when his father's hard judgments rained down on him like dark missiles and
apologizing tears streamed forth without meaning or understanding.
After lunch Charles sat with Keiffer, a well-fed, friendly boy, who'd
spent four years at Linton Hall already. Keiffer got along with everyone
except the really tough older boys, who thought he was a sissy. Of course,
he kind of was, and the nuns loved him for it. He spoke in a slight
sing-song. His round lips curled gently and his cheeks were soft and
round. He had an earnest way of going about whatever he was doing that
only comes from being born into generations of bourgeois Northern European
stock. Born to a harness which fits easily, not tempted by speed or
freedom, Keiffer was in the stream. He followed orders that Charles could
not hear. He sped up when it was required, he slowed down at the right
moments. Charles could only marvel at this ability, which was far beyond
him. It was nice to associate with such people, even if one couldn't be
one.
When the bell rang, they lined up on the asphalt playground by classes and
marched into the building, where the scent of supper was already drifting
through the halls. Indefinite, it smelled slightly meaty, and the boys
sniffed with interest as they marched past the empty dining hall, but
could come to no sure conclusion. Sister Regina was already in the
classroom when they arrived. Sister Regina had an incredibly ample and
forward-pressing bosom, indeed her breasts pushed out so massively through
the black folds of her habit that when one looked at her face it appeared
at a certain distance, off beyond a hilly horizon. An imposing but kindly
woman, she peered through her spectacles brightly, as if waiting to see a
display of sincere interest in Science, which was her subject. Since
there were no experiments to capture his attention, Charles read the book
on his own, which gave him a fairly good grade in the class, since it was
interesting reading.
After Sister Regina departed, Sister Bernadette returned to lead the Music
class. Ciccone, an insolent kid from New Jersey with the air of a mafioso,
was of course put out of the room for taking serious tunes like "The Eerie
Canal" too lightly. So there he waited in the hall, unconcerned, till he
was presently devoured by an ever-vigilant Sister Mary David O.S.B. At
last school was over. Books were collected and put away. For a moment
things hung in limbo, then the bell rang, and kids on two floors exploded
out of their classrooms, poured through the hallways, and out of doors.
It was a detonation which no one made the least effort to contain.
Outside Charles found most of his friends building a Dinkytown to populate
with Stevens' set of authentic, antique Dinky-cars. Children lose
themselves in a sandbox, moving piles of moist sand into formations that
suit them, building and changing their minds, tearing things down and
making them over again. Charles' mind was no different in this way, at
least, from any other child's. He absorbed himself in the game, and didn't
think of anything else for over an hour. Then he had to go to the
bathroom. On the way there he saw Sebastian. Now Sebastian was an enigma.
He never seemed to be obeying the rules, but he didn't seem to be punished
for it either. Like right now one of his shoes was flapping its sole off.
He looked like a circus clown and it was a blatant violation of the rules.
Big deal, he didn't care. He'd glue it if he could. Amazing.
The bell rang a short time later, and they formed into lines on the
blacktop by dormitories. The dormitory leaders gave their reports.
"Dormitory One, all present and accounted for, Sir! "
"Dormitory Two, all present and accounted for, Sir!"
And on down the line. The flag was lowered while the boys saluted and the
bugler played Retreat. A solemn moment. The day's over.
The evening was good, not
complicated by disciplinary problems. Sister Grace did not rage at them in
the dining room for being too loud, nor did Sister Mary David find it
necessary to shrill them to silence with her police whistle. Perhaps the
nuns were in a good mood. Supper was the best it could be: boiled beef
(not enough, though), mashed potatoes, mixed vegetables, milk and a
slightly dry piece of chocolate cake.
Study hall was quiet. Charles read a book by Jacques Cousteau and dreamt
of being a scuba diver, even though he couldn't swim.
Afterwards, in the dormitory
they were blessed. They got their lunches and a full allotment of free
time. Charles played chess with Villanueva while they chewed their
mint-flavored jelly candy. Some of the livelier, inner city type kids
played Motown 45's on a little portable record player. The game was a
satisfying stalemate--they both enjoyed not losing. At eight-thirty, after
the latrine call and bedtime prayers that Charles did not know, the lights
went out, all except for the violet blue night light high on the wall next
to the crucifix. In the laundry room the bugler played Taps, and the long
drawn-out notes settled over the dormitories. Somewhere in the dark
Charles knew that Villanueva was listening to the radio under his pillow,
a tiny little transistor voice that whispered in his ear and told him of
another world outside the walls of this strange place. In the darkness
Charles would have liked a piece of bread, some bit of luxury to comfort
him, but he always forgot to bring his own contraband. So it was time to
go to sleep, and he lay there with his head on the white linen and thought
of home and all that he would like to do, or eat, or see, he thought and
thought, as children do, until he fell asleep.
Copyright 1982, Charles
Carreon
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