The Fourteenth of September, page 30
Make it stop! Judy prayed. She couldn’t take on Lori again, and this was too public . . . her scholarship. Someone please say something.
“Stop the Killing Now!” David had joined the chanting. Judy could not let this continue and steeled herself to speak. She rose, eyes closed, imagining them all wondering why she would want the floor.
But it was too late.
She opened her eyes.
Robert Connay had stood up. He scanned the room, expressionless, and walked out slowly, right past her, as if she weren’t there, a whining, roaring, shattering silence in his wake.
An eternity went by as their wind returned to them.
Judy found her voice. “How dare you?” she glared at them.
She focused on David, who wouldn’t look at her, then swept the room.
“How dare us all,” she said, then walked out the same door Robert Connay had.
Chapter 43
“WAIT UP,” VIDA CALLED.
Judy shrank at the sound of her voice but did slow down, cringing.
What she had done was so lame, and late, and pointless . . . and she felt absolutely contemptible. She wanted to be in pain, as Connay must have been so many times. She yanked on a dried branch of a small tree in front of her and broke it across her knee, hoping it would scratch her hands and she would bleed.
“Judy, wait.”
She dropped the branch and sped up, passing the lagoon path, nearly home. She wondered for an instant if Connay was out here, maybe smoking a cigarette, wondering what it had all been for.
“Wait till you hear what happened.” Vida caught up with her, panting. “Everyone else left, too.”
Judy stopped.
“It’s true. The whole place blew up. Lori tried to get the chanting going again, and Meldrich, of all people, told her to just shut the fuck up, and everyone left except her henchman up at the head table.”
“What about David?”
“Dunno. He might have hung back with Lori. But you put him in his place.” She grabbed Judy’s shoulder to look her in the eye. “You put all of us there. We deserved it.”
“Lot of good it did Connay,” Judy said. “We’re doing all this so more of us don’t have to do what he had to do.” She turned to Vida. “How did we forget that?”
They walked in silence, side by side.
Back at the house, they settled in Judy’s room. Vida stretched out on the bottom bunk in David’s favorite position with the ashtray on her stomach and lit up. Judy sat in a desk chair to take her boots off. She was moving slowly, like her feet weighed a thousand pounds.
“That was really brave of you, Judy,” Vida said. “Frankly, I didn’t think you had it in you.”
“Apparently, I didn’t. Not when it would have counted.”
“Don’t be so hard on yourself.”
“We should never have let it happen, Vida. I should have stood up earlier; we all should have.”
“I know why you didn’t,” Vida said. Judy looked up. “I’m clairvoyant, remember? What I don’t get is why you didn’t tell me all this time. I’m supposed to be your best friend.” She took a drag and blew out a long smoke trail and followed it to Judy’s face, dead on. “Why didn’t you tell me you were in the army, Judy?”
Judy dropped her boot.
“David, of course,” Vida went on. “He probably wasn’t supposed to tell anyone, right?”
“He promised he wouldn’t,” Judy said. “I didn’t tell him, Vida. He found out. I would have told you if I could have.”
“I admit I was pretty pissed to hear it from him, of all people,” Vida said, “but I suppose the signs were there. I knew you were always holding back and hiding, but hell, I thought you were just afraid. Should I be worried?”
“About what?”
“You know . . . everything. What we’ve planned, what we’ve done . . .”
“Vida, you can’t be serious. I’m still the same person.”
She went through her usual, elaborate smoking routine, working slowly with the pack, the match, the light. Then she put the ashtray aside and sat up, knees to knees with Judy.
“Are you? Why did you even walk in the Tune Room that day and let me think you were someone who knows? That I was your friend? That Wil was your friend?”
“Because it was true. You were, you are. And you’re the one who taught me that I know.”
Then Judy told her everything, answering all her questions. Unlike David, Vida wanted to know all the details, not only the facts, but what she had been feeling. Judy watched her face change from shock to softness and back again as the story unfolded. She brought her right up to the present, with the dilemma she now had facing her.
“So that’s what you’re trying to do, get out?” Vida asked.
“I’m still not sure. It’s hard to explain.”
“I think I get it,” Vida said. “See if I have it straight.” She inhaled as if she were getting ready to sing a long note. “Get your degree, sell your soul. Get knocked up to keep your soul and end up dropping out and back home with a kid, just like your mom told you was the worst thing you could do with your life. You’d be Maggie with a better conscience.”
“I couldn’t have put it better.”
“And you’d still have all that tuition money to pay back.”
“Oh yeah, there’s certainly that. I think I could probably get out without having to get pregnant, but I wouldn’t earn enough to get back into school for a long time, maybe years. I’d be back where I started from . . . worse.”
“Oh, wow, that’s heavy,” Vida said. “So David’s pushing you, I assume.”
“He thinks it’s all so clear and simple. No life without principles . . . you know.”
“As if you’d be in this dilemma without principles. Besides, he can’t get pregnant, and despite his bitching, his parents probably pay at least part of his tuition. What’s he got to lose?”
Vida stood up and leaned against the windowsill. She ran her finger up and down the length of her nose, thinking, then pointed her cigarette at Judy. “He’s planning something.”
“I know, but I talked him out of it.”
“No, I think it’s something with Lori. He’s hard enough to trust . . . but her . . .”
“You think it’s about me?”
She shrugged. “I’m telling you because that’s what friends do. You’re still my best friend, get it?”
They hugged. Vida headed towards the door talking about how she would see what more she could find out, then stopped and turned at the threshold.
“This decision you have to make is tough, Judy, but it has to be yours. Be brave. Don’t let him use you.”
JUDY could no longer think straight and went to bed. She was spent and certainly didn’t feel brave. Wil had made a terrible choice, but he hadn’t wavered, no matter what they did or said. It was a far greater decision than hers could ever be. Achilles had confronted the National Guard with a question they had all wanted answered, knowing he would be thrown in jail. Even David had taken a risk with the ROTC fireworks, though she still wasn’t sure he realized that. And here she was, hiding in the covers.
She drifted in and out of sleep into the late morning, her dreams all over the place. Since tripping with Wil they had become surreal, as if she had plugged into a new palette of disturbing images, vivid colors, and dark, dark scenarios that mixed up all that had been happening. At one point she was dreaming about the drug dealer Sharp, who turned into Robert Connay, who offered her coffee that smelled so good, but she was afraid it was laced with LSD. She didn’t want to drink it.
“Judy,” a voice said. “Judy.”
She opened her eyes.
“I thought you could use this.” David was smiling down at her, holding a steaming cup.
She sat up and tried to comb her hair with her fingers and wipe the sleep out of her eyes.
“You look beautiful.” He handed her the coffee and plumped the pillows for her to lean against. “How do you feel?”
How did she feel? He had to be kidding. There was a vet somewhere on campus who had to be wondering if what he had to do was worth it, just to try to save our ungrateful asses; Howie and Marsha were destroyed; Achilles had gone off the deep end; her mother and Pete had both written her off; Michael and Wil were dead; and he was about to betray her. On top of it all, she still had to decide whether to continue on a path that no longer seemed to have anything to do with who she believed she really was.
“It was a rough night.” She took a sip of coffee and let it work its way through her limbs. He sat next to her.
“It’s almost noon,” he said. “Are you going to stay in bed all day?”
“Why?” She stretched her arms. “Were any more students shot while I was sleeping?”
“No, but Achilles is gone.”
Judy froze, her arms still raised. Gone is what had happened to Michael.
“His parents paid his bail, and he headed back home to Chicago. I think being in the clink for a few days really blew his mind, even if it was just the county jail.”
He chuckled. “Don’t worry, though. I’m sure Sharp will give him a few Quaaludes before his final court appearance, and he’ll be fine.”
She wondered why he never had braces for those lower teeth.
“I can’t stop thinking about that vet,” she said. “I can’t believe no one even tried to shut Lori up.”
“Probably wouldn’t have worked.”
She pulled the blanket around her shoulders. “I’ve always thought of myself as someone who would have been able to stop something like that.”
He was watching her carefully, the way Sheila used to watch Michael.
“I guess I’m not the person I thought I was.”
“Hey, ease up,” he said. “You’re the one who talked Wil off the ledge, for chrissake.”
“Oh, I’m good at doing what’s right in front of me. There’s no deciding involved, you just react.”
“Maybe nursing is your calling, after all,” he said. “I mean, if it wasn’t wrapped up in all this army shit.”
“That’s not the same. There’s no . . .” She searched for the words.
“Go on,” he said, sounding genuinely interested. He put his hand on her thigh.
“Personal risk,” she said. “There was great personal risk for Robert Connay to be there last night. But I didn’t stand up for him because I was more concerned about myself. I guess I’d have to say I was a coward.”
She wondered why she didn’t tear up. She put her hand to her heart.
“Sometimes, you get a moment when you realize what you’re made of, like when you talked about that trigger you wondered if you could pull. Well, this was mine. I did worse than cut and run. I stayed silent and expected someone else to do it for me.”
“Who?”
“You.”
“You’re gonna lay this on me?” he asked. “That’s not fair.” He pulled his hand away and folded his arms.
“I’m not laying it on you, David. That’s the point. I shouldn’t have expected you or anyone to be braver than I was willing to be. I folded, and someone was wounded because of it. And that’s taught me a lot about myself that I have to face.”
“And about me too, I suppose.”
“I’m talking about me, David. But I think . . . I hope we both learned something about ourselves in that room last night.”
He stood up and reached for a cigarette. “Yeah, well, if it weren’t for this fucking war, none of us would have been in that meeting in the first place.” He took a long drag. “But you know it will all be worth it, if it finally makes you do the right thing.”
“You’re right,” she said. “My mother’s right. Everyone’s right, David. If we try hard enough and talk it to death, we can make anything work. But deep inside, if you look hard enough, you know what you should do.”
He stared at her. She didn’t look away.
“So, now what?” He didn’t seem to realize they were over.
“I lost something last night,” she said. “And now I have to see if I can get it back.”
SHE missed Wil. He would have told her this moment with David was inevitable. She missed Michael. He would have told her they had gotten themselves embroiled in matters of life and death, making decisions using their teenagers’ rules. That’s why it was all screwed up, and they had lost the whole point of what they were trying to do.
It was time for her to set things right, as much as she could, for what they had done to Connay and, finally, for herself. She didn’t need any more acid trips or walks around the lagoon to figure it out. Pete was right: she had to decide, once and for all, and then, like Wil, she had to just let be what was going to be.
What she knew for certain was what to do next, and that it would all have to be done before the big meeting in the Tune Room that David and Lori had called for tonight. It would be their last stand to keep the university open so they could keep their movement going. They had learned that from Connay. And apparently Judy was to play a significant role. But it wouldn’t be the one David and Lori had planned for her.
She knew what it would take, just not how to pull it off. She thought of someone. She had no reason to believe he would help, just a hunch.
Chapter 44
SHE OPENED HER DOOR, AND FOUND HER EXIT BLOCKED by two cops crowding the threshold: one campus, one county.
“You need to come with us,” the county cop said.
The shiver of icy dread returned. “Am I under arrest?”
“Now.” Their faces were masks.
They bookended her down the stairs, put her in the back of a black-and-white car waiting in the driveway, silently drove her to the police station in town, deposited her into an empty room with a few chairs and a table, and told her to sit. The walls were concrete blocks. It was a step down from the Washington, D.C., interrogation room, but it was clear where she was. Of course, she was being arrested. Pete had been right.
Had he finally had enough and betrayed her? No, she couldn’t believe that, no matter what she’d done. He would have tried to talk to her first. It had to be David. This must have been what Vida meant when she told her he was planning something. But that didn’t make sense, with his big plans for tonight. He would have waited. With her elbows on the table and head in her hands, she tried to reason it out. There were only three people who knew—Pete, David, and Vida. But it couldn’t be Vida, either, unless she told someone before their talk. She had been hurt. It was possible. No, she couldn’t believe that, either. She didn’t know what was going on, other than the life-changing decision she thought was up to her was now surely off the table.
The door opened, and a female officer walked in and took a seat. She laid a folder on the table.
“I’m Captain Catherine Mark.” She didn’t need to say she was army. “You can call me Captain Cathy.”
The informality shocked Judy as much as Cathy’s appearance. She was blindingly beautiful, and astonishingly put together, with perfectly cut chin-length blonde hair, black eyebrows, and bright red lips. Her movie star looks were heightened by the crisp white shirt and black tie of her dark uniform, her precisely angled cap. Judy was mesmerized. In a few years, this could have been her.
Judy moved automatically to stand.
“No, please sit down.”
Judy obeyed, suddenly feeling horribly shabby in her jeans and embarrassed by her fatigue jacket. Of all the things to be wearing now.
“So, how will this work?” Judy asked, knowing the boom was about to be lowered.
Captain Cathy eyed her with amusement. “At least, you didn’t ask me why you were here.”
She opened the folder and read selectively. “Private First Class Judith Talton . . . enlisted August 12, 1968, as a member of the WRAIN program . . . excellent grades . . . top ranked on the list of applicants, impressive.” She went on to detail Judy’s military family and how both parents had served in World War II. “A picture-perfect recruit.”
“And now, apparently, you’ve become a spy?” Judy was astounded. She had heard this so many times—from Maggie, from Pete, even from David and Vida—but that had meant for the army, not against it. What was going on?
Captain Cathy lost her friendly edge and read from another piece of paper in the folder—a list ranging from Judy’s attendance at the Moratorium, and her trip to Washington, to her membership in the Student Mobilization Committee. They knew everything she had done from the very beginning. Someone had been watching her.
“That was the stupid part,” Captain Cathy said. “So smart, and yet you allowed your name on a list of an organization accused of federal crimes.”
My god, Judy thought, this sounded like Pete. Could he really have done this to me?
The inevitable had finally happened . . . from that very first step into the freak side of the Tune Room. Her mother will so enjoy being able to say, “I told you so.” Judy just wanted it done and over with.
“So I’m being kicked out of the army and I lose my scholarship, right? And you’ll want the tuition money back.”
Captain Cathy smiled. “You think it will be that simple?”
She rose, picked up her folder, and walked out.
Judy sat alone for a long time. She had time to imagine all variations of the worst case. They arrived in her mind fully formed, having been considered so many times before. She was sure the captain’s comment meant that jail was involved. She hadn’t really believed that would happen. What had she done that was so bad? It was what the other military freaks had probably done, no more. She had always assumed that Pete was exaggerating with his warnings to scare her.
She was certainly scared now.
The door opened again. Captain Cathy and the two cops came in together and sat across from her.
“We can make this all go away,” she said. Judy was astonished yet again. The captain went through a detailed explanation of how Judy’s life could just continue as is, in the WRAIN program, scholarship intact. They would even move her out to Walter Reed immediately and elevate her status from private first class for an acceleration through the program and, of course, more money. It would be like this never happened. They just needed one small piece of information to satisfy the legal authorities.
