Gray Girl (7 page)

They began running.
 
Jackson talked about the great ones of
West Point: Grant, Lee, Pershing, Patton, MacArthur and Eisenhower.
 
“They are turning in their graves now,”
he said, “because you are here.”
 

Jan said nothing, thinking about her
classmates shining their boots, memorizing poop, or finishing other
duties.
 

“These great ones who came before
us—their honor, their sacrifice and their spirit—are still here,”
he continued, “but you are tarnishing that legacy.”

Jan remained silent.

“And it’s my duty now, and the duty
of all of us in the Long Gray Line, to ensure that this legacy remains
unsullied.”

Not a word.
 

“You will not make a mockery of this
great institution.”
 

Silence.
 

“Do you understand me,
Wishart
?”
 

Damn.
 
A question.
 
“Yes, Sir.”
 
And she did understand.
 
She understood that Jackson was a
freaking asshole.

They ran for three miles and returned
the back way, coming to a walk at the underpass behind the Mess Hall.
 
This was a noisy, bustling hub of
activity during the day, but at that time of night, it was deserted and dimly
lit.
 
They reached a spot between
the streetlights where it was completely dark.

“Halt, Miss
Wishart
.”

Jan stopped.
 
Uh-oh.
 
She couldn’t see a thing.
 
Not Jackson, not the loading docks which
were on the right, nor the solid rock wall on her left.
 
But she heard him circling around her.

“It gets dark in battle,
Wishart
.”
 
He
continued to circle in a wide arc, probably five feet away from her.
 
“Sometimes you won’t be able to see
anything.
 
You can’t see the
battlefield, you can’t see your commanders, you can’t see your troops and you
certainly can’t see the enemy.”

No question.
 
No response.
 

“This is what it’s going to be like,
Wishart
,” he continued.
 
“You’re
gonna
find yourself all alone in the dark.”

No question. No response.

“Are you scared,
Wishart
?”

Dammit.
 
“No, Sir.”

“No?” He stopped circling.
 
He remained silent for what seemed like
a minute but might have only been twenty seconds.
 
Then she felt him right behind her and
she tensed.
 
He leaned toward her
left ear and whispered, “because in the dark you have no idea who’s
gonna
sneak up on you.”

No question.
 
No response.

“ARE YOU SCARED, WISHART?”

She jumped.
 
“NO, SIR!”
 
But she was, actually.

He stepped back away from her.
 
“Well, you should be,
Wishart
.
 
You
should be very afraid.
 
Because in
the time it took to have this little chat, you would have been killed in
combat.
 
Or worse.”

Then she heard him take off
running.
 
He left her there alone in
the dark to contemplate the worse part.

7

Thursday,
May 6, 1982

2140
hours

Jan pinged back to her barracks, straight to Cadet Trane’s room.
 
She knocked twice, not loudly, not
softly.

“Yeah!”
 
A masculine voice
yelled from inside.
 
Jan opened the
door but stayed standing in the hall.

“Sir, may I ask a question?”
 
Trane sat on his bed in gym shorts and a white t-shirt.
 
He was older than most
firsties
, very old in fact.
 
He left enlisted ranks to enter West
Point at the age of twenty-one.
  
Now, at twenty-five, he was considered the “Grandfather” in H-3.
 
But what made him special to Jan was
that he openly dated a female cadet.

Her name was Cadet Williams, from Company I-3, another tall
redhead.
 
But Williams had curly
hair, almost fuzzy, unlike Jan’s straight hair.
 
Williams also had enormous breasts.
 
Too big, Jan thought, for a woman in
uniform.
 
And while Williams was
mildly attractive, Jan didn’t like her.
 
Probably because she felt Cadet Trane could do better.
 
Cadet Williams probably has a great
personality.
 
Then again, it could be
the boobs…

Jan wished she had been in Trane’s class.
 
She felt certain she could have turned
his head away from Cadet Williams, even without the boobs.
 

Trane was about six feet and probably weighed in the vicinity of one
hundred and eighty pounds. He had the face of a thirty-something year old:
seasoned, strong,
yet
a little soft around the
edges.
 
His hair was light brown,
perhaps even slightly gray at the temples.
 
He had a muscular build, without being over the top.
 
It seemed he just came with that strong,
wide chest, as opposed to having earned it in the gym.
 
His lovely chest narrowed down to a
perfectly tight waist.
 
Funny,
women look for similar traits in men—big chests and small waists. Yet,
the most attractive thing to me is kindness.

Cadet Trane was kind, Jan could tell.
 
Even when he hazed plebes, he did it
with a slight smile.
 
He never
seemed to enjoy the yelling and screaming, as if hazing was beneath his
personal standards of decorum.

Dating Cadet Williams, openly and unabashedly, gave him the most
credibility.
 
In Jan’s estimation,
he must have some sympathy or understanding for female cadets.

“Have they acquitted you yet?” he asked.

“No, Sir.
 
Doesn’t look like
that will happen.”
 

“Well, then, what can I do you for?”
 
He often sounded like an old First
Sergeant, the way he said things.

“Sir, I am allowed to have one cadet of my choosing to sit with me on
the Honor Board, to provide support and advice, but I cannot ask anyone who is
involved or will testify, so that rules out McCarron and Trane, and I cannot
ask Cadet
Hambin
either, so, Sir, that leaves
you.”
 
She took a deep breath.

“Whoa, there,
Kemosabe
.
 
Slow down and run that by me
again.”
  
Jan made her request
again, calmer and slower.
 
“Wait,
are you asking me to be your cadet counsel at your Honor Board?”
 
Trane asked.

“Yes, Sir.
 
I think you
would be very helpful to me.”
 

“You do realize, Miss
Wishart
, that we are
about to enter final exam week?”
 

“Yes, Sir.”

“And you do realize that being on an Honor Board takes a considerable
amount of time?”
 

“Yes, Sir.”
 

“And do you realize that if I become your cadet counsel for your Honor
Board, there is a good chance I will not study adequately for my final exams
and therefore jeopardize my own grade point average and put my own graduation
in peril?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“So you are asking me to sacrifice my well-being for your well-being,
is that it, Miss
Wishart
?”
 

“Yes, Sir.”

“Good.
 
I hate goddamn exam
week anyway.
 
When do we
start?”
 

“0800 hours tomorrow, room 413, Mahan Hall.”
 

“Great, let’s do it.”
 
This
is why she was in love with Cadet Trane.

Jan returned to her room, changed into her shower uniform—gray
polyester bathrobe over flip-flops with towel folded over one arm—and
proceeded to the latrines.
 
Alone in
the white-tiled room, she turned on one of the six shower heads, removed her
bathrobe, and hung it on one of the six hooks lined up on the opposite
wall.
 
She stepped under the hot
spray of water and let it soak through her thick, short, straight, red
hair.
 
She opened the shampoo bottle
and squeezed a dollop onto her palm and rubbed the gelatinous substance all
through her hair until it became a big wad of foam.
 
She massaged her scalp, neck, ears and
face before tilting her head back under the water spray.
 
The white bubbles cascaded down her face
and neck, over her breasts, stomach, hips and thighs.
 
She watched as the foaming stream
continued its journey down her long legs and onto the white tiled floor where
it swirled around in circles until it found the drain.
 
The churning bubbles seemed to say,
“There’s
an inevitability to things.”
 
Jan sensed the bubbly flow speaking to her,
 
“Water flows downstream, not up.
 
Gravity pulls objects to the earth, not
away.
 
Honor Boards bend toward
finding guilt, not innocence.”
 

The laws of the universe were not going to change for her.
 
Two hundred years of brotherhood would
not step aside so she could pass.
 
Only one thing could change the tide.
 
Jan wept huge, silent tears of anger,
frustration and defeat, for she knew she didn’t deserve a miracle.
 

“Kristi, no matter what happens, just tell the truth tomorrow,” Jan
said after Taps had played over the Corps-wide PA system.
 
The three roommates lay awake in bed
with the lights out.

“I will, Jan.
 
I just wish I
had looked more closely at you Monday morning.
 
I wish I had noticed something was wrong
and asked you about it before the day slipped away,” Kristi said.

“You had no way of knowing anything.
 
Hell, I had no idea he would bring honor
charges on me.
 
I should have.
 
He had to cover his ass.”

“Jan, if they find you guilty, I’m going to talk to my dad.”
 
Kristi meant her step-dad, the man who
raised her.

“Okay.
 
I’m sure he will be
helpful.”
 
Jan figured Kristi would
seek his counsel, comfort, or wisdom as any good father would provide.

“Yeah, I think he will be able to do something.
 
What good is a presidential appointment
if you can’t use it once in a while?”
 
Kristi said.
 

Jan hadn’t fully computed Kristi’s last sentence when Angel chimed in,
“Kristi, is your dad in politics?”

“Not really.
 
He was a
business man before being appointed as an ambassador.”

“Your dad’s an ambassador?”
 
Jan asked the question, but it came out more like a shocking statement.

“Yeah, didn’t I ever tell you guys that?”
 
Kristi asked.

“Uh, no, you neglected to mention that fun little fact,” Jan said.

“Oh, sorry.
 
I thought you
knew.
 
My real dad died in
Vietnam.
 
I told you that,
right?”
 

“Yes, you told me that, but you never mentioned that your step-father
is a freaking ambassador?
 
To
Germany, I suppose?”
 
Jan couldn’t
believe it.

“Yup.”
 
Kristi said like it
was no big deal.

“Jesus H. Christ, Kissy, all this time I had no idea you were so high
up the food chain,” Jan said.

“Well, it’s really not that glamorous.
 
But still, I do hope he can help out if
things go badly here,” Kristi said.

“Thanks, Kissy, but if I am found guilty, there’s NO way I would stay,
with or without your dad’s influence.
 
I mean, I appreciate the offer, but think about it, Kissy.”
 

A guilty verdict from an Honor Board was rarely overturned, although
the Superintendent had the authority to do so.
  
The few cadets who did return to
the Corps after being found guilty of an honor violation basically lived in
solitary confinement.
 
Most other
cadets would not have anything to do with the dishonored cadet.
 
The “get-over” would room alone, eat
alone and study alone.
 
It was only
slightly milder than the old silencing when cadets found guilty of honor and
returned to the Corps, for whatever reason, were segregated completely into
separate barracks, classes, formations and meals.
 
“There’s no future for me here if this
thing goes badly,” Jan said.