When I get the job, it’s bizarre that I can’t brag about it to anyone, I can’t write it on a letter to Matt, it’s too risky and I can’t really tell anyone, instead I just thank and smile. I get told that I am good looking, so of course the homosexuals will crawl out, which I just took as a weird compliment from someone twice my age and far more misunderstanding of homosexuality that I ever had even when I was seven.
I also get asked questions if I’ve ever thought of other men, to which I shake my head and do a forceful nod to the fact that of course, I like females. I don’t think I even found girls attractive when I was in primary school.
Looking back I had agreed, refusing would mean that I was either homosexual or I approved of such deviant behavior. So it was either me in jail or someone else, it had been a bizarre second and I had Matt’s words in my head, I was allowed to literally fuck and it would all be seen as heroic in the eyes of nation, gay sex was finally something heroic, I was putting out my body to spread the decease from spreading. Wow, I wonder if I get a fucking medal for it. Maybe that’s how I should come out to my parents, hey I had gay sex in order to defend our country, while enjoying it, but don’t worry
don’t worry about what?
Exactly.
It’s not just blowing bubbles with some random girl on a park bench, everything you like can be seen as feminine or wrong and gay.
It’s funny how some find the drag shows the only way they can break the boundaries. I’ve wondered myself and I did it with Paul once, both of us singing something Paul had given me the lyrics for once and it was over before I knew it, but I also used the moment and kissed Paul, behind the stage, covering myself as a woman even if I’ve never felt like one, yet I wanted her freedom of being with another man, but I don’t understand why should I be different to have someone similar to myself.
But even with the kiss I had recieved and minor relation, I still decided that drag wasn’t my thing, instead I’d rather risk and have no one mistake me for a woman or think of such. Even if I wasn’t entirely sure if Jack had properly found me attractive or was desperate to masturbate and didn’t want to do so alone and I had been taken for the job.
I start walking up to the ship, feeling anxious and in my head, I know I have two jobs. My parents asked me about the interview, but I couldn’t say anything, instead I just proceeded drinking tea and ignored the question, them guessing that a raise was chucked away. I was content at that. I salute to the officer and ask for permission, giving my card. It doesn’t take too long and I don’t feel like distracting the officer.
I’ve been only on carriers before, so it would be my first on a non-carrier and away from the pilots. I don’t understand, but then I still get a lot of crew and someone has to be gay and if I’m getting sent here, there should be at least a few queers. And I have no find them. I actually wonder, how will it feel, sending someone away, letting the words spill from your mouth and then wondering why are you so thirsty and scared.
I walk on the deck and some don’t have their uniform on unlike me and I fix the hat, swallowing nervously, wondering who to ask and I approach a young man who is struggling with lightening his cigarette. I look at his short dark hair, not used to my recent cut and dreading the same cut we all have and how the barbers measure it, once they hear that I’m going to the navy. I look at his pants and plain white shirt, realizing that this is the best I’ll see. He raises his eyes at me, looks at me and asks me for a lighter.
I raid my pockets then drop my bag to the floor and I start raiding it, as he keeps watching me. Surely someone to note and I feel bad all of a sudden with someone right in front of me who I could send off if he sucks my cock.
I find the lighter eventually and I hand it to him as he lights it. I watch him inhale and I feel embarassed glancing into his soft brown eyes.
“Hey, so, you’re new, right?” He asks and his voice is deeper and more drenched in smoke than I had expected to. I just nod. He takes another drag and exhaling pretty quickly. “I’m Julian Casablancas.”
I shake his hand, getting the bag back on my shoulder and I try to smile back. I’ll be kicking out real people and sending them to jail just for a few orgasms and my own safety.
“I’m Alex Turner.” I let go of his hand and Julian thinks for a while and I take his offer of a cigarette as he offers me one, both of us realizing that most likely my cigarettes are also tucked somewhere between shirts, which would take a while to find as well. I look around, wondering who would Chief Petty Officer Kane be and how would he look like and if he’d be suspicious enough.
“Do you know where Chief Petty Officer Kane is by chance?” We smoke our cigarettes and then I ask. Julian nods and we start heading towards the guns. I follow Julian into the turrets and the door is wide open. A man stands up and waves at Julian, also a cigarette between his lips. I notice that he’s wobbling a bit, but the smile on his lips seems to be something like a subtle apology.
“Oi, Pete, get the fuck back here.” I hear an annoyed voice and Julian smirks. Pete rolls his dark eyes, nodding at the other man who is fiddling with the loader and cursing from while to while.
“Coming, I’m coming, my love.” Pete says and heads back into the crammed room and I watch them trying to turn the jammed hatch. In the end Pete just tries to help the other man and it’s still jammed. I glance at Julian, who sighs and goes to give them a hand. I just stand there, realizing that it would be more of a nuisance if I headed in there as well, so I just wait until they manage to move it slightly and then with a few more minutes of struggles they open the hatch. Pete pats the other man on the back and then he gets out a flask, which is grabbed instantly by the man.
And I get a good look at him and he glances back at me, straightens up and gets his hat from a switch on the wall. He’s taller than me and I feel short all of a sudden around all of them who are way above 6 feet. The man puts his hat back on, looking at me, trying to break something within me and I feel shattered already and frankly, I feel bizarre
I have a blanket fall on my shoulders and warming me up, as I’ve been feeling empty inside and he looks a bit lost as well. We keep our silence for a brief while, before he looks away at Pete.
I can’t help but stare at him, wishing his big eyes would lock on mine again, as he just hands the flask back to Pete, who mocks him by showing that it’s empty, opening it, tilting it over and shaking it, and he just puts an arm around Pete, smirking and punching him lightly. He tries to distract himself and frankly, I’m not even close to trying, I keep looking at his edgy features before my eyes drop to his lips.
“Miles, this fellow was looking for you.” Julian says and motions to me and I just bite my lip, trying to hold myself as he walks out of the turret. He throws away the cigarette, by aiming to get it overboard, I’m guessing he’s practiced enough as it gets its destination, to sink.
Shit. He’s attractive.
“Oh.” He straightens up and fixes his collar, before stretching out his hand to me.
Shit.
“I’m Miles and yeah, I take care of Pete when he’s drunk and Juju when he slacks off.” Julian just flips at him as I glance back to slap on the nickname given. I glance at Pete who just waves at me again. “And there’s another guy, but he’s off on the shore, but he should be back soon otherwise we’ll leave him and he of all people would be sad.”
“Carl’s getting me candy.” Julian says to Pete, who just shoves him lightly, clinging onto Miles still. I really hope that Pete would sober up by the end, but then I’ve heard that they were good, specifically word had gotten around after the last live fire exercise. Frankly, I was intimidated by transferring here, considering that during the time Paul was kicked out I had screwed up and missed a shot, miscalculating and the numbers crawling themselves in a little ball, as I just had Paul packing in my head, as Daniel was already gone.
Knowing that it would be the last time I’d see Paul, wasn’t better either.
“I’m Alex Turner, Sir. I got transferred.” I salute, wondering what else can I add.
“Oh, nice to meet you, Turner.” Miles just smiles.
Shit.
Shit.
“Juju, you mind showing him around, I need to make sure this thing doesn’t get jammed again.” He sighs and turns around, taking his hat off and I watch him from behind, having thoughts already which I will keep to myself, thank you very much.
“Do you need help?” I ask, wondering if I might be needed. I see Kane shake his head and wave me off. I glance at Juju, who just turns around and humming pushes me lightly to walk and we head down the deck to the lower decks. I follow Julian, who opens the door for me and we head into the tower.
It’s crammed as usual and some are in their uniforms, some are slacking off, enjoying the brief moment before we all have the same uniforms and scatter off to do our duties.
“Watch your head.” Julian tells me and I’m not sure I have to lean lower as much as he does, considering that he’s much taller than I am, but I still do to make sure. We keep going until we arrive at the bunks and Julian shows me the empty one and climbs onto the one on top of mine.
“You sleep there, I’m guessing?” I ask as I open my bag and take out the tooth brush, killing time by taking out clothing and sorting it out, as Julian mutters a yes and I see him close the curtains. Well, that was the entire tour I guess. But then it shouldn’t be different from any other ship. I look at the dark blue curtains and smirk, hearing Julian move around.
I get out some paper and a pencil and close the coffin locker and I get on the bunk, lifting my hand up just to see how cramped it is. I wonder still what makes me choose it, but then I always liked cramped places, I would build different forts when I was a kid of chairs and bed covers, I’d always make them small and cozy and then my mom would carry me to bed, before dad would come home and they’d argue why wasn’t I still in bed.
I wonder how would they feel if they knew that I’d still do a fortress only I’d have some guy with me in it and it wouldn’t be so innocent anymore. I don’t think there’s anything innocent about love, I mean, what’s innocent about both us getting down under the law and seen as criminals and never to see the light of acceptance.
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with me, but then to the ill person everything seems ok, but then who would be the ill person.
I bite the tip of the pencil, wondering what to write to Matt, surely I couldn’t mention that Pete was drunk, that Juju was excited about candy seemed somewhat acceptable, but I wasn’t sure how that would fly. Mentioning Miles seemed out of the question. I had just promised to write to him as soon as I get on the boat, even if we were still on shore. I had to do the same thing to my parents, but they could wait.
I scribble that I’m good, that everything seems ok, that I had met the rest of the people I’d be working besides a fellow who was still on shore, who seemed to be supplying a lad called Julian with candy. I wasn’t the only one with a sweet tooth, then and I had mentioned it to Matt.
I finish it with random blabbering, I tell him that I miss him and I wish him luck. I close the letter, stick it in the envelope and wonder who else sleeps on the other four bunk beds.
I head out, just to wander for a while, before confessing boredom and heading back to read some novel, which I had picked up with my eyes closed, it’s always the same, I’d have to imagine that all of them are male and that no female existed in the fictional world, but usually by the middle I drop it. I go to the canteen, which is closed, wondering what would be on the menu today. I drop the letter, curse at myself for not saying hi to anyone who talks to me.
I end up on the deck, watching the sea, wanting to sail already, let my mind be calm.
I should be searching for homosexuals.
How the fuck do I even do that?
Do I just see someone who I don’t like and flirt until they fuck me and then I kick them off?
I turn around to see Pete greet another man who is holding some bags, which I’m guessing would be the candy for Julian and they embrace briefly, but I catch that it should be longer than needed. When you struggle for contact, you do that one second which wouldn’t be visible to the naked eye, but I just look away. There had to be other queers, but the fact that it would be a couple, was surely something that didn’t cross my mind. I wouldn’t risk hugging Paul, not that we were a hugging couple anyway. It was literally a small tug of the arm in the night and we’d sneak out. That was all the intimacy we’d get outside the showers or if we could find a stock room, if no one else was using it. A lot of men would fuck someone eventually over the course of the months, even if they weren’t gay, it’s just how it happened unless you had a 2-10-2 on board for the straights, coz all the “pretty” ones according to Matt were taken, on shore or lesbians or presumed to be. Obviously you’d get the ones who’d deliberately try to get on with the lesbians, which was annoying and confessing to being a lesbian, was just as bad as any man getting caught with another man.
I had managed to become sort of close with another woman, who whenever she’d get hit on by other men, she’d just look at me with her green eyes, begging for the other guy to lay off. But by putting my arm around Lana’s shoulders protectively which had made us both shiver. She wasn’t too bad of a test pilot and she’d tell me before she had to leave, how she didn’t understand how she couldn’t be a proper pilot and that she wouldn’t have children, so what is God preparing for her?
I didn’t know what to say, so I shrugged.
“Mmm.You’re a white man, of course, you don’t.” And she exhaled the smoke from her cigarette. She was good looking, but she wasn’t my type at all, but I could see why both genders had gone with her. She’d talk about this childhood friend who she was close with and who had become a mother with a sad tone in her voice, that she had changed with all the children and the cooking and the stamp of being a wife. In conclusion she had decided aloud, stretching her arms, that maybe even a test pilot wasn’t too bad, surely something had to change.
-
I thank the US navy for thinking of such a wonderful and delightful job, without the idea this story wouldn't have happened.
Onwards, I have to think of so many male characters that it's bizarre. I'm literally taking anyone who I think would fit and so far in my head I've got 17 characters so far and I still need a 3rd loader x___X And I've got 3 women so far. So 14 men and 3 women O_o
The idea of Miles being in charge of Alex was really thought of straight away and I guess, random fact, Miles would be 28 in this story while Alex is 24.
I know who Alex is going to discharge and report, pretty much so it aches writing some characters, knowing what fate lies ahead or those who will die, since the story will progress onto WWII.
I've never researched a story so much or watched so many videos of the insides of ships either XD It's really fun, reading all these small things and at the same time I had to think a lot before every single paragraph.
I was really concerned about the scene where Alex first sees Miles and that took me a while to write, as I wanted the whole love at first sight effect.
Funnily enough, as usual, women with their relationships are easier to write xD
Thank you and I hope enjoyed it and please tell me so and I will post the next chapter. Even a small comment would make my day and help me write faster xD
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