This is a work of fiction. Names of characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination and are used fictitiously; any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locations is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2015 by Dennis Milholland – All rights reserved. Other than for private, not-for-profit use, no part of this work may be reproduced, transmitted or stored in any form or by any means, other than that intended by the author, without written permission from the copyright holder.

Careful! This is a work of fiction containing graphic descriptions of sex between males and critiques of religion and governments. And last but not least, Nifty would like your donations.

Farewell, Uncle Ho

by Dennis Milholland

questions and comments are welcome. www.milholland.eu / dennis@milholland.eu

Chapter 52 (Sun., March 5)

We made it to the bus stop in front of the stone-wall periphery to Central Park on Fifth Avenue, when Gerry set down his suitcase, pulled out his cigarettes, stuck one in my mouth and lit it before lighting his own. "Do you know, Ben," He successfully blew a smoke ring. "do you know what I feel like?"

"Relieved?" I ventured.

"Yeah," His wrinkled brow smoothed. "it feels like a ton of bricks has been lifted off me."

The bus arrived as we were extinguishing our cigarettes. Usually it was the other way around, the bus would arrive just as I lit one. Since I had change in my overcoat pocket, I paid, and we settled into the long journey past Central Park. The bus driver was middle-aged and seasoned. There was no erratic stopping and starting. We glided past the National Academy of Design and the Guggenheim on the left and the reservoir on the right. Gerry's suitcase rested on our knees. I ran my hand across its scarred surface.

"They gave it to me to bring my things to America in." He informed me, placing his hand on top of mine. "They said that it had belonged to someone who'd been sent to the concentration camp." His voice went soft. "I always wanted to believe that it had belonged to my dad."

Wanting to change the topic for my own good. I decided to go for the parts of the story I hadn't yet heard. "How did you get here?" Since Gerry's look was vaguely perplexed, I rephrased the question, and readjusted my seat. "I mean, what mode of transportation?"

"They sent me and several others by train with a woman from the Red Cross to Bremerhaven." He spoke softly. "We had to wear these pouches on a string around our necks with our papers in them. Then I was put on a ship and a week later, I arrived here." Gerry laughed quietly. "And, you wanna know something?"

"Sure." I wanted to know everything about him.

"When that Greyhound bus came out of the Holland Tunnel in New Jersey, that was the first time I had been out of New York State, since coming to America."

***

We got off the bus at 49th in front of Rockefeller Center and across from Sachs, not far from Le Chanteclair, where we'd eaten dinner last Friday. "You wanna walk," Gerry was trying to dodge tourists and talk at the same time. "or catch a cross-town bus?" It was odd how I'd get stopped by tourists trying to read maps upside down, asking for directions, when I was wearing civilian clothes. But in uniform and Gerry's carrying a suitcase, they didn't bother.

"Let's walk," I had to yell above a tour-guide's megaphone. "I'd rather deal with 'em on the ground than in a crowded bus." Gerry laughed and nodded.

Finally, we got to the relatively open spaces of congested traffic just north of Times Square on 45th. We were moving south on Broadway and naturally, a scam-scalper spotted our uniforms and one suitcase. He was quick to move in our direction. I looked past him and spotted the scam-scalper from earlier on, convulsing in fits of merriment. He yelled, laughing: "You're a waistin' yer time, Scoffer. They're one of us."

"Dinner?" I inquired. Gerry looked stressed, so I took his suitcase.

"Yeah, would be nice." He stopped to survey the mayhem around us. "but somewhere quiet, huh?" Since it was just past five, we had enough time to go downtown. We got on the subway at Times Square and were travelling south.

"You like Chinese?" I wanted to know, because we could go to Little Italy, if he didn't.

"There's one I'm partial to." I could tell by his face that he wasn't being funny.

I had to laugh. "I meant Chinese food."

"Don't know." He blushed. "Never tried it."

Trying to keep the look of utter surprise off my own face, in order to take the look of utter embarrassment off his, I told him about Broadway's being the border between Chinatown, Little Italy, and the remnants of Little Germany. We could start out with a spring roll, and if he didn't like it, we could go for a pizza, spaghetti, or Wiener schnitzel.

***

He took to Chinese food like a duck to water. I had taken him to my favorite restaurant on Elizabeth Street, where I could catch up on all the ghetto gossip. Bat and Marv had been in a couple of weeks ago and everything seemed to be going alright. No sign of Bernice and William, though, not that I really cared.

The conversation during dinner had been about our going to advanced individual training, and what would happen, if we got split up. "It's only six weeks." I reasoned and Gerry looked panicked. "Settle down, mein Schatz." I looked around and felt safe to take his hand across the table. "There are telephones, and I doubt that making a call will count as a privilege, like it does in basic."

"But what if something happens." The sadness in his face expressed a degree of hopelessness I'd never experienced.

"Please, let's not play the 'what-if' game." I forced a chuckle around the lump in my throat. "That's a bad habit, I'm trying to break."

He laughed with a minimum of humor. "Okay, it's just…" His face switched to a stony stare. "It would be really rough without you."

"Yeah, same here." I tried to lighten the mood. "But it's not like Russian roulette. We know that we'll be in Legal-Clerk school together and our assignment in Saigon will be in the same office, so if worst comes to worst, it'll be six weeks apart, and then a lifetime together."

I loved it, when he brightened up, like this.

***

We made it back to West 48th Street with fifteen minutes to spare. Moffett was already there. He'd been traipsing through the museums, and couldn't remember everything he'd seen. His evening meal had been a Nathan's hot dog, and by now Gordon was already a half an hour late. What a great start.

"Hopefully, nothing's happened." My contribution to inner peace was not good.

"He probably overslept." Gerry was more optimistic.

"If he's more than an hour late," I was getting worried about being AWOL. "we'll phone the unit." And then I heard two toots of the horn. "Better late than--"

"--sorry, Guys." He got out, came around the car and almost tripped over Gerry's suitcase. "Let's see, you had a run in with your parents, and everything you own is in that suitcase, right?"

Gerry laughed sadly and shook his head. "Sounds like you know from experience."

"Yip, came home on my first three-day pass," He chuckled and rubbed his right fist. "and my old man wanted to see what I'd learned in basic."

"Oh, shit." Moffett laughed.

"Yeah, and I'm gonna do the very same thing to Pierson, when I get my hands on him." He rubbed his right fist again, as if he wanted to polish it for coming events. "The little shit had me drop him off at a bogus address in Brooklyn Heights. That's why I'm late; I was busy ringin' bells."

"Think he planned to go AWOL?" I wondered out loud.

"I'd bet that he crossed into Canada at Niagara Falls, Friday afternoon." Gordon sounded bitter, as if it were his responsibility. "And you," He stabbed my chest with his index finger. "your ass is squad leader the second we get back. And I don't want any excuses, no matter how many push-ups you're willing to do. Understood?"

"Yes, Drill Sergeant." I was smiling at the thought of two weeks of ass play and blow jobs with Gerry, not because I was being a smart ass.

"You are such a clown, Loughery." Gordon grinned and shook his head. "But we all love ya, for it." He patted Gerry on the shoulder before he went around to the driver's side to get in. "Found yourself quite a fella, there, Helmstedter."

"Yeah, Drill Sergeant, I sort of think so, too." Gerry got in the back with me, leaving Moffett to ride shotgun.

***

The drive back to Fort Dix was relatively quiet with Gordon and Moffett talking about life in the Adirondacks, where Moffett was from, and where Gordon had spend many a summer away from the City as a kid. They were laughing about how, at the Reception Center, Moffett had convinced quite a few of the guys from the City, that he did, in fact, wrestle bears.

He talked about how he used it as a self-isolation device to keep both bullies as well as potential love interests at arms' length, like I had done with the Chinese book on the bus from the induction station on Whitehall to Fort Dix.

"Why would you want to avoid having friends?" Gerry was leaning over the back of the seat.

Moffett explained something that Gordon had neither known nor guessed, to have judged by his facial expression. "You and Ben saw what happened, after we had sex. My religion and my desires get conflicted."

Gordon wondered aloud how that could happen. "How religious are you guys up there in bear country?" He and Gerry laughed, but Moffett only smiled.

"How about mass every day before school, only nuns as teachers and a priest with medieval views." Moffett now chuckled softly. "Hell, I didn't know anybody who wasn't Roman Catholic until I went off to college." He turned sideways on the front seat. "How about you guys. Don't you really believe in god?"

Gerry laughed. "Moffett, I was born and spent the first years of my life in a displaced-persons camp, because both my parents spent the last years of their lives in concentration camps. I think that the story of an all-loving, benevolent god is a fairy tale, nothing more."

I sat up and leaned over the front seat next to Gerry. "I have never seen any evidence that a god ever existed. In my opinion, believing that a god exists is a feeble attempt of ancient peoples to explain things they failed to understand."

Gordon grinned wickedly. " Me, my dad, and my two brothers had our religious service every Friday night."

Moffett was startled. "You're Jewish?"

At that Gordon really laughed. "No, we would worship at the altar of the Rheingold Brewery in front of the television set, watching Gillette Friday Night Fights."

***

Signing back in to the barracks felt like coming home. Gordon exchanged his green beret for Smokey's Campaign Hat and once again became Drill Sergeant. And as ordered, I moved into Gerry's room and took the third bunk, since Pierson was not yet officially AWOL.

It was exactly what I needed. Gerry was within feeling distance, since the bunks were closer together than in the bay. And being a squad leader exempted me from fire guard duty, which meant that I could get a decent night's sleep. All in all, life was good.

And it got better when Gerry woke me about midnight, to lie with him under my bunk, since it was in the shadow cast by the opened door. We had neither time nor space for anything else other than the best way to keep from moaning, which is to have your guy's cock in your own mouth at the same time.

Even though we'd showered around two hours ago, Gerry's own smell and taste had returned. Sadly, they were not as intense as they were after a run, but enjoyable enough.

First, I let my tongue tickle the tip of his glans, barely poking out from under the tip of his skin; it tasted salty and something like Bat's cumin tofu stew. As my lips retracted the skin more, his slick and moist glans smelled a little like butter and tasted more like dark soya sauce. The closer I got to his pubic hair, the more enjoyable his testosterone-spiked perspiration was.

I applied suction to his shaft, encasing my teeth in my lips. My tongue was still gathering flavors and dispensing sensations, while my mouth created a light vacuum, teasing his tightly drawn skin on the outstroke and relaxing my cheeks and jaws when taking him back in to swallow him whole.

Then he came, filling my mouth more than once. I was on the verge but not yet there. He scooted down between my legs to suck my balls and tongue my hole, while he jacked me off. In the absence of his cock to stifle my ultimate moan, I reached over to one of his combat boots and stuffed one of his thick green socks into my mouth. Then I tensed to enjoy the rush.