The place stank, and the only timely and smooth process was the sale of orangeade.

  The girl behind the makeshift counter, an office table, was decidedly pretty. She reminded me of someone I might’ve known.

  There was also a fidgety old man back there, with a face identical to Comrade W?adislaw Gomu?ka, who was at the time interned.

  He wore an old raggedy train conductor’s uniform and was overactive, constantly rearranging the wooden boxes, picking them up, putting them away, bringing them inside.

  They arranged a concert in the main hall too, to provide some semblance of culture ofr the country prospectives who didn’t have access to concert halls, theaters, art galleries, or museums.

  A couple of the singers could make up for the lack of museums as well as concert halls for these boys

  I loved music, but this could induce vomiting.

  I loved music, only under the condition that it was American Jazz.

  There was even an authentic field kitchen in the place.

  The bean soup and bread was FREE, paid for by the army, which desired to instill from the beginning a barracks atmosphere among the men here.

  A corporal brought in buckets from an army truck parked in the back of the building.

  When the soup was running out the corporal schlepped with the bucket to the truck for more.

  When he was not doing this, sitting in an uncomfortable position he cut banner black bread with a razor-sharp knife taken from a German bayonet.

  As if these responsibilities were not enough, the corporal was also charged with keeping the stove running.

  Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  Being really very busy with a dizzying multitude of tasks, the corporal nevertheless made time to court the girl at the field kitchen.

  It involved getting fresh, pouncing at her from behind, and groping her more attractive parts.

  Eventually he got a little too fresh and she hit him with a ladle.

  -Oh you whore!, he yelled at her, covered in the soup.

  Really the old woman preparing the soup had the most fun.

  She’d steer herself to the slowest-looking prospective, an easy task, and in a formal way, made very intimate and personal queries as to the sexual notions of the cursorily accused.

  -So you go balls deep into the pig to finish it off?

  -Hey buddy! Comradette’s got a question!

  She got a little help from one of the boys, Karl. I knew him because he was next to me in line at the registration table.

  In conversation, Karl and the old woman figured out they came from villages not far apart from each other, and he made himself at home with her.

  Karl had an eccentric look. He was cross eyed, with a large nose and a flat round face.

  He had fat lips through which silver sometimes shone, his second or third upper tooth.

  His hair was the color of ripening wheat, cut in a flattop and combed back tightly, having the effect of making his head look like that of a heron.

  Karl was dressed in a short, tight, younger brother’s or smoking jacket, sown at some point from dark blue plimsoll with a breast pocket on the right side, which betrayed the fact that the jacket garment was reversed.

  Two fountain pens, a mechanical pencil and a sharpened number two pencil with a metallic spring clip in his pocket identified him as a literate.

  He wore a lapel pin of the folk sports league. He wore his not too clean ZMP-issued green shirt. He didn’t have a tie but buttoned the shirt all the way up anyway.

  He had army-colored wool horse riding pants, held by very used suspenders and strung tight at the bottom, tucked into dirty gray socks that looked home knitted, and worn out black low top shoes, which exhibited quite obvious signs of dried clay mud and remnants of horse manure in its distinctive golden color.

  His frame was short and even though he was thin, it was as if the proportions were somehow off.

  On his head was a big stiff baker boy cap, bright with a dark blue checkered pattern, the only brand-new thing in the fatigued wardrobe of poor Karl.

  He was a nice guy, amenable and friendly, but from a mile you could tell he was a yokel.

  I could feel the oncoming mind-numbingness.

  I turned to look at the pianist.

  What could he know?

  Give me Meade Lux Lewis, give me Albert Ammons, give me Pete Johnson.

  He couldn’t have anything in common with those legends.

  -But could you play some piano boogie woogie? I asked the pianist.

  -As a member of the Party and a member of the Musicians’ Union I never have and never would play such American trash.

  A stupid dangerous pest.