Chpt. 2

Six days later I woke up to my uncle banging on my bedroom door, yelling it was time to get up. Looking at the clock, I groaned. It was 0400. Running Joe over with the Jeep might've been a really bad idea. If I hadn't done that, I would be getting another four hours of sleep. Groaning, I got out of bed and stumbled to the bathroom to get ready for my first day of hell. After dressing in my ARMY t-shirt, shorts, and sneakers I twisted my hair into a massive bun at the base of my skull per my uncle's orders and headed for the stairs.

I walked into the kitchen looking for Uncle Charlie. I had no idea which squad I was in or who my drill sergeant was. Besides that, I had no idea if the drill sergeant even knew I was in his group. All around, this was just going to be awkward.

"Morning, Steph. Let's get a move on," Uncle Charlie said, grabbing his to-go mug filled with coffee while walking out the back door. We walked to the barracks. "You'll be in Josh's platoon. He'll watch out for you and make sure you don't get into any trouble. And remember, you need to call him Sergeant Klein, especially when you're around the other recruits."

"Yes, sir," I replied.

"Good start, smartass," he said chuckling at me.

"It's my best quality, sir."

"Oh Lord, you're going to turn this into a really long summer, aren't you, Steph? Are you going to call me 'sir' throughout Basic?" Uncle Charlie asked me.

"Yes, sir," I replied with a big grin on my face. My uncle just looked at me, still laughing and shaking his head. We quickly made it to the barracks and found Uncle Josh – I mean Sergeant Klein. Crap. Remembering to call him that will be difficult. Maybe I will just stick with calling him 'sir', too. He has been Uncle Josh since Val and I came to live with Uncle Charlie and Aunt Marjie. Technically he is not an uncle in the biological sense word; but we call him Uncle Josh as a sign of respect. Sergeant Klein, Sergeant Klein, Sergeant Klein, I kept mentally repeating to myself. Must get his name right in Basic. I don't want to stick out more than I already will.

"Morning, Steph. Ready for me to whip you into shape, kiddo?" Uncle Josh asked me.

"Yes, sir," I replied, standing up straight and snapping to attention.

"At ease, kiddo. Just follow my directions and no sass in front of the recruits. Outside of Basic, we can kid and joke around like normal. Okay?"

"Yup. Um…I'll probably just always call you 'sir' because I'm going to flub saying 'Sergeant Klein'," I said. Josh just laughed at me and gave me a kiss on the forehead.

"Alright, go stand over there in parade rest," he told me. "The others should be showing up any minute now."

Uncle Charlie waved, winked at me, and then walked down the street towards his office.

It was 0455. Each minute that passed, about five recruits joined me in line until there were 48 of us. I was the only girl.

"This is your first week in Basic. As such, I don't expect you to know all of the rules today, but I do by Friday," Josh barked at us. I knew drill sergeants barked at their recruits, but wow. I wasn't expecting this. Uncle Josh is so soft spoken.

"This week we'll start each day at 0430. You have until 0500 to get your asses out here in formation. Each minute you are late you will have to run an extra mile, the complete an additional ten pushups, and ten sit-ups you will have to complete in addition to your regular PT. Do you understand me?"

"Sir, yes, sir!" We yelled in unison.

"After PT this week, you'll have thirty minutes to shower and change into your fatigues. We will then have class instruction until lunch each day this week. In class you will learn the rules. At noon you'll have thirty minutes for lunch. Then you'll have class until 1700. You'll have thirty minutes for dinner. If I think you need additional instruction or I have items of concern to address with you, I'll let you know and we'll meet at 1730. Am I understood?" Josh barked at us again. I wondered how he even had a voice at the end of the day. If I yelled at people like that all day, I wouldn't be able to speak for a week!

"Sir, yes, sir!" We yelled.

"You'll then have personal time from 2000 until 2100. At 2100 it's lights out! Now it's time to whip you maggots into shape! We'll do a slow jog for five minutes and then a medium jog until we jog two miles. Fall in line!"

Uncle Josh started yelling out a running cadence song. I sang along since I already knew the words. That's what happens when you live on an Army base for three years.

C-130 rollin' down the strip

64 Rangers on a one-way trip

Mission Top Secret, destination unknown

They don't even know if they're ever coming home

When my plane gets up so high

Paratroopers take to the skies

Stand up, hook up, shuffle to the door

My knees got weak and I hit the floor

Jumpmaster picked me up with ease

Tossed my knees into the breeze

Count one-thousand, two-thousand, three-thousand, four

My main opened with a mighty roar

But if my main don't open wide

I got a reserve by my side

But if that one should fail me too

Look out below I'm a-comin' through

If I die on the old drop zone

Box me up and ship me home

Pin my wings upon my chest

And then bury me in the leaning rest

Well if I die on a Chinese hill

Take my watch or the commies will

But if I die in the Korean mud

Bury me with a case of Bud

And we jogged. And we jogged some more. It seemed endless. If it wasn't for the fact that Charlie was a general and in charge of this base, I would've thrown in the towel, yelled that Josh was a crazy slave driver, and walked away. The problem with that was I didn't want to embarrass my uncle. (I already stole an MP's Jeep and ran over Joe Morelli – I'm sure that was more than enough embarrassment for Uncle Charlie.) Nor did I want to stand out and be noticed by the rest of the recruits. Heck, I refused to even run in gym class—I did the bare minimum in order to pass. I just didn't see the purpose, though in retrospect it might have helped if I had actually attempted to run in class this past quarter. If I had I might not have ended our jog bent over at the waist, hands on my knees, breathing hard, trying to mitigate my nausea.

Two minutes later my uncle, apparently the ultimate drill sergeant, bellowed it was time to do sit-ups. The jerk had to yank me out of line to provide visual instruction on how to do a proper Army sit-up. Thirty sit-ups later, I was lying on the ground, panting, trying to come up with some other form of punishment for Joe Morelli. If it weren't for him I would not be here in physical training hell.

After getting a minute to rest, Josh hollered it was time for pushups. Holy hell was all I could think. I was incredibly relieved though when he chose a young, handsome, Hispanic guy to show proper pushup form. Six pushups later I was holding myself up on shaking arms and my normally soft-spoken, sweet uncle was crouched down in front of me, yelling in my face that I was a weakling that was giving up too easily. I narrowed my eyes at him and unsteadily lowered myself towards the ground. Half-way up, I was stuck, glared at him, and hissed, "I…" pant, "hate…" pant, "you!" He just grinned at me. I continued to scowl at him, causing him to have a huge smile. He quickly wiped the expression from his face and yelled at us that it was time to shower, change, and then meet outside the mess hall at 0615 for breakfast.

I glanced at my watch and realized I would have to sprint home to shower and change in order to be back in time. Taking a deep breath, I took off, making it home in three minutes. I took quite possibly my shortest shower ever, two whole minutes. I now understood why my uncle told me to start the day out with a tight bun. My riotous curly mane would have definitely caused me to be late. I changed into fatigues with "Plum" embroidered onto the breast pocket and combat boots.

My aunt stopped me at the bottom of the stairs. "Oh my! You look like such a cute little recruit! Let me take a picture for your uncle!" she exclaimed.

"Aunt Marjie, I don't have time for this! I have," I looked at my watch, "seven minutes to get back!"

"Time for your serious picture. Say cheese!" she said, smiling behind the camera. I stood straight, shoulders squared, with a stoic expression. "Ok, now time for your goofy picture. Say cheese!" I posed like I was one of Charlie's Angels. My aunt burst out laughing.

"Oh you are too much, Steph! Ok, now run along! Have a good day," she sang out.

That was easy for her to say. She didn't just have her second favorite uncle kick her ass and take pleasure in it. I sprinted to the mess hall and waited with the other recruits. At 0615, my formerly second favorite uncle walked over with a to-go mug of coffee. "Go grab your food and then meet back here at 0630," Josh barked. I wondered if he ever got sick of yelling at everyone.

I got in line behind the handsome, young Hispanic boy who demonstrated how to do a pushup. Another cute, Hispanic boy with bright green eyes was right behind me, chatting over me.

"So what do you think of PT, primo?" he asked the boy in front of me. "I thought it was a piece of cake." [cousin]

"Of course you did, Santos. We have been doing this for the past year," the guy in front of me said, talking over my head.

"What did you think?" Santos asked me.

"Um…the sit-ups were ok. Pushups and running suck," I said. "Hi, I'm Steph." I held out my hand.

"Lester Santos, at your service," he said giving me a flirtatious smile. I had to laugh. I knew it wouldn't go anywhere. First, I am a minor, and it was obvious that these guys had to be adults to enlist. Second, once he found out I was the beloved niece of General Charles Plumari he would likely never flirt with me again. Nobody wants to be on the general's bad side.

"This rude guy over here," Lester said, jutting his chin to the guy in front of me, "is my cousin, Carlos Mañoso."

"Nice to meet you both," I said politely while I grabbed a preassembled plate with eggs, fruit, and toast. We got to the coffee carafe. I filled my Styrofoam cup with coffee and cream, and sniffed it. "Oh thank God for caffeine," I groaned. Then I took a sip and almost spit it back out. "On second thought, never mind. That is burnt to hell." I was incredibly disappointed. I saw my uncle watching and laughing. He likely had good coffee from some officers' lounge. I sighed.

"Come on," Lester said. He grabbed my elbow and guided me towards the others at our squad's designated table.

"So you didn't prepare and get into shape before you joined?" Carlos asked me.

"Um…" I was trying to figure out a way to answer that without lying or disclosing too much. "This was all kind of last minute." I scrunched up my nose and made a face.

"You just decided to join the Army?" Lester asked me.

"Something like that," I replied taking a big bite of my scrambled eggs. Even these were bad. How can the cooks mess up eggs?

"We decided to join up over a year ago, but had already committed to a year at Rutgers. So we had plenty of time to prep," Les said.

"What made you decide to leave college?" I asked them.

"Sitting behind a desk and reading text books is not enjoyable. I like being more active. I felt caged in class," Carlos said.

"I am too hyper to sit in class all day and then study all night. Now, if you want to talk about partying all night, I'm your guy," Les replied wiggling his eyebrows up and down.

"Ignore my idiot cousin," Carlos said.

I laughed. "I am not taking him seriously," I said with a smile.

"You wound me, Beautiful," Lester said.

"Somehow I doubt that," I shook my head and bent my head down to finish eating. I knew we had less than five minutes to finish up and I was starving.

We finished up our breakfasts. Then I grabbed our trays to bring back so that they could be washed. Josh walked over to return his tray and had another to-go mug of coffee.

"Here, drink this. It's not the swill that they serve in here. It's actually somewhat drinkable," he said, covertly passing it to me.

"Thank you!" I said. I took a sip as I walked back towards Carlos and Lester. It was still bad, but drinkable.

I looked at the rest of my platoon. I was the only girl in it. So much for not standing out, I thought. We all walked to the building where classes were held, and also housed my uncle's office, in a single file line. We sat alphabetically and I was again between Carlos and Lester. Class was painfully boring. I actually already knew everything Uncle Josh was teaching us as Uncle Charlie had given me the text and told me I had to read and know it before Basic started. I was bored out of my mind. I pretended to take notes, but in reality I was brainstorming ways to get back at Joe. One broken leg just didn't seem like it was enough of a punishment for taking my virginity, humiliating me, and then causing me to spend my summer vacation in Basic. Okay, so maybe I am the one that made the decision to steal the Jeep and run him over, but I still partially blame him. Rat bastard. This time though, I can't commit a felony and get caught.

So far my list consisted of this:

Put superglue on his computer mouse and keyboard in my uncle's office

Put NAIR™ in his shampoo so he ends up losing his hair (need Mary Lou's help)

Duck tape his desk drawer closed

Stink bomb his room (need ML's help)

Ex-Lax™ in his coffee (after Basic is over, would have to visit Uncle Charlie's office)

Write on Women's bathroom walls that he has an STD

Weaken a crutch so it breaks while he hobbles around

My list still needed serious help.

I sat with Lester and Carlos again at lunch. They seemed nice enough and I felt safe around them. Hmm…maybe I shouldn't trust my judgment. I did go out with Joe…but I'm not going to date these guys. They are adults and I'm going to be a freshman in high school.

"So you seem like you have no problem paying attention in class. You took a ton of notes," Les said. "Can I borrow them? I'm sure I only got half of the important points down." Les grabbed my notebook and flipped to the two pages that had writing. On the left side of my notebook, there were notes. On the right side…Operation Vengeance.

"Woah, Beautiful! What is this? Operation Vengeance?" Les said way too loudly. Josh looked over at me from the other end of the table, raising his eyebrows at me. I gave him my best I'm-a-little-angel look. "Hmmm….I'm liking the NAIR™ in the shampoo bottle. Instead of stink bombing, have you thought of wrapping up fish in newspaper and putting it in his vents? It'll be this slow stench that'll be hard to find…. What do you think primo?" [cousin]

Carlos grabbed my notebook and looked at my notes.

"You could cut power to his house in the middle of the night so he ends up late. You could weaken one of the legs on his office chair so it breaks in case he is off of his crutches by the time you put this into action. Should I ask why you are doing this?" He raised his right eyebrow at me.

"Maybe I'll tell you in the future. If I ask you for help, I'll explain it to you," I replied.

"Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned," Les said.

"Hm, something like that," I replied. We cleaned up and headed back to class. Of course I saw Joe in the hallway. He glowered at me and I gave him my best angelic smile. Sitting down in the classroom, Carlos turned to me.

"Is Operation Vengeance for Crutch Boy out in the hall?" Carlos asked me quietly. Les perked up at that.

"Shh," I hushed them. Uncle Josh was walking into the room and I didn't want him to hear more than he already had. Les kicked me under the table and raises both of his eyebrows as if to repeat Carlos' question. I nodded in agreement. Les broke out into a huge smile, which quickly vanished as Josh barked that it was time for class to begin.

I made sure to take good notes, knowing that Les would need them. The guy apparently had ADHD. I could feel his leg jiggling under the table. I looked over to see Les and Carlos' notes and they were both working on their own Operation Vengeance ideas.

Huh, I thought. Who knew I would quickly make friends with two guys in Basic Training that would take on my vendetta as their own? I then paid attention to Josh again, taking copious notes for the boys. I knew I wouldn't need them, but they would. Class ended and I was beyond thankful.

"You guys should be good for today. I don't have anything extra to go over with you after dinner. Enjoy your dinners," he called out. Our platoon quickly disbursed, but Lester and Carlos stuck with me.

"Does Crutch Boy have a car?" Lester asked me. "We could always let the air out of his tires."

"Yeah, he has his own POS," I replied.

"I'll add that to the list," Carlos said yanking my notebook out of my arms and writing it down in neat, small block letters. "If he has a girlfriend, we could leave a bunch of empty condom wrappers in his car. Then the girlfriend sees it, realizes he didn't use them with her and gets mad at him."

"Add those to the list, please," I replied. I apparently made friends with vengeance masterminds. "We can also add sugar to his gas tank. My uncle said that stops engines." I saw Carlos write that down on my list.

Lester's eyes suddenly flashed with excitement. "I've got it! You can rub scentless IcyHot™ in his drawers so that his junk will feel like it's on fire"

"Oh my God, that's brilliant! And it's scary that you thought of that. Isn't that against 'guy code' or something?" I asked.

"Totally, but I would recommend it to a guy that screwed over my baby sister," Lester replied.

"Thinking along those same lines…" I said, "well, I was thinking about putting Krazy Glue™ on his keyboard and mouse, but what if I Krazy Glued™ his dick to his leg?" I saw both Carlos and Lester flinch.

"Definitely vengeance worthy," Carlos replied, again adding to my list. "Some of this is going to require some B and E. And gluing himself to his leg…you might need to drug him to get that accomplished."

"What's B and E?" I asked.

"Breaking and entering, Beautiful," Lester replied. "Never tried it?"

"Can't say I have, but then I'm averse to going to jail. I kind of lucked out last week," I replied.

"You don't like to go to jail? You just don't know how to have fun!" Les exclaimed.

I laughed. "You're crazy."

"So what do you mean you lucked out last week?" Carlos asked me.

"Eh…I broke his leg," I said. I didn't need to give them all of the details. Carlos raised an eyebrow at me. "It's a story for another time. But…getting back to the list, if you can help me with breaking into his house, I can probably get my friend, Mary Lou, to help with drugging him so he'll sleep through the actual gluing," I said thinking aloud. "She's dating his brother. I can give her one of my sleeping pills to dissolve in his drink one night. I could probably do the IcyHot™ in his underwear that same night, too."

"I would do those at separate times," Carlos said. "Maybe your friend could do the IcyHot™ a few weeks after the gluing." By this point we had walked over to the Mess Hall.

I grabbed my notebook from Carlos. "Thanks for your help thinking up ideas. I'll catch you in the morning. I have some things I need to do." I shot them both a smile and walked back home.

By the time I made it home I was exhausted. Uncle Charlie and Aunt Marjie were having their typical afternoon cocktail on the wrap-around porch. I flopped down on the wicker couch across from my guardians.

"So how was your first day?" my aunt asked. I knew Uncle Charlie wouldn't have to ask since Josh would give him a report at the end of the day.

"Good. Exhausting. Made some friends. They're actually cousins," I replied.

Aunt Marjie seemed unsatisfied with the lack of detail in my response. "How was PT? And tell me more about your friends."

"Um…well, Uncle Josh is a slave driver. He took pleasure in watching me struggle with my pushups and yelled in my face. You know how hard it was for me to not yell back? It helped that I was out of breath and that I don't want to stand out to the rest of the platoon. Those are two reasons why I didn't yell right back."

"Stephanie, Basic will help to teach you discipline…and learning to keep your mouth shut," Uncle Charlie responded.

"I think keeping my mouth shut goes against the hardwiring in my brain. I've always been a smartass," I said.

"Language Stephanie!" Aunt Marjie said. While she is far easier to talk to and less judgmental than my mother was, my aunt is a stickler for language.

"Sorry Aunt Marj. And back to my friends…um, their names are Lester and Carlos. They decided to enlist last year, but had already committed to a year at Rutgers, so they had to wait. During that year, they were crazy and actually looked up all the PT stuff and did it every day, so it's a breeze for them."

My aunt looked at her watch. "Oh! It's time for me to finish up dinner. We'll talk more later!" With that, she left my uncle and me on the porch.

"I heard you did well today. Josh was amazed all you did was whisper that you hated him after he yelled in your face. He also said you did pretty well keeping up with the running and sit-ups. He was surprised, especially since he knows your feelings towards exercising. He also said you paid attention and took a lot of notes in class. He was really pleased with you." Uncle Charlie looked happy and relieved, likely because I didn't embarrass him. I just gave him a tired smile in return.

"I'm going to go take a long, hot shower before dinner," I said. I gave my uncle a kiss on the cheek and headed inside for some relief for my tired and aching body.

Dinner was our typical family, sit-down meal. Valerie was only mildly condescending to me and I actually got out of having to clean up the kitchen since I was doing Basic Training. Val wasn't pleased to have an additional chore, but I didn't care to help her. I was bone tired. By 1900 I was in bed, listening to music and writing in my journal.

June 8, 1997

Song of the day: Erykah Badu, "On & On"

I hurt. My whole body hurts. What was I thinking when I ran over Joe? Right…I wasn't thinking. I just acted impulsively. This time, I'm putting thought into getting him back. How you ask? I call it Operation Vengeance and I've had plenty of time to think about it today while being tortured with PT and class (during the summer no less!). I was planning on acting on my own, but I think I will need help with some of my ideas. I know ML will help me because she's pissed at Joe for how he treated me. She has access to Joe and nobody will ever be suspicious of her since she is dating his brother, Anthony.

Two of the guys in Basic actually helped me come up with some of the ideas on my list. They are about 19 or 20, I guess. I haven't told them I'm 14½, but they made a comment that they would help their little sister get back at a guy if he treated her poorly. Hopefully they'll keep looking at me like that when/if I tell them how old I am. I think they will. They seem like good guys even if L made a crack that I don't know how to have fun since I don't like being arrested. I think I will ask them for their help. They seem to have experience with B and E. I didn't even know what that meant until they told me. I have a feeling that with their help, I could get back at Joe and not get caught.

I can barely keep my eyes open and it is only…1915. Stupid Basic Training. I'm going to bed.