Many years ago, I was part of an advance team coming back from Iraq well ahead of the main body. After touching down and given a "Welcome Home" celebration we were given a forty-eight hour pass and those that had family already there went with them but that left a large amount that did not behind and stuck in the barracks for the weekend.
At the time I was just a humble Private First Class, an E-3, very shy, a mere boy in uniform standing at a short 5'10", very thin at 130 pounds with a crew cut brown hair and eyes and constantly picked on and joked about by the rest for this. Everyone else smoked, drank, and, of course had sex except for me. At the time I was a virgin and tried to keep it a secret, waving off questions, but after being deployed for a year we were all pent up with testosterone. There were women in our unit, most were rather plain looking or married, and there was the prohibited sex, of course people broke it so much that there was large bowl of condoms in the battalion aid station.
The first morning back in the States I awoke and stepped outside the barracks and breathed in the clear air of Kansas the polar opposite of the sandy, shit stank, of Iraq and my first mission was to find a cheeseburger at the on base Burger King. No one was outside but me, in my civvies, it was an odd feeling, the clothes did not fit properly and of course neither did the shoes for my body had changed proportions being deployed and for a while it looked like a new born calf walking. Coming back to the barracks after a couple of hours I saw Sergeant Jeremiah stepping out. He was a tall, thin, black man with a bald head, but had muscles to his body. When he came out his eyes turned about and saw me and I do not know the reason why he called me over.
"I know you, you're the young guy right?" he asked.
"Yes, sergeant" replying trying to place my body in a "at ease position" to which he laughed and waved it down.
"Relax, man, we're back and off duty, call me Jeremiah. What are you doing right now?" Leaning forward at the waist towards me his dark eyes were on my paper bag of French fries and a half eaten Double Whooper, "Gotcha some Burger King?" pulling back, "I hear ya. Good choice but I bet it will go through you like hot grease," and laughed. A moment later a woman exited the barracks door behind him and slowly wrapped her arms around the sergeant's waist from behind and gave a gentle kiss to the neck.
"That was wonderful, baby" she said with a very faint voice. I did not know her, a black woman, and young, possibly early twenties compared to the sergeant that I think was thirty. The two talked for a moment, gave a kiss on the lips and she walked away and my face had a 'who was that?' Look with the eyes but it was not my place to ask, but the sergeant was wise and saw it, "She's a girl that's been waiting for me. Right now she's gotta go back to work. You know what a soldier first does when he gets back?"
"Cheeseburgers?" I replied.
He laughed, "True, but I was going to say 'pussy', but damn, I like you. Say, what are you doing tonight?"
In my mind it was flashing that all the things I could be doing but there were none. At that time there were no televisions, computers, or internet yet in the rooms because our personal possessions were in storage thus I shrugged, "I don't know."
"Cool, you want to help out on something?'
"Uh, sure."
"Cool, we're going to be having a party over at battalion tonight," Jeremiah said.
'Battalion?' I thought it was being remodeled at the moment. How are they going to have a party there? But apparently that was the point. He said that one of the rooms had been cleared of all the furniture thus it was large enough for a party. "But, what about the sergeant of the guard?" I asked. There was sergeant and usually one or two guys that would stay behind a desk all night answering phones and helping people access their rooms when they are locked out and sometimes, once in a blue moon, would inspect a room for contraband.
"Don't worry about him," Jeremiah said, "He's a friend of mine. Just be at 2200 hours at my room, 102, and help us."
Agreeing to this Jeremiah gave me a pat on the shoulder and he walked away leaving me to ponder what to do. I had the rest of the day to myself and spent it eating and of course Jeremiah was right and that stuff went right through me and later called my folks and promised them I would be home in a couple of weeks. Other than that I just waited and when it came time to meet the sergeant, changed into my desert dress uniform, for some reason my mind said, do it, I went downstairs and knocked on his door. Opening up he was surprised to see me in uniform but it was time, "Alright, my man, come on in."
He lived in a small room, no more than eight feet by ten feet and it was jammed to the gills with boxes of all sorts and it perplexed me where he could obtain all this in a day. Most of it was stereo equipment including CDs, subwoofers, and speakers and miles of cables and wires.
Looking at it all I asked him, "We're going to carry all of this?"
"Not all of it," Jeremiah replied, "But I have some more guys on their way to help."
He made no mention of my uniform but he wore loose fitting street clothes and sure enough five more guys showed up and each of us picked up as many boxes as we could and began the walk towards Battalion.
It was dark now, and the parking lot was empty except for one vehicle near the front. Going up the stairs to the building there was a desk off to the side where two guys were sitting rather bored. Jeremiah was the first through.
He and the sergeant on duty shook hands and I saw some money being exchanged but said nothing and went down a narrow corridor past the desk towards the back.
Walking behind Jeremiah he approached a set of double doors and pressed the bars and threw the doors open. This was it. A massive room that was normally used for battalion level briefings. The room's ceiling tiles had been removed to have wiring and pipes changed but fortunately the air conditioning unit was still operational if not sporadically. When we stepped through the doors Jeremiah turned about and began directing everyone where to place all of the boxes. I was carrying two coolers filled with CDs. Setting them down by Jeremiah whom asked me to go back to his room to get the ice and beers.
Going back I had the urge to avoid being seen. Getting into his room I could not handle all of the beer and ice all at once thus it took several trips and each and every time I kept worrying that I would be caught by someone. I did not know who, but someone, perhaps the surprise arrival of an officer and then the whole party would be in danger, but no officer ever presented themselves and the party was set up rather quickly. My task was to fill the coolers with ice and beer and move the cables off the floor and along the wall, trying to be helpful whenever necessary.
Jeremiah was distracted most of the time and when he saw me kicking some cables along the wall he called out to me, "You got all the beer?"
"Yeah," filled all the coolers" pointing at the brightly colored plastic containers beside the door.
Nodding "Good, good," he was satisfied and turned his head towards the speakers being put up around every corner of the room.
With nothing else to do I slowly, nervously, walked up to him, "Sergeant...Jeremiah, can I ask you something?"
"Sure thing," giving a wide smile that calmed me somewhat.
"Why are you doing this? This party I mean."
Quickly Jeremiah wrapped an arm around the back of my neck and pulled me in close, "That's my job, son. I organized basketball and football games but I couldn't do a party like this in Iraq, you know, the rules, but now that we're back, I want those that did not have a chance to get out and have some fun. Now myself, my family lives in Louisiana and I love my momma but I don't want to go home right now, it's personal, but you, why are you here?"
"I can't make it home and back in forty-eight hours," dipping my head in disappointment.
Jeremiah curled his arm and said, "No worries. I feel ya. Tonight you're gonna get to meet some people, some fine ladies and get to hang loose."
I sure hoped for it. Even though I could not drink it was still a nice chance to meet a girl. I did not bother to change my uniform. Jeremiah made no mention of it still and I hoped that there would be no officers, but then remembered that the only officers that came back with us were married thus were long gone by now.
As the minutes slowly ticked by everything was in place. According to the plan no one was allowed in until after 2200 hours, or ten o'clock and the doors closed at 2300 or 11. Looking at his watch constantly Jeremiah saw it tick closer to 10. The doors were closed to avoid any wandering eyes from seeing what was being done.
At the moment it was just us guys and I looked about and realized that all of the coolers had only beer, no water, Gatorade, hard liquor, just beer that he had bought in bulk and when it sank into my mind that we needed to correct this it turned ten o' clock and Jeremiah told me to unlock the doors. Pulling them open there were people already waiting there and seeing their faces I tried to smile but I was so shy that my cheeks turned beet red and I shied away.
The first people through were in civvies, or civilian clothing, and seeing me in uniform they were confused but Jeremiah beckoned them in then the next few people came in were also in uniform, some woodland camo others in desert, this was before the Velcro studded ACU uniform came out. It was against military regulations, but Jeremiah did not care and apparently neither did the people coming in wearing them. Sometime around ten-thirty the largest influx of people arrived and I could not see all of their faces then, at precisely eleven, the doors were closed and locked; no one was allowed in.
Walking towards a spot next to the stereo equipment Jeremiah took up a microphone and rapped his fingers to make sure that he could be heard, "Everyone!" their heads turned towards him, "I wanna thank you all for coming. I know that it's been very stressful coming back but let's not worry about that right now. Let's have some fun! Now remember, there are to be no cameras at all. No cell phones, no video cameras, we do not want anything that could be leaked about this."
He was holding people to their honor system, a rather tall order, but he did not sink to the point of searching everyone when they entered. Jeremiah went on, "And remember; what happens here...." thrusting his microphone towards the crowd.
"Stays here!" they finished.
The lights were dimmed significantly to the point that I could barely make out their faces unless they were nose to nose with me, even then they were strangers. I did not know most outside of my platoon and being so incredibly shy I sulked to a corner and waited as the first song came on.
