Not Just a Job will be released by Falling Marbles Press (fallingmarbles.com) on August 8th.

It was a clear August morning when the Okmok steamed into Subic Bay. Mr. Crookshank passed the word over the 1MC.

“PRESIDENT NIXON HAS RESIGNED AS PRESIDENT AND COMMANDER‑IN‑CHIEF OF THE ARMED FORCES. OUR NEW PRESIDENT AND COMMANDER‑IN‑CHIEF IS GERALD FORD. THAT IS ALL.”

As we approached our assigned mooring spot at maximum distance from the main gate, I could see three figures sitting on the pier, leaning back against their sea bags.

“Forward lookout reports Seaman Brogan, Seaman Apprentice Hutchinson, and Seaman Apprentice Crimmons,” Stringbean said from the sound-powered phones.

“Well, Chief,” Mr. Kempton said to Chief Lasko, “it looks as though your wayward quartermasters are back in the fold.”

“Call Needler,” Lightning Lenny said. “I want them put on report at once. They’re restricted to the ship until further notice.”

As soon as the brow went down, Needler hurried down to the pier. He handcuffed Hutchinson, Brogan, and Crimmons before he brought them aboard, which seemed unnecessary to me. If they were planning to go over the hill, they wouldn’t have waited around for the ship. Needler took the cuffs off them as soon as they were aboard. When Hutchinson and Brogan arrived on the bridge, Mr. Tobias was not happy to see them.

“We’re shorthanded and we need you,” he said. “But don’t think I will hesitate to discipline you if there’s any more trouble. Understand?”

“Yes, sir,” Hutchinson answered.

“Aye aye, sir,” Brogan answered.

At mail call, I got an envelope that was delayed over a month. It was a wedding invitation.

Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Ledezma request the honor of your presence at the marriage of their daughter Laura to Mr. Scott Latham at St. Cyprian’s Church saturday the twenty-second of June, 1974. Reception to follow. R.S.V.P.

There was a note inside.

Dear Gary,

I’m sure you remember Scott from school. He’s an insurance salesman now. I know you can’t make it to our wedding, but I sent the invitation, anyway.

Love,

Laura

Laura got what she wanted. Maybe if she had been less pushy about marriage, I might have chased her until she caught me, but it never would have worked out between us. Sometimes, I wished I’d never met her.

“Somebody gettin’ married,” Cool said.

He was looking over my shoulder.

“My old girlfriend,” I replied. “She married a weasel named Latham.”

“Damn!” Cool said with a big happy smile. “Thass some cold shit, man.”

“I can tell you’re heartbroken.”

“Let’s quit bullshitting and scrape down those bridge wings,” Chief Lasko said.

I shitcanned the invitation. We grabbed wire brushes. Cool and I went out on the port wing with Hutchinson and Brogan.

“How was Japanese jail?” I asked.

“They let us go after two days,” Brogan answered. “We’ve been in Olongapo for almost two weeks.”

“Ah talked to a legal officer on base,” Hutchinson said. “He said the evidence the Japs used to arrest us wouldn’t stand up under American military law. He said to call him if Lightning Lenny gives us even a reprimand.”—he lowered his voice—“Ah threw that pot in the bushes before the cops got us. They never found anything on us. Needler wanted us to sign confessions admitting we knew there was pot in the area. He knows they don’t have a leg to stand on. When we said we wouldn’t sign, he asked us to sign another statement that said we refused to sign the first statement.”

“They put us in the transient barracks,” Brogan added. “We’ve been hitting the bars, raising money with the lost ring routine.”

Hutchinson came up with lost ring scam after Brogan sold his watch to Jack at Hannigan’s. Brogan would go into a bar and tell everybody he lost a ring that wasn’t valuable but had sentimental value. He would promise a fifty-dollar reward for it and say he’d be back after he checked a few more bars. Then, Hutchinson would come out of the head acting drunk and showing everyone the ring he just “found.” Sometimes, they could get twenty bucks for a cheap ring they bought by the dozen in Japan.

“Never mind that,” I said, “is everything they say about this place true?”

“This place is crawling with chicks,” Brogan answered, “but don’t go with street girls. The bars have a better class of hooker.”

“Crimmons fell in love,” Hutchinson said. “He almost asked the first girl he met to marry him, but Ah talked him out of it.”

“You muthafuckas been skatin’,” Cool said.

“Not skating,” Brogan corrected. “Fucking.”

“Me and Brog bought a case of San Miguel beer and took the Perez sisters to the Liberty Hotel just before curfew,” Hutchinson said. “They gave us a two-for-one special. Mah girl had a seashell tattooed on the inside of her thigh. When Ah put mah ear up against it, Ah could smell the ocean.”

“We pulled the mattress off the bed,” Brogan said. “I took the mattress, and Hutch got the box springs. We were going to swap girls, but we got so drunk I don’t remember if we swapped ‘em or not. One of ‘em was on her period because I had blood all over my dick. The faucet didn’t work, so I washed it off with a beer.”

“We didn’t swap. Ah didn’t have blood on mah dick.”

“That’s a beautiful story,” I said.

 

I spent the rest of the day scraping paint, listening to the cries of birds and chattering monkeys in the jungle. When knockoff went down at 1630, I hurried to 02 berthing. Everyone was changing clothes. Mr. Crookshank’s voice came over the 1MC.

“LOOSE LIPS SINK SHIPS. USE YOUR HEAD, AND USE A CONDOM. STAY TOGETHER, ALWAYS IN PAIRS. DO NOT LEAVE TOWN. THERE ARE GUERRILLA CAMPS IN THE JUNGLE OUTSIDE OF TOWN LEFTOVER FROM THE HUK REBELLION, AND THEY WOULD LOVE TO GET HOLD OF A U.S. SERVICEMAN.”

“Lend me twenty bucks, Alaska,” Hoodwink said.

“Twenty for thirty,” Alaska replied

“Don’t be a one-way motherfucker.”

“That’s a better deal than you’d get from Kickback.”

“We ain’t gone yet, Shortcut?” Estorga said. “Let’s hit the beach. It’s oh-beer-thirty.”

“Beer, aye,” I replied.

“Hurry up, man. We don’t want to miss the bus.”

I changed clothes fast, and we headed down to the main deck. Snyder had the quarterdeck watch.

“Request permission to go ashore,” I said.

“No sneakers on the beach, Shortcut,” Snyder said.

“Sneakers are all I’ve got. They were okay in Japan.”

Snyder smirked and shook his head.

“Captain Quimp says no sneakers on the beach.”

“Go borrow some shoes, Shortcut,” Estorga said, “and hurry up.”

I ran back to 02 berthing. Alaska was playing solitaire. He had the duty.

“Let me borrow your boots, Alaska. Snyder won’t let me go ashore with sneakers.”

“Sure thing, Shortcut. Ten bucks.”

I didn’t have time to argue. I handed him a ten, pulled the cowboy boots on, and stood up.

“Why do they have to make these damn things so pointy?”

“So you can crush bugs in corners,” Alaska replied. “Don’t lose ‘em, or it’ll cost you seventy-five.”

Estorga saved me a seat on the bus. It was a bumpy ride through the jungle to the base and then a hike to the main gate. A crowd of sailors were lined up single file. We got in a long line behind Hayashi.

“Hurry up and wait,” I said.

“What’s with the line, Kenny?” Estorga asked.

“The guard is writing down serial numbers of cameras,” Hayashi explained. “If you have a camera when you go out, they want to make sure you still have it when you come back so you won’t sell it on the black market. It’s best to take only your body and your money.”

When we got to the front of the line, the guard said:

“Any cameras?”

“No,” we answered.

We squeezed through the crowd at the gate. We were surrounded by a group of Filipino boys between eight and twelve years old, offering to buy or sell anything.

“Camera? Watch? Stereo?”

“No thanks.”

We squeezed past them, repeating “No thanks. No thanks.”

We crossed a bridge over a narrow river.

“That’s Shit River,” Hayashi said.

One whiff explained the name. Filipino boys floated on the brown water in narrow wooden banca boats.

“PESO, PESO,” they called out. “PESO, PESO.”

Kickback threw a couple of pesos off the bridge, and a bunch of little kids mobbed him asking for more. Two boys dove into the brown water and came up with the pesos. At the other side of the bridge, the money exchange booths were under a concrete arch. Older men hawked cigarettes, gum, and cheap jewelry. We traded dollars for pesos. A jewelry vendor started talking to Hayashi.

“You buy necklace? Berry nice, berry nice. Ring por your girlpriend? Berry cheap price por you.”

Estorga and I kept moving. Kids tried to put their hands in our pockets. Estorga grabbed his wallet before a little girl did. She looked around seven. I held my cash in my teeth. They couldn’t reach that high.

“PESO, PESO,” they cried.

“This is worse than Tijuana,” Estorga said.

“Steady as she goes,” I replied.

The main thoroughfare was Magsaysay Drive, the only paved road in town. There were no traffic lights or stop signs. Magsaysay Drive was lined on both sides with eating spots and hotels but mostly bars. The locals drove motorcycles with sidecars and old Willys jeeps—called jeepneys—with wild paint jobs and fancy interiors. They taxied sailors from bar to bar. We walked past a place called Pauline’s. It had a moat out front with a live crocodile in it and a little footbridge without rails leading toward the entrance.

“I’ll bet that keeps down the drunks,” Estorga said.

“Want to go inside?” I asked.

“Let’s try that place across the street.”

He was pointing at a place called the Shamrock Intercontinental Club. We dodged jeepneys, crossed the street, and went inside. As soon as we found a table, two girls headed toward us.

“Two contacts at five yards,” said Estorga.

The girls sat down with us. The one closest to me wore a pink blouse with white shorts.

“What ship you prom?” she asked me.

“You looking por good time?” the other girl asked Estorga. She was wearing a black dress with high heels. “I lub you, no shit.”

“Jesus, girls,” Estorga said. “The sun isn’t even down yet. How about a beer?”

The first girl ran to the bar. She had nice legs.

“You make me horny,” the other girl said, grabbing Estorga’s crotch. “I puck you silly.”

“What’s your name?” Estorga asked.

“Burgee.”

The first girl returned quickly with two bottles of San Miguel. Estorga lifted his bottle toward the ceiling.

“Here’s to Olongapo,” he said.

We took a swallow.

“This stuff tastes stronger than Japanese beer,” I said.

“What you name?” the first girl asked. She sat next to me with one elbow on the table, smoking a cigarette. She looked seventeen or eighteen.

“Gary Thorpe. What’s yours?”

“Susie Sadayao.”

Burgee and Susie—the names seemed too cutesy to be real.

“We hab band starting soon,” Susie said. “Rusty Flyingfinger. You like music?”

“Sure.”

Burgee had her tongue in Estorga’s ear. The smoke from his cigarette was crinkling his eyes. When we drained our beers, Susie ran to get two more. Estorga leaned toward me.

“Dude, she’s warm for your form,” he said.

“She’s cute,” I said. “But I don’t want to take the first one I see.”

“You want to shop around a little, huh? Yeah, I can dig it. We’ll split after a while.”

Rusty Flyingfinger and his band were setting up. Rusty played some rock and roll licks on his guitar just to test the sound system. Susie came back with the beers.

“Rusty used to hab long hair bepore martial law,” she said.

“I think I’ll come back later,” I said.

“Where you go?”

“Yeah,” Estorga asked, “where you go?”

“I need some chow,” I said. “I’ll be back.”

“Wait. I’ll go with you.”

Estorga tried to disengage himself from Burgee. She had her hands under his shirt.

“You come back later,” Susie said. It wasn’t a question.

“Sure,” I said. “See you later.”

“I feel like a kid in a candy store,” Estorga said when we were outside. An old man squatted on the sidewalk with a hibachi grill between his knees. We bought two shish kebabs.

“Monkey meat,” the old man said after I took a bite.

“You think this is really monkey meat?”

“Nah,” Estorga replied. “Well, maybe.”

Music was pouring out of the bars. We walked up one side of Magsaysay Drive and down the other. The only reminders of President Ferdinand Marcos and martial law were the machine-gun-toting soldiers on the street corners. The sun was going down. We went into a place called the East End.

“ESTORGA! SHORTCUT! OVER HERE!”

Finesse, Billings, Loophole, and Crapshoot were waving beer bottles at us. They all had girls on their laps.

“You’re just in time for Penny Poontang,” Billings said.

Penny Poontang was onstage doing a strip tease. The guys in the crowd placed empty San Miguel bottles all around the edge of the stage. Each bottle had a peso coin balanced on its mouth. Completely nude, with her hands in the air, Penny Poontang squatted down on top of each bottle. When she stood up, the bottles were still standing, but the pesos were gone.

“That’s one prehensile pussy,” Finesse said.

“That ain’t nothin’,” Crapshoot replied. “Last WESTPAC, they had a split-tail in here named Juicy Lucy. She could pick up a peeled banana and a peeled hard-boiled egg with her snatch, do a belly dance, and then pop ‘em out again unbroken in the opposite order.”

“Never saw nothing like that in Wisconsin,” Loophole said. “Can you imagine the fuck she’d give ya?”

“That’s not all she’d give ya,” Finesse replied. “You can build up a tolerance to penicillin.”

“Lend me a peso, Shortcut,” Estorga said.

I handed him a peso, and he hurried to the stage. Estorga was lying on his back with the peso balanced on his tongue. Penny Poontang sat on his face. When she stood up, the peso was gone. She walked off the stage to cheers and applause.

“That can’t be sanitary,” Finesse said when Estorga came back to the table. “Wipe your mouth, at least.”

The show was over. We finished our drinks and went for a walk down Magsaysay Drive. Hankins was walking toward us from the direction of the base. He was bumping into other guys on purpose. He elbowed a guy from another ship.

“Hankins is always picking fights,” Finesse said, “ever since he found out his wife is dating the Morton. Every time somebody knocks his dick in the dirt, I have to patch him up.”

“Who’s Morton?” I asked.

“The Morton. It’s a destroyer.”

“She’s cheating on him with a destroyer?” Billings asked.

“Better than an aircraft carrier,” Loophole said.

Hankins was yelling:

“DON’T GIVE ME A HARD TIME, BOY, OR YOU’LL WAKE UP WITH A CROWD AROUND YA.”

Hankins was skinny but wiry. He shifted his weight from foot to foot. He landed two punches on a heavier guy who shook them off like they were nothing. The guy gave Hankins a hook in the belly that folded him in half and sat him down on the sidewalk. Then, he walked away.

“Let me look at you,” Finesse said.

“Getcher hands off me, pecker checker,” Hankins replied. “Which way did he go?”

“Ease off, Duane,” Billings told Hankins. “Let’s get drunk.”

Loud music was coming from the Shamrock. It was the Ides of March tune, “Vehicle.” I thought it was a jukebox, but when we walked in, we saw it was Rusty Flyingfinger live with a horn section. He was mimicking the vocals perfectly. Burgee latched on to Estorga. Susie spotted me from across the room.

“Where you go?” she demanded. “You butterply on me?”

“What are you talking about?” I asked.

“Butterfly,” Billings explained, “means fool around with another girl. Not that they’re jealous. They just don’t want you spending your money on someone else.”

“Some of ‘em carry butterfly knives,” Loophole added.

“GIVE US SOME MOJOS!” Crapshoot yelled toward the bar.

“What the hell is a mojo, anyway?” Estorga asked.

“Forty pesos a pitcher,” Loophole replied.

“A mojo,” Billings explained, “is rum mixed with pineapple juice and crushed ice, also vodka, bourbon, gin, and beer. They taste great, but they’ll take your head off.”

When the band finished playing, I went up to the stage and asked Rusty if I could sit in on drums.

“Can you play ‘Wipeout’?” Rusty asked me. His Filipino accent sounded nothing like his singing voice.

“Sure.”

“How about ‘In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida’? You play ‘In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida’?”

“By myself?”

“Okay, but don’t break ‘em,” the drummer said.

I squeezed in behind the drums. They played a new Kool and the Gang thing called “Funky Stuff” with Rusty on police whistle.

“Not bad, Shortcut,” Billings said when I got back to the table. The guys were hoisting glass mugs of mojos at me.

“You play drums!” Susie said.

She looked happy. She had beautiful eyes. She sat on my lap and put her arms around my neck. Billings handed me a glass. The pineapple juice covered the taste of the booze. Mojos were tasty, but I switched back to beer. I didn’t want to get drunk. I wanted to get laid.

“YOU BUY OUT PAPER?” Susie asked me. She was yelling over the music.

“WHAT’S THAT?” I asked.

Loophole yelled:

“YOU PAY THE OWNER OF THE BAR TO TAKE YOUR HONEY HOME EARLY. OTHERWISE, SHE HAS TO STAY UNTIL CLOSING TIME AND EARN MONEY SELLING DRINKS. FOR THIRTY-FIVE BUCKS, YOU CAN BUY A STEADY PAPER. THEN, SHE DOESN’T HAVE TO WORK AT ALL. SHE’LL WAIT FOR YOU AT THE MAIN GATE EVERY DAY.”

Susie was nodding and smiling. Renting a girl for a night was one thing, but I didn’t want to hire a girlfriend for a month. I took Susie out on the dance floor. I wasn’t much of a dancer, but neither was anybody else. You just had to rock from side to side with the music and not fall down.

At 2330, The Shamrock Club started to empty out. Billings, Crapshoot, Hankins, Loophole, and Finesse left with girls. Burgee was leaning up against Estorga, breathing in his ear.

“I’ve got to get out of here, Shortcut,” he said.

Rusty and the band were packing up. Susie leaned toward me.

“You wait for me at tea house around the corner,” she said. “I meet you there.”

Rain started pouring outside, but it was still at least seventy-five degrees. Along both sides of Magsaysay Drive, locals were opening umbrellas. They looked like dozens of blooming flowers in motion. I found the Ong Pin Teahouse around the corner on Gordon Avenue. I stood waiting under the blue canopy over the doorway. A dog with three legs hobbled along. It was a quarter to midnight. If Susie stood me up, I’d have to run through the rain to make it to the main gate before midnight curfew. I didn’t want to get picked up by the Shore Patrol or, worse, by one of those soldiers with the machine guns. I was about to flag down a jeepney when I saw Susie walking toward me.

“Come with me,” she said.

I followed her into the teahouse. She bought cigarettes, a magazine, and some pills.

“What are the pills for?” I asked.

“So I don’t catch clap when we make lub,” she said.

So much for sweet talk. It was almost midnight when we got aboard a covered motorized trishaw that took us about a mile up Gordon Avenue. Susie paid the driver. She took my hand and led me through a narrow alley between two concrete block buildings to her front door at number ninety-two. Susie’s family was inside: an old woman, a ten-year-old boy, and two little kids, a boy and a girl. At one end of the room was a stove. Wall shelves were empty, except for a few cans of food. There was a big canvas sack of rice on the floor. Lizards were skittering along the tops of the interior walls that stopped two feet short of the ceiling. Their toilet was outside. A little white dog sniffed at me, wagging his tail.

“What’s your dog’s name?” I asked.

“Kip,” Susie answered.

I felt nervous and out of place with all these people. They all knew why I was there, even the little kids, but I couldn’t go back to the ship now. It was after curfew. I gave up on the idea of sex. I couldn’t do it with her whole family watching us.

“Come with me,” Susie said.

“Where?”

“My room.”

She took me through a door to a separate bedroom, the only other room in the place. The room was taken up almost entirely by a double bed. She turned on an electric fan and picked up an alarm clock.

“What time you hab to be back to ship?”

“Set it for six,” I said.

“Take op you shirt and pants. Gib me thirty pesos.”

It was cheaper than a pitcher of mojos. I handed her the money. Thirty pesos—about five bucks—would have bought me a hamburger and fries back home, with change back. I took off Alaska’s cowboy boots. Susie took the money and the boots to the outer room.

Lying on the bed drunk in my underwear, I could hear Susie and her mother speaking in rapid Tagalog. What were they saying? Let’s kill him after he goes to sleep and sell these boots? A lizard crawled up the wall and across a small crucifix over the doorway. The rain was still falling outside. The air was thick, even with the fan on. I was glad she had mosquito netting on the window. In a few minutes, the light went out in the outer room and Susie came in. She took off her clothes and got in the bed. She lit a cigarette and held the pack out to me.

“No thanks,” I said.

She turned on a bedside lamp, put on a pair of rimless glasses, and began to read the magazine she bought. She looked younger now that she was naked. She couldn’t have been doing this for very long. My conscience started pushing through the booze. It was rotten that Filipinos had to prostitute their daughters to get by. I remembered reading in one of my history classes that the Philippines had been an American “client state” since the Spanish-American War. Being here was different from reading about it. The poverty was worse than Mexico, but I didn’t want to go on being a cherry boy. My conscience was overruled. I traced a finger lightly along the contour of her cute butt, trying to get something going. She kept giggling at the damn magazine. I looked at it over her shoulder. It was some kind of comic book, but it was in Tagalog. At last, she put it aside.

“You know I hab many boypriends.”

I didn’t know what to say.

“I know,” I said.

“I do this por money.”

“I know.”

I wished she’d stop talking. As though reading my mind, she put her glasses on the nightstand, turned out the light, and put her arms around my neck. I kissed her mouth, her throat, her cupcake tits. I was trying to put it in, and I was having trouble. She grabbed it and put it in for me. After that, everything happened on autopilot.

Later, as I was drifting off to sleep, I remember thinking: So, this is what it’s all about. I had crossed an ocean, rented a pair of boots, and paid thirty pesos to get laid in a hot room full of lizards, with the girl’s family less than ten feet away. Don’t get me wrong. It was great while it was happening, and yet, somehow, I expected something more. I wasn’t sure what.