Abe's Misadventures 1
Departure Day
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Abram “Abe” Dykstra dreamed of freefalling. He reached for his parachute rip cord and found nothing. Abe panicked until he remembered he was bungee jumping, the cords securely binding his lower legs. The water came rushing at him. He plunged. The cord was too long and wouldn’t pull him back up. He couldn’t swim with his legs bound. He clawed toward to surface to breathe.
Abe woke with a start, heart pounding. D-Day had arrived.
He showered, dressed, and checked the contents of his baggage once again, paying special attention to a large brown paper envelope filled with all manner of documents. His MEPS package, the Military Entrance Processing Station paperwork in triplicate. His passport out of his hometown into the big, wide world.
It was his departure day, leaving home for bootcamp. As the dream faded he was neither excited nor nervous, just numb, an automaton, moving out of muscle memory in a daze. A fresh high school graduate out of his league.
The date was set a year ago. Waves of emotions pounded him relentlessly in the interim, wearing him down. One moment he felt extreme relief at finding a path not involving minimum wage servitude, the next smoldering with envy of his classmates preparing for universities. Fear he would mess things up and fail followed, shame and self-anger for not working harder in school, teenage rage at the workings of the world in general. Then the cycle would repeat until, ultimately, the emotions faded along with the time slipping away, emotional waves receding to a minor tide ebb and flow.
He joined his parents for breakfast. From an outside view it was just a quiet family meal. But for them, the tension was thick, the air hard to breathe, sounds of cutlery and chewing unnaturally amplified. Both parents had disapproved of his choice to pre-enlist at seventeen. They still disliked the enlistment choice itself but were quiet about it now.
Abe's older brother, Ken, finally emerged from sleep and joined breakfast, unkept hair and disheveled clothes hastily put on. Oblivious to the tension in the air, he ate quickly and noisily, accustomed to being late to the table and every other engagement in life. The family waited for Ken to finish.
Abe gathered his things while his parents hovered, and Ken waited impatiently. There were contrived hugs and last words of encouragement, the part Abe dreaded. This never happened between them normally. It felt strange, alien. This wasn’t his family. Finally, with last goodbyes done, he could head out the door.
The rural town’s only taxi, a retired farmer driving a beat-up old station wagon, pulled up right on time. It would take him to the bus station for the first leg of the trip to MEPS, over a hundred miles away.
Abe hated riding buses; it was for people lugging problems along with their baggage. Still, he boarded the bus as soon as he could just to get out of the bus station lobby where the troubled people mingled individually, casting distrustful glances at one another. They were slow to re-board even with the repeated droning reminders the bus was soon departing. There was no urgency in the announcements.
The adventure had begun.
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