HOW LIKE A GOD
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he was pretty sick when we got there, and he never got too strong
on the diet. So I sort of nursed him. Well, we promised each other
that when we got out of there and back to the States we would throw
a big drunk, and sometimes we talked for hours about that drunk
... and the women.
"Then we got exchanged and shipped to Japan, and then on a
troop ship back to the States. When we got to Seattle this kid and
me went out the first night. Well, I got loaded right away, but he,
he didn't drink too much, and just kept sitting there and looking at
me and the wall and grinning kind of. And I kept drinking, and
pretty soon I didn't know what was happening.
"I woke up the next morning and there was both my arms swol–
len up like melons. There was this tattoo on them. I asked the kid
what happened and he said I told him I wanted to get tattooed the
night before. He said he took me to this place and I asked him
what to have put on my arms, so he told the guy to put on this.
He told me it meant 'The shit hit the fan.'
"Right away I didn't believe him. I didn't never want to get
tattooed before. Why should I then? And why this crap on my arms
anyway? So I asked him
if
he was lying, and he sort of didn't look
me in the eyes, see, and he said no. But I didn't believe him, and
he left for home the next day and I never saw
him
again.
"You know when I first saw you, you reminded me of him.
You're the same kind of wise young guy. What's it to you anyway
how I got this tattoo? Why are you so interested in what them
words say? I mean ... you wouldn't have that tattooed on me
would you? Not after being my buddy for a year in prison camp,
and living with me every day and all? That ain't right. Because I
did take care of him in camp and everything, and just because he
had a college degree he didn't have no right to do this, did he? I
mean, I'm not so stupid as that."
"I don't think I'd do that to you," I said. But suddenly I felt
a need to dispel this mocking spectre of myself. "Are you sure he
did it?" I asked him. "Didn't you ever want to get tattooed, as some
kind of souvenir of that time?"
"No. He did it by himself. It don't matter, I guess. Maybe
that was his way of saying goodbye, or saying he thought I was all
right. Anyhow, when I saw you it reminded me of him, and I wanted
