This is a bit from my WIP (work in progress if you're as bad as me with acronyms)
China Fleet Club
A military romance
It was
fascinating. The streets were narrow and
the buildings towered above. Vending
machines were everywhere. Soup in a can,
meat in a can, vegetables in a can, coffee in a can and they were all hot. If you wanted something to eat you could find
it in a vending machine. The kids were
all in one sort of uniform or another, obviously on their way home from
school. The smells of brick and rice
permeating the air.
There were food stalls
everywhere as they walked the narrow streets.
You could order at a counter right there on the street, or go inside to
sit down. Hale stopped to grab a bite at
one. Trace looked over the selections
and got a couple of things. It could all
be carried as they were bite size.
Jackie looked and ordered a couple of jelly donuts. They left and Jackie took a big bite and
swallowed as she walked. She started
choking and ran to a trash can gagging.
It was too late, it had gone down.
She threw the other one a way.
Hamilton was laughing and Trace just handed her a coke from the vending
machine there. All the guys had big
smiles on their faces, laughing at her.
“So, Breeze, what did
you think you were eating?”
“A jelly donut! What was
that?”
“Um, that was a sushi
bar. I’d guess you had fish eggs on some
sort of cake. Didn't you like them?”
Hale grinned at her.
Jackie stuck her tongue
out at him. “Jerk. Thanks for the coke, Trace.”
“Better stick to
vending machines Breeze,” Turner laughed.
Trying to scrape her
tongue and get the taste out of her mouth Jackie continued with the guys
ignoring their laughter as she continued to make gagging noises. Nasty.
She’d make sure she knew what she was eating from now on. She smiled.
Still, what an experience she thought, the fishy flavor still sitting on
her tongue, making her gag.
They wandered the
streets for hours. They had been enticed
into a pachinko parlor earlier. The chink
of the balls as they poured down and the clicking of the buttons on the
machines had intrigued them. The
machines had little Japanese standing in front of them, concentrating as if
their lives depended on it. There was
little room in the parlor. In the small
space there were over a hundred pachinko machines, a non-stop tinkle of balls
raining down. They were too big to get
through it, so they inched around the edges checking it out. It turns out that it was a gambling parlor,
Japanese style.
Back in the street, the
tinkling of balls behind them, they talked over what to do next.
“It’s getting time to
head back,” Turner said. “I want to
check out a couple of bars the guys from the shop told me about before liberty is
up. You all want to go?”
With everyone’s
agreement, they headed back towards base.
Most of the Japanese seemed friendly, but there were the places they
were warned about, the ones who had the “Americans keep out” sign posted at
their doors.
A block from the base
gates, they took a left turn. The
streets before this had seemed narrow but this was worse. It looked like a back
alley. The buildings were close together,
tall, dark and the smells were of old alcohol and smoke. Yep, this was the right place. Dimly lit bars lined both sides of the
street. A couple had the no American
signs, but the majority catered to the US sailors.
“Smell that.” Turner took a deep breath. “Beer.
C’mon let’s check one out.”
