In The Finest Tradition

In the not-too-distant future, Israel launches a coordinated surprise attack against Iran’s nuclear weapons research and development facilities; completely destroying their production capabilities and stockpiles. Despite widespread international condemnation; the offensive achieves its goals and sets the Iranian quest for a deliverable nuclear weapon back more than a decade.

Iran launches an invasion of neighboring Pakistan in an effort to seize control of the country’s nuclear arsenal. Iranian forces and their insurgent allies drive deep into Afghanistan and Pakistan; threatening to destabilize the entire region and become a nuclear power with a single rapid strike.

The international community is reluctant to intervene in another Middle Eastern war. The United States Congress passes a resolution authorizing the President to employ military force to defend the region and prevent Iran from seizing control of the Pakistani nuclear arsenal. Over ninety thousand troops are deployed to the combat zone in the first year of the conflict, with more predicted to follow. American efforts to halt the Iranian advance are unsuccessful. The war increases in intensity far more rapidly than the analysts predicted. Casualties begin to mount in numbers higher than expected. Public opposition to the war grows.

The war creates a strain on U.S. military commitments around the world and forces Congress to act. For the first time since the end of the Vietnam War, the United States institutes a military draft to field a credible force in the ever-increasing conflict.

Draft lottery numbers are issued and conscription begins immediately. As a result of evolving social attitudes and changes to the Selective Service Act, military conscription is extended to women aged eighteen to twenty-six. For the first time in the nation's history, America’s daughters will join her sons in being called to arms and sent to fight and die in a foreign land.

JUNE 02nd

They’re double-teaming her! They’ll cut straight across the field and they’ll both be in position to score! Even Katie’s not that fast! Get over there! Get over there before they score another goal! If they go up by one this late in the game? We’ll lose for sure!

“Donna, get up there!”

Come on! Get up there! The two of them that close to the goal? They’ll fake a kick, pass it, and score! Run! Get up there! We’re tied! Don’t let them score! We can still win this! One more goal for us and our defense can hold them off until the clock runs out!

“Donna! That way! Go right! Go right!”

I’ll go left! We’ll get right on top of them and split them up! They’re not going to score on us! It’s the last game of the year! I’d rather we get a tie than a loss! Run! Get up there! How much time is left? Come on! Go for the pass! I can pick it off and kick it back up the field! We can go for a goal or run out the clock for a tie! Yes! Got it! Pass! Pass!

“Katie, take it! Take it!”

She got it! She got the ball! Kick it! Pass it to Donna! Hurry! Pass it!

“Katie! Pass! Pass!”

Perfect! Donna’s got it! Go! Down the field! Hurry! I can get into position! Hurry! Get over there! We can still score! We’ve got time! There’s still time! Hurry!

“Go, Donna! Go! You’ve got it! Go! Go!”

Go for the far corner! She won’t be able to block it! Come on, Donna! Kick it! Right into the goal! Kick it! Hurry! Before they get anybody over there! Kick it! Yes! It’s in! It’s a goal! We’re up by one! A minute fifty-three left on the clock! We can run it out! We run out the clock and we win! And if McCarthy High loses their game? We take first place! The number one spot in the league! We can do it! Wouldn’t that be something? To close out our senior year as the league champions! Finally! We’ve been trying for three years already! It’s about time we came out on top!

“Way to go, Donna! Come on, everyone! Strong defense! Keep them away from the goal! We’ve got less than two minutes! We can do it!”

OK, I’m not the team captain, but who cares! I’m fired up! I’ve been sweating my butt off on this field all season! I’ve worked just as hard as anyone out here and harder than some of them. I knew I’d never get picked for team captain – I’m not anywhere near as fast as some of the other girls, and Katie’s hands-down the best player we’ve got, but nobody can say I didn’t earn my spot on the team. Hard work, listen to the coach, and always give it your all. That’s what mom and daddy always say and that’s what I do. It works.

What’s up with Felicia? She’s over on the sideline, talking with Laurie. Hello! We’ve still got a game to win!

“Hey, Felicia! It’s not over yet! Let’s go!”

She’s usually a lot more focused than that. And this is our last game of the season! We’re seniors! This is it! The only thing after this is graduation!

“What’s so important it’s got you distracted all of a sudden?”

“You didn't hear? Laurie said Stu Mason got his letter this afternoon. His dad called him and told him as soon as the mail arrived.”

What? We haven’t even graduated! He already got the letter? That’s crazy!

“It’s for real?”

“It’s for real. He got drafted. He’s got to report to the induction center in ten days. That makes what? Eight from Wilson so far?”

That sounds about right. Eight seniors from Woodrow Wilson High already got drafted. Well, seven if you leave out Mark Fitzgerald. He graduated last year, but he got tagged in the very first round when the draft started. Still, it’s kind of hard to believe. I mean, they only started that up in what? January? It’s only the first week of June. How come they’re picking so many from this town? It’s not like we’re a big city or anything. We’re a tiny little unincorporated town outside of Moscow, Idaho. This is really creepy. That stupid war seemed so far away until they started drafting people. Now it’s really here. Are we going to have draft protests like they’re having in the big cities? If they keep taking people, then it’ll probably happen. I hope to be long gone by the time it gets that bad.

“The only letter I want to get is an acceptance letter from Northwestern.”

“Jordy, they probably haven’t even sent those out yet. I don’t know anybody who got an acceptance letter from any of them. Not even Karen Shin, and she got cleared to apply for early admission to Cornell.”

Sure she did. When you’re the class valedictorian with a four-point-six GPA, you can pretty much go wherever you want. I don’t think she took a single class this year that wasn’t an AP course. Straight A’s all the way, too. I heard she applied to MIT. Don’t ask me how her parents are going to afford it if she gets accepted. We don’t have any rich people in this town. Everyone’s plain old blue-collar, or so my mom says. We sure are. I'm proud of that. So are most people around here.

“Did your mom ever get over it when you told her you wanted to go to UC San Diego?”

“My mom? Me going to school in California? What do you think?”

Felicia waited about two months to tell her parents she wanted to go to school in California. Around here? That’s sort of like telling your parents that you want to go to college in North Korea. This is Idaho. We don’t have any lefties around here. Daddy likes to say they’d never survive hunting season. He’s not the only one who says that, so I'm not sure he's joking.

“I get it. Hey, what do you think Heather’s going to do when Stu tells her the bad news?”

“Heather? Probably sleep with him as a going-away present.”

That’s kind of what I was thinking. Everyone knows Stu’s been trying to get in her pants since they paired up, but she’s best friends with Maureen Murray and she got careless and had a major pregnancy scare last year. It turned out she wasn’t pregnant, but the whole thing had an effect on a lot of girls in our class. Well, we’re all graduating and he’s getting sent off to war in Pakistan, so maybe she’ll do it? She’s probably never going to see him again. She’ll go off to college while he’s in the Army. Most high school romances don’t last beyond senior year. Everyone knows that. Even me, and I don’t have a boyfriend. I sort of did, but…let’s just say it didn’t work out. It's OKIt’s better that way. Afterward, I realized he’s kind of a jerk.

“Harcourt! Aden! Quit the jaw-jacking and get your butts in the game!”

Coach Stover. Everything she ever says always ends with “get your butt in the game!” But she’s right, so enough talk. Time to win this one!

“Come on, let’s run out the clock and pray McCarthy loses today. They’re playing Pershing. They lost to them once already.”

“Pershing? No way is that girl they’ve got playing forward still eligible! We should file a protest!”

People have been saying that all year. She looks like she’s at least twenty, she’s about six feet tall, and she’s got bigger muscles than a lot of the guys on the varsity football team. She’s good, too. She can blow through your midfielders like they’re not ever there. They blew us away four to zip when we played them.

“They’re not even in the running this year. Let it go and keep your fingers crossed. Come on, let’s win this!”

It’ll be nice to go out on a win, even if we don’t end up as the champions. I’m going to miss playing soccer. I’m going to miss a lot of things. My whole life has been here. This town is all I’ve ever known. As much as I’m looking forward to going to college; I’m going to miss this place. I was never one of those girls who hates living in a small town out in the middle of nowhere. I love it. Right now, I plan to come right back here after I graduate college – if I can. Like I said: it’s a blue-collar town and I’m not about to build houses like my dad and uncle. I'm not exactly sure what I want to do with my life, but I’d like to do it here. I’m a small-town girl and I like it that way. A college degree won’t change that. At least, I don’t think it will. I know I don’t want it to. Come on! Let's go! Let's win this thing!

Walking home. Victory! We won! We ran out the clock and won three to two! Not bad! Not bad at all! I really think this is the strongest team we've ever fielded. I hope we wind up as the league champs. We deserve it. Just once. We usually come in third or fourth, but we had that something special this year. It would be so awesome to finish up high school as the league champions, wouldn't it? Now it's up to Pershing. If they win? We're it! If they lose? We take second place. If it's a tie? We tie with McCarthy and we end up sharing the first-place spot. That would be sort of a bummer, but at least we'd get to say we were one of the champions. We'll see what happens. Right now, I've got bigger things on my mind. Graduation! It's over! High school is finished! All that's left is the cap-and-gown ceremony! God, I can't believe it! It feels like I've been waiting my whole life for this! Waiting and working! And now I've actually done it! We've actually done it! The senior class! I can't believe graduation is finally here. There were times when I thought it would never come. I wasn't the only one who felt that way. All of my friends and I have had dreams where we were stuck in high school forever. I wonder if all kids have those dreams? I'll bet they do.

I don’t live far from the school, and I prefer walking to riding my bike. I like riding my bike, but in the afternoon? A lot of people are getting off work and they don’t exactly look where they’re going. Especially not on a Thursday afternoon. I could name at least seven people who’ve been hit by cars on their bikes. None of them got seriously hurt, but they could’ve. People around here really need to learn how to drive. Yeah, look who's talking! I'm not exactly an expert driver. I’ve got a license, but I almost never get to use it. Daddy’s truck is strictly for work and mom doesn’t want me behind the wheel of her car. She never gets tired of telling me that. In two years, I think I've driven it ten times. Most of the time, she was in the car with me. I can't wait until I can get my own car. I've been saving up for one, but they're crazy expensive; even used cars. Someday, though. Someday.

As you learned from Coach Stover, I’m Jordan Harcourt. Jordy to my friends; Miss Harcourt or Jordan to most of my teachers who never seem to tire of making my life miserable. That’s what teachers do, isn’t it? That’s one thing about high school I won’t miss. It probably won’t be much better at college, will it? At least, not while I'm a freshman. I can’t believe it’s all over: no more high school! All that’s left is the graduation ceremony in the gym tomorrow and that’s it. It'll be the last time we're all together. Then I get to sit on pins and needles for the next month until I find out if I got into Northwestern. I admit it: I’m completely obsessed with getting accepted there. I put in for some other colleges, but mainly because my mom made me do it. For me? It’s Northwestern or...or I die! That’s where I want to go. It’s all I’ve thought about for a year and a half. I know it’s really competitive, but I’ve got super-good grades and a lot of extracurricular activities; not just soccer. I got a fifteen-seventy on my SATs. I wrote a killer essay, and I’ve got letters of recommendation from the head of my father’s construction company, two of my teachers, and even one from the Deputy Mayor. Mom knows him, so she kind of pressed him into doing it. Hey, I need all the help I can get! They only take about seven percent of their applicants! And it hasn’t exactly helped calm my nerves that I sent the application in before Christmas and I still haven't heard anything. It was due on January 3rd, so I made sure to send it in plenty of time. But it means I’ve been worrying about it for the last six months. I know I’m not the only one in the same boat, but personally? It’s been hell. Rooting through the mail six days a week and never getting anything? It's hell. I’m kind of at the point where even if they say no, I think I’d be better off knowing for sure. Just please don’t say no! I swear, I’ll die on the spot if I don’t get in! I have to get in! It's absolutely crucial! They have to admit me! So hurry up and make the decision already! I can't take much more of this waiting!

So what do I do when I’m not in class or chewing my fingernails down to the nub over getting into my dream school? Well, I work at McCormick’s Bakery. I mostly run the cash register, but I bake some of the pastries. Not the real elaborate ones, though. Those are a lot more complicated than you might think. I can handle the donuts. The fancy stuff? I leave those to other people who know how to do it better. It’s just a part-time job, but it gets me better spending cash than a babysitting job. It’s regular, too. Babysitting isn’t. You never know when someone is going to call you. With this job, I can actually save some money. So what else? Well, I do volunteer work at the library. OK, I mostly do it so I can put it on my college application and it looks good, but I like it. Sometimes I read to kids, and sometimes I even read to old people. Their eyesight is really bad, so sometimes they come in and pick out a book and one of us reads it to them. It’s pretty cool, except when they pick one of those books that just puts you to sleep. I’m not making that up. I once had this lady who had me read this book called The Mill on the Floss. It was so boring that I was actually fighting to stay awake, and then I looked over at her and she was sound asleep! Crummy book! I don’t care if the guy who wrote it was famous. It’s that boring! But if volunteering to read it gets me into Northwestern? Then it was worth every boring, painful minute of it!

I hate to say it, but even graduation has been overshadowed by that stupid war in Pakistan. You know; because of the draft. It's all anyone talks about; especially my friends. We're all either seventeen or eighteen, so it kind of sits over our heads like a big black cloud. They sprung it on us so suddenly. One minute they're sending troops to Pakistan to fight a war we don't seem to have any stake in, and the next thing we knew, the people in Washington are saying we need a new draft because of all the craziness in the world. It's so stupid! When they sent all those people to Pakistan? They said they'd all be back in six months tops. They'd show up, flex a little good old American muscle, and everything would go right back to normal. Then all of a sudden, they're saying a ton of them got killed and we need tons more people to go over there and fight. That's when they started the draft. And as soon as they did? They changed the law and said girls have to go too. I think that's infinite stupid! I don't know any girls around here who want to be soldiers and go to war in Pakistan. I sure don't want to go! I don’t really understand any of it. I think politics and foreign affairs are about as interesting as watching grass grow. I know what I saw on the news: the Iranians were all ready to start making nukes. They’d made a few, but they were really big and they didn’t have any way to drop them on their enemies. They didn’t have any of those huge bomber planes like we’ve got. And the ones they built wouldn’t fit on their missiles and nobody would help them make them smaller, which the guy on the news said is really hard to do. Then the Israelis sent a bunch of jet planes to blow up all their nuke factories, so the Iranians decided to invade Pakistan to steal their nukes and missiles so they’d be a nuclear power right away. It seems they had a lot of help, too. Lots of terrorists and people like that; trying to help them take over the country. In Pakistan right now, they’ve got two governments fighting over who really runs the country. I mean fighting a war. They're killing each other. One of them is on our side and the other one hates us. It got really bad and we sent a lot of weapons to help our side out, but it wasn’t enough. The guys who like us were losing. That’s when we started sending troops to help them fight and kick the Iranians out. Not many at first, but then the Iranians started pouring people into Pakistan and now we’ve got a ton of people over there. And now they’re talking about sending a lot more. They say it’s necessary; that our national security is at stake. We can't let the Iranians win. Nobody paid much attention to it at first, but then they started the draft and now everyone does. It’s the first thing you see on the news every day. It’s really bad over there, and it doesn’t look like it’s getting any better. People are up in arms about it. Sometimes it’s pretty scary. I wish it would all just go away, but that isn’t going to happen anytime soon. Even our President said so. Everyone on the news says we’re stuck with it for now. We’re not getting out.

At first, it wasn’t a big deal. Everyone knew we sent some troops over there, but they were supposed to be like advisors or something. Put on a good show and scare the Iranians and the terrorists. Then it got really bad, and our troops started doing a lot of the fighting. That’s when they sent about twenty thousand people there. That was bad. A lot of those people got killed. The people on the news? They said we were in over our heads. They said we underestimated the situation. The Iranians were in it to win. And with everything else going on in the world? The Russians causing a lot of trouble in Europe and the Chinese starting trouble over Taiwan? They didn’t have enough people in the Army to cover everything, so they started the draft again. Nobody could believe it when they did that. Mom and daddy sure couldn't. They said it was totally stupid. So did a lot of people around here. Daddy says he remembers grandpa talking about the draft during the Vietnam War, but America hadn’t seen one since then. Now we’ve got one, and this time, even girls have to register for it. I did. I had to. It’s the law, and you can’t get financial aid for college unless you’re registered. It says so right on the application. They check when you apply, and if you’re not registered, then they automatically register you. You get an e-mail from Selective Service saying you're now registered and they'll mail you your draft card eventually. Then you're eligible for student financial aid. How else can you pay for college unless you're filthy rich? I know how much college costs. Mom and daddy haven't stopped talking about it since I started my senior year. Neither have all of my friends' parents. It's like I said: we don't have any filthy rich people here. If you want your kids to go to college? It's a scholarship or student loans or both.

Nobody thought much about the war or even about the draft until they started calling people up. It was crazy fast. They started the callups almost as soon as the new law went into effect. We know people who got called up; people in the neighborhood. All of them were boys, though. Stu Mason is just the latest, but they sure grabbed him up fast. He turned eighteen in March. That's less than three months ago. I turned eighteen three weeks ago. Some of my friends are already eighteen, and more of them are going to turn eighteen this summer. I haven’t heard of any girls getting drafted around here, but I know it’s happened in other places. We all know it's only a matter of time before they start coming for us. I can’t believe they’re drafting girls. Daddy says it’s some sort of social statement: they’re just trying to prove a point about diversity and equality. I don’t know what the point is, but I’ve seen stories on the news about girls who got drafted. The stories didn’t say they were sent off to war, but that was the idea. They're definitely sending girls off to fight in Pakistan. More than a few of them have already gotten killed. Other girls have come back with their arms and legs shot off. The war is going badly. It seems like everybody who goes there comes back with body parts missing. Either that, or they come back dead.

My friends and I are all really nervous about it. It’s like I said: the stories coming back from the war are really scary. Mom was watching the news a few nights ago and they showed a clip of rows and rows of coffins with flags on them coming back from the fighting. It scared me. That could be me in one of those coffins. I don’t think they’re going to draft me. I mean, why would they want me? I’m not exactly a G.I. Jane-type. I do know that some of the girls around here who were thinking about joining up so they could pay for college have changed their minds. The news from the war is just too scary right now. Some of them looked into joining the Navy because they're not fighting the war, but people say that could change. And there's no end in sight. Nobody seems to know what we should be doing over there. There's been a lot of criticizing the way our Generals are handling the war. People say the fighting is really vicious and the Generals just don't seem to get it. I don't know. I just know I don’t want anything to do with it. Neither does anybody else around here.

And there’s our house. It’s nice, don’t you think? Mom says she’s going to kill daddy if he doesn’t stop tinkering with it. He’s always fixing something, changing something, refurbishing something; you know what I mean. He builds houses for a living, so I guess it’s never quite good enough in his eyes. I think it's just perfect the way it is. It’s just the three of us: me, mom, and daddy. I don’t have any brothers or sisters. I’ve got four cousins, but they don’t live in this town. We have to drive two hours if we want to go visit them. It worked out well for me, though. I’m totally daddy’s little girl. He’s been going around the house for the last month, saying how he can’t believe I’m about to graduate from high school. Imagine how he’s going to feel when I go off to college. It’s not like I can go to college here, right? The closest one is in Moscow and I don’t want to go to school there. It's not much of a college. I want to go to Northwestern. I want to go there and I think I want to study marketing. Then I’ll come back here and help daddy advertise his business. He always says most of their business comes from word-of-mouth referrals. That figures, since everybody here knows everybody else. He does all right, but I want him to do a lot better. He says if they could advertise more, then they'd have a lot more business. If I can help? I’m going to do it. Mom and daddy have done everything for me for my whole life. I want to pay them back somehow.

Oh, look! Perfect timing! Here comes daddy now! I can spot his truck a mile away. I don’t even need to see the sign on the side of it. It’s just about dinner time and he never misses dinner. Not as hard as he works. He needs to eat.

“Jordy! How’d you girls do?”

“We won! Now, if McCarthy loses to…”

“Jordy, what did I tell you about rooting for people to lose? You wouldn’t like it if people rooted for you to lose, would you?”

No, but I’m not really rooting for them to lose. I just want us to win the top spot. Is that so bad? We never won it before! Not even once! McCarthy High has won it twice already! It’s our turn!

“I know. But we’ve got a shot at coming in number one! What better way to cap off my senior year than coming in first?”

“It’s not about coming in first. It’s about doing your best. Give it a year or two and most folks won’t remember if you came in first, but they’ll always remember if you did your best every time. You can take that to the bank.”

That’s daddy for you: he’s always going on about doing your best and giving everything your best effort. He’s right. It’s always worked for him. Everyone at his company says he’s the best, hardest worker on the crew. And they’re not just saying that. I know for a fact it’s true.

“Well, I still hope we take the top spot for once.”

“So do I. You girls worked hard and you've earned it. So are you working tomorrow afternoon?”

“Uh-huh. School’s a half-day, and I told them I couldn’t stay past four because of graduation. I hope they don't make me stay late.”

“Jordy, I’m pretty sure everybody in town knows tomorrow’s graduation day. They’ll get you out in plenty of time. Trust me.”

He’s right about that. Most of the people who work at the bakery are still in high school. Most of us go to Wilson like me, but one girl goes to Harrison and I think Camille goes to McCarthy. I’m the only one graduating tomorrow, though. Mister Palmer – he’s the manager – he can be pretty stingy about letting people go home early, but even he’s not going to tell me I have to miss my own graduation. That would be infinite cruel!

“I’ll be there. Mom already had my graduation gown pressed.”

That’s pretty ridiculous, isn’t it? Some nylon robe that you’re only going to wear for two hours, and she sent it to the cleaners to have it pressed? Well, that’s a mom for you. It’s not every day her only daughter graduates from high school, is it?

“Your mom’s a scout. Oh, and when you get off work tomorrow? If you could bring a few of those crème-filled chocolate-glazed pastries with you…”

“Daddy! You know they only let us take them home when we have extras!”

Sometimes I think he let me take that job just so he could get a bunch of free pastries! What a mooch! He knows they’re very strict about taking home extras. And he’s always telling me to “accidentally” bake a bunch more so I can bring them home! That’s dishonest! But I know he’s kidding. Well, most of the time he’s kidding. He really loves those things. Mom says he eats too many of them as it is.

“What good is having a daughter working at the bakery if she can’t bring her old man a few pastries every now and then?”

“You could always buy them.”

“If I did that, then I wouldn’t need the daughter, now would I?”

Is that all I am to him? His pastry connection! For crying out loud! OK, I know he’s just kidding. He loves me. How could he not? I’m daddy’s little girl, after all. The only one he’s got.

“I’m telling mom you said that!”

“Don’t bother. I already did. So what’s for dinner?”

Good question. I’m hungry. A full day at school and a raucous soccer game works up an appetite. And since I was at the game, I didn’t have to help with making dinner. I know that sounds lame, but I’m not a very good cook. I usually just do the vegetables so nobody complains. Mom’s tried to teach me to cook. I’m better than I used to be, but I’m still not very good at it. Mom says I’ll never land a husband if I can’t cook. If daddy’s any indication? She’s probably right. He eats like a horse. Still, I don’t think he married mom because she could cook. I think guys are looking for a lot more than that in a wife. And I’m a little young to get married. I need to find a steady boyfriend first. I’m working on it, but what’s the point of getting tied down when in four months, I’ll be off at college? I hope I find a nice guy there, though. Being unattached is really for the birds. I've been that way for most of my senior year. I’ll worry about that later, though. I'm about to be a high school graduate! That's a really big deal. Things are going to change for me now. Big changes. Life-altering changes. I just hope I’m ready for it.

Friday evening. The post-graduation gathering at school. We did it! We made it! We graduated! I can hardly believe it! We all sat in our seats, listened to the speeches, and then we walked up and got our diplomas. They took a picture of each one of us and then the principal had us move our tassels from the left to the right, signifying that we all graduated. Then we got to throw our hats in the air and let out a big, well-deserved cheer! We did it! High school is over! It's official! We're graduates! Now we’re all looking forward to going to college and seeing what life as an adult is like. It’s pretty overwhelming; the thought of it. It is for me, anyway. So everybody is running around the auditorium and taking a lot of selfies while our parents are on the other side of the room; talking about how proud they are and how much they’re going to miss us when we go off to college. Well, most of them are talking about that. Some of them…they aren’t. The parents of the boys who already got drafted? They’re not talking about college. You can guess what they’re talking about. You can tell who they are, even if you didn’t already know. They’ve all got the same look on their faces: a look of doom. There’s no other way to describe it. The boys are handling it better than their parents are. I already talked to Stu Mason and Brian Swinney. They both got their letters this week. They seem to be all right, though. If they’re scared, they don’t show it. Brian seems pretty fired up about it. I guess that’s to be expected. His dad was in the Army and he fought in the last war over there. It’s like he’s just following in his dad’s footsteps. At least, that’s what he says. If he’s trying to cover up any fear? He’s doing a really good job of it. The same goes for Stu. He’s like, “It’s my duty. The country calls? You go. Simple as that.” Maybe I shouldn’t be so surprised? Idaho is a very patriotic place. Lots of people here served. Lots of them are still serving. Our neighbor, Gene Salmon? He’s in the Air Force. He’s what they call a technical sergeant over at Mountain Home Air Force Base in Idaho City. I don’t know what he does there, but I know he doesn’t fly airplanes. Still, I don’t think any of their parents are looking forward to their sons’ bright futures right now. They’re probably scared to death. I think I would be if I were them.

There’s mom and daddy. Time to do a little something I’m quite good at, but I’m not supposed to do: eavesdrop on what they’re saying. Hey, it’s an essential skill for all teenage girls. It’s how we stay out of trouble. You don’t want to be blindsided when your parents are all mad at you. That's how you wind up grounded for two weeks.

“Henry! Liz! Congratulations!”

Coming from Mrs. Shin? I’m not sure it’s a compliment. She’s a real tiger mom, and she’s been known to look down the nose at anyone who she thinks is competition for her daughter Karen. Karen was the class valedictorian, remember? I wonder if she got into MIT? I’ll ask her before we leave. Well, mom seems pleased enough. She’s like that.

“Thank you, Ellen. Tell me, did Karen hear back from any of the colleges she applied to?”

“Not yet, and it’s driving her nuts. I’d say you can’t imagine what it’s like; living with a semi-hysterical teenage daughter. But I guess you do know what it’s like.”

Hey! I’m not semi-hysterical! I’m just a little bit hysterical!

“Oh, I can relate! We haven’t heard a thing either. I’m telling you: Jordy’s going to be crushed if she doesn’t get into Northwestern. It’s all she ever talks about.”

Well…it’s not all I ever talk about. But I do talk about it a lot. Probably too much.

“I hear…Ray said…Ray said a lot of colleges are holding off on making decisions about freshmen admits because of the draft. Did you hear? Penny Mason’s son got his letter yesterday.”

“I know. Jordy told me. I saw him a few minutes ago. He seems to be taking it well. A lot better than I would’ve expected, at any rate.”

See? I’m not the only one who thought that.

“Probably because he’s a boy. You wouldn’t know it to look at her, but Karen’s been almost a basket case from time to time. She turns eighteen next month, and she’s terrified of being drafted. Jordy just had her eighteenth birthday, didn’t she?”

“Three weeks ago. I can’t even bring myself to think about it. What in God’s name were they thinking; extending the draft to teenage girls? Every time before that, they voted no. Now we’re at war and they changed their minds? It's crazy!”

“Ray says it’s a lot of posturing. He says they’re trying to score social points with the activists. I’d like to tell them what they can do with their social points! These are our daughters we’re talking about! It’s bad enough they’re doing it to our sons!”

She should know. Mrs. Shin has three sons. One of them is almost nineteen and the next youngest is sixteen. Both of them are at risk, though I think her eldest son is in the clear. I remember David Shin when he was here. His eyesight was so bad, he had to sit in the front row of every class just to see the board. And he got excused from a lot of stuff in gym class because he couldn’t see the ball speeding toward him. But Eddie? His eyes are just fine. He lettered in sophomore track and field this year. Two more years and he’s in the jackpot, as the guys around here have taken to calling it.

“I know, and I agree. I’m not usually happy when Henry gets on one of his sexist platforms, but I agree with him that they’ve got no business drafting girls into the Army. Feminists of the world be damned; being a soldier is a man’s job! It’s certainly no place for a teenage girl!”

“Is there anything that might keep Jordy out?”

“No, and I admit: I wish there were. As terrible a thing as that is to wish on your own daughter; I wish there was something that would disqualify her. She’s perfectly healthy and she already got her classification: she's 1-A.”

I remember that coming in the mail. The letter was really creepy. It said “Your selective service classification is 1-A: immediately eligible for any military service. You are not to leave the United States. You are not to change your name, residence address, or contact information without notifying your local selective service office.” Daddy said they’re trying to tell you not to try to run away and dodge the draft. As if that were even possible!

“Liz, I hear...I hear they’re not even making some of these kids get a physical. They’re using their high school records to make the determination. They’ve even got access to private doctors’ records for these kids! How is that even legal?”

“Henry said it was to speed up the process. Everything's already on computers anymore. The government gets access to your private health records so there’s no funny business when you take their own physical. Jordy already took hers for selective service. It was over at the clinic on Saticoy. They called them in a week after she turned eighteen. I had to drive her over there. There were twenty other girls in there with her. She said the doctor barely looked at them. She just asked them a bunch of questions, took their height and weight, and that was about it. The whole thing took less than an hour. It was crazy! How can they make a real assessment if that’s all they do? The whole thing scares the hell out of me.”

I remember that vividly. There were two lady doctors and two nurses. We all stood there in our underwear and they asked us a bunch of questions. They had us bend over and touch our toes. They told us to breathe in and out while the doctor listened with a stethoscope. They asked if we were taking any medications and if we’d ever had any surgery. Then they stood us on a scale, measured how tall we were and how much we weighed and said that’s it; get dressed. The physical is over. It took about forty minutes to get through all of us, and half of that was filling out the forms. It seemed really stupid to me.

“You’re not the only one, Liz. I saw on the news the other day: two of those big helicopters were shot down over the mountains. Thirty-four people were killed! What the hell are we doing over there? I heard we’ve lost more people in less than a year than we did in ten years the last time we were over there! What in God’s name is going on? My son Edward is going to be eighteen in less than two years! Less than two years and he’s going to have to take his chances with the draft! I don’t want him over there! I don’t want him anywhere near there! I want him in college where he belongs!”

We all want that, Mrs. Shin. I don’t think there’s a single person in our graduating class who isn’t planning on going to college. Even the three guys who said they’re going to enlist say they’re going to college as soon as they get out. They’re joining up so they can pay for it. The G.I. Bill. Sure! If they get out alive! Billy Tremont is going into the Navy. He won’t have to fight if he’s in the Navy. He’s not going to be one of those Navy SEALs. He’ll be on a ship doing something else; away from the fighting. Well, he will as long as they don't start fighting in the Taiwan Strait. A lot of the Navy is over there right now. They're not doing anything, but that could change real fast. That's what they're saying on the news, anyway.

“I can’t even bring myself to look at the lottery numbers. I don’t think I want to know where Jordy’s birthday falls on it.”

“Don’t bother. They’re not using the lottery. Not right now. Some moron from the Pentagon was on TV the other day, talking about how the situation was too desperate to go that route. He said it’s too slow. I don’t know how they’re picking people right now, but it’s not by the lottery. They could be picking them at random for all I know. That scares the hell out of me too.”

Yeah, I wondered about that. So did a lot of my friends. They drew the draft lottery numbers back in January. I didn't even look to see where my birthday was on the list. I was still seventeen, so I didn't really pay any attention to it. I kind of felt like the draft wasn't real unless you had your draft card. Daddy said they’d issue us draft cards in the mail and you have to keep it on your person at all times after that. I got an e-mail the next day saying my classification was 1-A, but that was it. It means I’m healthy and they can draft me if they want. If they’re sending me a draft card, I haven’t received it. I heard some of the boys have theirs, though. I’m not sure. I didn’t ask to see them. I don’t think I want to see one. I'm sure I'll have my own draft card soon enough.

It looks like daddy’s going to try to talk some sense into them. He knows a lot more about it than mom does. He wasn’t in the Army, but he knows a lot of people who were. One of the men he works with? Mr. Echevarria? He was in the Afghanistan war. He got shot and got the Purple Heart for it. He’s really proud of that. Mom says she thinks he should count his blessings that he’s still alive. I tend to agree.

“Liz, how many times do I have to tell you? Don’t go looking for trouble! Jordy’s not drafted and she’s not going to be drafted. And once she’s in college, they probably won’t touch her until she graduates. Worst-case scenario? They’ll figure she’ll be a lot more valuable to them as an officer with a college degree if they want to go that route. I'm telling you: this whole thing about drafting the girls is a goddamned social experiment! Nothing more! Even the Army doesn’t like it! That General from the Pentagon who was on the news last week? He said so himself. He said the whole thing has been a disaster for them. And with the public uproar about bringing back the draft? This damned war is going to be over before you know it. My father said this country tore itself apart for ten years the last time they did this. They’re not going to let it happen again. I hear the Congress is going to invoke that War Powers Act and shut this whole damned thing down any day now. Those people want to get reelected, and they can’t do that if the whole damned country is calling for their heads. You'd better believe they know it, too.”

See? I told you daddy knew more about it. He’s right: there’ve been protests all over the country about the war and the draft. Nobody likes it. Nobody wants us over there. Mr. Clemmons? Our geography teacher? He says this stupid war could get us into World War III. He says they’re going to have to shut it down before it gets out of control and everybody knows it. He says we’ll offer the Iranians some kind of incentive – well, he called it a bribe – to get them to leave Pakistan and then the U.N. will take over until everything cools down. He thinks it might even get rid of the nukes in Pakistan once and for all. He sounded like he knew what he was talking about. I believe him.

“I hope you’re right, Henry. I’ve been a nervous wreck ever since she was told to report for that physical.”

“Liz, they’re just going through the motions. The all-volunteer Army still casts a long shadow with the military. They don't want a bunch of kids who don't even want to be there. They’re looking for real fire-eaters; not some teenage girl who works at a bakery and who’s headed off to college in the fall. You’ll see: Jordy’s going to be just fine.”

That’s what I think. I mean, it’s pretty nerve-wracking to think about it: being drafted, maybe being sent to a war zone? But daddy’s right: why would the Army want me? I’m five-foot-six and about a hundred pounds soaking wet. I can’t do a single chin-up. I can bench-press maybe a hundred pounds. I’m not what you’d call soldier material. I probably wouldn’t survive boot camp. I’ve seen videos on the internet about that. It looks brutal. And guns? I’ve shot daddy’s hunting rifle twice in my life and both times, I missed the target. I don’t think they want to give me a machinegun. I’d probably shoot myself in the foot by accident. Does that sound like someone you'd want in the Army?

You know, now that I’m listening around? It sounds like a lot of the parents are talking about the same thing. They’re all scared to death; especially the parents of the boys. The dads are putting on a brave face: it’s a man’s duty, when your country calls, you answer the call; that sort of thing. But it’s clear they’re all scared to death. I’ve tried not to pay attention to the whole thing since it started, but I guess you can’t do that when you’re a parent. It’s not normal to see your parents scared like that. It’s creepy. You don’t expect your parents to feel like that. They’re supposed to be the solid rock in your life. This war thing really sucks. Look what it's doing to everybody. I wish they’d end it. Just quit. Make it go away. Why not? Nobody wants it. Even I know that much. When it started? There were all sorts of people screaming “not again!” Daddy says we were over there for something like twenty years. In Afghanistan? Right next door to Pakistan? My God! Twenty years? That’s crazy! I haven’t been alive that long! Most of the people they’re sending over there haven’t been alive that long! And why didn't they finish everything the first time? Now they want everyone to go back and do it all over again? What for? That’s just stupid. It’s crazy stupid.

“Jordy! Jordy!”

Felicia needs me. What for? We already took a ton of selfies. What's she got now?

“What’s up?”

“I just heard! You're not going to believe this! Kathy Banks got an acceptance letter from Vanderbilt! She got in!”

For real? Wow! I didn’t think she had the grades! Vanderbilt's a really tough school to get into. She had something like a 3.6 GPA. I didn't think that was good enough. But I know she had a ton of extracurricular activities. She volunteers for everything. We always joked about how she probably gets three hours of sleep a night. So she actually got a letter? Good for her!

“That’s unbelievable! Did she have a hook?”

That’s somebody with a lot of pull who gets you in when you don’t have the grades. Some people have hooks. Their parents went to a good school and they get their kids preferential treatment. I wish I had a hook. Neither of my parents went to college. I’ll be the first in the family to go. I’m actually pretty psyched about that. Still, it would be nice to have a hook.

“I don’t think so. I think she just got lucky.”

I wish I were that lucky! Not only did she get in, but she already got a letter. I’m going screwball with this not-knowing crap! It’s driving me crazy, and I’m not the only one. I think Kathy’s the only person I’ve heard of who got a letter either way. What’s the big holdup? We sent those applications out six months ago! We all should’ve heard something by now, right? Is Mrs. Shin right? Are they holding off on admissions because of the draft? God, I hope not!

“Hey, what’s up with Keith?”

Keith Plain. He’s over there looking pretty grim. I hope it’s not because he got a draft letter. No, I don’t think so. He’s not eighteen yet. His birthday’s not until February, I think.

“I don't know. Come on, let's ask him. Hey, Keith? Why the long face? We just graduated. You should be happy.”

“Hey, girls. Jordy, do you remember Huey Lerner?”

Of course. He graduated last year. His real name is Horace, but everybody calls him Huey because he’s so big. He was the Center on the football team. Best in the league. He had this old Camaro that was painted bright orange. Everyone called it the Great Pumpkin. Even he did.

“Sure, I remember him. Why? What about him?”

“He’s dead. Got killed in Pakistan. Mitch and Pete just told me. A couple of Army guys were over at his house with a chaplain this afternoon. I can’t believe it.”

He got killed? I don’t believe it either! I didn’t even know he was in the Army! Did he get drafted? Did he volunteer? Holy crap! How did I not hear about that? I wasn’t really good friends with him, but I knew him. I liked him. Everyone did.

“I didn’t even know he was over there.”

“They drafted him about six months ago. Shipped out in May. Jesus, he was there for what? A fucking month? And he got wasted? One fucking month and he got wasted!”

That’s…that’s hard to believe. I mean, don’t they…when you get over there, they don’t just send you to the front right away, do they? Isn’t there…you know, like...some kind of orientation? Some kind of special training before they send you to fight? This is really creepy! I didn’t…I never knew anybody who got…you know, who got killed over there. I mean, I know a lot of people have been killed. It’s all over the news. But still! It’s different when it’s somebody you know. This…this really sucks! I don’t know how else to put it. It just sucks!

“What about his brother? He…how old is he now?”

“Carl? He’s fifteen. Mitch says he’s taking it pretty hard. Yeah, your brother gets killed in some shithole country? How else are you supposed to take it?”

It’s like I said: I didn’t know him really well. He was a year ahead of me. Mom and daddy knew him. Daddy’s company did a lot of business with Huey’s dad’s company. Whenever we had a cookout, they’d be over at our house. My God! I can't believe it! I should go over there tomorrow and pay my respects, but what would I say to them? Their son was killed. What do you say to someone whose son just got killed? What can you say to them? God, he wasn't even twenty! I can't believe it!

“Is there going to be…like, a service or something?”

“Probably. I’ll let you know. We should all be there. He was a friend.”

He was a bigger friend to the guys. They all played football, like Keith. And Huey was popular because he had a sportscar. It was kind of ragged, but he kept it running really nice. I remember when I was a sophomore and he got suspended for three days for doing burnouts in the parking lot. He was a real joker sometimes. I can't believe he's dead! Someone I know is dead! That's really scary!

“Let everybody else know. It’s not the best time to spread the news like that, but we’re all here, so it’s probably our best opportunity. And find out from Mitch if there’s going to be a service. You’re right: we should all be there. He was a friend. He was one of us.”

So that’s it: the war is real now. It killed somebody I know. Somebody we all know. It’ll never be far away and something we only see on TV ever again. For some reason, I had this feeling like the war would end and nobody from around here would get hurt or killed. That was something that happened to other people; not us. I was wrong. I guess I was pretty stupid. One of us went there and got killed. Please, Lord: let him be the last one. Don’t let us turn into one of those towns where half the boys who go off to war never return. I think that would be the death of this place. I really do.