style="font-size:15px;"> The rest of the squad jumps to their feet and comes to his rescue, too. Slowly, Finch rises so he’s not the only one sitting.
“He helped us out, leave him alone, Javert.”
“Don’t call me Javert.”
“He’ll show you his friggin’ ID card tomorrow.”
“He’s helping in the war effort, what do you think he is, a spy on the inside?”
“Jules, offer Javert some whisky, he’s ornery because he hasn’t had any.”
“Enough out of all of ya!” the policeman bellows.
The only one saying nothing is Finch.
“You want to see my ID card, officer?” Julian says. “Why, of course. That’s not a problem.” Reaching into his pocket, Julian produces the card, the best National ID card money can buy off the back of a truck. “There you go.” Julian Cruz, it reads. Address: 153 Great Eastern Road. Occupation: journalist. “I work at a small financial publication near Austin Friars,” Julian says. “Well, worked. A parachute mine fell on Throgmorton Avenue.”
Mia listens to him in impressed puzzlement. “I thought you told me you ran a restaurant?” she whispers.
“Like you, I wear many hats.” Julian found out that not only is 153 Great Eastern Road still standing, but there is no restaurant there. And he prefers to make his white fibs as truthful as possible. To mollify the public officials further, Julian even produces a ration card, with someone else’s name etched out and his own stamped in. The cop glares at the sheepish warden, who in turn glares at Finch.
“Thanks for wasting my time,” the officer says to Javert as they skulk away.
The squad descends on Finch.
“Was that your doing?”
“Finch, did you rat him out?”
“I didn’t!”
“Finch, you fink, did you tell Javert that Swedish had no ID?”
“I didn’t!”
“Finch, you’re such a Berkeley hunt,” Wild says. “We don’t do that to our own. Why would you do that?”
“He’s not my friend, he’s not my own, stop calling me names, and I didn’t.”
“I’m disappointed in you, Finch.” That’s Mia. “Apologize to Julian.”
“It’s fine, Mia, don’t worry,” Julian says. “Finch made a mistake. He misunderstood. I said I misplaced it, not lost it. Good thing I found it, though, right, Finch?”
“I’ll burn first before I apologize to that tosser,” Finch says, skulking away.
There is Coca Cola, and Bing Crosby, and jitterbugs and calm confidence and good humor.
Carry on.
Carry on.
Carry on.
The young keep life going. They help the city at night, they sleep, rush to work, paint fake buses, they unload freight ships and bandage wounds. And in the evenings, they stay young. They argue over petty slights, learn to fight and how to wield knives, they drink, sing, and entertain others trapped with them in the cave. They do dramatic readings from newspapers, from history books, from memory diluted with whisky, they butcher Shakespeare and Dickens. On Sundays they read Charles Spurgeon’s sermons. They have drunken discussions about the meaning of life and argue about where more bombs have fallen, Shadwell or Lambeth. Sometimes they dance. They’re close, yet afraid to get too close. They live like men in the trenches.
Early one morning after they’ve come back from another pulsing all nighter, and the others have gone to work, or are asleep like Mia, instead of going to sleep himself, Julian takes a bottle of whisky and two mugs out onto the empty platform where Wild is lying down, humming and smoking, unmindful of the Central Line trains that screech to a stop in front of him every fifteen minutes. He sits up, Julian drops down next to him, pours them both a drink, they clink, and sit together in their solitude, resting their sore backs against the wall of the station.
“Awake all night, and awake all day,” Julian says.
“I’ll be asleep soon,” Wild says. “There’s something soothing about the trains skidding and leaving.” He pauses. “Folgate told you, didn’t she? About me.”
They sit. “Told me what?”
“Whatever. It’s fine. Just don’t talk to me about it.”
“Wasn’t going to,” Julian says. “Did want to talk about something else, though. So what’s up with Finch?”
“Do you mean what’s up with Finch and Folgate?” Wild laughs. “What, you don’t think they’re meant to be?”
“Just asking. How long have they been at it?”
“Hard to tell,” Wild says. “For a long time they seemed like brother and sister, at least from the outside. I think he’s been carrying a torch for her, though, since primary school.”
“And she couldn’t find anyone else?” Julian is incredulous.
“Sure, she did. But she kept coming back to him.”
“Why?”
“I dunno. He was pretty good to her.”
“And that’s what you want in a guy you plan to marry.”
“Yes, and he liked her, and he was around. I mean always around. The other chaps got tired of him hanging over them. And she never told him to go. She could’ve. But she didn’t.”
“And she agreed to marry him?”
“Ask her why she did that, mate. I’m not privy to Folgate’s innermost thoughts. A woman’s heart is a mysterious thing. I don’t know why it beats. He asked her a few months ago, right after Dunkirk. And she took a few months to say yes.” Wild chuckles. “Duncan and I said to her, were you waiting for him to die so you wouldn’t have to give him an answer?”
“How did she respond?”
“She walloped us.”
“And you?” Julian glances at Wild. “You and she were never an item?”
“Me and Folgate? Nah.”
“Why not?”
“What, you’re trying to match us up?” Putting down his drink, Wild ruffles Julian’s hair. “When I first met her, she was going with a friend of mine, so she was off limits.
