ROOTS 5

Part 4 of: The Lies We Told Each Other

Fandom: Top Gun (Movies), Thunderheart (1992)

INDEX: http://palabraspulsares.blogspot.com/p/the-lies-we-told-each-other-4-roots.html

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Chapter 5: Never Go Back

Summary:
To escape from Tom "Iceman" Kazansky and fulfill Ray Seresin's prophecy, Jake decides to become someone else, the person he imagines he could have been in another life. In the process, he hurts a few people and meets a coyote.
Warning: This chapter contains homophobic language.

1. Introduction

The term experiment comes from Latin, which means to test. An experiment is a phase of scientific research. When a mechanism is implemented that allows verifying or correcting the postulates of an already generated hypothesis. Usually, when we say experiment, we think of laboratories, white coats, and test tubes. In reality, experiments are carried out in all fields of knowledge: economics, anthropology, and sociology. In the field of humanities, experiments are based on observations and analyses that can be more or less debatable and for which there is no determined answer.

There is a third type of experiment: they are those we do with our own lives and our eyes more or less open. We have an idea, weigh the pros and cons, decide to put it into practice, and see what happens. Those types of experiments are deadly, so...


2 Observations and demand
What is an experiment trying to answer?

"Are you going to cut us out of your life just for opposing dad?!" -Bradley can't believe what he's hearing.

Jake snorts. His brother is so dramatic sometimes.

"You taking it too hard."

"He's not," Brig says from the phone. "This is ridiculous. Is it not enough for you to change your last name? Do you want to invent a whole identity? Also, for what?"

"To be able to advance on my own merits."

Bradley looks at him, exasperated, and Jake keeps his gaze because he's not technically lying. He can't tell them that a mystical man from the Oglala nation gave him a mission, but he can tell them how he decided to do it.

Brad's expression goes from rejection to disappointment.

"Oh! Because you continue with this ridiculous idea that you are not enough. Believe me, no one will give you anything with that last name."

"On the contrary, they will deny me things. If I want to make my way without prejudice, I cannot be associated with the most problematic aviator in the Navy. Help me out here, Brig."

"No, I won't. My parents left the service and moved in together. I have a rainbow flag flying behind me. I don't feel any shame about them."

Brad and Jake exchange a brief look of surprise. It's the first time they hear their friend refer to Hollywood and Wolf as his parents. This talk is radicalizing everyone.

"But you don't have either of their last names," Jake replies dryly. "No one will know that you are their son unless they ask."

"Don't be ridiculous, Jake. The Navy is an insular community. The entire admiralty knows who I am. Most importantly, they will know who you are."

"That's precisely my point," he replies, a little fed up. "If I explicitly separate myself from my father, they will be less inclined to see me as heir to Maverick's legacy."

"And does it have to include the whole family?" -Brad insists without hiding the pain that the idea causes him- "Sam and Sean don't have to pay for your ridiculous obsession. Think about them."

"I'm thinking about them. I won't put you in the dilemma of what to tell Dad, Iná, and Kazansky about me. Its better to make a clean cut."

"Friend, if you think Kazansky won't follow your footsteps..." Brig's voice is unmistakably mocking.

"It is one thing for him to keep tabs and another to be pulling strings. Warn him, Brad! If I find out he did anything, I will tell everything."

"About what?" -inquires Brig.

"Family secrets," Bradley cuts in quickly.

His frightened eyes fix on Jake. How far is his brother willing to go in this ridiculous feud?

When he went to pick him up at the Newark airport, Jake hugged him very tightly. It was like a castaway reaching for a board in the sea. As soon as they left the parking lot and headed toward Lakehurst, he told him, with tears in his eyes, that their father was Kazansky's lover. The calm with which he said "uh-huh" without taking his attention off the road made Jake's fury explode.

"You knew!?"

"I learned it before I went to college. I imagine they told you because they thought you were old enough."

The "you are not up to the task" remained between them.

Jake pursed his lips as if he wanted to say something more but didn't dare.

"Dad left my mother to return to Kazansky," he said at last as if that were a great revelation.

Bradley had imagined something like this ever since he heard the censored version of the story a few days earlier in the telephone conversation from Moapa Valley. He has given the tale several turns and remains convinced that something does not add up. It does not seem to him that Mavdad is under the control of Icepop. But he cannot offer arguments other than his instincts and experience.

"Jake, human relationships are complicated. Whether Dad left Rachel or Rachel left Dad doesn't matter much. Isn't the important thing that he is happy? Icepop…"

"Don't call him that! He is not my father. He never was. Me... He's lied to us all our lives. He said he didn't know who Rachel was."

"That's what he had to tell you! You were a child. Quite brash about your favorite topic, I might add. We are a military family."

"Arg!" -his brother replied with a disgusted expression- "Dad must have remembered that before sleeping with Kazansky. The damn faggot surely seduced him with some fancy lies. He had the opportunity for a normal life. Don't you understand?"

Bradley slammed on the brakes.

"Get out!"

Jake looked at him blankly.

"What's happening?"

"Get out," he repeated as he squeezed the wheel to contain the urge to punch him. "I'm a damn faggot too, Jake, and I don't have to put up with that kind of language from you, of all people."

This wasn't how he planned to come out to his brother, but things were going in a direction he didn't like. Normal? Is that really what Jake wants? Force your entire family to be normal? For what?

But Jake didn't leave the car but stared at him with hurt eyes.

"So you didn't trust me either."

The ego!

"It's not about trust," he replied between clenched teeth, "but the right to privacy, you idiot. Not everything in this family is about you. You and your obsession with a mother, a normal life, and little fucking birds flying. The fuck! Like you had been raised inside a Disney movie. We are your family. We don't have to fit into your ridiculous idea of normality. We are people with our own wants and needs. Have you ever thought these days about the loneliness that Dad has endured? How hard is military life for queer people?" -he was almost screaming at the end.

He was vaguely glad that this was happening in the middle of the road and not in the city, where someone might see them try to intervene.

Jake cowered in his seat, crying.

"It's not that," he said between sobs. "It's not... I said being normal like... You had a mom Brad, and Nick Bradshaw is this cool guy everyone celebrates, but you shrug your shoulders and always say you have Mavdad. You grew up the way it should be, with a mom and a dad. Sam and Sean also have a mom and dad. I am the freak. I am the one who invents kindship to console myself. Do you have any idea what happened at school when I said Sam was my twin? They made fun of me! I had to teach them not to mess with me. I... I wanted a mom. But when they gave me a photo and a name, it was with the warning that it was a secret. Outside our house, I was still motherless. Do you know what I heard once at a reception at Naval Base San Diego? That I was Kazansky's charity case. It is so unfair!"

Bradley sighed and put a hand on his brother's crying shoulder. When his attempt at comfort was not rejected, he leaned and hugged him. He kissed his head.

"Life isn't fair, Jake."

"He knows where Rachel is," he said between hiccups.

"Kazansky?" -somehow, that didn't surprise Bradley.

"Yeah."

"He knows many things," he conceded. "Now I'm going to start the car and take you home. Okay?"

Jake pulled away to look into his eyes with a regretful expression.

"About what I said about gays..."

Bradley silenced him with a shake of his head.

"You are tired, and you are not thinking clearly. USNA is a week away. We have time to talk."

That was Friday. Today is Monday, and things have gotten out of control again. Jake went from crying about what he doesn't have to planning to leave it all behind. Is he that resentful?

"Calm down, okay? It doesn't have to get like that," he says conciliatoryly. "I'm sure that," he is about to say Icepop, but remembers Jake's hysterical reaction the last time he used the nickname, "Kazansky will keep his distance if Dad asks him to."

Jake raises an eyebrow.

"What do you mean?"

"If you message Dad telling him to leave you alone, he will do it."

They look into each other's eyes, challenging, until Brig's disbelieving snort breaks the spell.

"I know your parents aren't as relaxed as ours," Bradley says, looking at the phone, "but we're talking about Maverick." -he turns his eyes to his brother- "If there is something he respects, it is autonomy."

Bradley is sure that Jake hasn't told him the whole truth about his stay at Pine Ridge. How did he meet that police officer who turned out to be his uncle? Why did they refuse to give him any clues about Rachel? Like Pete seventeen years ago, the reservation is a place from where he emerged changed. Maybe, just maybe, Jake will be willing to share that experience with his father, and it will bring them closer to healing as a family.

Jake considers his brother's proposal. It's true. He needs his dad to play along for this Jake Seresin thing to work. Telling him at least part of the truth could be the key to keeping him at bay. Dad knows Ray. He has to know about his powers. Dad will understand the reason for his apparent unreasonable decision and will make the rest of the family keep their distance. Above all, it's an honest solution because the truth is, no matter what he says, he couldn't rat out his own father.

"Okay," he concedes. "I will tell Dad why I want to walk away from the family."

"Good," Bradley sighs, satisfied with having won that one. "Then tell us how you will become Jacob Raymond Seresin."

2 Hypotheses
It consists of an assumption of something that may or may not be possible. As such, hypotheses make it easier to start the thinking process through which specific knowledge will be accessed.

"It's relatively easy. I already filled out the "Preferred Name" form on the USNA website. All official school documentation will be adjusted automatically. For privacy reasons, no one outside the records department has the right to see my legal name. I just have to remove any trace of my life in the University City mansion from my things, arrive with wide-eyed wonder, and say that I only had my mother, Rachel Seresin." -he raises his forearms and extends his hands with the palms up in a conclusive gesture, but remembers that Brig cannot see him- "That's all." -he adds for the benefit of his friend in Nevada.

He remains silent that he will even maintain the fiction that his mother had him at the tender age of twenty-one, although from his conversations with Ray and Wilson, he is sure that she was much older.

"How will you explain the money?" -Bradley asks.

"The money?" -he repeats, baffled.

Bradley snorts.

"You didn't think the family would cut you out, did you? I received an allowance at the University of Virginia and flight school. Don't think it will be different with you. Iná will come to shake your hard head if she suspects that you don't take care of yourself in the name of... what they call it in spy books? The legend of your character."

"Good luck explaining why Kazansky's wife came to spank you," Brig laughs.

"I will use whatever in moderation. Just… mmm … I have to get used to shopping at Goodwill and Payless. I will also look for temporary work during summer."

"How are you going to explain your knowledge of the military world?" -Bradley insists.

"And your flight experience?" -pipes Brig.

But Jake has already thought about that, so he has the answer ready.

"The best lies are those that have a grain of truth. I won't hide that I grew up in San Diego. Everyone knows that the city belongs to the Navy. I just went to school with a bunch of snotty officers´brats who couldn't stop bragging about their daddies' positions. As for flying, air shows were within the reach of Rachel Seresin's modest resources."

Bradley nods. The plan seems solid.

Brig reluctantly accepts from his house.

"About feigning that you don't know me..."

"It is necessary!"

"I won't leave you alone, Jake!" -answers Brig with a harsh voice.

Jake looks at the phone angrily. You'd think Brig had a crush on him or something. He tries to be reasonable.

"Look, I'm supposed to be the son of a low-income single mother from San Diego. You grew up in Nevada. How, exactly, did our paths cross?"

"At air shows." -Bradley proposes.

Jake looks at him, surprised and annoyed.

"Oh yeah?" -and raises a questioning eyebrow.

"Of course. You just said you learned to fly because your mother took you to air shows. Hollywood and Wolf have a recreational airplane business. It's not crazy that they would participate in those events, right, Brig?"

"It is very likely, yeah."

Jake feels a migraine coming on. His friend's tone is too cheerful for his taste.

"Okay." -he concedes- "Brigham and I know each other." -he then looks warningly at Bradley- "I don't have more connections."

Brig bursts out laughing, and Jake looks at the phone bewildered.

"I am the adopted son of Pete "Maverick" Mitchell," – his brother answers in a superior tone – "Everyone knows that I also grew up in San Diego and learned to fly at air shows. The strange thing would be if I didn't know you, Seresin."


3 Method
It is the conglomerate of previously established procedures, standards, and operations that facilitate reaching a specific objective. Likewise, it applies to the conglomerate of acts that a person performs in a more or less structured manner in carrying out a task.

3.1 Subjects participating in the experiment

3.1.1 Pete Mitchell and Tomas Kazansky

On Monday afternoon, when he takes his phone out of the locker after class, he finds a text message from Jake. He has been careful to avoid thinking about his son. It hurts too much, and he knows he can't do anything about it. Instead, he indulged in his self-pity, wondering about Ice's reaction to the postcard, which must reach his hands between today and tomorrow. So, the message catches him off guard.

But Mitchell hasn't spent so many years of double life for the sake of it. He won't let his surprise and hope show in his facial expression or body language while on base. He pockets the cell phone and continues with the usual routine: they analyze the day's exercises and say goodbye after exchanging some jokes. It is not until he arrives at the apartment assigned to him on base that he allows himself to read the message. Just in case, he sits on the bed.

Son 2: I talked to Ray in Pine Ridge. There is something I must do before I return.

He falls back on the bed. Defeated.

Since Bradley told him that Jake wanted to go to the reservation to get information, he feared this scenario. Ray is not a manipulative man out of malice, but Mav knows that the cryptic and casual way in which he reveals his visions cancels out most's critical capacity. Jake is still a child. Impressionable. Of course, that doesn't mean that the quest revealed by Ray is fake. Only that, for some reason, his son thinks he should follow that path on his own.

Maverick grimaces and covers his face with his hands.

He can't make this decision without Ice. Of course, he doesn't know if Ice wants to talk to him. He sits up, reaches for his laptop, and opens his email program. The problems with the offspring take precedence over the differences between their parents, right? It takes him a while to find an excuse to write, but he finally composes something that can pass as friendly correspondence.

To: TKazanky@navy.mil
From: PMitchell@navy.mil
Subject: Everything is fine here

Ice:
You have no idea! Today, I led the squadron on low flights between the gorges in the area. Visibility is good, but controlling height is difficult due to the sudden water masses. A wonderful area to train. In the middle of the exercise, we saw a wolf! He was advancing through the deep snow of the mountain. Have I told you there is snow here in some areas, even in August?
The other pilots told me that it was definitely going to hunt. That we had to move away so as not to scare away the prey.
One of my students is an amateur environmentalist. She explained to me later that when a young animal leaves its pack, it will return to visit, but always with prey. Without that, they may not return to their pack. I didn't know they had such complex social lives.
It's a very Norwegian thing, isn't it? To ask for the adjustment of a military exercise to protect wildlife. But wolf populations are also important, honestly. Besides, in this part of the world, there are plenty of places where I can teach them how to confound radars flying between narrow gorges.
What do you think? Next time, do I let the wolf go, or do we follow the planned route even if he gets upset?

Your wingman
Maverick


He closes the laptop and forces himself to prepare dinner. He knows Ice can't prioritize his email, so there won't be a response until the morning, hopefully. At dawn on Tuesday, Commander Mitchell does something unusual, opening his email before leaving his apartment. In his inbox is a reply from his friend.


To: PMitchell@navy.mil
From: TKazanky@navy.mil
Subject: Re: Everything good here

Mav:
I really envy that you still fly to exciting places. That's the only thing I envy about your disastrous military career, of course.
Your students seem to be a fascinating group if they think about the ecological impact of their maneuvers, and they can even give you talks about lupine social relations. After your training, I hope they can also explain the mathematics behind their maneuvers. I remind you that you are not there to chase wolves or enjoy the landscape but to help the combat readiness of the Royal Norwegian Navy and strengthen its ties with our Navy.
So the answer is, of course, to leave the wolves alone. I'm sure they can live without you and me.
Don't stop writing to me about your adventures, old friend. You know I miss flying like I'm missing an arm. I only have to live vicariously through you and Bradley.

Your wigman
Iceman

Mav closes his eyes and presses his tear ducts with the tips of his index and thumb, trying to contain the physical expression of his emotion. He can't go to the office with red eyes! But it's difficult. Ice has not only reconciled with him. He also agrees they should let Jake go wherever he decides. He once thought teaching his baby to walk and talk was the most challenging thing about being a parent. He was so innocent!

Pete takes a deep breath to calm himself and opens the texting app, ready to respond. His fingers stagger over the virtual keyboard.

Mav: Do you have an ETA?

He can ask at least that, right? The response takes about three minutes, which is worrying because it is one in the morning in New Jersey.

Son 2: No

He sighs. It couldn't be that easy. For the umpteenth time since this debacle began, he forces himself to see the positive side of things. He didn't lose Ice. Now he knows that he hasn't lost Jake. He just... He can't define it, but he must remember the promise implicit in the phrase "before returning."

Mav: Have a good flight, son.


3.1.2 Sarah, Sam and Sean Kazansky

She goes down to the kitchen with her head spinning. Bradley's call was complicated and tense. While his oldest son explained Jake's decision to leave everything behind, she felt her body vibrate with disbelief, pain, and anger. How can their baby imagine his life will be better if he leaves them? Bradley didn't give him any clear answers. His thesis is that he is too angry at Ice and Mav. Especially with Ice. In Jake's mind, he explained, Iceman is responsible for his father's homosexuality and for deceiving him by denying his knowledge of the identity and destiny of Rachel Seresin for almost fifteen years.

After ending the call, Sarah put on some sandals and went to the kitchen. The defined steps of cooking recipes will allow her to calm down. The attention she must pay to avoid burning herself or damaging the food will force her to distance herself from the problem.

Start mixing pancake batter.

There's nothing to do. Bradley told her that Jake got Pete's approval somehow. She knows that means Tom gave the green light, too. Does Pete know anything else? She sighs. They won't be able to talk until Thanksgiving when they physically meet again. So it's useless to dwell on the matter.

Turn on a burner and take out a wide frying pan.

This will be difficult for Sam and Sean. They are convinced that Jake will be back by Christmas at the latest. On seeing Sean's horrified eyes, Sam assured him it was because Jake was "stubborn like a mule." Now she will have to explain to them that, no, their brother is not coming in the near future.

Put a little dough in the pan and watch its gradual change in texture and color.

The hardest thing will be to explain to them that Jake has decided to cut them from his life and prevent their pain from turning into resentment.

"Good morning," Sam greets, his thick voice behind him.

"Good morning, čhuŋkší."

Sarah avoids her daughter's eyes as she scoops the first pancake onto the kitchen counter and rushes to pour more batter into the pan.

A question strikes her. Have they fallen into this pit because the web of lies they wove - Pete, Tom, Ray, herself - was too fragile or too dense? The photos were the trigger, it's true, but Jake's anxiety is long-standing and would explode at some point. They led their guard down, as simple as that. When this adventure began in November 1990, in the arid plains that the Sioux nation managed to wrest from the North American government, they did not imagine that their lives...

The pancake almost burned!

They never imagined falling in love and deciding to live together. It's that simple.

"Iná, tanke." -Sean woke up today with a rough voice. It has been like this, with irregular changes in his vocal register for a month. Ah! Puberty.

"You woke up with a macho voice, misún," comments her sister mockingly.

"Sam," Sarah warns in a harsh tone. Then she gives Sean a brief smile. "Good morning, čhiŋkší."

But the smile doesn't reach her eyes, and his little one notices it.

"What's happening?"

Beside him, Sam stops looking at her phone and stares at her.

"Iná?" -she asks too.

"It's... Bradley called to tell me how Jake is."

Her daughter snorts, annoyed. She doesn't adjust to not having direct communication with someone who has been his twin for the last fifteen years for all practical purposes.

Instead, Sean smiles hopefully.

"Is he coming back? Or does he want us to take his things to New Jersey?"

"No, nothing like that, my love."

The boy shrinks in his seat as if he had been deflated. Sarah turns off the stove and rests her hands on the kitchen island.

"Jake has decided that he is not coming back. That his fight with Mavdad and Icepop was too big and he doesn't want..."

"Make them apologize!" -Sean demands without letting her finish.

"Sean, it's not that easy. It's not that your parents don't want to apologize. It's that Jake doesn't want an apology. He wants information that they simply can't give him."

"But he just wants to know who his mother is," Sam intervenes.

"Yeah," says Sean. "Why is there so much secret with Jake's mother anyway?"

Sarah closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. It feels like she is losing control of the conversation.

"That doesn't matter now. I have to tell you what Jake decided because it affects us…"

"It doesn't matter?" Sam interrupts her with an offended tone. "You know, mom? It's starting to seem to me that Jake is right, and you guys know more than you're letting on. Clearly, if you are trying to protect Jake, you have failed spectacularly. How bad can it be? Is she at a sanatorium? Is she married and has another family?"

"Because it is a matter of national security!" -Sarah bursts- "There, I said it. Are you happy now? Rachel's identity is a military secret. We can't talk about that."

"You neither?"

She looks directly into his daughter's dark eyes.

"No, me neither."

Her teenagers look at her with surprise and confusion. Sarah takes advantage of their silence to finish delivering the news.

"But Jake won't accept that. He's convinced we're not telling him the truth to control him or something else. I do not know anymore! What I wanted to tell you is that... That Jake has decided that he doesn't want to know anything more about our family. He changed his last name, and he no longer... -her voice breaks- As far as he is concerned, he is no longer Mavdad's son, he is no longer my son, he is no longer your brother.

"The what!?"

"He can't do that! We are cekpápi!" -Sam dials her brother's number with a stormy expression- "He's going to hear me..." -she threatens.

"We're sorry, the number you're calling is out of service," responds the slightly metallic voice of the answering machine.

"What does that mean?" -Sean asks confused.

Sam looks at her mother in surprise. Sarah averts her eyes, helpless.

"Dial again, Sam! Why don't you dial again?" -her brother insists.

"He… He…" -Sam lets out a sob- "Jake changed his phone number."

"But Icepop said..." -he desperately searches the messages he exchanged with his father on his phone on Friday- "He said that Jake would come back."

Sarah puts a hand on his shoulder, trying to convey the certainty that she is far from feeling. This is being a mother, right? Tell the necessary lies. Maybe there is another way, but she doesn't know it, and, in any case, it's too late to turn back.

"He'll be back, Sean. It's just that we don't know when."

3.1.3 Javier Machado

He enters slowly. The decoration is sober but efficient: on each side, a multi-piece unit combines a bookcase, a work table, and a bed. The table has a couple of large drawers on the left, and below, attached to the wall, there are some metal racks. To the right is the narrow bookcase, but with a ring to lock it if necessary. On top of the work table is the bed, where they have already left the sheets, by the way. To the left of the table is the spacious two-door closet with many shelves and hooks to put shoes, hats, whatever. The cabinet also has rings to secure it.

There is a door to the right of the entrance. He opens it expecting an extra closet, but no, it's the bathroom.

He leaves his things on the floor and climbs onto the bed.

He is still a little afraid that this is all a dream. He is a child of Texas laborers in Bancroft Hall, the USNA dormitory. How could it be? He takes a deep breath and looks across the room, still empty. What will his roommate be like? Right now, he only has the information from the sign on his door, "7119. J. Machado ´12 JR Seresin ´12."

His roommate's last name is strange, isn't it? From what he saw in the rest of the doors, the assignments are arranged alphabetically, but this Seresin, what is he doing among the M's? He has no idea if it indicates the guy came in last or that he has high-level contacts. He read that almost half of the USNA's enrollment comes from military families. Will Seresin be one of them? It wasn't a very serious website, but...

He doesn't know what would be worse, getting a nepobaby or a fucking racist. He thinks he can deal with arrogance - few people put on more air than the Abbot family - but if he hears a single comment about the "diversity quota," he doesn't know what he will do. Javier decides it's not worth worrying ahead of time. It's only Friday. His partner could arrive today or in two days. What should he do first? Unpack or go in search of the cafeteria?

He's looking fearfully at his packages when someone taps twice on the open door.

"Hello." -says Javier, surprised, and jumps out of bed.

He is a blond, strong boy with a face of happiness so intense that it makes him look drugged. Yes, it's the same stupid expression as Javier.

"Are you Machado? I think this is my room."

"Ah! Seresin, right? Come in, come in."

The blonde smiles shyly at him. He steps back a little and very carefully pushes into the room two rigid-body travel suitcases, a little worn, one red, and the other black. On top of the red suitcase is a cardboard box wrapped in many layers of tape. On top of the black suitcase is a blue cloth briefcase, also somewhat worn. The stranger closes the door with his foot but immediately looks at Javier with a bit of fear.

"Oh, sorry. I didn't ask you if... It's automatic for me to close the door. The neighborhood I lived in was not… Shall I open it?"

"No, it's okay, brother." -Javier quickly reassured him- "No problem."

He gives him a look that's meant to be reassuring. Evidently, this guy was not born in a cradle of gold, and he does not want to scare him away. The blonde relaxes, and his happy idiot face returns. Javier extends his hand.

"I'm Javier Machado, from Texas."

"Jakob Seresin," -the hand that shakes him is strong, has calluses- "from California. But they call me Jake."

Seresin turns and puts the box on the bed very carefully. Javier looks curiously at his partner's luggage and compares it with his own. It doesn't seem like much to him, but he knows he shouldn't comment. His mother raised him well.

"So... from California?"

"Yeah." -he answers without looking at him, busy opening the black suitcase- "I grew up in San Diego. Do you know it?"

"Yes, yes, of course." -he racks his memory, trying to remember something about the city- "Simon & Simon, right?"

Seresin yells and drops a pile of neatly folded T-shirts to look back at him excitedly.

"Aren't they great?"

Javier blinks. He understands that they don't allow gays out of the closet at USNA.

"Sure, although I'm not a fan, just..."

"Don't worry." -he winks at him- "I know that at this age, one is not supposed to watch TV broadcasts from the eighties. Your secret is safe with me." -he returns to his clothes- "Are you also from a famous place?"

Javier snorts.

"Sure." -he states mockingly- "If you are a geek about geological quirks because the only thing famous in Fredericksburg are its rocks."

But Seresin doesn't laugh, as Javier expected. He continues putting neatly folded clothes in his locker.

"So Frederickburg , Texas," he says slowly, as if thoughtful. "No, I don't remember it being mentioned in school."

"Nothing to remember, believe me."

If Jake were black like him, he would have told him right away about the Abbot family and how they think they're a big deal because they own half the town and have connections in the state legislature. In 2006, one of them was elected Representative to the House. by Gillespie County. Now that smug Richard Abbot is walking around Washington, DC, screwing people over. But even though Jake is poor, he is white. You never know.

"Well, now I must learn since you are my roommate. By the way, do you want to be a Marine or an Aviator?"

"I've wanted to fly since I was five, man. You?"

"Aviator, definitely. When I received the acceptance letter, I screamed so much that the neighbor downstairs started hitting the floor with her broom handle." -he laughs at the memory- "Hey. When I finish putting my things away, are we going to eat?"

"Yes, perfect. Although I have no idea where..."

Surprised by the sudden sound of airplane propellers inside the room, he doesn't finish the sentence. Seresin takes his cell phone from his back pocket with a shy smile, gestures to ask him to wait, and answers the call.

"Have you arrived yet?... Yes... Floor, no! Deck seven, room 7119… Okay…"

He hangs up and looks at Javier again with a strange mixture of fear and longing as if he desperately wanted to like him.

"A friend who was also accepted. Do you mind if he joins us?"

Javier opens his arms with joy.

"I don't know anyone here, Jake, so the more the merrier."

CHAPTER 6: The Hangman Experiment (Part Two) http://palabraspulsares.blogspot.com/2023/12/roots-6_11.html

Notes:

The USNA does not have the "Plebe Summer” in this universe. "Plebe Summer” it is a seven-week period between June and August designed to turn civilians into midshipmen. I removed it so the Kazansky-Mitchell family would have more time for their dramas.

Lakota words
cekpápi = twins
čhuŋkší = daughter
iná = mother
misún = younger brother
tanke = sister