"Hey Freed. HQ’s looking for you.”

Moe looked up from the training manual he was reading and jumped down from his bed. His sergeant was looking at him puzzled.

“I didn’t think I’d find anybody here. Why aren’t you down at the beach with the rest of the guys?”

Moe shrugged. “I thought I’d review a little.”

“Don’t know why you bother you always get the top marks.”

Moe grinned. “Maybe that’s because I bother.”

The sergeant rolled his eyes. “Well get yourself down to HQ pronto.”

Moe’s CO was waiting for him. He acknowledged Moe’s salute and motioned to him to take a seat. “Freed we’ve got your orders. You’re leaving Hawaii and heading for New Jersey. They’ve accepted you for OCS.” He handed Moe a sheaf of papers. “Get these documents filled in and get ready to ship out.”

He looked keenly at the straight-backed private standing before him. “You must have some pretty important friends rooting for you Freed. Now that there’s a war on thousands of guys are banging on the doors of Officer Candidate School.” He stood up from behind an immaculate desk and put out his hand. “I’ve reviewed your records. You’re a good soldier and you’ll make a good officer. Make your country proud of you son.”

As he walked slowly back to the barracks Moe looked at the orders. Three days! He had three days to get his papers completed and submitted get his gear together and say goodbye to Hawaii.

He had no regrets about leaving. The island paradise Moe Lu and Harry had dreamed of had become a prison. Its pristine waters held no attraction for Moe. He couldn’t step into the sea not while he kept thinking about the sailors who’d drowned in its aqua depths. Hawaii’s white sands perfect for sunbathing held too many bodies of too many young men.

No he was glad to leave this blood-soaked wonderland. It would be good to immerse himself in the intensive studies of Officer Candidate School to ease his sadness in rigorous training. It would be good to learn to be an officer and eventually lead soldiers into combat. And it would be good so good to fight the bloodthirsty merciless men who’d killed Lu and gravely injured Harry.

Harry! The thought suddenly occurred to him: Leaving Hawaii meant leaving his friend behind.

Moe had spent every free moment at Harry’s bedside. At first he would simply sit and say Tehillim — no longer saying it by heart he now carried the volume with him — and wonder at the soothing effect it seemed to have on his suffering friend. In the past few days though he’d seen Harry’s condition was improving. Progress was brutally slow but it was there. The pain was still tremendous exacerbated by unbearable itching but Harry’s consciousness was fully restored and he could sometimes carry on a conversation.

It was one of life’s ironies Moe mused as he filled out the endless papers army life demanded. He was almost certain he’d gotten into OCS through the influence of Harry’s father Major Cohn — and it was that lucky break for him that would tear him away from Harry the major’s only son.