Time Drifters

“Sign up for your yearbook! Sign up right here!”

I felt like a carnival barker at Coney Island. But the more college kids who came, the louder I realized I had to get. While Thomas was in charge of the register on the table, securing everyone’s full name and home address, my job was to herd everyone like a collie dog leading sheep into a pasture.

It was working brilliantly except for the fact that the dance had started almost 45 minutes ago and there was still no sign of the target of this operation.

Calico had seen a camera and some yearbooks on the shelf. Under her breath, I heard her say something about a photo sign up, an operation I supposed she’d been part of on another Drift. But then she realized that we’d be too conspicuous, the same reason we couldn’t simply ask around for Sam.

“The group’s too small,” she noted. “He might know who was looking for him and that would cut our options.” I got the general idea and Thomas and I were both happy to see Calico jump into action. We found markers and poster board in the cupboard, along with a notebook we improvised as a guest register. I knew how to make nice lettering, like the printing my Dad did on special engineering drawings for presentations.

Most of the kids arriving were coming in the back, but Calico stayed inside at the base of the stairs to redirect anyone coming from the front of the building, just as we had when we first arrived.

A few students tried to wave us off, saying they’d sign up later. If they were girls, we let them go. For the boys, I’d call out, “Sam?” I’d only gotten shaking heads and quizzical looks. Music was pouring through the upstairs window along with the happy sounds of college kids kicking back and having fun. With a lull in traffic, Calico stepped through the doors.

“Nothing?” she asked, stating the obvious. I shook my head but then pointed to a young couple behind her. She spoke to them and pointed to our table.

“Welcome,” Thomas said, shaking out one of the pens that was giving him trouble. “Your full name and address, please. Both of you.”

His hand suddenly went to his chest.

I watched the girl take the pen and the names going down on the page. Yuka Seki, and her address first. And then an “S” followed by “Taniguchi.”

“Sam?” I said.

“Yes?” he responded, looking up.

“Nice to see you two,” I said, smiling, compressing my hand on the buzzing sensation I was feeling from my crystal.

Yuka was in an elegant and form-fitting white dress. There was embroidery of birds and flowers across the front beside a V-neck, and then again on the tops of the sleeves. It shone, like satin, and looked expensive. She was more dressed up than a lot of the other young women, so I figured she was the daughter of a very well off family, particularly since she seemed so comfortable in it. Sam didn’t look like he came from quite the same financial base. He was in a tan sport jacket with khaki pants that came up high on the waist. He had a thin black tie and a navy kerchief tucked into the lapel pocket.

They made a nice couple, to be sure. I just remembered thinking that there were guys in more expensive suits and others dressed-down in Hawaiian shirts, and yet this was the young man that history was pointing out to us. I’d never have guessed it.

Sam gave a brief, bowing nod and I jiggled my head in return, feeling dumb for not knowing the proper response. I’d felt weird about it earlier, since over half of the class was Asian and only a third were Caucasians. Something else felt like it was odd to me and then I realized there were no African-Americans and only a couple of Latinos in the mix. This certainly wasn’t any college near New York City.

When Sam and Yuka had wandered up the steps, Calico tore the final page out of the book.

“Keep this in your pocket, in case we need it,” she told me.

“What about the register?” Thomas said, looking disappointed.

“Leave it open on the floor with the rest,” she said. “Our names aren’t in there. Someone’ll find it when we’re gone.”

We lifted the table and things back into the activity room and went upstairs. The music was in full swing and so were the college kids. About a third of them were dancing away in the center of the room and others were congregated into groups along the sides. Calico was standing at the far end of the room beside the windows and we joined her at the same moment as an adult approached.

“Let’s get some air in here,” the woman said, shifting the latch and pushing open the louvered pane.

“I can help,” Calico said.

“No, no,” the woman said. “You just have a good time.” Her eyes, however, landed on Thomas and me. “Perhaps the boys would like something to eat,” she suggested.

“Yes, please,” Thomas replied, wasting no time in turning towards the table of treats.

I had just joined him when I saw the woman approaching a young teenager who was perched on a chair by the record player. She had a pink, frilly dress and was swinging her white, patent leather shoes beneath her. Very Sunday school, I thought.

Thomas reached for more date squares while I went for some of the cheese and crackers.

“Would you like a napkin?” asked the frilly girl, appearing beside me.

“Um, okay,” I said, accepting it from her, even though what I really wanted was to shovel the food into me in fistfuls.

“I’m Jennifer. What’s your name?”

“I’m Liam,” I said. “And this is Thomas.”

They exchanged waves, but neither seemed interested in the other.

“Oh, no. That’s blue cheese,” Jennifer said. “I don’t think you’ll like that one. It’s very smelly, but the brie is lovely. I eat the crusty part. It’s better with crackers. I break them in two so it’s one bite size. Much more ladylike.”

She fixed a serving, using her preferred method, and handed it to me. I’d managed to get some cheddar in first, so I nodded and smiled.

“My Mummy’s a Regent,” she said. “And do you see that man down there?” She pointed to an elderly man standing next to her mother. He had a pleasant, thin face and glasses, and he was smiling as he looked around at the students. “That’s Charles Reed Hemenway. The one they named the building after.”

“He’s alive?” I said, meaning that I thought buildings were named mostly after dead people.

“Yes, but his son isn’t,” Jennifer said. “He died… just a teenager. But Mr. Hemenway has been around forever and helped to found U.H. and was head Regent. And he’s nice to lots of students, and so they’re nice to him, too. Do you want to dance?”

I was still in mid-bite. I looked out at the floor. Calico was right; this was intricate stuff, these dances.

“Do you jitterbug?” she asked, swaying back and forth, expectantly. “I do. I’m very good. C’mon.”

She grabbed my hand and I tugged back, showing that I had to put down my napkin with food.

“You know Chattanooga Choo Choo?” she asked.

“Sure,” I lied. It sounded simpler to act like a train, than trying some of these steps. She grabbed my hands and got her fingers interlocked with mine. Her skin felt very warm. She began bobbing about, twisting her feet every time they hit the ground. She’d bring me closer and then push away, doing it over and over, her blond ring curls springing madly. I was trying to do a kind of two-step, the same as we’d showed Calico, but it wasn’t working. I gave up and just started bobbing, seeing if I could match her.

Jennifer let go with one hand and then spun, trying to make it under our wrists. I got the point of this one-armed game of London Bridge, I just didn’t know what came next.

“D’ya know the Nazi’s arrested kids… in Germany for dancing swing?” she asked, still happily flouncing around.

“That just happened?” I asked, leaving the answer open.

“No, in August,” she said. “We can do whatever we like here. I also oppose a National-Socialist ideology,” she added slowly, frowning. I could only shrug. I had no idea what she meant.

“You could come out to our plantation sometime,” she continued. “You like pineapples?”

“Who doesn’t? They’re swell,” I said, mimicking a college kid I’d heard at the registration table.

The music ended and I clapped along with everybody, bowing to Jennifer as I tried to leave the floor. She was nice, but kind of wild.

“No, just wait,” Jennifer said. “One more, please? Maybe ‘Perfidia.’ I love that one.”

I smiled and glanced around. Calico was looking at me nervously, apparently trapped in conversation with three girls by the window. My eyes sailed around and I found Sam and Yuka out on the floor, closer to the far end.

And Thomas…

He wasn’t at the food table, or by the records.

The next song started.

“Ooh, it’s Tommy Dorsey,” Jennifer said, snatching my hands.

“I’m really not that good,” I said, smiling and still straining on Jennifer’s firm grip.

“You’ll get it,” she said, already into it.

Finally, I spotted Thomas near the far corner. He was squatting down in front of the chairs. He looked over his shoulder onto the dance floor and then quickly turned around, his arm reaching inside his jacket.

Jennifer yanked me so hard, I turned and lost sight of him behind other couples that were scooting onto the floor. I did my best to keep up with her flailing tugs and excited jumps, but it was getting too crazy for me to fake any longer. Plus, Sam wasn’t on the floor. Where was he?

Thomas was skulking down the sidelines when I heard a shriek from across the room. I saw Calico whisk past along the windows and turned to see Thomas staring back where he’d just been. His mouth dropped open. I pulled Jennifer towards me and raised my arm for one of her twirls and then let go instead. She came of out the spin just in time for me to say my apologies and I took off, pushing through the forest of students twirling around the dance floor.

I emerged and saw the damage. Yuka’s white dress was stained with brown liquid. A couple of other girls were dabbing her with napkins. Sam was holding two cups and sniffing one of them; Thomas’ flask.

I turned and saw him following slowly.

“Did you do that?” I asked. “You spiked their drinks, didn’t you?”

“Hardly anything,” he said, but I glared. “What? They’re in college. I thought they’d be stoked.”

“Thomas!” I said.

“I’m sorry,” he said, upset. “I thought it’d help keep ‘em here. I didn’t have enough to go around, for the punch bowl. They were drinking Colas.”

“Crap!” I said, seeing Yuka and Sam heading for the steps.