November 1945 - I wrote this for a course I'm taking – and put a lot of work into it - the theme was supposed to be summer (for what it's worth this is not quite the version I turned in, as I don't think anything really personal was expected). Gene rather liked it.

The following took place on a day in early September 1941 at Devon school.

Chapter the first, in which, Forrester, this not-quite-a-stranger, with whom I was to share a room, and I turned out to have something minor in common.

There were no games, no classes, no events that day. Just guys arriving, unpacking and taking a sort of pre-semester deep breath.

On the room's open door, in the requisite tarnished brass frame was the usual 3x5 card where, neatly typed, were the occupants' names, in this case, his name and mine. Through the doorway was a wide strip of sunlight from the large single window leading right out into the hall. He stood there, suitcases in hand, momentarily in the light. Coming in, he squinted in my direction. It was as if he couldn't see for a moment. He probably couldn't. Then he stepped forward and almost into me. I stepped off to one side, into the light joining him. We were briefly very close, and I offered my hand, and we shook, like proper gentlemen. Emily Post would have approved, I'm sure. It was the right thing to do, and if a little formal, it was very boy's school, very Devon. Now and then, I like things like that, still do.

Within a few moments I took in the freckles across his nose and cheekbones, his hair, a sort of reddish brown, the width of his face, his chin, ears and neck and the eyes that were level with mine. This was the same Forrester, for sure; and something I hadn't noticed before; he was the same size as me (though skinnier than necessary).

This all was no great revelation. We were the same height - and I liked that.

Chapter the second, in which we do something contrary to the rules.

It was too late for lunch, too early for dinner. That and it was hot. "Want to go over to the Devon for the inaugutory swim of the semester?"

"That a word, Phineas?"

While his words were somewhere short of accented, they were spaced out in a way indicating he wasn't exactly from these parts. I knew enough about him to know that already, so it was no surprise. It was something I would be living with, something easy enough to get used to.

I raised an eyebrow and sounding more Gary Cooper than I meant to, "Don't rightly know. Got any trunks?"

"Nope"

"Underwear'll do. There's nobody out there looking."

"There's no swimming in the Devon, you've gotta know that"

Gene was right enough as the Devon was not technically on campus and the school didn't want any of the boys to drown off campus. It was okay if official and supervised, but otherwise no. Did I care? No.

The Devon was the only decent swimming around, and while I'm okay with an indoor pool in winter, it's a poor chlorinated second to the real thing; any clean cool muddy-bottomed fishy natural body of water. And what's more, it was, legally, still summer. I wanted to take my clothes off and get wet. The Devon beckoned.

Naturally, in the end we went. The shortest route from dorm to the Devon included a long treeless diagonal across some of the yellowed playing fields. I suggested we run to get us out of the sun sooner. He started without answering me, I followed, then passed him, then we were neck and neck to the first shade.

At the water's edge was a big tree struck by lightning during the summer apparently, with a long limb sagging broken into the river. I went climbing as far up it as I could; it seemed more interesting than the river momentarily. Then I hung down off of it and threw myself into the water. Gene, undressed by now waded out, then swam a lazy lap around me.

"Think there'll be war?" I asked him.

He stopped where he was, and and treading water and said "There's war already, Finny". First time he called me that, I think.

"Japan or Germany?"

"I don't want to think about it right now." He was looking at me, he kept looking. People do that sometimes, why should he have been any different?

Chapter the third - later that day.

We were alone the whole time; in and out of the Devon for more than an hour. He loosened up a little, which as much as anything, had been my reason for the expedition. He put me in mind of teasing an escargot out of its shell (not something I'd ever done - but had heard of). Speaking of food, it was close on dinner time before we started back.

I remember wringing out my underpants (which weren't about to dry on their own), then deciding I could do without them. I'd made the mistake of going to the river in an old pair of khaki linen shorts, and walking around in them, with underwear oozing river water, would have been a breach, an affront to civilization as practiced at Devon, and, as such, was unthinkable, even to me. Gene had been more sensible (typically) wearing nondescript thick wove denim, the type that show nothing much of what's going on beneath. He was a little shocked at my brief (pun unintended) out-in-the-air nekkedness, and primly looked away.

We went to dinner together, and he talked a lot. Don't remember much else about the day, except the weather broke and a breeze cooled our room, even if the walls stayed warm and we lay there under only our sheets.

Finny offered me what he'd written, "fix it up – if you want", he'd said. Briefly looking it over, and seeing that he'd chosen to write about us, surprised me.

I read it through. The day he described, I remembered, well - obviously. The day I got to room with a kid who had inexplicably, in no way I could reveal meant something to me. At the time, I figured knowing him close up would cause my interest to fizzle, as in familiarity breeding contempt.

Reading what he'd written, then reading it again, his words were so close to my own memories. I was slightly disoriented by the odd fact that there was not the slightest bit of content here I would have changed. Before, I probably would have happily taken his work and re-veneered every oddity and Finnyism right off the page. Now his ways had merged somehow with my mine, as through a slightly, very slightly distorting mirror.

Had the territory lying between us shifted? Were we that much the same now? I doubted it - out of cautious habit, I suppose.

I gave it back to him, saying, "I remember the day, what we did, in the same way." I put my hand on his shoulder and our eyes and mouths were on the same level. Being close, we moved closer, and we did things with our eyes and lips.