But that was a long time ago. I'm here in Israel now, standing in front of my boyfriend who's in the Israeli military until he's at least twenty-one. Avi is wearing a sand-colored uniform, unlike most of the soldiers on the base who are wearing olive green. All of us Americans are still in our regular clothes, so we look out of place among the real soldiers.
"I know we can't talk right this second," I tell Avi. "But after I learn how to do the marching thing, do you have any free time so we can be alone? Just you and me."
"Amy, we can't go anywhere alone. It's against base rules."
"But I'm your girlfriend, not some random?
I hear snickers behind Avi. Leaning so I can see who's behind him, I notice Nimrod standing with four guys and a girl all in sand-colored uniforms like Avis. The girl is covering her mouth to suppress her giggle. She's not wearing a stitch of makeup on her perfectly flawless skin, has long sandy blond hair with natural streaks in it tied up in a ponytail, and is really tall. To add insult to injury, she's got normal-sized, perfect boobs. I bet they stand at attention without a bra, while (as my mother always reminds me) God blessed me with boobs that need a little help being lifted.
I feel like an ogre next to this Israeli girl.
I would give her my famous sneer, but she's got a rifle so I figure it's in my best interest not to piss her off. I then notice they all have big rifles strapped to their backs. Avi does too.
Guns scare me. Especially big ones with bullets in them.
"Attention!" Sergeant B-S barks at me. I stand next to Nathan with my hands stiffly at my sides. We're still in front of everyone, so I guess our punishment for talking isn't over. This sucks.
The sergeant says something to Avi and his posse, then they all stand back and watch. "Ready," the sergeant says to Nathan and me. It's not a question.
Ready or not, I'm about to march. In front of the rest of my unit, and in front of Avi and his friends.
"Small. Small. Small-yamean-small. Small Small. Small-yamean-small. n Nathan and I follow the sergeant as we demonstrate how to march. I'm all too aware of Avis gaze on me, and I want to die from embarrassment because I'm royally screwing up. I'm smalling on the ya'means and ya'meaning on the smalls. It's not that I'm uncoordinated. I'm just nervous.
Glancing sideways, I catch sight of Avi. I can't tell what he's thinking because he's got a composed, soldier like expression.
As my eyes meet Avi's, I stumble into the sergeant, who must have stopped and barked stopping orders while I was still smalling and yameaning. "Oops," I say as my nose bumps his back. Actually, my boobs bumped him first because they're a gazillion times bigger than my nose, but I hope nobody noticed.
"B'amakom atz'or means you stop." Ronit clues me in.
"Got it. Thanks." I salute her because I want to be all military-like, but the saluting just brings more snickers from Avi's friends until he glares at them.
Oh, God, I hope he's not ashamed of me. What if his feelings for me changed since he came to visit back in January? What if he likes the gorgeous streaked-blond girl with the big rifle?
That very girl whispers to my boyfriend, then looks in my direction. Avi nods. Our eyes meet again, and I wish I could speak telepathically. But he just keeps up that stern military expression. It's driving me nuts.
I've seen Avi smile and laugh. I've made Avi smile and laugh.
Ronit calls out, "Girls, follow me! Guys, follow Susu!"
While we're scrambling to obey, Avi is at my side. The warmth of his fingers on my elbow sends shivers down my spine.
"What are you doing here?" he asks me. "I thought you were staying on the moshav with your dad."
"I was. Until I realized Jess and Miranda and Nathan were going to be on the same base as you. I thought you'd be happy to see me. Obviously I was wrong."
"Gefen, zooz," the sergeant barks out.
Avi turns his head to the sergeant, who doesn't look happy that Avi's talking to me. "I gotta go."
"So go," I say sarcastically. Okay, I know I'm acting like a complete brat but seriously... I came all the way to Israel and signed up to play soldier for ten days just to be with him, and he doesn't seem the least bit excited to see me.
"Amy..." he says, but I shrug his hand off me.
"Go," I repeat.
He sighs and walks away.
Chapter 7
Israel is .004% of the earth's surface.
They say the most valuable things come in small packages.
So now I'm depressed and want to go home. Seeing Avi in all his military splendor grilling me on why I came here wasn't exactly how I imagined it. I'm sluggish as I follow the girls inside a building and we all sit in chairs in a classroom. To my surprise, the snickering girl from Avi's unit came with us and is obviously about to teach us something.
"This is Liron," Ronit explains. "She's one of the few female operations specialists assigned to a new IDF commando unit called Sayeret Tzefa. They've just come back from parachute training and are spending a few weeks on our base before they head off to Counter Terror School. We're very lucky to have them here to train you."
The other girls are immediately impressed by Liron.
Even though she's not an official member of SayeretTzefa, by working alongside it she's as close as a female can get.
We spend the next two hours listening to her talk about the state of Israel and the countries that surround it.