Dear Mr. President Page 14

  And then today I came back and paced around the bunker, consumed with bitterness and rage and a deep sense of betrayal, but I finally caught my snap and moved past that, realizing that these emotions were of no use to me. I realized that Dithers did what he did not because he’s a hateful person, but because he’s simply misguided. And then tonight, exhausted but with a renewed sense of resolve, I started to go out on my mission for the Good of Mankind, with hardly any of my stuff because Dithers had stolen it all, and I reached for the handle on the hatch but it was stuck. I shook it harder, but it wouldn’t budge. Then I heard Marty’s snickering voice call out, “Hey, what’s going on down there, Help People.” A chorus of laughter erupted, and I could tell there was a bunch of them up there. I heard Dithers’s distinctive cackle. “Hoo. What’s amatter, can’t get outta there. Hey, whadya know, there’s a boulder up here. Ha-ha.” Then Diaz called out in a low voice that rose as he went on, “Hey, help help. Help me, Help People. Help help,” and then they all chimed in and were roaring it together, over and over, “Hey, help help. Help me, Help People. Help. Help.”

  And it hurts, because they don’t know this but I really would, I’d rescue each and every one of them if they needed it. There’s no ocean or stretch of land I wouldn’t cross to save their lives, and here they are, just fifteen feet away, doing everything they can to keep me from it.

  1. I should warn you, though, this welcome gesture on the part of the corps is a onetime offer, so please make your choice carefully but quickly, because time is of the essence and after a predetermined amount of time expires without our receiving a phone call from you, we will have no choice but to assume that you have elected to read further.

  * Due to legal constraints, we are not allowed to indicate exactly how much time you have left.

  2. The United States Marine Corps is an equal opportunity employer.

  MESSAGE TO OUR READERS REGARDING A UNIQUE EDUCATION EXTENSION OPPORTUNITY

  Dear Mr. President has been a presentation of the School of Obligatory Survival (S.O.S.). It is one of several texts which is mandatory reading within our lower-division core curriculum. If you enjoyed Dear Mr. President, it is probable you would make an exemplary candidate for our unique educational program, where students are exposed to, among other things, a vast array of S.O.S.—including our forthcoming book on immigration—supplemental literature.

  THE S.O.S. EDUCATIONAL PHILOSOPHY

  S.O.S. is different from other educational institutions in that it operates under the premise that its students do not wish to remain alive, but also do not wish to be, necessarily, dead. We at S.O.S. assert that Life and Death are the twin cultural lies propagated by the Military Industrial Complex, which seeks to perpetuate, for the sake of its financial and territorial gain, the inherent humiliation which riddles these two obsolete Existence Options. Which is not to say humiliation in and of itself is an unsatisfactory predicament. But that, even if humiliation is your thing, there are infinitely more complex and rewarding ways of achieving personal humiliation than your Vietnam Parents (pacifist or soldier), your WWII-style grandparents, the entire narrative of human History, or whatever other propagandistic story you base your own existence on, would have you believe.

  CURE YOURSELF THROUGH TACTICAL EXISTENCE

  Meet Leath®. Leath® is the half state between Life and Death. It’s the cornerstone of our educational philosophy, virtually technology free, and is the state which all S.O.S. students strive to achieve. No student leaves our campus with an S.O.S. degree before demonstrating, through a series of rigorous physical and mental tests, that they have entered Leath®. Additionally, when in Leath®, one can cavort between Life and Death with ease, and many of our graduates have made documented forays into a variety of Heavens, not out of any sort of religious principle, but merely because they can. A person who earns our degree is also able to convert their being into certain animals, or become a member of the opposite sex. S.O.S. graduates also, with the assistance of the S.O.S.–style two-piece bikini, learn how to see with their eyes closed (it’s this ability which is, more than any other skill, the most successful way to fake out full-fledged Death).

  LEARN MORE ABOUT OUR CAMPUS

  The S.O.S. campus is located in the West Village. The structure of the S.O.S. campus is constructed of Stealth material, which was purchased at a government-sponsored auction for a reduced price, and almost half of the campus is located underground. The campus itself hosts an extensive array of advanced Educational Tools. These Educational Tools include, but are not limited to, a small zoo with chimpanzees, camels, mules, bulls, and zebras, a medical center, wetsuits, a Hide Site Module, a full service Body Augmentation Depot, bunkers, a limited number of barracks, Brain-Mail® implants, as well as a fully operating cafeteria, or chow hall, which is referred to by the students, affectionately, as the Censorship Chamber.

  SCHOOL UNIFORM REGULATIONS

  At S.O.S., uniforms are a vital component of the training cycle. They not only assist students in their various missions, but also help propel them to the eventual goal of Leath®. Furthermore, as has been noted elsewhere in this book, S.O.S. students will train naked during Second Phase, since skin is the first uniform.

  ALUMNI TESTIMONIALS

  “I used to think it was necessary to sleep, and when I look back at my old self I just have to laugh. Now, after getting a handle on my HSO’s, I use this time I’d be sleeping to investigate my other hobby, Gravity Reversal. Who would’ve thought I’d be able to fly? Last night I built a constellation with a couple of stars and named it Sexy Me. Thanks S.O.S.”

  Jeanine Hanover

  Andrew, PA

  “I’ve never told anyone this before, but because of S.O.S., I spent the entire last year as a hundred dollar bill. It was a guilty pleasure, but I loved getting touched all the time. I fell in love with my owner, Anthony, who kept me in his underwear drawer for six months, and then one day out of the blue he broke me for change.

  Mark Heetl

  San Francisco, CA

  “Sometimes when I drive past a cemetery I have to resist the urge to run in there and tell everyone to wake up. It doesn’t have to be this way, I want to say. You’re just being lazy in your Approach to Existence. But I guess, you know, some people just want to do things the same old way, the Tradition Mongers. It makes me really sad to think about, so then I usually stop.”

  Meredith Brodkey

  New York, NY

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Much gratitude to the following people: Chris Rhodes, Jenny Minton, Ira Silverberg, Deborah Treisman, Dave Eggers, Edward Kastenmeier, Jennifer Jackson, Eli Horowitz, Lee Epstein, Anuj Desai, Bill Buford, Paul Maliszewski, Robert Coover, Ben Marcus, Lynne Till-man, George Saunders, Elena Wealty, Megan Hustad, Jesse Dorris, Jorge Hernandez, Hank Denault, Lola Deneault, Peter Semere, Virginia Ewing Hudson, my younger brother Kendall, and most of all to Sarah Raymont, for the storm.

  PREVIOUS PUBLICATIONS

  The following stories first appeared in other publications:

  “The American Green Machine” appeared in Conjunctions Web.

  “Dear Mr. President” appeared in slightly different form in The New Yorker.

  “Cross-Dresser,” “General Schwarzkopf Looks Back at His Humble Beginning,” and “Notes from a Bunker Along Highway 8” appeared in slightly different form in McSweeney’s.

  “Those Were Your Words Not Mine” appeared in Columbia: A Journal of Literature and Art.

  “The Cure as I Found It” appeared in slightly different form in Black Book.

  “Woman in Uniform” appeared in slightly different form in Shout.

  Gabe Hudson

  Dear Mr. President

  Gabe Hudson received his MFA from Brown University, where he was awarded the John Hawkes Prize in Fiction. His fiction has been published in The New Yorker and McSweeney’s. He has received the Sue Kaufman Prize for First Fiction from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and was a PEN/Hemingway finalist. He lives
in New York City. To send a letter to the President, please go to www.gabehudson.com.

  FIRST VINTAGE CONTEMPORARIES EDITION, NOVEMBER 2003

  Copyright © 2002, 2003 by Gabe Hudson

  Vintage is a registered trademark and Vintage Contemporaries and colophon

  are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

  Owing to limitations of space, notice of previous publication of stories can be

  found following the acknowledgments.

  The Library of Congress has cataloged the Knopf edition as follows:

  Hudson, Gabe.

  Dear Mr. President: stories / by Gabe Hudson.

  p. cm.

  1. Persian Gulf War, 1991—Fiction. 2. Americans—Persian Gulf Region— Fiction. 3. War stories, American. 4. Soldiers—Fiction. I. Title.

  PS3608.U543 D43 2002

  813’.6—dc21 2002020812

  www.vintagebooks.com

  www.randomhouse.com

  eISBN: 978-0-307-42546-1

  v3.0