Current Affairs (part 1 of 2)
a historical fiction by Matthew McAyeal
"Current Affairs" is a historical fiction story set in 1939. It was previously published in "Danse Macabre", "cc&d", "The Fear of Monkeys", "Scarlet Leaf Review", "The Magazine of History & Fiction", and "Fiction on the Web".
Current Affairs
by Matthew McAyeal
“Hey, where’s my book?!” screamed Mary Brown. In an instant, her angry shriek brought tension and headache to the otherwise tranquil spring day in April.
By “my book” she meant her copy of Gone with the Wind. Margaret Mitchell’s story of the Old South was practically the most popular book in the world, and few loved it more than fourteen-year-old Mary Brown. She planned to reread it over and over again, enough to absorb every detail, before the movie came out. But now her copy had vanished. She knew she hadn’t misplaced it. She knew where she kept it. Someone else had moved it.
Mary marched out to the living room only to see her parents were completely unconcerned by her beloved book’s disappearance. “Where’s my book?!” she repeated loudly.
“Your book has been put away,” said Mrs. Brown.
“What?!” asked Mary, outraged. “Put away? Put away where? What have you done with it?!”
“Your book has been put away until your grades improve,” said Mrs. Brown.
“But I need that book!” Mary protested. “I need to have it when the movie comes out!”
“That’s not until later this year. You have plenty of time.”
“December fifteenth, to be exact,” said Mary. She had the date memorized, obviously.
“If your grades then are like they are now,” said Mrs. Brown, “you might not be seeing the movie at all.”
These words made Mary so angry that she couldn’t even speak! How could she be banned from seeing the movie? Oh, how she hated the calm voice her mother had said it in, as though it were the most reasonable and sensible thing in the world! Mary wanted to hit something and hit it hard. Some part of her knew it wasn’t rational to get so angry about this, but she loved Gone with the Wind so very much. She simply had to see the movie!
“Father, do something!” she yelled eventually.
“Listen to your mother, Mary dear,” said Mr. Brown, resting in his armchair with the newspaper and not paying much attention.
“Thanks a lot!” she yelled back at him.
“Mary, do you realize how ungrateful you’re being?” asked Mrs. Brown reproachfully. “Look around you. You have a roof over your head, decent clothes on your body, and food in your stomach every night. Do you not see the people living in the Hoovervilles? What do you think any of them would give to be living your life right now?”
Mary knew her mother was right. She didn’t think of the Hooverville inhabitants she had seen in her boring real life, but instead of the part in Gone with the Wind when Scarlett O’Hara returned to Tara only to find her mother dead, her sisters sick with typhoid, and her home looted by enemy soldiers. Facing complete destitution, Scarlett had vowed that she would never be hungry again. There did seem a disconnect between Mary reading about people teetering on the edge of starvation for entertainment and then considering it an outrage when she wasn’t allowed to see a movie. Of course, she was still mad at her mother and didn’t want to admit to being wrong, so she said nothing.
“If you improve your grades,” Mrs. Brown continued, “you can see the movie and get your book back too. You know our family rules—you can go to the cinema only so long as you keep your grades decent and the picture doesn’t have Mae West in it.”
“But it’s too hard!” Mary objected. “I’m just not a smart girl like Margaret or Ethel!” Not that Mary would want to be like Margaret or Ethel anyway since she hated them.
“You could always take an after-school elective class,” said Mrs. Brown.
“But that would cut into my free time!”
“Do you want your book back or not?”
Mary sighed in resignation. She knew she had no choice. What good would free time be if she couldn’t have Gone with the Wind in it?
* * *
Later that day, Mary was in the local soda parlor with Miriam Schubert, her newest and best friend. Miriam’s family had only moved to America from Europe the previous November, but she already spoke excellent English. She had learned through hers and Mary’s common interest—American movies. Mary found it a bit surreal that movies from her country were apparently so popular over in Europe. After all, she didn’t know any non-American movies.
The jukebox was playing Benny Goodman as Mary and Miriam looked over the options for after-school classes. It was a good thing Mrs. Brown wasn’t there. She would have asked how Mary could concentrate with that “modern noise” in the background and demanded that it be shut off even though Mary could concentrate just fine. Although the goal was to select an after-school class for Mary, she and Miriam found time to talk about other things.
“Do you think Mickey Rooney would ever marry me?” asked Mary.
“Sure,” said Miriam. “Right before you two adopt Shirley Temple.”
“Come on! What does Ann Rutherford have that I don’t?”
“A role in Gone with the Wind?”
“Shut up!” said Mary playfully.
It was at that moment that the door to the soda shop opened. Mary looked over and was happy to see George Baker entering. George was a very cute boy from Mary’s school and her second choice of husband should Mickey Rooney happen to turn her down. Unfortunately, George was accompanied by his know-it-all cousin Margaret as well as Margaret’s friend Ethel. Mary had several classes at school with insufferable Margaret, but none with George. Oh, how she wished that situation were reversed!
Margaret acted like she hadn’t noticed Mary, but that didn’t stop her from leading George and Ethel unmistakably in Mary’s direction. Mary decided to return the favor by pretending she hadn’t noticed Margaret and busied herself with her milkshake. As the group reached Mary and Miriam’s booth, Margaret acted as though she had just noticed Mary there.
“Oh hello, Mary,” she said dismissively. “We were just discussing the impact of last year’s Republican congressional victories on President Roosevelt’s New Deal programs.” Margaret said it importantly, in the voice of someone who wanted it known that she regularly talked about sophisticated, adult things.
“Sounds very boring,” said Mary.
“You have a civic responsibility to know what’s going on in the world,” said Margaret superiorly. “Women have had the vote for almost twenty years in this country. You’re going to have to know what’s going on if you want to be able to make responsible decisions at the ballot box.”
“But I’m not twenty-one yet,” Mary pointed out. “I won’t have to become boring like you for another seven years.”
Margaret narrowed her eyes.
“Actually, we were talking about it for our current affairs class,” said George cheerfully.
“Current affairs?” asked Mary. “Is that an after-school elective?”
“Yes,” said Margaret. “Of course, that wouldn’t interest you. After all, you wouldn’t want to become boring like me, would you?”
Mary breathed a sigh. She looked down at the list. As she thought over what to do, the jukebox switched to a Louis Armstrong song, but she paid no attention. At the moment, the music was in the background and in the back of her mind. Eventually, Mary made her decision and circled “current affairs.” There was no way she was going to throw away the chance to be in the same class as George!
“What’s the matter, Mary?” taunted Margaret. “Not failing enough classes already? I'll bet you don’t even listen to the news on the radio!”
“Why should I?” asked Mary. “How do I know it isn’t Orson Welles again?”
“Because it’s not Halloween?” suggested Ethel.
“He could strike on a different day,” said Mary. “Besides, I know about plenty of things that are going on in the world. For example, that singing girl from Love Finds Andy Hardy will be starring in a movie based on The Wizard of Oz.”
“How about what’s going on in the real world?” said Margaret, rolling her eyes.
“Hollywood is part of the real world.”
“No, it’s not,” said Margaret contemptuously.
* * *
“I hope you really want to take that class,” said Miriam as she and Mary left the soda parlor together. “I kind of feel like you only took it because you felt that Margaret was challenging you and you couldn’t back down.”
“No, no, I really want it!” Mary insisted. “It has George in it!” She and Miriam both had crushes on George. How that would work out if he ever became interested in them she didn’t know, but for now he was another common interest for them to bond over.
“Okay, so long as you really want it,” said Miriam a bit uncertainly.
“Let’s talk about something else,” suggested Mary. “Do you think Vivien Leigh will be any good as Scarlett O’Hara?”
“I should hope so!” exclaimed Miriam. “They certainly went to enough trouble finding her!”
Mary laughed. “My grandmother was born in 1853,” she said, “so she remembers the ‘60s. I hope she’ll watch the movie with us so she can tell us how accurate it is. I’ve been trying to get her to read the book.”
“How do you think we’ll refer to the ‘60s when we get to the 1960s?” asked Miriam thoughtfully.
“The 1960s?!” said Mary with a laugh. “That’s so far off! We’ll probably all have flying cars by then!” By this point, they had reached Miriam’s house and came to a stop in front of it.
“Well, goodbye then,” said Mary. “I wish I could see more of you. What church does your family go to?”
“We—we don’t go to a church.”
“What?!” asked Mary in surprise. She hadn’t meant to sound so aghast, but she just didn’t know what to think. Did Miriam’s family not believe in God?
“We’re Jewish,” explained Miriam. “We go to a synagogue.”
“Oh, I didn’t know that,” said Mary a bit guiltily, feeling that she should have known this about her best friend.
“Don’t worry, you wouldn’t know,” Miriam said quickly. “I don’t normally talk about it. Well, I’ll see you tomorrow!” She sped up to the porch and in the door of her house.
* * *
It was Thursday the twenty-seventh when Mary, not sure what to expect, walked into her first current affairs class. She took a seat between Clarence and Lois, the only two people there she knew and liked, although they were only casual acquaintances. She would’ve preferred to sit near George, of course, but he was too near Margaret and Ethel for her tastes.
“Welcome to current affairs,” said the teacher, a middle-aged woman. “For those of you who are new, I’m Mrs. Gregory. Today, we’re going to play a little game of sorts. I’m sure you’ve all been following the recent events in Europe.” Mary hadn’t been, but decided to keep that to herself. Margaret’s hand, however, shot up.
“I have, Mrs. Gregory!” Margaret boasted. “I could explain it!”
“Very well, go ahead then,” said Mrs. Gregory.
“Well,” Margaret began rather smugly, “the German Chancellor, Adolf Hitler, demanded that the Sudetenland—that’s the German-speaking part of Czechoslovakia—be incorporated into Germany. Britain and France were supposed to protect Czechoslovakia, but they agreed to let Germany have the Sudetenland in order to prevent a war. Now, of course, Hitler has gone far beyond that agreement and taken over all of Czechoslovakia.”
Oh, how Mary hated Margaret’s know-it-all attitude! She thought she was just so smart for knowing all about some far-off events taking place in Europe. Well, it wasn’t like those distant European events could ever affect Mary’s life in the United States.
“Yes, very good,” said Mrs. Gregory. “This comes just a year after Hitler incorporated Austria into the German Reich, and now he’s clamoring for the Polish Corridor between Germany proper and East Prussia. Meanwhile, General Franco has won the civil war in Spain, and the Japanese invasion of China is still ongoing. In short, there’s a lot of trouble in the world nowadays. In our game, we’ll see how the world’s problems would be handled by you, the new generation. You’ll each be given a country, and we’ll see how you can try to achieve world peace while fulfilling your country’s interests.”
“Mrs. Gregory, I don’t think Mary should participate in this,” said Margaret, raising her hand but not waiting to be called on. “She’s just not smart enough for it. Either that or she should be given some inconsequential country which will never matter, like Cuba or Afghanistan.”
“You shut your big mouth!” shouted Mary.
“Both of you, stop it!” said Mrs. Gregory harshly. “This is no way for young ladies to behave in school!” Mary thought of asking sarcastically where the appropriate place for young ladies to behave like this was, but decided she would rather not get into trouble on her first day in this class.
Mrs. Gregory said that Mary would participate like any other member of the class. Each student was called up to reach into a hat and pull out a strip of paper with the name of a country on it. Ethel got France, Margaret got Great Britain, Lois got China, Clarence got the United States, and George got the Soviet Union. When it was her turn, Mary mechanically reached into the hat and, not caring much which country she got, grabbed the first strip of paper her hand touched. As she walked back to her seat, Mary unfolded the piece of paper. It read: “Germany.”
Once everyone had their country, Mrs. Gregory got them to rearrange their desks into a circle so that they could all talk to each other.
“So, I’m Germany,” said Mary. “Apparently, I want to take over Poland or something.” She knew nothing about the country other than what Mrs. Gregory had said at the beginning of class.
“The Polish Corridor,” Margaret corrected her superiorly. “Though knowing Hitler, he probably wants all of Poland in the long run.”
“This’ll be difficult,” said Ethel. “Hitler has broken every treaty he’s ever made. Somehow, we’ll have to come up with an agreement which Germany will have no choice but to keep.”
“I don’t think that will be necessary,” said Margaret smugly. “In fact, I believe this situation is already resolved. Germany cannot invade Poland without getting into a war with Soviet Russia. If Germany and the Soviet Union went to war with each other, we could just sit back and watch two of our enemies destroy each other. The British Empire’s dominance over the world would remain unquestioned, and our two primary foes would be severely weakened.”
“Thanks a lot, Britain!” commented George.
“Sorry, George, but it’s just politics,” said Margaret. “Herr Hitler has shown a real expansionist streak in the past, but I’m afraid he’s now expanded as far as he dare.”
And that’s a wrap for today! Come back next week for the conclusion of “Current Affairs.”
Meet the author:
Matthew McAyeal is a writer from Portland, Oregon. His short stories have been published by "Bards and Sages Quarterly," "Fantasia Divinity Magazine," "cc&d," "The Fear of Monkeys," "Danse Macabre," "Scarlet Leaf Magazine," "Bewildering Stories," "Tall Tale TV," "Fiction on the Web," "Quail Bell Magazine," and "MetaStellar." In 2008, two screenplays he wrote were semi-finalists in the Screenplay Festival.
If you wish to read more of Matthew McAyeal right here in Underside Stories, check out “Melody” and let us know what you think!
