My buddy Peter and I were the last two men in line for food. If you could call it that! I frowned at the war-time meal of stale bread, disgusting beans and hard chicken. The cook dolloped the sustenance onto my plate with a no non since look.

At the end of the line Peter and I turned towards the many fold up tables and chairs that littered the room. Not a single seat was left open.

"Where do we go?" Peter whispered to me. I'm surprised I heard him over the sound of the soldiers. Every man was rowdy and jovial, with the few exceptions of those boys who were drafted. They kept quietly to themselves. But the rest of the men. Those men who enlisted. They joked and sang songs and told each other stories. I thought to myself of how foolish those men were.

"I don't know." I answered as I scanned the room. I noticed two men sitting at a far wall. They seemed to have ran out of seating as well. "Let's go sit with them." I nudged Peter and began walking towards them.

Peter and I took a seat beside the short, young looking man.

"Hello." I greeted.

" 'Ello." He sighed. The boy was British, which surprised me.

"You're a Brit?" I asked.

"My parents were." He corrected me. The poor kid sounded as if he was about to cry. He must have been drafted like Peter. He couldn't have been older than twenty, his features still resembled that of a child. All the girls back home must have been falling at his feet. With a face like that he could have made it anywhere in show business.

I neglected the boy to eat my supper. I noted that the kid had not picked up any food. He only sat there with his head between his knees and tears in his eyes.

"Mike?" Peter asked me.

"Yeah, babe?"

"I don't like it here." Peter said to me, tears in his own eyes.

"I know you don't, but we have to please Uncle Sam." I informed him.

"Do we?" I looked sharply to my right towards the voice. It hadn't come from the young soldier.

"Does he really need us with all these soldier who are ready and willing to kill for him?" The other soldier, a curly haired, scrawny boy with a notebook and a pen in hand, asked. He didn't look up from his pretentious scribbling when he spoke.

"No...I guess he doesn't." I answered.

"You're darn right." The young soldier sighed.

After a moment the curly haired boy looked up and half smiled.

"Micky Dolenz, Las Angeles, California." I shook his outstretched hand, over the young soldier.

"Micheal Nesmith, Houston, Texas, originally. But I enlisted in Greenwich Village, New York."

Dolenz extended his hand over me to Peter. Peter accepted it with a sad smile.

"Peter Tork, Greenwich Village, New York."

"Ah ok!" Dolenz sat back down on the opposite side of the young soldier.

"And how about you?" He asked.

Dolenz nudged the boy.

"Huh? What?" The boy lifted his head and dried his eyes.

"Who are you?" I asked bluntly.

"Oh me? I'm David Jones, Huntington, Pennsylvania." Jones sighed before dropping his head again.

"How did you all get here?" Dolenz asked changing the subject.

"I was drafted." Peter spoke up.

"I enlisted when he got drafted." I added.

I was there when Peter received the letter. He was torn up. How could a hippy like him be drafted? Pete fell apart and so I promised to come along with him. To protect him.

"I enlisted as well." Dolenz half smiled to me.

"Why?" Peter said in disgust.

"I wanted to get out here and see what it's really like. All the Governmental leaders say the war is good, and the hippies back home say it's not. I want to see for myself." Dolenz informed us before continuing his writing.

A small silence followed before Jones spoke up. "I was drafted, and I don't want to be here. I wanna go home." He sobbed.