Chapter 8

It's Finny's dream for me to win the Olympics.

The first thing that Finny said to me when I walked in, was, "I can see I never should have left you alone" (95). This was refreshing because Finny was acting like himself, and joking. He continued to make fun of the way I was dressed and then began to complain about how there were no maids at the school. I explained to him that there was a war going on but Finny did not see the point I was trying to make. We seemed to be growing farther and father apart with our outlooks on the war. When we woke up in the morning Brinker came in, so that we could go enlist in the army. I was surprised to see, "Phineas was shocked at the idea of my leaving" (100). I felt all of the sudden, compelled to tell Brinker that I wasn't enlisting, and that it was a crazy idea to do so. We also, after years of trying to do so, came up with a nickname for Brinker, which was "The Yellow Peril". Days later, I was still shocked that Finny was so frightened by the idea that I would be leaving him, and that he had chosen me, as his only true friend.
As Finny walked up to his first class back, he decided he wasn't ready to, and we skipped. We ended up in the locker room. He asked me to chin myself a few times and asked about the sports teams I had joined. When I told him that I didn't sign up for any teams, especially because of the war, that there wouldn't be many trips, he was outraged. He couldn't believe that I still believed in the war. He told me that "fat old men" made up the war, like they made up the Depression and Prohibition. I was mad about this, but of course Phineas always has to be right. We continued to argue, and I started to chin myself. When I did it, Finny was so proud and he told me that he had been training for the Olympics. We haven't discussed the fight ever since. It was then that Finny decided he would train me for the Olympics. "And not believing him, not forgetting that troops were being shuttled toward battlefields all over the world, I went along, as I always did, with any new invention of Finny's" (109).
After a while, I began to question the war myself. Finny also started training me for the Olympics. When I first started training, I would get winded and tired, but lately I've been fine. It feels good to be in shape. "It was as though my body until that instant had simply been lazy, as though the aches and exhaustion were all imagined, created from nothing in order to keep me from truly exerting myself" (112). On our way back from training we ran into Mr. Ludsbury, who laughed at us when Finny told him about the 1944 Olympics. After he walked away, Finny and I laughed about how he believed in the war. In some way, I pitied Mr. Ludsbury.