The Taste of Fat

Camp McCoy, Wisconsin
Winter 1944–45

By the time the train shuddered to a stop, Hiro Tanaka was too tired to feel anything but cold.

He had been told what would happen when the doors opened.

The instructors back in Japan had made it very clear: Americans did not take prisoners. And if they did, they tortured them. Starved them. Stripped them of all honor before killing them anyway. Better to die by your own hand than in an American camp, they’d said.

Surrender was worse than death.

Hiro had believed them.

He’d believed them when he’d volunteered, when he’d sailed to the Pacific, when he’d scrambled through jungles on rations that dwindled from rough rice to almost nothing.

He believed them still, even as the metal doors clanged and a blade of cold air cut into the boxcar, stabbing through the stink and the stale breath of dozens of men who’d been packed together too long.

“Out!” someone shouted in English.

He braced for rifle butts.

For boots.

For the crack of a pistol, clean and quick.

Instead, he saw snow.

The world outside was white and flat and so cold the air burned his lungs on the first breath. His legs wobbled as he stepped down, boots slipping on the frosted ground. His uniform hung off him, threadbare and spotted with stains from places he did not want to think about.

Ahead, instead of gallows or pits, there were rows of wooden barracks. Guard towers. Fences topped with barbed wire.

And smoke.

Not from burning bodies, but from kitchen chimneys, curling gray into the sky.

The smell hit him next.

Food.

Not the thin, sour broth they’d eaten on the ship. This was rich, greasy, unmistakably heavy. Meat. Bread. Something sweet underneath.

He felt his jaw clench automatically.

Don’t show curiosity, he reminded himself. Don’t show weakness.

Around him, other prisoners tightened their faces into masks.

“Is this a trap?” someone whispered in Japanese.

“Be ready,” another murmured. “They want to see us beg.”

Commands came in English, short and sharp.

“Form up! Single file! Move it!”

They sounded like their own NCOs had sounded back home—impatient, but not enraged.

Then came words in Japanese, relayed through an interpreter with round spectacles and an American uniform that looked too big for him.

“They say you will be processed,” he translated. “You will receive clothing and food. You will be treated according to the Geneva Convention.”

Hiro almost snorted.

Geneva Convention.

In training, that had been a punchline.

He saw men in strange uniforms standing a little apart, clipboards under their arms, red crosses on their armbands. They had not been in the briefing. No one had mentioned that other people would be watching.

International observers.

Red Cross.

The kind of things you read about in leaflets and assumed the enemy ignored.

Now they were here, on a Wisconsin railroad siding, watching American guards watching them.

It shook him more than any shouted insult could have.

The intake was a blur of indignity wrapped in unexpected care.

Lice powder first, clouds of it shaken into hair and seams. Their old, crawling clothes stripped and thrown into a pile that was carted off and, later, he would learn, burned.

Hiro stood shivering in a line of equally naked men, waiting for whatever came next.

In his mind, nakedness equaled vulnerability equaled opportunity for cruelty.

A medic with a stethoscope around his neck moved down the line, checking chests with cool metal, peering at throats, ears, old scars.

Hiro had an infected cut on his forearm from a rusted nail back on the island. It had gone red and angry weeks ago, the skin around it hot, the flesh tender. In the rush of surrender and transport, he’d assumed it would just… take him. Another small death in a long list.

The medic paused when he saw it.

He frowned.

“Get me some antiseptic,” he said to an orderly, then looked at Hiro. His eyes were blue, which made them look cold. His hands were steady, which made them look… trustworthy.

“This hurt?” he asked, gently probing.

Hiro understood the tone, if not the words.

He nodded, jaw tight.

The medic cleaned the wound anyway, careful, thorough, his touch no different than it would have been on one of his own countrymen.

Bandage. Wrap. A nod.

“Keep it clean,” the medic said, and patted his shoulder once before moving on to the next man.

Hiro stared at the white strip of gauze on his arm.

Why? he thought, disoriented. We are not their men.

There was no answer that made sense.

Clothing came next. Plain wool uniforms, marked with “PW” in big white letters on the back. Coats. Boots that didn’t pinch, that didn’t have holes in the soles.

The barracks were no resort—plank walls, thin mattresses, crowded bunks—but there were stoves in the middle, red bellies glowing with coal.

Hiro wrapped his hands around the warmth like someone might snatch it away.

He still slept with his body curled tight, expecting to be kicked awake.

The kick never came.

Instead, the bugle did.

It startled him awake on the second morning, the notes slicing through the dawn.

For a moment he thought he’d been transported back to his own base.

The melody was almost the same.

So much so that his brain automatically filled in the shouted commands that used to follow.

This time, the words were in English.

The rhythm of military life had followed him across the ocean.

They were marched to the mess hall in the pale winter light, boots crunching on packed snow. Their breath plumed in front of their faces, mingling with the smoke from the kitchen.

Hiro lined up with the others, tray in his hands, stomach a hard knot of anticipation and fear.

Before food, a small man with silver hair and a Red Cross armband stood on a crate at the front of the hall.

Through the interpreter, he spoke in formal, careful Japanese.

“You are prisoners of war,” he said. “Under the protection of the United States and the International Red Cross. You will receive shelter, food, medical care. You may be assigned to work, but your work hours will be limited. You may send letters home. If you are mistreated, you may report it.”

Hiro lowered his eyes.

Shame burned his cheeks.

To feel gratitude—it wasn’t allowed. Not for the enemy.

And yet, the words scratched at something in him.

Letters.

Food.

Limits.

He’d learned to live without all of those.

He wasn’t sure he knew how to live with them.

Medical checks came again that day. More thermometers. More notes scratched on forms by American hands.

“A lot of these guys are half-starved,” one medic said quietly to another in English. “Look at the ribs on that one.”

Vitamins were handed out—small, chalky tablets.

“Drink water with them,” the interpreter said. “They will help your strength.”

Medicine for captives.

It felt wrong.

It felt… good.

Hiro swallowed his tablet and waited for the blow that didn’t come.

Days fell into a new pattern.

Roll call.

Work details—some to chop wood, some to clear snow, some to work in camp maintenance.

Hiro found himself assigned to the laundry at first, then to a small workshop repairing wooden crates. The work was monotonous but familiar. There were breaks. There was supervision. There were no beatings for shoddy workmanship—just do-overs and the occasional sharp word.

The guards were always armed.

Always watchful.

But they did not spit on them.

They did not use their rifles as clubs unless they had to break up a fight among the prisoners themselves.

When an older man slipped on the ice one morning and went down hard, a guard reached down, grabbed him under the arm, hauled him up with a muttered, “You OK, old-timer?” and kept walking.

No slap.

No kick.

It chipped away at Hiro’s certainty the way water wore at stone.

Then came the first hamburger.

By the time it happened, he’d been at Camp McCoy for a few weeks.

The food had already surprised him.

Porridge. Bread. Soup that actually had pieces of meat and vegetables in it instead of just flavor.

It wasn’t luxurious.

But it was predictable.

It was enough.

That was more than he’d had in uniform.

On a Tuesday that felt like all the others, the smell from the kitchen was… different.

Sharper.

Greasy in a way that wrapped around the brainstem and tugged.

He tried not to think about it.

He failed.

The line shuffled forward.

Tray.

Cup.

Fork.

“Next,” the cook barked.

Hiro stepped up.

The man on the other side of the counter was large, apron tied over his uniform, forearms freckled with grease splatter.

Without fanfare, he plopped a hot, round patty of meat onto a soft bun, slid a pile of golden fried potatoes beside it, and then grabbed a cold glass bottle from a metal tub filled with ice.

Condensation beaded on the glass.

Red script curved across the label.

“A little something special today,” the cook said. “Move along.”

The interpreter at the end of the line tried to explain.

“Hamburger,” he said, stumbling over the American word, then tapped the bottle. “Coca-Cola. A… drink. Soda. Sweet.”

Hiro stared at his tray.

Meat.

Bread.

A cold drink.

A bottle with more sugar in it, he suspected, than he’d had in months.

His hand shook.

At the table, the other prisoners sat down slowly, trays clattering on scarred wood. The hall buzzed with uncertain murmurs.

“What is this?” someone whispered.

“Meat sandwiched in bread?” another said, nose wrinkling.

Hiro picked up the bottle first.

The glass was surprisingly heavy.

He pried off the cap the way he’d seen Americans do—using the edge of the table.

It hissed.

Bubbles raced to the top.

He lifted it to his mouth and took a cautious sip.

Sweetness hit first—sharp and cloying, punching his tongue.

Then the bite of carbonation rushed up his nose and into his sinuses, so unexpected that he coughed, spluttering, eyes watering.

The men around him stared.

“Is it poison?” one asked half-seriously.

He shook his head, gasping.

“No,” he rasped. “It’s…” He searched for the word. “…alive.”

They laughed, nervously.

He set the bottle down and picked up the hamburger.

The bun squished slightly under his fingers. The patty steamed when he lifted it. He could see fat glistening on the surface, smell pepper and… something else. Onion, maybe.

He took a small bite.

Grease ran down his chin.

For a moment, everything else stopped.

The noise in the hall. The clatter of dishes. The weight of the PW sewn onto his clothing. The memory of jungle humidity and hunger.

All of it disappeared under the simple fact of meat on his tongue.

Real, honest fat.

His jaw worked slowly, as if relearning the motion. Tears pricked his eyes before he could stop them.

A bunkmate leaned in, concerned.

“Are you all right?” he murmured.

Hiro swallowed.

“I had forgotten,” he said, voice breaking, “the taste of fat.”

He put his hand over his mouth and was surprised to find he wasn’t ashamed.

Around them, the same scene played out in dozens of small variations.

Some men poked suspiciously at the food, then, hunger winning, took tentative bites that turned quick and ravenous.

One prisoner brought the burger to his nose first, sniffed it like a wild creature testing something in a trap. He ate with tiny bites at first, then faster, then with a soft sound that might have been a sob.

Another raised his Coke, drank, jerked back, eyes wide, then laughed, the sound half-terrified, half-delighted.

A few sat, hands shaking, unable to quite bring themselves to eat, as if refusing to accept kindness from the enemy was the last inch of defiance they had.

Hiro looked around the room.

The American cooks moved along the line, refilling trays without comment. To them, this was just Tuesday lunch. Bulk rations turned into something that filled bellies and kept men from falling over.

They didn’t seem to grasp the magnitude of what they were doing.

To them, a hamburger and a soda were routine.

To Hiro, it was a gut punch.

He had been taught that America was weak. Soft. Devouring itself with decadence, unable to field a real army.

Yet here he was, eating better behind American wire than he had in the Emperor’s service.

The shame sat heavy in his chest.

The relief sat heavier.

Life at Camp McCoy settled into a strange kind of rhythm.

Work earned them coupons.

Coupons could be spent at the canteen on things that had been fantasies in the jungle—paper for letters, razor blades, gum, chocolate.

The first time Hiro held a wrapped chocolate bar in his hand, he thought of his village in Japan, where chocolate had been rationed to children a quarter-ounce at a time, if at all. Where mothers had told kids it was a medicine, not a treat.

Here, the American clerk said, “That’ll be two coupons,” and handed it over like it was just… candy.

He shared squares with his bunkmates, savoring the way the chocolate melted slowly, the flavor lingering far longer than the piece lasted.

They took English classes, some out of interest, some because there was nothing else to do. They stumbled over strange consonant clusters, turned “family” into “fam ray,” sending the whole room, including the American instructor, into helpless laughter.

Hiro didn’t trust easily.

He didn’t make friends with guards.

But small interactions chipped at the barrier.

A cigarette passed through wire, offered without comment.

A guard shaking his head with amused disgust when one of the prisoners swallowed a stick of gum whole and then mimed chewing, trying to explain.

Tension flared, of course.

Not every guard lived up to the ideals in the pocket manuals.

Not every prisoner wanted to accept kindness if it meant accepting that his own side had lied.

But over time, the barbed wire seemed to hold in something more than just bodies.

It held in new understanding.

The idea that enemy did not automatically mean monster.

Years later, back in Japan, Hiro would try to explain Camp McCoy to his grandchildren.

They’d sit in his small living room, the shoji screens glowing with afternoon light, shoulders hunched over homework.

“Grandfather,” one would say, “what was it like?”

He would think of snow and bugles, of Red Cross armbands and the weight of new wool on his shoulders.

But mostly, he’d think of that first hamburger.

“Cold,” he might say first, to tease them. “Boring. Lots of walking in circles.”

Then, after a moment, he’d add, “And… surprising.”

“Surprising how?” they’d ask.

He’d look at their faces, smooth and full, the way his had not been at their age.

“We expected to be treated like dogs,” he’d say. “We were fed like men.”

They’d frown, trying to picture it. “Like now?”

He’d shake his head.

“No,” he’d say. “Like that first time your mother took you to a restaurant with real meat and you didn’t know what to do with your hands.”

They’d laugh.

He’d smile.

“The war taught us to hate,” he’d say softly. “Camp McCoy taught me… to doubt the hate.”

It didn’t erase what had happened in the Pacific.

It didn’t absolve anyone of anything.

But it lodged in his mind, stubborn as the taste of fat on that first bite—a proof, however small, that the world was not as simple as the posters had said.

The enemy had rules.

And sometimes, they chose to follow them even when they didn’t have to.

Sometimes they chose to feed their prisoners hamburgers and Coca-Cola on a Tuesday.

And sometimes, Hiro thought, that was how wars ended.

Not just with signatures on surrender documents, but with the shocking, humbling realization across a table of men in mismatched uniforms:

They could have done their worst.

They didn’t.

And his gut, remembering the first sweet burn of Coke and the warm grease of meat, still didn’t quite know what to do with that.

 

The end.