It’s December 6, 1941. Tomorrow I turn 18. I can’t wait. This is my last year of high school. My name is Jeff Stephens. I live in Oahu, Hawaii. It’s really nice year round.

We had a Japanese kid named Tanaka Morita come to our school from Japan. He speaks real good english. You wouldn’t know he was from Japan. He likes airplanes. Mostly the air force ones. I like fighter planes too. After school was over I invited him to my house. At school there were rumors that the Japanese were going to attack Hawaii. I didn’t believe them.

Anyways when Tanaka came over my mom made us turkey sandwiches. Tanaka said he never ate a sandwich that good. But he was just probably being polite. I realized he brought his bike with him.

“You want to go bike riding?” I said

“Sure, let’s stop by Pearl Harbor”

So we left our house and we went to Pearl Harbor. Tanaka showed me a secret bike path where the soldiers couldn’t find us. We were so close the battleships. But then a soldier comes out of nowhere and says

“Hey you kids! This is government property!”

After that he started heading towards us. We rode our bikes real fast back to our house. He only chased us for a couple of feet and gave up. Tanaka went home on the way back.

All night I couldn’t sleep. I was too anxious for my birthday. It was a quarter ‘till 7 o’clock I had stayed up al night. So I thought I might as well go bike riding. I rode my bike to Pearl Harbor. I decided not to take the path that Tanaka showed me. When I got there I heard a loud noise. It wasn’t the battleships. It sounded like planes.
Then to the right I see lots of Japanese fighter planes. One them drops a bomb and its heading towards one of the battleships! BOOM! The first ship explodes. I see bodies fly everywhere. The other planes follow as they too drop bombs and torpedoes! I go to the entrance and a soldier covered in oil hands me a gun goes “shoot at the japs!” I don’t even know how to work a gun. So I just drop it and I ride my bike and go back to my house. My mom comes running out

“Thank goodness you’re ok!”

“I’m okay mom”

“Why did you leave without telling me?!”

“I couldn’t sleep”

“Well go back inside and stay there!”
So I went back inside. I didn’t leave the whole day. I could hear people screaming. The next day I went to Pearl Harbor. It was a wreck. All the ships were destroyed! I learned the Tanaka had been taken from his house and taken to an internment camp. Now that I’m eighteen I am going to join the army and avenge Pearl Harbor! The president has declared war on Japan! WWII has started.