Wings (9 page)

“Excuse me,” the man said in a low, smooth voice as he smirked down at her and looked into her eyes.

She turned sideways and he settled in across the aisle. One of the sergeants interrupted her daze and offered Liddy a seat. She sat down next to Bet who was already chatting up the men. Liddy tried to appear as though she was listening to the conversation, while she fought with the impulse and apprehension of engaging the officer, sitting just feet away. Then she heard his voice, “Excuse me, Miss.” Liddy turned to face him.

He reached across the aisle and offered her his hand. “Reid Trent.” With confidence, he looked at her so fully. And it was a confidence she knew he had earned.

Liddy placed her hand in his, and he wrapped it up in a firm, warm grasp. A current ran through this man that Liddy couldn’t quite read, but it unraveled her just the same. He continued to hold her hand in his until she introduced herself, which was no quick thing. “Liddy,” was all she finally managed to utter.

“Nice to meet you, Liddy.” He looked straight into her eyes and smiled. And then his eyes roamed over her face and she felt flushed.

Within minutes, Bet had two soldier boys sitting across from her and two others leaning over the backs of the seats. The young men shared story after story, just to hear her giggle.

Liddy and Reid Trent leaned into the aisle on the arm rests. He had calmed her with his relaxed manner and quick wit, and soon they were making small talk about train travel. It was the kind of easy and exhilarating talk that you have with someone you’ve only just met, yet feel you’ve known for a lifetime.

He removed his cap and passed it playfully hand to hand. The short clip of his dusty blonde hair couldn’t hide its natural wave. Liddy searched to determine his age, but his sun thickened skin had a ruggedness that didn’t match the boyish twinkle in his face. He didn’t wear a ring, but she knew that didn’t mean a thing.

The light outside dimmed. Time disappeared with the words and the long moments when Reid Trent would look at Liddy and she at him and they would just stare, without words, sometimes with a smile, sometimes without. It was such a luxury to be able to study his face, as much as she wanted, and not have to look away. Something she had never done with any other man, or had the desire to do. And he took her in without any hesitation. Listening to this man, looking at him made her feel completely happy and calm.

“So what are you ladies doing on a desert-bound loco?” one of the men ask Bet.

“We’re headed to Sweetwater, Texas to train for the WASP,” Bet answered.

“WASP?” another man questioned.

“Women Airforce Service Pilots,” Bet said.

Reid was telling Liddy about all the lost and founds he’d discovered when he was a teenager and had a job cleaning train cars one summer. He stopped mid-sentence and looked wide-eyed at Liddy.

“Did you hear that, Major? These ladies are gonna be flying Army.”

Reid Trent’s eyes had changed and Liddy saw the moment he locked her out. He rose from his seat and spoke but didn’t look at her. “Miss, I’m sorry I didn’t catch your last name.”

“Hall.” Liddy looked up at him, trying to catch up with what was happening.

“Miss Hall, it was nice to meet you.” The major looked in her direction, but not at her, and extended his hand for the second time and accepted hers briefly before releasing it. “If you’ll excuse me, I need to attend to some business. Have a safe trip.” He took his bag from the compartment overhead and left the car.

Liddy felt abandoned like someone had cradled her, dropped her to the floor, and then stepped over her and walked away. She was stunned but tried to appear detached from what had just happened, whatever it was. Liddy shifted toward Bet’s chatterfest and feigned an interest, while she tried to make sense of the sudden turn in Reid Trent. She soon accepted what she knew was true. The more she stewed, the more her irritation grew.

She had never cared what anyone thought of her being a pilot before. It had never put a chink in her, but this time she cared. When enough time had passed since Major Reid Trent had left the car, she excused herself and went back to her seat and then to the sleeping berth. She unbuttoned and let her clothes fall to the floor and buried herself under the blankets. An ache filled her that called for home and kept her awake, but when Bet came into the room, Liddy laid still and pretended to be asleep.

Major Reid Trent didn’t return to the car that night or the next day, which was fine with Liddy. She had dismissed the whole thing and scolded herself for being such a sap. The call for Sweetwater, Texas came just after lunch and the soon-to-be WASP trainees gathered their luggage. With her suitcase in hand, Liddy climbed down from the train. Bet followed with her red case clutched in one hand and her matching bag slung over her shoulder.

After traveling in the rocker for so many days, it would take some time before they would have steady legs again, and the women felt the solid ground move beneath their feet. Through the people coming and going, Liddy spotted Major Trent exit a car at the end of the train, and an uninvited yearning reared up, which she immediately hushed. He walked to a waiting Army jeep and was saluted by the driver posted by the passenger side door. The driver took the Major’s duffle bag and threw it in the back seat.

“Now what?” Bet broke Liddy’s trance.

“Huh?”

“What now?”

Liddy snapped out of her daze and read the paper clutched in her hand. “Come on.” She headed toward town and Bet followed.

With their luggage in tow, the women walked street to street. The town was an extreme contrast to what Liddy had known in Holly Grove since it had been quieted by the war. Sweetwater had the dismay and fortune to be the funnel and neighbor to a military facility, which changed a place. And for Sweetwater, the facility was solely to train female pilots to fly for the Army, which was an added oddity. But it covered up the loss of their sons and brothers, so apprehension mixed with the relief of distraction.

The women were aware that they were being watched by the people they passed. When they walked by a filling station, a small girl hopped out of a pickup truck. She shuffled to the sidewalk in shoes that she hadn’t yet grown into. “Ma’ams, are you the pilot women?”

“Yes, we are.” Liddy smiled down at her.

“Can I git your autographs?” The child held up a postcard-sized book that had been put together with paper and string.

Bet was amazed, but it was old hat for Liddy. “Sure, honey.” Liddy took the book and flipped to a blank page.

“I don’t got no pen. Do you?”

Liddy looked at Bet looking down at the girl. She was still stunned, but she slowly unsnapped her purse and felt around the inside. She found a pen and handed it to Liddy. Liddy signed and passed it to Bet, who was now giggling at the whole notion. Bet signed and handed the book back to the child.

The girl’s father came out of the station and disapproved. “Rhonda, you come on now.”

The girl handed the pen back to Bet.

“You keep it,” Bet told her.

“Thank you,” The little fan gripped the pen with her book and didn’t take her eyes off the signatures as she shuffled back to her father’s truck. He opened the door and herded his daughter in.

When they saw the sign, Blue Bonnet Hotel, Bet grabbed the back of Liddy’s arm and squeezed. Their excitement was frosted with the travel hangover that soaked them from head to toe. The hotel was crawling with newly arrived WASP trainees. Women lounged around the lobby and some swooshed in and out of the elevator and the coffee shop. Other guests came and went too, including big cowboys with big ten gallon hats, some with pretty Texas belles on their arms. Families and men and women of all ages walked in and out, but the fly girls were different and Liddy could pick them out. A spirit exuded from these women—it was unmistakable. Liddy heard bits of conversations between women who hailed from the world of female flyers that she knew nothing about.

“Do you know Francine Ladler?”

“Yeah, I met her at the Benton Roundup. Do you know Rachel Middleton?”

Talk of cross country flying, air races and flight clubs, chatter about schools, families and boyfriends, swirled and bounced around the room. Liddy knew from the requirements that the women would range in age from eighteen to thirty-five, but as she looked around she realized this wasn’t what she expected. Not that she knew what she expected, but these women came in all types—short, tall, exceptionally attractive, exceptionally ordinary, quite loud, quite reserved. But they all seemed to know exactly what they were doing. She was glad she met Bet first. It made what she was looking at less overwhelming somehow. Still, when Bet looked at her beaming over the welcome chaos, Liddy beamed back.

Behind the front desk a woman was juggling mail, guest registers and fielding questions from the mob. Bet slipped through the crowd standing in front of the check-in counter and Liddy followed in her wake.

“Excuse me,” said Bet.

“What’s your name, darlin’?”

“Betsy Bailey and...” Bet waited for Liddy.

“Lidia Hall.”

“Lidia, huh?” teased Bet.

“Liddy to you, Betsy.”

The desk clerk continued, “Ya’ll are plannin’ to share a room, I hope. We got all you gals comin’ in and there’s an oil man’s convention in town. There’s no privacy ‘round this place, till tomorrow that is when the cattle car comes round for all ya’ll at ten a.m.”

Bet’s eyes saucered and she grabbed Liddy’s arm, “Cattle Car?”

Liddy and Bet took the elevator to the fourth floor.
Other than the Mayfair in St. Louis, where she’d had her WASP interview, Liddy had never been in a hotel. Wall-to-wall carpets were printed with vines and flowers. Two twin beds had curved headboards that were covered in coral tapestry, and the light green wallpaper had a pattern that was a shadow of the same color. Two forest green upholstered chairs sat in front of the window that was trimmed with a dark mahogany and looked out over a busy street. A writing desk was angled in the corner and had a pen and stationary set out and waiting. The room had a private bathroom and Liddy envisioned her trailer back home fitting into the space. It all seemed an odd entry to Army training but Liddy decided she’d better enjoy it.

Bet couldn’t wait to get downstairs and break in with the others, so Liddy sent her ahead and shut herself up in the bathroom and soaked in the tub. She ran the water as hot as she could stand it and sat on the edge of the rolled lip. She dipped in her toes, coaxed in her ankles, then her legs. When her body was warmed up, and the rest of her could take the heat, she slid in up to her neck. Her arms rested on the side of the tub and the porcelain was cold on the thin skin of the inside of her arms.

With her eyes closed she thought about how she had left her life and it was like she was living someone else’s. She heard Doubt knocking on the door but ignored him. Unknowns were layering themselves in her mind, and in those layers Major Reid Trent unexpectedly floated through. She shook her head to clear the thoughts away, then slid under the water and held her breath until she gasped for air. Liddy rolled over and cooled her cheek on the slanted end of the tub. She couldn’t wait to be in a plane again.

After she was good and wrinkled, Liddy dried off and stood at the mirror and studied her face.
Mama’s face?
Liddy asked herself,
Was it there the whole time?
She dressed and then sat at the desk and dashed off a note home:

May 8, 1943

Dear Daddy and Crik,

How are you? I’m good. I just bathed in a tub that I could sleep in, and now I’m sitting in a fancy chair, at a fancy desk, writing you a letter on fancy stationary. Such is the life of a WASP trainee.

We arrived in Sweetwater this afternoon. The train ride was long, but I met another fly girl and we made a pretty good time of it. We’re at the Blue Bonnet Hotel for the night. You probably guessed that from the stationary. Tomorrow we’ll be taken to Avenger Field. I’ll write after I get there.

Tell Daniel and Celia Hi for me.

Love, Liddy

Liddy folded the note and addressed it to Crik at the Holly Grove Post Office. She thought about Jack and what his face would look like when Crik read him the letter. And she thought about Rowby and wondered if she should write to him, but she didn’t even know when he had to leave for basic training, or where he was going. He would be alright, she felt sure of it.

Downstairs, Liddy found Bet in the coffee shop with some gals, talking it up big. Without a pause, the discussion was being jumped on by all of them at once. She joined them and listened more than talked. The more she listened, the more Liddy realized what an amazing group of women she would be calling her classmates. She had never known women who had done the things that these women had, and even though she was older than most of them, it made her feel young.

They ate dinner in the hotel restaurant and walked up and down Main Street to see what Sweetwater was all about. They had the idea to take in a movie, but the house had been sold out. The days that a new WASP class came to Sweetwater and graduates left were busy ones for the town. The rooftop garden of the hotel was where they ended up. There they reclined on lounges and crowded on benches talking late into the night, the last night without a curfew they’d have for months.