Do you hear from Michael Mallory? Your sister said that he was a pilot, too. Well, I don’t seem to have much more to say. I hope you receive this letter, and I hope you’ll remember me, and answer it if you can.
Yours truly,
P. S. We don’t live on Halsted any more. My new address is:
Miss Margaret Penner
5832 South Princeton Avenue
Chicago, Illinois
I can’t wait for you two guys to get together. My brother’s about as big as you are, Will, maybe an inch or so taller, with blond hair and brown eyes and my dumb buck teeth, only on him they look good. Are you an athlete? He was an athlete back home, a four-letter man, his sports were baseball, basketball, soccer, and track. Baseball was really his game, though; he pitched a no-hitter in the Little League when he was only ten years old, I’ll never forget that day as long as I live.
My mother came over to the field in the seventh inning, wearing jodhpurs and flicking her riding crop against her boot. I told her Skipper had a no-hitter going, and she said, Really, what’s a no-hitter? She was there to pick us up after the game, and she was pissed oft because it wasn’t over yet. She kept telling me about a dumb mare named Peony who’d developed a capped hock. I wanted to say Listen, go to hell, you and Peony both, my big brother’s got a no-hitter going, can’t you understand that? They carried him on their shoulders after the game, he was all covered with sweat, his face all flushed, and he looked around — he was on his back, you know, legs up in the air, arms waving for balance — he twisted his neck and spotted me in the crowd and yelled Hey there, Ace, we did it, huh? We did it.
He was in college when this thing started, you know, he could have gone in as an officer, but he didn’t want to. I told him he was crazy. Look, I said, get the most out of it, Skip, get the good chow and the broads and the easy times, why knock yourself out? No, he couldn’t see it my way. He enlisted in the Navy, so now he’s a big deal Gunner’s Mate/Third, what’s that the equivalent of, Will? A buck sergeant? He’s wasting himself, he really is. And with that Navy officer’s uniform, he could be getting more tail than he’d know what to do with, not that he’s making out too badly as it is. He’s got himself a little nurse off the hospital ship out there, she’s risking decapitation for fraternizing with an enlisted man, but she just can’t keep her hands off him. She goes around in a fog all day long, just waiting to get ashore to be with him, No, no, Miss Abernathy, I told you to prick his boil, do you know that one? You do? There’s this new nurse at a hospital, you see, and on her first day the intern tells her...
Dear Will,
The picture on the front of this card is me at Cape Cod. (Ha-ha) Here with Mommy alone just now, but Daddy will join us on the Fourth. How come the Air Force never sends you home? They sure are keeping you flying, lieutenant. (Ho-ho!) Our address here is: c/o Lambert, Truro, Massachusetts. Write, right?
Love & stuff,
Charlotte Wagner
June 14, 1944
Dear Will,
I’m writing again because I thought my last letter might not have reached you.
I guess you’re wondering how come all this activity when we haven’t seen each other for almost a year and a half now, and hardly knew each other even then. Well, I found you very interesting to talk to that night, and I thought it might be fun for both of us to start a correspondence. There are no ulterior motives involved here, Will, as I have a boyfriend at the University of Ohio who is in the Navy’s V-12 program there, and he knows I’m writing to you. I told him so when I spoke to him on the telephone last night. His name is Frederick Parker, Freddie for short. He’s from Edison Park, perhaps you know him.
Well, enough about Freddie.
I’m dying to know what it feels like to fly an airplane. Perhaps, if you have the time, you might describe it to me as I’m truly interested. I would imagine a person would be scared to death up there. Suppose you run out of gas or something? Do you fly with another person in the airplane with you, or are you all alone up there? Is it difficult to read all those instruments? In pictures I have seen, it looks like there’s a hundred of them.
I suppose you’re very handsome in your lieutenant’s uniform, though Freddie would kill me if he could read that. (I won’t tell him if you won’t.) In case you’ve forgotten what I look like, I’m enclosing a picture I took at the lake a few Sundays ago. (Don’t mind the girl clowning around in front. She’s my girlfriend Louise.) I got a terrible burn the day the picture was taken, you should have seen me. I’m a redhead (I guess you remember) and it’s true what they say about redheads having very fair skin that boils in the sun.
Well, I guess that’s all for now. I Love A Mystery goes on in about ten minutes, and I don’t want to miss it. Please tell me all about flying.
Fondly,
I’ve always had a thing about names, Will. When I was twelve or thirteen, I used to dream of dating girls with names like Connie or Grace or Wendy or Gail, they were all lovely blond dolls with long hair blowing. I guess I must have fallen in love with a dozen Connies later on, but only because I was already in love with the name. Even now, if someone says, Listen there’s this great girl you have to meet, her name is Gladys or Adelaide or Hannah, it’s simply not the same as April or Deborah or Diane. Okay, it’s a quirk. But you try living with Avery for a while. All I’m trying to say is that the name got me even before I saw the actual airplane. Even the number got me. What are you laughing at? You think P-38 is the same as P-40 or P-47? Well, it isn’t. There’s something sexy about P-38, stop laughing, will you? P-38, listen to it! It rolls off the tongue, P-38, it’s got a nice easy flow to it — you jackass, I’m trying to tell you something about this airplane we’re flying!
You know what the Germans call her? Der gabelschwanz teufel, I think that’s how it’s pronounced. It means fork-tailed devil. Now, Will, that’s a pretty fair reputation to have up there with you, the fork-tailed devil, the Lockheed Lightning. You can’t tell me that Curtiss Warhawk or Republic Thunderbolt sound anywhere near as exciting as Lockheed Lightning, that’s like saying Minnie is as exciting as Fran. I’m not even talking about looks now, I’m talking about the name of this bitch, the P-38 Lightning, it makes you want to hop into her and ride her up against whatever they’ve got!
The first time I glimpsed her, Will (I know you felt exactly the same way because I saw you when you landed, I saw that look on your face) the first time I glimpsed her sitting out there on the field in a long line of silver beauties in the sun, I thought You can’t ask me to fly that sweet precious thing, you can’t ask me to risk taking her off the ground where she might get hurt, you’ve got to build a big plexiglas bubble all around her and just let people come to gape at her the way I’m gaping now. I could have written a poem about that piece, well, what the hell’s so comical, would you please tell me? I happen to be serious here.
No, the hell with it. Never mind. No, never mind. Just forget it. If you want to go through life an ignorant, insensitive clod, that’s your business. Why don’t you go over there and sit with old Hotshot Horace, let him spit on you when he talks, maybe you like guys who use their hands when they tell how they dove at the screen, rat-tat-tat-tat-tat, pwwwwwwwssssssshhhhhhhh, all over your blouse, go ahead, Will, never mind the people in this world who’ve got a little feeling for things.