Gray Girl (18 page)

18

Q:
     
How
many lights are in Cullum Hall?
 

A:
      
There are
340 lights in Cullum Hall, Sir.
 

Heritage, Bugle Notes, 81, p. 242

“RALLY!
 
RALLY!
 
RALLY!”

Jan, Angel and Drew jumped up,
knocking books from their laps and began donning various, non-uniform
uniforms.
 
Jan chose the gray pajama
top over gray skirt with go-go boots and black beret.
 
The last three female only items were
never worn seriously.
 
Even if she
wanted to wear them, her calf muscles had doubled in size since R-Day making it
impossible to zip the boots.

Angel wore the Full Dress Gray coat
with its big brass buttons, tails and cut at the waist in front, over gray pajama
bottoms.
 
She wrapped another
women-only-never-worn item, the black and yellow polyester scarf, around her
head.
 
Jan thought she looked
adorable.
 
All 99 pounds of her!
 

The roommates tied Angel's white
skirt around Drew’s waist using a white parade chest strap as a belt.
 
Jan convinced him to wear her black
pumps, which she would never wear anyway, and finished his outfit off with
Angel’s black beret.
 
Without a shirt,
he looked a bit like a Scottish, French cross-dresser who had a few too many
drinks.

“You look the prettiest, Drew!”
 
Jan said as all three stared in the
mirror at their fashions.
 
They
laughed while scurrying to the rally.
 
Once in Central Area, they ran around screaming, shouting and jumping
like all the other pent-up plebes.

Many of the guys wore only
underwear.
 
Jan wondered whether
they were lazy, unimaginative, or, she later considered, trying to make a point
like her.

I
would never go out in my skivvies though.

The rally ran its course and the
three plebes reluctantly returned to the barracks.
 
They entered the room to find
Dogety
sitting in Jan’s desk chair.
 
“What the hell kind of outfit is that,
Hambin
?”
 
He
stood up while the three friends stood at attention.
 
“Answer me, dammit!”

“Sir, may I make a statement?”
 
Jan asked.

“No, you may not!
 
Hambin
, answer
me.
 
What the hell are you doing in
a skirt and high heels?”

“Sir, we went to the rally...”

“What?”
 

“Sir, we went…”

“I heard that,
Hambin
,
but what about the
freakin
' skirt?”

“Sir, we dressed him for the rally,”
Jan blurted.

“I wasn't talking to you,
Wishart
!”

Drew’s face turned red.
 
He hadn’t been reprimanded like this
since Beast.
 
Jan tried again, “Sir,
may I make a statement?”
 

“What?”
 
Dogety
yelled.

“It's my fault, Sir.
 
I told Cadet
Hambin
to use our clothes rather than waste time going back to his room before the
rally.
 
It's my fault, Sir.”

Dogety
continued staring at Drew.
 
“
Hambin
, it's not like your room is across Post; it's next
door for
shitsakes
!
 
What kind of sorry ass man wears girls'
clothes?
 
You some kind of fairy?”

“No, Sir!”
  

Dogety
continued, “That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever seen in my life.
 
I don't ever want to see that on you or
any man again, you understand me,
Hambin
?”
 

“Yes, Sir!”
 
Drew said, with a slight shake of his
head.

“And as for you,
Wishart
,
you don't TELL anyone what to do.
 
He's a big boy; he can make his own decisions.”
 

No
question.
 
No comment.
 

Then he stepped right into her face
and screamed, “YOU HEAR ME, WISHART?”
 

“Yes, Sir!” she yelled back.
 

Dogety
stormed out of their room.
 
Jan,
Angel and Drew let out a collective sigh of relief.
 
“He always finds a way to siphon the fun
out of everything,” Jan said.

“Yeah,” Drew added, “I was just
thinking how much I didn’t miss him.”
  

Dear
Jan,
           

Sorry,
code name doesn’t quite fit you.
 
Hope you don’t mind if I go back to Jan.
 
I like your name.
 
It’s strong and neither common, nor
weird.
 
And
Wishart
?
 
What nationality is that?

You
do not disappoint.
 
But I, for one,
would like to see you have some fun.
 
And I really would love to see you smile.
 
I know it’s hard to do here, but I am
living proof that it can happen.
 

I
understand your cautious approach to us, but we are very patient.
 
Just continue to send your questions and
concerns to Box 483 (or leave taped to your door), and I will do my best to
address your concerns.
 
I still want
you to join our organization, but you are proving to be a tougher case than I
thought.
 
I won't push you on that
issue anymore.
 
Let's just try to
get you smiling first.

Congratulations
on making the team-handball team.
 
And what happened at the parade last weekend?
 
Your platoon probably got a lot of
attention for that.

Hope
to hear from you soon,

SKIP

SKIP,

I
can’t decide whether I like your letters or not.
 
I am a little unnerved that you know so
much about my life while I don’t even know your name.
 
I might consider you a stalker.

On
the other hand, I look forward to your notes.
 
So, while it may be crazy to keep
encouraging you, I am going to play along for a while.
 

Yes,
team-handball is proving to be a big help to me.
 
Mainly it gets me out of
intra-murder.
 
But I feel bad about
leaving Kissy on the H-3 soccer team.
 
I suppose you know her, too?
 

A
couple of guys fell over while standing at attention in the parade.
 
Rumor has it they were hung over.
 
I don’t think anyone got in trouble over
it, though.
 
If it had been us lowly
Beanheads, we’d all be walking the area by now.

Why
don’t you just tell me your name?
 
I
promise to keep it between us.

Jan

A deuce and a half pulled up carrying
fifteen fashionably dressed young women seated in opposing benches in the
back.
 
Two male plebes opened the
tailgate, set a low bench next to it and helped the gaggle of females step down
from the Army truck.
 
The women
giggled together in groups before walking into Cullum Hall.

“What
IS
that?”
 
Jan asked.

“Fuck Truck,” Kristi replied.

“What?”
 

“Fuck Truck.
 
Also known as Cattle Call.”
 

Jan didn’t know about West Point’s
long tradition of importing young women from nearby Mount St. Martha's College
to cadet dances.
 
These ladies wore
tight pants, low cut
tops,
form fitting dresses, high
heels, off-the-shoulder jerseys, jewelry and makeup.
   

In dreary contrast, the Dress Gray
uniforms completely covered female cadets—their arms, chest and
back—with a clasp closure two inches up their necks.
 
The coat hung down over their buttocks,
hiding all signs of femininity.
 
Female cadets could not wear jewelry, nor grow their hair below their
collars.
 
Modest makeup was allowed,
as long as the eye shadow, blush and lipstick were not noticeable.
 
Jan felt sure they came across like
radishes in a basket full of ripe strawberries. “I don’t want to go in,” she
confessed.

“Why not?” Drew asked.
 

“Look at us, Drew.
 
We look like boys in these things.
 
There are real women in there, with real
clothes on, who are a whole lot more appealing,” Jan said.

“So what?”
 

“So, our hopes of getting asked to
dance just got run over by the Fuck Trucks,
”
 
Kristi
said it best again.

“I’ll dance with you,” Drew offered.

“Of course you will, but it would be
nice to dance with someone else, too.”
 
She knew he was doing the big brother thing, but she wanted to meet a
non-relative for once.

“Well, we may as well go in and see
what we’re missing,” Kristi said.

“That’s the spirit!”
 
Drew really didn’t get it.

They walked upstairs to the big
ballroom and stood together observing their male classmates co-mingling with
the female civilians.
 
Several H-3
guys:
 
Jones, McGuire, Winnans and
Davidson, stood near the snack tables.
 
Jan looked at Davidson, noticing his casual, relaxed body language.
 
He caught her glance and lifted his beer
in a toasting jest.
 
She looked away
quickly.
 

Jan and Kristi sighed
simultaneously.
 
They felt like
distant relatives who had been invited, but not really wanted, at the
celebration.

Drew’s voice bumped them from their
trance.
 
“Let’s dance!”
 
His bright eyes beamed as “Twist and
Shout” began to play.
 
Jan knew this
would be the only offer she would get.
 
She turned to Kristi who was already shouting the words to the
song.
 
Then all three plebes pinged
to the dance floor.
 
For a few
shining moments, they danced and sang like real college co-eds.

Well, shake it up, baby, now, (shake it up,
baby)

Twist and shout. (Twist and shout)

C’mon, c’mon, c’mon, baby, now, (come on
baby)

Come on and work it on out. (Work it on out)

Well, work it on out, honey. (Work it on
out)

You know you look so good. (Look so good)

You know you got me goin, now, (got me goin)

Just like I knew you would. (Like I knew you
would, oooh!)

Well, shake it up, baby, now, (shake it up,
baby)

Twist and shout. (Twist and shout)

Jan swore off going to any more plebe
dances.
 
Her oath lasted until the
following weekend when Army played VMI in a home football game.
 
Kristi thought they should try the
Cullum Hall dance again.

“Jan, the rats will be there tonight,
”
 
Kristi
said.
 
Rats were VMI’s equivalent to
plebes.

“Oh goodie!
 
The Mount St. Mattress girls will have
even more men from which to choose.”
 

“But there’s only enough
fuck-truckers to go around for our plebes.”

“That’s their problem.”
 
Jan didn’t see the point.

“Jan, while our cadet brethren are
cattle calling, the rats will be left without any dance partners,” Kristi
argued.

“And your point is….”
 

“My point is VMI doesn’t have female
cadets.
 
These guys might actually
be interested in us.
 
They might be
happy to just talk to women—even ones in Dress Gray.”

“Are you saying you want to go to the
dance?”
 

“Yes.
 
Let’s go and flirt with the VMI
rats.
 
Maybe some of our guys will
sit up and take notice.”

“I doubt it.
 
I’ll go only if Drew goes with us.
 
That way we can at least walk in with a
guy.”

“Oh Drew will definitely go.”

They arrived at Cullum Hall to find
the same scene: civilian women socializing with male plebes.
 
This time, however, the VMI rats also
looked out of place in their similar but not quite identical uniforms.
 
They dared not infringe on the civilian
women, who were monopolized by the plebe men anyway.
 
So the rats migrated closer and closer
to the female cadets, realizing the plebe women were not spoken for.

“So, how are things going at VMI?”
Drew asked one of them when they came within striking range.
 
And that’s all it took before Jan,
Kristi and Drew began casually conversing with the larger group.
 
Six rats formed a small semi-circle
around Jan.