Gray Girl (19 page)

“Would you like to dance?” one
finally asked Jan.
 

“Sure, but I’m out of practice.”

“Don’t worry about that,” he said as
they headed to the dance floor.
 
When the fast song ended, he pulled her close and they kept dancing to a
slow song.
 
She felt womanly and
wanted for the first time in over four months.
 
The VMI rat didn’t seem to care that she
wore a gray straightjacket.
 
She
wondered how hard it would be to transfer to VMI.

When the slow song ended, he offered
to buy her a beer.
  
Oh,
wow, it’s a real date if he buys me a drink, right?
 
Jan never actually went on a date with her high school boyfriend.
 
He had asked her to go out with him, but
they never did go out.
 
They
hung
out
all the time at her house, at his house, at friends’ houses, at school
and in cars.
 
That’s what
going
out
meant—
hanging out
.
 
But she always wanted to go on a real date.

They got their drinks and went
downstairs to the outside balcony.
 
“Where are you from?” she asked him.

“Virginia,” he said.

“No surprise there,” she said
nervously.
 
“So, do you like VMI?”

“It sucks.”
 

“No surprise there either.”

“I really miss being around girls,”
he said.

“Me, too,” she blurted out before
thinking.
 
He laughed out loud.
 

“Bill,” he said, when she asked his
name.

Same name as Cadet Trane.
 
They talked for two hours on the balcony overlooking the Hudson
River, occasionally going back for more
beer which
Jan
offered to buy, but he wouldn’t allow.
 
It was cold outside, but she didn’t care.

When the pre-Taps alarm sounded at
2330 hours warning all cadets they had thirty minutes to get to their rooms,
Jan considered asking Bill to spend the night in her room.
 
But three reasons convinced her against
it.
 
One: it was against the rules,
big time; two: Angel would not like it; and three: he might expect
sex which
was still not on her to-do list.
 
Instead, the gentleman rat walked Jan to
the walkway leading to her barracks.
 

“Thanks for dancing and talking,” he
said.

“It was my pleasure,” she replied.

“Wish we could do it again
sometime.”
 

“Yeah, me, too.”

“Well, goodnight then.”

“Goodnight.”
 
Bill went with his fellow rats to
wherever they went and she entered her barracks alone.
 

She rounded the corner out of the
stairwell and heard a familiar bark, “Wishart!”

“Yes, Sir!”
 
She stopped halfway down the hallway to
her room and turned around.
 

“Were you just fraternizing with that
rat
from VMI?”
 
Dogety asked loudly.

“Sir?”

“You know what I mean.”
 
Dogety walked closer to her.

“Sir, I do NOT know what you
mean.”
 
It seemed Dogety had been
drinking.
 
But so had she.
 
Then
again, he could just be his usual asshole self.

“You were cavorting with that RAT,
weren’t you?”

“Sir, we were at the dance at Cullum
together.
 
As far as I know, that’s
not against the rules.”

“Don’t get smart with me,
Wishart.
 
I saw you two making out
near Grant Hall.”
 

“Sir, I certainly did NOT make out
with anyone.”
 

“Wishart, we have an Honor Code here
you know.”

“Sir, I wish I had made out with him,
but I’m sorry, you must have seen someone else.”
 
The beers made her bolder than usual.

“Well, who the hell was that I just
saw making out with a rat?”
 

“I have no idea, Sir.
 
Why didn’t you just go up and ask them
who they were?”
 
She knew she was
pushing it.

He stepped right up to her, so his
face was only a few inches from hers.
 
“Wishart, I saw them from my window.”
 
She smelled the alcohol on his breath.

Peeping
Tom?
 
She remained silent and
stared back at Dogety, not wanting to say what she was thinking.
 

“Hey, Sam, call for you,” Jan’s Squad
Leader, Cadet Meyer, interrupted.
 
“Miss Wishart, shouldn’t you be getting to your room now?”

“Yes, Sir.”
 
She turned and sped away along the wall
while Dogety walked in the opposite direction to the third floor pay
phone.
 

Those
damn bells.
 

From its perch above West Point, the
Cadet Chapel is considered a stunning exclamation point to an already
breathtaking campus.
 
But to Jan,
the Cadet Chapel had one huge flaw: its bells.
 
Annoyingly, they woke her up every
Sunday at 0800.
 
God, I hate those bells.
 
They rang out on the only day plebes
could sleep in which caused Jan to wonder if they were part of the fourth-class
system.
 
Because sleeping was the ultimate
escape from West Point, even better than getting drunk and second only to
leave, the bells had to be a form of institutional hazing.
 

If she managed to go back to sleep
after the bells, which was always her preference, she ended up missing Sunday
brunch.
 
The Mess Hall opened from
ten o'clock to noon for
brunch which
was another
problem with Sundays.
 
Isn't brunch supposed to be
breakfast and lunch? What part of lunch ENDS
at noon?
 

Plebes were not allowed to go to the
snack bar in Grant Hall, nor to
Tony's
, the underground pizza shop right
in the middle of Central Area, nor to the Ike Hall cafeteria.
 
And Boodlers, the cadet junk food store,
was closed on Sundays.
 
So missing
brunch meant no meal until dinner.
 
Jan would have to forage for food.
 

She pinged along the wall to Kristi
and Debra’s room.
 
“Hey guys, sorry
to ask again, but you got any food I can borrow?”
 
Jan asked as she opened their door.
 
Usually one of them had something in
their footlocker.
 
Jan kept meaning
to store provisions in her footlocker for Sundays...she just never thought
about it until Sunday.

“No, you can’t borrow, but you may
have something,” Kristi said.

“I promise to stock up soon and then
you can borrow from me all you want.”
 
Jan said halfheartedly, knowing she might never actually do that.

“No you won’t Jan, but it’s okay,”
Kristi stated the obvious once again.
 

“Okay, you’re right.
 
May I have something to eat
anyway?”
 

“Only if you tell us what happened
last night after we started dancing,” Kristi demanded.

“Oh, not much.
 
We got a few beers, sat out on the
balcony and talked.
 
He was really
nice.
 
He walked me to the barracks
just before taps.”
 
She turned to
Debra, still lying in her bed, “Hey, what did you do last night?”
 
       

Debra responded, “I don’t dance.”

“Well, what did you do then?”
 
Jan asked.

“We had a swim team practice and
dinner,” Debra said.

“Jan, you didn’t ask
me
what happened last night,
”
 
Kristi
interrupted, with a slight smile on her face.

“Well, do tell, my dear.”
 

“Well, Dan, the Rat, and I danced a
bit and also had a few beers.
 
Then
we went down to Flirtation Walk.”
 
Flirtation
Walk, off-limits to plebes, was a trail where cadets and their dates could be
alone.
 
Jan thought most went to
“Flirty” to make out, and probably some had had sex on the mysterious
path.
 
It held a certain mystical or
mythical appeal to Jan, given that plebes were forbidden on it.
 
Kristi, however, never let rules get in
her way.
 

“Are you kidding?
 
And you didn’t get caught?”
 
Jan asked.

“Nope.
 
It was cold, but we kept pretty
warm.”
 
Kristi giggled.

“Kissy, you amaze me,” Jan said.

“We couldn’t keep our hands off each
other, even after we got back.
 
We
kept necking right up until taps.
 
Then we both started running to our rooms, without even saying goodbye.”
  
Kristi described it like she was
recalling a playful childhood memory.

“Wait, Kissy, were you making out by Grant
Hall?”
 
Jan wondered if maybe….

“He had my back right up against the
wall,
”
 
Kristi
confirmed.

“Oh man, Dogety saw you!”
 
Jan said.
 
“He thought
I
was making out with the rat.”
 

“No shit!
 
What did he say?”
 

“He said,” Jan lowered her voice to
mimic Dogety’s, “‘Wishart, I saw you making out with that rat by Grant Hall’ or
something like that.”

“Damn!
 
What did you say?”
 
Kristi’s eyes widened.

“I said it wasn’t me.
 
He didn’t believe me at first, so I told
him I wished I had made out with someone, but unfortunately I hadn’t.
 
You should have seen his face.
 
He looked like he was going to burst a
blood vessel.”

“Do you think he knew it was
me?”
 
Kristi asked.

“Hell no.
 
He obviously didn’t get a good
look.
 
I’m only about a foot taller
than you, Kissy.”

“It’s a good thing he’s blind as well
as stupid!”
 
Kristi laughed.

Debra sighed, “Are you two done
talking about your sexual escapades?
 
I’d like to go back to sleep.”

“Hey, I just
came for the food.”
 
Jan grabbed a
package of cheese crackers from Kristi before heading back to her room.

The other
problem with Sundays was what to do with the rest of the day.
 
Nothing else absolutely had to be done,
so the afternoon always led to brooding, ruminating and contemplating.

I wish I had the guts to do what Kissy did
last night.
 
I might have ventured
further with Bill at a normal college.
 
At a real university, I could wear whatever I wanted.
 
I could eat whatever I wanted.
 
No one would care how much I weigh or
how fast I run.
 
I could have a boy
in my bed and sleep in every day if I wanted.

So why am I still here?
 

This debate
raged on every Sunday afternoon.
 
The only way to escape the argument in her brain was to curl up on her
bed with her “Gray Girl.”
 
Issued to
all new cadets on R-day, this warm, gray, comfy comforter became every cadet’s
best friend.
 
Plebe Gray Girls were
crispy and bright gray,
if there is such
a thing as bright gray.
 
Firstie
Gray Girls were the best—dull gray, soft and worn like the Velveteen
Rabbit.
 
These comforters were
called Gray Girls long before the advent of women at West Point.
 
Jan didn't mind the name; she certainly
didn't want to share her bed with a Gray
Boy
every night.
 

“Angel, hope
it’s okay if I put on my Sunday afternoon uniform,” Jan said as she rolled on
her bed pulling the comforter over her body.

“What uniform
is that?”
 
Angel asked.

“Gray Girl
over Gray Girl,” she said before drifting off to sleep.
 

Dear
Jan,

Please
don’t be too unnerved by my letters.
 
I am not stalking you, and I am not dangerous in any way.
 
I just happen to be in the general
vicinity and notice things about you.

For
instance, I have yet to see you smile. I know it’s a tough thing to do here,
but that’s part of how we can be subversive.
 
Smiling is good for us and it totally
messes with the enemy.
 
Killjoys
don’t know what to do with smiling. Try smiling and see what happens.
 
Besides, I bet you have a really great
smile.
 
I bet you have an even
better laugh (but one step at a time).
 

I’m
sure “Kissy” understands you had to choose team handball over “intra-murder.”
 
(Great term.)

I’m
sorry to keep you in the dark about me, but if you think back about 2 weeks, we
met in the mailroom.
 
And this past
weekend, we met under some less than desirable conditions.
 
Soon you will figure it out.