Wingmen (9781310207280)
Read Wingmen (9781310207280) Online
Authors: Ensan Case
Tags: #romance, #world war ii, #military, #war, #gay fiction, #air force, #air corps
Ensan Case
Published by
Lethe Press at Smashwords.com
Copyright 1979,
2012, 2014 by Ensan Case.
All rights
reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form,
except for brief citation or review, without the written permission
of Lethe Press.
Originally
published by Avon Books, 1979.
Republished by
Cheyenne Publishing, 2012
This edition
republished by Lethe Press, 2014
118 Heritage
Avenue
Maple Shade, NJ
08052
www.lethepressbooks.com | [email protected]
This is a work
of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the
product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any
resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons,
living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of
either the author or the publisher.
ISBN-13:
978-1-59021-574-6
ISBN-10:
1-59021-574-5
eISBN:
978-1-59021-575-3
__________________________________________
Library of
Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Case,
Ensan.
Wingmen / Ensan
Case. -- Lethe Press edition.
pages ; cm
ISBN
978-1-59021-574-6 (pbk. : alk. paper) -- ISBN 978-1-59021-575-3
(e-book)
1. Gay
men--Fiction. 2. Fighter pilots--Fiction. 3. World War,
1939-1945--Fiction. I. Title.
PS3553.A7913W56
2014
813’.54--dc23
2014019166
Wingmen
by Ensan
Case
“Altogether,
however,
Wingmen
is gratifying to read. It is the sort of
book that should have—and may have—been written right after 1945,
the sort of book that should have been published then, too, but of
course it could not have been. I don’t know what effect it will
have on you, but this is probably how it will affect Case’s fellow
war novelists: Norman Mailer will clench his fists and swear and
refuse to believe it, Gore Vidal will say, ‘I told you so,’ and
James Jones will turn over in his grave.”
—
The Advocate
“Navy veteran
Case’s soaring adventure-romance, set with Victory at Sea
authenticity against the backdrop of World War II, is a treasure
for all fans of historical fiction.”
—
Elliott Mackle
, author of
Captain Harding’s Six-Day War
“Fans of war
stories will prefer this tome, whose focus gets very specific with
the details of flying planes and crashing them.”
—Jim
Provenzano,
The Bay
Area Reporter
“This is a
well-written, exciting, and emotionally touching novel. It is bound
to become a classic in gay literature.”
—Alan Chin,
San Francisco GLBT
Literary Examiner
Thanks to silly Dick Newhafer
and his first
Tallyho.
There actually
was an Air Group Twenty in existence during the time period covered
by this book, and it may or may not have participated in the
historical actions described herein. The Air Group Twenty of this
book, however, is totally fictitious, as is the carrier
Constitution.
The characters which people this
story, with obvious exceptions, bear no resemblance to real
persons, living or dead.
By the first
half of 1943, both Japanese and American air groups were coming to
rely on pilots who had received their training since the war began.
The story of the burgeoning strength of the United States Navy, the
result of the great disparity in comparative economic might of the
respective nations, was well known by the Japanese at the time and
is fully documented today. Behind the scenes, however, of this
dramatic increase in power lies a seldom-told tale of another
important facet of that growth: the training of the men to man the
ships, to fly the new aircraft, and to maintain and repair those
ships and aircraft. It is a tribute to the American economic system
with its classless qualities that when the great fleets began to
meet in combat during that and the following years the pilots in
the blue aircraft with the white stars were better trained, better
equipped and flew more reliable aircraft, while the men flying
under the rising sun could claim but one advantage: their
willingness to face death.
J.E. Hardigan,
Commander. USN (ret.),
A Setting of Many
Suns:
The Destruction of the Imperial Navy
[The Naval
Institute Press, 1962], p. 126.
Part VI-A
Interim: Consideration
VF-20
1
The girl moaned softly
and massaged Fred Trusteau’s shoulders with her fingertips. This
young man had already lasted four times longer than any of the
previous three men who had made love to her, and she was now
feeling something entirely new and wonderfully salacious. Their
bodies rose and wove, rose and wove, meeting in a precise fit that
made her marvel and think that he must have done this many times
before. It was so much better this time. She was having her first
orgasm.
Fred thrust
softly and relaxed, thrust and relaxed, over and over, amazed at
how the strength was being sapped from his body by this necessary
but emotionally neutral act. The warm wetness and the sounds they
made would not go away, so he tried to forget about them and think
of other things.
He knew that
the other guys in the squadron would give their last ten bucks to
be in this darkened room in the clean-sheeted bed with this
attractive girl. He also knew that he and the girl had been seen
entering the boarding house by at least one other couple, a young
fighter pilot and a nurse. Probably they had waited to see if the
lights would go out in the girl’s room. The word would quickly get
back to the squadron that Fred had scored big. Part of the price of
acceptance would have been paid.
The warm
Honolulu trade winds rustled the curtains at the open window. Fred
looked across the small, cluttered room, and like a child recalling
a new and delightful toy, he reminded himself that he was a Hellcat
pilot. In the morning a big blue fighter would again be put into
his hands. The novelty of that adventure hadn’t worn off, even
though it had been at least two weeks since the almost-daily
flights had begun. Tomorrow the guns would be loaded with
color-coded tracers, and the firing runs against the towed sleeve
would begin. This would be the closest he had ever come to the
awful reality of fighting. Often in the past year he had wondered
just how it felt to touch the firing button that sent the tracers
blazing into an enemy plane, and then to see the frail aluminum
craft explode or burst into flame, shedding chunks of metal and
oily smoke before disappearing into the clouds below. That another
young pilot much like himself might be dying horribly in that
blazing coffin meant little; in one of the training films they’d
been shown, taken from the wing camera of a fighter in action, the
pilot of the doomed aircraft had tried to exit. The class had
watched him climb with amazing agility from the shattered cockpit
to the wing root, where he clung for a second before he, too, was
exploded by hundreds of hot slugs. Then he had tumbled away like a
grotesque ragdoll. The entire class had erupted into clapping and
cheering, and Fred had cheered as loudly as the rest.
The girl let
out a mingled cry like a sob and a laugh, and she dug her nails
into Fred’s back. Good, he thought, leave something for the guys to
see in the shower tomorrow. She began to move more quickly now,
almost desperately, and Fred knew she was climaxing. He
concentrated, trying to bring on his own, but he only felt
emptiness.
Par for
the course
, he thought without bitterness.
He had worked
hard to arrange this evening, making certain that the other men in
the squadron would hear about it. He wouldn’t exactly brag, but
neither would he deny it when the men made him the butt of
suggestive, good-natured ribaldry. If what he was doing now would
make his fellow pilots like him more or show him more
consideration, then so be it. The time and the money he had spent
on the girl would be worth it.
Now she gave a
short cry and arched her back, lifting Fred with her. Then she
froze in one position until she settled at last into a trembling
state of aftershock. Fred extracted himself and rolled off her
body. Only their feet still touched. The girl’s eyes were closed,
and she was breathing deeply and quickly through her open mouth.
For a moment Fred watched her, then he rolled out of bed.