Wings (26 page)

Louise was living off base too, but with her kids. She was flying and taking care of her children and Liddy soaked in her happiness. She became Aunt Liddy to Bonnie and Tommy, which, as an only child, she treasured. She never imagined she would have such delicious little people in her life. Good as the times were, they were tough times too, and Louise appreciated the distraction Liddy brought to the little family. Liddy’s visits with the Parkers were quiet, but fun, and she always returned to base relaxed and renewed.

December in Louise’s Colorado could bring snow, or a warm snap, and Liddy and Louise’s daughter Bonnie sat on the porch swing of the little Parker home, enjoying a break in the winter season. Their legs stuck straight out on the upswing and they tucked them under the seat in unison as it sailed back.

“Aunt Liddy, did you know my dad?”

“Not really.”

“But you met him?”

“Once, kind of.”

“Did you like him?”

Liddy stopped the swing and looked down at her little friend. “Why are you asking me this, honey?”

“It makes Mommy sad to talk about him. He wasn’t that nice and I don’t really miss him, but I just want to know why he left us.”

“What’d your mom tell you?”

“She just said she’s sorry for us if we’re sad that he’s gone. She tried to say more, but couldn’t.”

“Well, honey, people do things sometimes they think will make them happy and they hurt other people in the process. You’re dad made choices that were about him. They had nothing to do with you, or Tommy, or your mom.”

“Does it work, those things people sometimes do to be happy?”

“Not usually.”

“Do you think my dad is happy?”

“I don’t know. But I can tell you this, someday you’ll understand it all. It won’t make it easier, though. I just want you to remember that life is good and bad. If you leave the bad alone and keep the good in your heart, you’ll be happy.” Liddy tickled Bonnie’s side and kissed the top of her head. “Think Tommy and your mom have that ice cream churned up?”

“If they do, it’s probably gone.”

“Tommy likes ice cream?”

“Yes, but not like my mom.”

Liddy grabbed Bonnie’s hand and pulled her off the swing. “Let’s stop them before it’s too late.” And they walked into the house.

The weeks of training
went by quicker than Liddy was expecting they would, and she was really comfortable and happy to be herself. Exchanging letters with Reid filled her with all kinds of excitement and anticipation. His letters came more and more often and were sometimes pages long and other times quick notes—she could hear his exhaustion in those. Without having to ask all of the questions that lined up in her mind, he answered many of them.

Liddy answered every letter as soon as she could sit and put pen to paper or she started writing in her head, while she was flying. With each letter, she wrote more of the things she’d wished she’d had the nerve to have written in her first letter to Reid, beginning with how glad she was that he chased the cattle car down and that she regretted sending him that sorry first note.

Reid wrote back and teased her that he had laughed out loud, which she believed he really did, when he read it because it wasn’t very bold for an HP like herself. Liddy felt her face flush and redden when she read that,
He’s right—it wasn’t
, she knew that.

Liddy was glad he didn’t give her a break on that one so they could joke about it, and she wrote back to him,
Hey, guy, I said I regretted that first letter. Give a girl a break would ya’? You made me go all red-faced that you thought I had written something so... Not very bold.

Liddy knew he would enjoy the fact that he could make her blush from thousands of miles away. ‘My courage has never been that great, about some things, when my feet are on the ground, but I think you intend to make me all over brave, don’t you?’

They wrote about good things. Liddy didn’t tell him how much she had ached for him when they were at Avenger, and now even more that he was where he was, doing what he had to do. She would someday, but now he needed to hear just good things, to feel good things.

Every letter, both his and hers, had something about Reid’s leave in the spring. Liddy couldn’t wait for that day when she would spend time with him. What would it be like? What would they do? The two of them together, it would be a date wouldn’t it?
How strange
.

When Liddy graduated
from pursuit school, she joined the other WASPs, including Jenna Law-Charles, where they both would serve from New Castle Army base in Delaware. Liddy was suited up for her first hours of paid civilian flying for the Army, and she entered the ready room to check in for her first flight assignment.

Some of the women were reviewing maps while others napped, using their parachute packs for pillows. When Jenna saw her, she hopped up from the floor and crossed the room to greet Liddy, “Glad to see you made it, Hall.”

“Was there any doubt?”

“Didn’t hear about one run-in with you and the powers that be in Palm Springs. Are you losing your edge?”

“Never!”

An assignment officer entered and addressed the WASPs, “Listen up, these planes need to be received by 1900 hours to catch a carrier going overseas. This is a very long flight. For those of you who’ve just come in, it’s highly recommended that you limit your fluid intake. You will have only one refueling stop, each way, so unless you have figured out how to use the tube, I suggest you take this matter seriously. Have a safe trip.”

This would be the longest flight Liddy had ever flown, and the newest plane with the exception of Jerry Bluff’s Fairchild back home. She spun Jack’s watch in her palm before she shoved it deep in her pants pocket, as a rush of adrenaline ran through her and she immediately had to pee.

The day she ferried her first Mustang
was one that would stick with Liddy for good, and she couldn’t wait to tell Crik about it. She didn’t write much to Reid about her flying. Her excitement over ferrying fighters seemed so trivial to Reid’s experiences in the same planes. So she wrote about what she saw when she was up and who she met or visited with on the way.

In a cargo plane, the women were taken to the North American factory in Columbus.

P-51 Mustangs were picked-up and Liddy couldn’t get over how Jenna and the other gals were so cool about the ships. Strapped in for the twenty-four hundred mile flight to Travis Air Force Base in San Francisco, the women took off like they were the queens of the air.

The temperatures rose and fell as they crossed the country, but the sky was clear and it was as though the heavens had laid out a carpet for Liddy. As the ferry formation flew over the Rocky Mountains, she marveled at the mass of the range. It was covered with snow, but the granite broke through here and there and it was all set against an icicle-blue sky. Liddy had never seen a landscape that held such power.

She was startled when she heard Jenna’s voice over the radio, “Hey, WASP Liddy Hall, wait for us would ya’?”

Liddy hadn’t realized she had tapped-in and gotten ahead of the others. “Oh, boy, sorry. Guess I’m just a little bit jazzed. Isn’t it beautiful?”

“Yes it is.” Jenna smiled at the delight in Liddy’s voice. “Enjoy the view, but let’s keep it tight up here.”

“Aye, aye, Captain,” Liddy teased.

When the WASP arrived at their refuel, they exploded from the cockpits as soon as the planes rolled to a stop and made a mad dash toward the buildings.

Two enlisted men watched the scene and one of them asked the other, “Where’s the fire?”

Every day that followed was a series of transports, pick-ups and deliveries. Flying as a WASP in the military was like being a pioneer in a new land. Liddy knew what they were doing was important for the war, but it was also important for the country and all her American sisters. The war was tearing away at the boundaries that had kept women and minorities from living bigger than the culture had been comfortable with.

Women were working in ever-increasing numbers, doing factory work that was oftentimes dirty and dangerous. Old ways were being tested and the results couldn’t be denied. Women were capable and it was now on the record. Whatever happened after the war, steps had been taken forward. Still, constantly on the minds of those in the march was the lingering hope that the steps forward would not be taken backwards in the future.

Beat-up Warhawks were delivered by the WASPs to Tuskegee Army Air Field in Alabama. Liddy hopped down from the pit and reflected on the times she was living in. As she walked across the TAAF, she looked into the faces of some of the first black men who would fly for the Army. The men looked at the WASPs, and the trailblazers acknowledged one another with a nod and a smile.

Liddy wished the planes they had brought to these men didn’t have so many miles on them and were not in such a worn state. But flying planes other male pilots didn’t want to fly, or in some cases refused to fly, was just one of the things a WASP had in common with a Tuskegee Airman. And the WASPs had a lot in common with these men.

Both had to deal with the opinions of people who didn’t think they were either smart enough or brave enough to be military pilots. Both had to deal with prejudice, but these men dealt with the prejudice every day, in every corner of their lives—not in the air, though. There they would be free and Liddy was happy they had that chance.

One qualified black female pilot did apply to the WASP program. Jackie Cochran interviewed her and explained that a great deal of opposition faced the idea of women flying for the military. Cochran didn’t deny her entry, but the woman graciously withdrew her application, rather than bring more scrutiny on the program.

It would take over thirty-five years for the landscape to begin to level for all Americans. It would always be a teeter-totter, though. It’s a weakness of humankind to want to be on the top of the pile and many people don’t hesitate to step on others in order to stay there.

When they were in Alabama, Liddy and Jenna saw Bet. Liddy liked how Jenna took Bet under her wing. Anything could happen and she knew the little HP couldn’t have too many mother hens. It seemed Liddy and Jenna were more alike than they were different and the two women got on pretty well. But it was still Louise who Liddy confided in.

Every once in a while Jenna would drop some information about Reid from the letters Captain Ellis Charles, now Jenna’s husband, sent to her. The two men had been friends since basic and had flown two tours together abroad. Although they flew in different fighter squadrons now, they were both in Europe somewhere and crossed paths frequently.

Jenna didn’t know anymore than Liddy did about the missions they flew. A husband wouldn’t want his wife to take on that worry, but she would share when Ellis wrote about seeing one of the officers or instructors that she and Liddy had known at Avenger. Liddy tried not to show extra interest when Reid was mentioned. She didn’t know exactly what they were to each other, and didn’t want to discuss it with anyone but Louise.

On one of their ferry runs, Liddy and Jenna stayed in California and spent a three day leave with Marina. Joy Lynn flew in and a big party was thrown. The great Jenna Law mixed right in with the crude and proper sisters, but like Liddy, Jenna couldn’t keep up with them either. “I don’t know how your bay made it to graduation.” Jenna said to Liddy as they flew home after the weekend.

“Sometimes I don’t either.” Liddy chuckled. “It must have been the will of the sky gods, I guess.”

“Or the Fifinella.” Jenna laughed.

Liddy was being flown out
with two other WASPs to move three AT-6s from one training base to another. She scribbled frantically to finish the letter she was writing to Reid when the assignment officer called out to her, “Hall, let’s go.”

Liddy folded the letter, stuffed and licked it, then asked Teresa Hinton. “Hey, drop this for me, will you?”

Teresa took the letter and read the address, “Major Reidburn Trent, what’s the story, Hall?”

“Just drop it, please,” Liddy pleaded as she rushed out the door.

The women climbed into planes
and out of planes, then into bed and out of bed and sometimes they were so exhausted they didn’t know which was which.

Liddy and Jenna were standing in line to receive their mail and Liddy asked, “Hey, Law—sorry, I mean Charles, in the letters you wrote, you never wrote about this pace. We’ve averaged four to five flights a day or cross countries since I got here. Avenger’s looking pretty sweet.”

“Can’t compare most of these ships to the beat-up buckets we trained on, though. We’re part of it now, Liddy Hall.”

Liddy took her mail from the clerk and walked to the corner of the room to sort through it. Jenna snuck-up behind her and stole it away. She flipped through the letters and read the return addresses, “Woman’s writing, woman’s writing, definitely a man’s writing.” Jenna held the letter up to the light and grinned.

Liddy calmly took the envelope back and turned it over to read the address. It wasn’t from Reid and Liddy’s disappointment washed over her face.

“Not from Major Trent?” Jenna returned the other letters to Liddy who looked back at her with questioning eyes. “Hinton told me she posted a letter for you addressed to a ‘Major Reidburn Trent’. Let me ask you something. The night I graduated, you seemed surprised and then thrilled when I told you I was engaged to Ellis. Did you think it was Reid I was marrying?”