Rank

by Richard Compson Sater

  “I fly planes,” he said. “Why bother with kites?”

  I shook my head. “You had a deprived childhood.”

  That settled it. He would learn to fly a kite today. I made a quick inventory for a picnic and decided we’d pick up some fried chicken and side dishes at the supermarket. I knew of a not-too-distant state park I’d never visited, and today we would remedy that situation.

  We dressed identically, as I was able to match his blue jeans, white sneakers, and gray Air Force sweatshirt. We topped off with our softball team caps.

  As we surveyed each other, I said, “May I grow a mustache like yours?”

  “No,” he said.

  “You could protect me from the fallout.”

  He shook his head. “Nice try, Airmail, but I’m the only one around the NAF who can flout the regulations.”

  “And why is that?”

  He cocked an eyebrow. “Because I’m a general.”

  That again. “Oh, right. I forgot,” I said. “Sir.” I unbuttoned his jeans and reached in through the denim and the white cotton of his shorts. He murmured his appreciation.

  “I hate you,” he muttered as I explored. “I hate you, because you’re going to get me hot and bothered and then piss on the fire by insisting that we go fly a goddamn kite.”

  “Would I do a thing like that?”

  Grumbling, the general backed away and buttoned his jeans himself.

  As he sat at the kitchen table, pretending injury and nursing a third cup of coffee, I stirred up a jugful of lemonade with plenty of ice and not too much sugar. I mixed a pan of drop biscuits, too, and while they were baking, I chopped up raw carrots and celery and cucumber and packed everything into a cardboard box with napkins and plates and cups. Finally, I pulled a spare blanket from the bedroom closet to use as a tablecloth.

  “You’re awfully domestic all of a sudden,” he said as I removed the biscuits from the oven.

  “But don’t they smell wonderful?”

  He would not be pacified. But he helped me load the box and blanket and jug into the trunk of his car, and he climbed into the driver’s seat. “You’re sure I couldn’t convince you to come back inside with me and work off a little more of your bad debt? What do you say?”

  I admired his hopefulness, but I was dead set on flying a kite, in spite of other temptations. “I say turn left at the end of the block.”

  He sighed and put the car in gear. “Fine. Let’s get this thing over with.”

  First I directed him to the local dollar store, where we picked up a ball of string and a traditional diamond-shape paper kite, rolled into a tight packet. The basic kite package hasn’t changed since forever, I guess, and it’s always like unwrapping a present. I’m somewhat amazed that kites are still available in the twenty-first century, but I’m convinced technology can’t possibly improve this particular flying machine.

  Next, I directed him to the grocery store. We parked, and I grabbed a basket on the way in. “I’ll pick up a box of fried chicken from the delicatessen, and you scout around and see if there’s anything else you want for our picnic,” I said.

  “Sir! Yes, sir!” He offered the most junior airman’s automatic response to any given order, executed a smart about-face, and marched off.

  The store was typically crowded for a Saturday morning. As I waited my turn at the deli, I was unpleasantly surprised to hear a familiar voice call me. “Lieutenant Mitchell!”

  I turned and faced our executive officer, in civilian clothes, with a cart full of groceries. I’d never seen her at this market before, although I shopped here myself only on occasion, preferring the base commissary. Could I have chosen anyone else from our NAF to run into at the moment, I would have chosen anyone else.

  “Good morning, Lieutenant Colonel Cartwright. How are you?”

  “Fine. Yourself?”

  “I’m fine, too. It’s certainly a beautiful day.”

  “It is. Have you any plans?”

  My plans were none of her business, but I could hardly say so. Perhaps, for once, she was simply trying to be sociable. I was stuck, still waiting my turn in line, and I couldn’t walk away or pretend to be in a hurry. “Yes, ma’am. I’m taking full advantage of it. Going on a picnic, in fact.”

  “All by yourself?”

  “No, ma’am, with a friend.”

  I hoped she wouldn’t press for details. No one on the staff knew anything about my private life, and I was certainly not going to share with her. She might have been aware Julia was out of town, so I didn’t want to be any more specific about my company for the day.

  “Well, it was nice to see you, ma’am,” I said, hoping she would take the hint. “Have a good afternoon.”

  She bade me good-bye, but I hadn’t even finished breathing my relieved sigh when the general’s voice cut through the din of the Saturday crowd. “Hey, Gunshot!” He was striding unmistakably toward me, triumphant, with two red apples, a package of chocolate cookies, and a bottle of Vermont’s finest. His mustache managed a rumba as he dropped the stuff in my basket. “We don’t want to run out of maple syrup, do we?” he said.

  “Why, General O’Neill!”

  I could see the look of consternation that crowded his face in that second. He recognized the voice without even looking around, but he pasted on a smile and faced her.

  “How do, Jenny?”

  “Fine, sir.” I could almost hear her mind clicking away, calculating as she inventoried the general, unshaven in blue jeans and a sweatshirt. Clearly, he was here with me. And what would she possibly make of his concern for running out of syrup? Or of my referring to him as a friend? Our matching attire?

  “How are you today, sir?” she said, a little uncertain.

  I could see she desperately wanted to ask a question or two or three, but she knew she couldn’t. She couldn’t pump me for information in the general’s presence, either, though I made a note to myself to prepare a good excuse for the following week, as I expected she would probably corner me as soon as she could, inquisitive as a town gossip. She would not be above pulling rank to insist upon a satisfactory answer or two.

  “Fine, Jenny. You enjoy your weekend, now.” He offered nothing more. Just stood with his arms crossed, looking at her, a faint and cryptic smile on his face. With a final puzzled glance at me, she wheeled her cart away.

  “Great,” the general muttered.

  “Don’t worry about it, sir,” I said, attempting a weak joke. “It’s a free country, and no one’s going to tell us we can’t shop off base on a Saturday morning.”

  “Somehow, I don’t think that’s what’s troubling her.” He shook his head, as if to clear away a bad memory. Then, unexpectedly, he chuckled. “She’s going to wonder about the syrup all day long.”

  The deli clerk called my number, I collected my box of chicken, added some potato salad as an afterthought, paid for it all, and we hit the road. The general was uncharacteristically quiet, and I hoped our chance encounter with Jennifer Cartwright wouldn’t spoil the rest of our day.

  I would do my best to ensure it did not.

  We drove far away from the base, a good hour and a half into the next county, and he seemed more relaxed with every mile. The farther we went, the less chance we’d be interrupted by inquisitive staff members. By the time we reached the park, his buoyant humor had returned.

  The densely wooded park was sprawling and beautiful, like some great reward: a wooded, clear lake looped with a path for cyclists and runners, surrounded with acres of suitable picnic possibilities. Finding a quiet, private spot beneath the branches of an old shady tree proved easier than I had imagined. I’d expected competition for space on such a picture-book summer day, but we had plenty of options, and the merry breeze promised good things for kites.

  We spread our blanket on the ground and unpacked chicken and biscuits, potato salad, cookies. I poured lemonade and set out plates and napkins and spoons, and we stood and surveyed as letter-perfect a picnic as one coul
d find in fiction or film.

  “Sunburn, you’ve done yourself proud. Couldn’t ask for a better day, a better meal, or better company,” the general said as he embraced me. “Forgive me for being such an old stick this morning.”

  “If you prove to me that you’re truly sorry,” I said, adding “sir” as an afterthought.

  “Careful, Sunburn. I might tackle you right here.”

  “Go ahead and try, if you think you’re man enough,” I said. “Sir.”

  He wrestled me to the ground, his half-nelson catching me by surprise, but I was not one to take such a challenge lying down. I engaged fully into the spirit of the game, and we rolled and tumbled in the grass until he put a quick stop to it by situating his mouth against mine the instant he had the advantage. Then he pulled away, countering my protest with a lofty “You’re the one who wanted to fly a kite instead.”

  Lunch awaited us first. I hadn’t really had a proper breakfast, and I was suddenly ravenous. We sat down to eat, and over the course of a leisurely hour, gorged ourselves ridiculously full, one of the finest meals I’d eaten in my life, seasoned with salt and pepper and sun and easy laughter. I had never felt more certain of the future.

  Putting the plates aside, in the heat of the early afternoon, I stretched out on the blanket, intending only to rest my eyes for a few minutes and woke up perhaps two hours later, my head in the general’s lap and him with his pipe lit, looking as content as if all his dreams had improbably come true.

  “Hey, you traveler,” I said, yawning.

  A grin as wide as sky stretched across his face.

  I tried it again. “Traveler. That’s it. That’s you.”

  He nodded, satisfied. So I’d stumbled across something good and right because the name just suited him. We’d solved one problem, and maybe everything else in our world could reach a similarly fortuitous end.

  “Sleep well?” he said. “You dreamed about me, of course.”

  I got up and stretched. “Awfully sure of yourself, aren’t you?”

  He nodded. He had every reason to be, and I guess he knew it.

  “I didn’t mean to fall asleep on you,” I said. “Sorry.”

  “I’ll be your pillow anytime. Besides, it’s Saturday, and we have nothing on the agenda except us.”

  That reminded me. “And kite-flying!” I said. “Come on!”

  I retrieved the kite and the string from the car. I unrolled the paper and flattened it out, crossed the sticks, and strung it properly, explaining each step as I went along. The general watched with interest. I was pleased to be teaching him a new skill that truly had some real-world applicability. Knowing how to fly a kite will serve a man well through all his days.

  As I bent the stick to tie the bowstring, I remembered that we had nothing to use for the tail, a serious oversight on my part. “The tail keeps it upright,” I explained. “It’s ballast and balance. I should have thought to bring an old T-shirt. Do you have some rags in the car? An old towel, maybe?”

  He shook his head. “But I’ve got an idea,” he said. His mustache charged ahead of him, and I groaned.

  “Okay, what is it?”

  He whispered to me, and I burst out laughing. I had to admit it was ingenious, though, and it seemed to be our only option under the circumstances.

  “I figured on getting you out of your drawers one way or another before the afternoon was over,” the general said as we kicked off our shoes and socks and shucked our trousers in the back seat of the car. “You can stay as undressed as you want,” he said, running his fingers up the inside of my leg. I smacked his hand away.

  “Behave yourself, Traveler. Our next order of business is getting the kite in the air,” I said.

  “You’re no fun,” he said. As we pulled on our pants again, he said, “I’m still a little sticky from breakfast.”

  “Sorry, sir,” I said.

  “Liar. Just for that, I won’t let you work off that ‘sir’ until next month.”

  “Now who’s lying?” I said.

  A few minutes later, I had fashioned a suitable tail from our undershorts and socks and attached it to the kite. I estimated that the weight would be just about right. The more wind there is, the more tail the kite needs, I told him. Finally, I fastened the bridle, the line connecting the kite to the ball of string.

  We moved away from the trees into an open spot, relatively flat, and I gave the kite to the general to hold. “It’s easier with two people,” I said. “You’ll be the launcher. I want the wind at my back, and you’ll feel the breeze in your face.” Years before, my dad had patiently clarified the science of it for me, and I shared what I knew. “The difference in air pressure from the face of the kite to the back surface of it will make it rise. That’s lift, Traveler. See?” A flash of recognition crossed his face. “And the resistance of air to the forward motion of the kite is—”

  “Drag,” he said.

  “And pulling it down, working against the lift is—”

  “Gravity,” he said with satisfaction.

  “Very good. The angle of attack, the slant of the kite against the wind, has to provide enough lift to overcome gravity and drag,” I said.

  “You know what, Tightrope? That’s what keeps a plane in the air, too. It’s the same physics.”

  “Then you’re already ahead of the game,” I said. “I think we’re ready for takeoff.”

  Into the wind, I backed away several dozen feet from him, unspooling string as I went and poising myself to run. I pulled the line so there was no slack. “Okay, Traveler, let go,” I said. He offered our kite to the wind. I ran, and it rose, perfect.

  It was a good day for up. Once confident that the kite was satisfied to continue heading in that direction, I called the general over and handed him the ball of string.

  “What do I have to do?”

  “Hang on. Let out more line when you need to.”

  “When? And how much?”

  “The kite will let you know. Listen to what it says.”

  And the kite did tell him, tugging against the string, persuasive, as he let out more and more, a little at a time. The diamond grew smaller and smaller against the blue sky. The wind liked our kite, and I was pleased at how easily it climbed. The general was ecstatic, eager as I must have been, a boy of three or four, when my dad took me kite-flying for the first time. Air Force pilots make much of slipping the surly bonds of earth, and though I will never be a pilot, I believe if you attach your soul and imagination to a kite in a blue sunny sky, you can accomplish a similar result. A kite rising takes your spirit with it.

  I reeled it in and switched places with the general, launching for him as he ran, and he was clearly proud of himself for a successful take-off. The wind that afternoon could not have been more ideal for a first-timer. Our kite bobbed and dipped occasionally, and I showed him how to let the line slacken until the kite regained its balance, but mostly it just aimed higher all by itself. We walked with it, introducing it to little currents and eddies in the air. Sometimes our diamond looped downward, caught itself and surged back upward, regaining lost altitude. The general wrapped himself around me and we held on to the string together, exultant, laughing and shouting enough to lift the sky.

  It remains one of the finest days in my memory, the two of us with the kite on that afternoon, the kind of day you will always remember but never be able to rebuild, however carefully you scheme and plot.

  Once the sun began its inevitable descent, we ended our adventure. The wind proved equally reluctant to let go of our kite. They’d become good friends. But slowly, the general reined it in. Silent, with a little sadness, we gathered our tablecloth and tidied up our picnic spot. The general set the kite gently on the back seat of his car. By the time we pulled into my driveway, a comfortable darkness had settled in. I unlocked the door to my apartment and we went inside.

  He folded me into his arms. “Thank you, Blacksmith,” he whispered. “I can’t tell you how grateful I am for this day
.”

  My cell phone, sitting on the coffee table, began vibrating to announce an incoming call.

  “Don’t answer it,” he said. “Please?”

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t want to share you with anyone tonight.”

  I let it ring.

  *

  On Sunday morning, I awoke once again before he did. He stirred too, but I told him to stay put. I went to the kitchen to brew a pot of coffee and set the table for breakfast. When I returned to the room, I found him sprawled across the bed, asleep again, hanging tight to my old stuffed bear, which usually sat watch over me on the headboard. I grabbed my camera and spent the next half hour watching the general slumber, shifting now and then, holding the bear close. I shot nearly a whole roll of film of the pair of them in the available light from the bedside lamp, which cast some very provocative shadows.

  Maybe the whir of the autofocus or the click of the shutter finally roused him, but he caught me in action, the camera viewfinder to my eye. “What fresh hell are you up to, Kodachrome?” he groaned.

  “Just a little blackmail, Traveler.”

  “That’s conduct unbecoming an officer.”

  “Give me a letter of reprimand,” I said. “Or you could sentence me to a couple hours of hard labor. Sir.”

  That set his mustache afire.

  After a sedate brunch in the kitchen, the general packed his overnight bag and took reluctant leave.

  “I’ve got to,” he said. “The lawn needs a mowing, and the garden wants a good weeding, and it has to be done this afternoon. A general can’t let his yard go. Sets a bad example.”

  “I could help, Traveler. You’ll get done faster, and then we could…well, who knows what we might come up with?”

  He shook his head. “I’m tempted, but I won’t have it said I’m taking advantage of my aide by deputizing him as a gardener, too.” I protested, but he was right. Appearances counted. And for us, as general and lieutenant and as boss and employee, appearances counted twice or three times over.

  Before he left, he dutifully marked an X across each O made good on the “sir” list posted on the fridge. I found excuses to call him sir a few more times, and we were back where we started.