The Secrets of Flight

by Maggie Leffler

  LATER, WE ARE AT THE DINER, SQUEEZED INTO A BOOTH—ANA, Murphee, Grace, and me—when I see a man just outside on the sidewalk, a man with blond hair and glasses who is absently tapping on himself as if his chest were a drum and his fingers the sticks. I blink. Forty miles from his home in Abilene, Sol Rubinowicz is peering at the menu taped just inside the window.

  “What’s up?” Grace asks, when I gasp.

  He’s a breath away from me, but I’d have to lunge over Murphee to rap on the window. Look up, look up, look up, I think instead, and his eyes glance up and then linger on my face. I smile and hold my breath, afraid to move and afraid to break his gaze for fear he’ll disappear if I blink again. We stare at each other through the window. Then he smiles and points to the entrance. Meet you over there? I nod and feel my face crack open with joy. Yes, yes, definitely yes, meet you—here I come!

  “What about dessert?” Murph calls after me, as I move past the waitress who is carrying a tray of ice cream floats toward our table.

  “Go ahead without me,” I say, opening the door with a jangle of bells.

  Outside on the sidewalk, Sol stands there, staring at me with baffled amazement.

  “Sol?” I say, letting the glass door fall shut behind me. “What are you doing in Sweetwater?”

  “It’s kind of a funny story.” His laugh is sheepish, as he runs his hand through his hair. “I wasn’t allowed to take the truck because it might break down, but then I took the truck, and then it broke down.”

  “That happened to me yesterday,” I say. “Only it was a plane. I landed in a cornfield.” When something furry brushes up against my ankles, I yelp and side step, startled by a tabby cat.

  “Well, I’m glad you’re okay,” Sol says, stooping to pet the scraggly thing, whose back is matted with tufts of dirty fur.

  As I watch Sol’s strong and capable hand cupping her nuzzling head, I’m struck by a thought: I want to be that cat. My cheeks flush with embarrassment, as if Sol can read my mind. “Is she yours?” I ask.

  “I think she’s a stray. Want to sit?” he asks, jerking his head toward a nearby bench, and I nod and follow him over.

  “So, what are you doing in Sweetwater?” I ask again, once we’re sitting, the cat still intermittently brushing up against the rungs of the bench. The evening is warm and breezy, the lamps just flicking on over the sleepy side street. From out here, the inside of the diner has a golden glow and bustles with activity, as if it’s the stage, and we’re in the dim theater seats.

  “I wanted to see if you were free for dinner tonight.” He smiles and nods at my dress. “But you look like you’ve already got plans.”

  “Going dancing. With my friends.” I glance at the diner window again, where they’re all watching over ice cream floats. Ana’s dimples are cutting divots in her cheeks, while Murphee is grinning and saying something obviously inappropriate, because Grace is blushing, one hand covering her mouth. “You should come, too.”

  “They were able to patch the tire on the truck. It’s almost ready, and I’ve got to get it back. When I called to tell them I needed money for the tire, well . . . it wasn’t pretty. Hey, buddy,” Sol says to a cocker spaniel, straining on its owner’s leash as they pass, and I think, He’s Dickon, Sarah, straight from The Secret Garden, until I realize the dog is actually lunging for the stray cat.

  “Have you thought of being a vet?” I ask, and he laughs.

  “I’m more partial to helping humans. Adult humans. Well, anyone who can talk. I was in the hospital once—”

  “Because of your heart?”

  “There’s nothing the matter with my heart. It’s just a murmur from when I had rheumatic fever as a kid. That and I have an extraordinarily slow pulse.” Sol holds out his hand, and nervously, I move to shake it. “No, feel. My pulse.”

  Fumbling around on his wrist like a guitarist learning the strings, I can’t believe I’m actually touching Sol Rubinowicz in public, when two weeks ago I couldn’t even make eye contact at the dinner table. At last, the slow, steady beat of his blood pumping half the speed of my own bangs against my fingertips. “Are you alive?” I ask.

  “Very much so.”

  In my entire life, I can’t think of a single human being who has gazed at me the way Sol is right now. Tzadok comes to mind, but he always makes me feel like a small child who has managed to delight a sad, old man. Sol and I stare at each other for a long moment, until I hear the bells from the diner door, followed by Murphee’s voice: “Steel, we’re going. Is your friend coming, too?”

  “Is my friend coming, too?” I ask Sol quietly.

  “I can’t right now. But I’ll find you again.”

  WE GET TO THE CLUB, WHERE THE BRASS BAND IS PLAYING GLENN Miller and the entire dance floor is filled with Army Air Forces servicemen and women. Suddenly, I wish I had worn my own uniform—anything to give me confidence right now. The truth is, besides the Hora, I’ve rarely ever danced. I certainly can’t swing.

  “You should be wearing this,” I say to Grace, after turning down yet another close-cropped cadet who wants the chance to spin around the lady in red. It’s not because of me, I think, it’s the dress. Besides, what’s the point in being here, when the only person I want to be dancing with is Sol?

  “Give someone a chance,” Grace says just as another uniformed man comes up to offer his hand. She glances back at me and shrugs, as he leads her onto the floor, leaving me standing beside Louise, the blond pilot from Tennessee who holds a special affection for everything, including roaches. She’s not in our bunk, but we march together, and eat together, and now, apparently, avoid dancing together.

  “How do they make it look so easy?” I say, as we stand back, taking in the crowd with their gyrating glee.

  “Flying looks easy, too. From the ground,” she says, and I glance at her and smile. “I heard about what happened to your plane,” Louise adds. “You’ve gotta inspect it extra carefully before takeoff—don’t count on the mechanics to do it. You never know what kind of sabotage they’ll pull. Some of those airmen can’t stand that a woman can do their job.”

  “It was a bird strike,” I say, and she shakes her head, reminding me of Captain Babcock, who’d been perplexed by the engine failure himself afterward, but not convinced an investigation was in order—perhaps too ashamed of his concussion.

  “With the size of that prop and that engine? The birds would be chewed up—not vice versa,” Louise insists. “Seriously, watch your back.”

  Unsure if she means in flight or right now, I glance over my shoulder to see Murph, who pushes a gangly guy wearing a green army uniform right into me, making me stumble. “Miri, meet Jeremy. Jeremy, Miri!”

  Jeremy is tall with shaved black hair, so there’s not much to distract from his enormous ears, except for his smile, which is nice enough, if just a bit bewildered. I wonder if she’s picked him out for me because she thinks he’s Jewish.

  “Want to dance?” Jeremy asks.

  “Um . . .” I say, as Murph shoves me toward him. Louise gives me two thumbs-up and off we go, into the sea of bodies grooving and hopping, swinging and swaying.

  When I tell him I don’t know how to dance, he says, “It’s like a waltz, only faster—just do what I do and leave the rest to me,” so I let him push me away and pull me back, and spin me around and spin me back, all in time to the music. Soon enough I realize I’m laughing, enjoying myself, even if Sol’s not here, and I can’t do the dress justice.

  We shout-talk over the brass band, which is how I find out that Jeremy’s from the Bronx, New York, that he’s a Reform Jew, and that he hasn’t found a temple since coming to Texas.

  “There’s one in Abilene!” I say.

  “Have you been?”

  “Three weeks ago!” I mention the Rubinowiczes then, “old family friends” who wanted to see me as much as possible when they heard I was stationed in Texas.

  “If I can borrow a car from my CO, can I give you a lift there sometime?” Jeremy ask
s.

  “That would be wonderful!” It’s only after the words are out of my mouth that I realize I’ve just made a date with a man to see another man.

  After a few songs, I excuse myself to find a bathroom and afterward discover Ana, Louise, and Murphee at a table drinking water—or possibly vodka by the way they are collapsing on each other, Murph laughing so hard mascara is dripping down her cheeks. I follow her gaze onto the dance floor, and my mouth gapes when I see Grace swinging over her partner’s shoulders, and shooting underneath his legs, then whipping up in the air with a scissor-kick of her legs.

  “Good God, Corn, was that a backflip?” Murphee asks when Grace gets back to the table, panting. “Does Teddy know you can jitterbug like a Cotton Club dancer?” Grinning, Grace slumps into a chair and reaches for the pitcher, just as Jeremy weaves his way through the crowd and approaches our table. “Have a seat,” Murphee says, kicking out a chair for him to sit down, and he does, right next to me.

  “So, how am I going to reach you?” he asks, looking at me, or at least, glancing furtively back and forth between my eyes and curls. Is he checking out my dry scalp or does he want to brush away a stray hair that’s fallen out of my bobby pins?

  “Um, Miri?” Murph interrupts, clicking her tongue, and I glance over at her. “Seven o’clock,” she adds, and I swivel around to see Sol, making his way toward our table. With his plaid tie, tweed jacket, and unshorn hair, he looks out of place among the servicemen.

  “You made it!” I say, standing up, as he approaches.

  “I made it.” Sol says, his voice both wry and relieved. “Apparently just in time.”

  There is a beat of silence, as the band pauses between songs, and I realize that Jeremy has stood up as well. Both men are staring at each other. “Oh, Sol, this is—Jeremy. Jeremy—Sol.”

  “You’re Sol? Miriam says you’ve known each other forever,” Jeremy says, and Sol looks right at me when he answers.

  “That’s right. Forever.” My face heats up, and I glance at the floor as “Smoke Rings” begins to play.

  “So, when are we going to Abilene together?” Jeremy asks me, and Sol’s eyes widen as the corners of his mouth go up.

  “I don’t think—I’ll need the ride after all. But thank you,” I say, quickly turning away from Jeremy’s crestfallen face.

  “Want to dance?” Sol asks, holding out his hand.

  We walk out onto the floor among the other couples swaying to the slow music. It seems too intimate to cling to him the way Ana drapes herself over her partner, so I position my hips at a right angle to Sol’s torso and straighten my arm as if I’m leading. “This works better if we’re facing each other,” he says, placing his hands on my waist and shifting my pelvis toward his. “Relax this arm. See? We fit.”

  “I see,” I say, except that it comes out a strange little whisper.

  “That’s a pretty dress,” Sol says, drawing me closer.

  I have to work hard to keep my voice even and measured. “Oh. My friend Grace lent it to me.”

  “Well. Jeremy liked it,” Sol says, and I laugh, in spite of my guilt.

  Then he leans in so close to my ear that I almost think he’s going to kiss me. “I like it, too.”

  WE DRIVE BACK TO BASE UNDER A FULL MOON, JUST SOL AND ME, alone at last. Just thinking those clichéd words makes me think of the romantic novels Sarah used to sneak out of the library and hide beneath the bed so Mama wouldn’t see—novels with sappy endings, unbelievable coincidences, and the worst offense of all: declarations. “Like all a woman needs is to have a man make a declaration,” I once said to Sarah, who retorted, “Would that be so bad?”

  “So, you never finished telling me before—why were you in the hospital?” I ask, pointing out the road back to Avenger Field.

  “I cut the tendons in my hand on a table saw when I was fourteen and had to get surgery. I still have very little sensation in the tip of my right pinky finger.” He lifts it from the steering wheel and wiggles it. “The army didn’t like that, either.”

  “I can’t imagine flying a plane with numbness in the tip of my right pinky.”

  Sol shoots me a smile, so he must know I’m joking. “I paid attention as the doctors made their rounds. That’s how I learned to map out the location of organs and their conditions by percussion.” I must look perplexed, because he adds, “Normal lungs sound one way and lungs full of fluid sound completely different when you tap on them—that sort of thing. It seemed like I was being shown this window into medicine for a purpose. They won’t let me go to war, but at least I can help some other way.”

  It’s quiet for a moment, save the sound of the engine, until I finally ask, “What will you do, if you don’t get in again?”

  “I’m not working in my father’s shop the rest of my life, I know that.” His voice is firm, almost hardened, but then he sneaks me a look. “You must know how I feel. It’s why you fly, isn’t it?”

  I think of his father’s tree in the backyard and the juices dripping down my chin the other night. “Flying makes me feel as if I’m sucking out the mango of life.”

  “Exactly.” Sol grins and then chuckles. “Although, Miri, you do know . . . No, of course, you know . . .” He shakes his head.

  “Know what?”

  “That it’s the marrow of life? ‘I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately . . . and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not—’”

  “Right,” I say. “Emerson.”

  “Thoreau. And it was marrow of life,” Sol says.

  “We’ll see,” I say, folding my arms across my chest.

  “‘We’ll see’?” he repeats, and then laughs—a great, big booming laugh, which makes me join in. There’s so much at stake these days—a cure for TB, Hitler’s next move, my sister’s survival, Thursday’s check ride. If I can spend the rest of my life laughing beside this man, I’ll be happy, it occurs to me then, and the thought is so urgent, it feels like a prayer.

  When we get back to base it’s nine fifty-two and the moon is shining like daylight. Sol pulls up just before the gate and pushes his glasses up on his nose. “What . . . is that?” He’s pointing to Fifinella, the red-booted, blue-winged Walt Disney creation decorating the sign over the gate.

  “That’s Fifi, the good gremlin—she keeps the bad gremlins out of the planes.”

  “Ah,” he says, cutting the engine. Then he faces me with a smile. “You asked that guy to bring you all the way back to Abilene just to see me again.”

  I can tell in that sentence it’s the story we’ll toast at our wedding, the story we will tell our children one day: how, once upon a time, Miri Lichtenstein tried to dupe a serviceman into taking her all the way from Sweetwater to Abilene for Sol Rubinowicz. Oh, no, I think, that won’t do.

  “Not quite,” I say, and his eyebrows shoot up. “I told him we were family friends, and that I wanted to go to temple. You, meanwhile, couldn’t stop thinking about me. You went to the trouble of stealing a truck. And when all hope was lost, suddenly there I was in the window of a diner. It was the first time in your life you’d ever conjured anyone right out of your head.”

  Sol tilts his head back and laughs, loudly, and I’m thrilled once again. It’s a wonderful sound, and I caused it. There it is, I think. The Declaration. “Is that how our story goes?” he asks.

  “That’s right.” I play with my necklace. “Get it straight.”

  “And what happens next in the story? Do I kiss you in the moonlight under that gremlin?”

  “You do.”

  As he opens his car door and makes his way around the car, I can see his shoulders are still shaking with laughter. I quickly jump out of the passenger side before he can reach the handle. “I’ve got it,” I say, slamming the creaky door of the truck behind me.

  “I guess you do,” Sol says, watching me coming toward him. We meet in the headlights. Giddy with anticipation, I think of Murphee saying, You can’t smile and pucker at the same time, honey,
which makes me want to laugh, until he leans down, brings his hands to my face, and pushes back my hair. Then I close my eyes and our lips meet and meet and meet again. His kisses are gentle but firm, inexperienced yet expert. Moments or days later, we finally pull apart.

  “Goodness,” I say, as the first notes of Taps begin to play.

  “You are,” he says, and I squeeze his hand, back away, and then turn on my heel and run. “I want to see you again!” he calls after me.

  “Yes!” I say, jogging backward for a moment, just long enough to see his quick smile.

  LATER THAT WEEKEND, I WASH THE RED DRESS AND RETURN IT to Grace, part of me wishing it were mine forever, and part of me knowing it doesn’t really matter anymore. He kissed me! I think, and everywhere I look I see color, rich, vibrant, and bright.

  CHAPTER 15

  Miri, Lost

  The Saturday after I got out of the hospital, Elyse surprised me with a phone call. Despite the fact that I wanted nothing more than to crawl into bed and rest longer, despite the fact that I hadn’t gotten out of my nightgown for an entire day and had almost forgotten how to reconstruct my top curl with bobby pins, I told her that of course I would love to see her. She showed up that evening cradling a sack of flour in one arm and holding a Tupperware of chicken soup and dumplings in another. When I exclaimed, “How wonderful!” and asked if she had prepared it herself, she said, “Oh, no, Mom did. These are leftovers. But it seemed like getting-better sort of food.” It did look like getting-better sort of food, just so long as I stuck to the plain broth and never let an ounce of fat cross my lips again.

  “Do I look the same?” I asked tentatively, because I’d spent four days in that godforsaken hospital, with interns and residents asking me the same questions over and over, and entire teams of surgeons visiting my bedside and pushing on my belly. “Exactly the same,” she said, and her tone was not one of relief but encouragement. She seemed to know that I needed to hear this, for perhaps if I appeared unchanged, the same might hold true for my life.