The Flying Cutterbucks

by Kathleen M Rodgers

  “I’m creaking along. Knitting caps for the homeless and chemo patients. So, what are your big plans, Miss Gadabout?”

  Trudy chuckled, her gaze fixed on the purple cap adorning Jewel’s head, one of Aunt Star’s creations. “My stuff’s in storage for six months. For now, I’m going to bunk here with Momma and help her sort through stuff. Maybe haul a few loads to the dump or the Salvation Army.”

  Aunt Star snorted. “Good luck with that. It’d be easier to light a match to the place.”

  “I think that’s called arson,” Jewel chimed in. She pushed her frail frame up from the couch and handed Trudy the cellphone. “Where’s the remote? Let’s get the news on and see what Star’s harping about.”

  “I heard that, Sister. Try any of the stations. It’s made international news.”

  Jewel found the remote and aimed it at the flat screen television wedged between the bookshelves on a cheap metal stand. The image of a fancy tour bus filled the screen. In the background, the voices of two men bantered like teenage boys in a lockerroom.

  Trudy tucked one hand under her other arm and held the cellphone out in front of her. She stood glued to the screen, her mouth agape at the shock of what she was hearing on network television. She glanced over at her mother every few seconds to gauge her reaction.

  Jewel’s heart-shaped face, once smooth but now wrinkled, took on an amused look. All at once, she lowered the volume on the television and glanced toward the phone in Trudy’s hand. “Honestly, Star, I heard Shep and his squadron buddies use worse language than that.”

  “Shep flew fighter jets, Sister. He wasn’t running for president.”

  Still gripping the remote, Jewel sighed and placed one hand on her back and stretched this way and that. Trudy watched and listened as her mother breathed through her nose. “It’s been forty-four years this month since his plane went missing.”

  Trudy swallowed, trying to ignore the panic swirling in her gut as if it were yesterday when her mother received the telegram. Trudy glanced at a large photo of her father in a flight suit next to his F-4 Phantom, his square jaw clenched in a tightlipped grin that said he meant business. She didn’t need to walk across the room to read the words engraved on the small brass plaque at the bottom of the picture frame: United States Air Force Major Shepard Cutterbuck, MIA October 2, 1972 North Vietnam.

  Aunt Star cleared her throat. “I’m sorry, Jewel. I know it still hurts.”

  Even in the waning light, Trudy could see her mother’s blue eyes soften. Jewel scratched at something on the back of her neck and looked away, not bothering to answer.

  Trudy hugged herself and began to pace. For a second, she regretted coming home.

  In sequined slippers, Jewel padded toward the kitchen, the remote still in hand. Halfway across the room she swiveled and cranked up the volume. The offensive word blared into the room like an intruder. This time, Jewel’s whole body stiffened. With a shaky hand, Jewel aimed the controller at the television like a mad woman with a gun. “I’ve heard enough of his crap,” she snapped, clicking the power button.

  “This election is making us all cranky, that’s for sure,” said Aunt Star.

  Jewel spun and snatched the phone from Trudy’s hand. Trudy flinched, surprised by her mother’s sudden outburst and how quickly she could move when provoked.

  Jewel held the cellphone up to her ear and mouth even though it was still on speaker. “Star, I just realized something.”

  “What’s that, Sister?”

  “The Orange Dude… it’s the filthy way he talks about women. He reminds me of Cousin Dub.”

  Cousin Dub. All the air went out of the room.

  Trudy shuddered and wrapped herself more tightly in her long cable knit cardigan. Even her winter leggings and flannel tunic couldn’t stave off the sudden chill that crept through her body. She glanced toward the kitchen, half expecting to see him there. The sound of Aunt Star’s labored breathing filled the room.

  Then a long silence ensued between Trudy and her mother in Jewel’s dusty living room on the outskirts of Pardon and Aunt Star in her little pink adobe several hundred miles away.

  A freight train rumbled past on the railroad tracks behind Jewel’s home. The whole house vibrated in its wake. A lone whistle sounded after a moment as the train drew closer into town and away from the women.

  “We don’t have to worry about Dub ever again,” Aunt Star whispered at last. “Karma caught up with him.”

  After Star hung up, Jewel turned to her daughter. “Trudy…?” Her voice sounded odd, like she had something stuck in her throat.

  Trudy swallowed and licked her lips. Her heart raced ahead of her as she tried to appear calm. “Yes, Momma?” Her voice came out raspy.

  Jewel took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “Did something happen here that fall of seventy-four after I had to go away?”

  Go away. Her mother couldn’t even bring herself to say it.

  Trudy gazed up at the ceiling, trying to dodge the question. You mean when you had your nervous breakdown? she thought. It’s okay to say it, Momma. Your husband got shot down and went missing and a year and a half later your son died. That’s enough to send anybody to the funny farm.

  Funny farm: What Cousin Dub smarted right before he “bought the farm” as Trudy’s father might’ve said, had he been there.

  Trudy glanced down at her mother. She towered over her by several inches. “Aunt Star took good care of me and Georgia while you were away.” Her dull voice drummed in her ears as she tried too hard to sound normal.

  Handing Trudy the remote, Jewel walked to the kitchen sink and stared out the window. Dusk was settling. She turned and ran her fingertips over her bottom lip. “You know one of the last things your daddy said to me before he deployed? ‘Keep that sorry cousin of yours away from my girls.’”

  CHAPTER 2

  Twirler Girl

  October 1974

  THE POWDER blue VW Beetle sputters away, heading east into town. Trudy waves to her girlfriends, all three upperclassmen whose daddies are civilians. She clops up the long gravel driveway in her chalky white majorette boots, the tassels swinging with each step. Gray clouds droop overhead, and she breathes in the promise of an early snow. For once, she doesn’t wriggle her nose at the smell of cow manure from the feedlots south of town.

  Her maxi coat flaps open, exposing her bare creamy legs and skimpy uniform, the stretchy sequined material the same shade of green as her daddy’s eyes when they sparkle. So Trudy’s momma always reminds her with a sigh of longing in her voice. Shifting her textbooks in the crook of her left arm, Trudy twirls a baton in her right hand. A few days shy of fifteen, she is aware that out of the six twirlers in the Pardon High School Band, she is the least talented. But at five feet nine inches with a slim but curvy figure and a shiny mane of reddish blonde hair, she is assured by the band director, Mr. Ennis, that her appearance more than makes up for her occasional fumble fingers.

  “Hey, Daddy, I only dropped my baton once during halftime,” she sighs as if he is standing by the side of the driveway in his green flight suit, both hands planted on his narrow hips, his long bandy-legs spread inches apart. “I’ll never be as good as Momma the way she twirled her way into beauty pageants. And we all know your youngest daughter, Georgia, got all the dance moves.”

  Trudy does whatever it takes to keep him alive, even if it means talking into thin air. She approaches the territorial-style flat-roofed dwelling her momma calls their adobe, but Trudy knows it’s stucco. Halfway up the long lane, her gaze travels to the front door and the wooden sign her momma bought at the base thrift shop when they returned to New Mexico: Mi Casa Es Su Casa. “My house is your house,” Trudy chants, switching back and forth between English and Spanish as she continues to twirl her baton.

  Aunt Star’s Plymouth Valiant is parked under the double carport next to Momma’s Chevy station wagon that hasn’t moved in weeks. Daddy’s ’69 silver and black Camaro sits out back under cover in the d
ilapidated barn, waiting for him to return and fire up the engine and drive ninety-to-nothing on the caliche roads outside of town, kicking up dust devils in his wake. Trudy reasons that if Daddy were here, he would brush a hand across his sandy-haired crew cut then let her take the wheel and teach her how to operate a stick shift. Instead, she must rely on some gum-chewing coach who teaches drivers education at Pardon High.

  A fighter jet screams overhead at five hundred feet on its final approach into the air base a couple of miles to the southwest. Trudy pauses, filling the hole in her heart with the sound of thunder as she cranes her neck, gazing at the mighty war bird before it disappears out of sight into the setting sun, igniting the sky in tangerine and purple.

  “Daddy,” she calls, knowing her voice is lost to a jet engine that drowns out her plea. Knowing the sound will keep others from thinking she is losing her mind…like her mother.

  Pushing open the side door under the carport with her right hip, she is expecting the savory aroma of chili bubbling on the stove, and Aunt Star’s crispy corncakes browning in the cast-iron skillet.

  Instead, Trudy’s muscles go limp while her heart pumps like a fist in her throat. Her books scatter to the floor, but the baton… Oh, her blessed baton is still firmly in her grip.

  Her mind scrambles to process the sounds and smells and the terror in her own voice as she screams into the kitchen, “Aunt Star, Aunt Star, what’s going on?”

  Still in her white nursing uniform, Aunt Star’s broad backside sways to and fro as she pelts a man with her purse. “Let go of her,” Aunt Star yells in a strangled voice Trudy doesn’t recognize.

  To her horror, she realizes the man is Cousin Dub, the family drunk Daddy warned them to steer clear of.

  How did he get in? Trudy scans the room. A half-empty whiskey bottle sits on the end of the counter by the back door.

  The smell of liquor and sweat reeks from every pore of Dub’s stocky body as he hunches over the back of a kitchen chair, pinning her sister Georgia beneath him. At thirteen, Georgia’s terrified sobs fill the kitchen with sounds no sister or aunt should have to hear.

  Dub clamps a beefy hand over Georgia’s mouth while he shoves his other hand beneath the hem of her uniform, a short green and silver dress that swirls when she performs at pep rallies and games on the junior high dance squad. “You’re a scrapper,” he laughs, his crude gravelly voice sending shivers up Trudy’s spine.

  Aunt Star pivots, red faced and wild eyed. She is panting, out of breath, gasping for air. Trudy has never seen her look so scared. Aunt Star is the rock, the family caretaker, the keeper of them all. But at the moment, her frosted pink lipstick is smearing into the lines around her mouth, opened but silent, as if she has forgotten how to talk.

  Dub’s eyeglasses are askew on his wide glistening face, spittle spewing from his cracked lips as his head swivels in Trudy’s direction. “Come here, twirler girl. Give ol’ Dub a kiss.”

  Something primal roars through her body. Her guts twist, and Daddy’s voice thunders in her head. “Get him, Trudy. Take that monster down.”

  Trudy dashes forward, the baton high over her head. She cannot disobey her daddy’s orders.

  CHAPTER 3

  Talk About Town

  October 2016

  LUPI LOOKED up from slicing green chile and waved a meat cleaver through the air. “If a man tried to grab my VJJ, I’d chop his wiener off and grind it up for posole.”

  Trudy snorted coffee up her nose. She pulled a napkin from a dispenser with the words “Lupi’s Diner” scripted in red. Trudy and Jewel were seated on barstools at the counter where they watched Lupi prepare their breakfast burritos.

  Jewel tapped manicured red nails against the sides of her white mug. “So I take it you’re not a fan of Mister Sweet Potato Head?”

  Lupi went back to chopping chiles, her long black hair twisted in a topknot. The look accentuated her high cheekbones and slender face. “No way. The man is toxic…like agent orange.” She mumbled something in Spanish and then glanced at Jewel. “Perdón. I shouldn’t joke about chemical weapons. But that dude. He pushes my buttons.”

  Jewel shrugged and sat her mug down. “No offense taken. To be honest, I don’t like either candidate. I’m seriously thinking of writing Shep’s name on the ballot.”

  Trudy spun around, sloshing coffee on the counter. “You can’t be serious!” She found her mother’s comment sad and funny at the same time. Reaching for another napkin, Trudy noticed Lupi had set the cleaver down.

  Lupi’s dark eyes softened. “Miss Jewel. Can you do that? I mean your husband has been…” Lupi’s voice trailed off as she retrieved two flour tortillas from a warmer. They hung flaccid over the sides of her small hands before she began stuffing them with her special mixture of scrambled eggs, Hatch green chile, and chorizo.

  Jewel’s ruby lips formed a wicked grin. “Well, they can’t accuse me of writing in the name of a dead man.” She batted her lashes at Trudy and Lupi. “Considering we have no proof. Considering they never found his body.”

  Trudy and Lupi exchanged glances. Lupi graduated high school the same year as Georgia, and both girls served as cocaptains of the dance squad, the Cougarettes. After earning a couple of degrees and living abroad, Lupi returned to Pardon to run the family business, a tiny diner founded by her grandmother on the outskirts of town. Lupi was known for her homemade chile sauce, a secret recipe passed down from her grandmother. Customers raved how the heat opened their sinuses without leaving blisters in their mouth.

  An older gentleman seated at the end of the counter pushed his plate aside and picked up a toothpick. “Good morning, señoras. I couldn’t help but overhear your lively discussion.”

  Lupi flashed him a grin. “You’re welcome to join us, Mayor Trujillo.”

  Trudy elbowed Jewel. “Is he the current mayor?”

  Jewel shook her head and whispered, “No, a few years back. He lost the last election to that potbellied pharmacist who tried to kill me when he mixed up my meds.”

  Trudy smiled at the former mayor, a slim man with a pleasant face in his late sixties. He gave her a polite nod. “You ladies don’t mind me. I’m a fly on the wall.”

  Jewel swiveled on the barstool. “Good morning, Mayor. If you don’t mind me asking, who do you plan to vote for?”

  Trudy nudged her mother. Was this the same woman who’d lectured Trudy and Georgia to never ask a woman her age, to never probe a person about his or her politics?

  The former mayor slid off the barstool and grabbed his cowboy hat. He strolled up to Jewel and placed a friendly hand on her shoulder. “To tell you the truth, Ms. Cutterbuck, I’m with her.” He chomped on a toothpick and pointed his thumb at Lupi.

  Then he placed his hat on his head and left. A little bell over the door jingled as he turned and waved.

  “See you Monday, Mayor.” Lupi picked up two plates and sat them in front of Trudy and Jewel. In the center of each plate rested a large breakfast burrito. “He’s my best customer. Since his wife died, he comes by every morning for breakfast.”

  Jewel picked up her fork and knife and smoothed a paper napkin on her lap. “I think he’s sweet on you.”

  “Or he’s hooked on your special sauce,” Trudy jibed with a knowing smile.

  Lupi made a face and picked up a menu and went to wait on another customer. “The last thing I need is a man in my life telling me what to do.” She paused in front of Trudy. “How long you in town for? We need to catch up.”

  “Um, I’m not sure.” Trudy started to babble about how one day a few months ago after a long trip, she’d stepped off a 737 and rolled her battered suitcase through the jet bridge and thought, I can’t do this anymore. I need to retire.

  But something in Lupi’s eyes stopped her from having to explain.

  Lupi fanned herself with the menu and glanced at her waiting customer. “I’ll be right there.”

  Trudy could feel the rush of air on her own face. “I’ll tell Georgia I saw you. She
’ll be so glad to hear it.”

  Lupi’s face lit up. “I bet that girl can still shake her booty.”

  “She’s quite a tap dancer, too,” Jewel tossed out, lifting a fork to her mouth.

  Lupi dashed off and Trudy caught sight of Mayor Trujillo as he climbed into an older model pickup parked next to Trudy’s 2016 silver Camaro. She pictured him holding open the door of his pickup for Lupi, and Lupi letting her guard down long enough to climb into the cab.

  Trudy wished she could let her own guard down…

  She shoved that thought aside and enjoyed knowing her mother was inches away, still going strong at nearly eighty. And Trudy had the luxury, for now, to spend time with her.

  Breathing in the delicious smells wafting up from her plate, Trudy picked up her burrito and savored the first bite, letting the spicy flavors of New Mexico welcome her home.

  Jewel stuck a knit cap on her head. “How did the new mattress sleep? Your sister threatened to stay in a hotel next time if I didn’t get rid of the old one.”

  Trudy drove, like her dad, with both hands on the wheel. Her smartphone sat on the console. “My back isn’t killing me this morning if that’s any indication.” Trudy had slept in her and Georgia’s old bedroom, surrounded by seventies rock band posters curled around the edges and a pair of green and silver pompoms tacked to the wall. Before going to sleep, Trudy texted a photo of the pompoms to Georgia and asked: Do you still want these? Ha ha. And Georgia had texted back: LOL! Sis. I’m surprised she hasn’t bronzed them.

  Jewel ran her tongue over her teeth. “Do you have any asteroids in your purse?”

  Frowning, Trudy glanced at her mother. “You mean Altoids? Check the side pocket.” Lately, some of Jewel’s words came out all wrong. Just moments ago as they were leaving the diner, a young man held the door open for them when Jewel said, “Thank you, young fella. How’s it hanging?”