Born to Fly

by Michael Ferrari

  Then Mom said, “Bird, the lieutenant said he saw you on the airfield this morning.”

  “You were flying that Warhawk?” I asked him, finding it pretty hard to believe. I mean, Mom was taller than this kid.

  “Yup. Sorry ’bout bombing ya, sprout,” he apologized. “You okay?”

  I looked him over and frankly, I wasn’t too impressed. “You look barely old enough to drive.”

  He laughed and mussed my hair. “I’m nineteen, you little peach pit.”

  “Bird, I told you to stay away from the airfield,” Mom said.

  “Okay, Mom. I promise.” I gave it a shot, but it wasn’t one of my better performances. Behind my back, I made sure my fingers were crossed.

  “Now, back to bed,” Mom said.

  I trudged up the stairs.

  “Good night,” the lieutenant called out to me.

  Halfway up the stairs I paused to give him some advice I remembered from the manual: “Adjust your rudder trim and you’ll get more airspeed diving.” But the lieutenant and the captain just laughed as I scampered the rest of the way upstairs.

  From my window I could hear Mom seeing them to the door. “You’ll have to excuse Bird. She has this thing for airplanes.”

  “We’re just glad she’s okay.” The captain sounded amused. Not amused like he really believed I knew anything about airplanes, but amused like the way people used to get when Dad told them I could throw a curveball.

  While the captain talked with Mom, I saw the lieutenant wander into the front yard. I could hear Margaret’s big mouth gargling from the bathroom and my brain hatched an idea. I leaned halfway out the window and whispered out to Lieutenant Peppel, “Pssst! Hey, greenhorn.”

  “Hey,” he answered.

  “What would it take to get me a ride in your Warhawk?”

  He shook his head. “You mean besides a commission in the Army Air Corps?”

  “Listen. I’ve flown lots with my dad. And I know the P-40 backwards and forwards,” I told him.

  He looked up at me and smiled. “I bet you do. But it’s still a pretty tall order, Peach-pit. You better leave the flying to us fighter pilots.”

  But he didn’t realize I had a goo-goo-eyed ace up my sleeve. “What if I could arrange a rendezvous between you and a certain curly-haired Allied sympathizer?”

  “Rendezvous?” Bingo! His eyes lit up like Judge Dickens’s Christmas tree. “And you’re sure she’d go out with me?”

  I turned toward the bathroom and saw Margaret trying on Mom’s lipstick. “Let’s just say my intelligence sources promise little or no resistance.”

  I could see he was about to take the bait, when the captain called, “Lieutenant, let’s go.”

  With time running out, I scrambled for something that would seal the deal. I quickly grabbed one of Margaret’s bras, which happened to be nearby. I stuck it out the window and twirled it around my finger. “I can guarantee it.”

  Lieutenant Peppel’s eyes were practically bugged out. “All right, Peach-pit. I’ll be in touch.”

  “Roger Wilco.” I gave him my best Army Air Corps salute and watched him drive away with the captain.

  The next day at school, I kept busy sketching in my notebook, while Mrs. Simmons slowly worked her way through the class, assigning report topics for each of us. My drawing was really cool. It showed me piloting a P-40 Warhawk and strafing the Genny in the bay with my wing-mounted machine guns. D-d-d-d-d-t-t-t-t! Luckily, no one had taken my topic yet—“The Curtiss P-40: Greatest Plane in Rhode Island”—so I was pretty jazzed. I imagined someday, when I was a world-famous fighter ace, I was gonna fly to a desert island and find Amelia Earhart. I didn’t believe it when people said she was dead. I bet she was on an island, drinking coconut milk and lying in a hammock safe and sound.

  Mrs. Simmons moved down the list to Minnie. “And your report topic, Miss Lashley?”

  “President Roosevelt,” Minnie announced loudly so everyone could hear.

  “What’s he got to do with Rhode Island?” Libby complained.

  “My father said he’s making a whistle-stop in Providence this July,” Minnie answered.

  “Excellent, Minnie. Susan? What about you?”

  “Um. I don’t know.”

  Uh-oh. Wrong answer. But before Susan could blink, Mrs. Simmons had her assigned. “How about the state flower, hmm?”

  Susan groaned. I had learned the hard way you’d better be ready with your topic or else Mrs. Simmons would stick you with one of the boringest ones. I’m talking about the kind that would put even Mr. Van Dyke, the science teacher, to sleep (and he liked to make mold).

  Finally it was my turn. I leapt to my feet. “I want to do it on—”

  “Bird, sit down. Kenji is next,” Mrs. Simmons said.

  “Oh. I guess I didn’t see him there.” I slumped back down into my seat. Come on, just pick your stupid topic so I can go.

  Kenji peeked out from behind some movie star magazine he had hidden inside his arithmetic book. He stood up and said, without an ounce of enthusiasm, “My uncle works at that factory outside of town. He said they make the engines for the plane John Wayne flies in his new movie, The Flying Tigers.”

  Mrs. Simmons corrected him, proud of our little town’s important contribution to the war effort. “Oh. You mean the P-40 Warhawk.”

  “Yeah, whatever. Could I do a report on that?”

  “What an original idea. That would be splendid. Okay, now you can go, Bird.”

  Splendid? It wasn’t splendid. It was awful. So awful I was speechless. I glared at Kenji.

  “I don’t have all day,” said Mrs. Simmons. “Shall I choose one for you?”

  In a daze, all I could mumble out was “Huh?”

  “How about the state marsh weed?” she said with a straight face.

  My mouth dropped open but I was too outraged to speak.

  “Marsh weed it is. And remember, everyone: footnotes.”

  The class groaned all together. As the bell rang and the students filed out, I was too shocked to even drag myself out for gym class.

  By the time I did trudge outside, the boys were picking baseball teams, so I snuck over to watch. They were splitting off to head for the diamond when Mr. Phelps, the gym teacher, noticed that Kenji was left behind.

  Mr. Phelps collared Farley and pointed at Kenji. “Hey. What about that kid?”

  Raymond had to think quick. So he kicked Kenji in the shin.

  “Ow!” Kenji yelped.

  “He’s got a bad leg,” Raymond explained.

  Then Red Phillips, an obnoxious kid with too many freckles, piped up. “And what do Japs know about baseball anyway?”

  “Besides, he doesn’t want to play,” added Farley.

  But as anyone could tell you, that argument didn’t work with Mr. Phelps. Sports were his life. He wore sneakers and sweat socks all day, every day, even to church.

  “Listen,” he said. “In my class, everybody plays.” He walked over, grabbed Kenji, and pushed him along to join them. “I’ve got to umpire for the girls. Any trouble, you just holler.”

  A half hour later, it was the bottom of the last inning, two outs, with Farley on the mound holding on to a one-run lead and looking for blood. He wound up, hurled his meanest curveball, and hit Frankie Mitchell hard in the back.

  Raymond hollered from shortstop, “Atta boy, Farley.”

  “Atta boy?” their second baseman, Dickie Doolittle, shot back at Raymond. “That’s a walk, you idiot.”

  “It’s all right.” Raymond shrugged, trying not to seem so dumb. “We still got ’em by a run.”

  Frankie hobbled to first. But as soon as Farley turned his back, Frankie took off for second. He was faking being hurt! By the time Farley noticed, Frankie was already safe at second with a stolen base.

  All the players on Frankie’s team jumped to their feet, rattling the dugout fence, cheering and clapping for Frankie’s great steal. Everyone, that is, except Kenji, who sat alone at the end of the
bench.

  I decided this was as good a time as any to straighten him out. So I walked over and poked him hard in the back. “You stole it.”

  “Huh?” he answered, turning toward me.

  “And you didn’t even know it was called a P-40,” I said with disgust.

  “The airplane? So?” He turned away.

  “So?” I poked him in the back some more. “It was my topic. Everybody knew it was my topic. And you stole it.”

  Sean Fitzgerald, their catcher, called out, “Come on, Farley. One more out.”

  Red called his next batter. Kenji. “Hey, Charlie Chan, you’re up.”

  But Kenji just played dumb. So I elbowed him, hard. “Hey, they’re calling you.”

  Red clapped his hands. “Come on, Nip. Chop-chop.”

  Kenji rose slowly from the bench and walked over to Red. “For your information, Charlie Chan is Chinese. My name is Kenji.”

  “That’s not my fault. Now listen. Know what this is?” Red held a tattered hardball under Kenji’s nose. Kenji said nothing. “Didn’t think so. It’s a baseball, see? Now the point of the game is for that guy”—Red pointed to Farley—“to hit you with it. Just ask Lumpy.”

  Lumpy looked up from the bench and nodded. He was a chunky kid with baseball welts on his face and arms. His specialty was getting beaned. Lumpy had drawn a walk every at-bat for the last two years. When he smiled, Kenji saw that he was minus quite a few teeth.

  “After you, Tiny’s up next,” said Red.

  Kenji spotted Tiny, a miniature Babe Ruth, fanning a Louisville Slugger in the on-deck circle.

  “He’ll knock you in,” Red explained, “and we win. See? It’s so simple, even you can understand it.”

  Kenji turned and marched to the plate. He picked up the bat and held it at an odd angle.

  Farley wound up and called out, so everyone could hear, “This is for Pearl Harbor, guys,” and whistled one right past Kenji’s head, flattening him to the dirt. Kenji accidentally swung his bat in the process. Strike one.

  “Like a turkey shoot,” gloated Farley.

  “Except this time it’s a chicken,” Raymond chimed in.

  Figuring out Red’s strategy, the catcher, Sean, said, “Stop fooling around, Farley. If he gets on, Tiny’s up next.”

  Sean was right. Tiny hit at least a double every time he came up to bat. If Farley beaned Kenji and put him on base, odds were pretty good that Tiny would get a hit and win the game. Farley needed to get Kenji out to seal the victory.

  Kenji climbed back to his feet. Dusted himself off. From the bench, Red and his teammates signaled Kenji to lean into the pitch. He just ignored them. Farley launched another pitch, straight for his head. Kenji sidestepped and swung again—strike two.

  Sean returned the pitch. “Atta boy, Farley. One more.”

  By this time, most of the other kids in gym class were finished with their games and heading back toward the schoolhouse. A small crowd began to gather to watch Farley strike out the new Japanese kid.

  Red marched angrily up to Kenji. “What’s a matter? No speaka da English? You got to let it hit you if you want a walk.”

  Kenji shoved him aside. He dug his feet into the batter’s box. Set his jaw. Tightened his steely focus on the ball. Then … complete silence as Kenji pointed his arm out to center field, just like Babe Ruth calling his shot.

  Who did this kid think he was? He cocked the bat like it was some kind of medieval catapult. That was when the other kids in the crowd started to laugh.

  But for some reason, I didn’t.

  Farley snickered. He pounded his fist into his mitt.

  “Lights out, Hirohito.” Farley wound up like a spring. And hurled one last blistering curveball with everything he had.

  Crack!

  It sounded like a thunderclap. But there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. Only a white ball shooting like a rocket up to outer space.

  GOODBYE, MR. SPAULDING! Kenji had creamed it harder than Farley or any kid I had ever seen—even seventh graders. That ball sailed like it had wings, over the helpless outfielders, landing at least twenty feet outside the fence.

  Raymond called out to Farley, “Maybe you should’ve beaned him?”

  “Shut up,” snarled Farley.

  I had to admit, I was pretty impressed. Maybe even a little jealous.

  Kenji’s teammates cheered him, but the funny thing was, he made no motion to run the bases.

  Red patted him on the back. “You’re all right for a Jap.”

  But Kenji turned away with the bat on his shoulder. There was a strange look in his eyes.

  “Hey, you gotta run the bases.” Red laughed nervously.

  Kenji ignored him and began walking to the schoolhouse.

  “Hey! What about the game?” Red shouted.

  Kenji stopped, turned, and answered in a pretty good imitation of Clark Gable, “Frankly, freckle-head, I don’t give a darn.” Then he tossed the bat in the dirt—and just walked away.

  Sean and Red began to argue over whether Kenji needed to round the bases for it to count. Farley just stood there, pounding his fist in his mitt, grinding his teeth, and getting red in the face.

  I watched quietly and found myself wishing that I had been able to do that to Farley.

  On Saturdays I would usually go to the movies. In fact, every kid in Geneseo would go to the movies. But thanks to Kenji, this Saturday I had to go research “the official Rhode Island marsh weed.” At the movie theater they would show newsreels before the features. The week before, the Fox Movietone News had a story on the German U-boat wolf packs in the Atlantic, and the amazing Doolittle Raid on Japan. I had been trying to remember all the names and places (in case Dad got sent there or wrote about them once he was shipped out), but it was hard because they all sounded so stupid and weird.

  As I walked past the Bijou on Main Street, kids were lining up for Only Angels Have Wings, that week’s Saturday matinee feature, starring Cary Grant. Just my luck, a picture about pilots on the one day I couldn’t go. I bet Dad would have really liked that one, too. I remember one time, when I was in second grade, Dad snuck me out on a school night to see this silent movie about World War One pilots called Wings. To tell the truth, except for the flying scenes, it was kind of boring, but I pretended to love it as much as Dad did. I think that made him enjoy it even more. Afterwards he caught heck from Mom for sneaking me out, but he said it was worth it. I wished I could have snuck Dad out of the Army Air Corps to see this one with me. This time I wouldn’t have had to pretend to like it, because just having Dad sitting next to me would have made it the best movie I ever saw.

  I passed by Minnie, Susan, and Libby They said “Hi,” made a few wisecracks about my overalls, and tried to get me to stay, but when I told them I couldn’t, they went right back to giggling about how “dreamy” Cary Grant looked on the movie poster.

  I spotted Kenji hopping off the back of his uncle’s bicycle, which was weighted down with all kinds of junky-looking fishing gear.

  “Are you sure you’ll be okay?” his uncle asked.

  “I’ll be fine, Uncle,” Kenji said.

  I noticed Farley and Raymond smoking a cigarette in the alley, by the trash can. The way they were eyeballing Kenji, I didn’t think he was gonna be fine. But I didn’t tell him that. I didn’t say anything. I had marsh weeds to pick.

  Along the shore of the bay, I stomped through the cattails in my dad’s oversized trout-fishing hip boots, buried halfway to my waist in slimy green gunk. I tried to shoo away the mosquitoes buzzing around my head, but they came right back.

  “How about the official Geneseo marsh weed?” I whined aloud to myself in my best imitation of Mrs. Simmons. I reached down and grabbed a bunch of weeds and yanked them out by the roots. Then something in the mud grabbed my attention. Clearing the weeds some more, I found it. A strange coil of copper wire. But before I could think about what it was—

  “Ahoy, there!”

  I jumped about a foot and landed
with my butt in the mud. I peered back through the weeds and saw a rowboat, a little ways offshore. It was Father Krauss, along with Mr. Fujita, Kenji’s uncle, back from fishing. They ran the boat aground and hopped out.

  I stood up and brushed myself off. “Any sign of the Genny?” I called out.

  Father Krauss snickered. “No. Not much of anything biting, I’m afraid.”

  Kenji’s uncle quietly thanked Father Krauss and gathered his things to leave.

  “No? What about tomorrow, Tomo?” Father Krauss asked.

  “No. I cannot,” Mr. Fujita said. “But thank you.” He nodded to me and hurried into the woods on foot.

  Father Krauss finished pulling the boat ashore.

  “I guess he doesn’t like me much, huh?” I said.

  “It’s not you, it’s me,” Father Krauss explained. “Mr. Fujita thinks he and I shouldn’t fish together so much anymore. He thinks people might not like it if I’m friends with someone who’s Japanese. I told him he’s being foolish, but he’s concerned for my well-being.” Then Father Krauss noticed my hands and butt covered in muck. “What on earth have you been up to, Bird?”

  “Um, looking for marsh weeds.”

  “Hope your luck’s better than mine.” He held up just one sickly-looking fish on his string and shook his head woefully. “Saints alive. Sister Marilyn’s gonna have my head.”

  I laughed to think that Father Krauss might be as terrified of Sister Marilyn as all of us kids were. She was short, but she was about as wide as she was tall, like she’d been inflated with a tire pump. She had the uncanny ability to hear a swear word whispered from the farthest corner of the room during Sunday school, and other than Mrs. Storms, the town librarian, Sister Marilyn was the most vicious ear-pincher I ever knew. To top that off, you could never make faces when her back was turned, because she really did seem to have eyes in the back of her head.

  “She’s crankier than usual because of all the turnips in the victory garden. With all the food rationing, we’ve had to eat them every night for a month.” He put the back of his hand to the side of his mouth and whispered, grinning, “They give her gas.” He patted me on the head and went on his way.