FALLOFF

From Falloff, Chapter 5: “Straphangers and Near-Naked Sheilahs” Cam Ranh Bay, Viet Nam: February 1969 Now, winding down, he would sleep. Would have slept. Would have liked to sleep—to have slept. The dogmatic iterations were endless. In the gulf between sleep and awareness, though, Bracken’s chainsaw snores from across their space overrode his efforts. It was not merely Bracken’s snoring. Through the wall at the head of his bed came the abrasive thump-scream-shock of rock and roll music pulsing with a seven-eight beat; it was felt more than heard. Winter and The Sandbag shared a wall, one to either side, and for the bar to be open and going strong in the wee hours was not unusual. Officers and regulars of the 1st RR, enlisted Crazy Cats, visiting firemen, Navy SeaBees—anyone could open the bar, even if only for himself. It was a rare individual in Southeast Asia who had enjoyed a drink there who did not know where the key hung from a nail on the wall inside Bimbo Billingsgate’s unlocked room. Bimbo was chargé d’affaires for the Sandbag. Winter pressed the wind stem on his Timex; in the ghostly blue glow he read, whispering aloud, “Oh-three-oh-seven. Jee-zus!” He left the room to Bracken and the chain saw and stumbled through the center passageway, arriving at The Sandbag in GI-issue skivvies: white boxer shorts, tee-shirt, and Ho Chi Minh sandals. Weak amber light and rock music spilled out The Sandbag’s doorway. Three people were at the bar. A mound of residue, suspiciously officer-like, was crumpled in the corner on the concrete floor, head hidden under a conical Vietnamese peasant hat. Major Nichols, the Executive Officer, leaned on the bar, khaki shorts and tie-dyed tee shirt uniform of the day. He was arm-wrestling Chief Warrant Officer Corbin, another non-flying officer whom Winter had not met. He had been told about the Assistant Avionics Officer. He had no wish to meet him; but everybody gotta be somewhere. Beyond the XO, Winter imagined he saw a long-legged, long-bosomed, long-blonde-haired nymph in powder blue panties and bra. She watched the arm-wrestling, frozen on point as if she’d just wound down a pas de deux. Her eyes in the uneven, weak light of the Sandbag were Little Orphan Annie-open-to-the-max, blue to match the underwear. She was barefoot. She was not an illusion. Winter felt the cold draft of his own near-nakedness, but before he could retreat, Major Nichols spotted him. “Dave. Dave, c’mon in. Got shombod—somebody wancha meet.” Nichols was flying, and he wasn’t even on the manifest. The nymph demonstrated unusual poise. Stepping close to Winter, she leaned even closer and, somehow, murmured softly over the rock music, “Hi, there. I’m Wendy. I’m a showgirl.” Winter, struck with unaccountable panache, said, “Indeed you are.” “A real, really, reely real . . . showgirl,” Nichols managed. His hand and forearm, under Corbin’s casual pressure, were crushed almost to the fibreboard that served as bar. From the look on the major’s face, it was obvious he had not envisioned this turn of events. Especially in front of the reely real nymph. “You sound . . . British. Sorta,” Winter stumbled. He almost said “foreign,” but caught himself before such a faux pas. “Well, I’m sort of Australian,” she laughed. There went first impressions. Despite a chest any showgirl might comfortably be proud of, the hint of irony and roll of eyes that went with her response was Winter’s first clue. While Nichols and Corbin arm wrestled, engaging in one repeat performance after another, both caught up in a desperate, unbreakable conflict to transform macho into an art form, Wendy related her story. For a dental assistant-from-Darwin-turned-vocalist, she kept it amazingly low-key. “I’m with The Trip, a troupe of singers and dancers contracted to USO. We’ve been making the rounds for weeks in One and Two Corps, playing airbases, fire bases, fire support bases, little, tiny, hacked-out jungle camps. Terrible bloody places. But today, Margery, a friend from Christ Church, one of our troupe, came off sick and I flew back with her on a Garry Owen helicopter to see a doctor at the Sixth Evac here. I met the major, who is just the most thoughtful person ever, at the PX at South Beach. End of story. Ta-da!” Lovely hands, too. Seeking distraction, he thought he should avoid gaping too longingly at the inviting chasm between her mostly exposed breasts if he could, though why he should, he could not explain. He was currently in a suspension of marital vows. And they were a fine, matched pair. “Is The Trip the Spanish dance company?” Winter managed. “Not a flamenco in our repertoire,” she said cautiously. “Why?” “We’d heard about a group of Spanish dancers supposed to be coming.” When Winter heard her response—“Sorry. You’ll have to make do with us, mate.”—it was obvious Wendy was not the come-to-life manifestation of every dumb-blonde joke he’d ever heard. Outsized, outspoken, sexy, she was a gorgeous woman who tripped to a different piper. And tough as hell, he realized, watching her fend off Corbin. First impressions were kick-ass! She laughingly explained that her state of undress was a result of her truthful answer to Nichols when he’d earlier looked at her skirt and blouse and asked, “Aren’t you hot in that outfit?” She had looked over the men’s common dress of shorts and tee-shirts and said yes. Nichols, good-hearted man that he was, had offered a solution: “Well, you’re among friends here. Take off what you can’t stand.” And she had, shedding everything except the powder-blue bra and panties, both of material offering little concealment, though somewhat fulfilling the other half of that military dictum—cover. She was a sight to behold. And she knew it, Winter could tell; she just was not promoting it. Shortly after oh-four-thirty, seeing no possible benefit in remaining with this strange ménage à trois, Winter, wiggling his fingers in a minute goodbye, took his tired body away. Corbin had slid to the floor, silent, leaving shorthanded the Ship, Captain, Crew dice game that Wendy proposed to follow arm wrestling. Major Nichols labored on at the bar, unable to win a wrestling match even without an opponent. The silent, unidentified figure on the floor had yet to declare himself. And Winter was flying a back-to-back today, second straight day. All reasons for him to go. Albeit with unaccustomed and unwelcome sensations in his groin. But he dare not return to his bunk; if he could sleep, he’d never rise in time for launch. Nearly five, the sun was already lightening the seaward side of the peninsula. Only wimps needed sleep, as Ratty Mac would have it. Winter showered and made for the chow hall. Today’s mission was launching early; he chose to beat the crowd merely as something to do. And he could smell sausage on the outside entryway grill from two hundred feet away. When he returned from the mess, shortly after seven, the Sandbag was padlocked, quiet inside. He thought of the lovely Wendy, and smiled all the way to Flight Ops