I can’t see Gustav’s helicopter, but because I saw it Tuesday, I comment on the tail propeller and how nice it looks.
“That’s a rotor,” Gustav says. “It’s so we can steer.”
I want to ask what he means when he uses the word we, but I know he must mean someone else. The woman I’m happy for him to marry. The one I write postcards to.
“I know it seems dumb,” I say. “But I really do love the color. So bright!”
“They had the kit in black, too, but I chose red,” he says.
“I’m glad.”
Gustav smiles at me. “Do you ever take off your lab coat?” he asks.
“Not really,” I say.
“Why not?” he asks.
“I don’t know,” I say. “Probably the same reason you wore your snowshoes that time.”
“Aren’t you hot, though?” he asks. He’s wearing a T-shirt and a pair of shorts. The garage where he’s assembling the helicopter is hot without a doubt, but I’m too shy to take off my lab coat, so I don’t answer. I just shake my head.
He says, “Tomorrow I’ll finish the engine and place it inside the chassis.” He says, “We’ll be flying in another week or so.”
“That soon?”
“That soon.”
“Why do you keep saying we?” I ask.
Gustav looks hurt. “Because you’re coming with me, aren’t you?”
I smile.
Gustav smiles.
“Are you sure you don’t want Lansdale to come?” I ask.
“Lansdale lies too much,” he says. “She serves no purpose.”
“What about China?” I ask.
“China has eaten herself,” he says.
“One of your physics friends?” I say. “Wouldn’t they be a better copilot than me?”
“None of them believe,” he says.
I tell him I’m honored and say I have to go home now. By the time I walk out, I’m sweating through my lab coat because I’m nervous and the garage is so hot. As I walk home, I wonder how we’ll fly in a helicopter I can only see on Tuesdays. I wonder where we’ll go. I wonder if we’ll ever come back.
I wonder so much I forget about the dangerous bush until I’m several steps past it on the wrong side of the road. The bush man calls to me, so I cross and say hello.
I say, “Can you tell me where Gustav is going in his helicopter?”
He looks disappointed. “Don’t you want it to be a surprise?”
“I don’t like surprises,” I say.
“Well,” he says, “I can’t tell you. That’s up to him.”
“Have you ever loved somebody?” I ask him.
“Yes.”
“Does it always hurt so much?” I ask.
“When does it hurt?” he asks.
“All the time.”
“I’m not sure that’s love,” he says. “You may be sick.”
“My mother is Hawkeye Pierce. He says without love we’re just eighty-nine cents’ worth of chemicals walking around lonely.”
“He’s probably right,” the bush man says.
He gives me a stuffed purple velvet lowercase f for my trouble, but I drop it at his feet and walk home feeling like eighty-nine cents of chemicals.
My bedtime story is season one, episode twenty-three, “Ceasefire.” Everyone at the M*A*S*H 4077th hospital believes a rumor of a cease-fire, but there really isn’t one. I go to bed knowing how they feel.