A Time for Patriots

There comes a moment when you have to stop revving up the car and shove it into gear.

— David J. Mahoney

Joint Air Base Battle Mountain

A few days later

Ron Spivey strode into the Civil Air Patrol hangar wearing a football jersey, shorts, running shoes, and carrying a backpack. He found Bradley McLanahan and Ralph Markham at a table. Ralph was in a CAP camouflage field uniform, but for the first time he saw Brad wearing a green Air Force — style Nomex flight suit. They had a stack of manuals on the table, along with sign-off forms. “Where the hell were you, McLanahan?” Ron shouted as he came over to the table. “You’re the only guy on the defensive squad that didn’t show for the workout.”

“I told you, Ron — I couldn’t make it because I’m getting my first ride as mission scanner,” Brad replied. “With the current air emergency, we got an ‘A’ mission number, so I get to go for real.” An “A” mission was one assigned and paid for by the Air Force for a specific task.

“Oh yeah — it’s your birthday today. Happy birthday,” Ron said tonelessly. “You get to start training to fly as a scanner for real. So why aren’t you flying?”

“I’m waiting to be briefed. I thought I’d help Ralph with his reading assignments for summer school.”

“Why doesn’t Marky do his own reading?”

“You know he has a little trouble reading,” Brad said. “But if you read it to him first and then help him through it, he picks it up pretty quick.”

“We’d all like someone to spoon-feed us,” Ron said. “But you’re still a cocaptain on the football team, so you’ve got to set a fucking example. You gotta do five miles every day plus wind sprints, and an hour in the weight room until football training-season starts. No excuses. And we train as a damned team. If you don’t show up, other guys won’t show, and pretty soon everyone is fucking around doing their own so-called training routine, which turns out to be nothing but dick .”

“I know,” Brad said. “I won’t miss any more. But I didn’t want to miss out on an ‘A’ mission.”

“Well, get your fucking priorities straight,” Ron said acidly. “I was at practice, and now I’m here, and tonight I’ll be on the FedEx ramp in Elko loading and unloading planes, and after that I’ll be at the AM/PM out there in Elko hoping I won’t get held up and the drunks won’t set the gas pumps on fire.”

“You got a job at the AM/PM in Elko too? You have two night jobs?”

“My mom’s boyfriend knows somebody,” Ron said. “It doesn’t matter. If I can do it, you can fucking do it. Just get your rear in gear and do what you said you’d do, or get the hell out of the way.” And he stormed off.

“Wow, he was sure mad,” Ralph remarked.

“I didn’t realize he was working so much,” Brad said. “He’s probably beat, driving all the way out to Elko and back. He works part-time afternoons at the Walmart too, at least until school starts.”

“Why is he working so much?”

“Helping out at home, I guess,” Brad replied. “He doesn’t talk about it much, after his Dad left and all. I know he likes to take his girlfriend out a lot too.”

“I’m never going to have a girlfriend,” Ralph announced.

“You say that now, but in a year it’ll be totally different,” Brad said.

“ You don’t have a girlfriend. You’re a pilot, and you’re on the football team, but you don’t have a girlfriend.”

“I have friends that happen to be girls,” Brad said, surprised at how uneasy he felt, “but… I don’t know. Lots of reasons. Girls don’t like special-team guys like they do quarterbacks and linebackers; I’m not a private pilot yet, so I can’t take girls on rides; I’m fairly new in school, and… I don’t know, dating is just not high on my list right now. I’m thinking about college, and scholarships.”

Ralph sighed. “I wish I could go to college.”

“You can. We just need to work on your reading. You’re a smart guy — you just don’t learn like other kids.”

“I get tested every year in school. They say I’m like a fourth grader.”

“That’s compared to other students in school,” Brad said. “But how many kids you know can do all the first aid, orienteering, and fieldwork you do? How many kids can pick up a complex adult video game and figure out how to ace it in just a couple hours? Heck, how many kids do you know that have any idea what the one-in-sixty rule is?”

“But that’s easy.”

“It wasn’t when you started. I remember when I first tried to teach you land navigation and how to read a map and compass — you just didn’t have a clue. But you’re a visual learner.”

“What’s that?”