The Man from the Sky

The grim day when her father left the household to buy cigarettes and never came back, was the moment that convinced ten-year-old Glenda to give up every expectation on love.

Her mother had cried and drank for countless days until she became too wasted to be a decent parent. Rumors run through town faster than electricity on copper wires and, even among her peers, she became the rejected daughter and the alcoholic’s kid. 

It was only a matter of time. Said one.

I always thought she was a whore. Poor little girl left with such a mother. Reprised the other.

I wonder if he’s got another woman. Insisted a third.

You are so ugly that even your dad left. Concluded her classmates.

Glenda resolved that life was miserable and people cruel. Being comfortable, safe, and unflappable was a greater value than being happy.

Glenda knew she would have to marry sooner or later for there was no other decent perspective for a half-orphaned country girl with little means and no particular skills.

I will settle for the man who will offer me stability, she decided, if he'll also offer me isolation and exile from these grotesques villagers then I’ll be his forever.

The sunny day in which our story takes place started with Glenda Lambert opening wide the frosty windows of the bedroom that she shared with her husband Walter.

It was a crispy early spring day with the bluest sky and not even a cloud.

She scanned the landscape in front of her and contemplated the expanse of corn and crops. She smiled and kissed her husband’s photo for he was the reason she had been able to live in such a sweet form of exile.

Descending the stairs, she thought about her boring wedding day to 37-year-old Walter Lambert a couple of months ahead of WW2. Her gigantic husband, twenty years her senior, had never been touched by any female, except for his mother and dog, before their wedding night. Glenda knew that, even on that honeymoon evening, nothing had really happened for poor Walter and that her virginity was still intact, but she did not have the heart to tell him the truth, that marriage had nothing to do with intimacy.

Glenda was not in love with Walter. He was not easy on the eye and more accustomed to plants’ company rather than people’s, but he worshipped her, and he had offered her all the resolutions she had made as a child on a silver plate.

When Walter had been recalled to the army and left her in charge, she could not believe her luck and she now lived with not a trouble in the world, alone in her saltbox house surrounded by a sea of corn and emptiness.

On that spring day, Glenda entertained herself with one of the activities that pleasured her the most: doing laundry. She prepared breakfast as usual then washed all the sheets, napkins, towels, tablecloths, and aprons she could track down. Fabric was not necessarily dirty, she simply relished the perfume of Marseille soap, sunshine and breeze on clean cotton.

She hung the laundry on the racks and created a forest of damp cloth through which she walked in silk underwear to feel the wet fibers on her young skin. She bounced and twirled among sheets with not a worry her mind, and her dog at her heel.

While the linens dried out, she resumed her other duties. Glenda harvested the blueberries of her garden and headed to the kitchen to cook marmalade.

Blueberries and sugar were barely melting together when little Juniper, that never barked, started howling. Glenda felt a shiver down her spine and for the first time got a sense of distress in being all alone in the middle of nowhere.

Juniper persisted in her unusual growling and Glenda resolved to go check what the fuss was about. She exited her home with the meat knife tight in her hand.

At first glance, nothing seemed changed, but Juniper directed her towards the laundry racks and indeed there was more fabric than Glenda remembered.

Yellowish cloth mixed with her off-white sheets creating a circus marquee. Below the sound of breeze slithering through the sheets, Glenda could hear weak moans.

Scared but curious she walked on.

“Help.” She heard from nowhere.

She looked around. “Who is this? Where are you? What are you doing in my garden?”

“Above you.” A cracked whisper answered.

Glenda lifted her head to discover a man in a soldier uniform stretched perpendicularly over her racks. She could not distinguish his face, but the flying outfit had intertwined with the racks’ ropes and made him look like a hanging salami. 

Glenda giggled.

“What is there to laugh? I’m a US Army officer, help me down.”

“Well, soldier, from my perspective you look like a sausage. You’d laugh too.”

The man quivered tensely. “Help me down, will you?”

“Why are you on my fresh laundry?”

“Can we talk later?” 

“You’re on my property, you do as I say.”

He grumbled. “I’m a training paratrooper, there was a problem with the parachute, and I landed here.”

“You got my laundry dirty.”

“If I had smashed on the ground, your laundry would be even dirtier with my blood.”

“If I help you come down, will you help me clean it?” asked Glenda surprised by her own initiative and insolence with a grown man.

“What?” the man turned his head toward her. Glenda could only grasp a pair of reddish lips that made her whole body tense.

“I’m eighteen and petite. It’s going to take a great effort to bring you down, the least you can do afterward is help me clean the mess you’ve made.”

“Fine. Help me down first.”

“What’s your name?” asked Glenda.

“Thomas Lawrence. Yours?”

“Glenda Morrison.” She blushed, realizing that she had used her maiden name. “Ok, I’ll help. Do you have any suggestions on where to start?”

“Find the ropes that tie me to the parachute and cut them.”

Glenda returned to the house and grabbed a chair to bring herself closer to the man. 

She touched his back to find the starting point of the ropes and felt a sort of excitement that she had never experienced before. She didn’t know if it was the unknown, the loneliness or the fact that she had never been so close to a man willingly, but Walter suddenly became tremendously small in the farthest corner of her mind.

“You’re good with the knife and ropes, you do this often?”

Glenda grinned. “No, you’re the first man from the sky in my garden.”

“Well, I see the potential. What do you do for a living?”

Glenda released the first cord. “I was a seamstress.” 

“Was? You’re young.”

“I’m a housewife now.”

“Oh.” Was that disappointment in his voice? Wondered Glenda. “So, there’s a husband?”

“Yes.”

“Where is he?”

“Away for the war.”

“How could he leave you here all alone? Don’t you have parents to go back to while he’s away?”

Glenda swallowed and cut another thread. “I have no family. My father left when I was little, and my mom died of cirrhosis.”

“I’m sorry. I understand. I grew up with my dad only. My mom had not the mother gene apparently. As far as I know, she’s working in a brothel somewhere in the north. My father died last year.”

“That’s why you joined the army?”

“That’s why you married?”

“Touchè. Only two ropes left.”

“Eighteen and married. Don’t you feel in a cage?”

“I feel safe, protected, taken care of. Yes, I’m young but I’ve had a troubled life. Walter is not much but he gives me a tranquil life.”

“Do you guys have kids.”

Glenda grunted. “No.”

“I feel sarcasm.”

“I don’t know why I’m about to tell you this, but in a year of marriage... well, we never did it.”

Thomas's head rotated in shock. “What, that’s the only reason I would marry for. Well, maybe not only that, but you know what I mean.”

“I don’t think Walter really knows how things work down there. On the first night, he made love with the mattress.”

Thomas chuckled. 

“He’s a good man.” continued Glenda.

“I’m sure. Are you sure the life you’re living is better than the one you had before? Yes, you’re safe and all, but you’re missing fun, passion, complicity. Shouldn’t those things be the key elements of marriage?”

Glenda cut the last rope and felt hit right in the guts. Thomas brought out all the doubts she tried to hide.

“You’re an expert I see. Are you married?”

“Never ever been in love. But I had sex with a prostitute once.”

“You’re free.”

“Yes. Freedom is great. That’s why I decided for paratroops. I want some thrill in life. I don’t want to settle for the least. You should neither. There are enough bad things in the world to live a life of unhappiness with a man that you can’t love.”

“No, you’re free. I cut all the cords.”

“Oh. Can you slide the parachute from over me?”

Glenda nodded and helped the light fabric slide on the ground.

Thomas rolled over the racks and finally dragged himself down. “Feels good to stand on soil, I must admit. Wow, you’re little.” Exclaimed Thomas.

They were a couple of inches from each other. They made a weird pair. She, barefoot and in her silk underwear. Him in a green, thick uniform.

“Thanks.” She said.

“Why are you thanking me? You’re the one who saved me.”

“Yes, but nobody ever talked to me like you did, so maybe YOU saved me.” A tear slid down her cheek.

Thomas took off his goggles and revealed his face. Trough the film of tears, Glenda could see curious blue eyes and corn blond hair. The smile he gave her though, was the sweetest one ever reserved for her.

He drew near and hugged, patting her on the curly black hair. “Come ‘on. I’m only twenty-one, I don’t know anything.”

“I’m terrified of living. I don’t want to end up like my parents so, I trapped myself in the most boring marriage of history.”

“Shh. You’ll never make your parents' mistake. We can learn from them and try to be better.”

“What do I do with Walter?”

“I think the law allows some ways out if you really want it.”

“People will talk.”

“You will move where no one will care. You’ll make new friends.”

“I’m not able to make friends.” 

“You just made one.”

Glenda looked up. “Did I?”

“Yes. I must admit that with this lingerie on you, I would not aim for the mattress if you know what I mean, but friends are good for now.” 

Glenda smiled. “How will you go back?”

“Where?” 

“To the army?”

Thomas shrugged. “I’ll think about that later. I’ve got duties now.”

“What?”

“Show me where the soap is, we’ve got laundry to make.”