Gildenheart -2- Cimmanun Roll

They had gone down the stairs to the ground floor, hurrying toward the dining room where the delicious smells lurked. But when the other girl started skipping, Gordie let go of her hand and pulled away. “I’m not going to do that!” he protested.

“Oh, yeah,” the brunette said. “You’re not built for skipping,” glancing at Gordie’s chest. “But is something else wrong?” They stopped too, while the other residents came down the stairs and went around them. All of them were women, some older than the girls by decades. The ladies smiled at the two youngsters and some of them even laughed.

Oh, jeez, thought Gordie. He tried to nod and shake his head at the same time and suddenly he was crying and giggling instead.

“Oh, sugar,” said the other girl, pulling Gordie close. “Let’s get around a cimmanun roll and some coffee; you always feel better.”

Gordie sniffled, embarrassed to be crying in public. Is this how come girls are so emotional? The tears disappeared as quickly as they had come and the two went on into the dining room. There were four long tables and two smaller ones and two counters where baskets of rolls and bread sat along with the sort of heavy ceramic cups Gordie associated with diners. A coffee dispenser at each end of the two counters was in constant use. 

At the smaller tables, sitting on low stools, a group of women were finishing up what looked like plates of sausage and eggs. You must have to get up even earlier to score a real breakfast, thought Gordie. This must be a boarding house, he reflected. A women’s boarding house since there were no men in sight, not even behind the counters. 

The room wasn’t crowded, perhaps a third full, and an older woman stood near the front, smiling and speaking to everyone. “Phyllis,” said the lady, “I see you got our sleepyhead oat and aboat.”

Canadian? wondered Gordie, failing to suppress more giggles.

“Vickie’s always slow moving on these cold morning, Missus Fairley,” said the brunette, evidently named Phyllis. Gordie rolled his eyes and giggled and Mrs. Fairley laughed. Then the girls each took one of the over-size cinnamon rolls and a cup to fill and moved to the end of one of the long tables, sitting across from one another on the benches.

A big clock above the counters showed the time but Gordie had trouble reading it. The clock had an analog dial with both hands pointing almost straight down. It looked ancient; though, at the same time, almost new. 

But Gordie was famished and dismissed the anachronistic feel of the place in favor of the heavenly smells from the cinnamon roll. It was as big as both of his (new, smaller) hands together, almost two inches tall at the center, and covered in sticky white icing. He could see juicy raisins and slivers of almonds peeking out.

He had taken several bites of the roll before he noticed that Phyllis ate much slower and with smaller bites, chewing thoroughly. Better try to be a little more ladylike, Gordie thought. He slowed down and took a sip of coffee. “Kack!” He almost gagged at the taste of the strong bitter brew after the sweet roll.

Phyllis giggled and pushed the cream and sugar she had already used over. “Four sugars and a quarter cup of cream,” she said. “I don’t see how you can possibly forget that.”

Gordie shrugged and almost distracted himself with the unexpected movement of his chest. “I’m not awake till I get coffee,” he muttered.

“Not even then,” teased Phyllis. “You always sleep until after the tunnel. Half the time, I have to wake you up when we get to Penn Station.”

Penn Station? A vague memory of an old movie made Gordie think that the name suggested New York City. He blinked, doctoring his coffee and taking a sip. Much better. Captain Gordon Victor had drunk his coffee black since college but Vickie seemed to like hers thick and sweet.

Phyllis nattered about something “at the shop,” names and incidents that Gordie had no referent for. He tuned her out and considered his situation. Half an hour ago, or less, he had been a fighter pilot over Syria, apparently taken down by some unknown bogie.

Now he seemed to be a teenage girl named Vickie. Victoria? Would her last name turn out to be Gordon? He shook his head. He’d had a grandmother whose maiden name had been Gordon, that’s where he had gotten his first name.

“What?” asked Phyllis.

Gordie shook his head again, mumbling nothing into another bite of roll. Phyllis resumed her dissertation.

I’ve heard of reincarnation, thought Gordon, but not like this. Am I recuperating in a hospital somewhere, dreaming? He stopped himself from shaking his head again. No, this was too real; the smells, the taste of the roll, the tock of the big clock, the detail of Phyllis’s face with the incipient pimple in the edge of her hairline. And dreams always changed or vanished as soon as you thought of them being dreams.

I’m really here, thought Gordie. Back wherever I was before, I’m probably a dead fighter pilot but here I’m alive and maybe ten years younger. And a girl.

That last was a sticking point. When he’d been a child, Gordie had often been told that he was pretty enough to be a girl but that sort of crap had stopped when his voice changed and his beard came in and he’d shot up to six feet tall when he was only thirteen. 

He hadn’t got any taller after that but he’d bulked out a bit and been a star athlete all through high school. Not so much in college, too many bigger, stronger, faster guys but he’d made all the teams he’d tried out for and had a decent record as a utility player for the Academy Falcons baseball team.

He looked down at the delicate hand holding a piece of sweet roll and tried to imagine stopping a hot grounder at third and making the throw to first with such tools. Nope.

He wondered if he could still pilot a plane but felt certain that no one was going to let him try. He giggled nervously and Phyllis paused to smile at him. 

“I know Mr. Spaight likes you, he’s always calling you back to his office, you’re sometimes gone half a shift and you come back smiling,” she said.

Uh, oh, thought Gordie. Am I going to have to deal with a different kind of bogie now?

People had started leaving the dining hall by the big doors at the far end. Phyllis stood, slurping a last gulp of coffee and shaking sugar flakes off her hands. “We better go, sometimes the train is early.” She began to button her big coat.

Gordie stuffed the last of his roll in his mouth and another swallow of the sweet but cooling coffee before standing up.

Phyllis was pulling gloves out of her pocket and putting them on. Gordie found a single glove in one coat pocket too and began putting it on.

“Fasten your coat first, silly,” said Phyllis. “Here, let me.” She made quick work of the buttons and handed Gordie his other glove from the other coat pocket. 

Gordie giggled. “Thanks,” he said, using the glove to wipe sugar off his mouth before putting it on. They pushed out of the room into the cold, holding hands and giggling again.

“Crap, it’s cold,” said Phyllis and Gordie nodded. It was so cold his cheeks and nose felt as if they were blistering. “Let’s get to the station and out of the wind,” the brunette suggested and Gordie nodded again.

What have I gotten myself into? he wondered. Are we in Canada? Does it get this cold in New York?

They started down a flight of icy steps to the street, using each other for support. “Don’t giggle,” Phyllis warned. “We’ll fall on our asses.” But they didn’t despite making noises like steam kettles by the time they reached the bottom.

Those were real giggles, reflected Gordie as they hurried down the street to the only lighted building in sight. We’re having fun while freezing to death.

It did turn out to be a train station with a faded, poorly lit sign identifying it, after some puzzlement, as Rochester Station. Rochester, New York, Gordie wondered? Being a pilot, he had a fair idea of geography, even of places he had never been and Rochester, NY, seemed a bit far north for a daily train ride to Penn Station.

It occurred to Gordie to wonder if they had tickets but Phyllis did not seem concerned. They had barely gotten out of the wind behind some partial walls when the train came into view. Big bright light leading, it made a rising moan sound as it approached the station.

Nobody moved out of shelter to wait for the train on the open platform, Gordie noticed, glancing around, but three men were looking directly at him. Each smiled as he met their gazes. Gordie froze. What were they looking at, a blonde girl bundled up in winter clothing?

Maybe they knew Vickie and were just being friendly? But when they had smiled, she had felt herself smile too, and something inside her had responded with warmth. She felt absurdly fine right then, as if she had won a medal for excellent flying or gotten a plum assignment, like to the Thunderbirds, the Air Force aerobatics team. Had their ever been a female Thunderbird pilot?

There were other men in the station, what if she smiled at them?

Gordie shook his head and turned away, pressing his face into Phyllis’s shoulder. What just happened? Had he been thinking of himself as Vickie? “I’m so cold,” he whispered to Phyllis, just to be doing something that did not involve thinking about wanting to smile at more men.

“We’ll be in the car soon, it’ll be so warm we’ll have to open our coats,” Phyllis whispered back. “Take off your gloves first, though.” She laughed softly.

Gordie had an image in his mind of opening his coat and being naked underneath. She hadn’t seen herself naked yet. Had any of the men seen her naked? 

Would they like to?

Gordie whimpered with his face against Phyllis’s thick black wool coat. “Do you know those guys?” he asked, motioning with his head which group he meant.

“Not really,” Phyllis answered after a moment. “I think they ride the same train we do. Lots of people work in the garment district.”

“They’re looking at me,” said Gordie.

Phyllis sniffed. “Men always look at you. The tits, the hair, the face. And if you’re walking away, the ass. Usually, you smile and sometimes you wink.”

“Oh!” Not what Gordie wanted to hear.

“What’s wrong? Is it the wrong time of month?” Phyllis asked but Gordie missed the implication, in part because the train came into the station just then, all bell and horn and lights and steel-on-steel noise.

Everyone stayed back until the train quit moving and the porters dismounted to lay down the steps for people to climb into the train. “Ladies in the first car,” one of the black men in bright red uniforms called and he directed Phyllis and Gordie toward the steps with a flourish without quite looking directly at them.

This is not a modern train, thought Gordie as he followed Phyllis into the first car and found seats on padded benches half-way back. In the excitement of the train stopping, he had forgotten his concern about the men. Besides, there were no males in this car.

Nothing I’ve seen has been modern, 21st century stuff. He continued the train of thought that had occurred to him. No one has cellphones, the clothes all look like stuff from black-and-white movies, the women are all wearing skirts. Including me. And there’s a special car just for women?

I’ve traveled in time.

He sat there blinking, thinking it over. Maybe I got shot down by time travelers? I need to find out the date.

Phyllis made a noise beside him. “Oh! I hadn’t seen you from this angle this morning yet.”

“What?” Gordie asked, mind occupied in figuring out ways to ask someone the date—including year.

But Phyllis had gone into her purse and come up with a scarf, a pink-and-blue-and-white one. “Let me tie this around your neck,” she said.

Gordie lifted his chin to let her do it. “Uh, why?”

Phyllis leaned in close to whisper. “To hide the hickeys on this side.”

Mortified, Gordie knew he must be blushing like a traffic light. Hickeys?

Phyllis seemed unconcerned, other than her effort to conceal the evidence. Evidence of…? What had Vickie been doing, and where and with who? It was an all-female boarding house. They couldn’t really talk about it in the noise of the train but Gordie looked at Phyllis sideways and felt no sexual charge at all.

Unlike her reaction when she had smiled back at the men smiling at her at the train station. Was she smiling now, remembering it? The tingle and warmth….

I am smiling, thought Gordie. He tried to shake off the identification he had felt with Vickie’s feelings for a moment and succeeded but it left him frowning. I’m Captain Gordon Victor, US Air Force, he reminded himself but it seemed a little less convincing now than it had been.

The car was still not full but the platform was empty. The porters stored the steps away and took their positions, though none of them rode in the ladies’ car. The train inched into motion after a horn blast. A bell rang somewhere. A mostly inaudible conductor’s voice far away announced, “Now leaving…New Jersey Central…Peehawken…Ninth Street…Penn Station.”

The bench seats vibrated pleasantly as the train slowly gathered speed. A yawn caught Gordie by surprise. Once the train doors had closed it had gotten warmer in the car. He blinked, his eyelids heavy. He yawned again and leaned his head on Phyllis’s shoulder. A nap would be good. It still wasn’t light outside and the motion of the train made falling asleep easy. 

“Told you so,” he heard Phyllis say as a warm cloud seemed to embrace him.