Dogfight makes me want to scream. I love it. I'm pretty late to the party, but I just really wanted to write about this moment. I'm weak for this show. I am such a weak, weak man. I need this fresh hot angst in my life. Spoilers for the end of the movie/musical, though this is more based off of the musical.


Closing time had washed over Rose and the diner all too slowly, yet all too quickly. Time began to fly on days like this, days where she could work without thinking too heavily about the past that haunted her, and about the worries that constantly danced in the back of her mind. Everything that had happened in the last few years was a tangle of events that were either things that moved too fast, or things that were too sluggish. Her hair grew out, she lost some weight, gained it back, her mother had retired and moved down to Florida, leaving her to manage the diner, and then there was Eddie.
Eddie, who had the laughter that was so full that every other sound was hollow. The man who had loved her for a night, kissed her tenderly, touched her softly, and tucked her written address into his fatigues before he left for the base. He had never written to her once. Her heartbreak had been replaced with some form of anger between irritation and fury, then hurt beyond what she could describe, but now the feelings had faded to a dull sting. He was always on her mind, however, even if she tried to not think about him. Eddie's charming smile with his dimples and his calloused hands always haunted the back of her mind. Rose Fenny was just a naive girl who had her heart all twisted up for a boy who could very easily be dead.

She had listened to the radio every night, but always had to turn it off when they started talking about the soldiers who died. A nausea washed over her, tears occasionally stinging the her eyes, dripping down her cheeks. Any of them could be Eddie. The war was pointless and caused too much pain, but Rose couldn't bring herself to hate any of those who went off to fight over in Vietnam. They were simply doing what they thought was right. They never talk about how you could very easily die a painful death from guerilla ambushes, or from blasts, or from accidents as you march through the jungle. Those who came back due to injuries or because they had completed their time were walking corpses, hollow shells. If Eddie was alive, he wouldn't have come back to her. If he was alive, he was like those men. Flooded with survivor's guilt and suffering from PTSD, their souls slowly rotting away as they either killed themselves or turned to substances that would slowly kill them. She hated the war, she hated the violence, and she hated the aftermath.

Part of her wondered what happened to the men who ran the dogfight, who laughed and made jokes about the women they had brought, the poor girls who had thought they were being taken out on a date to have a good time. She wondered what had happened to toothless and abrasive Marcy, who had pity and hesitation in her eyes as she told Rose the rules of the dogfight. She wondered what happened to the young girl who had spent the night with Eddie Birdlace. She was still there, she knew, but she wondered what parts of her had been lost in the process of that night and of the four years between when she last saw him and present day.

Closing time came quickly, and the light of the setting sun shone across tables as the sound of the radio and sweeping filled the diner. It was a peaceful end to a hectic day, and she gazed up for just a moment, smiling faintly as the sun dyed the once blue sky pink, purple and red. She was so wrapped up in this serenity the sound of the door opening, as well as the bells that were attached to it, made her jolt.

Turning, she moved strands of brown hair behind her ear, wavy instead of curly as it had been when it was shorter. Words begin to form on her closed lips, seconds away from leaving them, but then they locked eyes.