96 pages • 3 hours read
Sherri L. SmithFlygirl
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2009A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Chapters 16-18Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 16 Summary
Ida begins flying with a hood pulled over the cockpit. She likes this better than the simulator: “[W]hen you’re under the hood in a real airplane, you can’t see the sky, but you can feel it. I feel safe” (153). Lily is flying with her, reading the map. If Ida passes this test, she can move onto training for long distance solo flights, and then graduation. In the plane, Ida and Lily talk about how they both want to work in ferrying detail after graduation. Even though Patsy wants to work in target towing, the two of them make a pact to stay together after graduation. After they land, everyone congratulates them for making it to the next phase of training.
On Christmas, Ida steps outside to be alone. Patsy comes out to ask what’s wrong, and Ida tells her she misses her family. Patsy says that it’s the worst during the holidays, but she, Lily, and Ida are a family now. Patsy and Ida go inside to open presents with Lily. In the barracks, a trainee comes in to tell Ida that a black woman is there to see her. Ida goes outside and sees her mother waiting for her. Ida wants to hug her mother, but a guard is watching, so she resists and pretends instead that her mother is her housekeeper, which makes Ida feel awful: “Watching my mother play the role of servant, I feel a sour taste in my throat. I never meant for my own role-playing to bring her such humiliation” (160-61). Ida’s mother tells her that Thomas has gone missing in the South Pacific, and the army isn’t doing anything to search for him. She asks Ida to ask the army to look for him, thinking they might take the request more seriously coming from a white woman. Finally, Ida’s mother has to leave, and Ida notices that the man giving her mother a ride to the train station is the same black farmer from the hardware store.
When Ida gets back to the barracks,Patsy asks her if everything is okay. Ida starts to say “my mother” but quickly corrects it to “my mother’s maid”(165). Nancy Howard says she thought Ida was a farmer. Patsy tells Nancy to leave Ida alone. Ida isn’t sure if Patsy believes her, “but if she doesn’t, she never lets on” (165). Ida tells Patsy that her mother’s maid’s son has gone missing in the South Pacific, and Patsy suggests she speak to Mrs. Deaton, the establishment officer. Patsy takes Ida’s handkerchief and ties a knot in it. She explains that it is a worry knot and tells Ida to tie up all her worries in this knot so that she’s not carrying them around.
Chapter 17 Summary
The novel jumps forward two months to February 1944. Instructor Jenkins and Mrs. Deaton have helped Ida locate Thomas’s commanding officer.Ida sends several letters, but there is still no news of Thomas. Meanwhile, the war is getting worse.
Ida, Lily, and Patsy are assigned their first cross-country flight. If they complete the flight, they’ll get to graduate and officially become WASP. The women take a cargo plane to Philadelphia, where they’ll take off on their solo flights to California. On the plane to Philadelphia, Lily invites Ida and Patsy to her wedding. Ida realizes that she probably won’t be able to go to Lily’s wedding because it is being held at the Waldorf-Astoria, which is whites only. Ida doesn’t know whether she’ll return to her old life or continue passing as white when the war is over. She remembers her mother’s warning: “[C]olor is not a line you can cross back and forth over just as you please” (172).
Twelve women in total are taking the solo flight test to California. Their first pit stop is in Cleveland. As Ida approaches the Cleveland base, she radios in for permission to land. The tower controller is surprised to hear a woman piloting a military plane, which makes Ida laugh; the women were warned that this might happen. Two days later, the women land again in Nebraska. One woman, Mandy, mentions that it’s harder for women pilots because they have to stop to use the bathroom and can’t use the “relief tubes” (177) that men are able to use mid-flight.
Ida is the first to land in California. She watches the other women come in, until Patsy is the only one who still hasn’t landed. Ida is worried that Patsy won’t make the noon deadline. Finally, she sees Patsy’s plane start to land, but the plane skids on the runway and crashes into an outbuilding, bursting into flames.
Chapter 18 Summary
Patsy dies in the plane crash. Lily and Ida are encouraged to see a counselor. Ida knows she can’t be truly honest with the doctor about everything that is troubling her, and she doesn’t think talking to a doctor will help her grieve. Her way of grieving “has always been to hide it, turn it into something else” (182). Patsy’s death reminds her of her father’s death. Finally, she ties a second knot in her handkerchief “hard and fast for Patsy” (183).
Jackie Cochran, the woman who convinced the U.S.to form the WASP and whom Ida greatly admires, is at the graduation ceremony. Ida is excited to be a WASP but sad to leave Avenger Field.
After graduation, Ida and Lily travel to Florida for Patsy’s funeral. They are burying her near Mrs. Harper, an older friend of Patsy’s and the closest Patsy has to family. Lily’s mother pays for the funeral. They stay at Mrs. Harper’s house and bury Patsy the next day.
Chapters 16-18 Analysis
In these chapters, Ida faces two more challenges she hadn’t anticipated by passing as white. First, she must treat her mother like a servant when she comes to visit so that no one will be suspicious. This is extremely difficult for Ida, and she is embarrassed and ashamed for her mother. Later, she acts excited for Lily’s upcoming wedding but knows that she probably won’t be able to attend because she probably won’t continue passing as white after the war is over. These scenes connect thematically back to Ida’s conversation with her mother in Chapter 6, when she said to Ida: “Listen to me, girl. Because you are young and you don’t know, I’m here to tell you: you cross that line, you cannot cross back just as you please” (56). Before Ida left to become a WASP, her mother warned her that she would face challenges she hadn’t yet anticipated. Ida is starting to realize what her mother meant by that warning and is unsure how her decision to pass as white during the war will affect her life once the war is over.
The theme of how to cope with grief is also introduced in this chapter. Ida had to learn to cope with grief after the death of her father and is reminded of this experience when her close friend Patsy dies suddenly. She remembers how she felt after her father died:“[A]ll I wanted to do was hate everyone I loved so they couldn’t leave me hurting the way Daddy did” (182). Finally, Ida realizes that despite her sadness,she must continue on to graduation and become a WASP. At graduation, Ida thinks of her accomplishment:“I want to shout, I want to cry. I want to be happy, but it’s as bitter as it is sweet” (185). Ida struggles with her happiness at graduating and becoming a WASP, while also mourning the death of her friend.
