In the Company of Women Read online

  “Mind if I join you?” Toby, the private who had met her at the train station the night before, paused beside the steps.

  “Not at all.”

  Toby, CJ noted, had changed from her formal “A” uniform into the same one-piece coveralls the WAC trainees at Chanute Field had worn on duty. Both uniforms bore the blue and yellow Army Air Forces shoulder sleeve insignia.

  “So, Jamieson, do you like sports?” she asked, lighting a cigarette.

  “Absolutely.”

  “Good. There’s a basketball hoop in back of the officers’ quarters, and a group of us get together on the weekends for softball. We’re playing today, in fact, after noon mess. You’re welcome to join us.”

  “Thanks. I will.”

  She’d played softball, basketball and tennis on the weekends in Illinois too. Sports were second nature to her. She’d grown up shadowing her two older brothers around the farm and assorted playing fields. Only now Joe, a Marine officer in the Pacific, and Alec, a B-17 flight engineer in Italy, probably didn’t get much opportunity to play games.

  “Lieutenant Kelly’s our ump.” Toby blew a cloud of smoke into the air and watched it dissipate. “I thought you looked like the sporting type.”

  Just then another Wac dropped onto the steps. “Hiya, girls.”

  “Hi yourself,” Toby said, smiling at the newcomer. “Kate, this is CJ, our newest grease monkey. CJ, this is Kate Delaney. She’s with Personnel.”

  “Welcome to Bliss,” Kate said, proffering the same greeting Toby and the staff sergeant had given the night before.

  Other than the greeting, however, she seemed to have little in common with Toby or the sarge, both of whom were short-haired, narrow-hipped women who looked more natural in coveralls than in the WAC summer uniform that Kate filled out so well. Unlike them, she managed to look curvy and pretty even in a shirt and tie.

  “Hiya, kids,” another woman said, snagging Toby’s cigarette and taking a deep draw.

  “Antonelli,” Toby mock-growled, “you better watch it.”

  “Gee, I’m shaking in my GI shoes,” the dark-haired newcomer returned as she handed back the smoke. Like Toby, she was wearing coveralls.

  Between them, Kate rolled her eyes. “Reggie, have you met CJ?”

  “Sure did, last night.” Reggie offered CJ a nod. “Hey.”

  “Hey.” CJ waved a little and tapped ash from the end of her cigarette. Was being a replacement soldier always this awkward? No doubt it was worse trying to join a tight-knit combat team during an offensive. Count your lucky stars, she reminded herself for the umpteenth time since joining up.

  “We should probably get going,” Kate said. Without warning she grabbed Toby’s cigarette and leaped down the steps.

  “Come back here,” Toby said good-naturedly.

  “You’ll have to come and get me.”

  Toby laughed and took off after the smaller woman, who held the cigarette over her head as she trotted away.

  “Duty calls,” Reggie told CJ. “The general has us working half-days on Saturdays.”

  She rose quickly. “Am I supposed to report too?”

  “Nope. Sarge says you’re on limited duty until Monday.”

  Whew.

  “Feel like a walk anyway?” Reggie added.

  “Why not?”

  As they marched down the dusty road that led through the WAC compound, CJ exchanged pertinent details with the others. Kate was from Wisconsin—practically neighbors, they agreed—so the conversation skewed briefly toward the Midwest, Wisconsin cheese and the Great Lakes. Toby and Reggie, both from the Northeast, refused to believe that Lake Michigan was too wide to see across.

  “I’ll take you there someday,” Kate said, bumping Toby’s hip with her own.

  “That’s a promise I plan to hold you to.”

  At the edge of the compound a pair of military police guards nodded politely, their eyes friendliest, CJ noted, as they rested on Kate’s face. The two men returned to their conversation—they seemed to be ranking their favorite desserts—before the women were out of earshot. CJ didn’t envy them, but then again, being an MP was better than being an infantryman in a foxhole on the Italian front. Besides, they probably weren’t alone much. Back in Illinois, despite the rules against fraternization, sympathetic Wacs had often stopped to chat with the MPs on duty.

  CJ accompanied the others along the main road toward the center of the post, examining her surroundings curiously. She had passed through the night before but had been too tired to take much notice. Like in the WAC area, the buildings here were mostly whitewashed wood or adobe that reflected the bright sunlight. The landscape, a mixture of tan and brown, stretched toward nearby mountains and the outer reaches of El Paso like a colorless sea.

  Ah, the ocean. She tried not to curse the girl she’d replaced, a married Wac who had apparently gotten pregnant while on furlough with her husband, a Navy pilot home on rotation from the Pacific. Maybe she’d wanted out of the Army without the shame of quitting, or perhaps she’d merely longed to have a child with her husband before it was too late. Couldn’t begrudge her that, could she?

  At the PX, Toby and the others said their farewells and strode off to their respective assignments. CJ ducked inside and glanced around, wondering if she should pick up an extra pair of sunglasses. As she wandered the aisles, she trailed her fingers over the metal shelf edges. The post general store at Chanute, with its postcards, candy bars and other non-GI items, had felt like a direct link to the outside world. Would this new PX offer the same reassuring connection to a life she had previously taken for granted?

  Lost in thought, she turned a corner near a display of stationary and nearly collided with another khaki-clad woman.

  “Sorry,” she said quickly, reaching out to steady the Wac. At five-nine, she was used to looking down, literally, on other women. But the private first class before her, trim and attractive in what must be a specially tailored summer uniform, met her gaze nearly square on.

  “It’s my fault,” she said, her hands on CJ’s. “I was moving too quickly, as usual.”

  Her hair was the color of honey, her eyes pale blue with a tawny starburst about the pupil—but only in her right eye, CJ noted, intrigued.

  The other woman’s brow rose slightly. “I don’t think we’ve met, have we?”

  CJ realized she was still holding the stranger’s arms. “No,” she agreed, relinquishing her grip. “I arrived last night.”

  “From?”

  “Chanute Field.”

  “Ah,” the Wac said. And then, with a slightly ironic smile, “Welcome to Bliss.”

  “And is it blissful here?”

  “If you happen to love all things GI.”

  CJ tilted her head. “Do you?”

  “As a third-generation Army enlistee, I should probably toe the party line. But let’s just say I’d rather be here than back at home, wishing I’d taken the leap. I’m Brady, by the way.”

  She offered her hand, and CJ squeezed it.

  “CJ. Where’s home for you?”

  “Southern California. You?”

  “Michigan. Kalamazoo, actually.”

  Brady smiled again. “‘I Got a Gal’—bet you never heard that one.”

  “Hardly ever.” CJ returned the smile. Glenn Miller’s hit song had launched her hometown into the national spotlight a year earlier. As Brady continued to gaze at her, she felt a blush creeping up her neck. “Well, it was nice meeting you.”

  “I don’t suppose you’d fancy a tour of the base? I have a Jeep waiting outside.”

  Even if Brady had been the peskiest of GIs, CJ would have had a hard time refusing the offer. Like her father and her brother Alec, she loved motorized conveyances of any kind, which was how she’d ended up with a Military Occupational Specialty (MOS) in Maintenance.

  “Sounds like fun.”

  “Swell. Let me pay for these,” Brady added as she moved away, brandishing a box of red pens and a stack of typing paper.r />
  CJ waited near the front of the PX, watching Brady interact with the civilian cashier. Not as friendly, definitely cooler—which meant she probably didn’t invite everyone she met for a Jeep ride.

  Outside, the promised vehicle sat parked illegally at the curb, two GIs chattering away in its front seat.

  Brady held the door open for CJ. “Hop in,” she said, her words more of a dare than an invitation.

  CJ maneuvered into the back seat, keeping her skirt down and her shoulders squared as the two men up front did a double-take.

  “Hang on,” said the driver, a lanky youth with smooth cheeks and sharp brown eyes. “Did I miss something?”

  “This is CJ,” Brady said, sliding in beside her. “She’s new. I thought we could give her a tour of Bliss.”

  “Why didn’t you say so?” the front-seat passenger quipped. He was almost as blonde as Brady. “Carry on, Jeeves.”

  The driver punched him and put the Jeep in gear. “Your wish is my command, my queen,” he slung at Brady as he pulled out onto the main post road.

  “That’s Charlie,” she said, nodding regally in his direction.

  “And I’m O’Neil,” put in the passenger. “But you can call me Mick. Everyone else does.”

  Charmed by his open face and laughing eyes, CJ liked him immediately. The driver she wasn’t so sure about.

  “I suppose you’re wondering why we have a Jeep,” Brady said.

  “Uh, sure.”

  In reality, she’d been noticing again how well Brady’s uniform fit. More than a year after its inception, the Women’s Army Corps was still working out supply issues.

  “We work at Administration,” Mick helpfully put in.

  That meant this ride probably wouldn’t be repeated once she was on active duty. CJ had noted at Chanute that there seemed to be an invisible barrier between the administrative and maintenance ranks, a division that reminded her of the farm girl versus city girl split at her high school.

  “What’s your rating?” Charlie asked, taking his eyes off the road long enough to give her an appraising stare.

  “Seven forty-seven.”

  Mick chewed his lip. “Maintenance, but what specialty?”

  “Airplane engine mechanic,” CJ clarified.

  The boys up front were silent, perhaps aware that her military occupation required more brawn than theirs. This disparity could create an awkwardness that many men did not appreciate, she had learned. On the train to Bliss, she’d avoided mentioning her rating to the GIs who’d tried to pick her up in the dining car or followed her back to her seat.

  But now she was on the base that could, for all she knew, be home for the duration of the war plus six months she’d signed up for. No avoiding reality here.

  Brady said, “You must be skilled. There can’t be many Wacs rated as airplane mechanics.”

  “I guess not,” she said, smiling at Brady. “What do you do?”

  “I work for the Public Relations Office doing news releases and soldier profiles for the Fort Bliss Monitor. Oh, and I write a bimonthly column, ‘Wacs on Parade.’”

  “You actually get to use your brain?”

  “Shocking, isn’t it?”

  From what CJ had heard, a majority of Wacs were underemployed or assigned to positions that didn’t match their skills or stated interests. Bliss, in direct proportion to its sprawling size, had a fairly large contingent of women soldiers. On the walk in, her new squad mates had informed her that in addition to Biggs Airfield, women in their battalion were assigned to the Transportation Corps, Personnel, Materials Management and other administrative offices. There were four companies of Wacs at Bliss, close to four hundred female soldiers in all. And more than eight thousand men on any given day, including armored and artillery units and Army Air cadets.

  Charlie slowed the Jeep as they neared headquarters, where the post, state of Texas and US flags all waved languidly in the breeze.

  “There’s the Grinder,” he said, jerking his chin at the wide parade grounds that seemed to go right up to the mountains in the distance.

  “Those are the Franklins,” Brady said, following her gaze. “Some of us like to go hiking up there on weekends.”

  “Are you one of those outdoor types too?” Mick asked CJ, aversion evident in his tone.

  “Don’t listen to him,” Brady said. “He grew up in New York City. Claims to be allergic to trees.”

  “Then this is a good place for you, Mick, isn’t it?” CJ commented.

  “What do you call those?” Charlie nodded at the low, scruffy deciduous trees ringing the parade ground.

  “Pathetic, mainly.”

  Michigan trees—elms, maples, oaks, evergreens—were majestic life forms her parents had taught her to respect. These, on the other hand, were barely more than shrubs.

  Brady laughed. “Are you a tree snob?”

  “Apparently,” she said, smiling back.

  “I suppose there are worse things to be.”

  Charlie careened the Jeep around a corner, throwing Brady into her. CJ held out a steadying hand. This close, Brady’s eyes were more cornflower than ice, she decided.

  “I have to stop running into you.” Brady slid back to her side of the seat. “Otherwise you won’t be any good for PT.”

  I don’t mind. But CJ didn’t say the words. Just because she felt an immediate connection to Brady didn’t mean the sentiment was mutual. Still, as they continued the tour of Bliss, she thought that despite a noticeable lack of stately hardwoods, West Texas might not be so bad after all.

  Chapter Two

  During the next half hour, CJ learned the layout of the post and nearby town while exchanging GI pedigrees with her guides—where they were from, where they’d done basic, how long they’d been at Bliss. Then Brady and the two men agreed that they should probably get back to work before their officers sent a search party after them.

  “Where are you headed?” Brady asked as they parked beside the building that housed the Public Relations and Monitor offices.

  “No idea. It feels like I’m the only one who doesn’t have to work this morning.”

  “The post library is down the hall from us,” Brady said. “You could pick up some reading material, and then maybe we could walk back to the compound together for mess.”

  “Works for me.”

  Brady, it seemed, didn’t want to get rid of her yet. Funny how quickly someone in the Army could become a friend. The instant camaraderie reminded her of the teams she’d played on in high school and college—shared hardship could bond you in a very short time. Not that she and Brady had experienced any hardship this morning. There was still noon mess to get through, though. No doubt the cooks here were, like all Army cooks, fond of serving chipped beef on toast—SOS in soldier parlance, short for “shit on a shingle.”

  In the fluorescent lamp-lit library, Brady introduced CJ to the WAC librarian, Marjory from Albany. Then she headed back to work, promising to retrieve CJ shortly before noon for the slog back to the WAC area, where women soldiers cooked, dined and performed KP in their own mess halls. Marjory went back to the book she was reading, a beat-up copy of what looked like a mystery novel. CJ paced the stacks, curious what the collection had to offer. Mysteries, westerns, military biographies, a few classics like Shakespeare and Dickens, and piles of old issues of Life, Yank and Stars and Stripes. The walls bore the usual propaganda posters: “Buy War Bonds,” “Loose Lips Sink Ships” and the library favorite, “Books Cannot Be Killed by Fire,” which showed oafish German soldiers burning books by the armful.

  In the periodicals section, she found what she was looking for: the Fort Bliss Monitor. She picked up the latest edition of the base weekly, sat down at a reading table and turned on a lamp. The library was a windowless interior room; without the clock on the wall, she wouldn’t have known whether it was morning or evening. Soon she was skimming the paper, looking for a particular byline. She found it on page two: Brady Buchanan. Had to be her, didn’
t it? She read the article carefully, a profile of the 203rd, an artillery company about to ship overseas. The story was good, she realized—writing crisp, details sharply drawn, tone of the piece a good balance between patriotism, humor and human interest. For once the Army had gotten a Wac’s MOS right.

  As she stared at the smiling faces of a handful of the soldiers Brady had profiled, CJ felt a familiar knot in her stomach. These boys were all someone’s son, brother, sweetheart, friend. Each of their lives touched a hundred others, lives that would be permanently altered if something happened to them. Her family would certainly never be the same if one of her brothers were to go missing or—God forbid—be killed in action.

  For the past year her family, like so many others, had lived in fear of receiving a War Department telegram. Alec had been with the Northwest African Air Forces originally. Now that the mission in Africa had ended, he had been transferred to Southern Europe. Being on a bomber crew was one of the most dangerous jobs in the ETO, and Alec’s tour wouldn’t be over for months assuming he—she stopped the thought. Dark-haired, light-eyed and barely a year older, he looked so much like her that people used to mistake them for twins. She couldn’t conceive of a world without him.

  In the Pacific, meanwhile, where Joe was stationed, American forces were moving from one fortified island to another on the march to the Philippines, taking substantial losses as they attempted to expel the dug-in Japanese. “Substantial losses”—CJ closed her eyes as her eldest brother’s face flashed before her, the candid image of him in his Cubs uniform from the front page of the Chicago Tribune the week after he joined up. “Jamieson Swaps the Majors for the Marines,” read the headline. Her mother had cut out the article and placed it in the scrapbook she had started keeping for him when he made the leap from farm team to major leagues.

  The last photo in the book was from Fort Lewis in Washington state, an official Marine portrait Joe had sent home before he shipped overseas. Occasionally CJ remembered that scrapbook, tucked onto a bookshelf in the family room. Joe wanted to come home and go back to his baseball career, she knew, but in a recent rare missive, he’d told her that he hadn’t thrown a ball in months. What was worse, he couldn’t seem to bring himself to care.