In the Company of Women Read online

  Back at Michigan, she had known a handful of women in “Boston marriages,” mostly older professors or graduate students who kept their relationships private. Love between adult women—or men, for that matter—was hardly a new concept, particularly in academia. The only thing new was the increasing fixation with uncovering and eliminating such relationships. Some higher-ups in the WAC were bent on ridding the corps of queer women, she knew, like some male officers were obsessed with ridding the Army ranks of homosexual men. As a result, even heterosexual soldiers avoided mention of the situation that clearly existed, afraid of receiving a discharge that didn’t qualify as honorable or dishonorable—a blue ticket, in GI parlance, reserved for those deemed “unfit” for military service.

  During the First World War, CJ knew, any soldier found to be involved in a homosexual relationship was arrested, court-martialed and dishonorably discharged. This process took valuable time and resources, so in the early stages of the second “great” war, blue ticket discharges became an administrative stopgap for dealing with military misconduct. Along with homosexuals, blue tickets were routinely issued to Wacs who engaged in fraternization with superiors, GIs with a history of problems with alcohol, soldiers who developed a personality conflict with a commanding officer, and those who couldn’t perform their duties adequately for myriad other reasons.

  Kate and Toby exchanged a look, and instantly CJ understood. They were more than friends; of course they were. Momentarily she worried about guilt by association, but then she pushed the fear away. Why the Army cared was beyond her, but then, so many aspects of the military defied logic that this was one more gripe to add to the list.

  After lunch, she piled into the Jeep with the others for the return trip to the airfield. As they neared the hangar, Reggie asked, “Anyone interested in getting a drink at the club tonight?”

  “Always,” Toby said.

  “Count me in,” CJ agreed.

  “And me,” Sarah said.

  It was unanimous. CJ wondered if she might talk Brady into coming too. They’d waved at each other across the mess hall again at both breakfast and lunch, but each sat with her own buddies. Brady hadn’t minded being seen with her, a lowly Maintenance Wac, in the darkened theater or in the shadows at the far end of the post, but the enlisted women’s club was a different matter.

  One way to find out how far Brady’s daring streak extended.

  * * *

  CJ, Sarah and Jill worked on the B-29’s engines throughout the afternoon, running through a checklist that Jill carried around on a clipboard. CJ had always enjoyed getting grimy around the farm in the name of accomplishment. This work, as far as she was concerned, was not much different, though the stakes were admittedly higher.

  At break time, she and the other Wacs strolled out to the flight line and chatted with nearby crews. Most of the men were friendly, but a few spit tobacco juice in their general direction and pointedly looked away.

  “Get used to it,” Sarah said as they returned to the hangar. “The combat returnees are the worst. I had one non-com, his chest covered in ribbons, nearly knock me over on the sidewalk a few weeks ago.”

  “What? Why?”

  “I don’t know. He didn’t say.”

  Their squad was relieved at six p.m. by the all-male night crew. A staff sergeant who doubled as a propeller specialist gave everyone a ride home in a GI truck. Back at the WAC compound, CJ stopped at her barracks to get cleaned up before mess, using the homemade lye soap her parents had sent her in Illinois. The scrub-down took so long that the mess crowd had dwindled by the time she arrived. There was still food, though. There always seemed to be more than enough food, even with items that had long been on the ration list.

  As a WAC cook handed her a food-filled tray, CJ felt a tap on her shoulder: Brady, holding a cup of coffee and smiling at her. It felt like ages since they’d seen each other.

  “I thought maybe you were boycotting Army food,” Brady said.

  “Me? Never.”

  “Good. Come and tell me all about your first day.”

  “It was amazing,” CJ enthused, following her to an empty table. “There were hundreds of planes on the flight line, and we got to work on a B-29 all day.”

  “A B-29?” She whistled. “Talk about starting in the deep end.”

  “Did you know their engines overheat at the slightest encouragement?”

  “I didn’t, in fact.”

  CJ shoveled turkey, mashed potatoes and black-eyed peas into her mouth and tried at the same time to describe her first day in the hangar. Finally, her mother’s voice sounded in her head, reminding her to mind her manners.

  “Anyway,” she added, “I heard you on the radio. Didn’t you say you were a writer?”

  Brady described her role in the PRO in more detail while CJ demolished her supper. The previous winter, she had begun her office stint filing and typing. Then her male CO found out she had edited her college newspaper and done some writing for an L.A. paper, and he had broadened her duties. The PRO was responsible for all publicity on the post, maintaining relations with the townspeople of El Paso, censoring news and correspondence, publishing the eight-page Monitor, releasing stories to the two El Paso newspapers and running a daily fifteen-minute radio broadcast. In addition to assorted news stories, Brady was responsible for editing the radio scripts.

  “How do you get everything done?” CJ asked.

  “I don’t always,” Brady admitted, tracing a gouge in the wooden table with a fingertip. “Sometimes it gets so overwhelming that I need a break, like on Saturday. We see things almost no one else on base does. The casualty lists, for example. I used to look, wondering what I’d do if I found my brother’s name or Nate’s.”

  “That sounds traumatic,” CJ said, setting her fork down. Her plate was empty, her stomach was full and, despite the mention of casualty lists, she felt unaccountably happy being with Brady.

  “It can be. We’re a pretty tight group, though. That helps.”

  “Too bad your company can’t field a decent softball team,” CJ said, shaking her head in mock regret.

  Brady narrowed her eyes. “You got lucky last weekend, Jamieson.”

  “I think I speak for Maintenance when I say we’re up for a rematch anytime.”

  They lingered over coffee, arguing good-naturedly about whose company was better. A Wac on KP finally asked them to bring their dishes to the window, and they complied, smiling sheepishly at each other as they left the mess hall.

  Back at Brady’s barracks, they paused outside chatting until CJ finally steeled herself and asked, “What are you doing tonight?”

  “Writing letters, probably. Why?”

  “A bunch of us are going to the club later. Want to come?”

  “Does ‘the bunch’ know I’m invited?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “Huh.” Brady chewed her lip briefly. Then: “What the heck. Come get me on your way.”

  “Swell.”

  CJ gave her smile full rein as she jogged back to her own barracks. It was only a drink. Why did it seem like more, then?

  * * *

  An hour later, CJ and her buddies commandeered a table near the bar in the enlisted women’s service club. A WAC band played recent hits in a corner that functioned as a stage. The music was too loud to talk over, so they nursed their beers, smoked cigarettes and people-watched. Occasionally a boy would come by and ask one of them to dance. More often than not, the invitee politely declined.

  All the EW clubs CJ had visited were the same—bright and gaily decorated, jukebox off to one side, ping pong and billiards tables crowded into a side room, and a handful of servicemen laughing it up with their WAC friends at the bar, which looked more like it belonged in a soda fountain. A handful of couples danced, including two pairs of Wacs. For a change in an enlisted service club, there weren’t enough men to go around.

  CJ was at the bar waiting for refills when Jack Sawyer appeared beside her.

 
“Hiya, soldier,” he said, leaning close to be heard over the music.

  She grinned, genuinely glad to see him. “Hi yourself. How did you weasel your way in here?”

  “I have friends in the right places. Can I buy you a drink?” he asked, pulling a wad of bills from his pocket and catching the bartender’s eye.

  “Sure, but I’m buying for my table.”

  He relayed the order and glanced back at the table in question, his gaze resting on Brady.

  “Join us,” CJ said, taking pity on him. “But go easy on the Romeo act, okay? These are friends of mine.”

  “I won’t embarrass you,” he promised.

  The band finished their set, and someone dropped a quarter in the jukebox. Popular tunes rolled on, Glenn Miller and the Andrew Sisters and Tommy Dorsey. At CJ’s table, Jack surveyed the group of women, smiling like the proverbial cat. She resisted the urge to smack him.

  “CJ and Jack go way back,” Brady told the others.

  “Then you must have some good stories.” Toby eyed him encouragingly.

  Before CJ knew it, he was telling her new friends all about their Michigan days. Over her protests, he described in overly generous detail the time someone spiked the punch at a Homecoming Dance and she decided, uninvited, to perform with the band.

  “It’s not like I can’t sing,” she said, kicking him under the table.

  She retaliated by sharing how Jack and Sean had been picked up by university security while skinny-dipping in a campus pond. Their punishment had been to spend a dozen hours a week the rest of the semester working with the grounds crew. Neither had ever mowed a lawn before, let alone cleaned a fountain or painted a fence.

  “Just a couple of city boys,” CJ said.

  “We can’t all hail from the sticks,” he retorted.

  “Where do you hail from?” Sarah asked. While the rest of the group was well on their way to getting drunk, she had barely started in on her second glass.

  “Evanston, Illinois.”

  “Really? I went to school near Evanston,” she said, and named a small, private college.

  Jack knew it. In fact, he had a friend whose mother had taught there; maybe Sarah knew her? She did, and they were off on a tangential conversation.

  Brady leaned closer, one hand on her glass and the other on the table close to CJ’s. “So,” she said, “why do you think they call it the sticks?”

  “I never thought about it.” This close, Brady smelled of strawberries. Her hair brushed against CJ’s neck, tickling her, but she didn’t move away. “Your hair smells good.”

  “Thanks.” She leaned back, and the intimacy enfolding them faded. “How do you feel about road trips?”

  “Generally positive. Why?”

  “A lot of people at Bliss go exploring on the weekends. You’ll be eligible for a pass in a few weeks, and I know someone with a car and gas coupons to spare. Interested?”

  “Of course.”

  “We could even go camping once it gets warmer.”

  “You like camping?”

  “Don’t sound so shocked. My grandparents used to take my brothers and me up to the Redwoods for a couple of weeks every summer.”

  “Huh. I wouldn’t have guessed.”

  Brady leaned close again and let her arm rest on the back of CJ’s chair. “There’s plenty you don’t know about me.”

  “I don’t doubt it.”

  CJ looked away, remembering the odd moment in the Jeep the night before. It was almost as if—but no. Brady was an intense person, that was all.

  They stayed until the attendants kicked them out—they’d overstayed their welcome twice in one night, Brady pointed out to CJ. Then they said goodnight to Jack and hurried back to their barracks to make bed check, running into other groups of women like themselves, tipsy and giggling.

  CJ stopped outside Brady’s barracks. “I thought you said you could hold your liquor, Buchanan.”

  “I can,” she said, slurring the words slightly. “See you tomorrow, Caroline.”

  “Don’t call me that.”

  “It’s a term of affection.” Brady tried to slap her on the shoulder but misjudged the distance between them and nearly fell over.

  CJ caught her and pointed her toward the barracks door. “Goodnight, Brady.”

  “Goodnight, CJ.” She saluted smartly even though she was the one with stripes on her sleeve, and went inside.

  CJ jogged to catch up with her buddies.

  “I like Brady,” Sarah said, holding their barracks door open.

  “Me too,” Toby said.

  This surprised CJ. She’d caught more looks passing between Toby and Reggie at the club and had assumed they were still leery of allowing “outsiders” into their midst.

  Then again, what wasn’t to like about Brady?

  “Me three,” she said, and followed Reggie inside.

  Chapter Five

  Over the next few weeks, life at Bliss settled into a comfortable pattern. During the day, CJ worked on bombers and transport planes, mostly in the Transient Hangar but occasionally out on the flight line. She got her “wings” the first week—Air Corps patches to sew onto her uniforms and HBTs. Surprisingly, she actually teared up a little when Master Sergeant Griggs handed them over, but she was careful to hide her emotions. She may have been a “penguin”—an Air Force service member who didn’t fly—but it sure beat being at home, as Brady had pointed out.

  Off-duty, she hung around with the usual crowd, which sometimes included Brady and sometimes didn’t. They played softball and basketball, sunbathed, watched movies at the post theater, played endless rounds of ping pong, listened to music at the enlisted club and played cards in the barracks until lights out. Sometimes they joined Jack and his buddies for drinks or dinner on base or in nearby El Paso. As Jack and Sarah started spending more time together, he stopped making teasing remarks about farming and country life. A wise move, CJ thought, given that Sarah’s family owned a cattle ranch in Montana.

  On her third weekend at Bliss, CJ joined Brady and a handful of other Admin Wacs on a hike in the nearby Franklin Mountains. She had a good time—other than the hot, dry conditions and the cold, supercilious looks from Janice and one of her friends, neither of whom, it turned out, were impressed with stories of the Biggs Airfield flight line.

  Brady held back with CJ as they descended from the summit of the Aztec Cave Trail, a short steep climb down a talus slope from a collection of cool, spooky alcoves that had nothing to do with Aztecs and everything to do with the region’s geology. CJ had taken an introductory geology course and struggled now to recall the meaning of terms like stromatolite, rhyolite and quartzite. Why did rock formations always end in -ite? She was pretty sure she had once known that too.

  “Don’t hold it against her,” Brady said in a low voice as Janice cast them another brooding look.

  “Why shouldn’t I?”

  “Because before you got here, she had me all to herself. Besides, she’s had a rough year. Her fiancé was killed in Sicily.”

  “Oh.” CJ paused. “You know, Brady, it’s fine if you want to spend more time with your other friends. I know we don’t run in the same circles.”

  Brady caught her hand. “That’s not what I meant.”

  CJ glanced down at their clasped fingers. Brady’s skin was pale and freckled, while her own coloring was more brown than white. Growing up on a farm would do that.

  “What did you mean then?”

  Brady gazed at her, frowning slightly. “I don’t know. I guess I want you two to get along. You’re my closest friends, even if I am the one thing you have in common.”

  At that moment, the subject of their conversation turned back to wait for them, and Brady dropped her hand as if it had suddenly grown as hot as a Duplex Cyclone engine.

  Drama. CJ pulled her fatigue hat lower to block out the blinding Texas sky. She had never been a fan of drama. Probably, then, she shouldn’t have joined the Army, pressure cooker that it was with
masses of soldiers jammed into chronically small spaces.

  Currently, though, there was plenty of space to enjoy, unfamiliar as it was. She was still getting used to the Southwest. Unlike Michigan, where fields of green and gray, their color dependent on the time of year, abutted green and gray forests or blue-gray bodies of water, the land in this corner of the country was brown and bounded by rocky outcrops that exposed millions of years of geologic history to passersby. The earth was revealed in a way here that she wasn’t used to, sediment layers permanently visible to sun and wind and human observation. Where she came from, you only saw the earth’s skeleton during planting and harvest, brief seasons delineated by winter’s drifting snow and summer’s riotous greenery.

  So different, she thought again, watching Brady cast her high-wattage smile at Janice, who beamed up at her in return.

  * * *

  Her first hop came sooner than she’d expected. Two days after the hike to Aztec Caves, a staff sergeant CJ hadn’t seen before stood talking to Sarah and Jill during the two-thirty break. Work was slack that afternoon. Their crew had already completed a fifty-hour check on an AT-10 trainer, nicknamed the “Flying Coffin” by Air Corps cadets because of the frequency with which it crashed, and they were basically sitting around on their tool chests waiting for a new assignment when the sergeant dropped by. CJ saw Sarah gesture toward her, and the next thing she knew, Jill and Sarah were telling her to come to the supply room to get fitted for a parachute. A pilot they knew had invited them along on a test flight of a recently repaired trainer.

  “That is, assuming you want to come with us?” Jill asked, smiling.

  “Yes!” CJ grinned back. “Please!”

  In the supply room, the GIs fitted them with the smallest parachutes available. Even so, the packs were nearly as heavy as a pile of wet hay and almost as difficult to maneuver. The Wacs had plenty of volunteers to carry them out to the plane—the boys they worked with seemed almost as excited as CJ felt. Everyone in the hangar waved and yelled goodbye, and CJ tried to forget the stories her squad mates had told her about airfield crashes. What were the odds that her first flight would end in flames? It wasn’t like they would be facing down Messerschmitts or Zeroes.