In the Company of Women Read online

  The plane was waiting for them, hitched to a tug that would tow it out to the line. At first sight, CJ fell in love. The AT-21 Gunner, a bomber trainer prototype, was like no other plane she’d ever seen, with gull-like wings and a tail so high you had to use a ladder to board her. After the crew chief dumped the parachutes in the tail under the gunner’s seat, CJ clambered up behind Jill and Sarah. The pilot and copilot were already in their seats running their preflight checks, and introductions were made quickly as the three women donned headsets.

  Soon CJ was watching the land roll past as Captain Fitzgerald and the control tower discussed the passenger load and intended flight path. Then the tow plane pulled away, and the pilot started the plane’s engines. He pointed the AT-21’s nose down the runway and eased the throttle forward. CJ checked her watch. It wasn’t even three yet. Everything had happened so quickly. Was she really on a military aircraft racing down the runway? Her stomach fluttered crazily, and she hoped she wouldn’t be sick. Then they were in the air, the ground dropping away faster than she had anticipated. Below them was Texas—the post and houses and cars on the roads, all very distinct. For a second she was dizzy looking down.

  “Focus on the horizon.”

  The pilot’s voice sounded in her headset, and CJ saw Sarah and Jill lift their gazes to the flat desert arcing away to the northeast as they flew parallel to the Franklin Mountains. The day was clear, not a cloud in sight. As soon as they leveled off, the three Wacs took off their seat belts and walked around, seeking the best view out. The pilot turned the plane north, and in a short time they were flying close to the Organ Mountains near Las Cruces. From the air, the mountains loomed impossibly high above the desert floor. The copilot pointed out Organ Needle, the highest peak in the range, its rocky surface dusted with snow.

  To the east, the valley floor shone white as well. Sarah caught CJ staring and said, “It isn’t snow. It’s White Sands National Monument. Those are sand dunes.”

  CJ gazed in wonder at the vast field of dunes that stretched north and east of the Organ Mountains. What a fascinating region. Why had she ever believed the desert would be boring?

  At the northern end of the mountain range, the pilot turned the plane west and brought them low over Las Cruces. Downtown looked a bit like a giant grid with several main roads crisscrossing. CJ looked down upon the houses and schools and churches and factories with their adobe walls and tile roofs, and she knew that down on the ground there were men and women and children looking up at them, hands shielding eyes from the afternoon sunlight glinting off the plane’s metal and glass exterior. She tried to imagine operating controls that would open payload doors and unleash tons of explosives on those people and the buildings around them, but she couldn’t. The American Southwest was too far from Schweinfurt and New Guinea for her to possibly conceive of what the conditions there must be like. She couldn’t picture the war, no matter how many photos she saw or firsthand accounts she read.

  The return trip took less than a half hour. Soon the pilot was requesting permission to land. The airplane touched down more smoothly than CJ would have expected. They taxied back to the Transient Hangar, and then they were climbing down from the craft and waiting for their parachutes to be dropped down to them. Her first hop was over. It had lasted nearly an hour and yet had seemed to go by too fast.

  “What do you think?” Sarah asked as they strolled back to the hangar, weighted down by their parachutes. “Do you like flying, or are you a landlubber?”

  “I love it,” CJ said. “I absolutely love it!” And she raced ahead of her squad mate, adrenaline easily besting the weight of the parachute.

  That night, CJ looked for Brady as soon as she reached the mess hall. She was in her usual spot with Janice, Marjory and their other Admin friends. CJ strode over, still in her coveralls, and clapped Brady on the shoulder.

  “I flew,” she said, smiling so broadly it almost hurt her face. “I went up on a hop today.”

  Brady smiled in return. “I don’t suppose I have to ask how you liked it, do I?”

  “It was amazing. I wish you could have seen it.”

  Janice gave her an almost pained look of condescension and then glanced back at the other women arrayed about the table, muttering something low that CJ didn’t hear. They tittered unkindly, reminding her of a flock of starlings.

  They probably considered her naïve for showing such enthusiasm over something as commonplace to them as an airplane flight. The farm girl on a plane—not exactly the stuff of fairytales. Or maybe it was like a fairytale, and she was the poor peasant girl who, in the end, would win the prince away from the snooty ladies of the court. Except there didn’t seem to be a prince in this scenario, did there?

  She took a step back. “Anyway, I’ll see you later,” she told Brady, and turned away.

  Some part of her hoped Brady would follow her to the mess line and declare there in front of everyone that what Janice and the other Admin Wacs thought didn’t matter. But Brady stayed where she was, and CJ stood alone in line, trying not to let her disappointment take root. Closing her eyes, she pictured the horizon where blue sky met brown earth, the Organ Mountains rising from the surface like a strange creature, a dinosaur perhaps, armor-plated and spiny against the desert backdrop. From the air, Fort Bliss had appeared immense. It had been easy then to remember that she was one of thousands of military and civilian personnel at the sprawling post working together for a common cause. In the way that mattered most, even she and Janice were on the same side.

  A little while later, Brady brought an after-dinner cup of coffee over to CJ’s table. Toby and Reggie made room for her, and she slid in beside CJ.

  “Hey.” Brady nudged her.

  “What?” CJ focused on her food, spearing an overly soft piece of broccoli with her fork.

  “Hey,” Brady repeated, nudging her again.

  “I said what.” CJ looked up this time.

  “I’m sorry about before.”

  Instead of making things better, the apology made CJ feel worse. Cheeks warm, she stood up, tray in hand. “Fine.”

  “Wait.” Brady followed her to the mess window. “Come on, CJ.”

  CJ ignored her, smiling tightly at the Wac on KP as she handed over her tray and utensils.

  Brady followed her out of the stuffy mess hall into the cooling evening. “Look, I said I was sorry.”

  “I heard you.”

  Brady grabbed her arm. “Then what is your problem?”

  CJ shook her arm free. “I’m not the one with the problem, am I? Careful, Brady. Your friends might see you talking to me.” And she turned and stalked back to her barracks.

  By the time she got there, she already regretted the outburst. Snide comments weren’t her style, which was one of the reasons she actively disliked Janice. Except that wasn’t the main reason, was it? She couldn’t deny that she was jealous of Janice, embarrassing as that may be. They were adults, not school girls; Brady shouldn’t have to choose between them. But somehow it felt like her sophomore year of high school all over again, when Carol Getz had befriended her and, for weeks, Carol’s cousin and another friend had taken every available opportunity to snub her. Then one night they’d all shared a fifth of Earl Baker’s moonshine during a Kalamazoo Central football game, and after that, the foursome had been more united than divided.

  Seemed unlikely a bottle of hooch would have the same effect on Janice, unfortunately.

  CJ shook her head, trying to empty it of company drama. She had flown in an airplane today, and here she was worrying about petty inter-squad dynamics. There were more important things in the world to dwell on, that much was certain.

  Back at the barracks, she set about washing her HBTs, relying on the desert air to do its usual magic and dry them in time for duty tomorrow. In the day room, she found an empty couch corner and started in on her mail as women laughed and chatted around her and popular tunes played on the wireless set. She owed her parents several letters, not to
mention both of her brothers. The V-mail letters would probably reach Alec and Joe not long after the regular first-class mail reached Michigan, given the microfilm technology used to reduce the letters to thumbnail size and transport them overseas. Then again, if a supply ship was torpedoed or otherwise destroyed, the V-mail would be lost. That wasn’t the only way to lose a letter, either. She’d heard that the Fort Bliss post office had burned down the previous spring with most of the mail still inside. You could never be sure a letter to or from a soldier would reach its destination.

  She was finishing a cheery update to her parents, long on hop details and short on interpersonal conflict, when the Wac in charge of quarters stuck her head into the day room and said, “Jamieson, visitor for you.”

  Brady, CJ thought, unable to hold back the flare of hope. It might not even be her, she told herself as she left the day room trailed by the Andrews Sisters crooning, “Don’t sit under the apple tree with anyone else but me.”

  But it was her, waiting in a pool of lamp light. And she wasn’t alone—Janice stood at her side, arms crossed tightly against the front of her uniform.

  CJ paused on the front stoop, aware of Sarah and Reggie nearby hanging laundry on the line outside their barracks.

  “Hi,” Brady said.

  “This is a surprise. Not that it isn’t good to see you.” She bit her lip. “Do you want to come in?”

  “No, thank you. We can’t stay.” She nudged Janice unsubtly, much as she had CJ earlier.

  “I’m sorry,” Janice said, her eyes fixed over CJ’s shoulder. “I was terribly rude at supper. I hope you can forgive me.”

  “Of course,” CJ said, blinking. How had Brady gotten her to offer an apology? And more importantly, why had she gone to such trouble?

  “Are we okay?” Brady asked, eyes anxious on CJ.

  “We always were.”

  And yet, she thought, rubbing her bare arms in the cool desert air, something had shifted. Brady seemed to have made a decision, and CJ couldn’t pretend the outcome didn’t matter.

  “Good.” Brady smiled up at her. “See you tomorrow?”

  “Yes, all right.”

  They turned away, and CJ watched them walk back to their own barracks. Before you got here, she had me all to herself, she heard Brady say again.

  For a second she almost felt sorry for Janice. Then the moment slipped away, and she returned to the day room where her unfinished letters waited under the watchful eyes of Boadicea and Joan of Arc, who, she was fairly certain, had never had to worry about such matters.

  * * *

  After thirty days on base, Wacs at Fort Bliss were eligible for weekend passes. Kate had an in with one of the officers who handled leave requests, so their group of friends could usually get passes together. The first weekend CJ would be eligible they were planning to see the Andrews Sisters at a USO concert in El Paso, with an overnight stay in a downtown hotel afterward.

  “You interested?” Toby asked as they smoked a cigarette on the front stoop of the barracks, bracing themselves for GI night festivities. “It’s still a week away. I bet we could scrounge up an extra ticket.”

  “Thanks,” CJ said, “but I already told Brady I would go to White Sands with her.”

  “Really?” Toby glanced over at her. “Just the two of you out in the middle of nowhere together?”

  “Well, yes.”

  “Huh.”

  CJ was getting tired of the looks that passed between her Maintenance buddies whenever Brady was around. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Beware of things that go bump in the night.” Toby ground out her cigarette and rose, holding the butt between her fingers. “Unfortunately, latrine detail is calling my name. Better not keep those duckboards waiting.”

  Toby retreated but CJ stayed where she was, gazing out across the crowded compound with its barbed wire enclosure and armed guards at the gates. Four buildings away was Company A, where Brady would be recovering from KP duty—assuming she’d finished at the mess hall by now. She might still be scrubbing pots and pans or lugging garbage, exhausted from a day in the hot kitchen at the beck and call of the cooks. Or worse, emptying the grease traps.

  Kitchen Police was the scourge of every soldier’s life. She and Brady had gone to a show recently in which the Russians captured a German soldier and were discussing what to do with him when a GI at the back of the theater called out, “Give him KP!” The movie-goers groaned approvingly—even the mention of the horrid duty every private pulled once a month no matter their MOS was enough to send a spasm of disgust through the crowd.

  During basic training, she and her fellow recruits had often sung the WAC version of a popular GI ditty, “The KPs are Scrubbing Away,” to the tune of “The Caissons Go Rolling Along”:

  Over sinks, over pails

  With the sergeant on our tails

  All the KPs are scrubbing away

  Shining pots, shining pans,

  Cleaning out the garbage cans

  All the KPs are scrubbing away!

  Oh it’s hi, hi, hee in the kitchen scullery

  Sixteen long hours of the day

  And wher’er we go,

  By the smell you’ll always know,

  That the KPs are scrubbing away

  (Keep ’em scrubbing)

  That the KPs are scrubbing away!

  CJ pictured Brady with her sleeves rolled up above her elbows, hands red from hot water and GI soap, face flushed, skin shiny. Even all sweaty from KP, she would be beautiful. Sometimes when they played basketball, CJ missed an easy shot or dribbled the ball out of bounds because she was distracted by the way Brady flipped her hair off her face or by the color of her eyes, which reminded CJ of a hazy summer sky. It wasn’t just the way she looked or moved, either. There was something else about Brady that drew people to her, a quality CJ couldn’t quite put into words.

  Brady herself often seemed oblivious to the effect she had on other people, though.

  “Are you sure you don’t want to go to the concert in El Paso instead?” she asked CJ at supper mess a week later.

  “Hmm. Now that you mention it, maybe I will.”

  Brady bit her lip and looked down at the battered wooden table.

  “I’m kidding,” CJ added. “Don’t worry. I’m not going to change my mind.”

  “But you know you can go with them if you want, right?”

  “For one thing, it would take a miracle to find a ticket at this point. And for another, I’d much rather spend the night with you than with hundreds of screaming GIs.”

  “When you put it that way…”

  Brady smiled at her, and CJ smiled back. How could Brady have thought she would want to be anywhere else? She was looking forward to their getaway weekend so much that she hadn’t slept well in days. Finally, a break from regimentation, from duty, from Army life. Compared to the squad of women she normally shared her quarters with, having Brady as her lone roommate Saturday night was going to seem like a luxury.

  They went over their list of supplies again, mostly hiking gear, extra food and a camera Brady was planning to check out from work. One of the officers from the PRO was loaning them his car for the weekend, so they didn’t have to worry about traveling light.

  “We’re skipping inspection and parade, right?” Brady asked later as they walked back to their barracks. They hadn’t stayed long at the service club—their pass officially began at midnight and they wanted to get an early start in the morning.

  “Right.”

  “I wonder if we’ll even want to come back Sunday, or if we’ll be tempted to keep driving.”

  CJ stared at her. “Of course we’re coming back.”

  Brady shook her head, clearly trying to hold back a smile. “Not much for breaking rules, are you?”

  “I’m as rebellious as the next person.” As Brady eyed her, she conceded, “Okay, maybe not. It’s possible I don’t like to upset people.”

  “Apparently I don’t have the same
qualms.”

  “That’s because all you have to do is smile and everything magically goes your way.”

  Brady snorted. “That’s a load of crap.”

  “No, it isn’t. People fall all over themselves to please you.”

  “They do not!”

  “Yes, they do.”

  “You don’t.”

  CJ paused. “Well, someone has to keep you honest.”

  A few minutes later, they said goodnight at Brady’s barracks. CJ walked on alone, wondering if she was immune to Brady’s appeal or if she simply hid her feelings better than the majority of Bliss personnel. She had a feeling their weekend away would answer that question, one way or another.

  Chapter Six

  In the morning, they met at the mess hall to finagle food for the trip from the WAC cooks. Then, PBJ sandwiches, fruit, cookies and barracks bags in hand, they said goodbye to their friends and headed for the officers’ quarters. Lieutenant Kelly had given them permission to park behind the WAC officers’ house the night before.

  “Nice car,” CJ said, sliding into the passenger seat. It was a 1938 LaSalle, the same model her brother Joe owned. His was back in Michigan now, up on blocks behind the feed barn where they used to play summer ball.

  “She’s a beauty.” Brady started the engine and checked the dash, then smiled at CJ across the narrow front seat. “Full tank, like Brent said, with gas coupons in the glove box. I think we’re ready.”

  “Let’s go then,” CJ said, grinning back. They were free. Almost.

  They drove across base, windows down, music from an El Paso radio station playing on the car radio. At the main entrance to the post, they showed the MP on duty their leave papers. He waved them through.

  It wasn’t quite nine yet. They should have been at work, but instead they were in a car speeding toward Las Cruces and the Organ Mountains beyond. CJ had enthused so much about her recent hop that Brady had proposed they take a road trip to White Sands National Monument and the town of Cloudcroft, New Mexico, both popular tourist spots among Fort Bliss GIs. Their route via Las Cruces would take them in a triangle of sorts around the Organ Mountains, which they would be able to view from every angle possible.