by Ella Carey
“You desert girls are always swell. Welcome to Avenger Field!” Nancy was medium height with bright-red hair, and her face was covered with a spatter of freckles. “I hail from Cincinnati, and Helena here comes from—”
“New York or Boston?” Eva couldn’t resist.
“Technically speaking, Los Angeles is no desert.” Nina let out a laugh.
“Boston,” Helena said, her eyes dancing from Eva to Nina. “But our friend Nancy here’s much more interesting than me. She’s a fully trained scientist. She loves to look at the stars. I’m afraid she’s a lot smarter than me too. Her brains are going to put me to shame. But like I say, I can organize folks, so that is what I’m going to do, whether you like it or not!”
Nancy threw back her head and let out a loud laugh. “Oh, don’t you be ridiculous, Helena. I’ll tell you one of the reasons I had to apply for WASP. Because Texas here is one of the best places on this planet to look at stars. The night skies are huge and endless out here. Can’t wait to get up in the air and fly in the dark. I tell you, it’s going to be magical. Just you wait, girls.”
“Well, I have to admire you,” Eva said. “Instrument flying at night is something I’m not so experienced in. It’s my least favorite thing. Anyone who has a handle on instrument flying is a clever girl in my books.”
“You either love it or hate it,” Helena said. “Let’s hope Nancy inspires you to love it. It took me a while, but I’m at peace with instrument flying now.”
“Helena here’s a flight instructor back home in Boston.” Nancy looked up at the tall girl with respect.
“Well, I can tell you two are going to be mighty helpful friends to have.” Nina put down her kit bag and folded her arms. “A scientist and a flight instructor? Sounds like we came to the right place.”
“Say,” Helena said, eyeing Nina’s bag on the ground. “We’d best get back inside now. And I suppose you girls don’t have bay mates yet? Because Nancy and I are going to share with a girl named Beatrice—Bea—she’s a pal of Nancy’s, from Cincinnati too. And we need another three girls to make up a bay. You two interested for a start?”
Nina turned to Eva. “Evie? What do you say?”
“Sounds just grand to me,” Eva said. Sharing a bay for five months with five strangers was either going to be wonderful or a terrible nightmare!
“Let’s get going.” Helena glanced up toward the training base in the distance, the wooden buildings sitting stark in the wide, sunny landscape.
As they walked up the long driveway, Eva felt the full force of the Texan sun on her cheeks. Flying out here in open cockpits was going to be tough. As the other girls chatted alongside her, the plains seemed to stretch in endless silence, the reddish soil broken only by the blue horizon in the far distance.
“Here’s the lowdown. Each line is a barrack, and each room in the barrack is a bay,” Nancy said.
They came closer to the wooden buildings that would be home.
“There’s only one bathroom per two bays. And twelve girls sharing them, with two showers between us all, I’ve been thinking about how long we’ll have in there each morning.” Helena added, “I’ve been inside. I like to scout around.”
“Well, Evie and I’ll be all right,” Nina said. “We grew up in Burbank. No frills where we come from. But how will you do, Helena?” Nina looked up at the auburn-haired girl, her expression entirely innocent.
A flicker of annoyance passed across Helena’s face, but after a while, she smiled down at Nina. “I’m not completely and utterly precious. I can manage perfectly fine, thank you, Nina.”
Nina’s cheeks reddened. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend.”
“I’m figuring sharing with you girls will be a sight better than sharing with four little boys. I have four brothers.” Helena came to a stop at the edge of the long rows of buildings.
Outside the barracks, groups of girls milled about on the dry brown lawn. A fountain marked the entrance to the home of the WASP.
“That’s where you get dunked after you do your first solo.” Nancy stopped for a moment at the round fountain. The water spattered cool droplets in the searing heat.
“Oh, in that case, bring on my first solo flight,” Nina said. “We’re hardened Californian girls, but this Texan heat is something else. No ocean breezes, just dry winds, I imagine.”
Another girl split away from the others who milled about on the dry, baked grass. She was tall and blond, and she raced toward them.
“I’m Rita,” she said, coming to a screaming halt in front of them. “All the way from Oklahoma.”
Rita shook Eva’s and Nina’s outstretched hands as they introduced themselves.
“Mighty glad to meet you, Rita,” Nina said. “I’m Nina, and this is my oldest and dearest friend, Eva.”
“Oh, how charming. Let me tell you, you are lucky to have a very good friend out here,” Rita said.
“I sure know that, Rita.”
“I’m Helena, and this is Nancy,” Helena said.
Rita bit her lip for a moment. “I don’t mean to be forward or anything. Or perhaps I do, but you girls know of a spare place in a bay at all? I’m here alone, and I promise, I’m no trouble!”
Eva felt an instant warmth toward the girl, and she saw Nina’s eyes crinkling into a smile next to her.
Helena rested a foot on the edge of the fountain. “Well. It seems to me we’ve got a bay sorted. Nina, Eva, Rita, Nancy, me, and Nancy’s friend Beatrice.”
“Oh, thank you, girls. I promise you won’t regret it. Hope the rest of the five months goes as swell as this afternoon has!” Rita’s face broke into a huge smile.
A loud noise boomed over the lawn, and a microphone whistled.
“Come on, girls,” Helena said. “Get yourselves over between the barracks now. Time to listen to our housemother speak.”
Eva felt Nina’s elbow in her side. “Think we’re goin’ to get used to Helena herding us all around like cattle? I’m not sure about this girl.”
“Think we’re goin’ to have to get used to being herded like cattle in general,” Eva said. “And if Helena wants to herd us faster, well, better her than me.”
“Oh boy.” Nina’s face crumpled up into a pout. “This is going to be an interesting five months.”
“It’ll be grand,” Eva said. It was the sight of the airplanes that had done it. The moment she’d spotted them, all her exhaustion from the long journey into this unfamiliar terrain had gone away. Because around airplanes, Eva always felt like she was at home.
A woman stood on a small podium between the two rows of barracks. She just reached the microphone, but the expression in her eyes was serious.
She introduced herself as Leoti Deaton, their housemother, responsible for their welfare and care while they were here. “Welcome to Avenger Field, girls. You will be Class Forty-Three-W-Eight. I’m known around here as Deedee.”
Eva shaded her eyes. Deedee’s blond hair was tied back into a tight bun, and she stood up perfect and straight in a navy dress jacket and fitted skirt, even out here in the heat.
“Before we begin, there are a few vital things that I need to say. I hate to start this way, girls, but first and foremost, you must be mindful of the opportunity that Jacqueline Cochran has given you out here. You need to be above scandal. Any wrong steps in moral conduct will be more damaging to us as a group than any mistakes you could make in your training.” Deedee paused for a moment. “The fact is, we’ve had to close Avenger Field to outside traffic. We had daily forced landings from men making up mysterious malfunctions that seemed to disappear as soon as they landed. They all were here to check out our girls.”
Rita let out a groan. “Oh, for pity’s sake. What a lot of fools. As if we’d fall for that sort of malarkey.”
Eva felt her mouth twitch. She was going to like Rita.
“We’ve had to ban social contact with our civilian instructors because they are all male, and also with army air force staff. Class Fort
y-Three-W-Eight, you all have to conduct yourselves in a manner that we’ll all be proud of, and we expect you to do a good job of that. Mrs. Cochran is relying on you to do her justice. She works very hard for us all so we can train at Avenger Field. Please, don’t let her down.”
Eva sneaked a glance around the crowd of girls gathered on the grass. To a T, they all looked sweaty, hot, and excited. A shiver of anticipation passed through her. Nerves too. Based on statistics from previous classes, only just over half of them would graduate. She had to do everything to ensure she and Nina ended up in the right half.
“Please stick together and don’t find yourself alone away from base. Especially at night.”
Deedee turned a page on the notepad she held. “Now to the practicals. A typical day here starts with reveille at six hundred hours, and then we march to breakfast. After that, half of you will march to ground school. You’ll get your khaki trousers and white shirts issued for ground school classes in the morning. The other half of you will dress in your flight suits, with your turbans to keep your hair out of the way, for going to the field for flight training. You’ve all provided your funds to buy the uniforms, so well done, class.”
“Nearly wiped me out,” Rita muttered next to Eva. Eva kept her eyes on Deedee, too scared to talk out of turn. “But I didn’t realize I was payin’ for a turban. I hate puttin’ anythin’ on top of my head.”
“Shush, Rita.” Helena nudged the blond girl. “You’ll get us all in trouble.”
Rita groaned.
“Then you’ll swap classes, ground school or flight school in the afternoons, followed by calisthenics every day on the airfield for everyone,” Deedee went on. “We march to dinner in, as they say in the military, the mess hall, and then we march to the field for night training. Finally, we march to barracks to go to sleep at twenty-two hundred.”
Nancy was fidgeting a little alongside Nina and Eva. “Marching? I’m the most uncoordinated girl you’ve likely ever met.”
“We don’t allow talking while marching,” Deedee proclaimed. “But you can sing.”
A deep-red blush spread down to Nancy’s throat.
“We are professional, and we want to make the WASP into something which you will always be honored to be a part of, class.”
“Too much marching,” Rita muttered. “I never heard of so much marching in my life.”
Deedee folded her hands in front of her. “Don’t think we are not as serious as the men. The washout rate is high, although at this point, we women are washing out less than our male counterparts in the military. And we are working toward becoming part of the military, as you know. We work by military rules out here. Don’t get caught out on demerit points—watch that you keep your bedding neat. Your bays will be inspected every Saturday morning, and you’ll need to line up while we do that. You need to adhere to the bedding standards that will be set out for you, and your towels must even be hung just so. Keep tidy, work hard, and always stay focused. That is the way to be the WASP that I know you all have the potential to become.”
Deedee stepped down from the podium, and the girls milled around, organizing bay mates. Lugging her kit bag across the dusty brown lawn that ran between the barracks, Eva moved with her group toward one of the screen doors nearby and surveyed the row of six cots lined up against the wall inside. There was no mirror in the room, and there was one closet around six feet tall for each girl. Each trainee had a locker painted in a bilious yellow.
“Well, whoever put this together had a charming eye for color,” Rita said. Standard white sheets and a rough gray blanket were folded neatly at the end of each bed.
“Bed makings have to be done with a slide rule and eight-inch tucks. Pillowcases to be folded around and under, and the second blanket has to be over the pillow to the exact half inch,” Helena said.
Eva turned to her, wide eyed.
Helena raised a brow.
“You a schoolteacher or somethin’, Helena?” Rita threw her kit bag down on her bed.
“Don’t go messing your bed up, Rita.” Helena laid her bag down carefully on the floor.
Nina sent Eva a wink.
Just then, a small dark-haired girl appeared on the threshold. She dumped her kit bag down with a loud thump on the bare floorboards, causing Eva to jump. She wiped a hand across her red face. Her pair of sharp brown eyes scanned the room.
Nancy moved over to her. “Bea! Come meet our bay mates.”
Nancy made her introductions, and Bea shook all of their hands.
“I’ve been talking with Deedee.” Bea spoke in a practical, forthright way. Eva looked at her and thought there would be no messing about with Bea. She’d see through everything and tell you exactly what was what. “Deedee told me that we’re only allowed one picture on top of our lockers, so if you’ve got three beaux, you’ll have to pick one. Lucky for me, I don’t have any. I find most of ’em dull.”
“Heck, that could be a problem for me,” Rita said. “I guess the boys back home will have to be out of sight, out of mind. Not sure that I’d call any of them beaux, to be honest, more like a bucket of trouble.”
Nina grabbed Eva by the arm. “I’ll need a bed next to yours, just in case I have any dramas late at night. I need you within whispering distance, Evie. Imagine, we can talk all night if there’s something pressing to gossip about.”
“You’ll be way too tired to be gossiping all night, Nina,” Helena’s voice sounded from behind them, and Eva turned in surprise. “We’ll be flying so hard and so bent over our textbooks studying for ground school that we’ll all fall asleep the moment we hit our cots.”
“Don’t you bet on it,” Nina muttered, pulling a face behind Helena’s back. “Is she for real?” she mouthed at Eva.
Eva giggled and shook her head.
“The two showers are a real sight.” Nancy appeared in the doorway from the bathrooms. “We’re going to be lining up in the mornings, and we’ll have to be super quick if we’re sharing with next door. I heard that when the very first class came here in April, there were no stalls around the showers, so I guess it could be worse. Some girls had an awful time of it and went crazy with embarrassment.”
“We should get up early so we can use the showers first.” Helena unzipped her suitcase with a flourish. Inside, her clothes were ironed to a crisp and folded so they sat perfectly flat. She pulled out a white blouse and hung it in her wardrobe.
Eva found herself staring at the organized, meticulous girl. She was going to have to watch her standards. If there were a lot of girls like Helena here, then the threat of washing out for those less organized could be real.
Eva sat down on her bed with a thump.
“Well, we’ll have plenty of time to sort those practicalities out, Helena,” Bea said. Her kit bag was already halfway unpacked. She looked up from where she was kneeling on the floor. “Deedee told me there’s no leave into Sweetwater for the first two weeks. We have to stay at Avenger Field.”
“Are you kidding me?” Nina said. “Rebecca, our driver in that great cattle truck of a thing, told me there’s a swimming pool. How are we supposed to stand being without a swim in this heat for two whole weeks? And we can’t dunk in the fountain until we’ve had our first solo flight. That’s a tradition.”
Helena stopped her unpacking and surveyed Nina. “Nina, it’s fine to let loose in here, but mind you don’t complain too much about Deedee’s rules, or any of the other instructors, won’t you?”
Nina threw her arms in the air when Helena turned back around. Rita caught the gesture and made a face behind Helena’s back.
“Well, I’m awful panicked about the instructors. I’ve heard stories that they don’t want girls learning to fly planes,” Nancy said. “I’m braced for them not to be friendly. Mostly, I’ve heard they’re men who don’t believe we women are any good for the ferrying jobs.”
“Someone asked me if becoming a pilot meant I was going to turn out fast.” Bea stood up from where she’d been unpa
cking. She threw her short arms in the air. “I mean, me? Fast? You’ve gotta be kidding!” She did a little twirl on the spot. “If any folks knew me, they’d know the reason I like getting up in the sky is so I can be by myself. I’m just a hardworking girl. I was furious when folks back home told me not to hop on instructors’ laps like a secretary would do.”
“Oh my goodness me,” Rita said. “You can’t git away from gossip, even when there’s a war on. You’d think folks would have bigger things on their minds.”
Eva threw herself back on her bed and stared at the ceiling.
“Watch you don’t mess your bed, Eva,” Helena said. “They might come check us for tidiness.”
Eva leaped up.
“Jumpin’ Jehoshaphat, girls!” Rita shot across the room. “I’ve already got a scorpion in my wardrobe.”
Everyone rushed over to stare at Rita’s wardrobe. Bea appeared with a jar and deftly covered the little scorpion until it had crawled up the side. “Knew this place was famous for insects, so I brought this.”
“Well, aren’t you a treasure.” Rita wiped her hand over her messed-up blond hair.
Bea bustled off with her jar and went outside, the screen door swinging closed behind her.
“Best get unpacked, girls,” Helena said. “I think we have to be at dinner in half an hour.”
Nina clutched Eva’s arm. “Thank heavens I have you,” she whispered, “because this is going to be one crazy time.”
On her first morning at Sweetwater, the touch of Helena’s hand on her shoulder woke Eva from the heaviest sleep she’d most likely ever had in her life. Slowly, she opened her eyes, watching Helena moving around the bay in her nightgown, gently waking everyone up. Nina was still curled fast asleep in her cot next to Eva’s.
“Oh, patience love us!” Rita sat up, stretching her long arms wide in the air. “What on earth time is it, Helena?”
“It’s five forty-five.” Helena tapped Bea’s shoulder. “I thought we’d get a head start on the showers before our friends in the next-door bay take over. I don’t want any of us to be late on our first day.”
Rita lay back and groaned. “Fifteen minutes more sleep, and I swear I would have been a different girl.”