by Jane Healey
“Never in front of the soldiers,” I said. “My God, some of them are babies.”
“I heard a bunch of them saying they graduated last month,” Dottie added, chewing on a strand of her hair. “From high school. And I second what Viv said: we’re here for you. You don’t have to hide it the way you’ve been trying to these past few months. We’ll get through this together. We’re all nervous.”
“I’m not that nervous,” Viv said with a shrug as she tapped her cigarette, ashes sprinkling the bathroom floor.
“Shush, Viv, you know that even you are,” Dottie said. “I am, for a lot of reasons, one being that I’m not nearly as outgoing as you and Viv. I think I barely passed that requirement in the personal interview. If I hadn’t pulled out my guitar at the end, I’m sure they would have rejected me.”
Dottie was right about that. She was not a fit for the “outgoing, friendly” persona the Red Cross was looking for. At some point she was going to have to talk to the soldiers and play her guitar, not just smile pretty and blush.
“Anyway, I understand you wanting answers about Danny,” Dottie continued. “And the three of us are here together, for all the other reasons we’ve talked about.”
“She’s right,” Viv said. “We all need this. It’s been so frustrating seeing Danny, Dottie’s brother, all our friends—men our age—get shipped off to war and we can’t do anything to help them but assemble care packages and serve stupid frankfurters at the USO.”
“Like you said yourself, Fiona, if Danny possibly gave his life to the war, you can—”
“I can give it one year. I know,” I said with a sigh. I could give it a year. And I knew I could barely stand the thought of living one more day with my parents and sisters, feeling sorry for myself. And working at city hall with the rest of the staff constantly giving me looks of pity.
“And if we had waited too long, the war might be over,” Dottie said. “And even if not, I’m not sure the Red Cross was going to come through Boston interviewing for Clubmobile positions again. We had to take the chance when we had it.”
“We did,” said Viv. “Ready or not, we’re on our way to England. We just went through six weeks of training for these jobs. I had to learn to play badminton, for the love of God. There’s no turning back now.”
“I know, Viv. I’m sorry I lost it for a moment,” I said, starting to calm down because, really, she was right. “What am I going to do, jump overboard? And God forbid you not get to use your newly acquired badminton skills.”
“And remember,” Dottie added, adjusting her cap, “it’s kind of a big deal to be chosen for this. One of the girls just told me they only choose one out of every six applicants. One out of six. We went through that gauntlet of interviews and exams—it’s a prestigious assignment.”
“And parts of it might be fun, you know,” said Viv. “Travel, adventure, our first trip to Europe—our first trip anywhere—and the three of us get to go together? When was the last time you really let yourself have fun, Fiona?”
“I know, I know. Thank you for reminding me,” I said, giving them both a smile. “This is a fresh start. One that I desperately need.”
“You got that right.” Viv winked at me as she stood up and threw her cigarette in the toilet. Dottie jumped up, grabbed my hands, and pulled me off the floor.
The three of us stood squeezed in front of the mirror and did a quick check of ourselves. We were a study in contrasts. Dottie was petite with olive skin, rosy cheeks, and thick black hair like the rest of her Portuguese family. Her glasses only served to highlight her large dark eyes. Viv, on the other hand, was tall with dark-reddish-brown curls, high cheekbones, and full lips. I was the palest of the three by far, with green-gray eyes and those freckles across my nose.
“You should adjust your cap so you can see the highlights in the front of your hair, Fiona,” Dottie said. My hair was light brown, but I had an odd chunk of blonde streaks in the front.
“Maybe I should adjust it right down in front of my puffy eyes so no one can tell I was crying,” I said, frowning at my reflection.
We all jumped when someone started banging on the door loudly and we heard a voice say, “Hellooooo? Hello, Boston? Y’all in there? It’s Blanche.”
“As if we couldn’t tell by that accent,” I said, opening the door to see Blanche Dumond, a spitfire of a girl from New Orleans. She was curvy, blonde, and fast-talking. We had met her at training in DC.
“I thought I saw you heading this way,” Blanche said, raising her eyebrows at me. “You okay, honey? You aren’t looking so good.”
“She’s fine,” lied Viv as we filed out of the bathroom. Blanche had become known as somewhat of a gossip among all of us newly initiated Red Cross girls.
“Uh-huh,” said Blanche, unconvinced. “Anyway, a bunch of us are heading up to the officers’ deck—they call it the Bird Cage. There’s a bar and a club room and a piano. You want to join us? You need that red ID card they gave all of us to get in—only officers above captain and Red Cross girls allowed.”
“Of course,” Viv said. “I think we could all use a drink before the war. Hey, Dottie, you could play piano! Or you should go grab your guitar from our cabin.”
“Um . . . no, that’s okay, maybe next time,” Dottie said, already turning pink at the thought of performing in front of anyone outside the elementary school where she taught.
“Well, let’s go!” said Blanche, heading toward the stairs.
Viv and Dottie followed while I stood outside the bathroom.
“I’ll be right there,” I said, and they both stopped and looked at me, concern in their eyes.
“You promise, Fi?” Dottie asked.
“Yeah, yeah,” I said. “I want to freshen up a bit more. You know, the eyes.” I pointed to the puffiness I could feel underneath them.
“Okay, we’ll see you there,” Fiona said, and they kept walking.
I went back into the bathroom, stood in front of the mirror, and put a bit of cool water on my swollen eyes. I reached into my pocket and felt for the folded letter. The last letter I had ever received from Danny before he was shot out of the sky somewhere over the forests of Germany. It was dated September 8, 1943. Danny went missing sometime around October 20. His family and I found out a month after that. I took the letter out of my pocket and started to open it, to read it for the thousandth time. I opened it halfway and saw my name at the top of the page in his familiar, terrible handwriting, but then I stopped myself. I looked up at the mirror, my puffy eyes staring back at me. I folded up the letter and shoved it as far into my pocket as I could.
I had already memorized it; reading it again wasn’t going to help me now.
“You’re doing this, Fiona,” I said to my reflection. “Ready or not, you’re doing this.”
I applied the lipstick Dottie had given me, and the eyes looking back at me now had more resolve and strength than when I’d first walked into the bathroom. It was time to go to war. Hopefully to find answers. Maybe to find Danny.
Chapter Two
July 19, 1944
Sleeping on a narrow bunk bed in a tiny cabin with five other women meant falling asleep fitfully every night and waking up at odd hours, often from vivid, jarring dreams.
Danny and I were sitting on the large red-and-white-checked cotton blanket that I had spread on the lawn of the Bunker Hill Monument. It was a gorgeous but steamy day in late August, breezy with a faint scent of the ocean a few blocks away. He was leaving for Europe in three days. We had both been trying to ignore that fact, though it hung in the air between us, unspoken and heavy like the summer air.
He was lying on his side on the blanket, resting on his elbow as he bit into one of the apples I had bought off a pushcart earlier in the day. I shaded my eyes to get a better look at him; six foot one with long, athletic limbs, his dimpled cheek and almond-shaped blue eyes, his white-blond hair now cropped per military standards. I could still see a glimpse of the lanky, awkward nineteen-year-old
I had fallen for sophomore year of college, but it was getting harder all the time. He looked up at me and smiled, running his finger down my bare arm, giving me goose bumps.
“How you doing there, Fi?” he said quietly, his dimple fading as his face became serious.
“I’m doing . . . I’m doing fine,” I said, lying. “This was one of the best Saturdays I’ve ever had. Betty Grable was as good as I hoped she would be in Coney Island. And I had such a great time walking around the St. Anthony’s Festival eating pizza and cannoli until we were stuffed, and now we’re sitting here in the sun on this gorgeous summer afternoon . . . What more could I ask for?”
Danny kept looking at me, still serious. “Honey, it was a great day, the best, but we can’t ignore the fact that I’m leaving.”
That pit in my stomach. I studied his face, and then sighed.
“I know,” I said. “I’m doing okay. I’ll be all right. I’ll miss you terribly; I’m already missing you if that’s possible. But I’m sure I’m doing better than you are. I’m not the one going half a world away to fight in the war. How are you doing?”
I lay on my side across from him, resting on one elbow while I smoothed my green-and-white gingham skirt and tucked it under me so it wouldn’t blow up in the breeze.
“I’m as ready as I’ll ever be, I guess,” Danny said, putting his apple core on the grass and reaching over to grab my hand. “Training is all done. It’s what every guy our age has to do . . .” He squeezed my hand and looked into my eyes. “The hardest part is leaving you.” He leaned over and gave me a long kiss.
“I’ll keep really busy,” I said, reluctantly pulling away in case my mother or one of her friends happened to walk by. “As you know, there’s never a dull moment at the mayor’s office; the days fly by. Mayor Tobin keeps piling more responsibilities on me by the minute.
“Of course, I’ll help my mom and dad with my younger sisters. The twins are driving my mother crazy lately. Oh, and Dottie, Viv, and I are going to volunteer at the USO over at the Charlestown YMCA . . .”
“Uh-oh, don’t let any soldiers at the USO try to steal you away while I’m gone,” he said.
“It’ll never happen,” I said, giving him a playful shove. “I’ll make it very clear that I’m engaged. Besides, they’ll all be falling over themselves to get Viv’s attention. And Dottie’s too—they’ll just mistake her shyness for playing hard to get.”
“You three can be trouble when you’re together,” he said, smirking. “I might have to have a word with those two before I go.”
“I think you mean we can be really fun when we’re together,” I said.
He was looking at me, serious again.
“What?” I said, putting my hand on his cheek.
“I’m trying to memorize your beautiful face. Your freckles and your eyes that change shades with the weather. The patch of blonde in the front of your hair that you’re always pushing out of your eyes. I’m going to miss your face so much.”
“I’ll miss your face too,” I said, suddenly feeling my chest tighten and my eyes well up. “So much.” I leaned down to kiss him again, blinking fast so I wouldn’t start to cry.
“Fiona,” he said, whispering. We were nose to nose. “We need to talk about the possibility . . . if something happens to me over there—”
“No,” I said, sitting up, feeling physically ill at the words he was saying. “Nothing is going to happen to you over there. I know it in my heart. You’ll be back in . . . in a little over a year . . . and we’ll get married, and I’ll finally move out of my parents’ house, and we’ll really start our life together. You’ll finish law school, become a district attorney like you’ve always dreamed. We’ll eventually have kids, maybe buy a small house outside of Boston. We can finally get a couple of Boston terriers . . .”
He was quiet. Staring out past the monument at something I couldn’t see.
“I’m serious. You’re going to be fine. And if you’re not fine, I swear to God I’m going to come over and get you myself . . .” He was still quiet, so I kept talking. “This war has to . . . it’s got to end sometime soon, right? It can’t—” I was interrupted by the sound of a loud, deep horn. “What was that?”
“I’ll be seeing you,” Danny said, like he always did when we said good-bye. It was his favorite song. He looked up at me again and grabbed my hand like it was the last thing he’d ever hold.
“Why are you saying that?”
The horn sounded again.
I sat up, startled, and opened my eyes, nearly hitting my head on the bunk above me. I listened to the foghorn of the Queen Elizabeth and the quiet snoring of at least two of the six girls in our tiny cabin. I sighed and looked up at the bottom of the bunk above me where Viv was sleeping. Every time I woke from a dream about Danny, it was still a grim surprise.
I stayed in bed for another fifteen minutes before I realized I wasn’t going to be able to fall back to sleep. It had to be well past midnight, but I needed to get some air. I felt around under my bunk for my uniform, which was neatly folded next to my shiny new steel helmet and gas mask. I got dressed lying down on my bed, grabbed my shoes, and opened the door of the cabin, slipping into the hall as quietly as I could.
The hall was dimly lit. I decided to make my way up to the Bird Cage, where my friends and I had been spending a good amount of time. We’d gotten to know some of the other Red Cross girls and soldiers—playing card games and singing songs by the piano. A few of the soldiers were decent musicians. Viv and I still hadn’t been able to convince Dottie to contribute her talents.
I walked up several flights of stairs and relished the silence, which was interrupted by the foghorn at regular intervals. The Queen Elizabeth had been designed as a luxury cruise ship meant for about two thousand passengers per voyage. At the end of our first day on board, however, we were told there were fifteen thousand military men and about a hundred Red Cross workers heading to England via the vessel. This meant it was always loud and crowded. Everyone ate two mediocre meals a day in assigned shifts. There were never enough chairs, and while GIs would often offer to give up their seats for us, my friends and I were usually more comfortable just sitting on the floor picnic-style.
The late-night emptiness and quiet were a welcome change from the daytime hustle and chaos. As I reached the top of the stairs to the officers’ deck, I stopped for a minute and listened. I heard someone playing the piano in the lounge. I walked toward it, pulling my jacket tighter around me. It was a cool, starless night, and the ship was surrounded by fog. As I got closer to the lounge, I saw a soldier sitting at the piano, his eyes closed, completely immersed in his playing. A lit cigarette sat in an ashtray next to him on the bench, along with a pack of Lucky Strikes. I recognized him by his red hair—he had been playing drinking songs on the piano a couple of nights earlier, and an enormous crowd of officers and Red Cross workers had been singing along. At the end of the night, the beer was still flowing, and verses of the song “Roll Me Over in the Clover” had become increasingly bawdy.
I opened the lounge door, walked in, and sat down on one of the oversized brown leather chairs to listen, tucking my legs underneath me. It smelled like stale beer, and there was an ever-present haze of cigarette smoke. A few officers were playing cards at a table in the opposite corner, and they all gave me nods and smiles.
The GI played the piano as if he were in a trance. Jazz. I knew the song. When he finished the piece, he turned and looked at me with a small smile. He had warm brown eyes.
“There’s so few women on this ship, seeing you is like seeing a ghost.”
“‘Rhapsody in Blue’?” I smiled back.
“Yes,” he said. “Very good. That’s the one.”
“I’m sorry to disturb your playing,” I said. “I couldn’t sleep and came up here for some air.”
He waved his hand and took a drag of his cigarette. “It’s fine. I’ve been coming up here every night. I like the quiet. Not a lot of quiet time on this boa
t.”
“True,” I said with a nod.
“Here, would you like a Krueger’s?” He reached under his bench and grabbed a can of beer, offering it to me. “The bartender’s off duty, but he left several six-packs for us night owls.”
“Why not?” I said with a shrug, taking the can from him and cracking it open. “Thank you. Maybe it will help me sleep.” I took a sip before adding, “You play beautifully. Are you a professional musician?”
“I am, thanks,” he said. “I’m head of a swing band in Chicago . . . well, I was before this whole mess. Do you play?”
“No, but my friend Dottie, who’s here with me, plays piano and guitar. She’s incredibly talented. We’ve been trying to get her to play all week, but she’s shy about it,” I said. “My friends and I love swing, love the big bands. I’m Fiona, by the way. Fiona Denning.”
“Nice to meet you, Fiona. I’m Joe Brandon,” he said, reaching over to shake my hand. “You’re one of the Red Cross girls, I take it?”
“Yes,” I said.
“What are you going to be doing over there? Do you know yet?” he asked.
“My friends Viv, Dottie, and I will be in one of those Clubmobiles—in DC they said we’d most likely be sent to France. We have training in London for a couple of weeks, and they’re going to officially assign us then. How about you?”
“Captain in the Twenty-Eighth Infantry Division,” he said, lighting up a fresh cigarette. He had long fingers. Fingers meant to play piano. “I’m going to be heading up a band over there, believe it or not.”
“I believe it, playing the way you do,” I said. “Maybe my friends and I will get to see your band sometime.”
“Maybe you will,” he said, smiling at the idea. “Where are you from, Fiona Denning?”
That’s how the conversations on board had started all week. Where are you from? What do you do? Where are you headed over there?