For Love and Country

by Candace Waters

  While the other women seemed content to share news and speculation about the coming conflicts, most of them hated the idea of battle. A lot of them were nervous to be as close to the fighting as they were.

  But a part of Lottie was itching to fight. Maybe it was because, more than the other women, she’d worked side by side with men in the shop. She hated the idea of their going off without her, taking risks without her—putting their lives in danger without her. If someone had been willing to put a wrench, or a weapon, in her hands, she’d have been just as ready to take it as any of the men.

  She’d heard how men in service grew deeply loyal to their units, wanting nothing more than to stick with them, whether they were under terrible fire or not. She felt that way about her unit—the men in the shop—leaving without her. About Luke’s leaving without her. Deep in her heart, she felt a strong desire to protect her country, and her freedom, just like them.

  In the meantime, they still had to finish the last planes that could fit on the carrier. Every one counted. And every one had to be perfect.

  That was why Lottie was there now. Pilots had started to fly short flights from the base runway to the carriers, delivering finished planes. Sometimes Chief Cunningham made the runs himself.

  Cunningham hadn’t flown a plane for the Navy in a long time. But for the short hops to the carrier—basically a takeoff, lazy circle around the bay, and landing—he often volunteered without complaint.

  Today, Luke had sent Lottie along with him. It was a welcome relief to have a break from trying to do her work without thinking of him. Now, though, with the fresh, salty breeze, she couldn’t help but wish it’d been Luke, and not Cunningham, sitting next to her in the cockpit. Her stomach lurched at the thought.

  The maintenance department on the ship had sent a message over saying the propeller on one of their TBM Avenger reconnaissance planes had been catching when it started up. They’d given it a crack on board, but it was such a serious problem they wanted some expert eyes on it.

  “You look it over,” Luke told her. “I think we can get it back, no problem. But I can’t leave the shop while we’re working around the clock. I want you to be my eyes. You can do that?”

  It wasn’t really so much a question as a statement.

  And without hesitation, Lottie had nodded.

  Then she’d jumped into the next plane Cunningham was flying down to deliver to the carrier, so she could get on board and get a look at the Avenger herself.

  Maybe she should have been worried about the fact that it was her job to decide whether the Avenger was safe to fly back in, not for some faceless pilot, but for both her and Cunningham.

  But what had really worried her, on the flight over, was the fact that she’d never set foot on the carrier before. The men on land at the base had had time to get used to seeing some female faces around. But the carrier was still a man’s world, through and through.

  And now it was her assignment to convince all the mechanics on board that she knew how to do something not one of them had been able to do themselves.

  Lottie had seen this kind of problem before. If she was right, it was simple, but deep in the propeller, so that most of the obvious fixes, even by a seasoned mechanic, wouldn’t work. In any other circumstances, she’d have been sure. But in this case, she had to get into the plane and fly in it back to base.

  So she climbed up the ladder to the propeller and removed the variable-pitch hub case, exposing the gears. There it was: a dislodged gear.

  “What’s she doing?” one of the carrier’s mechanics asked Cunningham, who was standing at the foot of the ladder. “Gonna wind it by hand?”

  Cunningham didn’t say anything, but she could imagine his smug expression: a cross between annoyance and anticipation of what this guy’s reaction would be if she could get it working.

  Lottie fastened the stray gear back into place, at least enough so that they could get it to the shop, where they could tear the whole thing apart.

  Then she climbed down the ladder.

  “You might want to get out of the way,” she told the mechanic beside Cunningham, who was already following her out of harm’s way.

  “You sure about that, honey?” the mechanic said with a leering grin.

  Ignoring him, Lottie gave the thumbs-up to the tech in the pilot’s seat, who had been waiting for her signal to fire the engine to test the prop.

  Instantly, the engine roared to life—with the propeller spinning.

  The mechanic on the ground scrambled out of the way. “You got her fixed!” he yelped.

  “Not quite,” Lottie said. “Just a patch-up. Once she’s loaded off the boat, we’ll need to get her back to the shop and tear it apart to make sure it’s fixed once and for all.”

  When they got back to the shop, Lottie strode in with an air of satisfaction. But she’d hardly had a moment to savor it when she saw Luke coming toward her.

  “Palmer,” Luke said. “Glad you’re back. Come here.”

  Dutifully, Lottie went over to where he was standing, close to the lip of the repair bay, where the shadows of the hangar gave way to the bright Hawaii sunshine, and tried to pay attention to anything else in the world but how close Luke was.

  To her surprise, he immediately climbed up on a nearby stool and began to whistle and clap to get the hangar’s attention. The dozens of men in the shop began to gather ’round. As they did, Lottie’s own heart started to slow down.

  “As you know,” Luke said when they were all assembled, “the carrier is shipping out tomorrow. You men have all done tough work here. We’ll have twenty more planes on board than the commander ordered, because of your work in the past weeks. And I don’t have to tell you, those twenty planes could be the difference between victory and defeat.”

  A low cheer rose up among the crowd.

  “As you also know,” Luke said, “most of us will be shipping out with them, on the carrier or support ships. Including me.”

  Another cheer rose up.

  Lottie scanned Luke’s face, looking for any trace of the vulnerable man she knew lay buried beneath the surface.

  Is he really ready to go to battle? she wondered. A nagging voice inside her knew that he wasn’t. And her heart twisted at the thought of what might happen to him if he was sent back into the fight while he was still struggling with the nightmares she’d seen in his eyes. But war raged on, whether the men were ready or not.

  “We’ll be leaving a skeleton crew in the shop,” Luke went on. “If you haven’t got orders to ship out, you know who you are.”

  A few of the men looked at each other. Lottie glanced at them as they did, hoping to get a sense of who she’d be working with.

  “Cunningham will be running the shop while I’m gone,” Luke said. “And Palmer will be his second-in-command.”

  The room suddenly fell silent.

  Lottie’s head spun.

  “I’ll expect nothing but the absolute best standard you’re all used to providing in my absence,” Luke added. “Because believe me, I’ll be back to check up on everything you’ve done.”

  He grinned, then clapped his hands. “All right,” he said. “Get back to work.”

  As the men shuffled away, Lottie looked up at Luke, in shock.

  “What’s the matter, Palmer?” he asked. “Don’t tell me you don’t think you can do it without me.”

  For some reason, this challenge focused Lottie’s mind. She lifted her chin. “I can,” she said. And at the same time, she started to feel a bit of indignation. Where did he get off, putting her in charge without ever even talking to her about it? Maybe he thought it was some kind of compliment and she should be grateful for whatever she could get from him. But she deserved more respect than that.

  Luke raised his eyebrows. “So why are you still standing here? You out of work to do before the carrier goes out?”

  “No,” Lottie said.

  “I didn’t think so,” Luke said, and grinned.

&nbs
p; As Lottie headed back to the plane she’d been working on, she heard a voice she didn’t recognize. “Hey, Palmer,” he said.

  When she turned, she found herself face-to-face with a mechanic she’d never talked to before, whose name tag read Redmond.

  “Guess you’re the captain’s favorite,” he said. “Wonder how you managed that?”

  By the lift of his eyebrows, he made it very clear how he thought she’d managed to become Luke’s favorite. Her cheeks flared with heat.

  “Redmond,” Lottie said with as much authority in her voice as she could muster.

  Redmond looked at her in shock, as if she were some kind of savant for knowing his name. Apparently he’d forgotten it was prominently displayed on the chest of his overalls.

  “You staying here once the carrier goes out?” she asked.

  Almost reluctantly, Redmond nodded.

  “You think you’d make a good boss?” Lottie continued.

  Redmond wasn’t sure of the answer to this one. He just looked at her, calculating.

  “You see that Avenger out there?” Lottie said, nodding at the plane she and Cunningham had just brought in from the carrier. “I’ll tell you what. You get that thing up and running, I’ll make you the boss. Deal?”

  Redmond couldn’t bring himself to say no, but he wasn’t about to try his hand at the Avenger on his own, either.

  Lottie just stood there for a long moment, making sure that he, and all the men around him, had the time to take the situation in.

  “I didn’t think so,” she finally said, then turned on her heel and smiled as she walked away.

  Twenty

  “YOU KNOW,” MAGGIE SAID with a twinkle in her eye, “when all these men ship out, we’re going to finally have the run of the place.”

  She was scanning a civilian club that was currently bursting at the seams with women and Navy men. One of the big carriers was shipping out tomorrow, and the men were doing everything they could think of to celebrate what for many would be their last day on land for God knew how long.

  “Can you imagine it?” Maggie asked, turning back to Lottie where the two of them were ensconced, at one corner of the long tiki bar, and raising her eyebrow.

  Lottie took her own look around the room, which was filled with tiki decorations: carved wooden faces, flickering flames hidden behind gold lampshades, and local girls dressed in short skirts and leis.

  “Probably a lot less of this tiki motif,” Lottie guessed. “And we might let these waitresses work in tuxedos, like a respectable maître d’.”

  “Or make the maître d’s wear leis,” Maggie said with a grin. Then her face turned serious as she looked around the place.

  She didn’t need to tell Lottie what she was thinking. Despite the joking, the dancing, and even the singing that broke out from time to time in the raucous club, nobody could really forget that the war never stopped.

  And that many of them would be on their way to the heart of it, tomorrow.

  There was nothing any of them could do about it now. Except for enjoy themselves tonight, as much as they could, because they didn’t know when they’d have the chance again. But still, shadows passed across many faces in unguarded moments. When it happened, everyone else quickly glanced away, because they all understood themselves.

  Lottie remembered one of her last engagement parties, the one where she’d run into Robert heading off to war. No one had had a care in the world, except for Robert. All the needs of those in her social circle back then had been taken care of. There were so many diversions and frivolities. She’d never wanted for anything.

  The mood at this party was very different. But for some reason, Lottie felt more at home here, despite the danger everyone faced. Or maybe she felt at home because they were all facing danger together, not despite it.

  “Anyway,” Maggie said, “I think we might miss them after all.”

  Then her face crinkled into a mischievous grin. She gestured to the surrounding crowd, as if she were a maître d’ herself, introducing guests to a large and tempting smorgasbord. “What do you think?” she asked, looking over at the faces of the many young men gathered there, in all shapes and sizes, from all backgrounds. “Any in particular that you’re going to miss?”

  The face that rose up in Lottie’s mind, instantly, was Luke’s. As soon as it did, she felt uneasy, foolish, and strange.

  She didn’t like the feeling that her mind, or maybe her heart, was mixing up business and pleasure without her permission. She hadn’t been lying awake at night like some silly schoolgirl, nurturing hopes of a romance with her commanding officer. In fact, she’d done just the opposite, doing her best to avoid him and stay out of his way.

  Lottie had never been the kind of girl to go chasing after a man. And she certainly hadn’t joined the Navy to find one. Her heart squeezed at the sudden thought of Eugene back home, a wave of guilt resurfacing. There was some small part of her that felt she owed it to him not to entangle herself in a complicated new romance.

  She hadn’t ever told Maggie, or any of the other women, about her feelings for Luke, or the private moments she’d shared with him. She and Maggie had become such good friends that it felt strange not to share with her about something that important. And the other girls in the barracks were in the habit of swapping stories about their own little crushes and flirtations, some of which Lottie suspected might end in full-blown marriages, if this war ever ended.

  But her story with Luke wasn’t like any of theirs. What could she tell the girls about him, even if she wanted to? That he was harder on her work than any of the other trainees’? That he spent entire days pretending that she didn’t exist? That he only gave her compliments about her skills as a mechanic?

  And the deeper things between them—the strange way he’d looked at her on the beach, as if he were hoping something he saw in her face might actually save him, and the frightened, wounded noises he’d made when she caught him sleeping in the repair hangar—those felt far too personal, too serious and deep, to be swapped in exchange for their tales of seamen who brought them little presents at their desks or complimented them on the cut of their uniforms.

  Maggie shifted in her seat and suddenly looked away. Lottie realized that the same sorrowful shadow must have fallen on her face. Maggie searched the crowd, and Lottie guessed she was checking to see if there was some specific person who had caught Lottie’s eye.

  But as she looked back and forth, from Lottie to the crowd, it became clear to Maggie that the answer didn’t lie out there. Maggie slapped the counter.

  “All right, Palmer,” she said. “Why the sad face? Did one of these clowns break your heart? Do I need to do some reconnaissance of my own, before all these jokers move out?”

  Lottie shook her head and smiled.

  As she did, a tall, handsome soldier with blue eyes and black hair almost stopped in his tracks, caught by her expression.

  But Lottie simply didn’t have the wherewithal to think of what to say to him tonight.

  “All right,” Maggie said, waving him by. “Move along. Move along.”

  Behind him, his buddy gave the tall soldier a shove, and the tall soldier disappeared into the crowd, looking for a more welcoming greeting from someone else.

  “Although,” Maggie said, “I have to say, I might have talked to that one myself.”

  As Maggie gazed after the departed young man, Lottie felt a tap on her shoulder.

  When she turned, Luke was standing there, his expression serious.

  He looked so different in his street clothes, a light blue shirt and a pair of blue jeans, that it threw her off balance. Her heart suddenly started beating harder, her breaths short.

  “Palmer,” he said. “I’ve been looking all over for you.”

  Lottie glanced at Maggie.

  “Palmer,” Maggie repeated in a voice full of amusement. “Just when I thought you were out of surprises.”

  “Maggie,” Lottie said. “This is Luke—I mean,
Captain Woodward. Captain Woodward, this is my friend Maggie.

  “We work together,” Lottie said, by way of explanation, turning back to Maggie.

  By now, Maggie was staring at her with an amused expression.

  “Mm-hmm,” Maggie said, nodding. “I’m sure you do. You know what? I think I saw someone over there I need to go talk with.”

  “Well, no,” Lottie began to protest, but there was no stopping Maggie, who swanned off into the crowd, perhaps in the direction of the tall seaman who had just grinned at them.

  Lottie half-hoped that when she looked back, Luke would have disappeared, too. Then Lottie wouldn’t have to figure out what to say next. And she’d have some time to deal with the rush of emotions that had welled up in her at the sight of him.

  But there he was, as solid as ever.

  “It’s kind of noisy in here,” he said. “You want to see if it’s any better outside?”

  “Sure,” Lottie said. Out of habit, she tried to stuff her hands in the pockets of her overalls, a tic she’d developed in the shop whenever she tried to ward off her uncomfortable feelings. But there were no pockets in the dress she was wearing. And she suddenly realized that she was wearing pearls and not her usual jumpsuit.

  The end of the bar was near a side door. When Lottie agreed, Luke nodded at it, and an instant later, the two of them were standing outside, under the bright light of the Hawaiian moon, which broke and sparkled on the ocean beyond the beach where the club was perched. Lottie wasn’t sure if it was the view that took her breath away or something else.

  “Look familiar?” Luke asked.

  For a long moment, nothing looked familiar to Lottie. Apparently standing outside in the dark made the whole world seem new and strange.

  But then she realized what he was talking about.

  The club was set on the far edge of the beach that the officers loved to frequent. The one where she’d run into Luke that night, just a few weeks before.

  “Care for a walk on the beach?” Luke asked.

  When Lottie hesitated, he grinned. “I’ll be there, in case you run into any strange men.”