In Perfect Time

by Sarah Sundin

  His right foot worked an imaginary pedal for a bass drum, and he picked up the pace, swinging the rhythm.

  The boys murmured in Italian, squirming in expectation.

  Roger’s eyes popped open. He shot them a mischievous grin, then tapped out a frenzied but gentle pattern on the four little heads. The boys ducked and shrieked with delight.

  He laid the sticks in parallel on the book, lowered his chin to signal the end, then stuck out his hand to the oldest boy. “Gum, per favore? Gum?”

  All four laughed at the role reversal.

  “What do you have, Shell?” Roger dug the Mars bar from the pocket of his jacket, a bit squished from his nap, but boys didn’t care about things like that.

  “A Hershey bar.” He handed it to the smallest boy and mimed breaking it in half.

  “Grazie, signore! Grazie!” Eyes bright, the boys divided the candy and scampered away down the beach.

  “The Pied Drummer strikes again.”

  Roger laughed and returned his drumsticks to his jacket, his fingers still tingling with the rhythm.

  “Say, if this drumming thing doesn’t work out, you should be a teacher. You’re great with kids.”

  His hand clenched around the sticks, right over his heart. It skipped a beat. His laugh came out stiff. “Why would I want to be stuck in a school all day? Hated school.”

  Hated it because of dull teachers who made lessons as tasty as chalk. He’d sit and watch and think how he’d make the lesson engaging with color and humor and flash.

  Countless appointments with the principal’s paddle showed him color and humor and flash did not belong in the classroom.

  But the big bands welcomed it.

  2

  Pomigliano Airfield, outside Naples, Italy

  March 27, 1944

  “Need some help?” Mellie Blake leaned in the cargo door of the C-47. “My plane’s already set up, and I have nothing to do.”

  “Sure.” Kay motioned her fellow flight nurse inside. “Dabrowski isn’t here yet.”

  Mellie climbed in and tucked her wavy black hair behind her ear. “Oh, you’re almost done.”

  “You sound disappointed.” Kay reached into a canvas bag affixed to the ceiling, drew out a coil of web strapping, and let the end flop to the floor. “Missing Georgie?”

  “Of course, but I’m sure she misses us more.” She released another coil of strapping a few feet away. “Can you imagine? They sent her to Capri as a reward for the ditching incident, but for Georgie, being alone is the worst form of punishment.”

  Kay laughed and knelt to secure the strapping to a pole running along the floor. “She’s probably attracted a crowd of new friends. So how’s Tom?”

  “Wonderful.” At the mention of her boyfriend, Mellie smiled, wide and bright. “His Engineer Aviation Battalion finished another airstrip in the Foggia area. He has a forty-eight-hour leave over Easter weekend to come to Naples. I can’t wait. It’ll be nice to worship with him.” Her gaze slid to Kay, a question almost visible on her lips.

  With a slight shake of her head, Kay scuttled that question. She tugged on the strap, nice and taut from floor to ceiling. That’s what she liked about Mellie. Although her friend’s faith was important to her, she never pushed.

  Besides, if Kay walked into the air base church, the building would burst into flames and the chaplain would have a coronary.

  Mellie tested her strap too. “I’m glad we’re getting more planes with this new system. It’s much better than the old aluminum brackets we had when we first came to North Africa.”

  “Sure is.” Kay stood and slipped her hand in one of the loops that would hold a litter pole when the patients were loaded later that morning. “That’s the last one.”

  A smile flickered on Mellie’s face. “I’m glad I could be of such great help.”

  “Mellie? Ah, there you are.” The chief nurse, Lt. Cora Lambert, poked her head inside the cargo door. “Your patients are ready to be loaded.”

  “Thank you, Lieutenant.” Mellie left the plane. “Bye, Kay.”

  “Bye, Mellie-bird.” Kay glanced around the cabin. All looked fine. “How about my patients?”

  “Not yet. Maybe half an hour.” Lambert pulled back, ready to leave.

  “Wait.” A moment alone with the chief couldn’t be wasted.

  “Yes?”

  Kay hopped to the ground and scanned the airfield. Yes, she had privacy. “A few weeks ago you said replacement nurses were coming at the end of the month. Do you still need volunteers to go home?”

  “I need one more. Why? Did you change your mind? I thought you loved flight nursing.” Her brown eyes widened, and she stared at Kay’s abdomen.

  Oh, for heaven’s sake. She thought Kay was stupid enough to get pregnant. Kay tossed on a smile. “I do love flight nursing. So much that I’d like to go to the chief nurses’ school.”

  “The . . . chief . . .”

  Kay’s heart twisted at the sight of her dream out in the open for the first time. She gazed away, toward the bulk of Vesuvius to the south. “I’ve been thinking about it since October when we were back at the School of Air Evacuation in Kentucky.”

  “You have?”

  “Yes. It’s perfect. I love nursing, but I’m also excellent at administration and organization. I’d be a good chief nurse. We all know this war will be over soon. Come spring, we’ll go on the offensive again here in Italy, and all those troops gathering in England will invade France, and it’ll be over before you know it.”

  “Most likely . . .” Lambert sounded wary.

  Kay stroked the olive drab aluminum of the fuselage. “Ma’am, we both know flight nurses won’t be needed after the war. I could go back to being a stewardess, but I’m twenty-eight, and they’ll let me go when I turn thirty. That’s just how it is. I could work as a ward nurse, but after the independence of flight nursing, how could I go back to kowtowing to physicians? But I could be a chief. I’m good with details—”

  “Kay.” Lambert raised her hand. Her expression oozed compassion but held the force of a red traffic light.

  “Yes, ma’am?” Her smile twitched, and she hated it.

  Lambert glanced away to the tents of the 58th Station Hospital by the flight line. “I don’t know what to say. It never occurred to me that you’d be interested.”

  “I am. This is what I want.”

  She smoothed back her brown hair, and her mouth puckered. “If the decision were based on your skills alone, I’d send you. You’re one of the best nurses in the squadron—levelheaded, clever, and warm but not sentimental.”

  “Thank you, ma’am.” She winced at the word however hanging in the air.

  “However . . . your reputation. Why, I can’t keep track of all the men you date. I’m surprised you can.”

  Kay stiffened. “Nothing illegal or immor—”

  “Maybe not, but it’s the appearance.” Her frown deepened. “I haven’t said anything because you stay away from the married men, I haven’t heard anything scandalous, and you keep curfew.”

  Kay fingered the side seam of her gray-blue trousers. “As I said, nothing illegal or immoral.”

  “But there are so many. The other girls don’t take you seriously.”

  A slight shrug. “It’s just for fun.”

  Lieutenant Lambert crossed her arms. “There’s more to being a chief than nursing and administrative skills. The girls look up to you, and you have to present an image to strive for.”

  “But I’m a good leader.”

  “Are you?” She waved an elegant hand toward quarters. “Your flight of six nurses has given me the greatest headaches from the start. Things have improved, but still, after a year abroad, yours is the least unified of the four flights in the 802nd Medical Air Evacuation Transport Squadron.”

  She shifted her weight from one leg to the other. “They don’t like each other much.”

  “I’m sorry, Kay.” Lambert headed down to the next C-47.

  All t
he wind whooshed out of Kay’s lungs. Her father was right. The wicked didn’t prosper.

  Comiso Airfield, Sicily

  Roger walked over the stubbly grass toward Headquarters with Shelby. Patchy clouds hovered over the Sicilian plain, sloping down to the Mediterranean to the southwest. If his squadron kept getting grounded on good flying days, he’d never get the thousand hours of flying time needed to go home.

  “Uh-oh,” Shelby grumbled. “Here comes Klein.”

  Grant Klein marched in their direction, head down for once. The man usually strutted about like he owned the airfield.

  “Say, Coop, the DFC,” Shelby said in a loud voice. “Imagine that.”

  Klein raised dark eyes, snorted, and passed them by. “Didn’t know they gave out medals for losing planes.”

  Roger turned and shoved down the smoldering, painful truth. “You see, it’s called the Distinguished Flying Cross. You’ve got to fly to get it, not sit around schmoozing with Parrish.”

  Shell nudged Roger’s arm, his eyes too wide. “Didn’t you hear? Parrish is rotating stateside. We have a new squadron commander.”

  Roger rubbed his chin. “Come to think of it, I did hear. Good news for you, Klein. You won’t be flying only milk runs anymore. Might get yourself a medal too.”

  Klein’s look turned even darker. “You’re a jerk, Cooper.”

  He grinned at Shelby. “More good news. I got promoted from lazy bum to jerk.”

  “With hard work and determination, anything is possible.”

  Klein stomped away. “Only promotion you’ll ever get.”

  “True.” Roger resumed his trek to HQ. Not like he wanted a promotion anyway. He just wanted to log his hours and survive the war.

  “Heard anything about the new CO?” Shelby asked.

  “Not even his name. About to find out. I’ll fill you in later.” Roger waved off his friend and ducked in the open flap of the Headquarters tent.

  A tall officer in his forties leaned over a field desk, wearing a lightweight leather flight jacket, khaki trousers, and the crush cap favored by airmen. Same as Roger wore. Except this man had a major’s gold oak leaves pinned to the collar of his khaki shirt.

  Roger saluted. “Sir! Lieutenant Cooper reporting.”

  “At ease, Lieutenant.” The officer raised light eyes. “I’m Major Bill Veerman, your new squadron commander.”

  Veerman? Like one of Roger’s favorite bandleaders, a young up-and-comer. In fact, the major had the same kind of look about him, lean and blond and narrow faced. “No relation to Hank Veerman, I presume.”

  “My kid brother.” He slid on reading glasses and picked up a paper for inspection. “He’s done well for himself. I’m proud of him.”

  Roger’s mouth went dry. Veerman’s band sat at the top of his list, not too famous to be out of his league, and it fit his style—not too sweet, not too hot. He clasped his hands behind his back. “One of my favorite bands. The man can send it.”

  “Send it?” The major peered over the top of his glasses. “You’re a musician?”

  “A drummer, sir.” Behind his back, his thumbs tapped out a new rhythm on each other.

  “Drummers.” Veerman groaned. “Hank can’t keep a drummer for two weeks straight.”

  That was better news than the DFC. That meant openings. That meant God might have answered his prayers.

  Veerman studied Roger. “Drummers are known for being . . . unreliable.”

  His thumbs stilled. Sounded familiar.

  The major flipped through the papers. “That explains your record. Late all the time, sloppy reports, pulling pranks on the other pilots. Parrish said you questioned a direct order. And you’ve lost two planes.” His expression dared Roger to defend himself.

  He took the dare. “Sir, the first plane was destroyed in a ground collision. I’d parked her on the hardstand, shut her down, and left. Another plane lost its brakes, slammed into it.” Grant Klein, the idiot. And two good people had died—navigator Clint Peters and his girlfriend, flight nurse Rose Danilovich.

  “And the second? Just a few days ago. You flew in the middle of a volcanic eruption?”

  Roger cleared the huskiness from his throat. “Sir, I knew it wasn’t safe to fly. I was given a direct order, which I questioned. Then I got reprimanded for ques—”

  “For questioning the order.” Veerman nodded. “Then you successfully ditched, saved a planeload of patients, and earned a nomination for the DFC.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The major came out from behind his desk and eyed Roger up and down, his expression vacillating between admiration and disapproval. “You have a good head on your shoulders and a mind of your own. That I like. Now show me hard work and reliability.”

  “Yes, sir,” he said, but he’d only disappoint the man. Might as well scratch Hank Veerman’s band right off that list.

  3

  Naples, Italy

  March 28, 1944

  Kay sashayed through the doors of the Orange Club with her friends, and a dozen heads turned. She never tired of the reaction she sparked when accompanied by blonde beauty Alice Olson and sultry brunette Vera Viviani.

  Ever since they’d answered Pan American Airway’s call for registered nurses to serve as stewardesses, the three women had worked together, roomed together, and played together.

  Alice had a boyfriend in the Army stateside, but she didn’t let that interfere with her nights out—her boyfriend certainly enjoyed his nights out. Vera had a man in her life but maintained mysterious silence. Probably an enlisted man. Georgie Taylor had dated an enlisted man earlier in the year, but she wasn’t as secretive as Vera.

  Kay, on the other hand, had a mission. She strolled around the tables in the darkened room, in time to the band’s rendition of “Stardust,” through billows of cigarette smoke, making chitchat with Vera and Alice to keep the men at bay while she sized them up. Her breakup with Grant left an unacceptable hole in her lineup.

  Lambert wanted too much. Give up her boys? Unite Vera and Alice with Mellie, Georgie, and their new friend Louise Cox? Why not ask her to hike up Vesuvius and put a giant cork in it?

  Might as well enjoy life while she still had her looks.

  What then?

  Kay gripped a chair back for support, laughed for her friends’ sake, and pretended to slip her black pump back onto her heel.

  What then? She had to set things up now to settle things later. Without the Army Air Force chief nurse program, she’d have to serve in a hospital ward and work her way up to chief. Might take years. Might mean moving from city to city, searching for an opening. And it might never happen.

  Then she wouldn’t have a home.

  Pain squeezed her chest so tight she gasped.

  Kay shook it off, swung back her hair, and scanned the tables. “What do you think, gals?”

  “Plenty of partners tonight.” Alice wiggled her fingers at a man across the room.

  Sure, plenty of partners, but such young pups. This got more difficult each year as the mature men married off.

  The band eased into another soft number, almost lifeless.

  “Come on!” a man called, hands cupped around his mouth. “Enough with the sweet stuff. We want to jive.”

  The bandleader lowered his baton, glared at the heckler, and turned to the microphone. “As I mentioned at the start of the set, our drummer didn’t show. We have to make do.”

  Vera rolled her eyes. “If this war’s taught us anything, it’s how to make do and do without.”

  “Coop!” a flyboy yelled. “Hey, Coop! Get up there and help.”

  Coop? Kay followed the man’s gaze. There at the front corner table sat a bunch of boys from the 64th Troop Carrier Group, including Roger Cooper.

  He shook his head and waved off his pal.

  Kay returned Vera’s eye roll. Roger Cooper, the fuddy-duddy? Whenever Kay said one word to him, he’d say something religious and scram.

  As far as Kay could see, religious people
came in three varieties. Some held a can of white paint and wanted to slather it all over her, people like Georgie Taylor, although Georgie had wisely lowered her paintbrush. Some, like Mellie Blake, offered the paint can but didn’t get huffy when Kay turned it down. And some, like Roger Cooper, acted as if she held a can of black paint and wanted to slather it all over him.

  Bert Marino, one of the pilots, stood and tugged on Roger’s arm. “Yeah, Coop’s our man. Used to play for a band in Chicago.”

  Kay nudged Vera. “His high school marching band maybe.”

  However, the clamor built, and Roger stood, raised one hand to quiet the crowd, and made his way to the bandstand.

  Oh dear. He might be a fuddy-duddy, but she had no desire to see him humiliated. He was a good pilot, and all the nurses liked flying with him. Georgie had survived the ditching because of him.

  Roger conferred with the bandleader, then drew drumsticks from inside his olive drab service jacket and shrugged off the jacket.

  Kay lifted an eyebrow. Someone once told her Coop was an Iowa farm boy, and he was built like one, with thick arms and a solid chest.

  Too bad he was so boring.

  “Excuse me, miss? Would you like to dance?” A skinny blond kid blocked her view, half a foot taller than Kay, but she probably outweighed the poor thing.

  “I’d love to.” She smiled back and gave him her hand. “I’m Kay Jobson.”

  “Enchanted.” He kissed her hand. “I’m Bob Sperling.”

  She would have found him charming. When she was eighteen. “Come on, Bob. Let’s cut a rug.” She led him to the dance floor.

  On the bandstand, Roger stared at the drums and cymbals like a kid at the fair. The trumpet section stood and pumped out the opening chords of “Sing, Sing, Sing.”

  Bob broke into a jitterbug, but Kay winced for Roger’s sake. No mistaking why the bandleader chose Benny Goodman’s big hit. The complicated drumming had made Gene Krupa a star but would prove Roger Cooper an imposter. Then the band could return to their lazy love songs.