Free Flygirl by Sherri L. Smith Page B

administrative building to what they call the training theater, where we will be processed. It’s an old white building that sits like a box on the flat earth. The low roof doesn’t make it any cooler in here. A small, kind-faced woman enters the room, a clipboard stacked with papers in her hands. She’s in uniform, a tailored blue skirt and matching jacket, with her dark brown hair cut into a neat bob.
    â€œWelcome to Avenger Field, ladies,” she says. Her voice has a no-nonsense kind of gentleness to it that reminds me right away of Mama. “My name is Leni Leoti Clark Deaton. I am the establishment officer here. Anything you need, anything concerning any WASP trainee, come to me and we will take care of you. For the next five months, you will be in training for the Women Airforce Service Pilots. Some of you will succeed, but most of you won’t. Take a look at the girl to the left of you.”
    Dutifully, we all turn and look at the turned heads of our fellows. Some look like kids. Some look like movie stars. I can only guess how I must look to them.
    â€œNow,” Mrs. Deaton says, “look at the girl to the right. Say goodbye to both of them today, because two out of every three of you will wash out before training is over. We want only the best, ladies. We keep only the best. Remember that.”
    There’s some nervous shuffling, the kind you hear before a pop quiz in school. Everyone’s wondering who will be left standing in five months. I feel my stomach roll again and this time not from the heat. I clench my teeth and take a deep breath. I will be here, I tell myself. I will be here.
    I catch Patsy Kake smiling at me from the corner of my eye. Maybe she’ll be here, too. She’s got the attitude for it.
    Mrs. Deaton passes around copies of a list of rules for living at the base. I glance down the sheet. No smoking, no drinking, no fraternizing with the instructors . . . the list goes on.
    â€œAll right, listen up, ladies,” she says. “You’ll be bunking in the barracks, six girls to a bay, two bays to a barrack. There’s a Jack and Jill bathroom accessible from both rooms, or Jill and Jill, if you like. No men are allowed in the barracks. The twelve of you will share this bathroom for the next five months. Make friends. It’ll go a lot easier that way.”
    Mrs. Deaton’s voice is clear and mellow. It seems to carry from her small frame like a church bell, despite her size. We all listen attentively. “Barracks are broken up by alphabet. When I call your name, come stand beside me, and we’ll take you to the laundry, where you’ll pick up your sheets, and then on to your quarters. We are on a military clock here. The hands go from oh-one-hundred to twenty-four-hundred hours. It is now twelve o’clock, or twelve hundred hours. You have the afternoon to settle in. Supper is at eighteen hundred hours, or six o’clock. Get used to the hours, ladies. It will also make life easier.
    â€œNow, Anderson, Attley, Boxer, Bradford, Cunningham, DeAngelo,” she begins calling off names. One by one, girls pull away from the crowd to stand by her side. They look nervous, every one of them. Me, I can hear the blood pounding in my ears. This is it. Anyone I room with could be my best friend or the person who turns me in. It’s all the luck of the draw.
    â€œHoward,”Mrs. Deaton calls out. “Jennings. Jones.” I almost jump. A chill crawls up my spine and I step forward to join my new bunkmates. We don’t look at each other, just our feet, and wait for the rest of our group. I don’t know what to do with my hands, so I hold my purse with both of them. I don’t know what to do with my feet, so I stand there, heels close together, and wait.
    â€œKake,” Mrs. Deaton calls. Patsy Kake smiles and sashays over to stand between Jennings and me. “Laidlaw. Lowenstein.” The last of the girls,