Eyes Turned Skyward by Alena Dillon

Author:Alena Dillon
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2022-08-02T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 17

December 1943

JACKIE COCHRAN APPEARED BEHIND GEORGIA AND PEGGY at breakfast and laid the gavels of her hands on their shoulders. “I need to see you both in my office,” she said, and didn’t wait for a response before marching out of mess.

“What was that about?” Connie asked.

The weigh-in. Cochran had promised to put Peggy back on the scale before letting her near a bomber. Peggy had assumed she’d forgotten, and maybe she had—until now. Was Peggy over one hundred pounds? She had no clue. With new workouts and a change in diet, she was lean but brawny and had lost sense of her size. Her time might be up. Her bite of oatmeal lay like a dollop of plaster on her tongue. She wanted to swallow it but feared it would trigger her gag reflex and she’d lose her breakfast when she needed every spare ounce. She brought a napkin to her mouth and spit out the oatmeal.

Once they were under the sun’s watchful gaze, Georgia swatted her arm. “Let’s hear it. What did you do?”

They traveled through mini–dust tornadoes whose flying pins pricked Peggy’s eyes. She blocked them with her arm, though she’d been at Avenger Field long enough to know it was no use. By the time they reached Cochran’s office, her mouth would be chalky and her skin unnaturally tanned.

“Last I checked there were two of us on this funeral march,” she said.

“I’ve kept my nose clean since our sojourn into town. I can only assume you’ve been naughty, and Cochran lumped me in by association. If I’m going down, I at least deserve to know why, and the telling better be titillating.”

“There’s nothing to tell.” Peggy’s thumb thrummed against the hard notch of her hipbone. If this was about her weight, why would Georgia be called too? “What do you imagine I’ve done?”

“Off the top of my head, I’d say you finally canoodled Major Handsome.”

Peggy’s laugh propelled from her stomach, too loud, she thought, too showy. She tried to counter it with nonchalance. “How could Cochran lump you in with that?”

“As Bill Shakespeare put it, ‘Let me count the ways.’”

Peggy raised her hand. “Please don’t.”

Georgia knocked against Peggy as they walked. “You didn’t object to the idea of canoodling Major Handsome.”

“I did so.”

A flagpole struck the sky above their heads and whipped the stars and stripes like it couldn’t believe its good fortune to be given the responsibility. Georgia raised her voice to be heard over the thrashing. “Your hackles only went up at the suggestion of me joining. You don’t despise the man. You want him to yourself.”

They’d reached headquarters, a one-story, plain-faced building that made Peggy feel like a Texas Ranger entering a police station. Peggy brought a finger to her lips, glad she didn’t have to defend herself, and pulled the door open. The air inside hit them still and sober. It urged them to be professional, even supplicating. Peggy slipped that persona over her head, but not before fitting in the last word.

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