September 1959

Sarah asked Ann to meet her after school.

For the twelve-year-old, who began the seventh grade at King Kamehameha Middle School that morning being able to go to Pearl Harbor High School made her feel very grown up.

Ann knew that Sarah McCawley looked at her as a younger sister because she didn't have any sisters of her own. She was the middle child and the only girl. Ann and her younger sister and brother grew up two doors down from Sarah and her older brother Danny and younger brother Joseph.

She couldn't remember a time when her family and Sarah's didn't do just about everything together. If it wasn't a ballet or piano recital, baseball game or a swim meet they would go to the beach on Sunday's and have a picnic. Her father, Major Daniel Walker and his best friend and Sarah's father Major Rafe McCawley had been stationed at Wheeler Air Force Base for as long as Ann could remember.

She knew well the stories of how Sarah's parents met and how Major McCawley was shot down twice during the Second World War. She loved listening to how her own parents met in 1941 and how they waited through a whole war to get married. She couldn't think of anything more romantic than that.

Ann stood in front of the school and waited for the three o'clock bell.

When it finally rang, she watched as the front doors to the school opened and the students began to stream through them. She looked intently for Sarah all the while hoping she didn't look like a middle school kid.

"Annie!" She heard her friend's voice and looked up to see Sarah with her brother and a girl she'd never seen before. "So how was your first day of school?"

"Fine. I'm not sure about my Algebra class though." She admitted.

"Math has always been your strong suit Annie." Danny smiled at her. "So I wouldn't worry about it."

"I'll be doing Algebra II Danny and I don't think it's going to be that easy." She frowned.

"Well, Mr. Wizard if it's so easy you can help her if she needs it." Sarah laughed. "You breezed through Geometry and Calculus so this should be a piece of cake for you."

Danny put an arm around Ann's shoulders. "If you need any help just ask, okay?"

"Thanks, I'll probably need it." She sighed.

"Daniel, will you take me home please? If I have to spend one more moment in this place, I'll go mad." The blond said.

Ann saw Danny glance at his sister and she was none too pleased. "Just tell me where you live." He sighed.

"We live at Wheeler, I told you that." She folded her arms across her chest and frowned. "It's certainly not as nice as Eglin was, but it'll do until I graduate." And she began to walk toward the student parking lot.

"I'll see you at home." Danny's face flushed and as he juggled his schoolbooks and presumably the blonds as well walked away to catch up with her.

"Danny!" Sarah called after him. "He was going to give us a ride home, the rat. That's one of the reasons I asked you to meet me here. Danny bought a '55 Chevy last weekend and he was going to let me ride in it."

"Why would he buy a four-year-old car?"

"Because he can't afford a new one. Dad helped him with the down payment, but now he has to come up with the monthly payments himself. Between football, ROTC and working after school and weekends bagging groceries at the Oahu Market, he needed his own car to get around."

"Has he heard from the Air Force Academy?"

Sarah shook her head. "Not yet. He had to have all of his paperwork turned in at the end of June so they would have time to decide who's going to be admitted next fall. Danny says it's probably going to be around Thanksgiving before he knows anything."

"What's he going to do if he isn't accepted?" Ann asked.

She laughed. "You know Danny. If he isn't admitted for next fall, he'll try again for the fall after that. My brother is bound and determined to get to the Air Force Academy and he'll do what he has to, to get there."

They began to walk and Sarah sighed. "I guess it's the bus." And they headed toward a line of busses that waited in front of the school. "So aren't you the least bit curious who the girl is?"

She shrugged her shoulders. "Not really."

"I don't like her."

That made her laugh. "That's pretty obvious."

"Her name is Caroline Harris and her dad is a pilot who was transferred from Eglin Air Force Base a couple of weeks ago. She's an only child and has already made it very clear that she doesn't want to be here. She said that as soon as she graduates, she's moving to New York."

"What's so terrific about New York?" Ann wondered.

Sarah smiled at her. "Don't you remember the stories about our parents going to New York? They had dinner at a swanky hotel, went to a nightclub for drinks and chipped in for a two-room suite."

"It can't beat Hawaii."

"Now how would you know that, you've never been there." Her friend observed. "I would love a chance to go to New York."

"I can't think of any place nicer than where we live right now." Ann said.

"You sound just like Danny. If he didn't want to go to the Academy so badly, I don't think he'd ever leave Hawaii."

She smiled. "Come on Sarah, can you honestly say that you'd want to live anywhere else but here?

"I never said anything about living anywhere else, but having the chance to see someplace else is another thing." Sarah told her.

"I always thought it would be kind of fun to see that nightclub where my parents met." Ann admitted. "He and Mama were both so shy, it's a wonder that they ended up getting married."

"I've heard Dad and Mama talk about that too and Dad said that he never met two people that were more right for each other than them."

Ann smiled at her friend. "I've heard my parents say the same about yours."

"Do you ever think about how lucky we've been?" Sarah asked. "We haven't been like a lot of military families that have been transferred from one end of the country to the other..."

"Or one country to another."

"Or one country to another." She laughed before she continued. "We've been able to stay in the same place while we've been growing up and I've always been grateful for that."

"So have I."

"Hey girls, how'd you like a ride home?"

Ann looked up and saw Danny standing next to his car.

"What happened to Caroline?" Sarah asked him.

He shrugged. "She got a look at my car and said she'd rather take the bus."

The two girls looked at each other and Sarah was frowning before she looked at her brother and put a smile on her face. "Well I don't know about her, but I'd rather ride in any car than have to take the bus."

"Well then get a move on, I haven't got all day." He said with a grin as he walked around to the passenger side and opened the door. Sarah got in and Ann got in next to her before Danny closed the door. "So what do you think Annie? Do you mind being seen in my old car?"

She looked at him and smiled. "It's better than the bus."

"Good answer." He smiled back and laughed before he walked around to the driver's side and got in. He closed his door and started the engine. "She may not be new, but she runs like a dream."

Ann and Sarah looked at each other again and Sarah mouthed, "She?" as Danny pulled away from the curb and headed for home.