Chapter Eight
Changes
Alice jumped awake, when somebody pounded on her door insistently. The room spun around her and she had only vague memories how she'd gotten here.
The door flew open, and Allie could only register the silhouette of a man, before she squinched her eyes shut, blinded by the bright light. She recognized the footsteps as Rafe's, and let herself fall back into the pillows. He sat down on the edge of the bed and placed something on the nightstand.
"Alice, what on earth did you do?" he asked, clearly concerned.
She blinked warily and dared to open her eyes. He offered her a pill. She picked herself up slowly and grabbed the pill with her teeth. She tried to swallow it, but her throat felt dried out. Rafe took a glass from the nightstand – that must've been the thing he had placed there – and helped her to drink a few sips. Finally, the pill slid down.
Never before she had had such a terrible hangover – actually, there hadn't been any hangover before. And she never had drank four double bourbons in such a short time before.
Gradually, she could remember, why she'd hit the bottle. And she remembered how she'd gotten back from downtown. She gave an involuntary pained groan.
"Please tell me that Doolittle has no idea of this" she mumbled faintly and tried to sit up tentatively. The room started to spin again, but more slowly. Nevertheless, she felt sick immediately; luckily, Rafe was alert enough to hand her the bucket, that was standing next to her bed, in time.
Allie retched, but only a few flakes of foamy saliva dripped from her lips. Her stomach was empty, there was nothing she could regurgitate, she had done that at nighttime already. She felt miserable.
"No, Doolittle knows nothing. But that will change if you don't get your shit together and get up now. He'll ask questions if you don't see your brother off."
All of a sudden Allie was like sober. Rafe would leave today, to go to England, go to war. Why had it to be him?
"Rafe, can't you stay? War is in Europe, why can't you wait until we'll get involved? That will happen. But you needn't go searching for danger, come hell of high water…" She broke off.
It would lead to nowhere, whenever Rafe had made his decision, he stood by it. Actually, that was one of his better traits, but today she cursed him for that. His damned sense of duty and trying to fight for others. Him trying to be a hero. Was it not enough to be a hero for her?
Cumbersomely, she peeled off the blanket and found she still wore her red dress, although it was crumpled now. She'd take care of that later, for now she was glad she could stand and walk without everything spinning around her or feeling sick again. Rafe must have gotten hold of a highly effective drug. Well, it had to be good for something, that he was seeing a nurse.
She rummaged around in her closet, then she went to the bathroom with a bunch of clean clothes under her arm and proceeded to wash herself. Today, she was in the mood for her uniform. Alice in civvies had been up to too much nonsense.
She felt notably better after brushing her teeth and rinsing the stench from alcohol, cigarette smoke and gastric juice out of her hair. The uniform also did help.
She got herself a cup of coffee – hot, black and with lots of sugar – at the galley where she met Danny. Today, he was wearing civvies.
She plunked into the chair next to him and propped her head up. He gave a low laugh.
"Oh God, how embarrassing, I'm so sorry" she mumbled, when the kiss crossed her mind. He laughed again.
"You didn't mean it" he explained her behavior away. She shook her head in embarrassment and sipped her coffee.
Several minutes later Rafe appeared with his packed bags and Allie looked at him, for the first time consciously this morning.
Yes, it also hurt him to go away, she saw that in his eyes. But he couldn't do anything about it.
On their way to the station the three tried to talk about anything but the impending farewell, but it was a losing game. They all knew, they couldn't prevent it from happening.
At the station hall they asked after the platform, from which Rafe's train would depart, who searched the crowd strikingly often until Danny commented.
"I thought you told her not to come."
Alice faced her brother startled. "Why mustn't Evelyn come to say goodbye to you? That makes no sense."
"Yes, it does" Rafe explained, "that's my test. If I tell her not to come, and she comes anyway then I know she loves me." He smiled at the thought of Evelyn.
Allie shook her head. "Makes zero sense. Luckily, you're not testing me, I wouldn't come. But you know that I love you."
They had reached the platform and the train was to depart in a few minutes. The woman continued to walk down the platform in search for the rail car with Rafe's seat, and was unaware of the men stopping for a moment.
Danny put the bag down he'd been carrying. Rafe hesitated to pick it up. He inhaled audibly.
"If anything happens to me" he started carefully, "I want you to be the one to tell her. And Allie."
Danny dropped his gaze. "Just make sure and come back for all of us" the younger man replied. They hugged each other tightly.
Then Rafe grabbed his bags and went to meet his impatiently waving sister.
"Quick, hurry, the train leaves any minute now!", she called out to him, whipped one of the bags out of his hands and threw through the open train door. He put down the other bag next to it.
He squeezed his sister tightly. "Take care", he instructed, "and keep out of mischief."
She returned the hug. "You too, and don't get shot, okay?"
The sibling said their goodbyes and Evelyn still hadn't shown up. The doors closed, the train was ready for departure and Rafe had lost all hope, when he saw her at the platform. She put her face into her hands and turned and he knew, she loved him too.
They scarcely had reported back to base, when Major Doolittle summoned the pilots to his office. He explained to all of them where Rafe was headed to, and that he had news for all of them.
"I need my best pilots in case of an emergency, that hopefully never will happen. Until then the Navy wants you to be safe, so you'll be posted at the safest and probably most pleasant base – Pearl Harbor."
If they hadn't been Navy pilots, the men would have cheered.
"In ten days, at the beginning of February, you'll be on your way, so better prepare yourself."
And they did prepare. Allie was blissfully unaware of how much effort it took to move a whole flight, but luckily, the pilots didn't need to take care of the planes.
Two days later, she had learned that the nurses would also be shipped to Pearl Harbor.
And however much Allie was excited to go to Hawaii, it hurt her to be separated from her brother. When he had left Tennessee to go to Long Island, that had been something different. He still had been on the same continent, even though 1,000 miles away. But she had managed to follow him. However, from Hawaii to England, that was eight times the distance, with a gigantic ocean in between.
She already had written him al letter, but by the time she would receive a response, she would be lying on the beach getting a suntan.
A few days later they were on their way.
The surface impression of Hawaii was exactly what Alice had been expecting. Warm, sunny, fantastic.
They reached the airfield without complications and were greeted with an "Aloha", a typical Hawaiian greeting. The men here made a totally different impression, than Allie was used to from Long Island. Danny seemed equally perplexed. "Y'all pilots?" he asked.
One of the men – the one wearing an Hawaiian shirt – scratched his head thinking. "Well" he answered, "we're working on it. There's a lot of switches and stuff." He grinned broadly and laughed. "Pride of the Pacific."
"And who are you?" asked the man, who had greeted them.
"Terror of the Skies" Danny answered, also grinning broadly.
"And who's that chick?" the Hawaiian shirt asked further and pointed at Allie, who was standing half hidden behind Red. She stepped forward and faced the man.
"Biggest Terror of all" Billy added to the debate. "Got into a fight with her once, can't recommend that."
"Lieutenant Alice McCawley", she introduced herself and offered him her hand. His smile that had begun to cease with Billy's comment, lit up again and they shook hands. "Pleased to meet you, Alice, I'm Lieutenant Gooz Wood." Her smile back was as big as his.
"Then let's get you into your quarters" the Sergeant interrupted and they went to have a closer look at their new rooms.
Allie again had her own room, that had a much more pleasant view than before. When she was nearly done unpacking, there was a knock on her open door. Danny was standing under the doorframe and had already changed clothes.
"Come in", she waved him nearer and stowed away the last few things. In this climate, she would have to get some new clothes or collapse in the heat soon.
He carefully stepped closer and sat down on her bed. Allie closed the last closet door and sat down next to him.
"What can I do for you?" she asked and couldn't remember the last time he'd come to her alone. That probably had never happened before. They knew each other all their lives, but what had kept them together was Rafe.
Danny didn't answer for a while, but finally looked at her. Tears glistened in his eyes. He tried to say something, but his voice failed him. He cleared his throat and blinked a few times.
"I just miss him so much" he finally admitted. Allie knew exactly what he meant. She squeezed his hand gently. "I just need a moment" he added.
"Want a hug?" she offered. He didn't answer, probably afraid of saying neither yes nor no. So she just put her arms around his shoulders and pulled him a little closer. "Everything will be fine" she tried to reassure him and patted his back softly.
Someone coughed quietly just outside her door. Gooz looked into the room. "Did I interrupt something?" he asked cheerfully, and Danny escaped her hug jumpily. "I can come back again later, but you really should close the door."
Danny had leapt to his feet and was at the door with a few steps. "It's not what it might have looked like" he explained in passing and was gone.
Gooz looked after him with raised eyebrows and then back to Allie. She laughed. "Really, it's not what it seems" she confirmed Danny's statement.
"So… he's not your boy friend" Gooz continued and leaned casually against the frame.
Allie immediately regretted her words, feeling there was something cooking now. And Doolittle was not around. In the beginning, her fellow pilots didn't make approaches to her because the threat of punishment from the Major was omnipresent, and a bit because she had slugged Billy. But Sergeant Sistern – or Earl, like everybody called him – seemed to more relaxed on that matter and Gooz hadn't seen Billy after the fight.
But still, she liked him somewhat.
"No, Danny's just a friend, like a brother" she eventually answered. "Say, what so you do for fun here?" She tried to steer the conversation to another topic.
"I can show you the island, if you want." He smiled charmingly again.
"Maybe you can show us all?" she negotiated. "The boys would be bitterly disappointed to miss the fun."
He sighed. "Okay then, but tonight, you buy the first round."
She agreed and laughed. He left to let her colleagues know and she could change out of this awfully warm uniform at last. In Hawaii her uniform wouldn't be used very often.