“Yeah,” he murmured and reached out a hand, briefly squeezing my wrist before letting go again. “Thanks for saving my life.”
He wasn’t joking with me now. The teasing from earlier had left his voice and demeanor altogether.
“Just doing my job.”
“Still...thank you.”
“Well, I can’t marry you if you’re dead, William.”
He chuckled and then winced, pressing his hand gently to his wound. “What about the head injury guy?”
I shrugged. “He probably won’t remember asking me anyways.”
“I have a feeling I’ll one day regret a lot of things I’ve done and said in this war,” he said. “But asking you to marry me while high on blood loss and morphine won’t be one of them.”
And with that, he stopped fighting the medicine, closed his eyes, and went to sleep.
13
After delivering SergeantMitchell and the other men aboard that first flight to my base in England, I was immediately put on another plane, returning to the same field to bring back another group of wounded. This time there were no prisoners and Theodore and I gave one another a look of relief.
There were several men in casts, the plaster still wet, and I marveled at the quickness at getting them immobilized, a move crucial to their survival, but hard to manage under such dire circumstances.
I took in one man covered from neck to toe in plaster, his face bloodied, head wrapped in bandages stained with blood, mud, and something else I couldn’t identify but didn’t bode well for the young soldier. If I were a religious woman I’d have prayed for the man. Instead, I gripped the bottle of morphine in my pocket.
“Ready?” the pilot shouted from the cockpit.
I looked to Theodore beside me, who nodded.
“Ready!” I yelled over the roar of the engines, and we were off.
As soon as we landed back in Fulbeck and the men were unloaded, I grabbed my bag and strode wearily across the tarmac to where my bicycle was parked.
It was evening, the sun just making its way down for the night, the air thicker than usual and warm. I breathed in, smiling at the green hills beyond and a lamb following behind its mother as I pedaled home, hoping in the dimming light that I didn’t miss my turn.
“How was your first day?” asked a woman sitting at the kitchen table when I entered in search of a snack before heading upstairs.
I couldn’t remember her name. Olivia? Olive? Ellen? I’d met so many the day before, first at lunch, then in the evening as they returned from missions and began filtering in, exhausted and bleary-eyed.
“Busy,” I said. “But good. Didn’t lose anyone.”
“That’s the goal,” she said and went back to the letter she was writing.
I grabbed an apple and smiled at the others I passed on my way to my room. A few were playing cards, a couple reading, and several others were sprawled about chatting quietly.
My bunkmate, Hazel, was fast asleep in the cot across from mine, her dark hair splayed across her pillow, a stuffed dog nestled in her arm. She’d gotten in this morning as I was heading out, having been sent to another base nearby to unload injured before catching a ride back before the sun came up. We’d had a brief introduction and then I’d hurried out as she’d fallen fully clothed into bed where she still lay, taking full advantage of a day off.
Grabbing my towel, toiletries, and a fresh set of clothes, I padded to my assigned bathroom where someone had just left, the mirror still covered in condensation and the air steamy and warm. With a sigh, I peeled off my clothes and stepped into the pristine tiled shower, luxuriating in my surroundings, and for the first time truly thrilled I’d been sent to England instead of the New Hebrides.
While I stood under the warm water, letting it wash away the grime of the day, my mind drifted to the soldier I’d had to stitch up and his woozy marriage proposal. I grinned under the spray, remembering how handsome he’d been, though pale and barely conscious. Char would’ve stood by his side the entire plane ride, and by the end of it, would’ve had a date. Sometimes I wished I was a different sort of girl.
But thoughts of him reminded me of the other passengers we’d had onboard that same flight. The German prisoners. My heart sank as I remembered letting them get the best of me.
“Stupid,” I whispered, my eyes filling with tears. I couldn’t let that happen again. It was too dangerous.
“What time is it?” Hazel asked when I returned to the darkened bedroom.
“Twenty-three hundred hours,” I said, turning on the small lamp on the crate serving as a makeshift bedside table. “Have you been asleep all day?”
