“That’s dangerous,” he said, visibly impressed.
“Sometimes,” she admitted. “I’ve been lucky.”
“Me too. Especially tonight, when I met you.” He had finished the cigarette, and she took it from him, stubbed it out on the sole of her shoe, and slipped the butt in her apron pocket. Then she carefully maneuvered the gurney again to take him back to his original location. “Thanks for the smoke,” he said, smiling happily.
“Now you should try and get some rest. I’ll check on you again before I leave,” she promised as she put him back where he started and set the brake so he didn’t roll away.
“When is that?”
“I’m off at midnight, and no, you can’t go to the pub for a drink and a smoke,” she said sternly, and he laughed. She didn’t know why, but she liked him. He was something of a rough diamond, but he seemed like a nice guy.
“Don’t work too hard,” he said as she waved and hurried off. She had some critically ill patients to check on before her shift was over.
She wandered by to check on him before she left, and he was lying flat on his back and snoring. She smiled and signed out at the nurses’ desk. He had been the bright spot in the night. One of her patients had died of his injuries, and most of them were suffering from their wounds. She suspected that he’d be shipped back to the States soon, but at least the war would be over for him, and he could go home. For some, they would be there for months, and had numerous surgeries to look forward to, and a severely altered life, or permanent disfigurement. Petty Officer Stanley was right, she decided. He’d been lucky.
She walked the short distance to her barracks. It was a beautiful June night, and she could easily have been fooled into believing that all was well with the world. But her patients, and the nurses who cared for them, knew better, which made it hard to believe that the world would ever be whole again.
Chapter 12
Just to keep his spirits up, Alex stopped by to check on Petty Officer Stanley the next day on the way in for her night shift, after she flew her regular missions with her crew during the day. They had all been working double and triple time since the invasion of Normandy, but slowly the less seriously injured men were leaving to go back to their ships, and the critically injured to be sent home once they were well enough to move. There were navy officers in and out of the hospital constantly to check on the status of their men and categorize them with their own triage system, some of which shocked the nurses and doctors. Some of the men the navy was returning to serve were in no condition to face combat again, but they sent them anyway. They needed them too badly to send them all home.
When Alex checked on Petty Officer Stanley, she found that he’d been moved to a ward. She went to see him and found him in a proper bed. He had showered and shaved, with assistance, since he couldn’t get his cast wet.
“You’ve changed address,” she said when she saw him, greeted him with a smile, and slipped him a cigarette. He smiled broadly when she did.
“Thanks for that.” He tucked it into the pocket of the pajama top provided by the hospital.
“How are you feeling today?” she asked him, and he smiled.
“Better now that I’ve seen you. I had bad news this morning. Whenever I’m back on my feet, they’re sending me back to the front, wherever it is at the time.” Alex was surprised.
“They’re not sending you home with third degree burns and a broken leg?” She was shocked.
“It takes more than that to impress the navy. They figure I’ll be up and back on my feet in a matter of weeks. That is not good news to me. I’ve been here for two and a half years. That’s a long time. I’m ready for this war to end.”
“We all are,” Alex added. “You’ll be with us for a while. You’ll be in that cast for six weeks at least.” So he’d be at the hospital until mid- or late July.
“I’ll be ready to go back into combat by then. I want to kill a German or two before I go home. They’ve given us enough grief.”
The Allies’ goal was to liberate Paris, but advancing through the French countryside, town by town, was going slowly. The Resistance was doing all they could to help.
“At least I’ll have a chance to see more of you before I leave,” he said, gazing at her longingly. He looked at her intently when he spoke to her, as though he wanted to see into her soul. It made her uncomfortable, but at the same time, his gaze was so piercing that she found she couldn’t resist. She was attracted to him, but she didn’t know why. He wasn’t handsome. He was powerful-looking, but there was a gentle side to him too. He made her laugh when she stopped to talk to him. And he made it very clear that he was attracted to her. None of the men she knew and had grown up with had ever been so direct.
“What does your father do?” he asked her one day, curious about her. She seemed intelligent and well bred.
“He’s a banker,” she said, feeling suddenly shy with him. He asked real questions and wanted real answers.
“Do you have a boyfriend here? Or one at home?” She thought the question much too personal, but answered it too.
“No, I don’t. They keep us too busy to have time for romance.” Although some of her fellow nurses managed it, like Lizzie. She and Ed had become a couple now in everyone’s mind.
“Why not?” Dan Stanley pursued his question. “You’re a beautiful girl, you must have men running after you all the time.” She smiled at that.
“I’m a nurse, Officer, not a movie star. I fly air evac missions all day and bring twenty-four injured men back from the front with every load. And now I do a night shift here. I’m exhausted by the time I go home. But we won’t be doing the extra shifts forever.”
“My family is in the commercial meat business,” he volunteered. “We provide meat, mainly beef, for high-end restaurants and hotels. It’s not glamorous, but it’s a lucrative business. Our family lives well on it. My father owns the business and I run it for him. We have the finest top-quality butcher shop in Philadelphia, and a booming wholesale business in Pittsburgh. That must sound vulgar to you,” he said, and hit the nail on the head. She had been thinking just that, and felt like her mother when she did. She hated her mother’s snobbism and was ashamed to realize that she was thinking something her mother would have. What difference did it make how he made his money? She tried to envision him at one of her parents’ parties and almost laughed out loud. “Was I right when I said you have a fancy accent? Something tells me there is some very blue blood in those veins.” He waved vaguely at her arms.
“Why does it matter?” she asked seriously.