Like most folks at the time, Marge and I volunteered for the war effort. On Mondays we rolled bandages for the Red Cross, and on Fridays we worked at the local USO club, which was held at the recreation room of the Catholic church on Prytania Street. We were junior hostesses, which meant we helped serve refreshments and clean up afterward (or at least I did; more often than not, Marge was still flirting with one or more servicemen when the lights came up at midnight), but our main job was to entertain servicemen on leave or waiting to be shipped out. We were there to dance and talk and generally boost morale. Not exactly a hardship for two single young women.
We entered the church rec hall a few minutes before seven thirty.
“Marge, Addie. There you are.” Mrs. Brunswick frowned as she bustled forward. A tall, stout matron with tight gray curls and a high-pitched voice that seemed incongruent with her size, she was both a senior hostess and in charge of the church’s women’s auxiliary, so she ran the show on all fronts. “You’re late.”
“The streetcar was running behind,” Marge lied effortlessly.
“I was getting worried about you. Three of the other girls are out with colds.”
“Well, we’re here now. And there’s nary a sniffle between the two of us,” Marge said.
Mrs. Brunswick eyed her uncertainly. She was never sure if Marge was making fun of her or just being personable, as junior hostesses were encouraged to be. I was relieved when she turned away and waved her arms as if she were gathering butterflies in front of the refreshment table. “Girls, attention, please! Circle up. Is everyone wearing their name tags?”
The twenty or so other young women milling around the room wandered up.
“Who wants to work the refreshment table tonight?” Marge and I raised our hands, along with several other girls. “Margie, you and Tina can serve cake, please. And Addie, sweetheart, would you pour the punch? And please make sure no one spikes it.”
“Of course,” I said, although I had no idea how I was supposed to keep that from happening.
“Last time, some spirits found their way into the punch, and three of our girls got sick,” Mrs. Brunswick said.
Marge’s eyes widened in disingenuous shock. “How awful!”
I knew for a fact that Marge had let a soldier from Georgia pour a bottle of hooch into the punch about an hour before the dance ended. A redhead also privy to this misdeed giggled and poked Marge, causing Mrs. Brunswick to give them a suspicious frown.
I tried to create a distraction. “Oh, what beautiful flowers!” I exclaimed, bending down to examine a vase of yellow tulips on the table between the punch and cake.
“Aren’t they lovely?” Mrs. Brunswick smiled appreciatively. “Schmidt Florists donated them.”
“They’re just trying to cover up the fact they’re Huns,” sniffed a girl named Eloise.
The crease in Mrs. Brunswick’s forehead deepened. It occurred to me that the name Brunswick sounded somewhat Germanic, as well. “They can’t very well help their name, now, can they? They’re a good American family, and I won’t tolerate talk like that.” She glanced at her wristwatch and clapped her hands. “All right, now—places, everyone.”
Flora, a pale, nervous girl from an upper-crust New Orleans family, whom Marge had nicknamed Florid because she blushed so easily, took her place at the registration book. The other girls scattered around the room.
Mrs. Brunswick nodded to the two women at the front door. They opened it, and a stream of servicemen poured in.
The refreshment table was quickly swamped. During a lull in the action, Marge elbowed me.
“My, oh my, look what just walked in!”
There was no mistaking whom she meant. He was tall, probably six two or six three, with brown wavy hair, a movie-star handsome face, and an army officer’s uniform. His most attractive attribute, though, wasn’t physical; it was his bearing. There was something about the way he carried himself, something deliberate and steady and so self-assured that other men stepped out of his way. He wore the mantle of a leader, of someone accustomed to the respect of others, as surely as he wore a four-button army uniform. When he turned to the side, I could see the Army Air Force insignia on the upper sleeve.
Marge saw it, too. “Oooh, he’s a flyboy!” she cooed. In Marge’s mind—and mine, too, I admit—airmen were a special brand of wonderful. “I call dibs.”
He looked around the room, and for a second, our eyes met. My skin felt hot.
“Seriously,” Marge murmured. “He’s mine.”
I had always acquiesced to Marge’s preferences, turning down offers to dance with men she liked. After all, I reasoned, she was my roommate, and chances were, we’d never see any of these men again. But this time was different. “I’m making no promises,” I replied.
“But I saw him first!”
“Doesn’t matter.”
I watched him bend to sign the registration book. Marge and I weren’t the only girls attracted to him. Flora’s face turned hot pink as she handed him the pen. Two other girls quickly appeared at the registration table as if to help him. One of them—a big-chested brunette from the Seventh Ward, named Betty—leaned over the book directly in front of him, deliberately displaying her generous décolletage. He straightened and handed the pen to Betty, his gaze sweeping up to her face with admirable smoothness. He smiled at her, inclining his head to listen as she said something. I saw him respond, smile, then say something to Flora. Her blush spread to her neck. Her face was the color of a rooster’s crown.
“He’s coming this way!” Marge whispered, unbuttoning her sweater. She whipped it off in record time.
