“He’s alive, Dot. We’d know if something had happened, wouldn’t we? We’re his only family. They would have to notify Dad if somethinghappened. I agree with you on his letter writing though, and when he eventually comes home, I plan to give him a piece of my mind.”
“I wish he’d come home right now,” Dot said with a sigh. “This house is going to feel so empty without either of you in it.”
“Fred,” Dash said, changing the topic.
“Fred,” Dot echoed. “You go. I don’t know where to start.”
Neither did Dash. She thought about Fred a lot, imagining what his last moments might have been like. Flying was Dash’s passion, but there was obviously a terrifying aspect to being airborne. Fred would have been streaking through the sky, then something had struck his plane—the fuselage? a wing?—and he would have scrambled for some way to level it. To make everything right again. Then he’d grasp the fact that he couldn’t, that he wasgoing to die, and what then?
“People say things like ‘He knew what he was getting into when he signed up,’?” Dash said, dabbing a tear from the corner of her eye. “But how could he have truly known? I mean, he got shot out of the sky. One minute he’s flying, and the next… We don’t even know how he died. Was he alive when he crashed?”
Dot looked away. “I changed my mind. I don’t want to talk about that. It’s awful.”
“If we don’t talk about these things, they’ll just stew,” Dash warned.
“Let’s talk about the Wrens, then,” Dot snipped.
Dash blinked. “I’m not going to apologize for my decision, Dot. It’s what I need to do.”
Dot’s expression was tight, a mixture of anger and grief.Betrayal. Dash had never seen that before. This was the first time she’d ever come close to betraying her sister. And boy, had she done it.
“You should join,” Dash said, filling the silence between them. “You really should. You could join the typing pool or work the telegraph machines, I don’t know. They’d love to have someone as smart as you. If you tell them about your French and German, they’d leap at the chance to bring you on.”
She knew Dot didn’t want to go. She wouldn’t want to leave the quiethaven of their house. She wouldn’t want to work someplace where she didn’t know anyone and didn’t know what was expected. Dot would have already convinced herself that she wouldn’t fit in. That she would fail.
“Couldn’t you wait a little longer?” Dot tried. “With everything that’s happened with Fred—”
“Fred is precisely why I have to go now. Men are dying over there, and I’m doing nothing. My own cousin was killed while I was flying around without a care in the world. I don’t want to sit around feeling this way when maybe I could somehow prevent it. Fred died doing something important for the rest of the world. I want to do what I can as well.”
“So your mind is made up.”
“I love you, Dot, but if I stay here I will go nuts. You know that. You’ll be fine without me. The best thing you can do is keep busy. Think about joining.” But it was more than that, and they both knew it. Dash’s hands tightened to fists on her lap. “I want you to step out of this house without me and not be afraid.”
Dot’s voice was cold. “I am not you, Dash.”
“No one is asking you to be me. There’s so much you could do for the Wrens that would be of use. Things that are nothing like what I can do. Imagine a brain like yours working for them. You could really make a difference.”
A barrage of rain hit the window, but neither of them flinched.
“I don’t want to fight with you, Dot.”
“Then don’t leave me.”
“I’m not leavingyou, I’m—”
“Yes, you are!” Dot exclaimed, sitting straight up. Dash was alarmed by the rush of hurt that filled her sister’s eyes. “I don’t know what will happen around here without you. I don’t know what will happen tome. I don’t know how I will live without seeing you every day. I don’t know how to… I don’t know anything except I don’t want you to go. Please, Dash. Stay with me. Don’t leave me.”
Every part of Dash longed to rush to her sister and hold her tight, assure her that she’d always be with her no matter where she was. Butshe did not move. It was the hardest thing she’d ever done, and it needed doing.
“I’m not leaving you,” she repeated calmly. “It’s not about you or the rest of the family. I’m going for my own sake. It’s impossible for me to sit here, knowing that Gus and all those other men, all those boys we grew up with, are going through hell and I’m not doing anything about it. I believe joining the Wrens is how I can do something.”
“How can you say you’re not helping?” Dash demanded. “We’ve been doing a lot of good. We volunteer for the Red Cross, we built the victory garden in front, we collect and donate metal, and we’ve knit hundreds of things for the men over there.”
“You’re right,” Dash allowed. “All of those things are helping. But I need to do more.”
The flush faded from Dot’s cheeks as defeat set in. She reached into her pocket and handed Dash an envelope. “I guess you need this, then,” she said.
It was from the recruitment office. “You hid this from me?”
