slippers and robe, still bleary-eyed from her date the night before.
“Oh, my head.” Boots groaned, sliding cautiously onto a chair across the table. “I don’t even know what time I got in last night.”
“After two in the morning.”
“No wonder I feel like a truck ran over me.”
Hildie folded the paper back to read the second-page continuation. “Have you seen this?”
Boots rubbed her temples. “Heard it on the radio last night.”
Papa had worried about this kind of thing happening. German relatives had written glowing letters about the meteoric rise of Adolf Hitler and the National Socialist German Workers’ Party. Papa said a man with such messianic charisma might prove to be a devil in disguise. Mama thought the Great War would end all wars in Europe. Papa said man’s nature never changes.
Boots made a dismissive gesture. “I hope America stays out of it.” Apparently she had other things on her mind besides what was happening in Europe. “I saw a new guy in the cafeteria yesterday.” She raked her fingers through her curly black hair. “Good-looking, tall, great body, nice eyes, a smile to make a girl’s knees wobble.”
Hildie looked up from the paper. “Did you make a date with him?”
“Nope. He’s an orderly. I only go after doctors, lawyers, and Indian chiefs. You might like him, though.”
Hildie just looked at her. They’d had this discussion before. Boots accused her of becoming a social outcast. Hildie said she had enough of a social life with the nurses and her patients at work.
“Flo, you’re going to become like Miss Brown.”
“And what’s wrong with Miss Brown?”
Boots stood, shaking her head. “Gotta get ready.” She opened the bedroom door and turned back to Hildie. “I’m going out after work. Don’t wait up for me.”
Hildie laughed. “I never do.” She had the house to herself more than she had expected, especially when it came to yard work and doing dishes. She didn’t mind the quiet. When she had a day off, she slept in, caught up on laundry, housekeeping, and yard work. She kept up correspondence with Cloe, who had moved to Los Angeles, or wrote to Mama and Papa. Mama wrote back once a month, giving a chronology of what had happened on the farm. When Hildie had Sunday off, she went to church.
Hildie was sitting in the cafeteria the next evening, finishing her supper and thinking about Boots and her comment about Miss Brown, when she felt someone looking at her. She glanced up and saw a young man standing in line, waiting for the cook to hand him his dinner. He fit Boots’s description of the “new guy” she’d seen. When he smiled at her, Hildie looked down quickly. Flustered, she picked up her tray, dumped the contents, and left the cafeteria.
The next day when she came on the ward, she saw him helping lift one of her patients from bed to gurney for transporting him to surgery. He had an athletic build like Bernie. Football player? When he smiled at her again, she felt herself blush. Embarrassed, she looked away quickly and busied herself with paperwork at the nurses’ station. She kept her eyes down as he went by with her patient.
As she stood in line for lunch, someone came up behind her. “I saw you on the medical ward this morning.”
She glanced at him and returned her attention to the cafeteria menu. Picking up her order, she headed for a table in the far corner of the room, where she could be alone. As much as she laughed over Boots’s disdain for orderlies, she knew there was an unspoken rule about nurses fraternizing with them. What was it the General had said?
“Mind if I sit with you?” When Hildie just stared, openmouthed, he set his tray down and took the seat opposite hers. “Is there an unspoken rule around here that a nurse can’t say more than three words to an orderly?”
Did he read minds? “No.”
“One word. Hardly an improvement.”
His smile did odd things to her insides. “I don’t usually strike up conversations with people I don’t know. I only saw you yesterday for the first time.”
“That’s better.” He grinned, which made her heart do flips and flutters. “I’m a junior at UC Berkeley with eyes on medical school. I thought it might be a good idea to work in a hospital and get a different view on my future career.”
“Good for you.”
“I’m working in the psych ward for the next month.”
“I hear it can be a real riot in there.”
He laughed. “Good one.” He was even more handsome and appealing when he laughed.
“I wasn’t joking.”
“Oh.” He looked at her, really looked this time, and she could feel the heat coming up again, along with tingles and other feelings she had never had before that made her feel vulnerable. “Miss Waltert.” He held out his hand, a big strong hand like Bernie’s only without the calluses. “I’m Cale Arundel, but my friends call me Trip.” When his fingers closed around hers, heat surged through her. She pulled her hand away.
“Do you like movies, Miss Waltert?”
“Who doesn’t?”
“How about Friday night?”
She glanced up sharply. “Are you asking me for a date?”
“You look surprised. Yes, I’m asking you for a date.”
She looked around, disturbed by his attention. She had never been asked out by a boy, let alone a man. Why would someone like Cale Arundel be interested in her? “I’m on duty.”
“When are you off duty?”
“I’d have to check the schedule.”
He crossed his forearms on the table and leaned forward, gazing at her with faint amusement. “Is it because I’m a lowly orderly that you hesitate?”
“I don’t know you.”
“I don’t know you either, but I’d like the opportunity to get to know you. Hence, the invitation.”
She looked at her watch. “I need to get back. Excuse me.” She grabbed her tray, dumped the contents in the garbage can near the door, and left the tray on top. Her heartbeat didn’t slow until she returned to the medical ward.
“What happened to you?” one of the nurses asked.
“Nothing. Why? Am I late?”
“No. You just look a little flushed and excited about something.”
Cale Arundel came on her ward later that afternoon. The moment she spotted him, she grabbed a clipboard and ducked into the linen closet to check off the list of sheets, pillowcases, towels, and washcloths. One of the nurses peered in. “Someone’s waiting for you at the nurses’ station.”
Cale walked toward her. “I came for an aspirin.”
“An aspirin?” Nurses sat, heads together, whispering and grinning at her. She glared at Cale. “You came all the way here from the psych ward to find an aspirin?”
“I didn’t think you’d loan me a straitjacket.”
She didn’t smile. She looked pointedly at the other nurses and then back at him. Maybe he’d get the hint and stop providing grist for the gossip mill. He noticed, too, but shrugged it off. “People talk. So what?”
“Why are you here?”
“Why do you think?”
“I have no idea!”
“I checked your schedule. You’re off on Friday. I’d like to take you to dinner and a movie.”
No one had ever asked her out, and the thought of this handsome young man, orderly or not, being interested in her seemed beyond comprehension. “I have no intention of being the brunt of someone’s idea of a joke.”
“Why would I joke about it?”
“No!”
