Chapter Thirteen

“Ruth?”

“Shirley!” cried Penny, Doris, and Mary together, recalling what they’d come around for in the first place.

Doris and Penny promptly rushed out of the lounge and came to a halt at the foot of the stairs. Looking down at them stood Shirley. Her red hair, normally tied in a ponytail, was loose and flowed around her narrow shoulders. Her usually friendly face, however, was not only wearing the frown the girls had become used to seeing on the rare occasions they’d seen her around the base earlier in the day, it also appeared gaunt, almost haunted.

“What are you two doing here?” Shirley demanded, placing her hands on her hips and showing no sign of coming down the stairs.

Doris opened and closed her mouth, not sure how to react before deciding a frontal attack, so to speak, was the best way forward. Taking Penny by the hand, she started up the stairs. From the surprised expression on Shirley’s face, this wasn’t what she wanted. As far as Doris was concerned, that didn’t alter things.

As they got to the top of the stairs, Shirley turned on her heel and stalked off into the last room at the end of the hall, followed by the slamming of the door.

Penny offered her arm to her American friend. “Shall we?”

Doris linked an arm through Penny’s. “We shall,” and they strode down the hall, raised their free hands, and knocked. Then, without bothering to give Shirley a chance to reply, Doris turned the doorknob and the two of them marched in.

Sitting cross-legged on the brass bed, Shirley didn’t seem to be surprised at the intrusion. If anything, she appeared to have taken the few seconds she’d had alone to gear herself up. The saying redheads were feisty and always up for a fight could have been made for her, as the venom in her voice when she spoke was nearly enough to make her two erstwhile friends take a step back.

“Why are you here?”

The blaze in her eyes spoke volumes more than words, and briefly, both Penny’s and Doris’s resolves stuttered. At the same time, they squeezed each other’s hands, Doris kicked the door shut, and splitting up, they came and sat on either side of their obviously still upset friend.

As they both sat, the bed springs gave a squeal of protest and, without warning, sagged alarmingly in the middle. Both Doris and Penny slipped down until they were pressed up against Shirley, who promptly tried to shove them away, though with little effect.

“Will. You. Get. Off. Me!” she stuttered out, trying to push one and then the other.

In spite of the seriousness Shirley was obviously seeing, Penny and especially Doris were finding it increasingly difficult to stop from bursting out in laughter at the tangle of limbs they now found themselves in. With the way all three were endeavoring to push their way out of the jumble with no thought of coordination, nobody was getting anywhere in a hurry.

“If you’ll move…” Doris stated, holding up someone’s leg.

“I don’t think…” Penny began.

She was interrupted by Shirley’s still angry voice. “It’s not as if I invited either of you two buggers…”

Penny and Doris both exchanged quick looks when they thought they detected a slight upturn of her lips. Doris nudged what she hoped was Penny’s ribs.

“I know you didn’t,” Doris told Shirley, reaching out to take a hand, stroking the back in what she hoped was a soothing manner. “But we wanted to speak to you.”

“Something we should have done days ago,” added Penny and then pointed out to Doris, “By the way, you’ve got my hand.”

Whilst Penny and Doris sorted out their limbs, Shirley managed to extract herself and went to sit on a chair by the window, the only other piece of furniture in the room, apart from a free-standing wooden wardrobe. Folding her dressing gown tightly around her and leaving her arms crossed, Shirley fixed them with a stare which could have killed at ten paces. Penny and Doris both resisted the urge to shuffle off the blankets. Both would have sworn the temperature took a dive for a few seconds, and they let out an involuntary shiver.

Doris cleared her throat and turned what she hoped was a friendly smile on to full charge. Shirley’s stern stare remained unaffected, and so, even in the face of a not very hospitable approach, Doris ploughed on. If they were to find out what was wrong, or confirm their suspicions, she had no other choice.

“I know you never asked us around,” she began, “but as you’ve been avoiding us for an age, you didn’t really leave us with any choice.” When it became obvious Shirley wasn’t going to say anything, Doris went on. “We thought we were friends,” she stated, getting a harrumph sound in reply, “but if we’ve done something to hurt you or offend you in any way, then please, let us know. Talk to us, Shirley. Help us understand, so we can put things right!”

After what was only a few minutes but seemed longer to Penny and Doris, Shirley finally let out a deep sigh and shook her head slowly before at last saying, “You really don’t know what you’ve done, do you?”

Not willing to risk the slightly less charged atmosphere by speaking, both girls simply shook their heads. It would be best to pretend not to know, best for Shirley to tell them in her own words, assuming they were right.

“You recall the dance you two went off to a few weeks ago? RAF Polebrook, I think.” Upon seeing the glances the two sat on her bed exchanged, Shirley shook her head again. “You do, don’t you. Well, when you walked off to base, all dressed up to the nines, guess who was watching you? Guess who wasn’t asked if she’d like to go?” Shirley’s voice was steadily rising as she got into her stride. “Guess who realized, right then, she wasn’t your friend, as she thought? Who spent the night crying into her pillow? Me! Bloody muggins here!”

Her outburst finished, Shirley sat hugging herself, rocking back and forth, with tears streaming down her face. After a moment, Doris crawled off the bed and threw her arms around her distraught friend. Half expecting to be thrown away, Doris was pleasantly surprised and soon found herself joined by Penny. Through the tears all three were by now in, the only words anyone could make out were, “Why? Why?” from Shirley in between sobs.

Eventually, when everyone had cried themselves dry, the three of them found they’d all slid to the floor, with arms and legs once more everywhere.

Shirley wiped her eyes and nose on the sleeve of her robe and then turned red eyes upon the other two. “Why?” she implored once more.

“Oh, sweetheart,” Doris implored, dragging the younger girl into an embrace and kissing the top of her head, not one bit happy she’d been correct. “We’re so, so sorry. We…we didn’t think. We were stupid, we were selfish, and we didn’t think.”

Shirley sniffled again and canted her head toward Penny.

Penny raised her head from where she’d buried it in Shirley’s shoulder. “It’s true,” she told her, not able to look Shirley in the eye in her shame. “We knew there were only so many places on the plane. We knew,” Penny carried on, hoping Shirley would know she was telling her the complete truth, “there wouldn’t have been room for anyone else, but we still should have asked you.”

Where before there had been anger emanating from every pore of Shirley’s body, there now appeared to be only sadness, as she leant back slightly against the chair. When she next spoke, the older women had to strain to hear what she said. “You should have. I thought I was an outsider again. I thought you didn’t like me, any of you.”

There were times you forgot how young some of the people involved in the war were, and this was one of them, Doris realized. Shirley had gone through so much, late last year. Turning up in their midst, blackmailed into spying on Betty Palmer by a dastardly woman who ran a draft-dodging scheme in London. In spite of the odds against her, she’d found the courage to defy her and had been invaluable in helping the girls find out the truth about why Betty’s sister had been murdered. And now, now they’d inadvertently wrecked her confidence and trust in them. The enormity of what they were responsible for hit Doris like a ton of bricks, but this wasn’t the time for self-recrimination. The only thing of importance was convincing Shirley they would do everything to regain her trust and friendship. She’d done nothing to deserve any less.

Doris placed a hand either side of Shirley’s face and looked her right in the eye. Next to her, Penny was gripping one of the younger girl’s hands, closely watching and listening to everything her American friend was saying.

“Please listen to me carefully.” Doris waited until she felt a slight nod. “We were wrong, very, very wrong, but there’s nothing we can do about the past. We can only assure you we never intended to belittle or hurt you. You are our friend—our very dear and brave friend—and if you’ll give us all a chance, Mary too, then we will be the best friends you could wish for again.”

“We will, really!” Penny made certain to say. “Please, lovey, say you’ll let us. We do love you. Don’t let all we’ve been through together die because of one act of stupidity we so regret. Please? We’re so, so sorry.”

Whether Shirley deliberately kept them waiting mattered not, as she finally answered, with a slightly forced smile, “I don’t want to lose you all as friends, but you have hurt me. I…I don’t want to feel like this anymore. I’ve missed you all these last couple of weeks, so I’ll accept your apology.”

At hearing this, Doris and Penny threw themselves at Shirley and smothered her with hugs and kisses. Neither seemed to notice the love she was being showered with wasn’t being returned with quite the same enthusiasm.

****

Having taken a little time to clean and spruce themselves up, the three of them reappeared downstairs, where Ruth, Mary, and Lawrence had now moved into the kitchen. Ruth had put a rabbit pie into the oven for supper.

At seeing them, Mary let go of her boyfriend’s hand, pushed her chair back, and rushed toward Shirley, who was leading Penny and Doris in. She stopped directly in front of her, not sure of what to say or do, despite seeing her two housemates standing behind the younger girl, both with smiles on their faces.

Shirley, seeing Mary’s indecision, reached for Mary’s hands. “It’s okay. Doris was very…persuasive. We’ll be all right.”

Mary still appeared hesitant to believe this was true and looked over her shoulder to where both Doris and Penny were nodding furiously. She told Shirley, “Then let me say to you as well that I’m very, very sorry. I know I didn’t go to the dance either, but I did know about it, and I really didn’t think how much we’d hurt you.”

The smile Shirley gave her was all the reassurance Mary needed. She threw her arms around her and hugged her tight. “Friends?” she asked.

“Friends.” Shirley nodded before letting her go.

Once everyone had sat around the kitchen table, Penny turned to Shirley and asked her, an incredulous expression upon her face, “I’ve got to know. How did you not hear us banging on the front door?”

“Were you?” Shirley said. “I didn’t hear a thing!”

“No kidding!” replied Doris. “How come?”

Shirley fished in her pocket and held out her hand. “Ear plugs. I don’t know how Ruth does it, but I’d forgotten how loudly Lawrence snores.”

All eyes turned to Lawrence, who shrugged his shoulders and looked apologetic. “No one’s ever told me I snore before. Ruth?”

Ruth reached down and pulled Bobby up onto her lap, fussing the spaniel behind the ears. “I’ve lived with this one sleeping on the end of my bed for so long, and he snores like a drill. If I can sleep through him, I guess it’s no surprise I don’t notice Lawrence.”

“So we know why Shirley didn’t hear us, but,” Penny decided, once everyone had stopped laughing, “what about old chainsaw vocals?”

When he didn’t reply straight away, Mary boxed him around the ears and didn’t quite yell at him, “No more secrets! Do you hear?”

Lawrence held his hand open on his thigh and Mary placed hers without hesitation in his. “I’m in a little more pain than I’ve told you,” he admitted, rubbing his wrist as he spoke. “I came back from the airfield early today and took a little pill the doctor gave me when I was discharged from hospital.”

Mary squeezed his hand and placed her free one over his wrist. “Is it the wrist?”

One side of his mouth turned up before he answered, “Actually, a mix of the wrist and my shin. The cut looks worse than it really is.”

“In future,” Mary instructed him, taking his chin in her hand and turning his head so there could be no doubt as to her seriousness, “tell me or anyone here if you’re in pain. Don’t try to hide it. You just get better.”

As Ruth went to check the pie, everyone around the table seemed relaxed, cordial even, now they were all back to being friends again. However, if anyone had paid close attention, they’d have realized Shirley wasn’t taking part in the conversation. In fact, the smile upon her face as she sat and nodded along to the conversation seemed forced and didn’t reach her eyes.