“Maybe.” Nina had yawned. “Who cares?” It was war: day was night, life was death, sorrow was joy. Who cared about anything but the now?
When they’d been on the southern front, they’d met at the back of the shop where mechanics stashed spare tools, and it had been warm enough to laze afterward skin against skin. Here in Annisovskaia it was cold enough for their breath to puff in clouds inside the shed, and they dived quickly back into trousers and coats. “We won’t be able to meet outside much longer,” Yelena said. She sighed, wincing as her shirt went over her shoulders. “You scratch worse than any rabbit! I should call you kitten instead.”
“Something more dangerous than a kitten,” Nina retorted. “And I’ll find someplace warmer to meet.” It was easier to steal time together than either of them had anticipated. Everyone was too tired after a night’s flying to care if a fellow pilot sneaked out. No one raised an eyebrow if Nina and Yelena clasped hands as they walked to the airfield either, or if Yelena embroidered Nina scarves or Nina dozed with her head in Yelena’s lap. The entire regiment traded kisses and hugs whenever off duty; gave each other presents and pet names. Time was too short not to show your sisters-in-arms that you loved them. Nina had seen other pilots sneaking off discreetly, who knew where to—perhaps private rendezvous with fellow pilots, or with the male ground crew from neighboring regiments.
Still, the two of them were very careful.
“You slip out first,” Nina told Yelena. “I’ll wait three minutes and come after.”
“Nag,” Yelena teased. “You’re as bad as a mother.”
“I’m worse. Because your mother told you to find a nice boy and get married, not go to war and become a pilot, and you didn’t listen. But I’m your navigator, Comrade Lieutenant Vetsina, and unlike your mother, you have to listen to me.”
Yelena snapped a mock salute. Her short curls were rumpled, and her cheeks as rosy as the little pink orchids that bloomed wild around the Old Man, poking their slippered heads up when the snow melted. Nina could hardly breathe, looking at her. I want to hold you, she thought. I would fight the world off for you, Yelena Vassilovna. It was something new, this tremendous wave of protectiveness. It wasn’t like anything Nina had ever felt in her life. It clutched at her with something almost like fear.
Maybe she was afraid of two things, now.
Yelena blew her a kiss, slipping out. Nina waited three minutes and then sauntered after. When she slipped back into the dormitory, she could hear Yelena’s soft breath already slowing toward a deeper rhythm. She’d sleep like a baby now, maybe as much as four hours. Nina wasn’t far behind, dropping off the edge of wakefulness like a stone falling off a cliff.
“Up, rabbits! The Hitlerites aren’t going to bomb themselves!” Major Bershanskaia’s voice, obscenely cheerful. “Up, up, up!”
“Fuck your mother,” Nina mumbled. “Fuck your mother through seven gates.” Peeling open eyelids that had apparently been glued together with cement. “Fuck your mother through seven gates whistling.” Bershanskaia was already gone to the next building, waking the next round of pilots. “One of these days I will cut her throat for being so damned cheerful, and then I will be stood up against a wall and shot, and it will have been worth it,” Nina announced, tugging her blankets to her chin.
“Don’t get shot, Ninochka.” Yelena was already up and halfway into her overalls, as the room filled with yawns and rustles, the rake of combs through sleep-tangled hair. “I don’t want to break in a new navigator, not when you know exactly how I like my tea.”
“Stone cold and tasting like motor oil?”
“Exactly.” Yelena yanked back the blankets, making Nina yelp and fly out of bed. “Up, up, up!”
“I’ll cut your throat too, Yelenushka,” Nina warned, yanking her shirt over her head and tucking her razor’s cord around her wrist. Yelena had a pistol in her cockpit like most pilots, but Nina never went into the sky without her razor.
Another monotonous meal, the sun tilting toward the ground. As they headed for briefing, Nina saw trucks being loaded with armament and cans of fuel. The trucks would rumble out toward the auxiliary airfield closer to the front lines, the U-2s following by air. The ladies of the 588th crammed together to hear Major Bershanskaia give the daily update. Tonight’s target