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Lottie loves out loud. Her affection drapes arms over shoulders, rests lips against cheeks and hair and brow, and holds hands no matter the occasion. She flirts without meaning to one minute and flirts with full intent the next, somehow managing to make neither version sound too serious. If you fall for the idea of it being serious anyway – and people often do, hook-like-sinker for that cocky smile and can-do attitude – she’ll let you down as easy as she can, which is to say that she’ll enforce a no with her fist if she has to and adopts a disappointed I thought we was havin’ fun tone if you can’t help but cry about it some.
She doesn’t often apologize. Darlene thinks it’s one of those things Lot just hasn’t been taught, same way she had to be told how to wash her clothes to keep ’em from shrinking. Same way she had to be told how much value really is in a dollar – you can only spend it one time, Lot, goddamn – because she was out here buying presents with cash that would’ve gotten them groceries for three months. That had taken a few solid weeks, looking back, and Darlene doesn’t doubt it’d take even more weeks for Lot to learn how to say sorry proper. Not that kinda glib sorry ’bout the mess she’s perfected – something that flies all right with her fellow pilots – but the kind of sorry that comes outta her toes and tells you she won’t do it again.
That poor ol’ sucker, she almost says out loud, eyeing Lottie’s easy smile at one of the English fellas. They’re on second drink only because Lot palmed her ginger ale off to Major Cleven and managed to make it look like an accident, which is already more than she woulda gotten away with back home. It’s like England’s not really prepared for the eventuality of a Lottie, who descends upon pubs with the air of a tropical storm battering against politely-offered umbrellas. Jesus Christ, Darlene wants to hiss, recognizing that casual flip of hair well enough, he’s already down, will ya stop kickin’ his teeth out?
She shakes her head. It’s one of those nights when she’s not my sweet girl for Lot, tucked away under the woman’s arm and cheek burning with all of Lottie’s kisses. It’s one of those nights she lost Lot’s hand the second the door swung open – it’s for the best, it’s okay, it’s what happens when you’re both girls and can’t sell the we’re just friends very well – and Darlene’s not sorry for it the longer she looks at what’s going on. Lot’s back is pressed against Major Cleven’s side, which Darlene’s sure she’s managed to excuse away as being stuck in a crowded space. Lot’s foot is on the other fella’s chair and her necklace glints up in the light, peeking out from underneath undone shirt buttons. Her smile’s unwavering, as is that little tilt to her head, and Darlene’s seen this work one too many times to not know how the rest of the night’s gonna go.
I don’t like the look o’ him, she’d still say, if she were close enough to Lot’s ear to be heard. He’ll be like that fella we brought home time before last – that one had wanted a picture of them kissing each other, as if that’s the kinda thing to stuff into one’s pocket – and ya know how much of a letdown that was. Darlene supposes maybe it’s different when she lets Lot go alone this time, though this fella don’t look like he knows the first thing about how to make Lot’s legs tremble at all. And Lot ain’t tricky about getting to that stage – though she says she is, but Darlene thinks that’s a special kind of balderdash she just says to make Darlene feel good about getting her there every time – but she’s gonna be catapulting off the walls of her bedroom in the mornin’ if she ain’t gonna get her fill tonight all the same.
Darlene’s just going to clean it all up when that happens. Won’t need to show the English fella to the door, because Lot’ll have gotten rid o’ him just fine after seven minutes of fumbled trying. Won’t need to hold Lot’s hair while she pukes, because she just pawned off her next glass of liquor to a passing Curt Biddick and knocked her water back instead. Will need to tut at Lot about poor choices, sure, and will need to kiss her until Lot sighs and says she’s really done trying this time. Will need to grin and tease and bear it a little longer until Lot forgets her jagged edges long enough to become soft and pliant and needy in a way Darlene understands better than she gets this broken funhouse mirror image Lot keeps trying to pull up. Will need to poke at this wound until it smarts worse than it does now, because she’s just never going to be enough for Lot but there are still moments when she undoubtedly is Lot’s entire universe.
“Hey,” she hears, then, and it sounds like this hey is just meant for her because of how soft-voiced it is, “mind if I sit?”
Darlene makes the mistake of glancing up. Is met with the full force of Bernard DeMarco’s tentative smile directed solely at her. His dark eyes are crinkled up in a way that makes his gaze look even friendlier. It’s warm in this corner of the pub – heat flushes her cheeks now that she feels it unfurl in her chest – and yet he looks unbothered by it enough. It probably helps that he’s not in a bulky flight jacket the way half these fellas still are, but in that leather one she’s always liked the look of far better.
“Uhh,” she says, which isn’t the smartest way to start a conversation. Blinks at him in an effort to gather her thoughts, which seem to have wandered off at the sight of his slightly undone collar. “S-Sure,” she nods, then, patting the empty chair beside her, “yours if ya want it.”
She doesn’t fully know why he wants that. Most of his crew’s keeping entertained near the game o’ darts – ain’t that where she saw him last, too? – and the rest of the folks they know are mostly stuck in that crowd around Major Cleven and Lottie. She’s already said bye to George, who begged off with a headache after first round, and the rest of the girls she came in with are either fanned out across the pub or gone back to base. It’s just her in this corner now, and she’s not really the kind of easy company a pilot like him might want.
“Thanks,” he says, and she flushes a little crimson when he settles down beside her with a sigh that sounds like it came deep outta his belly. “Had to get out of that game before Dickie and Curt took me to the cleaners”– he nods at the darts, where Biddick’s crowing victory –“and Buck’s not great company right now.”
“Major Cleven looks all right ta me?” she questions, glancing over at the man just to be sure. He certainly don’t look different – hand curled around his glass, toothpick between his lips – but she doesn’t really know him all too well. “I trust your judgment, though,” she amends, turning her attention back to the man who’d requested she call him Benny. “If ya say he ain’t, then he ain’t. You fly with him, not me.”
“He’s not all right while Ace keeps flirting with the guy he is most annoyed with,” snorts Benny, and it takes all of five seconds for Darlene to realize he means Lottie and the English fella with that comment. He glances to the side a moment before looking back at her. “I could almost swear she does it on purpose just because Buck doesn’t like him.”
“Yeah, that’s her all right,” agrees Darlene, because it does sound like a Lottie sort of thing to do to her new commanding officer. “And she knows all them English fellas because they been working with our fighter squads more than with y’all,” she elaborates, “so she don’t really think twice about flirting with them any. They know she used to fly them fighters before she went and got herself reassigned, so…” She shrugs. Smiles at Benny. “It’s just some itch that needs scratchin’, for her, and ya can tell the Major that if ya like.”
He makes no move to vacate his seat. If anything, he sinks a little deeper into it – his knee knocking against hers, his jacket brushing her arm – and seems to settle down beside her. He makes a little harrumphing sort of noise in the back of his throat, as though the suggestion of telling Major Cleven that little tidbit about Lot is one he’s wholly discarding for reasons unknown to her.
“Don’t you think this place is a little… weird?”
Darlene blinks at the question, which he managed to make sound earnest somehow. “What d’ya mean, sir?”
“Please,” he says, brow furrowed, barely containing his wince, “I’m just Benny. Not a sir.”
“All right then, just Benny,” she laughs, tucking her leg under her knee and getting comfortable in her own seat, “why do you think this place is weird?”
“Dunno.” He shrugs in a way that tells her he might yet know, but isn’t sure on how to say it. “It’s such a… Back home there’d be more dancing. And singing.” He lights one of his smokes. Offers her one, which she declines with a smile. “There’d be some games, sure,” he admits, “but all these tables… My cousins would make quick work of these, putting them up on the side and the chairs on top of that. Clear some space.”
“Space for dancin’?”
“Yes ma’am,” he grins, already gesturing at which tables they’d clear, already conjuring a hazy vision of it for her mind’s eye. Traces of smoke linger in the air, almost forming dancing shapes of their own where his fingertips were before. “The proper kind, too.”
Darlene can’t help but rest her chin atop her hand at that. “Now what in the world d’ya know about proper kind o’ dancin’, Bernard DeMarco?” she asks, smiling at him like she can definitely keep that secret if he decides to share. “And don’t you ma’am me now, ya hear? I won’t have that when ya got me callin’ ya Benny.”
He raises his hands in clear surrender. “Can’t tell you what I know,” he says, even though he’s leaning forward like he wants to share. “Would need to show you, and this place is not ready for that.” His grin’s as quick as his wink. “It’d be as proper as we make it, Darlene.”
Darlene. He remembers her name without being prompted to. Doesn’t try to make it sound like Arlene or Charlene the way folks do back home when they can’t quite recall the name her mama gave her. He says it the way it ought to be, except somehow he makes her name sound soft and wanting and…
“I ain’t that proper,” she warns him, grinning back now that she’s made a decision. “But there ain’t a reason why ya can’t show me, either. We got outside, don’t we?” She nods at the door. “Ain’t anybody in here that’ll miss us, not with your fellas caught up in their game and Lot caught up in her stupid flirting.”
And it is stupid, now that she really thinks about it some. It’s something so perfectly Lottie, sure enough, because a girl who’s rich enough to make bad decisions with her money sure ain’t gonna fare better making decisions about her life any. She knows all the reasons why Lot goes and plays that kinda game over and over again, but Darlene’s told her time and again that it don’t mean she’s gotta play it with Lot any. It’s certainly not something worth sticking around and ruining her own night for.
“C’mon, Ben,” she coaxes, rising to her feet and offering her hand to him. “Let’s make this place less weird.”
She doesn’t look back once his hand wraps around hers. Does give herself a little shake – that was not a jolt of electricity, no sir – when he holds on to it for longer than she’d thought he would. When his fingers actually tangle with hers, squeezing down just a little, and he guides her to the door as though she’s his actual date for the night. If you was Orpheus, she suddenly thinks, I would be doomed to the underworld because you’d glance at me every time, you’d not walk all that damn way without wanting to see me following you there.
Darlene doesn’t mention that, though the thought makes her draw even closer to him once they pass through the door. She’s always loved the story – of course you’d look back to see your beloved, of course you’d want to – and thinking of that makes her think of how tonight would look to an artist. She’d paint herself in shadows, even her red hair barely catching glints of the light. She’d paint him in warmth – the pub had made him look tanned and full of sunshine – just to translate the feeling she gets from his hand tangled with hers. She’d draw them separate first, then winding together in a flurry not unlike the one she’s battling on the inside now.
He releases her hand just to turn around and bow to her, which is the most ridiculous thing of all.
“Ben–”
“Darling Darlene,” he interrupts, smiling at her like he already knows all the next steps, “will you please do me the honor”– and he makes it sound so sincere, so believable, that she stands and simply gawks at him –“of giving me your hand so I can lead you in our dance?”
He calls me darlin’. Means it, too, because he ain’t the type to say something he don’t mean. “I dunno about honor,” she hedges, fingertips already brushing his knuckles, “but I’d love to dance with ya, beautiful Benny.”
His laugh is instantaneous. Warmer than any paint or pencil of hers could ever hope to catch. “Beautiful, huh?”
“Gotta say it one time,” she admits, “in the hopes that you don’t get too big for that plane o’ yours hearing summat like that.” She grins when he ducks his head. “Seems I just got you shy instead, huh,” she teases, though his hand fastens around hers and his arm wraps around her waist in a clear negation of such a statement. “I did ask George who that handsome fella with the dog was when y’all landed, ya know”– and she’s done pretending she never did, done holding back on that –“so it ain’t like I changed my mind between now and then.”
“God, you just…” He laughs again, warm and full and buzzy against her ear. There’s a gentle sway to his steps that she follows without thinking, leading her further away from the pub’s door. “You’re making things hard, Darlene, you know that?”
“I’ve been told I do,” she grins, unapologetic, and lets out a giggle when he casts his eyes to heaven. “Come on now, ya knew I was gon’ say that. There’s a reason why folks at home call me tacky and shameless.”
His hand tightens around her waist. “Folks at home are wrong about you.” He says it with such quiet conviction that it almost makes her grow too still, too incapable of following his next motions. “And jokes that are also true aside,” he murmurs, “what I meant was that you’re making it hard for me not to fall in love with you.”
“You…”
“Sorry,” he says, guiding her into a spin that takes her out of his arms. “I wasn’t gonna say that part.”
“But ya did,” she says, ignoring his outstretched hand and making up a few swaying steps of her own. If she thinks about anything other than the next move, she knows there’s not gonna be anything left to hold back. “So now we’re dancin’ with that, too.”
“We don’t have to, it’s just some… something I feel. It doesn’t have to…” His hands find her waist. A small curl’s escaped his perfectly coiffed hair. “It doesn’t have to matter.”
She reaches up for that curl before she can stop herself. Brushes it back, then rests her hand against his cheek. She doesn’t think anyone’s claimed to be in love with her before. Lot’s come closest – love ya, Dar – but even that didn’t quite feel like… Didn’t feel like Benny. Didn’t feel as earnest, as honest, as open.
It does matter.
So she kisses him. Winds her arms around his neck and pulls him so close that they simply fit without trying. Meets his mouth with hers because that’s what she’s been wanting to figure out for the better part of a few weeks now. Lets him muffle a sound of surprise in her kiss, lets him press back and squeeze her to him so tight, lets his hand tangle in her curls that have already escaped their past confinement. They’re still swaying to music unheard – to Orpheus’ lyre, or their own hearts – and he makes no effort to spin her out of his arms again.
He winds her closer to him, kissing back, kissing her like she thinks people kiss in those love stories that were never hers. Kissing her with so much care that she definitely falters in their dance. He catches her missed steps with a smile against her lips, a stray touch of lips against her cheek, a murmured I got you that feels safer to her than any plane’s landing.
Darlene doesn’t love out loud. Doesn’t think she knows how, not yet, not in this way she’s feeling right now, in that way that’s entirely too big for her. Thinks she’ll learn, sometime, when she follows his steps right, and memorizes him as he is now. Silhouetted against the horizon, with a smile just for her, holding her like she is something dear.
She thinks she’ll paint him in warmest colors, like the setting sun.