But she lost altitude carefully, and then let Chris take over the controls again, before they landed. As a result, his landing was not as smooth as hers would have been. They touched down too hard, bumping awkwardly down the runway. She was trying to will him to land the plane properly, but Chris had none of her instincts and as a result he'd done a “pancake” as he landed, hitting the ground hard after leveling off too high for a proper landing.

When they got out of the plane, both of them were surprised to see Nick and their father standing near the runway. They'd been watching them, and Pat was grinning broadly at Chris, while Nick seemed to be staring at Cassie.

“Nice work, son,” Pat beamed. “You're a natural pilot.” Pat looked immensely pleased and overlooked the shabby landing, as Nick watched them. He'd been watching Chris's face, but he was much more intent on Cassie as he had been from the moment she stepped out of the plane. “How was it being up there with your brother, Cass?” her father asked her with a smile.

“Pretty good, Dad. It was really fun.” Her eyes danced like Christmas as Nick watched, and Pat led Chris back to the office, as Nick and Cass followed behind in silence.

“You like flying with him, huh, Cass?” Nick asked carefully as they sauntered toward the office.

“A lot.” She beamed at Nick, and for reasons best known to himself he wanted to reach over and shake her. He knew she wasn't telling the truth, and he wondered why Pat was so easily fooled. Maybe he wanted to be. But those kinds of games could be dangerous, even fatal.

“That loop looked pretty good,” Nick said quietly.

“Felt good too,” she said, without looking at him.

“I'll bet it did,” he said, watching her for a moment, and then, shaking his head, he went back to his office.

A few minutes later, Pat drove the kids home with him. When Nick heard their car leave, he sat at his desk, thinking of them, and the flying he had just seen. He shook his head with a rueful grin. He knew one thing for sure. Chris O'Malley had not been flying that plane. And he couldn't help smiling to himself, as he realized that somehow Cassie had found a way to fly. And maybe, just maybe, after all her hard work to get there, maybe she deserved it. Maybe he wouldn't challenge her for a while. Maybe he'd just watch and see how she did. He smiled to himself again, thinking of the loop he'd seen her do. Next she'd be flying in the air show. But why not? What the hell? Everything about her told him she was a natural. She was more than that. He sensed instinctively that woman or not, she needed to fly, just like he did.

2

When Pat, Cassie, and Chris walked into the house that night, all of Cassie's sisters were in the kitchen helping their mother. Glynnis looked like Fat, and at twenty-five, had four little girls of her own, and had been married for six years. Megan was shy like her mom, and looked like her, though her hair was brown. At twenty-three, she had three sons, and had married six months after Glynnis. Their husbands were farmers, and had small properties nearby. They were decent, hardworking men, and the girls were happy with them. Colleen was twenty-two and blond, she had a little boy and a little girl, both were barely more than toddlers, and Colleen had been married for three years to the English teacher at the local school. She wanted to go to college, but she was pregnant again, and with three kids at home there was no way she could go anywhere, except if she took them with her. It wouldn't be fair to leave three kids with her mother every day just so she could go to school, and her father wouldn't have let her anyway. Maybe when the kids were older. For the moment college was only a dream for her. The reality of her life was three babies and very little money. Her father gave them small “gifts” from time to time, but Colleen's husband was proud, and he hated to take them. But with his own wages so small, and a new baby only a few weeks away, they needed all the help they could get, and Colleen's mother had given her some money that afternoon. She knew they needed it to buy things for the baby. Depression wages had hit the schools, and they could hardly eat on what David made, even with regular gifts from her parents, and food given to them by her sisters.

All three of the girls were staying for dinner with them, their husbands had other plans that night and the girls came home to their parents often. Oona loved seeing the kids, although having them all home at once made the dinner hour unusually chaotic and noisy.

Pat went to change and Chris went to his room, while Cassie tried entertaining the kids and everyone else cooked, and two of her nephews thought the dirt on her face was hysterically funny. One of her nieces did too, and she chased all of them around the living room pretending to be a monster. Chris didn't appear again until dinner was called, and he glared at Cassie when he did. He was still annoyed at her about the loop she had done, but on the other hand she had won his father's praise for him, so he didn't dare complain too much or too loudly. They were both getting what they wanted out of the arrangement. She wanted to fly, and he wanted the money. His father's praise was an added bonus.

Half an hour later, they all sat down to an enormous meal, of com and pork, com bread and mashed potatoes. Glynnis had brought the pork, and Megan the com, and Oona had grown the potatoes. They all grew their own food, and when they needed more they bought it at Strong's. It was the only grocery store for miles, and the best one in the region. The Strongs were doing well, even in tough times, and theirs was a solid business. Oona said as much again as they finished the meal, and Cassie heard a familiar sound of wheels outside the house, almost as though on cue. It was easy to guess who it was, he dropped by almost every night after dinner, particularly now that they were both out of school for the summer.

Cassie had known Bobby Strong, the only son of the local grocer, since they were children. He was a good boy, and they had been good friends for years, but for the past two years they'd been more than that, though Cassie insisted she didn't quite know what. But her mother and Megan always reminded her that they had gotten married at seventeen, so she better know what she was doing with Bobby. He was serious and responsible, and her parents liked him too. But Cassie wasn't ready to admit to herself, or to him, that she loved him.

She liked being with him. She liked him, and his friends. She liked his good manners and gentle ways. His thoughtfulness, his patience. He had a kind heart, and she loved the way he was around her nieces and nephews. She enjoyed a lot of things about him, but he still wasn't as exciting as airplanes. She had never met a boy who was. Maybe there was no such thing. Maybe that was something you just had to accept. But she would have loved to know a boy who was as exciting as a “Gee Bee Super Sportster” or a “Beech Staggerwing” or a Wedell-Williams racing plane. Bobby was a nice kid, but he didn't even compare to an airplane.

“Hi, Mrs. O'Malley… Glynn… Meg… Colleen… wow! Looks like it'll be pretty soon!” Colleen looked huge as she tried to gather up her kids to leave, and Oona helped her.

“Maybe tonight if I don't stop eating my mother's apple pie,” Colleen grinned. She was only five years older than they were, but Cassie felt as though they were light-years apart sometimes. Her sisters were all married and so settled and so different. She knew instinctively that somehow she couldn't be like them. She wondered sometimes if there was a curse on her, if her father had wanted a boy so badly that it had somehow damaged her before birth. Maybe she was a freak. She liked boys. She liked Bobby particularly. But she liked airplanes and her own independence a whole lot better.

Bobby shook hands with her father, and said hi to Chris, and all the little kids climbed all over him. Then a little while later her mother and the oldest sisters went out to the kitchen to clean up, and her mother told her not to bother, and just to go sit with Bobby. At least Cassie had washed her face by then, but you could still see traces of the grease that had been there before dinner.

“How was your day?” he asked with a shy smile. He was awkward, but likable, and he tried to be tolerant of her unusual ideas and her fascination with her father's airplanes. He pretended to be interested, and listened to her rattle on about a new plane that had come through, or her father's cherished Vega. But the truth was, she could have said anything, he just wanted to be near her. He came by faithfully almost every night, and Cassie still acted surprised when he did, much to her parents' amusement.

She was just not ready to face the seriousness of his commitment, or what it might mean if he persisted in visiting her. Only a year from now she would graduate, and if he kept dropping by like this, he might ask her to marry him, and expect to marry her as soon as they finished high school. The very thought of that terrified her and she just couldn't face it. She wanted so much more than that. Time, and space, and college. And the feeling she got when she did a loop, or a spin. Being with Bobby was like driving to Ohio. Safe, and solid and uneventful. He wasn't like flying anywhere. And yet she knew that if he had stopped coming to see her, she would miss him.

“I went up in my dad's Jenny with Chris today.” She filled him in, trying to sound casual. Getting too serious with Bobby always scared her. “It was fun. We did some lazy eights, and a loop.”

“Sounds like Chris is getting good,” Bobby said politely, but like Chris, airplanes didn't do much to excite him. “What else did you do?” He was always interested in her, and secretly he thought her beautiful, not like the other boys who thought she was too tall, or her hair was too red, or liked her because her figure was great, or thought she was weird because she knew a lot about airplanes. Bobby liked her because of who she was, even if at times he recognized the possibility that he might not understand her. But that was endearing about him too. A lot of things were, which was why her feelings about him confused her. Her mother told her that she had felt that way about Pat at first too. Commitment was always hard, Oona said. And that made it even harder for Cassie. She didn't know what to think of what she felt for Bobby.