The five-day schedules the women had received for their time at Camp Mirage were hectic and jam-packed with a slew of different activities; many of which the women had never heard of before. The ladies had been split up into three different groups of which bunked together and trained together. The groups had different training exercises scheduled for different times, but every day, no matter what group you were in, began at six in the morning and didn't end until about ten at night.
Setting her bag down on the trunk at the end of her bed, Margot took a seat on the thin, hard mattress and began to read over her schedule for the following day. The first day allowed for the women to settle in and get to know each other, but the relaxed state of the camp would cease to exist in roughly fifteen hours when the first day of training began.
The billet where Margot was staying, along with the other Group B women, was small and about as bare minimum as it got. Margot knew that a drastic change like that would be a rude awakening for many of the trainees, but she also knew that should anyone make it past the upcoming five days, the male training camp wouldn't take it easy on them. It was better to get used to the rough living conditions as soon as possible.
"Six AM, breakfast in the mess hall," one of the women began to read her schedule out loud. "Six-thirty, map and compass basics. Seven-thirty, four-mile run ... obstacle course, eight-mile march ... weapons training?" She looked up at the rest of the women with a look of disbelief. "Like guns?"
"Didn't you hear what Captain Miller said, Cathleen?" The woman next to her, who was obviously a friend, or at least an acquaintance, scoffed. "This is war. You can't very well go into combat without a weapon."
A woman with lush, wavy dark brown hair and a round face placed her hands on her hips. "He can't actually mean war when he says war, can he? Like digging trenches and shooting people?"
"I'm no expert, but I'm pretty sure that's what war is," Margot spoke up, eager to let her fellow trainees know she wasn't one to shy away from a difficult task. "If it's what we have to do, it's what we have to do."
Hearing an affirmative hum, Margot turned to see the young, mousy blonde girl from before nodding along with her statement. She was skinny and looked no older than eighteen at the very most. With a quick glance up and down, Margot had decided in a matter of seconds that the girl from Connecticut wouldn't even last the first day.
After the eight members of Group B had settled into their billet, they changed into the jumpsuits and boots that had been laid out for them and decided to explore the camp and introduce themselves to each other. Margot knew that while the women around her were going to be her best friends for the next five days, they would also be her competition. She had to stay on her toes and make sure no one pulled any tricks over on her.
Antonia Winslow—or as she preferred to be called, Annie—had an entirely different outlook on the situation. Instead of being filled with a desire to leave everyone in the dust behind her, she wished that as many ladies as possible would be able to make it through the five-day stint at Camp Mirage. If she were, for some seemingly impossible reason, going to find herself on the front lines of a war in her future, she wanted a strong woman by her side.
As the group wandered the camp grounds, taking in the sights like the obstacle course and the classrooms, Annie stayed near the back of the pack and listened to the other women chat among themselves. She was way too busy looking around to contribute any meaningful dialogue to the conversation and was perfectly happy to just listen.
She did, however, pay close attention when the women began introducing themselves to one another. First was the woman who had recited the contents of her schedule in the billets; her name was Cathleen Carr and she had been a waitress before deciding to enlist in the WAAC. Next was the woman Cathleen had met on the bus trip over, Marion Write, a seamstress from Jacksonville, Florida.
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We Happy Few | Band of Brothers
Historical Fiction"Women don't belong in war" was something Margot Kessler and Antonia Winslow heard day in and day out, but never once did they let those words deter them from serving their country alongside the men. They were unbelievably strong and skilled beyond...
