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“That’s not a woman either,” Adele said.

But it was Florence all right, swinging out onto the wing spar and then hopping down to the grass below.

She strode toward the hangar, pulling off her helmet as she went, setting her long wavy hair free.

Adele’s eyes widened. From the back of her throat came a startled squeak.

“Florence!” George called out.

The pilot turned. “Miss Ector. You’re back.” She looked at Adele, taking in her trousers, and smiled. “You must be Miss Ector’s mother.” She held out her hand.

“Adele,” her mother croaked, gawping at Florence.

“Florence. Looks like we might have a pilot in training on our hands here.” Florence nodded at George.

Her mother cleared her throat and grinned. “Looks like we just might.”

“She wants an airplane, of all things,” Adele said that night at dinner. “Can you believe it?”

Her father, smiling, admitted he could not.

“Can’t be bothered with a car,” said Adele. “No, sir. It has to be a vehicle that will leave the ground, apparently.”

Even with her mother’s backing, George wasn’t sure she’d get the plane.

She knew, from talk at the dinner table, that oil prices had been soft since the start of the Depression.

“Fortunately, I pulled most of our funds out of the market before the crash,” her father had said.

He’d been able to keep his crews intact and his wells pumping when other oilmen couldn’t.

“And I don’t spend half as much on you and your mother as most men I know spend on their wives and daughters,” he told George two months later when he presented her with the papers for a secondhand Taylor J-2.

George hadn’t been so delighted with a birthday present since she’d received her own set of socket wrenches when she turned twelve.

She couldn’t believe her luck. A plane, flying lessons to go with it, and the uncustomary warmth of her mother’s approval.

“My daughter,” Adele said, to anyone who would listen, “the would-be aviatrix.”

She spent her first lesson mostly on the ground.

Stu made her check every cable and wire, every fastening mechanism, the condition of the belly of the plane, the tire pressure.

He startled when she asked what PSI they wanted to see.

His jaw went slack when she took the gauge from him and attached it to the valve.

When they checked the fluids, she surprised him again by knowing where to look before he told her.

“Hey, kid, if you’re as good with this plane in the air as you are on the ground, this’ll be a snap. Up you go.”

He didn’t help her into the front cockpit, which was a relief.

George had never spent time in such close proximity to any man besides her father.

Stu was younger than her father, and, with his Clark Gable mustache, much more handsome.

It had been thrilling to surprise him with her knowledge of tools and engine components.

Away from the airfield, she daydreamed about him swinging her around and kissing her the way he’d kissed Florence.

He was two inches shorter than George, but somehow in the daydream this didn’t matter.

At the airfield, she dreaded that he might somehow guess at her fantasies.

“Focus on the plane,” she told herself sternly. “Think about flying, and that’s all.”

“He’s so handsome,” said Helen when George stopped by her house. “Is he married?”

George had no idea if Stu and Florence were married.

“Well, does he wear a ring?” asked Helen. She hadn’t thought to look. Helen sighed. “You’re hopeless, Georgeanne.” She always used George’s full name when she was exasperated with her. “Now, tell me what you think about this dress. Frank’s taking me to the dance next weekend.”

The dress was perfect. Helen’s sunshiny blond hair was perfect. She wasn’t too tall. She had a boy who wanted to take her to movies and dances. Compared to Helen, George felt hopeless indeed.

As Stu tightened the rudder attachments before her next lesson, George examined his hands. No ring. “Is Florence around?” she asked. She hadn’t seen her in over a week.

“She’s doing a string of shows in Texas. Here.” He handed her the wrench. “I keep forgetting you can do this yourself. I never know when she’ll blow through, but she always does.”

His rueful smile told George everything she needed to know about how Stu felt about Florence.

She couldn’t blame him. Florence was glamorous and bold.

When she wasn’t flying, she wore her long dark hair down and wavy.

Or tied up in a silk scarf. Her lips were always siren red.

“My signature color,” she told George once as she swiped on a fresh coat.

Florence walked as if everyone were watching and she expected nothing less than their full attention.

George, despite Adele’s constant admonition to stand up straight, slouched when she walked, trying to minimize her height.

Her hair wouldn’t hold enough curl on the left and held too much curl on the right.

Whenever she tried on Helen’s pink lipstick, she felt like a child playing dress-up.

No wonder Stu only had eyes for Florence.

No wonder he called her kid. To him, that’s all she was.

One morning before Stu arrived at the airfield, she spotted a golden tube on the flight office desk.

She peeked outside. No sign of Florence’s Jenny.

George pocketed the lipstick. She’d try it out when she got home and return it to the desk the next day.

No one would be the wiser. Certainly not Florence, who might not blow through again for weeks.

Her hand went to the smooth metal tube in her pocket repeatedly as she ran through the preflight checklist. Stu trusted her to do most of it herself now. Just as he let her handle the controls almost entirely herself while they were in the air.

“You’re a natural, kid,” he shouted as she banked the plane after takeoff.

“A natural,” she repeated in front of her mirror that afternoon as she tried on the red lipstick and rolled her lips together.

Her eyes looked brighter. Her unruly hair looked tamer.

She felt pretty. There was only a nub left in the tube.

Maybe Florence had left it behind on purpose.

Maybe she’d never miss it. George slipped it into the drawer of her vanity.

She ventured downstairs, holding her breath, waiting for her mother’s judgment. Her parents had never forbidden makeup, but her mother rarely wore any herself. “Well, look at you. Don’t you look nice,” Adele said, and George exhaled.

“How’d you get to be so grown up?” asked her father at dinner that night. It was funny, George thought, that wearing lipstick—more than flying an airplane—made her seem grown up. “It suits you,” he said.

“That’s a good color on you,” said Helen the next day. “Did you get it at Woolworth’s?”

Before she could answer, Frank joined them on the porch. “Wowza, George!”

“Georgeanne was just leaving,” said Helen.

George’s shoulders slumped. Frank was funny and kind. He never made her feel like a third wheel, even if Helen sometimes did. He was an inch taller than her, a rare thing among boys her age, and thin as a rail. He had dark spaniel eyes, and when he looked at her, her stomach did a little flip.

Helen’s mother didn’t approve of Frank. The Bridlemiles lived a step up—and only a small one—from hand to mouth. But George saw why Helen liked him. And why she wanted him all to herself. Helen could shoo her off, but she couldn’t shoo away the fact of Frank’s “wowza.”

George squared her shoulders and rose to her full height. “I’ll see you two later,” she said airily. Descending the steps of the Cramer porch, she did her best imitation of Florence’s walk.

Stu wanted Florence. Frank wanted Helen.

Somewhere in Enid, Oklahoma, there had to be a boy who’d want her.

Finding him was the challenge. The rule that a girl had to date boys who were taller left George with only a handful of possibilities.

Like Frank, many of them already had girlfriends.

One was the Pomade Boy who had teased George when she was little.

He teased her still, asking her how the air was up there.

Asking her how she could tell whether she was flying or walking, because no one else could.

He didn’t say a word about the red lipstick, though.

“Stunned into silence,” said Helen. “For once.”

Mel Carson, a varsity starting linebacker, seemed like a possibility.

“You two would look good walking down the hall together,” agreed Helen.

“Frank’s on the team. I’ll get him to introduce you.

” George doubted Mel would care much about Frank’s recommendation, but a few days later, Helen reported that Frank had arranged a double date for them on Saturday.

“Frank wants to see Stagecoach . Then we’ll go for ice cream after.

Wear your blue dress with the Swiss dots. And that lipstick.”

George did as she was told. Frank drove his father’s car.

He picked up Helen first, then Mel. George waited for them on the porch.

Helen wouldn’t approve of that—she’d cautioned George about appearing overeager.

But George couldn’t bear to sit inside with her parents, who were obviously dying to assess Mel Carson.

Their invisible antennae quivered, telegraphing questions and exclamations back and forth at one another.

Height aside, George had barely assessed him herself.

She didn’t want to hear her mother’s opinion until she had formed her own.

Adele’s opinions tended to be big and weighty, and George’s often collapsed in the face of them.

When Frank pulled up, she dashed down the steps, calling out, “Bye!” She’d closed the car door before her parents made it out onto the porch. “Goodness.” Helen scowled. “Where’s the fire, Georgeanne?”