Wings

“People love a fairy tale, Cass,” he said quietly as he drove her home, and he patted her knee as she sat beside him. He really had missed her. “It's nice to be able to give it to them.”

“I guess. But it feels weird to be one. I keep thinking to myself I'm just me… but they act as though… I don't know… as though I were someone else, someone I don't even know… and now they want to know everything, they want to be part of it.” It was almost as though they wanted to own her. And the thought of that made her uncomfortable. She had tried to explain it one night to her father, and he had reminded her that it would get worse after the tour. Look at the price poor Lindy had paid… his infant son kidnapped and killed… the price of fame could be frightening. But Pat hoped that Desmond would protect her.

“You belong to them now, Cass,” Desmond said, as though he believed that. And stranger still, he seemed to accept it. ‘They want you. It's not fair to hold back. They want to share in your happiness. It's a nice thing to give them.” Desmond always seemed to feel as though he owed a great deal to the public.

But she wasn't prepared for the intensity of their attention over the next six weeks until their wedding. She was followed everywhere, and photographed, at the hangar, in the office going over charts and maps with Billy, outside her apartment, on the way to work, in department stores, shopping for her wedding dress, and any time she appeared anywhere with Desmond.

She took Nancy Firestone with her everywhere now, and sometimes she even tried to hide, with a big hat, or a scarf and dark glasses. But the persistence of the press was astounding. They hung off fire escapes and ledges, dropped from awnings, lay under bushes and in cars. They popped out at her constantly, from everywhere, and by early February Cassie thought they would drive her crazy. And for once, Nancy was of fairly little help to her. With anything. As organized as she was, Nancy seemed to have a lot on her mind, and she seemed less interested than usual in the details of Cassie's wedding. Desmond had told Cassie not to worry about it, and he was having Miss Fitzpatrick and an assistant handle most of the details. Cassie had enough to do just dealing with the press, and getting ready for the Pacific tour. He didn't want her too distracted by having to organize her own wedding.

But when Cassie tried to talk to him about Nancy Firestone, he never took her seriously. She was trying to explain to him that she had the impression lately that Nancy was annoyed at her and she wasn't sure why. Nancy had been irritable and cool ever since she and Desmond had announced their engagement. And there was no rational explanation for it. Nancy herself seemed to spend less time with her, and on the one evening Cassie had invited her for dinner, she had insisted that she had to stay home and help Jane with her homework.

“I don't know what's wrong with her. I feel awful. Sometimes I get the feeling she hates me.” They had never gotten as close as Cassie had once thought they might when they first met, but they had always been on good terms, and enjoyed each other's company when they worked together.

“The wedding probably upsets her,” Desmond said sensibly, with the rationality of a man, analyzing the situation, “it probably reminds her of her husband. So she's backed off so as not to get too involved, or upset. It probably brings up painful memories for her,” he said, smiling at his bride. She was so young, there were a lot of things she didn't think of. “I told you, just work with Miss Fitzpatrick.”

“I will. And I'm sure you're right. I feel like a moron for not thinking of it.” And the next time she saw her, she realized that Desmond's explanation fit completely. Nancy was short with her more than once, and a little brittle when Cassie asked her advice about some detail of the wedding. And from then on, for Nancy's sake, Cassie took Desmond's advice and kept her distance.

She did her best to cope with the press herself, but at times they were truly impossible to deal with.

“Don't they ever stop?” Cassie gasped one day, as she ran into Desmond's house through the kitchen, and collapsed into a chair, exhausted. She had been trying to move some of her things from her apartment, but someone must have tipped them off. They had arrived en masse before she ever got through the door, and from then on it was sheer circus.

Desmond came in the front door half an hour later, and they besieged him, and finally he convinced her to come out and pose for a few pictures with him and get it over with. He had a great way with them. He always gave them just enough to keep them happy.

“Are you nervous yet?” one reporter shouted at her and she grinned back at them and nodded.

“Only about you tripping me on my wedding day,” she quipped back, and they laughed and shouted at her.

“We'll be there.”