The Hidden Women. Kerry Barrett
as we washed up.
‘What was all that about?’ I asked her.
‘Should we club together and buy the parents a dishwasher,’ she said, squirting washing-up liquid into the sink.
‘I can’t afford it,’ I said. ‘And they wouldn’t use it anyway.’
Miranda frowned. ‘True.’
I elbowed her in the ribs as I passed her a stack of dirty plates.
‘Miranda, focus. Did you see Mum and Dad look at each other when I mentioned Lil?’
She elbowed me back like we were still ten and twelve, not thirty-four and thirty-six.
‘That was a bit weird, wasn’t it?’ she said.
‘What was weird, darling?’ Mum wandered into the kitchen clutching two empty wine glasses. ‘Is there another bottle?’
I thought Miranda might burst with the effort of not rolling her eyes. ‘In the fridge,’ she said, through gritted teeth. ‘You watched me put it in there.’
Mum blew an air kiss in her direction. ‘Don’t get snappy, Manda,’ she said, mildly. ‘What was weird?’
‘Work stuff,’ I said. ‘Manda was telling me about some really important deal she’s doing. Worth millions. Trillions even.’
Miranda was the youngest ever head of international investment at Ravensberg Bank and also the first woman to do the job. I was fiercely, wonderfully proud of her and in total awe of her skills. Our anti-capitalist parents, however, thought it was terrible. They always appeared faintly ashamed of Manda’s money, which I thought was ironic considering she’d honed her financial management skills by organising the family budget before she hit her teens. And she still invested both of our parents’ erratic income wisely and made sure they never ran short.
In fact, thanks to Dad composing the scores for huge blockbuster films since the Nineties, and Mum’s enthusiastic love of art history earning her spot as an expert on an antiques valuation television show, my parents were both pretty wealthy. Not that they’d ever admit it. If they even knew. They shared a vague ‘it’ll all work out’ approach to money and mostly ignored anything Miranda said about it.
‘Urgh,’ said Mum, predictably. ‘It all sounds so immoral somehow, finance chat.’
I grinned at Miranda over Mum’s shoulder and she scowled at me.
‘Take the bottle into the lounge,’ she said to Mum. ‘We’ll be in when we’re done.’
‘Is Dora asleep?’ I asked. Friday nights were dreadful for my daughter’s carefully crafted routine. She absolutely adored my parents and tended to run round like a mad thing for the first half of the evening, then drop.
‘Curled up on the sofa like an angel,’ Mum said, soppily. The adoration went both ways.
‘And Freddie?’
‘Playing piano with your father,’ Mum said.
Freddie was Miranda’s seven-year-old son who could be adorable and vile in equal measures but who had apparently inherited Dad’s musical talent – much to our father’s delight.
Mum opened the fridge, took out the bottle and retreated. I turned to Miranda, who’d finished the washing up.
‘So, you saw the look, right?’
She nodded.
‘What do you think it meant?’
Miranda shrugged. ‘Probably something completely unrelated, knowing them,’ she said. ‘They were interested though. Dad especially. Do you think it is our Lil?’
‘No,’ I said, though I wasn’t as sure as I sounded.
‘Where did you see her name?’ Miranda asked. She pulled out the wooden bench that lived under the kitchen table and sat down with a sigh. ‘I’m exhausted. Freddie was up half the night.’
I didn’t want to talk about Freddie; I wanted to talk about Lil.
‘On a list of people approved to fly bombers,’ I said.
‘Did women fly planes in the war?’
I nodded. ‘I don’t know a whole lot about it, but it seems so. Not in combat, obviously.’
‘Obviously,’ said Miranda drily. ‘It’s funny that Lil’s never mentioned this because it sounds amazing. Flying bombers?’
‘Not just bombers,’ I said. ‘The records I found are from something called the Air Transport Auxiliary. They flew all the planes. Took them from the factories where they were built to wherever they were needed.’
‘And it was women doing this?’
‘Mostly,’ I said. ‘But men did it too. Jack Jones’s grandad did it because he was too short-sighted to join the regular RAF, which is faintly terrifying.’
Miranda chuckled.
‘But yes, mostly women. They called them the Attagirls.’
‘I like that,’ Miranda said. ‘It’s clever. And only a tiny bit patronising.’
It was my turn to laugh. ‘They were really impressive,’ I said.
‘What’s incredible,’ Miranda said, shaking her head, ‘is that I’ve never even heard of these women.’
‘I’ve not heard much about them either,’ I admitted. ‘And it’s literally my job.’
‘If it was our Lil, I can’t believe she’s never talked about it,’ said Miranda. ‘It strikes me as something you’d want to talk about. It sounds wonderful.’
‘She’s always been vague when I’ve asked her about the war. Never really told me what she did.’
‘She’d have only been about to turn sixteen when the war started,’ Miranda said. I was impressed; I’d been sneakily counting on my fingers trying to add it up. ‘And only twenty-one at the end.’
‘Old enough to be doing something,’ I pointed out. ‘I had an idea she did office work.’
Miranda screwed up her nose. ‘I can’t believe we’ve never been interested enough to ask her for the details,’ she said. ‘That’s terrible of us. You’re a historian, Nell. You should be ashamed of yourself.’
I stuck my tongue out at her. ‘I’ve asked her lots of times,’ I said. ‘She’s always told me how boring it was and how she couldn’t wait for the war to finish so she could travel.’
‘Sounds like she was trying to make it sound dull enough so you wouldn’t keep asking,’ Miranda said.
I blinked at her. ‘Oh God, it actually does sound like that,’ I said. ‘Do you think she saw some awful stuff? Or did some really brave things?’
‘Lil?’ Miranda said with a glint in her eye. ‘Brave? I’d say so, wouldn’t you?’
I thought about our great-aunt, who’d been the only person to step in when things were really tough for us back in the Nineties. Lil, who hated being in one place for long, but who’d stayed in London until she knew Miranda and I were okay and that our family wasn’t about to fall apart. Lil, who regularly phoned Dad throughout our childhood and reminded him about parents’ evenings, and exams, and even birthdays. I smiled.
‘Definitely,’ I said.
I perched on the table next to where Miranda was sitting on the bench, and put my feet up next to her. She frowned at me and I ignored her.
‘The ATA girls flew every kind of aircraft,’ I said. ‘Massive bombers, and tiny fighter planes, and everything in between.’
‘Do you think they got a hard time from people who didn’t think they were capable?’