Pat’s face was partly obscured by the precarious tower of twenty books she carried into the foyer of the Metropole Hotel. With her heart in her mouth, Betty followed her closely, arms outstretched and ready to catch any flying novels. Stepping into the hotel entrance, where pungent lilies in an enormous blue and white vase drooped in the heat, Betty tucked her hair behind her ears, discreetly pinched her cheeks and swept her eyes over the reception area and the drawing room, in case Sam was there.

‘Make a space, Betty!’ Pat commanded, as they approached a table where a small collection of books had already been deposited. Betty quickly cleared a space and began to lift down the donated books a few at a time from Pat’s tower and display them on the table.

‘Why are your hands shaking, lovey?’ Pat asked. Betty just shrugged and rubbed them together.

‘They’re cold,’ she mumbled.

‘Cold?’ shrieked Pat. ‘It’s warm as toast in here. Anyway, get on with it, we don’t have all night.’

Betty let out a small exasperated sigh and continued with the job. As she did so, a small crowd of Canadian soldiers and airmen gathered, dressed in their perfectly pressed, smart blue uniforms, stopping to read the descriptions on the backs of the books or flick through a few pages. Though she tried not to, Betty blushed at the sight of the men and once more scanned the room for Sam, but he was still nowhere in sight.

Relief and disappointment coursed through her. After the incident the other evening, when she’d been so rude to Sam on his birthday, she thought it best that she avoided him altogether. When Pat had announced they were delivering books to the hotel after her shift at the bakery had ended, her stomach had turned in on itself, but she had convinced herself that he had most likely forgotten all about her and was probably out with a pretty young woman who he’d met at the dance. Or perhaps he’d already been posted on operational service. These men were only in Bournemouth for a short period of retraining and orienteering before joining a squadron. Chances were that she’d never see him again – ships passing in the night and all that.

‘Betty,’ said a familiar male voice, interrupting her thoughts. ‘I’m beginning to suspect you’re following me. We really should make this official and go on a date…’

Gaping at Sam, Betty dropped the books she was holding and blushed madly, hit, not for the first time, by how handsome he was, with his blond hair, dark brown eyes, cheekbones sharp as knives and strong jawline. He towered above the other soldiers. Betty smiled up at him, her cheeks firing red, as he picked up the books she’d dropped and pretended to read from one of them.

‘Once upon a time a young girl named Betty met a handsome fellow named Sam,’ he started, giving her a winning smile. ‘Sam was the envy of all the boys in the Canadian Air Force because he was the finest pilot they’d ever known. One evening, this heroic pilot asked Betty out, but Betty wasn’t interested. He wanted to show her what he could do on the dancefloor…’

Sam threw a few dance moves, nearly knocking over the vase of lilies, and Betty put her hands to her mouth to suppress a hoot of laughter, but before she could stop giggling, Pat waded over in her sturdy brogues.

‘And who, may I ask, are you, young man?’ Pat said, positioning herself in between Sam and Betty, with her right hand raised in order to shake Sam’s hand. Placing the book back down on the table with an amused expression on his face, he took a bow, shook Pat’s hand and grinned.

‘I’m Sam, and I arrived in this wonderful town with the Royal Canadian Air Force three weeks back,’ he said. ‘Betty and I have become acquainted since she’s staying in the hotel next door. I was hoping, ma’am, that before I’m sent on an operation, Betty might accompany me for an evening out. Am I right in thinking that you’re her sister? It can get a little dreary with all these fellas, what with our lectures on flying and all. A man needs to have a little fun.’

Pat tutted, put her arms behind her back and rocked on the balls of her feet.

‘Of course I’m not her sister! You should keep your eye on the job, young man,’ she said. ‘Have you seen what Jerry has done to this country? We need men like you to help, not get distracted by a pretty young face like Betty here.’

Betty blushed, hoping that Sam wouldn’t take offence at Pat’s comments. She hadn’t known the woman long, but already knew that she couldn’t help but wade in and stick her nose in, whether it was wanted or not.

‘Oh, but a pretty face and good conversation are so good for morale, Mrs…?’ Sam said.

‘Barton,’ said Pat. ‘Mrs Patricia Barton.’

‘Mrs Barton,’ said Sam. ‘My mind is always on the job. How can it not be? I’ve sailed thousands of miles from home, of my own free will, to put my military training to good use and help defeat Hitler, to win peace and freedom for us all. I don’t mean any harm by letting off a little steam and taking a pretty girl to a dance. I’m a gentleman through and through. Betty knows that, don’t you, Betty?’

Betty, lost for words, nodded and busied herself with arranging the books. Pat, seemingly humbled by his words, looked apologetic and mumbled, ‘Of course,’ before continuing with her task.

‘Anyway, I’m making a nuisance of myself, so good day to you, ma’am,’ he said. ‘Good to see you, Betty.’

He began to walk away, and Betty tried not to stare at his physique beneath his jacket. He looked incredibly strong – like he could lift an aircraft, not just fly one.

‘Come on, Betty,’ said Pat, tutting. ‘We need to get on with our next delivery. If you want my advice, keep away from flirts like Sam.’

Pat quick-marched out of the hotel first, and, managing to tear her gaze away from Sam’s shoulders, Betty started to follow her. There was a tap on her arm and she turned to find Sam grinning at her. Eyeing Pat, he quickly handed her a piece of paper and winked.

‘Betty!’ called Pat from the van. ‘Come on with you!’

Betty glanced at the piece of paper and saw that he’d written a message: To B, 6 p.m. at the clock tower, tomorrow. Jitterbug lesson. From S x

Grinning, Betty stuffed the piece of paper into her pocket and ran towards Pat, who was waiting with an impatient look on her face, but not before she glanced back at Sam, gave just the slightest nod of her head and mouthed, okay.

Mary waited until Audrey was with Uncle John in the bakehouse, discussing tomorrow’s bread orders, before she crept into the kitchen in stockinged feet from which one big toe had escaped. Tucking her silky bobbed hair behind her ears and with a mix of excitement and trepidation in her heart, she quietly opened the cupboards, searching for ingredients. Blinking into the dark cupboards that Audrey kept spotlessly clean and astonishingly organised, Mary breathed in the heady fragrances of baking: ginger powder, cinnamon and nutmeg, currants and treacle. Though she longed to delve her little fingers into the neatly wrapped packets of dried fruit and squirrel away fistfuls of the sweet treats, she knew they were reserves to be kept for the bakery’s Christmas orders. Instead, she reached for the dried milk powder and pulled it out of the cupboard.

‘Margarine, sugar, dried milk powder,’ she muttered, carefully lining up the packets on the kitchen table. Realising she needed a bowl and spoon, she quietly moved across the kitchen, pausing when she heard the sounds of the neighbourhood’s children playing out on the street. Throwing open the window, she stuck her head out to see what games they were playing and to check that those American soldiers weren’t handing out sweets. Traffic light lollies were her favourite. Goodness knows where they found them but find them they did.

‘Oi, Scary Mary!’ shouted a voice from the street. Squinting in the sunset and hearing the seagulls overhead – a nice change from those noisy aircraft that seemed to drop in and out of the clouds like yo-yos – she scanned the faces until she recognised Billy, a bully boy from her class at school who smelled like soused herring and had once told her he weed on the raspberry bushes just after she’d picked and eaten some of the berries. Dressed in grey flannel shorts that were way too small on him, he called her ‘Scary Mary’ because once, when a siren had gone off while they were at school, Mary had been too scared to come out from under her desk. She hadn’t been able to find the words to tell him what it was like to watch her brother die when a bomb had hit their home.

When he saw her, he stuck out his tongue, so she stuck out hers in return and slammed the window shut. Deciding she wasn’t missing out on anything if he was there, she climbed onto a chair and poured the ingredients into a bowl. Creaming them together, she frowned – how was she going to make this cake look like a banana?

What can I use to make this yellow? she mused, returning to the cupboard and scanning the tins and packets, finally settling on a bright yellow tin of Colman’s dried English mustard powder. That would do it! Though she wasn’t sure how mustard powder would taste in icing, she decided to give it a go. Surely Audrey would be delighted with the banana cake even if it didn’t actually taste like bananas. As she mixed in the mustard powder, the icing started to resemble a yellow sludge, but after spreading it onto the bread and shaping it into a banana shape, Mary was satisfied. She giggled, but was distracted by a stone being thrown up at the window.

‘Billy, will you go away?’ she muttered, licking her fingers and cringing at the flavour.

When another stone, bigger this time, hit the glass, Mary worried that he’d put a hole right through it, so she opened up the sash window and peered outside. The children had mostly gone and in Billy’s place was a man three times his height, with broad shoulders and hands as big as saucepans.

‘Sorry, miss,’ he said. ‘I saw someone was in there but couldn’t get an answer at the door. I’m looking for Betty. Does she work here?’

Mary instinctively sensed danger but she was hopeless at acting and the man got the answer he wanted from her silence.

‘I thought so,’ he said. ‘Do you know where she’s staying? There’s a shilling in it for you. Don’t be frightened of me. I’m Betty’s brother.’

Mary mulled over the man’s words and stared at the coin in his palm. With that shilling she could buy Audrey a birthday present to show her how much she cared – and if he was Betty’s brother, why wouldn’t she want to see him?

‘If you give me the shilling,’ Mary said. ‘I’ll tell you.’

The man laughed.

‘You’re a smart one,’ he said, tapping his skull. ‘Now, where is she?’

‘She’s staying next door to the Metropole Hotel in town,’ said Mary. ‘You can catch the bus straight there. It’s opposite the clock tower.’

‘Good girl,’ he said. ‘Now keep this a secret, will you? I want to surprise her.’ The man tossed the coin up into her hand and walked off down the road without waiting for an answer. Mary trembled, wondering now whether she’d made a mistake. Following him down the road with her eyes, she eventually tore herself away from the spot at the window and moved back to her cake, slipping the coin into her sock. The evening was warm, and the mock icing was already dripping unattractively down the sides of the bread. Hearing Audrey’s footsteps on the wooden staircase, she quickly put a dish over the banana cake.

‘Mary, were you talking to someone?’ Audrey said, popping her head round the door. ‘I thought I heard your voice.’

Mary thought about telling Audrey about the man for a second before shaking her head. She couldn’t tell her the truth because then she wouldn’t be able to keep the shilling and buy her a gift. No, she’d do as the man said and keep it a secret.

That night Betty got ready for bed with a knot of excitement and fear in her belly. Sitting at the tiny table at the end of her bed, which served as desk and dressing table, she studied the note that Sam had given her. Even his handwriting, which was like lace, was a little bit thrilling. Maybe it was wrong to have butterflies in her stomach, she thought, glancing at her pink cheeks in the small mirror hanging on the wall in the room, but she couldn’t deny they were there. And why shouldn’t she be thinking of enjoying herself for a change? With the war on – and after the shock of Robert’s deception – she needed to let her hair down now more than ever before.

Tucking the note into the pages of the book Pat had given her, then spreading the colourful crochet blanket out on her bed, she thought of a speech that Winston Churchill had made on the wireless earlier in the week. Some of his words had stuck in her head: ‘…we may stride forward into the unknown, with growing confidence’ he’d said. Of course, Churchill was talking about military operations, for which he had said ‘there was only one end’, but somehow his words seemed to apply to her personal life too.

Before climbing into bed, Betty glanced out of the window criss-crossed with Splinternet tape and peered up and down the street, hoping there would be no air raid siren tonight. Just as she was about to turn away, a sudden movement in the bushes opposite caught her eye, making her suck in her breath and the hairs on her arms stand on end. She stared out into the darkness, thinking she could see something – or someone – staring back at her. Squinting, she rubbed her forehead and tutted.

‘Robert?’ she whispered, before shaking her head and rolling her eyes at herself, thinking that she was becoming paranoid. There was nothing and nobody there, just a seagull standing proudly on the clock tower.

Letting down the blind and sliding into bed, Betty wondered if she would ever be free from her fears or whether she’d always be looking over her shoulder, expecting Robert to have found her, wanting his money back. Shrugging off her anxiety, she pulled the blanket over her head and thought again about the note Sam had written. She would meet him tomorrow at 6 p.m. Whatever their meeting turned out to be, she was willing to give it a chance. If only for a few hours on one evening of her life, she would put the past behind her and live in the moment – striding forward into the unknown, with growing confidence.