TDTLBU Chapter Thirty-Six

Trigger Warning: Contains descriptions of battle scenes. May be upsetting to some readers

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Emma rubbed her eyes and yawned. Her head ached and she longed to drop into her blankets and sleep like a stone until daybreak, but she couldn't neglect those letters. 

"One a night," she told herself. "Only one a night. That's all you need to do." 

But even with this resolve firmly in mind, the stack look terribly daunting. There was a lovely long newsy letter from Mom with words dropped in here and there by Dad, and a scribbled postcard from Mickey. Katie had sent a rather troubled little epistle, her worry over Jerry consuming all other thought. Ronnie had sent his customary short letter that didn't really say much at all and Lissie had sent a brief note... Just a few hesitant lines as if she was afraid to say anything. There was a letter from Nathan too… a wonderfully long letter full of funny stories sprinkled here and there with lines that made her blush. He really was wonderful. She liked him a little more with each new letter. And she knew by now, without a doubt... He was falling in love with her. 

"Thinking of you tonight," his letter read. "And man, I wish I could see you again. I'm stuck in a foxhole here in the desert somewhere and it's awful lonely. To pass the time I think of you and all the things we could be doing if it wasn't for this dratted war. I'd take you out to dinner and a dance... A real fancy restaurant, the kind that serve those really good bread sticks and have candles on the table. We'd eat extravagantly good food... Wow... Steak probably. I could definitely go for a steak. And we'd just sit and laugh and talk for hours and there wouldn't be anybody giving orders and we'd just be on our own time. And the band would play pretty music and we'd just dance as late as we wanted. And you'd be so beautiful in the candlelight. I can see it all now. Maybe someday we really can do that. Would you be up to it, Emma?"

She folded his letter with a sad little smile. She was always glad to hear from him... But letters were dreadfully few and far between. It was a strange feeling, certainly, to realize that someone actually thought of her that way. She wasn't sure exactly how to react. It was like a dream come true, wasn't it? A handsome and charming lieutenant... loving her... Her! Emma Ruth Stewart! Oh, it was all so hopelessly romantic and wonderful. But something... somehow, somewhere... something was missing. Once, maybe twice, she let herself imagine a certain pair of teasing green eyes, and wondered. Ah, but that was ridiculous. He was just a friend, of course. 

But in spite of that, she let herself pick up Josh's letter and read it again. She knew she was grinning ridiculously over it, but she didn't care if anyone saw her. It made her happy, these letters from Josh. They made her feel at home again. Even if here and there she was beginning to note a spark of something else... Something terribly unlike Josh. It seemed as if there was, hidden beneath all his jokes and sarcastic complaints on the life of a soldier, something terrified and uncertain. She read between his lines and found a different story from the one he portrayed. One of horror and darkness and depression. He seemed to be hovering on the breaking point... As if someday soon it would all come crashing down and he would tell her the burdens that lay heavy on his heart.

✯✯✯

1942 slowly slipped into 1943. January came and with it, slushy, frozen, miserably cloudy days. Katie wandered listlessly around the house, knitting endlessly. She knit socks day and night, putting every scrap of her nervous energy into the work. But no heart. She was afraid. No word at all had come through. In final desperation, mid-way through January, she telegrammed the war department, hoping for some news… any news. A few words would be enough… just to let her know that he was alive and okay. Not knowing anything was unbearable. 

“It’s so strange,” she confided to Mrs. Bailey one morning in February. “I can’t understand why he wouldn’t write. Or why all my letters come back. I have dozens and dozens of them stashed in a drawer in my room, all saying “Returned to sender by direction of the War Department.” What does that even mean? Is it that they can’t send them or they won’t? Is he on a confidential mission? Or is there no postal service where he’s at? Or has he been…”

“Captured.” Mrs. Bailey finished the sentence when Katie faltered. “I don’t know, Katie, I just don’t know. All my letters have come back too. But I’ve had no word… no information whatsoever from the war department. I sent a telegram just a couple of days before you said that you did. It’s been two weeks and I still haven’t heard.”

“Oh, dear God, I hope he’s okay,” Katie murmured. 

“He must be.” Mrs. Bailey spoke firmly, lifting her face with a kind of defiant hope. “He has to be. If anything had happened, they would have contacted us. It must just be some kind of mistake that…” she broke off as the doorbell rang.

“I’ll get it,” Katie jumped down from the stool at the kitchen counter and hurried to the door. A Western Union boy stood on the step. The grim look on his face suddenly caused a shadow to pass over her soul. She could barely hold her hand steady as she accepted the yellow envelope he held out to her. 

“My sympathies, miss.” He spoke in a low tone, touching the brim of his cap in salute before turning quickly to the bike he had left in the street. Katie leaned against the doorpost, feeling suddenly weak at the knees as she stared at the yellow envelope in her hand. It was addressed to Mr. and Mrs. Bailey, of course, and she knew better than to pry. But at that moment, every sense of propriety fled and she found herself tearing at the envelope before she could stop. The message was brief… only a few typed words pasted to the page. 

She read it over and over and over, numbly, her brain refusing to process the words before her eyes. With a sharp little cry, she turned to stumble inside, trying to call out for Mrs. Bailey. She felt faint and dizzy, unable to find her tongue as her knees gave way and she collapsed to the floor. Mrs. Bailey came running, calling out to her.

“Katie? Katie, honey, what’s wrong?” 

Mutely, Katie held the telegram out to her with a shaking hand. Mrs. Bailey read it aloud, her brow furrowing as she stared at the words.

“The Secretary of War expresses his deepest regret that Private Gerald Bailey was killed in action November 13, 1942 as result of sinking of ship USS Juneau by enemy action at Guadalcanal. Letter to follow.” 

The telegram fluttered to the floor beside the kneeling girl and Mrs. Bailey too, sank to her knees. 

“Oh God!” she cried out, clutching her hands against her heart and raising beseeching eyes to heaven. “Oh God! My boy… oh my boy…” Sobbing, Katie threw her arms around the older woman and they clung to each other, desperate in their grief.

✯✯✯

"You okay, Chief?" 

The words took a while to register in Ronnie's mind. His eyes were glued to the scene before him as he slid another magazine into his rifle, the action so automatic he didn't even look down. They were surrounded by the enemy, fighting two men to a foxhole. The battle was a desperate one and it was looking bad. If the German tanks began to advance, their orders were to retreat. All the way back to the Kasserine Pass, if necessary… fifty miles back from front lines.

“Damn it, you're bleeding, Chief. Answer me!" Mac sounded annoyed as he yelled to make his voice heard above the shots.

"I can still fight," Ronnie yelled back, not bothering to check where he was wounded. If he had been hit, he never felt it. 

"Damn it," Mac swore again and dragged him down to the uneven sandy floor of the foxhole. He grabbed Ronnie's right arm, pushing his rifle to the side. "You dafty, man? Look at this!" 

Ronnie looked… and only then did he feel the pain. Blood covered his wrist and forearm, making it almost impossible to see where the actual wound was. Mac kept his head below the opening of the hole as he clenched Ronnie's wrist in an iron grip, attempting to slow the flow of blood. 

"How's it feel?" He dug through his rucksack with his other hand.

"Hurts like hell," Ronnie hissed in pain between clenched teeth. Remembering the morphine he had been issued, he found the syringe in his pocket and jabbed the needle into his arm. Mac slid a knife from his pack, flipping open the blade with his teeth.

"It's clean," he assured Ronnie, wiping the blood away with his sleeve so he could find the wound. "I keep an extra clean knife for this kinda stuff. If I can take care of stuff like this, it'll keep the medics free for the big problems." As he spoke, he dug the point of the knife into Ronnie's arm, pushing out the bullet. "Lucky they made us carry all this junk, eh?" He grinned as he pulled out a roll of bandages and wrapped it tightly around Ronnie's wrist, his hands gentle. "Feel okay?"

"I'll survive," Ronnie winced as he gingerly touched the bandage. "Thanks, buddy."

"All in a day's work!" Mac saluted and rose to peer above ground. ""Looks like our orders to retreat are coming through. We gotta get outta here."

✯✯✯

Josh dug his fingers into the hard-packed dirt walls that surrounded him and gasped for breath. The memory of the last few minutes was foggy. He wasn't exactly sure how he had ended up here, in another man's foxhole. It had just been there and so he had jumped into it, he supposed. He glanced at the floor of the deep hole and cried out. The former occupant of the foxhole was there still, lying motionless in a pool of blood. Josh couldn't look at him. He sank onto the narrow shelf jutting out a foot from the bottom of the hole and shut his eyes, trying to think. His mind was swirling and nothing coherent was rising to the surface, just flying sand and debris and flashes of fire from guns and bombs, nearly obscured in an overwhelming cloud of thick, black smoke.

Just a few minutes ago, he had been surrounded by his own unit. The order had been given to retreat and they were trying to, but being out in the open enough to actually run was near suicide. When Corporal Bryce was wounded and Sergeant McFarland fell, dead instantly, the squad had nearly disbanded. Ronnie held them together by sheer force. Josh had never seen Ronnie that way before, gray eyes blazing, veins on his neck standing out like whipcord as he screamed at the men around him. Some were too terrified to move and Ronnie had resorted to physically dragging them back toward the group. Mac had lagged behind to help Stan and when he reappeared with the wounded man on his shoulders, he helped Ronnie push their unit through.

And then the tanks came. German Panzers, great, hulking beasts, bearing down on the fleeing allied troops like merciless giants preparing to devour their prey. The men scattered. Josh had seen the foxhole just ahead of him and dove for it frantically. He hit the dirt just a few feet short of the opening and rolled into it, moments before a Panzer rumbled over his head. The noise was deafening and still he could hear the grumbling roar ringing in his ears. Dirt and sand had showered down on him, filling his nose and ears even as he ducked his head and tried to cover his face. The sand was pouring down the back of his collar. Small pebbles and a few large rocks glanced off his back, leaving aching bruises behind. More tanks followed the first and the ground shook beneath the treads. Josh thought it would never end or that, when he opened his eyes, he would be standing on the brink of eternity. But no. When at last the tanks had passed and he lifted his head, reeling dizzily, he saw nothing but dirt walls, gray sky, and a dead man at his feet. The man had died hours before, judging from the ghastly pallor of his face and the stiffness of his limbs.

Josh swallowed the bile rising in his throat and, leaning forward, rolled the body over so the man lay on his back. He tried to close the gaping, staring eyes, still fixed with a look of surprise and horror, but they wouldn't stay shut. He fished in his pocket for a clean handkerchief and laid it gently over the man's face. There were tears in his eyes as he reached out to grasp the chain around the man's neck and read his dog tags.

"Well, Harry," he croaked, his voice raspy from the inhalation of debris and smoke. "Looks like it's you an' me pal for the next good long while, cuz I have no idea where anyone is. Sorry you're dead, buddy. Wonder if you had a mom waiting at home for you. A dad… little sisters and brothers… maybe even a girl, eh? Was she pretty?" He sighed and brushed the sand from his sleeve so he could use it to wipe his face. There were tears in his eyes. He could still hear gunfire above him, although it sounded slightly more distant than it had before. Cautiously he stood, raising his head above the rim of the hole. Dead men lay scattered over the ground, crushed from the passing of the tanks. Here and there, and in complete disorder, survivors ran, leaping over the bodies of their comrades. Every so often, one would stagger and fall, hit by a German bullet. Josh stayed put, not yet eager to risk the open field above him.

"Anyone alive in there?" 

The voice startled Josh, close by and just as hoarse as his own. He glanced up to see a face black with soot peering down at him. The helmet was decorated with a large red cross.

"I think one of us is," he grinned feebly. "You ain't a Yank, are ya?"

"Nah," the newcomer grinned back and slid into the foxhole, cramped as it was. It has been dug for two men, but now there were three. "I'm Canadian. Name's Seth. Ya hurt anyplace?" 

"Naw, I ain't, but this guy sure is," Josh gestured toward the body. A shadow crossed his face as he looked once again at the dead man and his heart constricted inside of him. 

"Too bad," Seth whispered, shaking his head. He leaned against the wall with a heavy sigh. "Man, I'm bushed. Gave my last bit of water to a man who died a few minutes later… and now I could drink a waterfall."

"You don't have water?" Josh looked at Seth as if he was crazy and handed over his canteen. "Drink up, man, or you'll die. But not too much, or we'll both die. I'm Josh, by the way."

"Thanks, buddy," Seth drank thirstily and passed the canteen back. "It's hell out there for sure. Enough to make a devout Christian out of any man. Eh, Josh? You been praying?"

Josh shrugged uncomfortably. He'd been too scared to pray. And when he finally did think of prayer, he'd decided not to. Why should God listen to him now, when Josh had pushed Him aside for so long? 

Seth nodded at his silence as if it had answered him.

"I'll pray for ya then, buddy." He turned to raise his head over the edge of the hole. "Gotta get back out there, see if there's anyone alive out there. Take care, kay?"

Before Josh could even begin to attempt an argument, Seth had scrambled up onto the ground and was running along the field in the opposite direction of the retreating men, half bent over as he kept his head low. Josh watched, warily raising his head, as Seth lifted another man onto his shoulders and ran toward the nearby cliffs where the fleeing army was momentarily sheltering. But he stumbled and fell. 

Josh didn't think. He was out of the hole and on the ground within seconds, running toward the fallen man. Bullets whistled past his ears, falling like fiery rain. Less than ten yards to his left, a land mine went up in smoke and he felt burning shrapnel glance off his cheek. The field seemed to be growing longer with each step he took and every moment that dragged past was an eternity... But he kept going.

Seth had collapsed with the other wounded man on top of him, both unconscious but still breathing. Josh glanced at the landscape around him and realized the cliffs weren't as far away as they had seemed earlier, nor could he remember exactly where the hidden foxhole had been. The choice was obvious. He grasped each of the wounded men by an arm, knowing no better way to take them both, and moved towards the cliffs as quickly as he could, dragging them behind him.

He was surrounded by American soldiers before he reached the cliffs and he collapsed, exhausted, as the wounded were carried off. Someone lifted him to his feet and he managed, with help, to make it to shelter. He was never happier in his entire life as when he saw the men of his own unit around him again. It was amazing how wonderful a familiar face could be in the middle of a battle. He cried... and didn't even care that they saw his tears. 

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