Don't wanna be here? Send us removal request.
Text
0 notes
Text
Tuskegee P3
1943 – Off-Base Bar – Evening
The Tuskegee Army Air Field quieted after dark, though “quiet” was a relative term. The constant hum of generators still filled the air, punctuated by the distant clink of tools from the night maintenance crews. Dorothy, however, had escaped the base entirely.
She’d walked into the edge of town, down a narrow street where the streetlamps threw soft golden pools across the sidewalk. The air carried the faint smell of fried catfish from the diner two blocks away and the sharper tang of tobacco smoke drifting from the row of small bars and clubs where servicemen gathered after hours.
Dorothy stepped into one of them—a dimly lit place called Red’s Tavern, though the paint on the sign had long since peeled away. Inside, the smell of whiskey and beer mingled with the sweet notes of jazz from a battered upright piano in the corner. The crowd was a mix—Black airmen in uniform, a few civilian workers from the airfield, and the occasional white soldier who wandered in from the neighboring town. The atmosphere was loose but careful; everybody knew the unspoken rules of who talked to who and how far you could test them in Alabama.
She moved toward the bar, intent on nothing more than a glass of iced ginger beer and a moment to clear her head after the officer’s outburst earlier. But as she scanned the room, her breath caught.
He was here.
The officer.
He sat alone at a small table in the far corner, away from the crowd, his cap set on the table beside an untouched glass of something amber. The light above him flickered faintly, catching in his blond hair, and his posture was tight—shoulders slightly hunched, like a man trying to look smaller in a room.
Dorothy hesitated, sliding onto a barstool where she could watch without being obvious. She ordered her drink, but her eyes kept flicking back to him.
From here, she could see more details she hadn’t before: the faint shadow of stubble on his jaw, the way his hand drummed against the glass but never lifted it, the way his gaze kept darting to the door as if expecting someone.
She thought about the folded paper in her pocket. She’d gone all day without opening it, the officer’s warning echoing in her mind: Don’t open it here. But now, seeing him alone, she felt the urge to march over and demand an explanation.
Except… he didn’t look like a man in the mood for conversation.
The bartender slid her drink across the counter. “You know him?” he asked quietly, following her gaze.
Dorothy shook her head, just enough to be truthful but not enough to invite more questions.
For a few minutes, she sipped her ginger beer and watched him. At one point, a pair of pilots from the 332nd passed his table and gave him a polite nod. He nodded back, brief and stiff. No words exchanged.
Finally, she made a decision. Dorothy slid off the stool, smoothed her skirt, and walked toward him.
He noticed her halfway there. His eyes flicked up, and his expression shifted—surprise first, then something unreadable, then the faintest shake of his head, almost imperceptible.
“Mind if I sit?” she asked, stopping by his table.
He hesitated a beat too long before answering. “You shouldn’t be here,” he said quietly, his voice low enough that it wouldn’t carry over the music.
Dorothy raised an eyebrow. “It’s a public bar.”
“For you and me—it’s not,” he replied, glancing briefly around the room. “Not tonight.”
She sat anyway, folding her hands on the table. “Then tell me why you gave me this.” She reached into her pocket, sliding the folded paper toward him.
His gaze dropped to it, then back up to her face. His jaw clenched. “Not here,” he repeated, sharper now. “If you open that here, you could put both of us in trouble you don’t even understand.”
Dorothy leaned in, her voice matching his in low intensity. “I followed you because I thought something was wrong. You yelled at me like I was a child, but you still gave me that paper. You can’t expect me not to have questions.”
His eyes held hers for a long, tense moment. Then, finally, he let out a slow breath. “Finish your drink,” he said. “Then walk out like you don’t know me. Go to the diner across the street, sit at the back booth, and then open it.”
Dorothy’s pulse quickened. “What’s going to happen if I do?”
He didn’t answer. Instead, he stood, dropped a couple of bills on the table, and left without touching his drink.
She sat there for a moment, staring at the folded paper now in front of her again. Whatever this was, she had a choice—walk away, or find out.
And she already knew which one she’d make.
0 notes
Text
Tuskegee P2
1943 – Tuskegee Army Air Field – Late Afternoon
The heat had shifted into a heavy, humming warmth that clung to the skin. The hangar buzzed with movement—mechanics shouting to one another over the grind of wrenches, pilots passing through in their leather jackets, and the distant rumble of a plane taxiing on the runway.
Dorothy still had the folded paper in her pocket, pressing against her side like it was alive. She hadn’t dared open it yet. Not here. Not with so many eyes and ears.
She stepped toward the officer’s retreating figure, determined to ask him—politely—what this was all about. But before she could reach him, he stopped abruptly and turned on his heel. His shadow fell over her as he closed the distance in three quick strides.
“You!” His voice cut through the din like the crack of a whip.
Dorothy froze, startled. She wasn’t used to being addressed that way—certainly not in front of others. A few nearby airmen paused in their work, glancing over with interest.
“Do you have any idea what you’re doing?” the officer barked, his tone sharp enough to slice. “You don’t follow a man into restricted areas without clearance, do you understand me?”
Her mouth opened, but her voice caught in her throat.
“I—”
“This is an active maintenance zone,” he snapped, gesturing to the P-51 Mustang gleaming behind him. “We’ve got fuel lines exposed, live equipment running. One wrong move and you’re in the hospital—or worse. And you were this close to walking straight into a moving propeller back there.”
Dorothy’s cheeks burned hot, though whether from embarrassment or indignation she couldn’t tell. She could feel eyes on her from all sides—mechanics pretending to work, airmen leaning on toolboxes, all clearly eavesdropping.
“I didn’t mean—”
“And what’s worse,” he cut in, “you’re a nurse. You should know better. Safety protocols exist for a reason.”
Something in his tone wasn’t just about safety—it carried a weight, a strain, like there was more beneath the surface. His jaw was set too tight, his eyes too alert, scanning the hangar as if looking for something… or someone.
Dorothy swallowed hard, forcing her voice steady. “Sir, I apologize.”
Her words seemed to quiet the air around them, just for a moment. “I wasn’t trying to cause trouble. I saw you walking toward the hangar and I—well— I thought you might’ve been looking for medical personnel. I was only trying to help.”
His expression shifted slightly, the hard lines of his face softening—just barely. The wind outside carried in the faint smell of engine oil and hot metal.
“You should’ve stayed in the infirmary,” he said, still firm but not as sharp. “That’s where your help is needed.”
“Yes, sir,” she replied, nodding quickly. “It won’t happen again.”
The officer studied her for a long moment, his gaze unreadable. Then he stepped back, his voice lowering so only she could hear. “Keep that paper safe. And don’t open it here.”
Dorothy blinked, her apology still lingering on her lips, but before she could say another word, he turned away, striding back toward the Mustang where the mechanic was waiting.
She stood there, heart still thudding, the sting of his reprimand mixing with a sharper, more curious ache. Whatever was in that folded paper in her pocket—it was important enough for him to risk drawing attention to her… and important enough to yell at her for following.
And now she needed to know why.
0 notes
Text
Tuskegee P1
1943 – Alabama – Tuskegee Army Air Field
The midday sun hung heavy over the red-dirt runways, making the air shimmer as planes roared overhead. Dorothy Jenkins, 22, adjusted the brim of her service cap and kept walking, the crisp white of her nurse’s uniform already tinged with the faint dust that clung to everything in this part of Alabama. She had just finished her shift at the infirmary—a blur of dressings, fevers, and nervous young pilots with more bravado than sense—when she spotted him.
The officer.
He was tall, shoulders squared beneath a perfectly pressed olive-drab jacket, his cap tilted just so. His blond hair caught the sunlight in a way that made it almost glow. Dorothy had seen him once before—briefly—in the hallway of the operations building. She’d been carrying a tray of medical files, and he’d nearly run into her coming around a corner. He’d said something—she couldn’t make it out—but his voice had been calm, quick, deliberate, and his blue eyes had flicked to hers for the briefest moment before he hurried on.
Today, he was moving fast again, across the tarmac toward one of the smaller hangars. Dorothy couldn’t explain why she followed—maybe curiosity, maybe something else—but her steps fell into rhythm with his at a careful distance. She could hear his voice now, low and urgent, speaking into the wind, but the roar of an engine starting nearby drowned every word.
“Excuse me—sir!” she tried, but he didn’t turn.
Her shoes clicked against the pavement as she picked up her pace. She passed a cluster of airmen—men of the 332nd Fighter Group, laughing as they rolled a spare tire toward the hangar—until she was almost close enough to catch more than just his profile. He reached the door to the hangar and spoke again, but the sound vanished beneath the metallic clang of a toolbox being dropped.
Dorothy frowned.
The Tuskegee base was a strange place—segregated like the rest of the country, yet bursting with contradictions. The airmen she served with were African American, brilliant and brave, trained to fly and fight for a country that didn’t treat them as equals. But here was this officer—white, clearly not part of the local units—moving with purpose like he didn’t quite belong, either.
Inside the hangar, the smell of oil and hot metal hit her. Mechanics in grease-stained overalls swarmed around a P-51 Mustang, its silver skin gleaming under the sunlight streaming through the open doors. The officer had stopped near the plane, speaking to a dark-haired mechanic. Dorothy moved closer, trying to catch fragments of the conversation, but a crewman’s shout about a fuel line problem cut through instead.
The officer glanced over his shoulder—and their eyes met.
For the second time in as many weeks, Dorothy felt a jolt. Not quite fear, not quite recognition—something in between. His mouth moved—he was saying something to her, she was sure—but again, she couldn’t hear it.
“What?” she called, stepping forward.
He gestured, sharp and quick, pointing toward the back of the hangar. Then, without waiting, he disappeared behind a stack of crates.
Dorothy hesitated. She was no spy. She was a nurse, and her job was to keep these young men alive, not to chase after mysterious officers. But something in her gut told her this wasn’t nothing.
She followed.
Around the crates, the air was cooler, shaded. The officer stood by a side door, one hand on the handle, the other holding a folded sheet of paper. He looked at her—really looked, as though trying to decide something—and then held out the paper.
Before she could take it, voices rose from the front of the hangar. He stiffened, shoving the paper into her hand.
“Read it—later,” he said, finally loud enough for her to hear, his voice low but firm.
And then he was gone. Out the side door, into the blinding sunlight, leaving Dorothy standing there with her heart hammering and the folded note burning in her palm.
She looked down at it. It was creased, the edges slightly smudged. Her fingers trembled as she tucked it into her uniform pocket.
Whatever this was—it wasn’t over.
0 notes
Text
Wings Of Valour
James “Jimmy” Delaney tightened the straps on his parachute as the C-47 plane hummed steadily at 10,000 feet, cutting through the cold, grey sky over Normandy. The year was 1944, and the war had reached a fever pitch. The invasion was hours away, and Jimmy’s heart pounded fiercely in his chest—not just from the imminent jump, but from the weight of responsibility and the unknowns that lay ahead.
Beside him, Private Evelyn “Eve” Jackson adjusted her helmet, her dark eyes sharp and steady. She was one of the few African American women trained as a paratrooper—a rarity in the segregated army. Unlike Jimmy, she had been met with suspicion and mistrust from many of the men around her. The whispered doubts and cold glares weighed heavily on her, but she carried herself with quiet strength. Today was more than a mission. It was her proving ground.
Jimmy glanced over at Eve, a slight furrow in his brow. He knew the rumors—many officers didn’t trust her with a gun, doubting her ability to fight alongside men, and the tension was palpable. But to Jimmy, Eve had proven herself time and time again during training. She was fast, smart, and courageous.
He swallowed his doubts and nodded toward her. “Ready?”
Eve gave a small, determined smile. “Born ready.”
The jump order came. One by one, soldiers plunged into the void, the roar of the wind swallowed by the sounds of battle below. Jimmy followed Eve out, the cold air whipping past him as he fell toward the earth, his parachute snapping open with a violent jerk.
He landed hard, scraping his elbow but otherwise okay. Eve touched down a few meters away, rolling expertly on landing and rising immediately.
“Let’s move,” Jimmy called, and Eve fell into step beside him.
The battlefield was chaos—gunfire echoed, cries rang out, and the dense woods were riddled with danger. Jimmy and Eve fought side by side, pushing forward to secure their objectives. It was in the fire of combat that true character was revealed.
At one point, Jimmy found himself pinned down by enemy fire behind a crumbled stone wall. Bullets chipped away at the mortar, dust swirling thick in the air. Eve was beside him, scanning for a way out.
“I’ve got an idea,” she whispered, eyes bright. She grabbed a discarded grenade, pulled the pin, and lobbed it toward the enemy machine gun nest that was suppressing them. The explosion silenced the gunfire, and they seized the moment to rush forward.
Jimmy couldn’t help but admire her fearlessness. Despite the doubts others had, Eve proved again she was more than capable.
Later, as the dust settled, Jimmy and Eve found a quiet moment near a small stream where medics treated the wounded. The adrenaline was ebbing, replaced by a heavy weariness.
“You okay?” Jimmy asked gently, noticing a bruise beginning to bloom on her cheek.
Eve shrugged. “I’ve had worse.”
Jimmy studied her face, trying to see beyond the surface. “You know, a lot of the guys don’t trust you. Not because you don’t belong, but because they’re scared or ignorant. I don’t get it.”
Eve’s eyes darkened, a flicker of hurt shining through. “It’s not just the army. It’s the world. I’m fighting two wars—one on this battlefield, and one against the prejudice I see every day. But I don’t have a choice.”
Jimmy nodded slowly. “I’m sorry. I don’t want to be one of those guys.”
“You’re not,” she said softly.
They stayed by the stream, the air between them charged with something unspoken. Days of fighting had forged an unlikely bond. Jimmy found himself drawn to Eve’s resilience, and Eve saw in Jimmy a rare kind of respect and kindness.
As the campaign moved on, their partnership grew stronger. They shared stolen moments around campfires, exchanged stories of home, and found comfort in each other’s presence. Jimmy learned that Eve dreamed of becoming an engineer after the war, a goal few women dared to voice. Eve discovered that Jimmy’s family had a small farm back in Pennsylvania, and that beneath his tough exterior was a man who loved poetry.
But the war was unforgiving. One night, during a fierce German counterattack, Jimmy was caught in an explosion and injured badly. Eve refused to leave his side, dragging him to safety and shielding him with her own body from incoming fire. Her actions saved his life.
As he lay recovering in the field hospital, Jimmy reached for her hand. “You were amazing.”
“I’m just doing what’s right,” Eve replied, brushing a stray lock of hair from his sweat-damp forehead.
Their relationship blossomed amidst the ruins of war—defying the barriers of race and gender, fueled by courage, respect, and an undeniable connection. It wasn’t easy; the prejudice didn’t vanish overnight, and there were moments when Eve felt isolated and worn down. But Jimmy stood firmly by her side, becoming an ally and protector, showing others that true bravery and loyalty transcended color.
Months later, as the war drew closer to its end, they stood on a hill overlooking the fields, the sun setting in a blaze of orange and red.
“Promise me something,” Eve said, her voice steady but vulnerable.
“Anything.”
“That when this is over, we don’t let the world tell us who we are. That we keep fighting, even if the battles change.”
Jimmy squeezed her hand. “I promise.”
And in that promise lay the hope for a future where love and equality would find their place—even in the aftermath of war.
0 notes
Text
Thank you to everyone who got me to 50 likes!
0 notes
Text
Yossarian and the little ghost

Title: Ghosts, Chocolate, and Catch-22 Nonsense
Setting: Pianosa, Italy – 1943, Catch-22 Tent HQ
Characters: Yossarian, Major Major, Dobbs, Aarfy, Orr, Nately, Milo Minderbinder, Clevinger
The sun had long dipped behind the rocky hills of Pianosa, leaving the military camp bathed in gold-tinged dusk. Inside the largest, most chaotic tent of the camp—known unofficially as “The Office of Eternal Bureaucratic Despair”—sat the usual gang of misfits: Yossarian, sprawled dramatically on a cot in his underpants; Major Major pretending not to be there; Dobbs twitching nervously in a corner; Aarfy polishing his glasses like a man on the brink of a moral crisis; Orr assembling what might’ve been a homemade accordion grenade; Nately reading poetry to no one; Milo Minderbinder counting his profit margins; and Clevinger trying, in vain, to apply logic to it all.
The tent reeked of sweat, coffee grounds, shoe polish, stale air, and Yossarian’s foot powder.
“Listen,” Milo was saying, “if I trade twenty crates of Egyptian cotton for fourteen barrels of Sicilian olive oil, then reinvest that in Calabrian tomatoes—”
“You’ll still be a crook,” Yossarian grumbled.
“I’m an entrepreneur!” Milo said proudly.
“You’re a wartime racketeer,” muttered Clevinger.
Suddenly, as if reality hiccuped, the tent flap fluttered with no wind, and out of nowhere, a soft yawn echoed through the room.
All eyes turned.
There, waddling confidently across the dusty floor, was a two-year-old Italian ghost girl. She was wearing a tiny lace dress, a tattered bonnet on her head, and her see-through cheeks were round with innocent chub. A faint spectral glow trailed behind her like mist.
She plopped herself, without ceremony, directly onto Aarfy’s lap.
“AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!” came a synchronized scream.
All seven grown men screamed in high-pitched terror like schoolgirls caught in a haunted amusement park ride. Papers flew. Cots flipped. Yossarian tried to climb inside a trunk. Orr shrieked and hit himself with a wrench.
The ghost girl blinked at them all, delighted.
“Buongiorno!” she chirped, cheerfully.
“DID IT JUST TALK?” Clevinger wailed, clinging to a cot post.
“IT SPOKE! IT SPOKE!” Dobbs shouted. “IN ITALIAN! IT’S A POLTERGEIST WITH LANGUAGE SKILLS!”
Aarfy was frozen, eyes wide, as the child grinned up at him, completely oblivious to the fact that he was no longer breathing.
“Dis pwace smewws wike fawts,” she declared casually, scrunching her little nose.
The tent went silent.
Yossarian clutched Major Major by the collar. “She can smell the truth.”
“She’s not wrong,” muttered Orr, sniffing the air and frowning.
Then the toddler looked up again, this time with a hopeful little pout. Her ghostly fingers reached toward Aarfy’s face.
“You ave tandy? Oo… tocowates?”
The gang looked at one another in dread.
“No candy,” Yossarian said grimly, checking his pockets.
“No chocolate,” Dobbs echoed, rummaging through his footlocker.
“Nothing!” Nately cried, upturning his poetry book.
The ghost child’s lips trembled. A cold breeze swept through the tent. Somewhere in the distance, a dog howled. The temperature dropped three degrees.
Clevinger whispered, “She’s getting… angry.”
Orr dove behind a crate.
Aarfy tried to gently remove her from his lap, but her tiny hands clung to his suspenders like she’d known him for centuries.
“She wants candy, you fools!” Milo cried. “Give her what she wants or we’ll be cursed into the next war!”
“I DON’T HAVE ANY!” Yossarian bellowed.
Suddenly, all eyes turned to Milo.
He froze. “Don’t look at me like that.”
“Milo,” Nately said slowly, voice trembling. “You always have Hershey bars.”
“No, I—”
“MILO.” Yossarian stood. “Give. The. Toddler. The. Damn. Chocolate.”
“I’m saving them for the Luxembourgian black market! The margin is—”
Before he could finish, the men tackled him.
There was a flurry of arms, legs, and business receipts. They dragged Milo upside down, hung him by his ankles from the tent pole like a giant profit piñata, and began shaking him violently.
“SHAKE HIM LIKE A VENDING MACHINE!” screamed Dobbs.
“HOLD HIS POCKETS OPEN!” yelled Nately.
“DO IT FOR THE GHOST CHILD!” Yossarian bellowed.
And then it happened—
Thump. A Hershey bar hit the floor.
Thump-thump. Two more followed.
Then an avalanche of sugar:
Caramels
Licorice
Tootsie Rolls
A half-melted Milky Way
Something labeled “Swiss Army Chocolate Ration – Not For Human Consumption”
A jar of Nutella
“OHHHHH!!!” the ghost girl squealed, clapping. “TANDYYYY!”
She dove into the pile like a cherubic banshee, her joy lighting up the tent with a faint celestial glow. She stuffed an entire chocolate bar in her ghost mouth, humming a content little tune.
Milo groaned as they released him from his upside-down fate. “That was limited stock,” he muttered. “She better appreciate the import tariffs.”
“She’s a ghost toddler,” Orr whispered. “She doesn’t believe in taxes.”
As the sugar-high ghost girl floated gently into the air, spinning like a tiny sugary hurricane, she pointed at Aarfy and said with glee:
“YOU—smeww wike cheese!”
Then vanished.
Poof.
Gone.
Silence returned to the tent, except for Milo softly weeping into his ledger.
“Did that just happen?” Clevinger finally asked.
“Yes,” Yossarian said, patting the back of his neck, “and the worst part is… now the place smells even more like farts and chocolate.”
“I liked her,” Orr muttered.
“I need a drink,” Dobbs said.
“I need a priest,” added Nately.
“I need to renegotiate my Italian chocolate contracts,” Milo sniffled.
They sat in stunned silence, eyes darting at the tent flap every time it rustled in the wind.
From that day on, none of them sat in Aarfy’s lap again.
And nobody dared eat chocolate without checking for ghost toddlers first.
End Scene.
(Inspired by true bureaucratic nonsense and ghostly sugar cravings.)
0 notes
Text
He Loves Me (He Just Doesn’t Know It Yet) P8
The war didn’t end with a bang.
It ended with a long, slow exhale.
The Aftermath
Operation Market Garden was a failure, a costly gamble that left the Allies scrambling and the soldiers of the 103rd battered and broken but not defeated. Wade and Esther survived the chaos, but scars—both visible and invisible—marked every one of them.
The Dutch villages, once vibrant and hopeful under the glow of liberation, now lay scarred by shellfire and ration lines. Civilians whispered prayers for peace, for the war to end soon.
Quiet Moments in the Camp
In a small, muddy camp just outside Arnhem, Wade and Esther found pockets of peace. Their arguments turned into laughter. Their stolen kisses turned into steady hands held in the cold. Their playful chases slowed into tender embraces at night.
Ashby remained a constant—wry, loyal, and forever traumatized by the “sounds” from Wade’s tent.
A Letter Home
One chilly evening, Esther sat by a flickering lantern, penning a letter home. Wade watched her, leaning against the tent pole.
She smiled softly, reading aloud:
“Dear Mama, We’re still here. Still fighting. Still holding on. I’m scared, but I have someone who makes the cold and the fear a little warmer. He’s stubborn and loud and annoyingly sweet, and I swear I’m going to punch him again soon. But I love him. —Esther”
Wade smiled, wiping dirt from his cheek. “You’re good with words.”
“Better with fists,” she teased.
The Final Push
The Allies launched their final push into Germany. Wade fought in the front lines. Esther tended to the wounded with steady hands and fierce determination.
Through it all, they held on to each other.
Every glance, every touch, a promise they would survive.
The Day It Ended
When Victory in Europe was declared, the camp erupted in cheers. Soldiers hugged, cried, and laughed—some unable to believe it was finally over.
Wade and Esther stood side by side, watching the sun rise over a war-weary land.
Ashby clapped Wade on the back. “You made it.”
Wade looked at Esther, his eyes shining. “We made it.”
Epilogue: The Quiet Years
Years later, back in a small house in a quiet town, Wade and Esther sat on the porch, hands intertwined.
Their scars were still there—faint, like the memories of gunfire and loss—but so was their laughter.
Esther nudged Wade. “Remember Arnhem?”
Wade laughed. “How could I forget? You punched a guy for trying to kiss me.”
She smiled. “And I’d do it again.”
He kissed her forehead gently. “And I’d let you.”
Because some loves aren’t just chased—they’re fought for.
And in the end, that made all the difference.
The End (Love survived the war. And so did they.)
0 notes
Text
He Loves Me (He Just Doesn’t Know It Yet) P7
The fog of war was thick that morning.
Low clouds hugged the Dutch countryside like a heavy quilt, and puddles littered the camp like tiny lakes—evidence of last night’s rain and the lingering chill of autumn crawling toward winter. The smell of coffee, mud, and burnt bacon filled the air, drifting lazily across the rows of khaki-colored tents.
Private Ashby was on a mission. Not a dangerous one. Not a covert one. But one of mild concern and nosy best-friend obligation.
He hadn’t seen Wade since yesterday evening, when the man had limped off toward his tent with Esther trailing behind him—fresh from their victory escape, full of adrenaline and thinly veiled romantic tension that had clearly reached its boiling point.
Ashby had planned to check in. Make sure Wade’s leg wasn’t infected. Maybe hand off a stolen extra ration bar. Maybe tease him about how many Germans Esther had personally scared off with her glare.
But as he neared Wade’s tent…
He stopped cold.
A sound fluttered through the canvas wall.
A sound no man on Earth wanted to hear.
Giggles.
Feminine. Airy. Breathless.
Then—
“Ohhh yes…”
Ashby’s spine snapped straight like a recruit at inspection.
He blinked hard.
Maybe he’d imagined it. Maybe Wade was—he didn’t know—reading a saucy novel aloud or reenacting a scene from a weird play with Esther for stress relief.
Then—
“YES. YES—OH, WADE!”
Ashby turned right the hell around.
“Nope,” he muttered to himself. “Nope, nope, absolutely not.”
He about-faced so fast he nearly tripped over a tent peg.
As he speed-walked back through the mud, avoiding eye contact with everyone, he muttered a prayer for his ears.
Back at the mess tent
Ashby dropped his tray onto the bench and sat beside Corporal Mallory with a haunted expression. He didn’t speak. He just stared into his grey mush of reconstituted potatoes like it held the answers to life.
Mallory blinked. “You good?”
“No.”
“You look like you saw a ghost.”
“Worse.”
“Hitler?”
“Worse.”
“Wade?”
Ashby slowly turned his head. “He’s alive.”
“That’s good, right?”
Ashby took a deep breath. “Not for my mental health.”
Mallory raised an eyebrow.
Ashby leaned in with the weariness of a thousand-year-old monk and whispered, “I heard things.”
Mallory snorted. “We’re in a war zone, man. Everyone hears things.”
“No.” Ashby pointed toward Wade’s tent. “I heard Wade. And Esther. And very, very non-combat noises.”
Mallory choked on his coffee.
Ashby wiped a hand down his face. “She giggled. Esther Green—the woman who punched a German in the face for looking at Wade too long—giggled.”
Mallory wheezed.
Ashby jabbed his fork into his potatoes. “I went to check on him. I was being responsible. But now? I need bleach for my brain.”
Mallory leaned back, cackling. “You poor bastard. You really tried to knock on the tent?”
“I got within five feet. That was enough.”
“Lesson learned.”
Ashby nodded solemnly. “From now on, Wade’s tent has a 30-foot radius of Do Not Approach unless you want to hear battlefield-rated dirty talk and romantic giggling from someone who used to yell at him in the Colonel’s office.”
“Honestly?” Mallory grinned. “I ship it.”
Ashby shoved a spoonful of sad potatoes in his mouth. “I ship it too. From a very, very safe distance.”
Meanwhile, in Wade’s tent...
The blanket was barely covering them. Wade lay sprawled on his back, eyes half-lidded, chest rising and falling in soft, satisfied waves. Esther—cheeks flushed, hair a beautiful mess of curls—rested her chin on his bare chest.
“You think anyone heard us?” she whispered.
Wade blinked at the ceiling. “If Ashby’s dead, it’s your fault.”
Esther laughed. “That’s fair.”
“I think I heard someone come close.”
“Did they run?”
“Based on the hurried footsteps and disturbed gravel sounds?” Wade smirked. “Oh yeah. Like a bat out of hell.”
Esther smiled lazily and trailed her fingers over his collarbone. “Good. Maybe next time they’ll knock.”
Wade groaned. “Don’t say ‘next time’ like that. I’ll never walk again.”
Esther leaned in and whispered in his ear, “That’s a risk I’m willing to take.”
0 notes
Text
He Loves Me (He Just Doesn’t Know It Yet) P6
The rope burned.
It bit into Wade’s wrists, raw and unrelenting, the coarse fibers soaked with blood and sweat. He and Ashby were tied back-to-back, wrists bound, ankles tethered, forced to sit in the dirt under a collapsing barn roof just outside Arnhem. The rafters creaked above them with every gust of wind, and somewhere in the distance, a cow lowed sadly—still waiting for a farmer who would never return.
The air reeked of smoke, rot, and loss.
The end of Operation Market Garden was not glorious.
Not for them.
Wade’s uniform was caked with mud and streaked with blood from the shelling that had torn apart their platoon hours earlier. Ashby had a gash above his brow that had stopped bleeding but was turning an ugly, purplish brown. They were breathing, yes, but each breath felt like a delay on a sentence.
The Germans had caught them during the retreat.
And now they were prisoners.
The barn doors groaned open, and a shaft of gray light split the dark. A tall, broad-shouldered German soldier stepped inside. His boots crunched over broken hay and burnt floorboards, his rifle slung lazily over his shoulder. His coat was neat. His face unreadable. But his eyes—they flicked to the Americans like a hawk sizing up rabbits.
He didn’t speak.
Just stood there.
Watching them.
Wade flexed his wrists again. Nothing. The rope had been tied by someone who’d clearly done this more than once. He leaned his head back a little against Ashby’s and whispered, “You still breathing?”
“Barely,” Ashby croaked. “You?”
“I’m too pissed to die.”
“That’s the spirit.”
Ashby shifted, winced. “What do you think he’s waiting for?”
“Orders. Or boredom. Or maybe he just likes watching.”
“…Creepy.”
“Very.”
The guard paced once around them, then stopped. He lit a cigarette with slow, deliberate fingers, puffed it once, then leaned against a nearby beam, staring at them in silence.
Wade stared right back. If you’re gonna kill me, do it, he thought. But don’t act like we’re just some museum exhibit.
The guard blew smoke out his nostrils and said, in passable English, “You Americans. Always so dramatic.”
Ashby snorted. “You tied us up in a damn burning barn, man.”
The German raised an eyebrow. “Would you prefer the trench?”
Ashby shut up after that.
Wade didn’t.
“Listen,” he rasped. “You’re wasting your time. We’re not officers. We don’t have intel. You got the wrong guys.”
“No such thing as wrong soldiers,” the guard replied coolly. “Just unlucky ones.”
They sat like that for an hour.
Maybe more.
The cold crept in through the floor, through their boots, into their bones. Wade was trying hard not to think of Esther—of her yelling at him, laughing with him, smirking with that promise in her eyes. I’ll be ready when the battle’s over.
Was this it?
Was this the ending?
She’d never get to slap him again. Never get to scream at him in front of the battalion. Never get to punch another poor girl trying to kiss him.
He felt his stomach twist.
“Hey,” he whispered to Ashby.
“Yeah?”
“If we don’t make it—”
“We’re making it.”
“—Tell Esther I love her.”
There was a pause.
Ashby tilted his head back against Wade’s shoulder. “You finally gonna admit it now, huh?”
“I’m tied to your ass in a warzone with a Nazi smoking like he’s at a cafe. If this ain’t the time to confess my sins, I don’t know what is.”
Ashby huffed a laugh.
“You think she’s okay?” Wade whispered.
Ashby nodded, even though he couldn’t be sure. “If anyone made it out, it’s her. Probably punched a German in the throat on her way back to camp.”
Wade closed his eyes.
He imagined Esther’s face—not the angry one. Not the mischievous one. The other one. The one he’d only seen twice. Soft, uncertain, just before she kissed him in the Colonel’s office.
“I hope she’s still chasing me,” he muttered.
“Buddy, I guarantee she’s halfway here to blow this barn up.”
Wade smiled faintly.
The German took another drag on his cigarette and looked up at the rattling barn roof. Rain was starting to fall in soft, slow drops.
Then—
Boom.
A far-off explosion shook the ground beneath them.
The guard froze. Ashby’s breath hitched. Wade’s eyes snapped open.
Another explosion.
Closer.
Then a scream in German.
The guard turned his head sharply toward the door, curse on his lips, but too late.
Gunfire.
You never forget the sound of a grown man screaming like a child.
Especially not when that grown man is a six-foot-tall, fully armed German guard.
Wade Jefferson and Ashby were still tied back-to-back on the floor of the ruined barn, both of them stiff from cold and exhaustion, their backs aching and wrists rubbed raw from rope. The guard, up until now, had been calmly smoking his cigarette and pacing like a wolf on patrol—cool, confident, utterly unbothered by the crumbling world around him.
Then the barn doors slammed open with a bang like a thunderclap.
And Esther Green—in mud-covered boots, wild curls flying, and an expression that could melt steel—charged in like the spirit of vengeance itself.
Her face was flushed, her medic satchel flapping against her hip, a captured MP40 machine gun in her hands. She wasn’t supposed to be on the front lines. She wasn’t supposed to be anywhere near combat.
But she wasn’t supposed to do a lot of things.
Did that ever stop her?
Not once.
The guard turned. His eyes widened. The cigarette fell from his lips in slow motion.
And then—
“AAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEE—!!”
The scream he let out was inhuman.
High-pitched. Trembling. The sound of a man whose entire worldview had just shattered. He stumbled backward, tripped over a support beam, and scrambled toward the door with flailing arms and snot streaming down his face.
“MUTTI! MUTTI!” he shrieked, sprinting into the fog outside. “ICH WILL ZU MEINER MUTTER!”
Esther lowered the MP40 slowly, blinking. “Was that—did he seriously just say he wants his mommy?”
Ashby craned his neck. “Yup. I don’t speak much German, but I definitely heard ‘Mama.’”
Wade stared after the screaming guard, then looked up at Esther, eyes wide. “What in the holy mother of Eisenhower did you do to him?”
Esther sniffed and shrugged. “It’s not what I did. It’s the aura.”
Ashby laughed. “Your aura just made a Nazi cry for his mom.”
“Damn right it did.”
She tossed the gun aside like a bored warrior goddess, then strode toward the boys, eyes gleaming with fury and adrenaline.
“I leave you idiots alone for one day—ONE DAY—and I come back to find you tied up like pigs at a barn wedding.”
Wade, tied and helpless, tried to keep his voice level. “Esther, I swear to God, this isn’t what it looks like.”
Ashby added, “I wish it was what it looks like. At least then it’d be fun.”
Esther knelt beside them and pulled a wicked little blade from her boot—sharp, shiny, and stained with God-knows-what. In one clean move, she sliced through the rope binding their wrists.
“Careful with that thing,” Wade muttered. “You’re gonna slice my artery.”
“You want a rescue or a manicure?” she snapped, sawing through the rope around their ankles. “Because I can leave you here if you'd prefer waiting for Mama’s Boy to come back.”
Wade chuckled, half in awe, half in pain. “Remind me never to piss you off again.”
“Too late.”
Ashby finally slumped forward, free at last, and muttered, “Bless the good Lord and all his sassy angels.”
Once the boys were on their feet—groaning, limping, but alive—Esther gave them a once-over. Her eyes softened, just for a moment, when they landed on Wade.
His uniform was torn. His cheekbone was bruised. His eyes were bloodshot.
But he was alive.
And hers.
“Wade?”
“Yeah?”
“If you ever let yourself get captured again without me, I’ll kill you myself.”
Wade blinked. “Noted.”
She crossed her arms. “And if another Dutch girl tries to kiss you, I’m not stopping at one punch.”
“…Hot.”
Esther rolled her eyes, but a corner of her mouth twitched upward. “Come on, Romeo. Let’s get out of here.”
“Wait,” Ashby said, limping toward the barn door. “We’re not gonna talk about how that full-grown Nazi cried like a baby?”
Wade slung his arm around Ashby’s shoulders. “I’m gonna write it in my diary.”
Esther grabbed Wade’s other arm and kissed his temple. “You’re welcome.”
“I’m not saying I’m turned on,” Wade muttered, “but I’m definitely not not turned on.”
Esther shoved him playfully as they walked into the smoke and rising light.
Behind them, the barn stood quiet again.
Except for the lingering echo of a German man, somewhere in the woods, sobbing for his Mama.
0 notes
Text
He Loves Me (He Just Doesn’t Know It Yet) P5
Morning dew. Gunmetal skies. And the smell of fresh bread.
It was the kind of morning that tricked a soldier.
The kind that made war seem distant, even with the muffled thud of artillery in the far-off distance. The kind where sunlight made the tanks look like toys, the uniforms like costumes. For a moment, just a sliver of time, it looked like peacetime.
Wade Jefferson stood in the back of a rumbling convoy truck as it rolled through a liberated Dutch village. The breeze caught his hair under his helmet, and for a moment, he let himself breathe.
The streets were lined with cheering civilians, their faces alight with hope, waving red, white, and blue flags—Dutch and American both. Kids ran beside the convoy, throwing flowers. Women stood on balconies, waving kerchiefs and crying with joy.
A Dutch woman in a faded green dress ran up to the truck and threw her arms around a corporal beside Wade, planting a dramatic kiss on his cheek.
“Oh boy,” Private Ashby mumbled from the seat next to Wade. “Here they come.”
And then—it happened.
A tall Dutch girl with golden braids, cheeks flushed, locked eyes on Wade like he was a walking Statue of Liberty dipped in hot butter. Before he could move, she leapt up onto the truck rail and grabbed his collar with a giggle.
“Oh—hey—uh—wait—” Wade stammered, completely stunned.
She leaned in, puckering.
And then.
BAM.
A blur of fury in the form of Esther Green came storming through the convoy on foot like a woman possessed. She had traded her usual white nurse coat for her battlefield gear, but the rage in her eyes was unmistakable. Her boots thundered on the pavement as she marched, and before Wade or the Dutch girl could react—
THWACK.
Esther punched the girl square in the nose.
The kiss was replaced with a scream. The woman tumbled back off the side of the truck, flailing like a parachute that never opened. A stunned silence fell over the surrounding soldiers and civilians. Ashby’s mouth fell open so wide, a fly actually flew in.
Wade blinked.
Twice.
Then slowly—so slowly—his mouth curled into a smirk of utter disbelief.
The kind of smirk that said:
Hot. Damn. We are definitely having sex tonight.
Esther didn’t even break stride. She adjusted her helmet, wiped her knuckles on her coat, and marched alongside the convoy like she hadn’t just delivered justice with a right hook.
Wade, flushed and blinking like a man who’d just been kissed by a ghost and punched by a goddess, leapt down from the truck.
He caught up to her in three long strides. “Esther—”
“Don’t talk,” she snapped.
“…I wasn’t gonna say anything,” he said with a grin.
“You were thinking something.”
“Yeah,” he said, still grinning, “I was thinking I might be in love with a woman who assaults civilians.”
“You’re welcome.”
Wade ran a hand over his face and muttered under his breath, “Jesus, Mary, and Patton…”
Esther glanced sideways at him, then smirked—sly, wicked, and teasing.
“I’ll be ready when the battle’s over,” she said low enough for only him to hear.
His jaw dropped.
“I—I—” Wade fumbled, eyes darting like a man caught between his desire to melt into the dirt or climb onto a rooftop and scream.
Ashby caught up to them, panting. “What the HELL just happened?”
Esther patted Ashby’s arm sweetly. “You didn’t see anything, dear.”
“She knocked out a civilian!” Ashby whispered, scandalized. “That’s a WAR CRIME!”
“She tried to kiss MY war crime,” Esther replied coolly.
Wade was still walking stiffly, eyes glazed over like a man trying to mentally restrain himself from publicly proposing. “This woman’s gonna kill me.”
Esther winked over her shoulder. “Not yet.”
Later That Day — Encampment Outside Arnhem
As they set up tents and prepared for the jump-off into Arnhem proper, word of “Nurse Green’s Flying Fist of Justice” spread like wildfire. Half the battalion was in awe. The other half took notes for how to get their own girls to chase them halfway across a war zone.
Meanwhile, Wade sat on a crate, head in his hands.
Ashby sat beside him.
“You okay?”
“I don’t know, man.”
“She threatened you again?”
“No, worse.”
“…She didn’t kiss you?”
“She said she’d be ready after the battle.”
Ashby blinked. “Ready like—ready ready?”
Wade looked up at the sky and whispered, “I am not strong enough for this woman.”
0 notes
Text
He Loves Me (He Just Doesn’t Know It Yet) P4
It was already going terribly.
Wade knew it the second he saw Esther’s back stiffen like a broom handle and her feet start that furious stomp-stomp-stomp pattern that meant she was exactly thirteen seconds from throwing her shoe at someone.
And he was that someone.
“Esther, wait!”
She didn’t.
She let out a loud, dramatic “HMPH!” and whipped around a corner like a woman on a holy mission.
He chased after her, boots thudding, breath quick, heart in his throat.
“Come on! Just let me explain!”
No answer.
“Esther!”
She stomped faster.
He practically tripped over himself following her, weaving through tents, around crates, past stunned soldiers who watched the chase like it was a radio comedy come to life.
And then—
BAM.
Esther yanked open a door, stormed through.
Wade followed without hesitation.
Only to crash to a dead halt when he saw…
A room full of brass.
And cigars.
And whiskey.
And—oh God—Colonel Donovan.
Inside the Colonel’s Office — Fort Waverly Headquarters
Colonel Donovan blinked, mid-toast, frozen in place like a taxidermy bear with a bourbon glass.
Captain Doyle had a cigar halfway to his lips.
Lieutenant Martens was sipping coffee, pinkie out, mouth agape.
Private Jenkins—young, doe-eyed, far too emotionally invested—already had a tissue box in hand.
Esther froze too.
Eyes wide.
Cheeks going scarlet.
“Wade,” she hissed, backing toward the wall, “you IDIOT! This is the—”
“I didn’t know! You were walking fast! I was trying to apologize!”
“Well, don’t! Not here! Not in front of—” she gestured wildly to the senior military audience, “—the whole command staff! I’m going to get demoted to toilet nurse!”
Donovan slowly lowered his glass. “Carry on,” he said without blinking, then took a sip like he was watching a theater show.
Wade turned to her. “Just let me say it. Please.”
She crossed her arms. “No. I am no longer emotionally available to you. My affections have been revoked and replaced with self-respect.”
“Esther.”
“I have moved on. I am dancing with Jonathan, who has an actual diploma and teeth that sparkle.”
“Esther.”
“And I have realized you are toxic, and I should not be addicted to pain.”
“Esther.”
She glared at him. “What?”
“I didn’t mean what I said at the bar.”
“You screamed at me.”
“I was angry.”
“You told me you hated me.”
“I hated that you wouldn’t leave me alone.”
“You told me to die.”
“I panicked!”
The officers all sucked in a collective breath like an audience watching a car veer toward a cliff.
Private Jenkins quietly offered his tissues to Colonel Donovan.
Esther’s lip trembled.
“I was drunk and stupid and scared,” Wade blurted, chest heaving. “Scared because you’re everywhere, and I can’t think straight when you’re around. You run after me and tackle me and kiss me and braid things into my shoelaces, and I can’t breathe when you’re near because… because I don’t hate you.”
She blinked.
“I never did.”
Esther’s mouth opened slightly, eyes filling fast.
“I miss your chaos. I miss you singing off-key at 6 a.m. I miss you putting heart stickers on my ration boxes. I miss your big, loud, ridiculous love like it was oxygen. And I’m sorry.”
She turned her face away, shoulders shaking.
“I was scared because… because maybe you’ve always loved me better than I deserve. And that scared the hell outta me.”
He took a step toward her.
“Please, Essie.”
She spun around.
“Don’t call me—”
And then he kissed her.
Hard.
Right in front of everyone.
The Colonel dropped his glass.
Captain Doyle elbowed Martens with a grin.
Private Jenkins actually wept, clutching a hand to his chest and blowing his nose like it was the end of a Shakespearean tragedy.
Esther stood frozen at first—then melted, arms flinging around Wade’s neck as she kissed him back, fiercely, like she had been waiting a thousand years.
Finally, breathless, she pulled back and whispered, “I knew you loved me. You were just bad at saying it.”
“I’m real bad at it,” he admitted. “But I’m gonna keep trying. For you.”
“I accept,” she said proudly, wiping her eyes and standing tall. “But you’re going to have to court me properly. That means flowers. And chocolate. And I want a goat named after me.”
“…Of course.”
They turned.
The officers all applauded politely.
Colonel Donovan raised his brow. “You two finished?”
Wade cleared his throat. “Yes, sir.”
“Good. Because the rest of us were just about to wager whether she was going to slap you or kiss you.”
“Sir,” Esther said sweetly, “you still might get both.”
Everyone laughed.
Wade smiled for real—for the first time in weeks.
And as Esther grabbed his hand and led him out of the room, he felt lighter than he had in years.
He might’ve been an idiot.
But she was his idiot now, too.
And in front of God, country, and the entire Fort Waverly command staff…
She had finally kissed him back.
The night air outside Fort Waverly was sharp and full of stars, but Wade couldn’t feel the cold. Not with Esther’s hand in his. Not after that kiss that had nearly restarted his heartbeat. Not after Private Jenkins had clapped like a seal and said, “That’s better than the movies.”
They walked in silence at first, the adrenaline slowly wearing off, the air between them fizzy with something that felt dangerously close to peace.
But Wade’s mind wasn’t settled.
Not yet.
Not until he got answers.
He coughed, eyes still forward. “So… that guy.”
“What guy?” Esther asked, clearly playing dumb as she swung their hands like school kids.
“The one you were dancing with. The human lamppost with the too-white teeth. Jonathan. Or Jacob. Or Judas or whatever.”
“Jonathan,” she corrected cheerfully.
“Right. Him.” Wade’s voice tightened. “Were you really—y’know—with him?”
Esther grinned like a cat who’d just knocked over a full glass of water. “Why? Jealous?”
Wade stopped walking. “Esther.”
She gave him a shrug and kept going, forcing him to jog to catch up.
“Esther.”
“Yes, Wade?”
“Were you actually into him or were you just—”
She turned and planted her hands on her hips. “Using him?”
He blinked. “Were you?”
She tilted her head, smirking. “Maybe.”
“Maybe?!”
“I knew you were watching.”
“Oh my God.”
“I wanted you to watch.”
Wade stared at her like she’d just admitted to being an alien sent to Earth for chaos.
“You mean… you danced with that guy just to get a reaction out of me?”
“Sure did.”
“Esther—”
“And I laughed louder on purpose.”
“ESTHER.”
“And when he dipped me? I definitely saw your face twitch like you’d swallowed a lemon.”
“ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR MIND?!”
Esther batted her eyelashes, the picture of innocence. “No, just in love.”
Wade threw his arms in the air. “You crazy, crazy woman!”
She beamed. “Love you too.”
Wade stared at her, completely undone.
“You love me,” he said flatly.
“Mhm.”
“You used a whole other human being as a jealousy bait.”
“He had fun!”
“You emotionally manipulated me in front of officers.”
“I told him it was for revenge and he still said yes. That’s called teamwork.”
“You’re insane.”
Esther twirled in place. “Well, I’m your problem now.”
Wade rubbed his face. “I kissed a psychopath.”
“You kissed your psychopath,” she said, patting his chest and standing on her tiptoes to peck his cheek. “And I only did it because you were being stubborn.”
“I was grieving the loss of my sanity, Esther!”
“And now look at you,” she said sweetly. “All better.”
Wade sighed, long and loud. “I need a nap.”
“You need to admit you like it when I chase you.”
“I liked it more when you didn’t use other men as bait.”
“I’ll only do it again if you ignore me.”
Wade stared at her.
Then finally—helplessly—laughed.
A real one this time.
“God help me, I do love you.”
Esther gasped, clapped both hands over her mouth like she was scandalized, then leaned in and whispered, “Say it louder for the men in the office.”
Wade rolled his eyes. “I’m not performing for Jenkins again.”
“But he wept, Wade. Wept.”
“You traumatized half the U.S. Army with our love life.”
“They’re stronger for it.”
He took her hands again, holding them tight, like they were anchors.
“I’m not letting you go again,” he said, voice steady.
“Good,” Esther replied. “Because I’d just come after you anyway.”
“Chasing me?”
“Like the crazy woman I am.”
He grinned. “Love you too.”
And this time, they kissed without an audience.
Just the stars.
Just them.
No yelling.
No stomping.
No goats.
Just a field hospital nurse who never gave up… and the soldier who finally surrendered.
0 notes
Text
He Loves Me (He Just Doesn’t Know It Yet) P3
October 1944 – Fort Waverly USO Bar, Georgia
It was a Friday night and the USO bar at Fort Waverly was packed.
Men in uniform laughed too loud. The jukebox crackled out swing music. Empty beer bottles clinked against the hardwood floor, and cigarette smoke curled into the yellow light above. It smelled like sweat, grease, and stale whiskey — and somewhere in the middle of it all was Esther Green, dancing unsteadily in a circle, her curls bouncing, cheeks flushed with a little too much gin and a whole lot of love.
And there was Wade Jefferson, trying to vanish into a booth near the back.
He had one hand wrapped tightly around a soda bottle, the other shielding his face as he slouched behind a half-hearted stack of napkins. He could already feel it coming. The tension. The anticipation. The creeping sound of disaster.
“WADEY!” someone howled.
He flinched.
It was her.
Of course it was her.
Esther stumbled onto the stage next to the old microphone the soldiers sometimes used for karaoke or awkward announcements.
“Can I have everybody’s attenshun, pwease?” she slurred into the mic, earning laughter and a few amused whistles from the crowd.
Wade buried his face in his arms.
Esther grinned, swaying slightly as she held onto the mic stand for dear life.
“So! So I have a confession,” she giggled. “A biiiiig juicy little secret about Private Wade Jefferson, the cutest man who’s ever spat near my boots.”
The crowd leaned in. Some of the nurses gasped.
Wade sat up straight. “Esther, don’t.”
She didn’t even hear him.
“Okay so—hic!—listen. When we were eleven, I saw him… I saw him kiss his mirror.”
The room exploded.
Wade turned scarlet.
“And—and he said—he said,” she broke into a giggle fit, tears forming in her eyes, “He said, ‘You’re the only one who understands me, Wade.’”
Someone fell off a stool laughing.
“Esther—” Wade growled.
“And I SWEAR he practiced talking to girls in French! But it was like—like… gibberish. Like, baguette fromage amooooour and then he FARTED and said it was an air kiss!”
Even the bartender lost it.
Esther wiped a tear and looked directly at Wade.
“I love you so muuuuuch, Wade. I always have. And I always will. Even if your mirror doesn’t!”
Everyone turned to him.
Wade slowly stood from his booth.
He was pale. And then red. Then pale again. A muscle in his jaw twitched.
Esther saw him coming and reached her arms out with a sleepy, joyful smile. “Waaaaaadey... Did you hear what I said? I told everyone ‘bout your kissy mirror. So now they know how romantic you are!”
He stopped inches from her.
The room went quiet.
“Get out,” he said coldly.
Esther blinked.
“What?”
Wade didn’t repeat himself.
He grabbed her wrist—not hard, but firm—and pulled her off the stage. She stumbled slightly in her heels, confused, still smiling.
“Wait, where are we—? Is this a surprise? Is this a—muah moment?”
He shoved her toward the door.
Harder than he meant to.
She hit the wall near the coat rack with a dull thud and gasped. Her smile cracked.
People murmured.
She looked at him, dazed. “Wade…?”
“Shut up.”
Her lips trembled. “Wade, I—I didn’t mean—”
“I said shut UP!” he shouted, and the entire bar froze.
A bottle clinked to the floor.
Esther stared at him, wide-eyed.
“I don’t love you!” he roared, breathing hard. “I’ve never loved you! I hate you!”
Tears welled in her eyes.
“Wade, please—”
“NO!” His voice broke, savage and raw. “Don’t say another word. Don’t look at me. Don’t breathe in my direction. I never wanna see your face again. I want you gone, you hear me?!”
She pressed her hand to her chest like she’d been shot.
“I—”
“I hope you die.”
Silence.
Esther’s world tilted.
The room blurred around her. Somewhere in the corner, someone whispered “Too far…” but she didn’t register who. Her breath hitched. Her heart thudded painfully in her ribs. Her throat burned.
Wade just stood there, chest heaving.
She looked at him like a stranger.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered.
And for once, she didn’t say another word.
She turned and walked out, her boots echoing in the heavy silence. The door slammed behind her like a final nail in a coffin.
Wade didn’t sit down.
He just stared at the door, jaw clenched, his hands shaking.
Someone exhaled.
“Jesus,” a corporal muttered.
Wade swallowed hard.
The mirror.
The air kiss.
The years of being chased, worshipped, kissed without permission.
And still—despite it all—he hated how quiet it felt now.
Outside…
Esther walked across the empty lot in the cold night air, one hand still covering the spot where he’d shoved her, the other gripping her coat.
She didn’t cry.
Not yet.
Because something inside her—something that had always been warm, chaotic, and fiercely in love—had just been shattered.
And she didn’t know how to pick it back up.
Not this time.
Fort Waverly Barracks – Three Days Later
The Georgia heat had faded into something cooler and slower. Fall drifted in with dry leaves and softer breezes. The usual morning clamor had quieted since Friday night — ever since that night at the bar.
Wade Jefferson lay sprawled across his cot, arms folded behind his head, one leg swinging lazily off the side. He hadn't looked this calm in weeks.
He chewed absently on a toothpick, stared at the ceiling, and let out a low sigh of relief. “Finally.”
Across the barracks, Private Ricky Dunes raised an eyebrow as he pulled on his boots. “Finally what?”
Wade shrugged, a crooked grin curling at the edge of his mouth. “Peace. Quiet. No surprise hugs. No weird letters. No homemade wartime wedding rings made of shoelaces.” He chuckled to himself. “I feel like I just escaped a cult.”
Private Hank Michaels, sitting by the footlocker cleaning his rifle, looked up slowly. “So you’re just… okay now?”
“More than okay.” Wade stretched like a cat in a sunbeam. “I feel free. First time in years I can breathe without someone screaming ‘MUAH!’ in my ear.”
Ricky exchanged a look with Hank.
“Uh-huh,” Ricky muttered. “So… that’s it then? You just told her off, and now it’s like she never existed?”
Wade waved a hand dismissively. “She’ll move on. Probably find some poor goat to marry. Leave me out of her soap opera.”
Hank frowned. “You did kinda go full nuclear.”
“She embarrassed me in front of the entire damn base,” Wade snapped, sitting up a little. “She told everyone about my mirror. My mirror, Hank. That was between me and God.”
“But you said—” Ricky hesitated, “—that you hoped she died, man.”
Wade’s smirk faded.
The room grew still.
He looked away, jaw tightening. “I didn’t mean that.”
“You sure?” Hank asked, voice low. “’Cause you shoved her into a wall, told her you hated her, then shouted death wishes loud enough for the entire state to hear.”
“She pushed me too far.” Wade’s voice cracked, the edge of it sharper than he intended. “For years. Ever since we were in diapers, she’s been following me around like a stray dog with glitter glue. She doesn’t get it. She never got it. She never cared how I felt.”
“But you knew she was like that,” Ricky said gently. “It wasn’t a secret.”
Wade stared at the floor. “She humiliated me.”
“You humiliated her back,” Hank pointed out. “But worse.”
Silence.
Outside, a crow cawed from a nearby fence post. The distant sound of trucks rumbled past the gates.
Wade dragged a hand down his face. “She’s not even around anymore. Isn’t that what we all wanted?”
Neither Ricky nor Hank answered right away.
Finally, Ricky leaned forward. “Look, I’m not saying you didn’t have a right to be mad. You did. She crossed lines. You tried telling her off a hundred times, and she never listened. But what you said at the end…”
Wade’s lips pressed into a thin, white line.
“…That wasn’t anger,” Ricky said. “That was pain. And I don’t think it was just about her.”
Wade looked like he might speak—might argue—but instead he lay back down, stared at the ceiling again, and stayed quiet.
“I mean, hey,” Hank said with a shrug. “Maybe she’ll forget you ever existed now.”
Wade flinched.
Just a little.
But it was enough.
Outside the Barracks — Moments Later
Wade stepped out into the sunlight, squinting. A wind tugged at the hem of his uniform. His hands were shoved in his pockets, and his jaw was clenched again.
From across the yard, two nurses passed by.
“Isn’t that Jefferson?” one of them whispered.
“The one who screamed at that poor girl?”
“I heard she hasn’t left the infirmary wing since.”
Wade turned away before they could see his face.
For the first time in three days, the peace didn’t feel so peaceful.
And the silence?
Felt an awful lot like guilt.
Late October 1944 – Fort Waverly Parade Grounds
Wade Jefferson kicked a rock across the gravel path with his hands stuffed in his pockets. The wind had picked up again. The air felt like cold metal—biting, brittle, and sharp with regret.
The world hadn’t ended after the bar incident. The war still went on. Trucks rolled in. Soldiers drilled. People flirted, fought, and danced like nothing had changed.
Except something had.
Esther Green was gone.
Not officially. Not transferred. Not discharged. She still worked in the infirmary. Technically.
But she didn’t exist anymore. At least, not in the same way.
She hadn’t come near him. Not once.
No surprise “MUAH!” ambushes.
No handmade lopsided bracelets.
No laughter at his window during lunch. No pebbles tossed at his head. No “accidental” falls into his arms that weren’t really accidental. Not even the weird little poems she used to sneak into his boots (“Your eyes are like burnt toast—but in a romantic way”).
It was silent now.
And the silence felt like punishment.
Day Five of The Silence
He found himself walking near the infirmary. Not intentionally. Just… wandered there. For a soda. Or a breeze. Or a hallucination.
He peeked through the open window.
Esther sat quietly, her hair pinned back neatly, her eyes focused on folding bandages. She didn’t hum like she usually did. She didn’t laugh. She just worked.
He waited for her to notice him.
She didn’t.
She never looked up.
Wade stood there a few minutes too long, like a ghost haunting his own choices, then shoved his hands deeper in his pockets and walked away.
Day Nine
He heard a laugh behind the barracks.
He turned so fast, his neck cracked.
But it wasn’t her.
Just two nurses. One was wearing a bonnet. He stared anyway, hoping. Imagining.
Then kicked himself for it.
Day Eleven
He tripped over a crate and muttered, “Watch it, Essie.”
No one was there.
He sat down and stared at the empty patch of dirt next to him.
“That was the part where you’re supposed to tackle me.”
Wind blew a single leaf past him.
“...I hate this.”
Day Fourteen – Mess Hall
Wade stabbed at his mashed potatoes with the dull end of his fork.
Ricky sat across from him, staring.
“You good?”
“Fine.”
“You haven’t yelled at a woman in a week.”
“Don’t want to.”
“You also haven’t smiled, showered properly, or told any dumb stories about beating someone at arm wrestling.”
Wade rolled his eyes. “Are you my friend or my therapist?”
Ricky leaned in. “You miss her, don’t you?”
Wade scoffed. “Miss her? Ha. You think I miss being chased like a cartoon animal? You think I miss waking up to someone braiding daisies into my helmet? You think I enjoyed being tackled in front of my commanding officer and kissed on the ear?”
He stabbed his mashed potatoes again, slower this time.
“I didn’t like it,” he muttered.
“Sure,” Ricky said. “So why are you carving her initials into the table with your fork?”
Wade looked down.
Crap.
He shoved the tray away and stood up.
The bar was loud that night.
Louder than usual.
The jukebox was playing Benny Goodman. Laughter echoed from every corner. Boots scuffed the floor, cards slammed on tables, drinks poured like rain, and the air was thick with the buzz of beer and burning jealousy.
And there, in the center of it all, wearing a red polka dot dress and laughing like she had never cried a day in her life—was Esther Green.
She was dancing.
Laughing.
Spinning under the strong arms of a tall soldier in a crisp uniform Wade didn’t recognize.
She tilted her head back, all wild curls and blinding dimples, the sound of her joy slicing through the music.
And Wade Jefferson nearly snapped his glass in two.
“Who the hell is that?” he growled, pointing toward the dance floor like he’d spotted a war criminal.
Private Ricky Dunes looked up from his beer, grimaced. “Oh no.”
Hank Michaels, sitting on Wade’s other side, raised an eyebrow. “That your barn girl?”
“She’s not my—” Wade’s voice cracked with rage. “That is Esther. And he’s got his hand on her waist.”
“She’s dancing,” Hank said, trying to sound neutral. “Not committing treason.”
Wade was already halfway out of his chair.
Ricky lunged and grabbed his sleeve. “Sit down, moron.”
“Let go of me.”
“Nope. Not happening.”
Wade stared back at Esther like a man watching his house burn down and being told it was fine because it wasn’t his favorite chair that caught fire.
The soldier twirled her again, and Esther giggled—giggled—as her dress flared and her fingers gripped the man’s arm.
Wade growled. “He’s touching her like she’s made of glass. She’s not glass. She’s Esther. She bites.”
Hank snorted. “Did you just say that out loud?”
“She doesn’t even laugh like that with me,” Wade muttered, furious. “She just tackles me and shouts MUAH! and throws goats into my bunk like that’s normal.”
“Yeah, and you told her to die, remember?” Ricky said, voice sharp.
Wade shut up.
But not for long.
Esther was still dancing.
Still smiling.
Still not looking at him.
And now the soldier had leaned down to whisper something in her ear.
Wade stood up again.
“NOPE.”
Ricky yanked him back down. “Sit!”
“I’m gonna go over there and punch that stupid clean-shaven idiot right in his smug—”
“You are gonna sit there and drink your soda and pretend to be a functioning adult,” Hank cut in, grabbing Wade’s other arm. “You told her you hated her, Wade. She’s allowed to move on.”
“She’s not allowed to look happy!”
“Wade,” Ricky said slowly, “do you even hear yourself?”
“I see her every time I close my eyes,” Wade snapped, trying and failing to sound like he wasn’t on the verge of either screaming or crying. “And now she’s pretending like I never existed. That guy doesn’t know her. He doesn’t know she snorts when she laughs too hard. He doesn’t know she dips ketchup in her ice cream. He doesn’t know she names her socks after Greek gods!”
“Do you know what you sounded like at the bar three weeks ago?” Ricky asked.
Wade didn’t answer.
He just watched her.
Esther leaned back in the soldier’s arms, laughing, free, easy, beautiful. Her cheeks were flushed, her smile wide.
Wade clenched his fists.
“She used to smile at me.”
“She used to chase you,” Hank muttered.
“Yeah,” Wade whispered. “And now I’m the one chasing her.”
The soldier dipped Esther dramatically, making the crowd whoop and cheer.
Wade’s chair scraped against the floor.
Ricky grabbed his collar before he could take a step. “Don’t you dare go ruin that for her.”
“I’m not gonna hit him,” Wade said.
“You’re clenching your fists like you’re gonna break the floor.”
“I just wanna talk to her.”
“No, you wanna bleed emotion all over her and beg her to forget what you said.”
Wade didn’t deny it.
Esther and the soldier finished their dance. She bowed jokingly, curtsied. He kissed the back of her hand.
Wade’s whole chest tightened.
Esther laughed again and made her way toward the bar.
Wade moved.
This time, neither Ricky nor Hank could stop him.
He walked fast, weaving through the crowd, heart pounding, hands sweaty, mouth dry.
She was already sitting on a stool, back straight, fingers wrapped around a lemonade glass.
He opened his mouth.
She turned her head slowly.
Saw him.
Their eyes met.
Her smile faded instantly.
And without a word… she stood and walked away.
No kissy face.
No dramatic scream.
No tearful apology.
Just her back.
Leaving.
Wade stood there, frozen, hollow.
“Dammit,” he whispered.
He missed the chase.
He missed the chaos.
He missed her.
And now, she was running away from him.
0 notes
Text
He Loves Me (He Just Doesn’t Know It Yet) P2
Belle County, Georgia — 1925
The summer sun was warm and sleepy over Belle County, the kind of day where even the flies took breaks and the cows swayed lazily in the shade.
Out in the Green family yard — a patch of wild grass surrounded by chickens, tomato vines, and one suspiciously crooked clothesline — a tiny barefoot girl in a yellow bonnet toddled through the grass with determination burning in her chubby little cheeks.
“Waaaay-Waaaayyy!” she called, sing-song and squeaky. “Waaaay-Waaaayy, I gots a suh-pwize for yew!”
She was two years old.
Her name was Esther Green.
She smelled like peanut butter and apple juice.
And she was in love.
A few feet away, a towheaded little boy in overalls screamed bloody murder as he scrambled up a tree stump, flapping his arms like a baby chicken being chased by a tornado.
“Noooooo!” he hollered, wiping his nose on his sleeve. “Go ‘way, Essie! NO MUUUUAAAH!!”
His name was Wade Jefferson. He was also two. His ears were too big for his face, and his knees were always covered in band-aids. He was the fastest toddler in town — and that day, he was running for his life.
Esther squealed with joy. “It’s da wuv muah! Da SPECIAL muah!”
She puckered her lips like a cartoon duck and ran after him with outstretched arms, making sloppy kissy noises that echoed through the fields.
“MMMMUUUUUUAAAHHHH!!”
Wade shrieked and turned back toward the porch, waving his arms. “MAMA!!! DAH MONSTAH WANTS DA SMOOCH AGAIN!”
From the porch, Mrs. Jefferson watched with a newspaper in one hand and a glass of lemonade in the other. She didn’t move.
Neither did Mr. Green, who was snoring in a rocking chair with a chicken sleeping on his lap.
Wade darted behind the water pump and threw himself down in the dirt, panting. “I’sa man, Essie! Man don’ get smooch by baby girls!”
Esther appeared around the corner of the pump with her cheeks puffed and eyes sparkling.
“I not a baby,” she informed him proudly. “I’sa wady! A pwitty wady!”
Wade screamed again. “Y’ain’t pwitty! YEW A TOAD!”
Esther blinked. Her lip wobbled.
Then she sniffled. “Toads can be pwitty too…”
Wade paused. Looked down at his scabbed-up knees. Then, in a moment of tiny guilt, he scratched the back of his neck and mumbled, “You’s not a toad, Essie. You’s jus’ got weird face.”
She beamed. “You like it?”
He panicked. “NO I DON’ LIKE IT! I WANNA GO HOME!”
He jumped up, arms windmilling, and bolted across the yard. His diaper sagged slightly under his overalls. Esther squealed and galloped after him, bonnet flapping behind her like a cape.
“I gunna give you FIFTY muuuahs!!” she shouted gleefully. “An’ den we get marrid!”
Wade tripped over a frog and faceplanted into the grass. “NOOOOOO!!”
Esther caught up.
“Gotcha,” she whispered.
“No… Essie… please…” he whined, voice muffled by a mouthful of dandelion.
She straddled him, pinning his arms with her chubby knees.
“Muuuah time.”
“NoooooOOOO—!”
She smacked a big, loud, wet kiss onto his forehead.
Wade made a strangled choking noise.
And then… silence.
Esther leaned back, looking at her handiwork proudly. “Now we marrid.”
Wade lay limp on the grass, eyes staring blankly into the clouds.
A single fly buzzed past.
Then, he let out a soul-piercing wail.
“MAMAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!”
From the porch, Mrs. Jefferson sighed.
“She done kissed ‘im again, huh?”
Mr. Green snorted awake. “Wade’ll be alright. Builds character.”
The chicken in his lap clucked in agreement.
Later that day…
Wade sat on the front steps, glaring out at the world with his arms crossed and his bangs stuck to his forehead.
“I don’ wanna marry Essie,” he mumbled.
“She gave you her last gummy bear,” said his mama.
“Dat’s cause she wanna own me.”
Mrs. Jefferson chuckled and handed him a cup of juice.
Across the yard, Esther waved dreamily from the swingset she’d built out of rope and a feed bucket.
She blew him a kiss.
“Wuv you foreber!” she hollered.
Wade groaned and pulled his cap over his face. “I’sa never safe again.”
Belle County Elementary School — 1933
The sun outside was golden and lazy, but inside Room 2B, doom had arrived.
It was the second week of fifth grade. The air smelled like chalk, erasers, pencil shavings, and something suspiciously like pickles. The classroom was buzzing with the excited murmurs of prepubescent chaos as students awaited the moment of truth.
Partner assignments.
Mrs. Boone, the fifth-grade teacher who wore floral dresses and had the patience of a saint (or a prison warden), stood at the front of the class with a clipboard of destiny.
“As part of our Civil War presentation project,” she announced, “each of you will be assigned a partner. You and your partner will work together for the next two weeks. That includes class time and homework time.”
A collective groan rose from the room.
Wade Jefferson, age ten, sat in the back row with his head against the chalkboard, silently praying that God, fate, or even Mrs. Boone’s poor eyesight would spare him.
Please, he thought. Not her. Anyone but her.
Esther Green sat three rows ahead, braiding yarn into a bracelet she had already decided would be a “commitment accessory” for her future husband — who, in her mind, had already been chosen by the universe.
Wade.
She doodled little wedding bells on the margin of her notebook, surrounded by vines, hearts, and a frog wearing a veil.
Mrs. Boone cleared her throat and read from the clipboard.
“Lila Benson and Clarence Hunt.”
Lila squealed.
Clarence blushed.
“Shelby Parks and Donnie Baker.”
A muttered “dang it” from Shelby.
Esther sat up straighter, eyes wide with hopeful fire.
Wade clutched the desk in silent terror.
“And… Wade Jefferson and Esther Green.”
For a moment, time stopped.
Then—
“NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!”
Wade shot up from his desk like a man struck by lightning. He staggered forward, stumbled, and then dropped to his knees with both fists clenched to the heavens.
“WHY?!”
The class went dead silent.
Wade fell forward onto the tile floor, face smushed flat against the linoleum. “Whyyyyy her? What did I do?! I only stole one lunch last week!”
Mrs. Boone rubbed her temples. “Wade, please—”
But it was too late.
Esther’s eyes lit up.
He was on his knees.
He was shouting her name.
In front of everyone.
Her hands flew to her chest. “Oh… my gosh…”
Wade looked up in horror just as Esther stood from her desk with tears in her eyes and a dreamy, unhinged smile.
“You’re proposing,” she whispered.
The room erupted.
“What?!”
“No way!”
“He’s gonna marry the barn girl!”
Mrs. Boone slammed her ruler on the desk. “Silence!”
But Esther was already walking toward him, clutching her bracelet.
“Wade… I never thought you’d do this so publicly. I always imagined a field. Maybe some chickens. But this… this is better.”
Wade backed away on his knees like she was a cobra in a bonnet. “What are you talking about?! I was screaming in pain!”
“You dropped to your knees,” Esther said, dreamily twirling her yarn bracelet. “You shouted to the heavens. You said ‘why her’ which means ‘why do I love her so much.’”
“NO IT DOESN’T!!”
Mrs. Boone, in a move of pure regret, handed them their assignment sheet. “You’re doing Clara Barton and Civil War nursing. Partners. Deal with it.”
Esther gasped. “Nursing?! I take care of you! It’s fate!”
Wade wailed and flopped onto the floor like a medieval widow. “This is worse than lice.”
Esther crouched beside him and began tying the yarn bracelet around his wrist.
“Nope—No! Stop that!”
She tied it tight.
“There. Bound together. Now and forever. You’re my Civil War husband.”
“I’m gonna be court-martialed.”
“Should we kiss now or later?”
“NEITHER!”
She kissed him on the cheek.
He screamed again.
The class went wild.
Mrs. Boone threw her clipboard across the room.
Later That Day…
Wade sat at his desk, arms crossed, sulking like a wet cat. Esther sat beside him, humming as she drew a heart around Clara Barton’s face in their shared textbook.
“I drew us as Union soldiers,” she said proudly, showing him a page where stick-figure Wade held a musket and a crown, and stick-figure Esther had wings.
“Why do I have a crown?” he grumbled.
“Because you’re the king of my heart.”
He tried to eat his pencil.
Meanwhile, in the Teacher’s Lounge…
Mrs. Boone dropped into her chair with a thud.
“Jefferson and Green?”
The music teacher raised an eyebrow. “Aren’t they the proposal kids?”
Mrs. Boone groaned. “I’ve never seen a boy try to crawl into the air vent before.”
Back in 1944…
Wade pressed a hand to his forehead.
The tent was quiet, the war distant for a moment.
That day had haunted him for years.
He could still feel the yarn bracelet sometimes, like a ghostly itch.
From outside the tent flap came a familiar voice.
“Waaaaaade! I made you a new yarn ring. This one has your DNA on it. I pulled it from your sock!”
Wade dove under his cot.
“WHY ME AGAIN?!”
0 notes
Text
He Loves Me (He Just Doesn’t Know It Yet)
The field was hot, the kind of Southern heat that crawled under your skin like fire ants. The air hung heavy with the scent of bleach, sweat, and distant gunpowder. Somewhere in the open air of Georgia’s Fort Waverly, nurses unpacked bandages while the wounded moaned and the sun beat down without mercy.
Esther Green stepped off the back of the truck with a bag slung over her shoulder and a clipboard under one arm, her hair frizzing at the temples beneath her cap. She blinked against the glare, adjusted her white uniform, and took in the chaos around her. Her heart fluttered. He was here. He had to be.
The moment her boots hit the dirt, a thick glob of spit landed just shy of her right foot.
“Oh,” she whispered, eyes widening in giddy wonder.
She looked up slowly, dreamily, and there he was.
Private First Class Wade Jefferson. Tall. White. Greasy-haired and cruel as a hungry fox. His arms were folded across his chest, and he wore the same ugly sneer he’d had since the fifth grade, when he’d pushed her into a puddle and called her “snot-nosed swamp trash.” The same guy who called her “barn-chick” in high school because of her family’s chicken farm. The same man who, every year without fail, had found a new way to humiliate her at every church picnic, corn festival, and town hall meeting.
He was beautiful.
“Jeffy,” she sighed, cheeks going pink with unfiltered, psychotic joy. “You remembered me.”
Wade blinked.
“Oh no,” he muttered.
Esther squealed like a kettle reaching full boil and lunged toward him, arms wide open. “You spat at me! That’s our thing!”
Wade’s face went pale.
He backed up, fast. “Get away from me, Green. I swear to God—”
But she was already on him.
Esther hurled herself at his midsection with all the grace of a war-torn romantic comedy. Wade shrieked—not yelled, shrieked—and twisted away like a man escaping death.
“HELP!” he roared to no one in particular. “The barn witch is back! She found me!”
But Esther was quick. And when she was in love, she was faster than heartbreak itself.
“You don’t have to pretend anymore!” she yelled, heart pounding, as she sprinted after him. “I knew every slap was just a love tap! Every insult was your way of saying ‘I choose you, Esther!’ I even carved our initials on my goat’s collar when I was fourteen!”
Wade ducked behind a tent, dove over a stack of stretchers, and darted past a bewildered surgeon holding a tray of surgical scissors. “SHE’S POSSESSED! GET THE PADDED ROOM READY!”
Esther leapt over a supply crate, her petticoat flapping wildly under her nurse's uniform. “Don’t be shy, sugar bear! I’m here now!”
Several wounded men sat up from their cots to see what the ruckus was.
“Is that the new nurse?” one of them asked, eyes wide.
“She just tackled that guy like a linebacker,” another whispered.
A corporal raised a brow. “That’s Private Jefferson. He’s usually such a tough guy…”
Jefferson’s yelps echoed through the tents as he ran for dear life. “I PEPPER-SPRAYED HER WHEN WE WERE SEVENTEEN AND SHE THANKED ME!”
Esther caught up to him near the mess hall and wrapped her arms around his waist with a squeal of pure ecstasy.
“Oh Wade, baby, you smell like you always do—like motor oil and disdain.”
He tried to shake her off, flailing like a fish on a hook. “Get off me! I ain’t into this! I got a real girlfriend!”
She giggled and whispered into his shoulder. “Sure you do, darling. Just like I have a real understanding of social boundaries.”
“LET ME GO!”
But Esther was a barn girl. A former rodeo queen. Once she latched onto a prize, she didn’t let go easy.
“You’re gonna love me,” she said with a dazzling smile, pinning him with the force of deranged, misplaced affection. “You already do.”
“NO I DON’T!”
“Yes you do,” she sang. “You’ve always loved me. It’s okay. You’re just shy.”
“I TRIED TO RUN YOU OVER IN NINTH GRADE.”
“And I’ve never stopped thinking about that beautiful moment,” she whispered dreamily.
He gave one final squirm and broke free, bolting toward the latrines like a man about to reenlist just to escape.
Esther stood in the dust, hands clasped to her chest, watching him go with glistening eyes. The tips of her ears flushed pink.
“That man is so in love with me,” she said proudly.
From behind her, the field hospital head nurse cleared her throat.
“Green. Are you alright?”
Esther turned around, beaming. “Never better, ma’am. I’ve found my purpose. My destiny. My—my little angry possum.”
“Private Jefferson just reported you to the MPs for ‘aggressive romantic terrorism.’”
Esther clutched her chest, swooning. “He always had such a way with words.”
The nurse sighed and made a note on her clipboard. “Right. Well, get settled. We have 87 patients, 14 amputees, and a screaming captain who thinks he’s in Gettysburg. Try not to traumatize anyone else.”
Esther saluted proudly.
“Oh, don’t worry. I’m a professional. And Wade will come around. True love is patient.”
Behind them, Wade was seen running toward the radio tent yelling, “I’LL TRANSFER TO SIBERIA IF I HAVE TO!”
Esther smiled at the sky. “I love you too, Jeffy.”
The sun was already climbing high above Fort Waverly when Wade Jefferson threw himself behind a stack of wooden crates outside the motor pool, breathing like a hunted animal.
His helmet was crooked. His shirt was soaked. His dignity had died at 0900 hours that morning.
Inside his breast pocket was a small, wrinkled letter — a nurse’s intake form with “Esther Green” written at the top in bubbly, floral handwriting. She had doodled hearts on the bottom. Some of them had little knives stabbing through them. One had the initials E + W = 💘 💘 💘
Wade had read it six times just to confirm the nightmare was real.
He peeked around the corner.
Clear.
No sign of her.
He sank back against the crate with a groan.
"God save me. She’s back. She's real. She's got arms now."
“Wade?”
He flinched like he'd been shot in the liver.
Private Ricky Dunes peered down at him from above the crates, chewing gum and holding a wrench.
“What the hell are you doing?”
Wade grabbed Ricky by the collar and yanked him down to his level. “Shut up. Shut up. Shut. Up.”
Ricky blinked. “Are you hiding?”
“Don’t say that word out loud!” Wade hissed.
Ricky looked around, then leaned in, whispering. “Is it the CO? Did you steal rations again? Or is this about that sergeant’s sister you made cry last month?”
“No, you idiot!” Wade snapped. “It’s her. The thing. The beast from Belle County. Esther. Freakin’. Green.”
Ricky frowned. “Who?”
“Esther Green!” Wade whisper-yelled. “The barn girl! The one with the weird smell and the pigtails that looked like snakes trying to escape her skull!”
Ricky blinked again. “The one who kept a taxidermied squirrel in her backpack and called it her 'emotional support warrior’?”
“Yes! And she’s here! She’s a nurse now. A NURSE. They let her have needles!”
Another voice piped up from behind the oil drum.
Private Hank Michaels, tall, freckled, and full of poor decision-making skills, looked down at Wade. “Wait. Isn’t she the one who punched your horse because she thought it was flirting with you?”
“EXACTLY!” Wade whispered furiously. “She said the way Biscuit stomped his hooves was a ‘romantic signal.’ She screamed at him for ‘trying to take me away from her.’”
“Didn’t she also knit you a scarf made of her own hair?”
“That was my birthday gift,” Wade moaned, rubbing his temples.
Ricky stared. “Dude... she’s still into you?”
“She tackled me this morning! Called me sugar bear and said we’ve been destined since I pushed her into a trough in fifth grade!”
Hank snorted. “That’s commitment.”
“THAT’S A CRIME!”
Wade suddenly jolted upright. His eyes scanned the yard. There was a nurse across the lot. It wasn’t her. Not yet.
But she could be nearby.
Wade ducked again and whispered, “She’s hunting me. I felt her breathing near my neck. She said my spit was a love note.”
Ricky was turning purple trying not to laugh.
“She’s got it bad, man,” he wheezed.
“She’s got delusions,” Wade hissed. “She thinks every time I humiliated her as a kid was a secret declaration of love. She told the head nurse that when I set her notebook on fire in 8th grade, it was my way of saying ‘you complete me.’”
Hank was doubled over, shoulders shaking.
“Wade. Buddy,” he choked. “You know how some girls pick red flags and pretend it’s a bouquet? She took your whole warning sign and made it a wedding cake.”
“She said the time I egged her house was the ‘most romantic gesture anyone’s ever made for her.’”
Ricky fell backward, laughing so hard he nearly swallowed his gum.
Wade slapped a hand over Ricky’s mouth.
“You morons don’t get it,” he said, dead serious. “She’s gonna trap me. She’s got one of those faces — the ‘I will chloroform you and make a scrapbook out of your dog tags’ face.”
Hank sobered slightly. “Okay, but what are you actually gonna do?”
Wade stared into the distance.
“…Fake my death.”
Ricky wheezed again. “You are not gonna fake your death, man.”
“Then I’ll dig a trench and hide in it till the war ends.”
“You’ll get trench foot.”
“I already have emotional foot fungus from her.”
Hank shrugged. “Look, you could just tell her you’re not interested.”
Wade looked at Hank like he’d grown an extra arm.
“She thinks that’s foreplay! The last time I told her to leave me alone, she sewed me a pillow that said ‘No Means Marry Me.’”
A shadow fell across the boxes.
All three men froze.
Slowly, they turned.
Esther Green stood in the sunlight, holding a tray of water canteens. Her cheeks were glowing. Her eyes lit up when she spotted Wade.
“There you are, my little rascal,” she said sweetly, stepping closer. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”
Wade nearly screamed.
Ricky bolted. “Nope, I’m out.”
Hank saluted and backed away. “I ain’t dying for this.”
Wade tried to crawl into the crate behind him.
Esther bent down and handed him a canteen.
“I thought you might be thirsty after all that running,” she said tenderly.
Wade stared at the canteen like it might explode.
“…Thanks.”
She beamed. “See? You can be sweet when you want to be. That’s why I love you.”
Wade made a sound between a whimper and a gurgle.
“Don’t worry,” Esther said, crouching beside him. “Love is patient. I’ll wait. I’ve already chosen the hymn for our wedding. And the name of our first goat.”
He blinked. “Goat?”
She leaned closer. “His name will be Wade Junior. Just like you.”
He screamed internally.
0 notes
Text
Margot Frank Part 1
1945
Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp, February 1945
The snow was more like ash that day—grey, heavy, and silent as it fell on the skeletal remains of once-living girls.
Margot Frank, now barely more than breath and bones, stood swaying beside her sister in the frostbitten mud. Her hair, once dark and neatly braided in Amsterdam, hung in matted clumps around her hollow cheeks. Anne gripped her elbow tightly, trying to keep her upright as the morning roll call dragged on.
“Aufstehen! Aufstehen jetzt!”
A sharp German voice cracked through the air like a whip. One of the young soldiers—perhaps barely eighteen—stalked down the line, his boots splashing in slush and filth. His blue eyes, cold but confused, landed on Margot.
“You! Stand up straight!” he barked.
Margot’s knees buckled. Anne caught her.
“I said stand up!” he shouted again, stepping toward them. His rifle clanked against his shoulder.
“She can’t!” Anne yelled, her voice shaking but fierce. “She’s sick! She hasn’t eaten in days!”
He scowled and grabbed Margot’s arm.
“Don’t touch her!” Anne screamed, lunging between them.
But it was too late.
Margot slumped forward, her body collapsing into the soldier’s arms like a lifeless rag doll. The young man froze, surprised at how light she was—how breakable. He looked down at the girl in his arms, her eyelids fluttering like a bird’s wings before unconsciousness took her.
“Stay away from her!” Anne shouted, trying to wrench Margot back.
He shoved Anne aside with one arm, not cruelly but with enough force to send her stumbling back into the muck.
Anne scrambled up, trembling. “Don’t you dare take her—don’t you dare! Where are you taking her? Let her go! Let her go!”
He didn’t respond. His jaw was clenched, his face pale. Cradling Margot’s limp form against his chest, he turned and strode toward the barracks, ignoring the chaos behind him.
Anne screamed again, this time her voice cracking with a raw, animal panic. “No! Not the chambers—please! Not my sister!”
Another guard grabbed her by the arm and yanked her back into the line.
“She’s being taken to the infirmary,” he said roughly. “If she’s lucky, she won’t die today.”
Anne stopped struggling.
Infirmary? She blinked at the retreating back of the young soldier, his arms still wrapped around Margot like she was made of glass instead of grief. Why would he carry her? Why not leave her to die like the rest?
Unless… unless he wasn’t like the others.
Inside the crumbling makeshift infirmary, lit only by a broken oil lamp and the flicker of a dying fire, the soldier laid Margot gently on a cot, his expression unreadable.
He brushed a tangle of hair from her forehead and looked around for something—anything—to keep her warm. There was nothing but a ratty blanket, barely enough to cover her legs.
“Verdammt,” he muttered under his breath, pulling off his own jacket and draping it around her frail body.
A nurse—really just another prisoner—looked up from her station.
“She won’t last long,” she said bluntly. “None of them do.”
“I know,” he said quietly.
The nurse eyed him. “Why did you bring her here?”
“I don’t know.”
He watched Margot’s sunken chest rise and fall.
“I don’t even know her name.”
The nurse hesitated. “Frank. Margot Frank.”
His eyes narrowed. “Frank?” The name stirred something. A whisper he’d heard from other prisoners. A diary. A girl. A family in hiding. A sister.
He looked at her again—this girl who had once dreamed of being a writer or a teacher or anything other than a corpse in a concentration camp.
“Margot,” he whispered.
Anne paced like a storm.
Two hours had passed. Two hours since he took her.
Every possibility screamed through her mind—had he shot her? Taken her somewhere to die quietly, alone? Or worse?
She didn’t even know his name.
When the guard finally returned, Anne ran at him, fists flying.
“Where is she? What did you do to her?”
He didn’t raise his hand.
“She’s alive,” he said, and something about his voice didn’t sound like a soldier’s at all. “She’s resting. I took her to the infirmary.”
“Why would you do that?”
His eyes flicked toward her. “Because I don’t want her to die.”
Anne stared at him, stunned.
“No one here wants to die,” she spat. “But most of you don’t care.”
“I’m not most of them,” he said.
“What’s your name?” she demanded.
“…Niklas.”
She glared at him.
“If she dies, Niklas,” she whispered, “I’ll never forgive you.”
“I wouldn’t forgive myself either.”
0 notes