Tuck Everlasting, The Continued Story.

This is the continuation of Tuck Everlasting, if Winnie had gone back to the spring to drink the water.

1944

Winnie Foster sat on a wooden bench on her front porch, waiting. The day was warm, but a slight breeze carried the wind. Winnie hoped that very wind would carry the Tucks back to TreeGap. It had been almost 40 years since she first met Jesse.

She closed her eyes, and listened for the sound. At first it was faint, but the sound of an approaching motorcyle grew closer and closer. She heard it stop in front of her house, and she heard footsteps drawing near. Winnie was suddenly very nervous, and several doubts began to run through her mind. She debated running away from the footsteps, when suddenly they stopped.

Winnie held her breath. She felt a hand cup her chin, and she opened her eyes, and grinned. Standing in front of her, looking just as handsome as he did before, was Jesse Tuck. She jumped out of her seat and kissed him passionately on the lips. He picked her up and spun her around. They laughed and held each other. Jesse was dressed in blue jeans, and a white t-shirt. But other then that, he looked the same as he did 40 years ago.

She slowly slid down, but their eyes never left each other. They kissed again, this time simply, and long lasting. Winnie nussled her face in his neck. "I miss you." She whispered. He kissed her head softly and said, "I know. But you have to wake up Winnie."

Winnie began to panic. "No. Wait, Jesse!" She watched as Jesse began to fade away, his soft smile dissapearing in the wind. She tried to hold on, but it seemed that the harder she tried, the faster he dissapeared.

Suddenly, Winnie opened her eyes and sat up in bed. She was breathing heavily, with tears streaming down her face. It was all a dream...

She burried her face in her hands and cried for a moment. Then, composing herself, she brushed away her tears. Looking around the room, she saw that she hadn't disturbed the other sleeping nurses.

Knowing that she would never be able to fall asleep again after THAT dream, she silently got out of bed. She tip-toed to the mirror and pulled her long brown hair back into a messy bun. She slipped her nurse's outfit on and applied a little lipstick. It was hard for her to keep up with modern fashion, because time seemed to move much slower for her. On the outside, she hadnt changed in 40 years, but on the inside, she felt like a completely different person. She wondered if Jesse would still love her when they met again.

She had waited for Jesse in Treegap ever since she was 16 years old. He had promised that he would come back for her, but after 40 years, he hadn't. Winnie feared that something had hapened to him, that someone had found out his secret, or that he had fallen in love with someone else.

Winnie had watched her friends, and family die. Had lived alone, afraid that her secret would be discovered. But, after the second world war had started, she felt a sudden urge to leave Tree Gap, and help people. And of course, to see the world. She decided that she would not wait around for the Tucks to return any longer! But, they still haunted her dreams each night, and she found that she couldn't share feelings with any other man but Jesse.

Sure, a few men fancied her. She had been proposed to countless times, but she couldn't let go of Jesse.

About 2 years ago, Winnie enlisted as a nurse, and had been stationed in France. She felt it difficult to watch young men die, knowing that she couldn't die, and sometimes wished that she could switch places with them.

Winnie walked into the kitchen, and found it empty. She poured herself a cup of coffee, and sat on the bench outside of the room where the healing soldiers were kept. After she finished, she decided to check on the soldiers. She had assumed that they would all be asleep anyway.

When she entered the room, she was hit with the strong smell of blood, but she ignored it. She walked down the rows of beds untill she was at the last one. As she turned to leave, a voice softly said, "Wait."

She turned to the bed the the voice came from, and saw a young man with his head wrapped in a bandage. His arm was in a sling, and his leg was propped up. "What are you doing?" He asked.

Winnie shifted on her feet, "I couldn't sleep." She admitted.

The man nodded. "Me too." He said.

"Sit down." he said, as he gestured to his bed. Winnie hesitated. "I want to tell you why I can't sleep..." he stated. Winnie sat. She looked at him expectantly. He sat up in his bed a little. "I can't stop thinking about the battlefield. And this guy I met..." She nodded. This was probably a tipical war story she was about to hear.

"See, we were together in our Unit, and then the Germans attacked us in broad daylight. Me and my buddy, we were croutched together behind a low wall, and the Germans threw a grenade right where we were sitting. We both ran from it, but when it went off, it got me pretty bad. I couldn't move. Then, my friend picked me up, and he began to run us to safety..." he stopped and with a puzzled look on his face, continued. "While he was running, I was watching bullets hit him over and over again. I thought for sure he was a dead man. But when we made it to safety, he didn't have a scratch on him!" Winnie's heart skipped a beat. It couldn't be...

"What was your friend's name?" She asked.

"Miles." he answered. "Miles Tuck."