The Spirit of the Corps » Band of Brothers

75: Waiting to Be Filled In

It had been a simple wound - shrapnel to the shoulder - and she'd patched it up easily, ignoring the look of surprise on the wounded man's face and the exclamation Gene made upon finding she'd beaten him there.

The wounded man didn't even need to come off of the line, the wound was so minor, so Charlie headed back the way she'd come when she was finished, and Gene went back to his foxhole, too, sprinting as fast as his legs would take him through the lightning storm.

The next time a shout for a medic went out she helped Spina, who had arrived first, patch up a nasty leg wound, then helped him take the man to the aid station. When she came back the barrage was over.

"Where were you?" Mabs demanded, cornering Charlie as she wandered around.

"I was going to the bathroom," Charlie said with a shrug, a white lie to get Mabs off of her case. "Jumped into a foxhole with a couple of replacements."

"Gene said you ran out at the cry for a medic."

"I was closer."

"Charlie," Mabs warned.

Charlie gave a bitter laugh. "You don't have to baby me. I'm fine."

"Then act like it."

"I am."

"You're actin' crazy!" Mabs exclaimed. "If Henry finds out she could take you off the line!"

"There's nothing wrong with me," Charlie insisted, defiant. "I'm just doing my job."

"No," Mabs said, shaking her head. "You ain't doing your job, 'cause you ain't followin' orders. There's an order to these things and you're fuckin' with it for whatever reason makes sense to you in your head, but I wouldn't know 'cause you won't let me in."

Charlie looked away and just laughed. She couldn't seem to stop laughing. "You don't want to know what's going on inside my head, Mabs," she said, still giggling at the thought, "I can promise you that."

"Charlie," Mabs said sternly, "you're startin' to scare me."

"You don't have to worry about me, Mabs," Charlie replied easily, casually, with a wave of her hand. "I'm fine."

But while Mabs didn't tell Henry about her concerns about Charlie, she did tell Floyd. And Floyd wasn't happy.

"Charlie," he said, approaching from behind her as she wandered in circles around a tree.

"Uh oh," she said. He only ever called her by her name when he was being serious.

"Why aren't you in your foxhole?"

Charlie shrugged and carried on walking her circles. "Bored."

"It's not safe out here."

"And it is in there?" she countered. "Skip and Alex were killed in their foxhole, Floyd, if I'm going to go I'm going either way."

"Charlie, don't talk like that."

"Like what?"

"Would you stand still for one second? I'm trying to have a conversation with you."

With an exaggerated huff Charlie stopped walking and turned to face him. She raised her eyebrows expectantly and he scoffed.

"What's the matter with you, Charlie? Huh?" He gestured to her. "This ain't like you."

"What's the matter with me?" she echoed with a laugh of disbelief. "What's the matter with me? Oh, wow, Floyd, I wonder. What could possibly be the matter?"

"I didn't mean -"

"No, of course you didn't. You didn't mean to bring up Skip and Alex just like everyone walked on eggshells around me after James, or after D-Day. Because this fucking war just won't stop taking things from me. First it was my innocence, then it was my boyfriend, and now my friends. What else, Floyd?! What else is it going to take before there's nothing left of me anymore?!"

His eyes looked so sad. "Charlie," he said quietly and started to approach her.

She held up a hand. "No, don't." She shook her head. "I don't want a hug, and I don't want to be babied. If you want to help you'll tell everyone to stop looking at me like I'm a puppy who's just been kicked. I'm fine."

"You're not fine!" Floyd protested. "And no one's looking at you like a kicked puppy. Everyone's just worried about you. Alright? We're your friends and we care. We want you to be safe."

"Of course you do," Charlie said with a dark laugh. "Because what would you do without me? Who would be there to do the horrible jobs that no one else wants to do?" She looked away as she began to mimic no one in particular, "'Someone's arm needs amputating, let's get Charlie to do it!', 'Someone needs to perform life-saving stomach surgery, let's get Charlie to do it!', 'Someone needs to decide who lives and who dies - oh, I know,'" she spat. "'Let's get Charlie to do it!'

"Well, maybe," she went on, speaking in her normal voice again, "I am just sick and tired of doing it."

"When was the last time you ate something?" Floyd asked.

Charlie scowled, somehow even more furious that he wasn't going to respond to anything she'd just said.

"When did you last eat, Charlie?" he insisted.

"I don't know."

"You don't know?"

"I don't remember."

"Today?"

"Maybe."

"God, Charlie."

Charlie wrapped an arm around the tree beside her and leaned her weight into it. Closing her eyes, she let her head fall to rest against the bark.

The sound of Floyd's boots crunching in the snow told her he was moving towards her. She was too tired to protest.

He took her hand and pressed a K-ration into it, closed her fingers around it. "Eat it, Charlie," he said, not letting go until she nodded.

Reluctantly, she opened her eyes and focused on unwrapping the K-ration.

"Floyd," she said quietly when she'd taken a few bites.

"Yeah?"

Her voice emerged small. All of the anger had gone out of her. "If I say sorry will you call me Freckles again?"

He let out a small puff of air, a placeholder for a laugh. "Yeah," he agreed.

Looking up at him, she sighed. "I really am sorry," she said quietly. "I didn't really mean it."

"Which part?"

"All of it." She couldn't even remember what she'd said anymore.

The silence surrounded them for a moment. Charlie took another bite. And then: "I can't believe I said the F-word."

She was being deadly serious, but her words made Floyd let out a loud, abrupt laugh. "I think it was a justified use of the word," he reassured her.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah," he agreed. "I think you're fine."

"Okay." She took another bite and swallowed it. "Don't ever tell my parents."

"I won't."

Not that he'd probably ever meet them.

"Can I come to your foxhole for a while?"

"Sure, Freckles," he said, watching as she ate the final bite of the K-ration. "Of course."