The Spirit of the Corps » Band of Brothers

Deleted Scene: Charlie Runs Away

"Tab," Malarkey called him some time later. Floyd had no idea how long it had been.

"I'm just gonna check one more -"

"No," Malark cut him off gently, "you're not."

Floyd didn't turn around as he traipsed from one bombed out house to the next. "I think she'll be in this one."

"Tab," Malarkey repeated, still patient but more urgent this time.

"You check the next one," Floyd instructed him.

"Floyd."

Finally, with as much visible and audible irritation as he could muster, Floyd turned around. "What?" he snapped, and immediately regretted it, because Malark had been out here searching for Charlie for just as long as he had.

"It's getting light out," Malark said. It sounded like something someone shouldn't need to point out, but he had needed to, because Floyd hadn't noticed. In his head, he was still watching Charlie, safe and unharmed and smiling, staring up at the stars. He had not been aware that the world had been slowly brightening up around him, and this didn't make sense to him, because he hadn't found her yet. The sun couldn't rise until he'd found her, so how was it getting light out?

"Oh," Floyd said, simply. Because he could think of nothing else to say.

"Let's head back to the CP, huh, buddy?" Malark asked kindly.

Floyd recoiled from him. "No."

"Tab."

"We haven't found her yet."

"We're not going to find her tonight."

The pair of them argued and they argued and they argued, and they checked some more houses and they argued, and then they were too tired to argue anymore. Floyd's eyes were drooping, burning fiercely with his fatigue, and his feet were so heavy it felt like he'd put them in cement. His shoulders were sloped forward, his chin ducked, his eyes barely open to navigate as he walked, and he felt like he might topple over at any moment from exhaustion.

He allowed Malarkey to lead him back to the CP.

He convinced himself Charlie would be there waiting for them.

She wasn't.

He allowed Malarkey to lead him to a bed.

He convinced himself Charlie would be there when he woke up.

He tried to fall asleep and couldn't. He passed the time by thinking about Charlie. He thought about the particular blue of her eyes and the pattern of her freckles, about the softness of her hands even when they were bloodstained and the brightness of her smile even when it was a little broken. He thought about her in Paris, in Holland, in Aldbourne, in Normandy. He thought about what she might be like at home, his home, in Indiana. He thought about what her lips might feel like pressed to his, where she'd put her hands while he kissed her, what she'd say to him afterward and whether or not he thought she'd let him do it again.

Eventually, he fell asleep. And then he woke up and she wasn't there and he convinced himself he just hadn't been looking hard enough last night, that he'd been too tired to concentrate properly, that now that he'd slept he'd be able to find her.

He found Malarkey in the main room of the CP, an old living room with crumbling chairs and couches and piano benches pulled into it to make some sort of a meeting room for the company.

"Is she back?" Floyd asked.

Malark ran a hand down his exhausted face. He looked older than he'd ever looked; the colour had somehow drained out of him, even out of his usually bright ginger hair. He looked grey. He looked tired. "No," he said.