𝐉𝐔𝐒𝐓 𝐀 𝐖𝐎𝐌𝐀𝐍 | | 1917

30. A LETTER

Not now, Jo.
Perhaps another time, but not now.

With her hand in the air, perhaps reaching out for something unknown, she relaxed and turned away from it all.

She needed something to do.

Yet when she saw the small letter placed upon her bare and lonely bed, probably placed there by another nurse, she for once chose to not do anything. Even though her subconscious knew who it was from.

She didn't open it.

She probably should have.

But instead, she placed it into one of her drawers, suggesting that her future self would take care of the matter.

She never did.

Why? Barely she knew.

Her head was spinning as she looked into the small metal brick on the wall, posing as a mirror. Jo barely knew the girl, standing there, anymore.

Nothing she did was ever good.
At least not for her.

And at least not for the soldier whose letter was hidden away from the girl he adored.

-

William didn't get the response from Jo that he had wished for the good news. In fact, he didn't get an answer at all.

Knowing the country's current state, he simply assumed that the french post office had more important things to do than prioritizing sending simple letters between two insignificant people.

He looked outside. The war had caused France to become quite a gloomy place, but the now warmer weather did it well. The hills passed by the window like waves in a single large, dark green sea. He admired the beauty and remembered that one time Jo told him about her home-

Now, what was it?

Right, Lyon.

He leaned back. Lyon. He couldn't imagine how it was, but hopefully, it wasn't as demolished as the once beautiful capital.

He thought of his own home. A small urban area surrounded by fields of grains and corn. It was a quite lonely place, but it had its fair share of beauty.
The people made it worth it.

He hadn't seen most of his kin in at least one and a half years. He rarely spoke of them, yet whenever the home was mentioned; his thoughts were occupied by his sister's voices.
He missed it greatly- that was the truth.

The oldest one, Maggie, aspired to work for the red cross one day. According to herself, the nursery was the only decent female profession left compared to the other ones like clerks and stenographers. Will rarely brought up the subject, but he knew that he never would let his precious angel of a sister come near any sort of warfare whatsoever, not after seeing what the medical life in the trenches had done to Josephine. She could be whatever she wanted, he knew that, yet at night he would beg the war to end so that the opportunity for her would be gone once she came of age.

His other sister, Lillian was the youngest out of the three. She had barely turned eight before Will left.
Such an innocent soul. Every time his mother wrote to him, she would always let Lillian draw a little figure at the bottom of the paper.

And he had kept every single one. Like a small gift that gave him reason at times.

Will was brought out of his thoughts, once the train slowed down. He furrowed his eyebrows thinking that it still was rather early, but this stopped once he glanced outside the window, upon the station which they were at currently.

They weren't there yet, there were simply more people boarding. A lot more people.

This wouldn't have mattered to him until he noticed who they were- yet more soldiers.

French ones, he noticed that nearly immediately. They looked over at him with gloomy expressions as they passed by in the corridor. There was some kind of understanding between people who had experienced the war as they had. A simple nod and they were gone.

He wondered if they were going home. Perhaps someone's waiting for them to come back as well.

-

Hello my loves!
Happy new year, i hope this year won't fucking suck :) BUT i'm really excited to say I'm getting back into writing for the time being and hopefully it stays that way for some time! Thank you all so much for the support!

Now don't be shy and tell me what you want to see in the future ;)
/connie