"Aw, well would ya look at us?" Luz declared as soon as he'd jumped out of the truck. "All dressed up with nowhere to go."
Posey didn't reply, simply focused on disembarking the truck without hurting herself or anyone around her. Once she was back on solid ground, she let out a sigh. Her eyelids drooped and the eyes beneath them burned with lethargy.
"I'm goin' back to bed," Bill mumbled, rubbing at his eyes.
"We haven't been dismissed yet," Posey reminded him. She couldn't help but wonder what was taking the officers so long; the jump had been cancelled and it was still dark outside, what need was there for three platoons worth of men to stand about and fill up empty roads?
"Second Platoon, on me," Compton called out as though reading her thoughts.
Posey followed after Bill, trusting him to take her where she needed to be; she was much too tired to bother looking for herself.
"There's a training exercise been scheduled for 1300 but for now you can go back to bed," Compton told them, sounding about as tired as they all felt. He offered the crowd a nod before turning to Bill, to whom he said, "I'll update you as soon as I know anything else."
Bill nodded. "Yeah, Buck, I got ya." The pair shared a nod before Compton departed and Bill turned back to Second Platoon. "You heard the man, head back to barracks."
Posey shifted her rifle in her hands and made to follow after the others before a thought halted her in place. She looked down at her gun and considered it for a moment, nodding to herself once her mind had been made up.
"Bill!" she called out, watching as he turned and furrowed his eyebrows at her through the darkness. "I'm going to go practise shooting at the rifle range. I need to get better at using the scope in the dark."
"And you gotta do it right now?" Bill demanded, walking a few paces back towards her. "Wells, ya look like you're about to drop dead."
Posey shrugged. "I don't want to feel so unprepared next time we get told we're jumping last minute, and you know it doesn't get dark until about 2300."
"How long are you gonna take?" he asked, crossing his arms over his chest.
"As long as it takes to feel confident, I suppose." She shook her head. "Look, if we get told we're jumping tomorrow I won't have time to practise unless I do it at the crack of dawn before the trucks leave. I'm already up, I might as well just do it now."
"Fine. But be back before breakfast, otherwise I'll come lookin' for ya and I won't be happy about it."
Posey grinned. "Noted. Thank you!"
"You're a pain in my ass, Wells," Bill told her as she turned on her heel.
She laughed. "Likewise!"
When she got to the rifle range it was eerily deserted. Posey had taken to spending a lot of time there now that she was working with a rifle she hadn't used in combat yet, and during the day there was generally at least one other person entering or leaving at intervals. In the dark of the morning, however, and in the wake of the cancelled jump, she found herself utterly alone. Likely, she'd have the place to herself for hours until the sun came up, which didn't tend to happen until much later in the day with the double daylight savings that Britain had in place to accommodate for power savings in wartime.
It didn't take her very long to prepare her weapon, as she'd been ready to jump with it not two hours before, but shedding her webbing seemed to be her biggest obstacle. By the time that was sorted, she found she was no longer alone. She turned to find Shifty making his way onto the range, his rifle clutched in both hands as he squinted up into the dark of the sky.
Posey smiled. "Great minds," she said, thinking of the old adage.
Shifty jumped, clearly not having expected to find anyone else there in the dark, but smiled when he saw her. "Hi, Duckie," he greeted, walking forwards to meet her. "Wasn't expectin' anyone else to be here."
Posey shrugged. "Neither was I. I wanted to get some training done in the dark before we jump again, just in case it should come in handy. I'm still getting used to the scope, you see."
Shifty nodded. "Well, if you have any questions, you know you can ask me."
"I know. Thanks, Shifty," she said.
Shifty ducked his head and mumbled that she was welcome before heading over to a target a little way down from where Posey was set up.
The pair of them stayed that way for hours, shooting at targets and changing shooting positions when either of them felt they were getting particularly achy from too long spent in a single one. Whenever they'd both find themselves changing magazines at the same time they'd speak a bit, generally Posey querying something with the scope and Shifty offering his tuppence on how to get around it, and then they'd get straight back to it.
By the time the sun was just beginning to rise, Posey found herself having to fight to keep her eyes opened. She figured that likely meant it was time to call it a day, at least until later when she could train again in the daylight.
Shifty, it seemed, had had exactly the same thought, and shot a smile over at her as the both of them got ready to leave. Wordlessly, he helped to pick up and subsequently carry some of Posey's webbing - which he'd been much smarter about, in heading back to the barracks first to leave it there as opposed to lugging it to the rifle range - to which Posey flashed a bright smile.
They walked in silence for a while, breathing in the chill of the morning air and exhaling it into the brightening sky. The sun was just barely peeking over the horizon, its oranges and yellows only managing to elbow the darkness of night a bit out of the way. The leaves on the trees dotted at the sides of the roads brushed against each other as they swayed, background music to the owls singing into the morning.
"This is my favourite time of day," Posey said to Shifty, keeping her eyes on the sky. "Life feels different in summer when the sun is just starting to rise and the breeze is still chilly. Reminds me of my childhood."
"It's sunsets that have me feelin' all nostalgic," Shifty admitted. Posey glanced over at him to find him gazing at the distant sunrise, too. "Sunrises here remind me of sunsets back home. They got the same colours. Reminds me of comin' back home from huntin' with dad."
Posey smiled to herself, trying to imagine the sunsets of Virginia and how the breeze might feel on sweaty skin after a day of hunting.
"Do you miss home, Shifty?" she wondered, kicking idly at a stone in her path and watching as it skated ahead of her.
"Everyday," he replied, nodding as he glanced over at her. "You?"
"Yeah," Posey mumbled quietly, chewing on her lip. "Everyday," she repeated. She paused a moment, slowing in her step as she watched the leaves of a nearby huddle of trees dance in the wind. After a few moments, she asked, "Hey, Shifty, can I ask you something?"
"Sure you can," Shifty agreed, watching her in profile. "Anythin' at all."
Posey nodded, working through clumps of thoughts on how to word her question. Eventually, she came up with, "If you found out someone you were close to had been lying to you for as long as you'd known them, even if it was to keep themselves safe, would you hate them for it?"
Only when Shifty cleared his throat after a while's contemplation did she look at him, fearing she'd find questions in his face to which she couldn't give him the answers.
"I guess it depends on what the lie is," he began, clearly choosing his words carefully as he spoke. "I don't think I could hate 'em either way, but if they had a good reason for it and they were actin' in their best interests then who am I to think ill of 'em for it?" Shifty shrugged, glancing down at his boots once before turning back to her. "It's a hard question. Why'd you ask?"
Posey chewed on her bottom lip, adjusting the webbing in her arms as she looked back at the winding road ahead of them. "Just curious," she replied quietly. "I know someone in a similar situation, is all."
They didn't speak much after that, simply enjoyed the peace and quiet of the morning where the locals were just beginning to go about their business and the paratroopers hadn't yet begun to make their usual racket. When they arrived back at the barracks, they shared a smile before Shifty handed her back her equipment and they went their separate ways.
She got all of her stuff put away and got back into bed herself just in time for Roe to roll over to face her from the bunk beside hers. He raised his eyebrows as he looked at her, a silent request for her to tell him where she went.
"Rifle range," she mouthed to him, but his eyebrows only furrowed as his face screwed up in confusion. "Shooting," she tried again, still to no avail. So she sat up, took a look around the room to make sure she hadn't yet disturbed anyone, and whispered, "Rifle range," as loud as she dared above the snoring.
"Wells, shut up," Johnny deadpanned from across the room.
Posey's jaw popped open. "How did you even hear that?" Johnny didn't reply, so she huffed and laid back down. When she did, she caught the tail end of Roe's smirk before he rolled back over again.
Posey shook her head, laughing in spite of herself. "Screw you," she muttered, and grinned when she heard Roe sputter a poorly concealed laugh.
She fell asleep soon after that.
When she woke again, for the second time that day, it was to Roe gently shaking her.
"Wells, get up."
Posey wrenched her arm out of his grip and snuggled further into her blanket. "Go away," she mumbled, refusing to open her eyes.
"Wells, we gotta go get breakfast."
"I'm tired." Her voice emerged muffled from where she had her face buried into her pillow.
"Wells -"
"Go 'way."
"Get your ass up, Wells, I ain't gonna tell you again," cut in Bill.
Posey huffed and sat up, pouting all the while, before rubbing at her eyes. She'd brought this upon herself, she knew, but she was certainly paying the price for it now. Dragging herself out of bed was hard work but all she had to do was put her jump boots on, which she didn't bother to lace; she felt more tired now than she had when she'd had to wake up for the jump.
The chill in the air from earlier had subsided considerably and the day was already warm - much brighter, too, than it had been when she'd last been outside. The birds were performing their little songs and the sun was high in the sky. The smell of whatever was cooking in the mess hall - the general consensus was that it was better not to ask - wafted out into the road and reached them even as far away as they were.
"Hey, could be worse, fellas," Skip began from somewhere near the front of the group, referring to the lethargy with which they all dragged their feet behind them, "we could be in France right now with nothing but a pack of K-Rations to live off of. Now, the food here ain't great, but I'll take it over the lousy dry food they feed us in the field any day."
Posey laughed tiredly and nodded her assent, following after Roe as the group picked up the pace on their way to the mess hall.
"You should get some more sleep after breakfast," Roe addressed her, shooting her a glance over his shoulder. "Ain't good to run on so little sleep."
Posey grinned half-heartedly. "No rest for the wicked. Training session at 1300, remember?"
Roe rolled his eyes. "I meant before lunch. You got time."
She sighed, tired of the debate already. "I will, Roe. Don't worry about me."
"When you stop needin' me to, I will," he replied easily. Posey chuckled to herself as she followed him into the mess.
First Platoon were already inside and mostly seated but Third hadn't shown up yet, so the noise wasn't too bad just now. Posey thanked whoever was listening from on high that her ears could adjust gradually as a result, still sensitive as they were from all of the gunfire earlier. She then mumbled a quick thanks to the mess officer when he dumped whatever he was serving onto her tray and followed Roe to a table as though in a daze. Slumping into a chair, her eyelids drooped once more.
Roe nudged her. "Eat your food. You can sleep after."
"Yes, sir," she mumbled, and stabbed at it with her fork.
"See, I told ya you shoulda just gone to bed earlier," Bill said as he slipped into the seat on her other side. "It's your own damn fault."
"I know, I know," she batted him away. "It had to be done, though. Now let me revel in self-pity in peace."
"Don't we always?" Toye drawled, all but falling into the seat across from Bill. When Luz came to sit beside him, Posey sat up straighter. She tried desperately to catch his eye to no avail and sighed silently as she slouched back over her food again.
"Gonorrhoea, any idea when we're jumpin' next?" Perconte asked, slamming his tray down beside Luz's. "Be nice to get a fair warnin' next time, right, Duckie?"
Posey's head shot up, her eyes wide as she looked at him, but he only laughed as he stared back at her. Reluctantly, she cracked a smile; Perco may have been a wind-up merchant but she knew he'd never break a promise. Their secret late night escapade would likely go to the grave with the lot of them.
"You'll know as soon as I do, Perco, now stop botherin' me about it," Bill retorted, shovelling food into his mouth to punctuate his statement.
Posey zoned out for the rest of the conversation, taking to pushing her food around her plate and eating large mouthfuls of it every once in a while if only to save herself from having to contribute. When they all made their way back to the barracks, Luz's loud chatter with Perconte made it impossible for her to get a word in to ask him to talk. Once back, she found she could hardly be bothered to try anymore.
Resolving to pull him aside when she was in a more lucid, suitable state of mind to explain everything properly, Posey settled herself back in bed and hugged Teddy close to her. She fell into slumber praying that Luz would soon come around.