More people than Posey could have expected had been bombed out of their homes in London. After the what was being called the 'little Blitz' of the previous year, the city's tube stations were full of mattresses and belongings and people milling about to protect them from theft during the day.
Posey pitied them, which she felt was strange because, really, she was one of them - she'd simply found herself in luck that her brother was being put up in a hotel for the time being. Still, it was difficult to look in on a scene that should have been so personal made so public. These people had no privacy at all.
London was a shell of what it had once been, but then again so was she, so Posey tried her best not to mind as she made her way to the hotel John was staying in. She kept her head down and her eyes on the pavement, mentally repeating the directions she'd asked the ticket-collector for at the train station over and over again in her head until she reached the double doors leading into the lobby.
The hotel was run down from the war and the hell London had been put through over the years, but it had clearly once been beautiful. The lobby's interior shone with muted grandeur, a hint of what must once have been incredibly opulent; Posey thought there was still something rather charming about it, elegant in the way that women sometimes were when they aged and you could tell they'd once been stunning, but the bustling activity made it difficult to get a proper read. It was coming up for late evening and people were moving in a restless tide in and out of the hotel bar and vying for whichever rooms were left; hotels were popular these days for romantic trysts and business meetings, among other things. Posey had been informed so when she'd asked for directions.
Posey queued up at the front desk and waited her turn impatiently, tapping her foot whilst her eyes swept the room on the lookout for John. She didn't want their reunion to be here, under the watchful gaze of so many prying eyes and in a room so loud they'd have to shout at each other to be heard, but she was anxious to see him. She wondered whether he was likely to be in the hotel restaurant or whether he got room service - maybe he was dining somewhere else altogether? There was no real use in hypothesising for she was at the front of the queue a moment later.
"Can I help you, miss?"
Being a woman again still hadn't lost its appeal. Posey was happier than ever to be back on home soil as herself this time, no fake accent or fake deep voice necessary.
"Hi, yes, I'm here to visit my brother. I'm not sure which room he's in."
"What's the name?"
"Flight Lieutenant Jonathan Wells. He's being put up here by the RAF."
The woman behind the desk nodded as she scanned the list in front of her. "Yes, I see. Room 231, second floor, miss."
Posey thanked the woman and was on her way to the stairs, weaving in and out of elderly couples and women with babies, children and businessmen. At the foot of the stairs she came upon a girl, likely around the same age as her, holding onto the arm of a soldier on leave and smiling warmly up at him. The soldier was American but the girl was British, and Posey paused a little ways away from them, struck by the thought that that could have been her; she might have stayed in London instead of ever going to America and come across the boys of Easy during one of their many weekend passes to the capital. She might have met Bill that way. How much simpler everything would have been if she had. But would they still have fallen in love if they'd done it like that? They hadn't even liked each other at first, after all.
Posey shook her head and ducked as she slipped past the couple. They'd still have fallen in love, she was sure of it. In a million different lifetimes in a million different universes she was certain that her and Bill Guarnere would still have met, war or no war, and fallen hopelessly in love. Her heart sighed for the universe where they were never torn apart, where they got to find each other and stay together, sighed for the happiness that that version of herself must have had.
When she made it to the second floor it didn't take her long to find Room 231. The biggest obstacle was knocking on the door. Posey lifted her hand and hesitated, staring at the wood of the door and trying to muster the strength to knock. So much had changed since she'd last seen John and she was different now to how she'd been before. Did she really want to face up to all she'd experienced since last leaving England, so much that she had to retell it? Did she really want to face the future the pair of them would have to carve out for themselves now that they were both out of the war for good?
Posey knocked thrice on the door and tucked her hand behind her back, holding her breath as she listened closely for movement on the other side. Half of her was hoping he'd answer the door quickly to put her out of her misery and the other half was hoping he wasn't there at all.
"Posey," John said when he pulled the door open. His face had been displeased at first, likely disgruntled at having been bothered, but his eyebrows hopped up in surprise when he recognised her. "What - what are you..?" He trailed off, seeming, for what must have been the first time in his life, at a loss for words.
"Hi," she greeted, letting all of her breath out in one go. "Can I come in?" It would be easier to explain everything when she was sure she wouldn't be overheard - she'd still broken laws in doing what she had and there was still a war raging around them. She'd had enough of her secrets being exposed.
"Yeah," John replied. There was something dazed flitting about in his eyes, something distant. Still, he pulled the door open wider and stepped aside to allow her in, and once she was he closed the door behind her.
"Make yourself at home," he said, coming up beside her where she'd stopped at the edge of the small hallway that opened out into the room at large.
The room was on the smaller side, comfortable as opposed to grand, and John had clearly been rejecting the maids for a fair while. He'd never been messy before the war but he certainly was now; his clothes were strewn about the floor, his bag left open on the desk chair and spilling its contents both onto the carpet and the desk beside it. The bed was unmade, the curtains closed, and the lightbulb dim where it was dying from overuse.
"It's cosy," Posey said quietly.
John laughed. "The RAF's finest."
What was left unsaid lingered on the air between them. The both of them missed home.
How lovely it would have been to have had a place to return to, to have gotten back from the war and been able to collapse into her own bed, to draw the sheets up to her ears and remember what it had felt like when the world was at peace. How precious it would have been to have heard her mother in the room across the hall, the cooks in the kitchen preparing dinner, the maids setting the table.
Posey missed home desperately. She missed it more than she could say. To have a place to return to, a place safe and warm and familiar where her things and her family were and where she knew she could always come back, was a commodity she could no longer afford.
Posey crossed the room and moved the bag on the chair to the floor, clearing the remaining items off of the seat before sitting down. She didn't want to sit on the bed, that would feel too personal; there was still an ocean between her and John, but just now she was hopeful they might be able to close it - she had some idea of what he'd been through now, after all.
"I met George," she said into the quiet of the room as John made himself comfortable opposite her on the bed. "Your bomb aimer."
If John hadn't been at a loss for words before he certainly was now. "My -"
"You told me you were a fighter pilot," Posey went on. She didn't know why she was saying it - she hadn't told him about George with the intention of accusing him of anything - but the words slipped out. Even still, she fought to keep her voice calm - polite, even. "You told me you flew Spitfires."
John stared back at her blankly. "You of all people should understand that sometimes you have to lie. How was I supposed to tell you I was a bomber pilot when all anyone was talking about was how the Germans were going to bomb us? And then when they actually did? And after the Spanish Civil War, too? How was I supposed to look you in the eye and tell you I was a bomber pilot?"
"I don't know," Posey admitted quietly. And she really didn't.
"Exactly." John looked away, setting his eyes on the curtains. "How are you back? And why are you dressed as a girl?"
Posey chewed on her bottom lip for a moment, willing her heartbeat to calm so that she'd have enough breath to speak. "I got found out," she said eventually. "Everyone found out so I faked my own death to make sure the army didn't come after me. I got wounded when I was leaving the company and a couple of nurses fixed me up and let me stay with them, so I was a nurse for a little while. When our unit got transferred to England I went back to the hospital you used to be in and asked where you were. When they told me they didn't know I did some digging and then I came here."
"How did you get found out?"
Posey sighed, wondering whether the heavy feeling in her chest would ever subside. "It doesn't matter anymore." She shook her head, her hands fiddling in her lap. "But," she began, fighting to keep her voice from shaking, "I wanted to tell you that I get it now. Before, I was naïve and I didn't understand, but after talking to George about what happened the night your plane went down, and after being left out on my own too, I understand. And I'm sorry. For everything. The parts I could have made easier and the parts I couldn't. Just, for all of it."
John didn't react for a few moments, then all of a sudden he turned back to her and there was something changed in his demeanour, something softer. "Mum would be proud of you," he said, trying for a smile. Then the smile fell from his face and tears sprung to his eyes. He shook his head with conviction. "I'm proud of you."
It was all Posey could do not to break down and sob. "Thank you." She hadn't known how much she'd needed for someone to say that to her until now.
John stood up suddenly and so she followed suit, prepared to follow him out of the door in the event he left abruptly, but when he came nearer he pulled her into a tight hug. "You've done so well," he mumbled into her hair, his voice thick. "You've been so brave."
"It's been so hard," she confessed, a sob breaking her words apart as she clung to him. "I feel so lost."
"It's over now," he replied, patting her on the back gently with his good hand. "You've done it and you're home."
His words made her squeeze her eyes tight shut, forcing the tears out faster. "But I don't feel like I am."
Had he felt like this when he'd first come back? Undoubtedly it had been harder for him, what with the Nazi occupation of France back then, but she wondered whether they were somewhat the same in this, in having been repeatedly torn away from those they loved every time they thought they were safe and left to work it out by themselves. Were they closer now than they'd been even before the war, not emotionally but in experience?
Posey had always thought of herself as an expert at being left behind but now she understood that she wasn't that at all. She was an expert at being left alone. Sometimes she did the leaving and sometimes people left her, but either way she always ended up by herself. She hadn't realised it before, but John was exactly the same.
They had dinner together that night and didn't talk about the future, though it was clearly on both of their minds. Posey tried her best not to worry about it but it couldn't be helped; where would they go from here? They'd have to get jobs to afford a flat (they definitely couldn't afford a house) but maybe at some point they'd get some will money - but had their mother even had a will? The government was giving out payment compensation for buildings destroyed by the Blitz but how long would it take to get it?
There were so many questions, none of which Posey could even begin to think through just yet. She didn't honestly know that she'd ever be ready to sit down and think through the answers, but she'd have to be at some point. She had to get her life back on track now that her little adventure was over.
She felt as though her book had ended and she was at the point in the story authors never wrote about because it was boring and sad and uncertain. Her story had ended when she'd left Easy. Her ending was the death they all thought she'd faced.
Except it wasn't. Not really. And now she had to navigate this extra epilogue and try to get to a point where she could start an entirely new book, a fresh one with different characters and a different setting. A different book for a different girl.
Somehow, she missed the old one, sad though it had been.