Posey knew she was being watched. She could feel the pressure of eyes on her, searing through her clothes and into her skin. Every time she turned she found all eyes averted but she knew who the gaze belonged to. Johnny Martin, of course. No one else had a gaze powerful enough.
Ever since he'd discovered her secret, Johnny had seemed to make it his personal duty to keep a watchful eye on her. She wondered whether things made a lot more sense now that he knew - why she was so much smaller than everyone else, why she struggled with the upper body strength aspect of PT, why her accent was so strange - or whether he was looking at her with new eyes now that he knew. Whatever she'd assumed upon the initial revelation, however - that he'd be supportive and a close friend or whatever naïve thing she'd assumed - had been wrong. Johnny seemed to keep his distance now more than ever. In a way, it quite stung.
She felt his eyes on her so steadily one morning at breakfast she brazenly turned in her seat to level him with a stare of her own. She didn't say anything, simply stared, until he eventually snarled out a, "What?"
"Do I have something on my face?" she wondered aloud. "Is that why you're staring at me?"
"I ain't staring at you."
"You were." Posey smiled smugly as she turned to face the front again when he didn't seem to have a response.
After that, the weight of those piercing eyes was significantly less, though it was still there. At mealtimes, during free time, whilst they were running Currahee or at the rifle range. Really, his eyes seemed to be seeking her out constantly. Testing her, perhaps. Waiting for her to fail. Or maybe he was simply trying to work out how she managed to keep her secret so tightly under wraps that none of the others seemed to suspect a thing. She thought the whole secret must have seemed incredibly obvious to him now.
She wasn't sure whether it was simply paranoia, but every time she left the barracks in the middle of the night to head to the showers, she felt eyes following her every move. She glanced back over her shoulder multiple times to check she wasn't being followed, determined to have some forewarning this time, though he never followed her again. None of them did. Each time she returned to the barracks and managed to get back in bed undetected she breathed a silent sigh of relief. The whole ordeal was more exhausting than she ever could have imagined, both physically and emotionally.
She always woke up in the morning feeling like she'd slept mere minutes as opposed to hours. Her head seemed to constantly ache, her eyes burn, and her muscles to scream at her to stop moving. Every wake up call was as much a shock to her system as the last, an unfortunate result of only being able to shower in the middle of the night.
As the entirety of Second Platoon lay in their bunks in silence one Sunday morning, Posey reluctantly blinked the bleariness out of her eyes and gazed at the small amount of light soaking the floor by the window. It must still have been early - much too early to be awake on a Sunday, in any case - though she found the quiet of the barracks and the gentle beauty of the early morning light to be calming. She felt settled as she laid there, eyes hazy but gazing at the small pool of light on the wood of the floor, not as reluctant to be awake as she usually tended to be.
"Hey, don't designations come out tomorrow?" were the first words out of one George Luz's mouth, forcing them all to drag themselves to consciousness. It was a weekend pass-less weekend, though the rest of the platoon all seemed to still manage to wake up feeling like they'd been hit over the head with a shovel.
"Yeah. I think so," replied Malarkey, his voice thick with sleep and muffled by the blanket his face was still buried into.
"What d'ya think you'll get?"
"Luz, go back to sleep." Presumably, Malarkey's words were accompanied by an eyeroll - if, that was, his eyes were even open at all.
"You'll be a radioman, Luz," Posey chimed in. She rolled over in bed to find him standing in the centre of the room dressed in his PT gear, seeming to be grinning at the world. Posey couldn't help but laugh at the sight of him stood there in his socks, staring at the ceiling whilst everyone tried to hang onto sleep around him.
"You think?" Luz asked, turning to look at her. He was still grinning, though now his eyebrows were raised.
"For sure," Posey replied, shuffling around until she was comfortable. "Big mouth like yours, they'll snap you right up. Who else can talk so loud they'll be heard in a warzone?"
"You," Guarnere grumbled from the other side of the room. "Will the pair of ya go the fuck back to sleep?"
"Oh, I take it back," Posey said. She turned back to Luz and shared a grin with him. "Guarnere's got a big enough mouth. Maybe he'll be a radioman too."
"Shut your fuckin' trap, Wells, 'fore I shut it for you."
"What would that entail, exactly?"
"Luz, Wells, Guarno," Toye cut in, "go the fuck back to sleep."
"Aw, come on, Joe," Luz crooned, sauntering over to stand at the foot of Toye's bed. "Aren't you even a little curious what you'll get?"
"No," Toye replied flatly.
"Alrighty then."
Posey admired Luz's ability to smile at everything. He was a happy soul. She thought she might even consider him her closest friend in boot camp - they'd seemed to bond over their shared and unspoken possession of contraband.
"Well, Duckie," Luz continued. He spared a moment to giggle at the nickname he'd given her, which seemed to never lose its comedic appeal from his perspective, before going on, "I think you're missing out a key loud-mouthed individual."
"Do you so?" Posey replied, quirking a brow.
"Yeah," Luz said matter-of-factly. "See, I know for sure there ain't anyone in this platoon - hell, even in this whole damn company - that speaks louder or more often than Second Platoon's own Eugene Roe."
Posey couldn't see Roe from where she was laying but she would've bet any money that he had flushed bright red. He was paler, even, than her, and that was saying something. A whole lot shyer, too; Luz's sarcasm was dripping.
"Aw, Luz, leave the man alone," Posey replied, poorly concealing her grin. "He can't help that he's got a lot to say."
"You two are awful," Malarkey cut in. "Go to sleep."
"Y'know," Luz began, undeterred, "I think I'd make a great medic."
"Really?" Posey asked around a yawn.
"Sure," Luz replied. He added no more.
"Well -" Posey began, and was cut briskly off.
"Another fuckin' word out of either of you and you'll regret it, so help me God." Though Posey couldn't see him, the voice unmistakably belonged to Johnny Martin.
Posey giggled into her pillow and listened to Luz's footsteps presumably retreating back to his bunk.
"You got it, Johnny," he said, his grin audible in his words. "Ain't that right, Duckie?"
"Not a peep," Posey promised, attempting to conceal her smile. The barracks fell back into silence the moment she finished speaking.
Posey took the time to contemplate what designation all of them might actually receive. The possible options that she knew of were rifleman, mortarman, medic, radioman, and machine gunner, though she was sure there were more. She was hoping to be assigned rifleman. She had no idea whether she was good enough with a gun but there was a lot less responsibility associated with being a rifleman than there was with being something like a medic. Plus, there were more of them - she wouldn't be putting anyone in a bind or putting the company at risk by leaving when they got to England if she was a rifleman. If they picked her for a medic, on the other hand, she knew it would be disastrous. She didn't know how many people would be chosen as medics but she knew they would be far fewer in number than riflemen. She wouldn't be able to leave as easily if she was a medic. No, she needed to be a rifleman. She could only hope her marksmanship would end up proving her worthy of the title to whoever was responsible for dishing out these designations.
After thinking for what was likely much too long on the possible designations, she fell into a light sleep. When she woke again it was to the sounds of various men dragging themselves out of bed.
"Breakfast?" Skip asked, his voice thick with sleep.
All he got in response was a series of lethargic nods. Still, that was good enough for him, and he set to getting dressed into his ODs.
Posey herself sat up and rubbed at her eyes until she felt she could keep them open. She sat staring at her lap for a few moments, simply listening to the small sounds that had filled the barracks, before she leant over to the end of her bed and reached for the lid on her footlocker. After a few moments' struggling she huffed loudly and rolled off of the bunk onto her feet, traipsing to her footlocker and removing her ODs as soon as she'd gotten it open. She made quick work of putting the jumpsuit on over the top of her PT gear, which she always slept in, and shoved her feet into unlaced jump boots as soon as she was finished. She contented herself with tucking the laces in, much too tired to bother with tying them up, and buttoned up her ODs as she followed the rest of the men out of the door.
When the sunlight hit her face, Posey's eyes shut immediately. It was much brighter now than it had been when she'd first woken up, the sunshine less a delicate glow and more a harsh beam. She had to rub at her eyes again before she could reopen them, and when she did she found Roe had waited for her whilst the others had continued on to the mess hall.
Posey shot him a smile and walked to meet him. "Thanks for waiting."
"S'alright."
As they walked together in companionable silence, Posey contemplated said companion. Her and Roe weren't all that close, though they did tend to end up at the same table at mealtimes and they were always in the same row when running Currahee. The rows of four that had been inadvertently formed on their first ever run up the mountain had stuck, so Posey always braved the mountain alongside Luz, Liebgott, and Roe. Still, she was mildly surprised he'd chosen to wait for her. He surprised her sometimes. This quiet, reserved man with the darkest hair she'd ever seen seemed to have one of the warmest hearts. She made a mental note to look out for him more.
"You know we were just messing around earlier, right?" she spoke up into the silence, breaking the rhythm of their boots on the gravel.
"Hm?"
"Luz and I," she clarified, squinting at him through the sunlight as they walked. "We didn't mean anything by it. You know that, right?"
"Sure," Roe replied. He seemed to struggle with himself for a moment before forcing himself to send her a smile.
Posey giggled to herself and smiled at the fact he'd made the effort.
"So what do you think you'll get tomorrow?" she wondered, shoving her hands deep into her pockets. It was still hot - she didn't think Georgia ever wouldn't be - but there was a cool breeze blowing today. It was refreshing but a bit chilly on the exposed skin. "Your designation?"
Roe shrugged and looked down at the ground ahead of him as he walked. He didn't speak for a while and Posey thought that might be the only answer she'd get, until suddenly he shrugged again and said, "I dunno. Rifleman, maybe."
"I'm hoping for rifleman," she admitted. "Seems like less responsibility than the others."
"Yeah, well, you're a good shot," Roe replied. His eyes were set firmly on the ground, revealing nothing of his facial expression. "I'm sure you'll get it."
"Well, you're not a bad one," Posey reasoned in response. "Did you used to hunt before the war? A lot of the other Southern guys used to hunt."
Roe laughed. "So 'cause I'm Southern that means I hunt?"
Posey shook her head, a grin twisting her lips. She'd managed to get a real life laugh out of the one man in the company she'd been sure wasn't capable of it. Then she giggled as she replied, "You tell me."
"I didn't used to hunt," Roe replied after a beat. "First timer, just like you."
"You been listening in on my conversations, Roe?" she teased. She grinned as she looked ahead of her and caught sight of the mess hall and the back of the rest of Second Platoon filing in.
"You talk so loud it's impossible not to."
"If that's what helps you sleep at night then you keep telling yourself that."
When she turned to look at him beside her, Roe was shaking his head. He had a poorly concealed grin on his lips and his arms crossed, his eyes unwavering from the ground. That was good enough for Posey and she turned back to face the front as they finally reached the mess hall.
Just as she was about to enter, she turned and shot Roe a grin. "For the record, I hope you get rifleman too. Then we can be buddies!"
She turned back to the front too quickly to gauge Roe's expression but she did hear his laugh, even over the cacophony of a company of men at breakfast.
Breakfast was always later on weekends and filled largely with the sounds of raucous men complaining obnoxiously of their hangovers. As she got into the queue for food, Posey took the time to gaze around at the men of Easy Company scattered between the benches, shovelling food into their mouths at a much faster rate than necessary and shouting much louder than they should've been. Despite how exhausting and difficult her life was these days, she couldn't help but think that maybe there wasn't anywhere else she would've wanted to be spending her Sunday morning.