Frohe Weihnachten

I.

The shells came down like rain right off the loch. Nurse Naomi was doing her best to tend to the wounds of a soldier no older than 17. The kid had gotten caught in an artillery shell and now had a sinched leg. She could see the burns, but it could have been a hell of a lot worse. Much, much worse than it was. The kid was lucky it hadn't gotten infected. Stuff happened like that in the Trenches. She was getting ready to give him the morphine she'd stolen from a French farmer whose land they were using for the war. Did she feel guilty, yes, did she know that it was the only option she had, yes. But it still made her feel icky. Her parents had told her it was wrong to steal, but she needed the medicine for the soldiers. Hashem, she knew, would forgive her for her transgression.

"Did I do good?" He asked. Looking at him, he could've been her little brother Jakob. The kid looked like him too. The same curly brown hair, the same ruggish smile that attracted girls from around the city. Something his older sister always teased him about. But Jakob was somewhere on the Eastern Front in Prussia. He wasn't in France. She hadn't seen her little brother in months. She'd silently hoped that she'd be placed with him. So she'd be there, but a lass, that wasn't the case for Naomi.

The ground shook, the dirt fell from the trench, the shake nearly collapsed the table where a pack of cards sat waiting to be played. It was cold and supplies were running thin. Winter had arrived in France as the snow fell down elegantly. "You did good, Soldier," she whispered, pushing back a piece of hair from his face. "Get some rest." She gave him some morphine. "Take this, it'll help with the pain."

After taking the pills, he closed his eyes and Naomi did her best not to cry. Taking a seat at the table, she lit up a cigarette, hoping that would take the edge off of everything. She looked around at her little unit. It had been dug out by the strength of soldiers. They managed to set-up a makeshift bed with a sheet. Medical supplies were in one corner, next to the cigarettes, and a framed black and white photo of four people. There was a lit candle on a tiny table that she often sat at, playing cards with some of the boys or whoever came to visit her. Food and other perishables hung from the rafters. It had been so rainy for the past few weeks that they had to string up food and other supplies to the rafters so it wouldn't get ruined. Presents from the soldiers' families and the Queen Mary littered the dugout as well. The presents, though a nice gesture, were becoming a nuisance for everyone. There were only so many cigarettes a person could chain smoke without feeling ill and there was nowhere to put the cigarettes as well. Soldiers couldn't put them in their helmets too.

She took another look at the boy sleeping, strung out on morphine to help numb the pain. They were just boys. Boys fighting a grown man's war. She did her best to save them, but they died. Often in pain and not surrounded by their families. She would assure them that they did a good job. These were kids who had their entire lives ahead of them. Many wouldn't grow up to get married or have kids. Fulfil the dreams they had. Pure nationalism had stolen it away from them. The stalemate they were currently in was something that would be a long and hard battle. They wouldn't be home for the Holidays.

Lieutenant MacGowan came into the make-shift hospital that was set-up. He took a seat next across from her. The worry lines on his pale face that had gotten even worse in the months since she met him. His thick Highland accent was something that many people, excluding herself, had problems understanding. He was tall and would be considered handsome. He had curly brown hair, blue eyes, and once had a kind smile that seemed to have faded in the months since they'd been in France. "Pass me a fag, will you?" He asked her.

She nodded and gave him a cigarette. She lit it for him. He looked at the kid sleeping. "How's the kid?" He asked.

"He's hurt pretty badly," she said, glancing over the kid one more time. He looked so angelic like there wasn't a pain in the world that he'd ever need to worry about. "Wanna play a round of cards? I'll deal."