Marine Life

Letters: Part Two

When I got home I opened my letter from that Marine Corps, Bryce Williams. 

It's a pleasure hearing from you Miss Madeline Georgiadis. 

As you know by now, I am Bryce Williams. I am 19 years old. And I am from London. But I moved to the U.S. when I was 13. We lived in California. But recently while I was in training, my dad got a new job in New York. So my mum and dad had to pack their things along with mine and move to New York.

I haven't seen the new house though. I just finished training to become a Marine Corps and it's my second week out here in the field. But it would probably be more than two weeks when you get my letter. 

Nothing too scary yet. Just a little sick something from being in the middle of nowhere at sea. Hopefully things will get better when we go onto land in two weeks. 

Apparently, this is suppose to be like my own little therapy session according to my sergeant. He says I can tell you anything and everything except my location and what our mission is. But it wouldn't matter... cause half the time I don't know where we are.

It takes time for these letters to get through. Especially since I'm at sea half the time. 

I'm glad my pen pal is a lady. Nothing kinky or anything; it's just that girls just have more affection towards everything. If you gave this letter to a boy, he would probably laugh at this or I would try and convince him to join the army. 

So tell me about yourself. 

What's your favourite colour? Favourite food? Favourite season? Things like that, it gets really boring here somethings. 

I need things to look foward to. So I hope you continue to write to me. Getting letters from my girlfriend and mum and dad aren't enough for me. 

Bryce Williams.

Something about that letter made me pity him. It was probably the fact that I was a stranger and he was looking foward to my letters more than anyone elses. 

I first got this assignment in April, and now it's December and we continued to exchange letters even when the assignment was over.There would be certain weeks when I would get more than one letter from him. He said he would just write letters when he got the time to cause sometimes he won't have time at all. 

The longest I didn't get a letter from him was a month. But that didn't stop me from writing to him as often as I could. 

Christmas is coming up and I sent him my very first care package to him. 

I was really suppose to focus on my college applications and essays and such, but instead I went shopping for Bryce's Christmas care package. 

I included everything I was able to think of. Paper, lead pencils with extra lead, eraser, pens, toothpaste, toothbrush, shampoo, a towel, chocolate, chips, gum, and pictures of New York City, a Christmas card, and a little paper that smelled like pine. It looked like a Christmas tree. 

Everything didn't fit in one box, so I had to split it into two boxes. 

You always have one of those guy friends when you first start talking about anything and everything. But then you slowly run out of things to talk about and it gets awkward. And it wasn't something that happened in a year, or two... It just slowly happened depending on the two people. 

It wasn't like that with Bryce. There was always something to write in the letter. The letters grew from one page to two, then to three, and all of a sudden, our letters became seven to ten pages. I felt like there was always something to talk about. 

I kept him updated on the news he wouldn't hear of. I told him about the ball games, who won, who lost, and who's playing who the following week. 

Was it possible for me to begin to like someone I never seen or met before?

He had a girlfriend that he loved. I should stop. I can't like Bryce... And even if I did... We would never end up together, we're just pen pals.