A Moment With You.

5

Time passed, the summer slowly began fading as we remained in the countryside of France longer than intended. We had now spent two seasons together. The summer, and the fall of 1915', before the cold and grey winter of 15',  cold as it was. The snow was mild, white, and heavenly. It reminded us of a temporary truce, of Christmas day during the battle of the trenches. There was one day out of the entire year in which men would come together, enemies or not, we would stop the cruelty just to wish one another a merry Christmas. To play ball, drink, learn new languages from our opponents-made-friends. That's what the snow always reminded me of. Elisabeth knew that I had some heavy pain and melancholy. One that affected me heavily. Although the wind was everywhere, the wind was bloody hurtful as well. By jove, the entire winter was dreadful. I was visiting a nurse, a sister of one of the soldiers from our unit, Jessica. Or, as I call her; Little Jessie. Jessie never told me much of what she did, or where she went. But I do remember her mentioning something of importance. She had asked me beforehand through the phone to drive over. Her house was in Naples, in this ancient little community. It was a long trip from the countryside of France to Italy, by train. For Italy, the winter was a new record of cold. It had never had snowstorms and blizzards this bad before. Though, this was just sudden weather. It wasn't unusual for it to happen, but when it came to the cold, it was. At most, it'd be some irregular weather based off of heat. This time, it was blizzards and ice cubes with a wind of such malignant force that you could almost say it was devil-driven. The car wasn't really that hot, although the engine was roaring its way about. It took about an hour and a half to drive there, due to the snow and the heavy traffic. It was Christmas, and the entire month of December was always filled with people;  no matter the places you went. Rome, Naples, Sicily. All of them were always crowded. I had arrived finally, right after ending up parking the car in the corner to the right of the house. It was a grand mansion, old as time itself. It was there that we stopped the car as I looked to Elisabeth who held my hand.

"Are you sure you can do this?" She eyed me with a worried look of concern.

"Someone has to. I may not have been responsible for their lives, but I should be the one to honour them." I held her hand quietly as I looked into Elisabeth's eyes. She saw that I didn't want to do this, but leaving the families of those who've long since passed away, without any information of what happened to the men they sent out; I felt it wasn't right. We stepped out of the car as we both felt the frost and the ravaging cold of it.

"Christ, winters are horrible," I mumbled to myself as I looked up to the sky and saw the snowflakes. Elisabeth held her hands together as a woman came out in front of the door. It was Jessica.

"Howard, you made it,"  She said, walking out the door and onto the cold ground outside. She smiled with a loving intention as she saw me and Elisabeth both come out of the car when we had arrived from the train station.

"Yes, although I could've had a good day without this wretched driving." I replied sarcastically. The world was at its lowest. Jobs were lost in the thousands, parties in the hundreds of thousands all across during the peacetime, and technology was being developed everywhere that one could look -- or at least what one would have called technology during such times. In reality, it was just the first era of modern technology as the war and political tensions pushed something in the engine of creativity. However, opportunity was an entirely different situation. There were millions of opportunists, always seeking their fortune in what one could call "The American Dream", one of many grand misadventures and stories during our time.   

Elisabeth didn't know much about Jessica, but it was my duty to ensure the good fortune and livelihood of those dearest to the deceased. In a way, this was an event that allowed Elisabeth to see a different side of my life, and me. The more professional, deep-bonding type of trait.