An Undecided Fate

Chapter 11

Three days later...

Alexander woke up one morning to a numb arm. He had been resting his head on it for the last eight hours.

It was just the most annoying and irritating feeling ever.

Yet, to his surprise, Henry was already up and was squatting next a lake - probably washing his face.

Alexander's eyes roamed around the space near him. The space that was mostly empty was now filled with heavy bags.

When did these get here?

He flickered his eyes towards another direction and saw a blurry figure. Rubbing his eyes, he slowly got up to see his good friend, George.

"Finally! You're awake," George chuckled at Alexander.

"George? When did you come? And how did you get here?" Alexander asked, perplexed.

"We seemed to have followed the same trail, I guess! Well, there aren't really many different ways to get from here to Charleston. We actually came here last night, but you seemed to be in deep sleep so we decided not to wake up the sleepy head. In fact, I would have expected to see Henry sleeping and you pacing around, just thinking about one thing."

That action described by George sounded somewhat familiar to Alexander - then he remembered why.

Cassandra would do the same thing. He never knew what went on in her head whenever she paced back and forth repetitively - similarly to how she never knew what went on in his head when he would do the same walking motion.

Speaking of Cassandra, she was the only thing running in his head the entire night.

"Why would she say such a thing about the army, that too in front of me? She would never do such a thing though...did I possibly mistaken-"

"Alex?"

"Oh sorry, I guess I was just lost in some thought," he replied, a little embarrassed.

"It alright my friend," George smirked, "it happens to everybody," and he added a wink to that.

"Did he know what I was thinking about?" Alexander pushed away the thought and changed the subject.

"Where's Fernando?" Alexander's eyes roamed around curiously. George pointed towards the lake that Henry was squatting next to. Alexander stretched his head a little further to see Fernando squatting as well - but they weren't even using the water from the lake at all.

Alexander pushed himself off the ground completely and jogged towards the two younger ones.

"Really - a game of jacks? Now?"

Fernando was too scared to even try to catch the jacks, so he let them all plop onto the ground. "Relax Alex," George chided, "It's nice to get your mind off battle stress every now and then."

"But we haven't even started fighting in the battles yet!"

With no reply, Henry and Fernando collected the jacks and put them in a small bag.

"Let's move!" Alexander commanded and the four of them got on their horses.

Within a few moments their horses began to trot their way on the trail.

***

Cassandra and Jenny were in the kitchen making tea for their family.

There wasn't much talking going around in the house lately. Every now and then there were greetings exchanged among the family, but other than that there was barely any conversing.

"Thank you dear," Gabriella gave a warm smile to Cassandra as she served her tea.

"I'm going to go to the balcony to get some fresh air," Cassandra told her mother-in-law.

"Oh please do! I know how much you'd need that now," she replied kindly.

Cassandra walked and thought within the balcony. She paced back and forth just thinking and thinking.

"What am I going to do all these months? Or maybe even years? I can't just do nothing!" she asked herself helplessly.

In just a few moments, an answer flew by - literally.

She caught the piece of paper that the wind was pushing at her direction.

It was some flyer, apparently. She read aloud.

"Women out there, army nurses needed!"

Army nurses?

Curious, she read out the description.

"Most men at war come by injuries or diseases and this prevents them from doing the best they can to serve our country. Hence, we will need help. Our soldiers will need help. As a woman, it may be quite difficult to land at the job you want or the profession you want to peruse in. This could be a splendid opportunity for you women out there to experience being in the workforce! If you are interested, which we hope you are, please attend the army nurse training on March 30th from 1 pm to 7 pm at the University of the City of New York!

Cassandra walked back a few steps, trying to process what she just read.

"If I become an army nurse," she slowly said to herself, "does that means that..."Cassandra pinched herself, making sure that this wasn't just a beautiful dream.

When she got the confirmation that she was living in the reality, an elated Cassandra ran out of the balcony and into the house eager to tell the family about her big decision.