I See You

One

1915. February.

Elias left for war this morning. France, they're taking him to. But they say that the war won't go on for much longer, only a few more months they believe. Mummy says that the war shouldn't have started in the first place, but daddy says that "those blasted Germans need a lesson".

Elias promised me that he would be back before my birthday...I'll be eighteen! The day when Elias returns isn't far away, and I cannot wait for the day when he does walk back through our little village streets, down our driveway and sits on our doorstep just as he used to do when we were young. On that day I will finally declare my undying love for him, as soon as he comes into sight.

I have it all planned in my head. War will be declared as over, and he will walk through our streets, followed by the other boys with his uniform on and backpack slung across his shoulder, looking like a hero. I'll run up to him and throw my arms around him just like in those romance novels where the two lovers finally reunite when they should never have been apart.

I turn the pages of the scrapbook that is laying on my table in front of me. It's the same scrapbook that I have had ever since I was a young girl and the familiarity of it comforts me. Elias not being here leaves a large gap in my life that I'm not used to being there. The page turns once again, and I find myself looking at a faded photograph of me and Elias a few weeks before war was declared. We both look so happy. So worry free.

My finger traces around his figure, slowing as it goes around his face. His short brown hair looks strangely lighter because of the photographic paper. Or is it that light in real life? He only left this morning and the image of him in my mind is already beginning to fade. I do hope he returns soon.

1915. May.

I awoke this morning to a letter from Elias, it was short and sweet and didn't seem like the Elias I love and know so well. The letter read:

Dear Evelyn,

I do hope you are well. I think about you every day and will continue to do so. Life in France is not as we talked about, nor is the war.

I will one day return to you and you will tell me about everything I have missed.

Your own, Elias Reimer.

Where are the jokes about Sir Barnaby of the main grounds with his large nose and strange glasses?

A smile tugs at my lips as I think about the time we were caught whilst exploring the forest of Sir Barnaby's manor. He claimed we were poaching for his deer on his land when really, we were simply picking berries. Elias was telling me everything he knew about mushrooms and berries such as what is safe to pick and eat, what isn't, what tastes good and what does not.

The forest was so beautiful that day. "Almost as beautiful as you Miss Brae" I recall Elias saying to me with a royal bow and a chuckle.

Somewhere in the distance you could hear the faint sound of a stream trickling through the undergrowth. Under our feet, the sound of breaking branches on the forest floor was present but all around us the sound of the forest living and breathing was unmistakably taking centre stage.

Birds chirped as they swooped between trees, frogs from the stream croaked, the light wind rustled the leaves in the trees. Days like those really do make you appreciate nature and the life around you.

Elias' hand in mine, the smoothness of his forever warm skin against mine. Life was truly perfect.

1915. August.