Missing in Action

Chapter Forty Two

Missing in Action

Chapter Forty Two

Louis' P.O.V

I worked silently. The only sound that filled the house was the clack of the dishes that I was drying being placed back where they came from and the constant breathing of the people in the living room.

We were all in Jane's house because my mum was worried about her.

The officer who had been watching the phone lines had gone home yesterday saying that someone would come and replace him today, but it was three o'clock, and they hadn't shown up yet.

It had been very weird. He had taken a phone call- during which he said very little- and then he had looked very saddened. He hadn't seemed to be that focused when he told us he was leaving either.

I sighed as I placed the last dish into the cupboard and closed the cupboard door.

Cassidy's week was up yesterday, but we hadn't heard anything. I wouldn't let myself have hope that it meant that they had her back. I knew it didn't.

I stroked the back of the wooden welsh dragon that rested on the side.

"She loved that," a voice said behind me.

I turned to find Jane in the doorway looking like she was unsure about entering her own kitchen.

I smiled weakly at her and she walked into the room.

She was thin and her eyes were constantly red. She wasn't eating properly.

I wanted to hate her fully, but I couldn't do it. Part of her still loved Cassidy.

"She loved anything that had meaning," I replied.

It came out more bitter than I had intended and Jane looked hurt.

"I'm sorry Louis," she said.

"For what?" I asked.

She gave me a pointed look. When she did that, she looked exactly like Cassidy did. Cassidy always had been the image of her mother, but she had her father's heart.

"For whatever it was that I did to upset you so badly," she said.

I felt the anger rise up in me.

"I'm the wrong person to be saying sorry to," I told her.

I put the towel back where it belonged and pushed past Jane to exit the kitchen.

I walked out into the back garden and into the summer house which was in the bottom corner. It was blue and pink like it had been since Cassidy and I painted it one summer.

I opened the door and walked inside. It still smelt of fresh wood and a summer passed long ago.

There was a table in the middle of the single room, and the ceiling was quite high up so I could still stand in it. Four chairs surrounded the table. Some pictures hung up on the wall.

We used to sit in here a lot and just talk. It was our space because Cassidy's brothers didn't like staying out here.

Summer just wasn't the same anymore.

I traced my hand over the table. It was battered by all of the homework, people, grief, happiness and pain that had been dumped on it over the years. So many memories surrounded it. So many of those would die along with Cassidy.

I looked over at one of the pictures on the wooden wall. It was a photo of Cassidy's family in France before Cassidy joined the navy. Admiral Sheffield was right about pictures containing ghosts.