Outlaws - An American Youth - [Charles Smith x OC]

Chapter 12 - Heartache

The first rays of the sun made the dew covering the meadow shine. In the past, this valley must have been a haven for a few peaceful farmers families. But one day, chaos came uninvited. From that moment, the only trace of humanity left were those ruins. Leaning against one of the few remaining walls, Arthur handed me a cigarette.

"Bad business eh?

- How can things go that far?"

He said nothing, only blowing his smoke slowly into the air. What feeling could these young hearts have seized when the sun rose on these lands, thirty years earlier? Terror. Resignation, surely. The assault was given on a morning like this. A few moments earlier, the sun's rays had passed through the trees, flooding the valley with incomparable softness. A last glimpse of comfort for these men before they encountered their tragic fate.

Trenches covered with sandbags. Old carts. Abandoned cannons. But no more human evidence. Not the slightest bit of fabric that can testify of their passage on earth. I thought about my father. He was only 18 when this war started, and yet he found himself on the front line. None of them had asked to be there. Most were still children, helpless toys of the powerful. Now the birds were singing, the flowers were growing. Slowly, the vegetation was beginning to engulf these long-deserted places.

Thirty years had passed. And yet the crows still whistled their dismal laments.

"I've seen enough. Let's go back."

----

The camp was silent that evening. Not a heavy or sad kind of silence. It was just... quiet. Sitting by the fire, I watched the flames dancing, the images of the battlefield still in the back of my mind. To forget them, I started to sing for myself, not paying any attention to who could hear me. ♫

"My old man is a bad man

But I can't deny the way he holds my hand

And he grabs me, he has me by my heart"

A voice soon joined me. "Gimme them gold coins". Karen had approached and obviously knew this song. We exchanged a smile as I got up to move to the rhythm of our voices. Alcohol totally inhibited me.

"I'm not afraid to say

That I'd die without him

Who else is gonna put up with me this way?

I need you, I breathe you, I'll never leave you

They would rue the day, I was alone without you"

"Anna, I wish you were a boy, you are more amusing than all these killjoys combined!

- If I were a boy, I would marry you and buy you a house. But I'm just a girl, I can only offer you my bottle of whiskey.

- I take it!"

I laughed and handed her the drink. She was really an amazing girl. Too bad she didn't get the love she deserved. Stupid Sean, if he had been less foolish, they might have had a chance.

The pretty blonde sat by the fire, carefully holding the liquor against her.

"Sing me another song! The Italian one!

- No, it's too sad

- Sing it anyway"

I took a deep breath, hesitating to comply. I knew all the sadness this song could bring us. If I learned the previous song with the girls in the saloon, this one came from my mother. A legacy of her Italian American family. ♫

"[...]

Catch me if you can

Dying by the hand

Of a foreign man

Happily

Ciao Amore"

I opened my eyes, closed throughout the song. Karen was crying. Lenny kept his head low. I sat down and grabbed a bottle. After long minutes of heavy silence, I decided to speak.

"I had a fiancé in Valentine. Jimmy. A nice boy, always smiling. Oh, fiancé, that's a big word. It was no more than a secret love affair, you remember what it's like to be a teenager, everything takes on crazy proportions. We met in secret, taking advantage of any free moment to discover a little more of the other. But after a bad winter, an illness took him. After that, I established my neighbor's rule. It's easier. It avoids getting attached.

But in the end, I think the hardest part was not knowing what would have happened if he had stayed alive. The odds of getting married were really slim. His family would surely have been against it, I was too original for their son. They would have found him a more suitable wife. Maybe even one of my own sisters. I would have been heartbroken. Not that I was deeply in love, I liked him, that's all. But it would have confirmed that I was not the kind of girl we marry. That I just wasn't good enough..."

Karen nodded, tears silently running down her cheeks. If our experience had been different, I believe that our feelings were the same. What if they weren't dead? Would have they fought for us? Could our destiny have been different? We continued to drink in silence, letting ourselves be carried away by the emptiness of the night.

----

Sadness was still holding my heart when I woke up. As I was doing my chores, I felt a look on me. Dutch was watching me from his balcony. Smiling, he gestured for me to join him. I had no idea what that smile was hiding...

---

I feel Karen & Anna would have been the kind of girl to spend a lot of time doing each other make-up, drinking and dancing, making up choreography for tik tok.

My chapters are getting smaller and smaller! But that was the last of what I called the "connecting chapter", next one should be longer and with a bit more drama.