𝙷𝙱𝙾 𝚆𝚊𝚛 𝙸𝚖𝚊𝚐𝚒𝚗𝚎𝚜

Talking Through Walls | Lew Juergens

i started The Pacific like last week and i just finished it today (17 may 2020, at the time i'm writing this) and hoLY fucking shit why do i keep falling in love with so many fictional characters? i mean just look at chuckler's smile. what a sweet boi. cute smile. side note, why iS hE sO friCKEN TALL. lanky boi has a cute smile and is so adorable. i tried imagining an "enemies to lovers" trope with him, but like i could not come up with anything, boi is too lovable.

Warning: mentions of PTSD (more commonly known as shell-shock back then). prompt found on a tumblr post. post WW II au. chuckler is adorable and needs love. that is my psa. gender neutral reader. soft angst.

~~~

Neighbors were always an interesting topic for you. You had moved in and out of apartments all over, trying to find the place you felt at home. It was always entertaining to see what sort of neighbors you'd have every time you moved in to a new apartment building. You'd had your fair share of annoying, quiet, downright weird (neighbors or people, the list applied to both, you thought); the list could go on.

This time, someone new moved in while you had made your home in your current apartment. He came in looking tired and worn, as if he'd seen horrors he couldn't explain with words. It didn't take a genius to figure out he was a soldier who fought in the war.

You had met him when you came home from your job at the phone company one day. He was just settling in, a couple boxes sitting right outside his open front door. He stepped out as you were turning the doorknob, greeting you with a cheerful smile. But you saw through it; you saw the way he carried himself, the way he limped a bit when he walked, the way his eyes looked like there was a storm brewing in them.

You could work with angry people. You could work with quiet people. You could work with drunk people. But this man...

This was a broken man, and you had no idea how to work with one.

You returned his smile though, and introduced yourself, helping him settle in and offering your help if he ever needed it.

"I'm Lewis. Most call me Lew. Nice to meet you." he replied, shaking your hand. He had a cute smile, you thought. "And thank you for helping me out."

"It's the least I could do for a new neighbor."

Other than that meeting, you and Lew didn't talk much. He went out for most of the day, and usually came home after you did. You never asked him about it, he didn't ask you to talk to him about it, so you let him be. You often wondered how he coped with all those memories and all the pain, though. Bottling it all in and drinking your sorrows away was not a healthy way of coping.

~~~

About three months had passed since Lew moved in. You had bumped into him a few more times, offering him a smile or a small wave. He always returned them, a soft smile on his face. But nothing more happened between the two of you.

Not until one night. You had gotten home to hear Lew moving about in his apartment, thinking nothing much of it. Sure, it was a little change in routine, but certainly nothing to raise concern about.

Or so you thought. You had just laid down in bed when you heard a "No." being repeated on the other side of your wall.

"No. Stop. Let 'em go! Make 'em stop! Stop!" your neighbor cried.

You sighed, a sad smile on your face. That poor boy. Lew was probably around his 20's. Young men everywhere, just like him, gone off to fight in the war. And they come back like this, all bruised and broken on the outside, and shattered to a million pieces on the inside. They go in as themselves, but they don't come out the same.