Winfred

81

Official Report

British Intelligence

Code: 3986

Kathleen Winfred

Although sleep was my request for Freidrich, I found it elusive that night in regards to myself. I lay in bed, staring at the ceiling.

The room was pitch dark, due to the new blackout shades, designed to not allow the escape of light that could provide a target for enemy bombers.

I mentally chided myself. The bombers were British. (Or American, but they are members of an alliance so I suppose it does not matter.) They were not “enemies”. They were my countrymen.

I turned over, facing the wall and bringing the blankets up to my chin.

I felt confused.

Was I forgetting where I really belonged?

I was helping the allies…Freidrich arranged it so that I periodically sent coded messages to my home country.

But I had started having thoughts that seemed almost…unpatriotic. I hated the air raids, and sat in the basement wishing it would all be over, when it was my countrymen doing the air raids, trying to gain headway in the war. Who was I identifying with then?

And what about Freidrich?

I liked Freidrich. The more I saw him…The more I talked with him…The more time I simply spent in the same room as him…The more drawn to him I felt. I admitted it to myself, there in bed that night. I was in love, and being in love was a foreign feeling to me. I almost felt as though I didn’t know what to do. And did Freidrich indeed feel the same way about me? Or were his feelings not as strong as mine?

I found myself a spy, able to speak two languages and fool German commanders, able to be trusted to go into town and collect the mail, able to be away from my homeland and still be alright, even when I was surrounded with people who, mostly, had no personal interest in my wellbeing or thriving. And yet, I had come up against a puzzle I could not work out…a puzzle that I looked at this way and that and yet still could not figure out.

I had been trained to expect anything in my job as a spy.

But I had not been trained for this.

I hugged my extra pillow to my chest and sighed heavily.

At that moment, I missed my old life a bit. I missed the surety of waking up and being confident in where I stood as a member of the WAAF. There was none of this confusion, none of this questioning.

But, as I thought about it, I realized I wouldn’t have had it any other way.

I finally fell asleep.