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theboredwritertm · 4 years ago

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Turn Into the Noise - Nixon

Summary: In 1942, a female soldier, Alice Crowley, joined the ranks of Easy Company at Camp Toccoa. Nixon tries to cope with his growing feelings for the woman throughout the war, but is forced to deal with her budding relationship with Spiers.

Warnings: brief mentions of assault, descriptions of a concentration camp, alcohol abuse.

A/N: This is part of a series I’ve been writing on and off for about...geez, maybe 4 or 5 years now. I had planned on waiting until I was finished writing all of the chapters to post them, since I wanted them read in a specific order (they’re written by character, rather than in chronological order, with each chapter being about the relationship between the chosen character and my OC). I realized I might never get a chance to finish it all the way I want, but I’ve always been happy with this chapter - it’s also the only one I’ve managed to finish. This is the first time I’ve posted any writing on tumblr, too! There are some jokes/references that will make more sense once the other chapters are posted.

Words: 16 820 (it’s a long one)

Pairing: Speirs x OFC, Nixon x OFC

***

I was three days in on a drunken sin

I didn’t much care how long I lived

But I swear I thought I dreamed her

She never asked me once about the wrong I did

- (The Work Song, Hozier)

7th May, 1945

Berchtesgaden, Germany _________________

They sat out on the terrace with bottles of expensive champagne, celebrating a victory that had been a long-time in the making, and after spending the better part of three years playing their own parts in achieving it, the spoils they now reaped were all the sweeter.

Nixon lay back on one of the chaise lounges, his arms resting behind his head as he took in the stunning views around them. On the next chaise over, Harry Welsh grinned as he chugged from his bottle of champagne, embracing the joy of the moment, thoroughly drunk. He glanced over at the man seated at the end of the lounge by his feet. Speirs had barely taken his eyes off Alice since Winters had announced the German army’s surrender. The lieutenant herself was staring out across the vast, mountainous landscape, deep in thought.

“You two set a date yet?” Harry asked them, hiccuping as he glanced between the pair. He thought of the girl waiting for him back home and set his bottle down on the table beside him. He hadn’t thought he could feel any happier than he already did, but recalling the glowing face of his beautiful fiancee the last time he had made love to her gave him a surge of joy he had forgotten was possible.

“Yeah, June 6th,” Alice deadpanned, turning back to them, glancing first at Nixon. He stared ahead with a grin, shaking his head.

Laughing more than the joke merited in his drunken state, Harry reached once more for his alcohol and sent the bottle crashing to the marble below. “Oops,” he said, laughing all the more.

From his position by the balustrade, Winters tried his best to throw the man a disapproving look, but his small, signature smile gave him away. This was one of the happiest days of their young lives – knowing that the long years of training and fighting – the pain they had endured, the friends they had lost – it was all somehow worth it.

Harry reached for the bottle in Speirs’s hand and the captain held it out of his reach. “Get your own.” He looked up as he felt the bottle pulled from his grip regardless, and watched his bride-to-be take a long drink of the golden liquid. She smirked as she drank, and tipped him wink, reveling in the smile that her small rebellion had managed to draw from him; his wild, brown eyes still filled with a lust they had yet to sate.

Though even the privates had managed to find time to bed the local women, fortune had never smiled on the two officers. They had either been too busy leading the men, planning and executing orders, or simply finding time somewhere in between for the most basic of needs, like eating, showering and sleeping. Not to mention keeping their relationship under tight wraps – fraternization was a punishable offence, and there was no question that either one of them, or both, would have been sent home if anything had gotten back to the colonel.

It hadn’t been too hard to hide – Lieutenant Crowley treated all the men the same, never showing favoritism, even when rank was involved. She had always held onto the belief that respect was something to be earned, not forcibly given, and her time at Toccoa with Captain Sobel had only strengthened that belief. She cared for every single one of the men she had served with – Speirs just happened to be the one she wanted to spend the rest of her life with.

She frowned to herself now as she found her beverage depleted, upending the bottle just to be sure. Catching the original owner’s look of annoyance, she placed a hand on his shoulder and grinned.

“There’s plenty more,” she reassured him. Her fingers brushed against his neck briefly as she passed by and he smiled once more. “Anyone else while I’m up?” She looked to Winters, who shook his head.

“I- Um, me. Please,” Harry requested, but she shot him a look.

“I think you’ve had enough, Welshy.”

“What?” he attempted to argue.

She glanced down at the shattered remains of his last bottle. “You’ll thank me in the morning.”

“I don’t think I’ll be the one thanking you in the morning,” he chuckled to himself, seemingly proud of his little joke. He looked over at Speirs and the laughter died from his face as he caught the dark glint in the captain’s eyes. He had to be drunk to make a comment so suggestive. Hiccupping again, he looked back at Alice and found she wore an almost identical expression.

“I’m gonna let that one slide, given the circumstances,” she told him, and he seemed grateful for the gesture, knowing her reputation well, “But thank-you for proving my point.” She stopped by the last person in line. “Nix?”

He shielded his eyes and squinted up at her. “Mm?”

“You want anything?”

He caught the little crease that appeared between her brows as he stared at her, taking too long to answer.

“You know what? I think I’ll come take a look with you,” he smiled, getting to his feet. “You always did make volunteering for things look like fun.”

Speirs turned to shoot her a subtle look and Alice gave a reassuring little smile. He was worried. She didn’t blame him after what had happened the last time she and Lewis Nixon had found themselves alone together.

“Where we headin’, Crow?”

Alice turned to give her helper an odd look as they walked through the living room of Hitler’s favorite retreat. Nixon had never once called her by her company nickname. It was the only sign he had given that he was even remotely drunk.

“What?” he asked with a playful grin, but she just shook her head.

“Kitchen. I think I saw some bottles in there.”

“God, I wish I’d taken you to see Goering’s wine cellar.”

“Why’s that?”

“I could have used the extra pair of hands.”

She chuckled. “I never took you for the looting type.

“I wasn’t looting,” he replied, with a teasing frown, “I was liberating the bottles from their shelves.”

She threw him a disapproving look for his choice of words, and paused to survey the surrounding cabinets and the pantry at the rear. Most of it had been picked clean by the other soldiers as they had made themselves at home in the place; but the alcohol was making her hungry, and the effect of the beverage was hitting her much harder than usual for the same reason.

“You hungry?” she asked.

“Why? You gonna whip me something up?”

“Yeah, well now that the war’s over, I thought I’d better put myself back in my place.”

He laughed and watched her pull open a cupboard door.

“Goddammit. Beans! I’m sick to death of fucking beans!”

She slammed the cupboard door closed.

“You know, I heard someone say Hitler was a vegetarian,” Nixon told her.

“No shit?”

“Yeah. He didn’t smoke or drink, either.”

“Christ, no wonder he started a war. Too much time on his hands.”

He chuckled. “Explains how I keep so busy.”

While Alice continued her search, Nixon grabbed a few of the bottles that sat grouped on the counter. When he turned back, he found her leaning against the opposite counter looking thoughtful.

“Hey, Nix?”

His eyebrow quirked up as he approached her.

“Yeah?”

“Say you were to get a certain…invitation. In the mail.”

“Mm?” he teased, knowing exactly where she was going before she even asked. He leaned back on the counter beside her and watched with a small smile as she struggled to find the right way to ask.

“Would you come to the wedding?”

“Depends whose it is,” he joked, his smile widening to a grin when she rolled her eyes. “Sounds mighty mysterious to me.” Then she turned her gaze back to him and he felt the same uncomfortable flip in his stomach he had gotten the night he had landed himself in trouble with her. He had thought the feeling had gone away – but it was proving to be like a cancer; coming back just as it seemed to be cured. He caught her eyebrow twitch and realized she was still waiting for an answer. “Of course I would come.”

She smiled, looking almost relieved. “Good. That’s…that’s good. I’m glad.”

And he knew it wasn’t just about the wedding. It was her relief in knowing things were okay between them. He had been one of the first people to welcome her at Toccoa; the first to make her feel welcome. He had been the one stupid enough to put that friendship on the line, yet here she was making the effort to make things right.

“You might have some trouble during the ‘Speak now, or forever hold your peace’ part, though,” he joked, wondering just how much he actually meant it. “Are you sure you want me there?”

“No, I just thought I’d send out a bunch of invitations to people I don’t want there. You, Sobel, Dike…”

He let out a good laugh at that and she screwed up her face.

“God, it doesn’t feel right putting you on a list with those men.”

They smiled at each other, then her gaze shot to the doorway where Speirs was standing, and some of the humor died from her face. Every time he looked at her when she was in Lewis Nixon’s company, she felt as if she had been caught with her hand in the proverbial cookie jar.

“Get what you need?” he asked her, glancing briefly at Nixon.

“We were just on our way back.” She plucked a bottle of champagne from Nixon’s hand and tossed it to him. Even in his semi-drunken state, the captain managed to catch it – just. “I believe I owed you half a bottle.”

“This is a full bottle,” Speirs pointed out, with a smile Nixon found odd, but Alice had come to find endearing; it was just another of the man’s many quirks that she had grown to love.

“So just drink half,” she replied with a crooked grin.

Smiling to himself, his mind swallowed up with thoughts like crashing waves, Nixon suddenly realized why Speirs had come to check on them. He had always found it amusing how possessive the man became when Alice was around him – and it was only ever when she was around him; Nixon had never seen the captain act that way when she was around the other men of Easy Company. To him it almost suggested that there really was something dangerous between them. Maybe Speirs sensed some competition. But there really was no competition – Alice had made that very clear to him on that fateful night. He hated to think about what he had done to her, almost as much as he hated to think back to what he still considered to be the single worst week of his life. He had made it through D-Day, had shivered his way through the snowy forests of Bastogne; still, nothing compared to that one day back in Landsberg, when all the events of that week had culminated into one stupid decision that had nearly cost him the friendship of a good woman.

***

25th April ,1945

Heidelberg, Germany _________

“Hey, you’re back!”

Normally, hearing her voice and seeing that sly grin would have lifted his spirits; but as he stepped out of the building Winters had designated Battalion HQ, Nixon couldn’t even muster up a smile. She climbed the stairs, pausing on the step just below him to take a seat on the slanting concrete balustrade, arms folded across her chest.

“How was the jump?” she asked, her voice a little softer now as her piercing green eyes searched his, sensing his mood.

He was silent for a moment, then shook his head. She nodded, reading his answer loud and clear.

“You want coffee?”

He gave a soft snort and finally a small smile appeared. “Yeah. Coffee sounds good.” The words felt forced. He would have loved even more to get blind drunk and pass out in his bed, but just couldn’t find it in him to turn down a drink in her company.

Moments later, he was seated out the front of the building that was serving as the company supply store, staring at the surrounding ruins of bombed-out buildings. He heard the distinct voices of George Luz and Alice as they argued over something trivial, the dispute peppered with occasional bouts of laughter. When she finally returned, Alice was smiling and shaking her head, a steaming metal cup in each hand. She passed one to him and sat down beside him. Taking a sip, he glanced down at the contents as an odd taste hit his tongue.

“What’s in this?”

She glanced over, fighting back a smirk. “A pinch of love, a dash of devotion...”

“Ah, that’s why I didn’t recognize it. Two ingredients my wife’s never used.”

“I’ll pass on the recipe.”

He chuckled and met her gaze, holding it for a moment as all thoughts of the woman back home melted away.

“I made yours Irish,” she finally explained, “You look like hell, Nix. What happened?”

His smile fell away and he stared out at the rubble once more. He looked as if he had aged years, despite having only been in combat for several months; his once handsome face now pale and drawn, a stark contrast against his dark hair and brows. Alice recognized the signs of battle fatigue when she saw them, having witnessed it many times in the freezing cold Hell of Bastogne: the listlessness, the irritability, the vacant stares, and the dark circles around once playful eyes.

“Plane went down. I made it out with two other men. That’s it. Now, it’s up to me to write letters to all mothers of the men who didn’t make it off. Make it sound like their deaths were worth it, somehow.”

“Isn’t that their CO’s job?”

He simply shook his head. The CO hadn’t made it either.

“Shit.”

“Yeah. Pretty much. Oh, plus I’ve just been told I’ve been demoted, so there’s that.”

He took a long sip of his coffee, not caring that it scalded his throat on the way down, desperate to work the added alcohol into his system.

She had a pretty good idea why he had received such a harsh penalty, and suddenly felt guilty for adding the whiskey to his drink. “Shit, I’m sorry, Lew.”

He glanced over at her and managed a small smile. It was oddly refreshing to hear a woman cuss the way she did. He had become so accustomed to the ‘proper’ women his mother and father invited around for their dinner parties, and their high teas, and their little meetings for whichever new club or association they happened to have joined. The women who wore their hair in the latest styles, dressed in the finest clothes with their little matching purses and shoes. Women who gossiped about women who dressed the same way they did and went to the same meetings and events they did, but somehow managed to find themselves ostracized for one imagined faux pas or another. And then there was Katherine. He felt the bile rise in his throat as he thought of the woman he had married. Straight out of college, they had fallen into bed and then quickly into what they had believed was a loving relationship. Looking back, he wasn’t sure if love had ever been there to begin with.

“Really hasn’t been your week.”

“No,” he replied bitterly, “That it has not.”

They sat in silence for a moment. Alice had never been good at knowing the right thing to say, and though she held a lot of love for the man beside her, she couldn’t think of an appropriate way to voice it. It had taken her a long time to work out her feelings towards him, mistaking them at first for genuine adoration; she enjoyed his company, she cared about him immensely, and she knew if it came down to it, she would take a bullet for him – but then that went for every man in her company. The biggest difference, as she had come to find, was the attraction. Even now, sitting next to him, knowing what he had been through, knowing that he was married, she felt the urge to comfort him in a more physical way. She drove the thought from her mind.

It wasn’t until the following day, when Nixon received his long-expected ‘Dear John’ letter, that Alice witnessed him let loose an unbridled tirade of frustration. She had never seen such a raw display of emotion from the man, and the look of concern from his best friend – Major Winters – only drove home just how deep Nixon’s problems went.

It wasn’t long after that they bundled into their jeeps and troop carriers, and drove on to their next destination along the Rhine. Alice stood at the rear of her own vehicle, half-tuned in to the conversations going on between the men behind her, the other half of her focused on the car behind them that carried Winters, Nixon and Speirs. Speirs had offered her the seat next to him, but she had declined, opting to travel with the rest of the troops, where she had always felt most comfortable. Looking back at them now, she noticed Nixon’s gaze was unfocused, his expression blank. She glanced over at Speirs and he smiled at her. She returned the gesture as best she could and then turned away, running her fingers back through her hair with a sigh before replacing her helmet.

“I’m gonna find me a nice Jewish girl,” Liebgott was saying, “with great big, soft titties and a smile to die for, marry her, then I’m gonna buy a house. A big house with lots of bedrooms for all the little Liebgott’s we’re gonna be making. She oughta like that. Hey, lieutenant, it’s a shame you’re not Jewish.”

“Yeah, I’m missin’ out big time,” Alice joked absentmindedly, her brow still marked with a troubled frown. A few of the men chuckled, Liebgott included, but having known her since Camp Toccoa, he knew when something was awry.

“Hey, Al,” came Luz’s voice now, full of mischief, “Get this, right? Janovec here’s readin’ an article says the Germans are bad. Can you believe that?” He grinned at her expectantly, waiting for the witty retort she never failed to provide.

The lieutenant threw them a look of mock-concern. “Gee, Janovec, I think you oughta tell Eisenhower. You might be onto something there.”

Luz laughed and gave the private beside him and playful whack, but seated across from him, Liebgott still hadn’t lost his look of unease.

“Whatta you got planned for when you get back, lieutenant?” he asked her, hoping to distract her from whatever thoughts were bogging her down.

Her eyes flicked over to him and she considered the question. “You mean if I make it back.”

“That’s just Speirs talking,” Webster remarked with a grin. She looked to him, smirked, and cocked an eyebrow, before considering Liebgott’s question some more. Of course, she knew very well what she would be doing, but she wasn’t in a place to reveal that information just yet.

“You know me, Lieb, I never have a plan. I make it up as I go.”

He smiled at the reply, but others weren’t so satisfied with the response.

“You mean you’re not gonna marry– ”

“Who, Janovec?” she cut him off quickly, her expression suddenly severe. One look at her sharp eyes and the private swallowed the rest of the question and dropped his gaze.

“No one, ma’am.”

The men who knew her best exchanged looks, struggling to hold back smirks, and she looked around at them, her look of warning softening. She turned back to the jeep. Speirs was observing the surrounding landscape and Winters was reading through some papers with his usual look of steady focus, but Nixon had finally managed to shift his gaze to meet hers. It still held that vacant quality from earlier, but underneath that she could see the turmoil he was going through, and the contrast from his usual jovial self was painful to witness.

She found him later, in a rare moment of free time as the division settled into the town of Buchloe for the night, not far from their intended destination.

“You can always get another dog, Nix.”

He chuckled, but it was tinged with a hollow bitterness. Sitting beside him, allowing him a minute to gather his thoughts, Alice put a hand on the back of his neck and massaged gently – an instinctual gesture to comfort someone in pain. As she rolled her thumb in small circles, working her way into his tight tendons, Nixon dropped his head forward and hummed.

“This is the worst it’s gonna feel, the day you receive the news. It’ll get better from here. I promise.”

She spoke as if from experience, and since he knew she had never been married or divorced – as the intelligence officer, he was privy to a lot of information, especially when he sought it out directly – he wondered what pain she had gone through that could allow her to relate. Then he remembered: her baby brother. God, he couldn’t believe he had forgotten about that – he had even been the one to summon her to Winters’ office. He didn’t think he had ever admired her more than when he had read that letter from her mother; knowing that she had been sitting on that loss for such a long time without ever saying a word.

“Until I have to go back home to the bitch,” he replied now, pushing the thought from his mind.

He watched her stick two cigarettes in her mouth and light them.

“So, don’t go back,” she suggested, holding one of the smokes out to Speirs as he passed by on his way into the building behind them, where Winters had made himself at home. The captain took it as if he had been expecting it, then kept walking without saying a word. She held out the second one to the man beside her, but he shook his head. He had noticed the way her hand had fallen to his shoulder as the other man approached, reducing the gesture to something less intimate.

“Germany’s not so bad,” she went on, “You know, once you get used to the fascism.”

She felt his body vibrate with laughter and he turned to give her the first genuine smile she’d seen from him in a while.

“Yeah, you’re right. It is a pretty little place. I guess I could stay. But only if you stay with me.”

She met his gaze and the humor-disguised proposition hung awkwardly between them. His smile fell away, and for the first time she felt the true extent of the feelings that had been forming between them over the past two years. Just as she opened her mouth to reply, Speirs returned. She looked up at him. He gave the slightest jerk of his head and the lieutenant was on her feet.

“Well, duty calls,” she said, “Look after yourself, okay?”

Nixon didn’t answer, staring blankly ahead and only came out of his trance when she clapped him lightly on the shoulder. He looked up, gave a very unconvincing nod, and then watched her walk away with the man he knew she was in love with. What hurt more was knowing Speirs felt the same way about her.

28th April, 1945

Landsberg, Germany ____________

“Alright, two bucks.”

Alice watched as her captain tossed a couple of notes into the middle of the table. Frowning at his optimism, she attempted to sneak a peek at his cards and couldn’t help but laugh as he jerked them away and threw her a disapproving look.

“Are you in or what?” Speirs asked her, gesturing to the pot, “Or too busy cheating?”

“Christ,” she laughed at his harsh words, “Here.” She smacked two bills down and leaned back in her chair, taking a long drag of her cigarette. It was a cozy little setting, drinks served all around and a fire crackling merrily just behind them. It was the most comfortable they had been since they’d left Aldbourne, what felt like another lifetime ago. Somehow, out of all the countries they had been to, it was the homeland of their enemy that felt the most hospitable.

To her left, she watched as Nixon made to pour himself a new glass of his beloved Vat 69 only to find the bottle empty. To his left sat Carwood Lipton, then their final player, Harry Welsh. The men stared at the boozy captain, waiting for his bet. He sighed and tossed down his cards.

“I’m out.”

Whether he meant out of the game, or out of his favorite beverage, Alice wasn’t sure. Nixon rose noisily from his seat and looked around for another bottle, wandering into the adjoining room when he failed to locate one. Alice watched Speirs’s face turn stony at his fellow captain’s behavior. Unlike the three other men, he and Alice had opted for coffee on the off chance they were suddenly called back into combat. It seemed highly unlikely at this point, but it was in the man’s nature to be practical like that, and she had followed his example. He caught her gaze but didn’t say a word.

“Alright,” Lipton said, tossing in his own money, “I’ll call your two and raise you another two.”

“Geez, get a little alcohol into this guy and he takes no prisoners,” Alice joked, “Kinda like you, Ron.”

“Are we still talking about that?” Speirs replied.

She threw him a smirk and he stared back, the corner of his mouth twitching upwards.

Lipton smiled at the reference in that good-natured way of his, but the moment was interrupted as a loud clang sounded from next door. They turned their heads, but were quickly drawn back into the conversation, trying their best to ignore their friend’s frantic behavior as he continued his hunt for more alcohol.

“I can’t believe we’re not jumping into Berlin,” Harry mused, with a cigarette hanging from his mouth.

“No shit,” came Lipton’s reply.

Tuning out for a moment, Alice turned in her seat to check on Nixon, hearing a strained ‘Goddamn it’ as he crouched in front of Major Winters’ trunk. Her expression grew heavy with concern. They had all ignored his habit at first. They were in the middle of a war, witnessing and playing hand to horrific things on a daily basis – it seemed like a reasonable way to take the edge off the day. Then it became so that she rarely saw him without that familiar silver flask in his hand. More recently, after his third jump into occupied territory, the toll his addiction was taking on him had become all too obvious. As the battalion’s intelligence officer, it went without saying that he needed a clear mind to relay the important information and any new orders they were given; a single incorrect piece of information could mean the difference between life and death for hundreds of men.

“This war’s not about fighting anymore,” she heard Speirs saying, “It’s about who gets what.”

“Like finders keepers?” she said as she turned back, recalling the brazen way he had stripped almost every house of its valuables from the moment they had stepped into Germany.

He smiled and looked at her with the dangerous glint in his eye that the men seemed to find terrifying, but that she found alluring. “Yeah. Like finders keepers.”

Nixon appeared from the bedroom and grabbed his jacket from the back of his chair, looking forlorn.

“Deal me out of the next hand,” he said before walking towards the front door. Alice stared after him, frowning, then lapsed into thought.

“What about your money?” Harry called after him, but the only reply he received was the sound of the door slamming as the captain stepped out into the cold, wet night. Harry sighed. “Are we waiting on him again?”

Lipton nodded, answering in the affirmative, when Alice was struck by a sudden recollection.

“Oh, shit!”

The three men looked at her, slightly taken aback by the outburst. They still hadn’t gotten used to the sound of a woman cursing, though Speirs knew he’d likely have a lifetime to do so.

“I just remembered something,” she told them, pushing back her seat and tossing her cards face-down on the table, “I’ll be back in a sec.”

“Now we’re waiting on her, too. Great,” Harry sighed, “Anyone else have somewhere they need to be?”

“Patience is a virtue, Harry,” they heard her call back as she moved down the hall towards the exit, and the two remaining lieutenants laughed. Speirs’ face was still, however, as he silently watched her exit the building.

It was pouring rain outside, and the sudden burst of cold brought back memories of the hell that was Bastogne. Alice paused at the top of the steps, allowing a moment to bring herself back to the present, then turned onto the street below. She caught sight of a familiar figure.

“Nix! Hey, Nix!” she called, in a voice that had the ability to reach across an active battlefield.

He turned towards her, drenched from head to toe, looking utterly lost.

“What the hell are you doing out here?” he asked her, catching the way she shivered. He strode over to her and led her over to an undercover area.

“I’ve got something for you,” she explained, voice raised to compete against the torrential weather.

“What do you- ” he began to ask. She gestured for him to follow, and they came to the building he knew she was staying in. The confused frown he had worn since she had first appeared on the street only deepened as they stepped into her room. In his drunken state, he was having trouble thinking of anything other than where he hoped this odd encounter was going. He glanced over at her bed, thoughtfully.

With a swipe of her hand, Alice shoved the discarded items of clothing and small stack of books off the top of her trunk, and opened the lid with a loud creak that brought Nixon back to reality. He heard her make a pleased sound and she got back to her feet.

“Here.” She held out a new bottle of his beloved drink. He just stared at it.

“How did you…?”

“I talked Winters into letting me take one. I thought something like this would happen one day.”

“Something like what?”

“That you’d run out.” She cocked an eyebrow and he couldn’t help but wonder just how badly he’d been behaving in the absence of his booze.

“You did that for me?”

“Well, more for the benefit of everyone else, really.”

He chuckled and stepped towards her, completely ignoring the bottle he had been so desperate to find.

“God, I think I love you.”

The smile seemed to melt from her face, replaced with confusion as he wrapped his arms around her waist and mashed his lips against hers. There was a split second of indecision where she almost considered giving in to her long-growing attraction – to risk the love of a good man for a moment of self-indulgence with another; then the odor of the alcohol and the stale smell of his sweat hit her and she was brought back to her senses, struggling to free herself from his grip.

But he wouldn’t let go.

It was only when her fist connected with his jaw and he was stumbling backwards that he realized what he had done. The look on her face, the mix of confusion, betrayal and regret, was something he had never forgotten. He looked down at her hand as she flexed her fingers and tested the pain in her knuckles. She was probably going to bruise. Rubbing the spot on his jaw, he thought that he probably would too, but he didn’t care. Nothing in that moment hurt more than knowing she might never look at him the same way ever again.

“Ron and I are engaged.”

The statement was a rude slap that shocked him awake better than a cold shower ever could have.

“When the hell did that happen?”

Trying her best to ignore the sharp edge in his voice, she said, “He asked a couple of days ago, and I-”

“And you said ‘yes’,” he finished for her, with a bitterness that made her blood boil. “So you’ve been engaged this whole time? Comforting me, telling me things are going to be okay, meanwhile you’ve promised yourself to that fucking lunatic?”

When he glanced up to meet her gaze, all resentment and anger fell away. He had never understood how the other men could fear this woman – she was always so quick to smile, easy to laugh and one of the most selfless people he had ever come across. But as she stood before him now, he saw not the warm and accepting Alice he had come to love, but Lieutenant Crowley of Easy Company; the cold, ruthless battlefield commander. And all at once he understood that fear.

“I’m sorry your wife’s divorcing you. I’m sorry you got demoted. And I’m sorry you lost all those men on your last jump. But if you ever lay your hands on me like that again, I will knock your fucking teeth out. Do you understand me?” She spoke in a hushed tone that only managed to intensify everything she said.

A flush crept into his cheeks as her words unlocked a deep shame that the alcohol had been doing well to keep contained. He swallowed the lump in his throat and nodded, croaking out, “Yeah, I got it.”

Then all at once the other Alice seemed to reappear. She glanced at his jaw, lifted her hand towards it, hesitated, and then rested it awkwardly on his shoulder. “I’m sorry, Nix.”

And he knew it wasn’t just for the punch.

When they finally made it back to the poker game, walking in a heavy silence, their waiting buddies looked up. They were a miserable sight, drenched from head to toe, expressions downcast. Spotting the bottle in Nixon’s hand, completely missing the mood between the two in his own semi-inebriated state, Harry smiled.

“Hey, look at that! You found one!”

Nixon stared at him, before he realized what he was talking about.

“Oh, yeah. Pays to have friends, I guess.” He glanced over at Alice as they both returned to their seats, but she wouldn’t meet his eyes. Lipton and Harry exchanged the briefest of looks, but said nothing.

As Alice moved to pick up her cards, Speirs spotted the bruises forming on her knuckles and glanced up to see the other captain rubbing gingerly at his jaw as he poured himself a fresh glass. Speirs tensed, but the second he moved to get up, Alice placed a hand on his thigh to still him. She didn’t look at him, but in the light of the fire he could see the mix of emotions glistening in her eyes.

“So, I hear congratulations are in order,” Nixon began, attempting to sound conversational, but failing to hide his bitterness. That seemed to do it for Lieutenant Crowley. She tossed her cards onto the table and pushed back her chair, caring little for the amount of attention she drew to herself in the process.

“You know what? I’m out. Keep the money. I really don’t care.”

Everyone but Nixon watched her leave, and when he felt their eyes burning into him, wanting some answers for her sudden change in temperament, he stared down into his glass.

Speirs waited for the slam of the front door, then folded his cards, stating casually, “I think I’m going to call this one, too.”

Harry sighed and downed the last of his drink. He checked his watch and saw it was well past midnight. “Yeah, I guess you’re right. Might be the last decent night’s sleep we get.”

Lipton glanced from Nixon to Speirs, and caught his commanding officer throw the other captain a dark look as he got to his feet. Like most of the men of Easy Company, Lipton was well aware of the relationship that had formed between the CO and his first lieutenant; but as for her and Captain Nixon – Lipton had only ever seen the two talking and joking around since they had first met back in Toccoa, though it had always appeared the same as the friendship she shared with him and the other men. Catching the bruise as it now formed on the disgraced man’s cheek, Lipton fought the urge to go and check on her.

Nixon emptied his glass in one gulp, quickly setting to pour another, ignoring the scrapes of chairs as the others got up. He caught Harry’s gaze as the lieutenant grabbed his winnings, and watched the man force a smile.

“See you in the morning, Nix.”

Nixon stared down at the liquid in his cup as if deciding whether or not to drink it, and gave a sad, empty chuckle. “Yeah. Sure.” Then without any further hesitation, he drained the glass.

29th April, 1945

Landsberg, Germany ______________

He tried to find her the next morning, to at least catch sight of her, but she was either avoiding him, or keeping busy elsewhere. He was standing beside Winters, who had already twice questioned the dark bruise along his jawline, when he was caught off guard by the familiar face as Lieutenant Crowley approached them. Ignoring him completely, she stopped in front of the major.

“Sir, do you mind if I tag along on that patrol this morning?”

“You like volunteering for patrols, Al?”

She gave a light chuckle, though she didn’t like to think back on the one she’d led in Haguenau.

“Just feeling a little homesick. Thought a stroll through the woods might help.”

“Might not be a stroll,” Winters reminded her. Though it was unlikely they would come across any trouble, word had come down from battalion that there had been instances of German soldiers retreating into the forest and forming a kind of guerrilla resistance.

“Honestly, sir, I could use the distraction.”

Hearing those words, Nixon finally looked away from her as his stomach gave an uncomfortable lurch; a feeling he knew well – guilt.

“That’s fine. I’m sure the men would be glad to have you along.”

Offering a final smile, he gave a nod to dismiss her and turned his gaze immediately to the officer beside him once she had left.

“What happened, Nix?”

He took in the bruise on his friend’s cheek and pieced it together with the lieutenant’s unusually cold behavior towards him, disliking what it added up to.

“A misunderstanding,” Nixon replied with a sigh.

“Do I need to ask her?”

“What? Jesus, no. If you did, she’d tell you the same thing, anyway.”

“I need this resolved. She’s one of my best officers. We’ve come too far to let something personal cloud decisions that could get people killed.”

“It’s fine. I’ve got it under control, alright? And it’s not…it’s not personal.”

Winters stared at him, expression firm, eyes searching his face in that uncomfortable way that made him feel almost naked.

“Nix?”

He fought the urge to roll his eyes and looked up with a begrudging, “Yeah?”

“Stop lying to me.”

“So, can you or can you not teach me the best way to find a beehive?”

“Luz, I swear to God.”

Stepping through the trees of the forest on the outskirts of Landsberg, Alice felt herself smile for the first time since the incident the night before. She looked at the men around her: Luz, Perconte, Randleman, Powers, Christenson, Vest and O’Keefe, and felt herself relax as they made their way through their designated area.

Perconte scrunched up his face, “Whatta ya talkin’ about, a beehive?”

Luz just grinned, holding his lieutenant’s irritated look, then shook his head, “Never mind.”

“Say, Al,” Perconte went on, and she knew just from his tone that he was about to say something she wasn’t going to like, “I heard you got into it with Cap’n Nixon, last night.”

Luz whacked him on the arm to shut him up, but the gesture came too late. Perconte looked back at him, shrugging him off, and George just rolled his eyes. Turning back to see if he would receive an response, he found Lieutenant Crowley gazing at him in a way that made him stop in his tracks.

“You heard what?” she asked. Her voice was casual, but one look at her eyes and he knew better than to make the same mistake twice.

“Nothing,” came his nervous reply. He heard Luz give a chuckle as he passed by. “Shut up,” he told him, but it only made his friend laugh more.

“Why’d you want to come along, lieutenant?” Christenson asked now, caution to his tone after witnessing the exchange with Perconte. He had always found Alice to be quite amicable – it was Speirs that terrified him – but it had always made him uneasy that she seemed so comfortable in that man’s presence, even from the very beginning when the rumors about him had been most prevalent.

He recalled one incident in particular, back in the woods in Bastogne. He had been one of a handful of men who had been left behind to hold the line while the others moved out to take Foy. He had been sitting in his foxhole with Perconte and Sisk, listening to the story of the executed German prisoners for the first time, when the rumored killer himself had made an appearance. Obviously having heard the retelling on the infamous story, Speirs had offered them each a cigarette, which, alarmed, they had politely declined. Then up sauntered Lieutenant Crowley with a casual, “Mind if I bum one of those?” She had pulled one from the pack, pausing to let him light it for her before asking, “Going my way?” He had replied with an odd smile and a simple, “That I am,” and then the pair had walked off together, leaving the three soldiers gaping after them.

“Don’t you know? She loves to volunteer for patrols,” Bull replied now, through a mouthful of cigar.

Alice chuckled, thinking back to Winters’ similar response. “I had no idea that was a running joke with you guys.”

“Ain’t no joke,” Bull told her, “Only you’d be crazy enough to keep volunteerin’ for shit that’d get ya killed.”

“I dunno, this doesn’t seem so dangerous to me,” Shifty said in his gentle Southern drawl, surveying the quiet forest around them.

“Exactly,” Alice nodded, “Shifty the sharp one, as always.”

“Kinda reminds me of Bastogne,” Perconte interjected with a frown, glancing around at the others, “Doesn’t it remind you of Bastogne?”

“Yeah, now that you mention it,” Luz replied, “Except of course there’s no snow, we got warm grub in our bellies, and the trees aren’t fucking exploding from kraut artillery. But yeah, Frank, other than that, it’s a lot like Bastogne.”

The others grinned, but as usual the sarcasm went over Perconte’s head.

“Right?” he agreed.

“Bull, smack him for me, will you?” Luz said. “Thank you.”

They had a good chuckle as Randleman clouted the soldier in the back of his helmet, then continued on in a comfortable silence. Alice fell into step next to Luz, feeling the weight of her uncertainty gradually falling away. She had been in desperate need of a distraction, between dodging an apologetic Nixon, and a concerned Speirs. She almost felt like she was a sergeant again; back amongst the men without the worry of managing an entire company. It was the breather she had needed, and it was only then that she realized she had been spending too much time among the fellow officers. She hated that feeling of isolation from the rest of the men.

“How ya been, Al? You doin’ okay?” Luz asked her, in a voice low enough that the other men wouldn’t hear. As she considered her answer, she flexed her fingers, testing the damage from the night before.

“Yeah,” she assured him, “Gettin’ there.”

He smiled and clapped her on the back, stepping passed her as they continued on. Alice lapsed into thought, keeping her ears pricked for any unusual sounds, but the further she walked, the more she seemed to notice that something wasn’t right. She glanced to Shifty, who had taken point, and caught his eye, noting the crease that formed in his brow.

“George,” she called in a hoarse whisper, signaling for them to stop. Luz turned back to look at her, a frown crossing his face when he caught her expression.

“What is it?” Christenson asked.

“It’s quiet,” Shifty answered for her.

“Yeah, cause Perconte stopped yammerin’,” said Luz.

“Hey, Luz, you know what- ” Perconte began, but was quickly cut off.

“Shut it, you two,” their lieutenant ordered, taking a few steps forward. All around them, the forest was still. Not so much as a birdcall cut through the unnatural silence. She had only ever seen something like this once before, back when a fire had broken out a few hundred miles from her home. The mere smell of the smoke had driven all surrounding wildlife to safer ground. Testing the air now, she caught a different scent. “You guys smell that?”

“Again, Frank,” Luz joked, but Alice held up a hand to shut him up. The humor fell away from his face and he sniffed the air. There was a bad odor, now that she mentioned it. He hadn’t noticed it much before, happy to simply be among friends on a relatively safe patrol for once. Plus, they’d experienced their fair share of bad smells throughout the campaign; body odor, vomit, excrement – both animal and human – blood, spoiled food and the ever-present smoke as buildings went up in flames. But this one hit closer to home. This one they knew all too well.

Bull stepped forward. “Smells like–”

“Death,” Alice finished for him.

It was then that she spotted the thin tendrils of smoke wafting through the tree line up ahead. Without a word, she took off towards it. The men quickly followed.

They stepped out of the forest and spotted the source of the smell and the smoke. At first, they were unable to comprehend what they were looking at. One by one they looked to Lieutenant Crowley for orders, but for the first time she appeared just as lost as they were.

“Frank,” she said, “How’s your ass feeling?”

Perconte looked over at her with a frown. “My ass?”

“Reckon you can make it back to base?”

Realizing what she was saying, he nodded, but she didn’t take her eyes off the barbed wire.

“Yeah. I can manage.”

“Get Speirs,” she ordered, her mind going instantly to the person she trusted most in her moment of uncertainty. He would know what to do, she told herself. Perconte turned to move, slinging his rifle across his back when she said, “No, wait. Get Winters. Just get an officer. Any officer. And medics. I think we’re going to need ‘em.”

“You are an officer,” he said stupidly, as if she had somehow forgotten, but she just shook her head.

“I think we’re going to need someone higher up for this.” Her mind whirred as she considered someone who might at least have some insight into what they had found. “And bring Captain Nixon.”

When they first pulled into view of the camp, Nixon spotted Alice beside Sergeant Randleman. Easily one of the biggest, toughest men in the company, Bull was now crouched on the ground with a broken look on his face. The lieutenant was speaking softly to him, resting a comforting hand on his shoulder, trying hard to hold herself together in the process. Each member of the small patrol held the same expression, as if it had become their new squad insignia; a telling mark of their recent discovery.

Hearing the crunch of tires on gravel, Alice looked up with a blank kind of confusion. As the officers jumped out of the jeep, Winters came towards her first. Nixon began to do the same, but faltered for a moment until she met his gaze for the first time that day.

“Lieutenant Crowley?” Winters said gently, as she stared off, then when she didn’t answer, “Al?”

She looked at him and he caught the lost look behind the eyes that were usually so confident and focused.

“Sir?” she blinked. He stared at her a moment before she realized what he wanted, but at first she struggled to find the words. “Uh, we were travelling north through the forest, Shifty on point. The smell hit us first. Then we followed the smoke. I had Luz, Christenson, and Vest scout the perimeter while Powers and Randleman did a sweep of the surrounding woods. I remained on watch with O’Keefe at the front gate. We attempted to make contact with the, the people, the, uh, prisoners. None of them speak any English. We found no guards, no enemy soldiers. I have no idea how long these people have been alone for, sir. As far as I can tell, they’ve been without food and water for a while.”

“The fires are fresh,” Speirs noted, looking up at the rising smoke as he stepped up beside her, and she nodded, feeling a little better with him by her side. “Guards can’t be long gone.”

“That’s fine,” Winters told her. Then, sensing her distress at her inability to find some way to help the people behind the wire, added softly, “You did good, Al.”

“You haven’t heard of this sort of thing back at headquarters, Captain Nixon?” Alice asked, turning to the other officer.

He didn’t respond for a moment, not used to being addressed by her in such formal manner. “Uh, no. Nothing like this.” He couldn’t help but stare, completely thrown by her behavior. He had only ever seen her like this once before; back in Haguenau, the morning after she had lost a man on patrol. She had blamed herself his death, somehow concluding that it was a reflection of her abilities as an officer. Even now she almost looked as though it was somehow her fault that the people behind the fences had met such a horrific fate, as if she could have prevented it from happening had she done something differently.

“I didn’t have any way to get it open. I just thought…”

It was the first time they had seen her at a loss for what to do. Winters nodded, understanding, and they turned to look back at the dozens of emaciated figures. Behind them, more men from Easy climbed off of a truck, each of them coming to a halt the moment they caught sight of the living skeletons, a few of them covering their noses as the smell washed over them.

Acquiring bolt-cutters from the truck, Christenson stepped forward and opened the perimeter gate. Alice and Winters stepped through, then exchanged an uncertain look.

“Open it up,” Winters ordered.

As Christenson cut the chain on the final gate, urging the starving prisoners away from the entrance with some help from Perconte, Alice felt someone step up beside her. She looked at Nixon, then turned to the group of medics behind her, ushering them in first to evaluate the condition of the men in the filthy, striped clothing.

“Do you speak any German?” Winters asked Christenson, but the man shook his head. He turned to Alice and she did the same.

“Is Liebgott with you?” she asked him, “I’ll go find Liebgott.”

She moved quickly, glad to finally be of use again, creating as much distance as she could between herself and the camp, finding it difficult to breathe. She paused for a second, took a deep breath, and then pushed through the group of Easy company men who were filtering in, passing Speirs along the way. He paused to say something to her, but she barely seemed to notice him.

“Liebgott?”

“Yeah?” came a voice from the back group. She spotted him holding the perimeter with a couple of others.

She jerked her head for him to follow her, her expression saying enough.

“What the hell is this place?” he asked her, another one to note the worrying change in her usually self-assured demeanor. After spotting the telltale patches on the prisoners’ chests, Speirs had been quick to place Liebgott on the perimeter to create some distance between him and the camp. The Jewish-born soldier hadn’t questioned it; he hadn’t seen much of what they had found, but with the smell coming off it he was only happy to oblige.

“That’s what you’re going to find out for us,” Alice replied, fighting to hold back the bile in her throat as the breeze blew the rancid smell of decay into their faces.

“Alright, boys,” she heard Lipton instructing as they walked passed, “These people need care. Give them water, any rations you might have. Grab some blankets.”

Hearing the clear, logical orders, Lieutenant Crowley seemed to snap out of her daze, walking with more purpose as she led the translator back to Major Winters.

She stood beside him, with Nixon to her left, and Speirs behind her as Liebgott questioned the healthiest of the men – and considering the condition of some of the others, that really wasn’t saying much. His clothes were filthy, draped over his emaciated frame. His skin had a waxy, yellow pallor to it as it stretched across his bones, and his eyes were two sunken pits. The stench coming off of him was not unlike that of the camp itself.

The guards had left that morning, he told them, running from an enemy that they knew was closing in. In a last ditch effort to hide their atrocities, they had shot as many prisoners as they could, before burning down a few of the huts with the men still inside. Any prisoners who had tried to stop them had also been shot. Without time to destroy all of the evidence, and running short on ammunition, they had locked those remaining inside and left them to die of starvation and disease that many were already well on the way to succumbing to.

Winters listened carefully, then asked the most pressing question: how was it that these men had come to find themselves treated with such cruelty? There was no reason in his mind that could compel men to treat fellow human beings with such brutality, but perhaps the minds of the Germans worked differently. He recalled the treatment of the women back in Eindhoven who had been accused of sleeping with German soldiers; the way they had screamed and begged as they were beaten on the streets, their shaved heads still bleeding from the townspeople’s vicious conduct. Humans always found a way to justify their violence.

“Can you ask him what kind of camp this is? Why are they here?”

Liebgott relayed the question and they waited, watching the gaunt man consider his words before he replied.

“He says it’s a work camp. There was a word he used, but I’m not familiar. ‘Unwanted’, maybe?”

“Criminals?” Winters guessed.

Liebgott tried that, but the prisoner frowned at him, clearly offended, and gave a very clear ‘no’.

“Doctors, musicians,” Liebgott translated, “Tailors, clerks, farmers, intellectuals.” He shook his head, not quite understanding how these things related to their imprisonment. Then the man spoke a word that resonated deeply with the soldier. He asked him again, just to be sure, and the man nodded. Like Speirs, he too had noticed the stars stitched onto their soiled clothes as he first entered the camp, but hadn’t made any correlation between the symbol and the men’s incarceration. It was beyond his reasoning that something as simple someone’s religious faith could have them wind up in conditions like this.

Winters stared, waiting for the reply.

“They’re Jews,” Liebgott said. The prisoner continued on, then seemed to become deeply distressed, gesturing up the road, voice breaking with emotion as tears welled in his eyes.

“Liebgott?” Nixon asked, brows knitting together as the prisoner began to cry.

“The women’s camp is up the road.”

Alice broke from the circle then, hands on hips, overcome and finding it difficult to breathe. It wasn’t just the smell; it was knowing that no matter how hard they had fought, they hadn’t been able to stop the suffering of these people. Maybe if they had made it sooner… She walked in a daze towards the front gates and came to a stop when she felt it was far enough. Taking a few deep, even breaths, she gazed down the road and considered her next move. A hand found her shoulder and she jumped.

“You’re not going,” Speirs said evenly, reading her mind. Though he somehow managed to maintain his usual stoic expression, she could see just from his eyes how much he had been affected, too.

“They’re out there, just like these people were. They’re locked up in there, waiting for help to come.”

“You’re not going,” he repeated in the same tone. “They’ve got someone on the radio to send another company over there. You don’t need to see that.”

Her breath became uneven again and she asked with a tight voice, “Ron…what if there’s children?”

He considered the horrific possibility, looking away from her and into the forest, then realized the more likely truth. He sighed as he considered whether or not to voice his thoughts. “I don’t think there would be.”

It took her a moment to process his response, and when she realized what it meant – how the men in this camp had barely managed to survive – she gave a quick nod and took a few steps further out with her head bowed. She came to rest beside the troop truck and in a moment of violent release, drove her fist into the side of it. She felt the already-bruised skin split, but didn’t care. The pain grounded her. She looked at the smear of blood she had left on the vehicle, then turned stare out into the forest for a moment. Speirs watched her take a deep breath and turn back, walking with purpose, her expression suddenly focused and determined.

“Stop,” he said, blocking her path. She watched him with a curious frown as he patted down a number of his pockets, finally coming across the object he was after. He took her hand gently in his own and wrapped it in the small bandage he had kept from his field kit. “I’m not having you catch something in there,” he frowned, clearly disapproving of her sudden outburst. “And you need to give that fist a break.”

She glanced up at him, finding an unusual softness to his usually sharp eyes. “That’s why God gave me two, Ron.”

He threw her a look of warning, but that too had a strange gentleness to it. It was the same way he had been looking at her that morning, as they’d briefed the men about the patrol. That presumption of vulnerability from a man who had once witnessed her beat a man to a bloody pulp – who had seen her take out a kraut-infested building on her own with a gunshot wound to the arm – had quickly begun to drive her insane.

He followed her back through the gates. The rest of Easy Company had fanned out, helping whoever they could and exploring the rest of the camp, which stretched out much further than they had first imagined.

Seeing more prisoners pouring out of the surrounding huts, Alice turned to Speirs. “What are we going to do with all of them? We can’t leave them here.”

“Where are we going to take them?” he replied, as if that were the better question, his face drawn as they passed shriveled corpses by the roadside. “I don’t even know if they’d survive the trip.”

“Not back to the town. For all we know, they’re the ones who put them here.”

He nodded. “Sink’s on his way with the regimental surgeon. They’ll figure it out. For now, we do what we can.”

They came to a stop behind Captain Nixon and Major Winters, and stared up at the looming train cart as the door was pulled back. The stench hit them immediately. Bodies were stacked inside, each in various stages of decomposition, some with their mouths open, frozen in their final death rattles.

Alice turned away, covering her nose and mouth with the back of her hand. She spotted Bull and Luz coming out of one of the huts looking troubled, and moved to approach them. Catching her questioning look, they shook their heads, but she misread the gesture.

“More dead?” she asked, voice solemn.

“Some are,” Bull replied in a similar manner, “Most o’ them are alive. We need to get some more doctors out here.”

“They’re on their way.”

“Christ, what the hell is this place, Al?” Luz asked, and together they looked around, taking in the horror they had stumbled upon.

“This?” Alice replied, barely able to comprehend it herself, “This is why we fight.”

“Winters wants us to find some food,” Nixon relayed to the two officers in front of him. He looked like hell. He had made it halfway through the bottle of Vat 69 Alice had given him, before passing out on his bed, waking up that morning in a puddle of his own piss. He had accepted it as his lowest point. But now, seeing the starving, dying men imprisoned in the Nazi work camp, the piles of corpses scattered around the yard, his own problems had quickly been thrown into perspective. He felt a deep shame work its way inside of him, and as he glanced between Captain Speirs and Lieutenant Crowley that feeling of self-loathing only intensified.

“We don’t have a lot of rations,” Speirs thought aloud.

“We’re going to have to loot the townsfolk. There you go, Ron. Something you’re familiar with,” Alice joked absently, retaining her solemn expression.

His mouth twitched in a grim smile, “What did we have there? A bakery?”

“Yeah, a couple of cafes, too, I think. Maybe a general store. Want me to tell the men?”

Speirs glanced up, biting his lip in thought and gave a nod.

“Tell Winters we’re on it,” Alice said to Nixon, and he, too, gave a nod of approval.

On the orders of Lieutenant Crowley, second platoon returned to the town of Landsberg and took any food they could find, most of it coming from the storerooms of German businesses. Ignoring the complaints of the owners, who had somehow managed to go about life as usual while innocent men and women were dying just outside their gates, the soldiers obeyed her one rule; no unwarranted bloodshed. But that didn’t mean things didn’t, at times, get violent. Still haunted by the smell and the sights of the camp, the soldiers took out their disgust on the German villagers.

By the time they made it back to the camp and began handing out the food to the crowd of desperate prisoners, Colonel Sink had arrived with the regimental surgeon, Major Louis Kent.

“We need to stop giving these men food,” Major Kent explained to them, “These men are starving. If we give them too much, too fast, they will eat themselves to death. Also, we need to keep them in the camp until we can find a place for them in town.”

“You want us to lock these people back up?” Nixon asked.

“We’ve got no choice,” Sink assured him, not liking the idea any more than they did.

“Otherwise they might scatter,” the surgeon added, “We need to keep them centralized so we can supervise their food intake and medical treatment. So, until we find some place better…”

“Lieutenant Crowley!” Winters called, keeping it formal in front of the colonel, but Sink was quickly dragged away to a radio call.

Alice glanced over from where she was supervising the distribution of the food with Lieutenant Welsh, and made her way over.

“We need to put them back inside until we find a better place for them,” Winters explained.

She narrowed her eyes, as if unsure that she had heard right.

“Al, we’re gonna need to lock them back up,” Nixon told her.

“Come again? You want us to put them back in there? With the dead?” she asked, the emotional toll of the day growing evident by the edge in her voice, “These people think they’ve just been liberated.”

“They have been liberated,” Winters assured her.

She nodded, “A little hard to tell someone that while they’re looking at you from behind a barbed-wire fence.”

The two men dropped their gazes.

“We need to get this done,” Winters said softly.

“Who’s gonna tell ‘em?”

He looked back at her and she already knew the answer. Her hand moved to her face as she rubbed her eyes and drew in a steady breath. She sighed, willing this nightmare to be over; for the prisoners, for the soldiers, and for herself.

“Alright. Christ. Liebgott!” Spotting the soldier among the prisoners, she waved him over for the second time that day.

“You want me to what?” he said, after she had relayed the orders. “I can’t tell them that.”

“You have to, Joe,” Winters replied.

There was a quiet moment when the guilt of those instructions hung heavily on all of them, and Alice found herself wishing she could speak the language, if only to relieve Joe of the painful task. This one hit too close to home for him, they knew. Just as she was considered having Webster carry it out instead, Liebgott finally answered, “Yes, sir.”

Alice walked with him and stood by the back of the truck as he climbed up and spoke the dreaded words. The relief and happiness drained from the faces of the starving men as they stared up at him. All at once they began to panic and, just as Major Kent had predicted, the prisoners made an attempt to scatter; after their fleeting moment of freedom, they were once again under someone else’s control. The men of Easy herded them back through the gates as gently as they possibly could, sending the crying, begging men back to face the bloated, fly-blown faces of their friends and loved ones who hadn’t made it. The mood was grim as they watched the tortured souls milling around the fence in a desperate frenzy, their frightened moans stirring some of the most battle-hardened men to their own silent tears.

Standing in a daze, the day’s events weighing on his mind, Nixon looked back at Liebgott. He watched as Alice climbed up beside him in the truck and put an arm around his shoulders, pulling him to her as his body began to shake with silent sobs. She didn’t seem to notice the glistening streaks that fell along her own face.

That evening, after getting a head start on his drinking for the night, Nixon found Winters in his office going over papers and constructing his report of the day’s events. The captain looked pale and lacking in decent sleep as he looked through the liquor cabinet to his friend’s left, attempting to read the foreign labels on the unfamiliar bottles.

“Thought you weren’t drinking the local,” Winters commented, pausing from his work.

“I’m just…browsing.”

Winters threw him an unconvinced look, then went on, “I heard from Division. Been finding camps like this all over the place. Seems the Russians liberated one a lot worse.”

“Worse?” Nixon narrowed his eyes. He couldn’t imagine anything worse than what they had witnessed behind those barbed-wire fences.

“Yeah,” the major sighed, weary at the thought, “Apparently. Ten times as big. Execution chambers. Ovens.”

Nixon cocked his head and waited for him to elaborate on the last part.

“For cremating all the bodies.”

“Jesus,” Nixon said, at a loss for any other words to express the disgust that sat like a heavy stone in the pit of his stomach.

Winters nodded. As he spoke the words, he almost understood why his friend drank as much as he did; it was enough to make any man turn to alcohol. Almost any man. Winters preferred to use those thoughts as a means of keeping sober.

“Locals claim they never heard of the camp,” Nixon told him, “They say we exaggerate.”

He recalled the trip back into the village to collect food for the prisoners. Speirs had been right to send Alice to lead the mission; she was just the right balance of commanding and compassionate, and when it came time to forcibly remove the food from the citizens, she had maintained a surprising level of civility. He had even seen her break up a few violent confrontations started by the traumatized men of her platoon, despite her own obvious desire to lay into the people who had allowed such suffering to go on right under their noses.

“Well, they’re gonna have a hell of an education tomorrow,” Winters said, looking somewhat pleased by the turn of events, sharing the attitude of the other soldiers of Easy in terms of the civilians. “General Taylor declared martial law about an hour ago. Ordered every able-bodied German in town aged fourteen to eighty to start burying the bodies, and they’ll begin tomorrow. Tenth armored are going to supervise clean-up.”

“And what about us?”

Glancing up at his friend, Winters couldn’t help but feel pity for the man. Usually Nixon would be the one telling him these things; but that was before he had been demoted. Now he was out of the loop and, it seemed, simply out of luck.

“We head for Thalem, tomorrow. Twelve-hundred hours.”

Nixon nodded, and another thought came to him. He considered the best way to word it without sounding suspicious, so instead of asking after the person directly, went for the next best thing – the less obvious thing.

“You seen Speirs?”

When Winters looked over at him again, he realized he hadn’t been as subtle as he had thought in his semi-intoxicated state.

“I think he’s with Al. Why? You need to talk to him?”

Nixon chuckled, aware that Winters was only teasing now, though the major’s expression remained stern. He recalled her confession from the night before, the one bit of information he was certain only he was privy to, and in a burst of alcohol-fueled impulsivity, said to the major, “You know they’re together, right?”

Winters went back to his papers, answering casually, “I’m aware.”

“You know that they’re engaged?”

Hoping to catch him off-guard with this bit of information, too drunk to care that it could get both officers in question booted out of the company, he was surprised again to see the man nod.

“Yeah, Ron told me this morning. It’s not impacting their performance on the field. I don’t have any issue with it. Plus, I think it’s a good match.”

“You do, huh?” He wondered what had compelled the man to inform Winters of the pending union, then recalled his thoughtless offer of ‘congratulations’ the night before. So, Speirs had thought he would be so petty as to try and get them reprimanded out of pure jealousy. Maybe he was right. After all, he was certain that Alice hadn’t shared the secret with him out of faith in his character. It had almost sounded liked she was trying to remind herself why she couldn’t give in to whatever urge she had been feeling. He had felt it in the kiss; a moment of indecision when she had started to kiss him back. He had gone to bed with that thought still playing in his mind, even with the dull ache of his bruised jaw reminding him what a stupid idea it would be to pursue it any further.

Nixon stared down at the floor, focusing on the frayed edges of the rug as he found himself caught off guard again. Realizing the risk he had just taken in divulging a secret that wasn’t his, he considered the outcome had he not been speaking to such a reasonable and considerate superior officer. On one hand, Speirs could have been transferred, even kicked out, losing Easy Company the best CO it’d had since Winters, and leaving a gap in Alice’s life for Nixon to try and edge his way into. On the other hand, they could have lost Alice, the next best officer they had; a woman who had worked hard to prove herself good enough for the paratroopers, and one who had not once hesitated in the battlefield to protect her fellow comrades, even when it meant putting her own life on the line. Still, with her gone, he would have had one less distraction, one less reason to want to drink himself into a stupor every day.

The sheer selfishness of those drunken truths made him sick to the stomach, and he left to find something to sober himself up; hoping a cup of coffee and a conversation with the lieutenant herself would do the trick.

He ran into Speirs as he stepped outside holding two empty canteen mugs. Though there were plenty of fine china cups inside the house, he knew Alice hated them after once witnessing her being served coffee in one. She had lifted the delicate item awkwardly between her calloused fingers and joked, “If you see my pinky sticking out, do me a favor and cut it off.”

Ever observant, Speirs glanced down at the two aluminum items then back up to meet his gaze.

“For Winters and I,” Nixon lied, annoyed that he felt he even had to explain himself.

Speirs gave a nod, but the glint in his eye told Nixon that he had caught the fib. As the demoted officer moved down the stairs, Speirs called, “I take mine black, no sugar.”

Nixon looked up in time to catch his disconcerting smirk, and muttered some colorful words as he trudged away.

He hadn’t expected to catch Alice in her room, since she wasn’t one to sit around in once place for too long, so when he ducked his head in to check, he didn’t notice her straight away. She was seated on the floor on the opposite side of the bed, her back resting up against the frame. For a second he thought that he had caught her at a vulnerable moment, but when she turned her head, catching the scent of the hot coffee, she offered him a gentle though somewhat unsure smile. He gestured with one of the cups, hoping it made a good enough excuse for his presence, and she nodded for him to come in.

Stopping in front of her, he passed her one of the mugs before considering the best place to sit. There was up on the bed beside her, but he felt like that was an invasion of her personal space – and for all he knew, she was already sharing that space with another man. He glanced around for a chair, feeling at a loss for appropriate options, when his gaze came to rest on Alice. Holding back an amused chuckle, a playful smile tugging at the corners of her mouth, she patted the ground beside her.

“I just…I wasn’t sure if-”

“Just take a fucking seat, will you,” she chuckled softly and shook her head. He laughed with her and did as she suggested. They sat in silence for a moment, coffees steaming between their hands as they replayed the events of the day, the silence quickening into a soundless grief.

“Do we need to talk about last night?” he finally asked her, forcing himself to look at her.

“Christ, that’s what you came here to talk about?” There was an edge of disbelief to her voice that he didn’t like. “I was about to ask you what you’d heard about the prisoners, what Sink’s plan is with them. How we’re going to help them. I think that’s a little more important than whatever happened last night, don’t you?”

Her sharp reasoning cut deeply as he was reminded yet again of his inadequacies as an officer. He had never felt the contrast between them more than he did at that moment: her, selfless and focused on the task at hand; him, selfish and increasingly preoccupied with his own personal dramas. He saw then why it would never work between them.

“Yeah, you’re right. As usual,” he said, attempting to make her smile again. It worked. He considered telling her about the larger camp Winters had spoken of, but saw the redness of her eyes and the distant look that often came into them as they sat there; images of the sick, dead and dying flashing back into her mind against her will. He doubted any of the soldiers from Easy would be getting any sleep tonight. Finally, he settled on one piece of information he thought couldn’t hurt.

“General Taylor’s ordered all able-bodied townsfolk to bury the dead tomorrow. Tenth armored is overseeing it.”

“Oh.”

He glanced at her and saw an almost disappointed look grace her features. “You don’t want to be there to see that,” he told her.

She recalled Speirs saying the same to her only hours earlier, and shook her head, but it wasn’t to agree with the statement. “I thought we should see it through.”

His thick eyebrows pulled down into a curious frown as he stared at her.

“I wanna be there to see their faces when they’re forced to confront the things they’ve allowed to go on,” she explained, “I wanna see that.”

It was a twisted confession, but one he found he could relate to. Not one of the citizens had believed him when he had asked them about the camp up the road, yet he was certain the death camp contained former residents of the town.

“We could go, if you want? Drive out in the morning? Honestly, I’m curious to see how they take it, too.”

She looked at him for a moment, then nodded.

“How the fuck could they let them just take them like that? I wonder if they knew what they were going to do to them…”

“I can’t imagine they had a lot of choice,” Nixon replied, “A lot of what the Gestapo and the SS get up to tends to be by force. Guns to heads, all that.”

“There’s always a choice.”

Nixon glanced over at her, somewhat skeptical considering the scenario. A dark look came over her and the battle-hardened face of Lieutenant Crowley was suddenly looking back at him. “If someone came up to me, put a gun to my head, and said ‘We’re taking Liebgott, and there’s nothing you can do about it’, I’d do my darndest to prove them wrong. Hell, even Sobel doesn’t deserve a fate like that.”

“No one does,” Nixon agreed. She ran her hand back through her hair, and he caught sight of the bandage. Knowing she hadn’t done nearly enough damage the night before to warrant a wrap, he asked, “What happened there?”

She sighed. “I punched a truck.”

His eyebrows shot up. “You punched a truck?”

“Yeah,” she sighed, sounding disappointed by her impulsive outburst, “I punched a truck.”

“What did the truck ever do to you?”

“It tried to kiss me.”

He laughed for what felt like the first time in days. “Okay, I deserved that.” They lapsed into a thoughtful silence, the incident weighing heavily on both their minds. “Did I ever actually apologize?”

“No, you didn’t,” she replied, her tone suggesting how uncomfortable the whole topic still made her. “In fact, I’m pretty sure I did.”

He chuckled again and nodded. “Yeah, that you did.”

“I guess I figured that, after that punch, you were well and truly sorry anyway.”

“Yeah, you’re not wrong.”

She turned to look at the mark she had left on his jaw, fingers moving up to touch the purple discoloration.

“How’s it feel?”

When her eyes flicked back to meet his and she saw the way he was looking at her, she withdrew her hand immediately.

“Fuck. Sorry.”

“For what? Christ, I’m the one with the problem, here. You’ve never done anything wrong by me. I mean that, Al. I mean, what the hell was I thinking?”

“You were drunk.”

“When am I not?”

He joined her as she chuckled, but his sounded empty, almost bitter. As they lapsed back into a more comfortable silence, a thought came back to Nixon.

“So, how’d he ask?”

“Hm? Oh. Um, he just said ‘We should get married after this’ and I said ‘Sure’.”

“You said ‘Sure’?”

She chuckled, a playful grin on her face, “Yeah, you know Ron and I, we’re not big on theatrics. We like to keep it simple.”

“Already with the ‘we’?”

“Yeah, well. It’s been ‘we’ for a long time. How are we going to take out those German guns? What are we going to do with these German prisoners? Not that we were always on the same page with that stuff.”

“Did you ever talk to him back in Toccoa?”

She smiled to herself as she thought back to those days. “I ran into him a few times. You know that story about me beating up that guy from Able?”

“Yeah?”

“He was there.”

Nixon’s eyebrows shot up again. “That actually happened?”

She gave him a sheepish look, forgetting that it had always been treated as a rumor.

“Who was it?”

Thinking back to D-Day, where she had watched the life drain from the young man’s eyes as he bled out under her hands, Alice just shook her head and said, “It doesn’t matter.”

“So, are you really going to marry him?” Nixon asked her after a moment.

The content smile that appeared on her lips told him all he needed to know, but she still replied, “Yeah, I am. I love that fucking lunatic.” She turned her gaze to him with a playful scowl and he recalled his words from the night before. Her expression turned a little more serious and she said softly, “You know it would never have worked between us, right?”

The comment hit him hard. It was something he had considered so many times before, something he had used to ground himself whenever he caught her in a rare moment of vulnerability and felt his stomach flip as he was hit with a rush of adoration for her.

The first time he had felt it was way back on D-Day. She had approached the officers on her way out of the town she had just helped secure for use as Battalion HQ. Her uniform and hands had been stained with someone else’s blood, some of it smeared across her forehead; her stripy, black paint mixing with sweat as it ran down her face. He had watched as she’d removed her helmet and swept her hand back through wet strands of pale-blonde hair, forgetting about the blood and leaving a crimson streak in her wake. She had just made it back from taking a third building, and the motley group of soldiers she had collected after landing still tagged along after her like a mother duck. He had listened to the respectful words of appreciation she had spoken to them before telling them to disband and track down their original units. Then she had stalked over to him with a grin, a greeting of ‘Hey, Nix!’, and a smack on the shoulder that had sent the first shock-wave of affection through his body.

“Why do you say that?” he finally asked, aware of the tightness in his voice.

“One of us wouldn’t have been happy.”

“Well, that’s the foundation of every good marriage, Al.”

She threw him a look and he realized she wasn’t kidding around.

“Besides, I usually feel pretty good when I’m with you.” The words slipped out before he could stop them and he waited for her reaction.

“We’re from very different worlds,” she began, acutely aware of the overriding melodrama in the words.

“You never read ‘Romeo and Juliet’?”

She rolled her eyes. “No, must have been exclusive to you Ivy Leaguers. Maybe Webster can give me the rundown.”

He laughed again and took a sip of his forgotten coffee, testing the temperature. It had cooled down enough to take a hearty gulp.

“I mean, can you imagine taking me to meet your parents? The esteemed Nixons of New York City meeting Alice Crowley of the Appalachian Valley. ‘Well, howdy, Mr and Mrs. Nixon, real fuckin’ nice to meet you. Your son’s a helluva guy. Sure was nice servin’ with him, especially when it came to those debriefin’s…”

Nixon snorted into his cup, sending up a spray of coffee that splashed them both.

“So, you see my point?” Alice grinned, as he cleaned himself up.

“You’re putting that accent on.”

“How could you tell?”

They gazed at each other, smirking at the playful exchange they had grown accustomed to when in each other’s’ company. Alice could see exactly where he was coming from. It didn’t matter that their backgrounds weren’t the same, or that his parents might not approve. There was enough there to lay the foundation for a genuinely happy relationship. But she would never be able to look past the alcoholism, and deep down she knew it was the seed that would take root in her heart and grow into a destructive bitterness that would eventually drive them apart. He was not the man she was supposed to be with, even if, in that moment, she felt a familiar nagging doubt in the back of her mind, urging her to reconsider.

She broke the gaze and finally took a sip of her warm coffee, frowning as an unfamiliar taste hit her tongue.

“What did you put in this? Not love and devotion, I’m assuming.”

“Didn’t think you’d drink it if I did,” he replied, grinning, “I made yours Irish. You look like hell, kid. What happened?”

***

June 6th, 1946

Boston, Massachusetts ____________

Lewis Nixon was not at all surprised by the amount of familiar faces inside the church, and suspected that every single member of Easy Company had made the effort to show up; they were not about to miss the union of two of the most feared and respected officers that the company had ever seen. He was certain he had even caught a glimpse of Colonel Sink as he’d found his seat in the pews. He had received his invitation about a month earlier, and could only shake his head when he saw the proposed date. True to her word, it was something only Alice Crowley would do.

Ronald Speirs stood at the altar, staring expectantly down the aisle, a look of marked determination on his handsome features. The captain looked particularly dashing in his dress uniform, but when the music started and the bride stepped in, the husband-to-be was completely forgotten. All eyes turned to Alice. She looked stunning in her white silk gown; her pale, blonde hair hung down her back in glossy waves against the snowy tulle of her veil, and her red lips brought out the healthy glow in her cheeks as she smiled. She looked so happy.

Escorting her down the aisle, Dick Winters looked the part of the proud father, having accepted her request for him to stand in Elliot Crowley’s place, since the man himself had been killed in an accident many years before. Viewing Winters as a sort of father-figure all throughout their European campaign – despite there being the smallest of age gaps between the two – he had been her first choice for the role. Exchanging a glance with him now, her grin grew wider and he gave her arm an affectionate squeeze. As they passed Lewis in the pews, they both turned their heads to look at him and he simply smiled back, ignoring the way his breath caught in his throat at the sight of Alice in her attire.

Somewhere nearby, Nixon heard Bill Guarnere whisper loudly, “Fuck me dead,” and caught the woman next to him jab him in the side with her elbow. Alice had to press her hand to her mouth to keep from laughing.

As they reached the altar, Dick gave her away with a nod to his old captain, who returned the gesture, unable to hide his joy at the sight of his beautiful bride.

When the time came for them to exchange their vows, Nixon couldn’t help but think back to his comment in Hitler’s Eagle’s Nest all those many months ago, pushing the thought from his mind as the priest began to speak.

“Repeat after me,” he said to Alice, “’I, Alice Martha Crowley.’”

“I, Alice Martha Crowley.”

“Take you, Ronald Charles Spiers.”

“Take you, Sparky.”

The church erupted in laughter as the groom stared at the woman before him, fighting back a grin. She stared right back, challenging him to keep a straight face as their friends called ‘Sparky!’ from the rows in front of them. Nixon joined in the merriment, but his own laughter felt hollow in his chest. Finally, after the laughter and catcalling had died down, they reached the part he had been dreading. The priest turned to the congregation as the happy couple stared into each other’s eyes, the entire world falling away around them in their moment of bliss.

“If anyone here has any reasons as to why these two individuals should not be joined in holy matrimony, speak now or forever hold your peace.”

Nixon took a deep breath…then breathed it out in a heavy sigh. He caught Winters’ eyes flick over to him and suddenly felt ashamed of himself. Dick knew him better than any man or woman in that building. He had actually been considering speaking up – that thought had actually crossed his mind. Thankfully, he was not nearly drunk enough to act on it.

“I now pronounce you man and wife. You may kiss the bride.”

Over a hundred heads craned forward to witness the act they had long imagined happening in secret on the battlefront, and knowing this, Speirs did his best to add a touch of showmanship. With one hand behind her neck and the other on the small of her back, he leaned her back and kissed her with the same amount of passion he had the first time, back in Germany after their victory had been announced at the Eagle’s Nest. The scene was met with the kind of whooping and hollering only men of the US military could provide, and when Alice was lifted upright again, they cheered all the more for her pink, glowing face as tears of happiness rolled down her cheeks.

“You finally did it, huh?”

“Hey, Nix!”

Catching her alone after the ceremony, he allowed himself to be pulled into a friendly embrace. The other guests milled around outside the church; Speirs caught in the middle of a mini Dog Company reunion as his old squad mates shared their congratulations.

“I said I would, didn’t I?” Alice said, stepping back.

“You always were a woman of your word.”

He took her in from the closer proximity. He hadn’t thought she could look any more beautiful, but outside, under the churchyard’s big oak tree, with the sunlight dappled across her skin, she was a far cry from the sweat and dirt encrusted lieutenant he had seen fighting back in Europe.

“What?” she asked, and he realized he had been staring. Dropping his gaze, his eyes came to rest on the shape of her belly. The dress was doing a good job of covering it, but from this range the bump was undeniable. Catching his expression, Alice winced. “We got started a little early.”

“You’re pregnant?” he asked, his thick eyebrows jumping up.

“Yeah. We were hoping no one would notice,” she chuckled. “Especially the priest.”

“Wow. God, that’s…. I can’t imagine you as a mom.”

“What are you talking about? I raised a whole goddamn company of kids. I think I’ll be alright.”

He laughed. “Yeah, you might actually have something there.”

“So, what’s her name?”

“Who?” He looked up at her, momentarily confused by the question, distracted by the brightness of her eyes. “Oh, her. That’s Laura. She didn’t want to come.”

“Oh? Why not?”

“Well, she found the invitation, asked how I knew you, and somehow ‘we served together in the airborne’ wasn’t a good enough answer.”

“So, what, she thinks I’m an old girlfriend or something?”

He chuckled and replied, “Yeah, I guess so.”

Alice gazed at him for a moment, sensing his apathetic mood.

“You don’t like her,” she realized.

“Well, I better. Since I’m marrying her.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah. It was kind of sudden. Sorry I didn’t get the chance to return the invitation. But, hey, maybe you can make it to the next one.”

“Geez, Nix.”

She frowned at the joke and watched as he reached into his inner jacket pocket and pulled out his old, familiar flask. He unscrewed the cap and took a swig, and then, catching her concerned look, he held it out to her. She looked around and spotted Speirs still surrounded by his old comrades.

“I really shouldn’t,” she said, then with a mischievous smirk she grabbed the container and took a sip.

“This is a new low,” Nixon told her, “Giving whiskey to a pregnant lady.”

“Hey, I could have said no.” She passed him back the silver flask and gave a little sigh.

He watched her for a moment, and simply seeing the content look on her face ate away at his long-harbored bitterness. Finally, he smiled. “Congratulations, Al. I’m really glad you’re happy.”

She looked back at him and realized that he genuinely meant it. With a small smile of her own, she leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek.

“Thanks for coming, Lew.”

“I wouldn’t have missed it for the world. Even if that meant leaving Laura at home. Oh, that reminds me, I should probably go find her, before she remembers how much she doesn’t want to be here.”

Chuckling, Alice watched him go with the painful realization that she might never see him again. Her heart ached at the thought of not being able to enjoy the company of these men every day, as she had for the better part of the last three years, but seeing them all with their family, their girlfriends and their wives, she couldn’t help but feel excited for the next chapters of their lives. Glancing over at her new husband, she caught his gaze and smiled, looking forward to the next chapter of her own.

Lewis found his fiancée chatting with Dick and the man’s long-time love, Ethel. Laura smiled brightly as he approached, and he quickly put on his own most convincing smile in return. As he listened in to the conversation, his arm draped around his bride-to-be, he looked around at the crowd of guests, glancing back every now and then to assure his interest in what was being said, laughing when the conversation called for it. He finally spotted Alice talking to Bill Guarnere, George Luz, Donald Malarkey and Buck Compton, the bride holding their rapt attention as she smoked a cigarette and grinned as she retold some story from their time in Europe. Even in her wedding dress, made up like a Hollywood starlet, she still managed to stand like an officer addressing their troops, and that was how he decided he wanted to remember her; not as the blushing bride of Ronald Speirs, but as the woman who had managed to capture a town with only a handful of men on D-Day; the woman who always managed to have a smile just for him.

#band of brothers #bob #band of brothers fanfiction #lewis nixon #ronald speirs #hbo war

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softguarnere · 2 years ago

Text

Like A Girl (Like A Man)

Shifty Powers x OFC

Chapter Three: Brother in Three Languages

Taglist: @latibvles @liebgotts-lovergirl

Summary: Routine may be her downfall after all.

Warnings: mentions of improper chest binding and menstruation, mentions of sickness, and like one cuss word

A/N: *cracks knuckles* Okay folks, settle in for a caveat.

If you've read my one shots in the past, then you know that I'm simply here for a good time, not a 100% historically accurate time. I've never seen a specific mention of exactly which tribe Shifty's family was from, but based on the area that he's from, and the fact that there are people on the Miller Roll with his father's last name and his mother's maiden name, we're gonna make an educated guess and say that they were from the Cherokee tribe for the purposes of this story :)

Also when I tell you that this is a slow burn, I mean sloooooow, so buckle up for miscommunications and all the other fun stuff that comes from having an emotionally illiterate MC

Besides that, as per the usual, this is based on the fictional depictions of from the show - no disrespect to the real life veterans! 💕🕊️

Toccoa, 1942

Finding someone like her was not something that Zenie expected when she imagined running away and joining up. Keeping her distance from the others, maintaining a few polite relations so that she didn’t stick out too much, doing well in her training, but not too well – that had been the plan. Becoming friends with an NCO and his close circle of friends had been a welcome surprise. And befriending Shifty is the kind of surprise that sends a little thrill through her chest. Which has never happened before, but she’s so shocked that she found someone like her – someone who gets it – that she starts to enjoy the way that the sight of him entering a room makes her heart speed up and the way that she can smile so easily around him.

For a plan that relied so much on acting, Zenie feels nothing but natural when she and Shifty spend time together. And considering that so much of her plan relied on lying, most of what she tells Shifty about her life is the truth.

No one has ever understood her in this way before. Not even Bobby, and especially not Beckie. Zenie tells him about her father, the stern son of Irish immigrants, and Mama, the beautiful Cherokee woman who gave Zenie her dark hair and eyes. Then there’s Matthew, who, even though he was adopted, was the best older brother she could have asked for, and Marilyn, the fashionable older sister. It’s nice to talk to someone who knows what her family is like. Comforting, even. Especially when their conversations turn towards the mountains and what it’s like to grow up in the hollows of Appalachia.

Someone finally feels the way that Zenie does about so many things. All those times that she spent feeling lonely in her room, feeling as if her own life were suffocating her, wondering if there was more to the world, and if there was a place where she belonged in it – they all feel like a distant memory now. Since arriving in Toccoa, she has never asked herself those same forlorn questions and has never felt that hollow ache in her chest. She doesn’t have to, because her questions have been answered.

There is a place where she feels like she belongs. There are people who understand her. There is more to life than working at the diner and cleaning the house.

But that life is for Thomas. Would it still be open to her if she had entered this new world as Zenie?

Time flies by with only occasional letters from Bobby to remind her of the life she left behind and the turning of the leaves to signal the change in season. Most of Toccoa’s days are marked with memories – funny things that Luz has said, runs where she beats Toye up Currahee on their runs.

Of course, Zenie has changed, just like the leaves. Mentally, yes, but physically too as she grows stronger, her muscles more toned, faster. She likes these changes. Aside from the extra weight on her chest, she feels like she has nothing to hide – if not for her carefully bound breasts, she would be free to show of her physique like her friends. And certain other changes have certainly come in handy; she finds herself thanking a God that she’s not sure she believes in when her menstrual cycle ceases due to the rigorous training and stress of life at Camp Toccoa.

The health sponges she managed to shove into her mattress to avoid detection during inspections become one less thing to worry about. Every other aspect of maintaining her identity still causes a fresh wave of panic to roll over her at a moment’s notice, though.

Routine, she thought when she first arrived at the camp, would be her savior. She manages to shower after everyone else. She finds excuses to visit the latrine at different times. She tries not to stiffen when her friends give her a slap on the back after running Currahee, hoping that they won’t feel the bandages beneath her PT clothes, and that they’ll attribute her labored breathing to her shorter legs making her work harder to keep up with them, instead of the fabric pinching her ribs suffocating her. In the mornings, she’s up bright and early to sneak off, bandage her chest, and change clothes before anyone can notice that anything is amiss.

Except people are noticing.

“You performance shy or somethin’?”

Zenie pauses, the door of the barracks half closed behind her, allowing a slat of early morning sunlight to cut through the long room, helping to wake the rest of Easy Company as they slide out of their bunks and begin their day. She clicks the door shut before turning to the man standing by one of the first bunks, staring at her with curious eyes that she could swear see right through her disguise.

“What?”

Joseph Liebgott only shrugs. Brown eyes flick up and down over her, like a light switch flipping. “You’re up before everyone else, and you never change in the barracks. Not sure I’ve ever seen you in the showers, but you’re always clean . . .”

Zenie lets out a half-hearted laugh, feeling like she’s choking on it as more men turn their attention to her. “Why are you lookin’ for me in the showers, Lieb?”

A few snorts from those nearby and a blush running across Liebgott’s face allow Zenie to escape relatively unscathed. Routine may be her downfall after all.

She tries to be careful – even more careful – after that. The only other time that someone gives her so much as a raised eyebrow or a questioning glance comes from Shifty, of all people.

It happens on a Saturday. He, Zenie, and Bill are sprawled between the beds and the small tables between them, abandoning their half-hearted game of cards to reminisce about their past lives and rant about Sobel – who’s the entire reason they’re even in the barracks instead of out on the town with everyone else. Damned weekend passes.

At some point in the conversation, they realize that they all have a real talent for languages. Bill knows Italian, and Shifty and Zenie both speak Cherokee. The languages of their ancestors start to pepper themselves into the conversation as they talk about home – that natural association between home as a place and language as the thing that makes it feel like home to begin with.

Bill is convinced that being able to speak to each other in combat without other people being able to understand them could be helpful at some point. Their own secret code. When it happens, he’s trying to teach them Italian, and they’re trying to teach him Cherokee.

He flips a card between his fingers. “Here’s a good one: Fratellino.” He gestures towards Zenie when he says it. When she raises her eyebrows and shakes her head, he taps the card against the table. “Little brother. Tu sei il mio fratellino.”

“You are my little brother,” she guesses. She should have been able to guess that one, based on how often Bill refers to her as the little brother of the group. One time after PT when they were roughhousing, she overheard Lieutenant Nixon tell Lieutenant Winters that he was going to start calling her Thomas Guarnere because of how close she stuck to her friend.

“You got a brother, don’t ya?” Bill tilts his head. “You don’t talk about home as much as the rest of us. Or as fondly, at least.”

She nods, a lump in her throat and words from one of Bobby’s letters flashing across her memory. Saw your parents yesterday. Your brother was home on leave – first time since you left. He seemed real worried about you.

“Yeah. Matthew.”

“How would you say that he’s your brother?”

“In Tsalagi or Italian?”

He shrugs. “Either one.”

“Matthew è mio fratello, for you. But I would say Matthew agido’i.”

It happens so quickly that she can’t even be sure it actually occurred. Later, she’s convinced that she imagined it, but she could swear that Shifty stiffens beside her, that his eyebrows furrow slightly as he throws her a confused glance. Before anything more can happen, Bill smiles at her.

“Matteo, in Italian, but you’re right! Geez Tommy, you’re good at this. Maybe we outta send you into intelligence with Lieutenant Nixon.”

Whatever reason for pause that she gave Shifty, Bill doesn’t seem to notice it. Shifty never brings it up, never casts her another curious look, so she doesn’t press the issue. And she tries not to question why her friend’s glance makes her feel like there are butterflies in her chest.

It all happens so unexpectedly that she thinks she now knows how Icarus felt the minute that the wax melted off his wings and he started to plummet back to Earth.

“You know, next time I see the dear ol’ Captain, I may just have to fall at his feet and thank him,” Luz chirps over the sounds of the crowded mess hall.

“That’s probably just what he wants,” Toye says. “Maybe he finally got the hint that nobody likes him. He’s just trying to get on our good sides.”

Luz pushes his garlic bread through the spaghetti sauce on his plate, his usual smile even brighter than usual. “Spaghetti and afternoon lectures indoors? I would say that it’s working, my friend.”

It’s clever, actually. Sobel can’t appeal to them sensitively like Lieutenant Winters can, so he’s decided to appeal to them through their appetites instead. After all, everyone knows that the fastest way to men’s hearts is through their stomachs.

Maybe the same can be said for Zenie. The sounds of silverware scraping against plates and laughter come together to form a symphony of camaraderie that elevates the spirits of the mess hall. She’s half focused on her spaghetti, and half focused on casually knocking against Toye every so often as they jokingly fight over a piece of extra garlic bread. Still, something holds her back from fully releasing herself to the good mood that everyone else is swept up in. In her world, benevolent acts from tyrants usually aren’t without some sort of price. Even if Sobel isn’t intentionally expecting them to pay some sort of price for today’s uncharacteristically kind gesture – which she seriously doubts – she wouldn’t be surprised if they all somehow unintentionally got food poisoning, just so the universe could balance out the score once more.

A forkful of noodles is halfway to her mouth when Guarnere jostles her from behind as he takes a seat at the next table, squeezing in beside Perconte as the other Italian comments on the quality of the food.

“Oh come on, Gonorrhea! As a fellow Italian, you should know that callin’ this crap spaghetti is a mortal sin!” Perconte insists above the din.

A few people down the bench from her, another paratrooper turns and makes a grab for Perconte’s plate. “If you don’t want it, I’ll have it.”

“No, no, no, I’m eatin’ here!” A sharp elbow to the ribs nudges the paratrooper back into his seat.

Bill jabs his own elbow at him. “Hey, get outta here!”

All the jostling is just enough to loosen Zenie’s grip on her garlic bread. Toye laughs as he takes it, shoving it into his mouth before she can protest. On both the old instinct of being the youngest sibling and her new instinct of reacting the way a boy would, she’s about to shove him and call him a dirty name, but the shrill scream of a whistle cuts her off.

Loud footsteps and long strides usher Captain Sobel into the mess hall. “Orders have changed! Get up!”

Silverware clatters and all the joking voices from a moment before fizzle out, like water dropped on hot cement – there one second, gone without a trace the next.

“Lectures are cancelled!” Captain Sobel bellows as he strides down the path between the tables. “Easy Company is running up Currahee!” Everyone collectively hangs their heads or grimaces, but no one dares make even so much as an audible sigh. “Move! Move!”

The sudden orders leave no room for routines or careful planning. They leave her absolutely nowhere to hide. Her stomach has turned into an ocean caught in the middle of a hurricane – the kind of storm that takes people’s livelihoods and leaves no survivors. Never in all her time at Toccoa has Zenie felt genuine fear course through her veins. Not during combat training. Not during her interactions with the other men. Not the thought of jumping out of a plane. But there’s a first time for everything.

Captain Sobel’s cries of “Three miles up! Three miles down! Hi ho Silver!” feel like taunts aimed directly at her.

Luckily, Zenie is wearing her white PT shirt under her ODs. Everyone is in such a rush that she hopes the rest of the company will change and be out the door before her. She can always catch up to them as they head to the base of the mountain. But her friends are determined that no man should be left behind.

“Come on Tommy!” Guarnere urges as Zenie steps behind her bunk and faces the wall, trying to slide into her shorts as quickly as she can. People are rushing by her so quickly that no one seems to notice that her proportions are different than their own.

The next thing that she knows, she and her friends are packed together, elbows knocking into each other as they join the rest of the company. Usually there’s more space to run, but everyone seems determined to stick close together, not wanting to risk being left behind.

Despite how close they all are, Sobel somehow manages to squeeze in between them, throwing taunts and insults at them between the sounds of all the retching, wheezing, and puke splattering on the trail.

“You’re a washout Private Hoobler! Looks like Gordon’s gone! Aren’t you Gordon?” Zenie feels his presence over her shoulder just as a wave of nausea rolls over her, causing her to stumble slightly as her stomach jolts. Stars dance across her vision as the bandages pinch her ribs, never letting her lungs expand enough to get the air they so desperately crave. “Private Driver is too short to keep up on a good day, and look at him now! If you struggle this much in Georgia, how do you expect to keep up in Germany?”

Just like some of the other men, she could puke. If she times it correctly, maybe she could make sure it hits Sobel’s shoes. That would teach him a lesson.

A few men ahead of her, Luz’s voice rings out. “We fall upon the risers, we fall upon the grass!”

“We never land upon our feet, we always hit our ass!” The rest of the company joins in. It’s not like the good time crowd back in the mess hall only moments ago, but it’s amazing how one can feel the spirit of camaraderie unite them as they join in the song, pumping their arms and legs with renewed vigor as they scale the mountain.

Zenie chokes down bile and joins in as she pushes past Sobel. “Heidy deidy, Christ Almighty, who the hell are we?”

By some miracle, the song carries her the rest of the way up Currahee, and then another miracle brings her back down the mountain without losing her lunch or falling on her face – both things that she has to concentrate on harder than ever. Everyone is so exhausted by the time they reach the base of the mountain that no one notices Zenie as she stumbles off towards the latrine.

She doesn’t quite make it. Instead, her legs give out behind one of the bunk houses and she collapses there, balancing on her knees and one hand and she tries to loosen her bandages through her shirt. The wood of the building is surprisingly cool as she leans her forehead against it, hiding herself away from the rest of the world of men as she works through her own body betraying her.

A few times, late at night while staring at the ceiling, she finds herself worrying about being shot and the medics and nurses discovering her secret as they try to save her. She didn’t expect to find herself feeling like death while still in camp – and she definitely doesn’t expect the soft hand on her back that starts to rub soothing circles as she tries to catch her breath.

She recoils from the touch, but there’s no way that whoever has appeared behind her hasn’t noticed the bandages. There’s nothing she can do about that, except maybe try to explain it away when she manages to breathe without seeing entire constellations again. What’s one more lie at this point?

The person behind her continues rubbing circles on her back. “Here,” a soft voice says, gently pressing something familiar into one of her hands. “Will this help?”

Between her gasps and the churning sensation in her stomach, Zenie feels hot tears prick at her eyes as she accepts what he hands her without a fight.

That’s the moment that she knows she’s been found out: the minute she realizes that someone has just handed her a health sponge.

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