by Alexa Kang
He couldn't stay in Paris. He couldn't be here, enjoying his life when they were all dead. He could not let them die in vain.
He had to go back. The Allies had to win this war, or all of them would have died for nothing. He had to do everything he could to help win the war.
Above all, he had to get Klaus. For Warren. For Jesse.
His mind made up, he got off the bus at the stop closest to the USO headquarters, where he went to write Tessa a letter. When he finished, he gave it to a staff administrator for delivery to her at the hotel, and left for the train station for the next train back to the Vosges.
The train would not arrive until 0600 hours the next morning. Anthony lay down on the wooden bench on the platform to catch some sleep. Deep into the night, the temperature dropped to freezing point. He shivered and pulled his jacket tighter. There was an inn nearby the station, but he didn't want to go. What was a little cold compared to what happened to the ones who had died? Anyway, by now, he was used to being outside in the winter. All he wanted was for the train to arrive to take him back to where he could pay back what he owed everyone.
Off and on through the night, he thought of Tessa. How could he carry on with her without regard for Jesse? Every time he thought of her, he felt like he had wronged Jesse.
He kept seeing Tessa happy in Jesse's arms. Jesse kissing her. Jesse walking away with her. The troubling images kept him awake, and he twisted and turned on the bench, unable to reconcile all the conflicting thoughts battling in his mind. The few hours' sleep that he did have were plagued by dreams. Dreams of all those who were now gone. Dreams of people and faces he could not forget.
Alone in the hotel room, Tessa lay on the bed, holding her angel amulet close to her face. Anthony was gone. Yesterday, while she was lost in grief, he had left the hotel and didn't come back. He didn't say goodbye. All he had left behind was a short letter he had sent from the USO headquarters.
Dear Tessa,
I am returning to the front. I owe it to Jesse to get the man who killed him. I will not rest until I get Klaus. Jesse deserves you a hundred times more than I do. If I can win him justice, and I know that he can rest in peace, maybe then, we will be able to get on with our lives. I can see now that you care greatly for him. I will do everything I can to avenge him for you. Maybe then, I will be truly worthy of your love.
— Until then, Anthony
Tessa left the message on the table after she had read it. She didn't care to read it again. Anthony. How stupid. How could he think he was not worthy of her love?
She clutched her angel amulet tighter. Tears fell from the corners of her eyes, soaking the pillow beneath her face.
Will you miss me?
"Yes. Yes, I miss you. I miss you very much."
Jesse couldn't hear her.
Life. How fragile it was. Gone. Like the wind, Jesse was gone. To another side where she couldn't see and couldn't touch. The dead and the living, separated by an invisible wall through which no one could pass.
Why did fate have to play this cruel trick on them? Why did she and Jesse have to meet when she was already in love with Anthony? How was she supposed to feel now, knowing how deeply Jesse had loved her? Could she have done more for him when he was alive?
Jesse was so alone. So misunderstood. She knew in her heart that she was his only true friend. If only time could turn backward. She wished she could go back in time to tell him he was not alone. She wished she could tell him that she, at least, understood him and cared about him. It was all too late now.
What about Anthony?
Anthony.
"If I wasn't here, could you have fallen in love with him?"
Anthony looked devastated when she didn't tell him no.
How could she explain to him that she didn't answer because, when he asked her that question, her memory of her dream the night before had sprung to her mind? She couldn't answer because she remembered that in the dream, she had tried to kiss Jesse. The sudden memory made her pause. She didn't know what to make of it.
But it was only a dream. A stupid dream over which she had no control. After that, she had tried to tell Anthony she loved him, but it wasn't enough. She had hurt him.
"Anthony," she whispered through her tears. He couldn't hear her either.
What if something happened to him? What if he was killed too, and she never had the chance to tell him how much he mattered to her? She didn't want to lose him.
The thought hit her like a lightning bolt. She had to tell him. She had to let him know. She had to write to him. Drawing on all the strength she had, she got up and went to the desk, and began writing.
Anthony,
I am so sorry you had to find out everything about me and Jesse this way. What a burden you must have carried on your way to Paris to deliver the news to me. I can imagine what you must be going through now.
I know nothing I say will change anything in the past. I only ask that you do not doubt me. I don't want to answer the question of whether I could love Jesse if you weren't there, because I don't ever want to be in a world where you aren't there. I chose you. Wherever you are, my heart is yours. It has always been yours. Remember, in Rome? You told me then, whatever happens, don't give up. I'm not giving up on us. I won't give up.
Come back.
I love you. I vow to love you for all eternity.
Come back to me.
— Yours always, before and forever hereafter, Tessa
VII
Part Seven - Kampfgruppe Pfeiffer
22
A troop of three hundred German soldiers, now prisoners of war, marched down the streets. In his jeep, Anthony passed them without giving them a look. The German prisoners to him were but an afterthought. He was after only one man.
Since returning to the Vosges, he had been on a relentless pursuit of Klaus. Following the Seventh Army pushing forward to the German border along the Rhine, he led the Orion strike team and advanced through village after village, searching for the man who was the pillar of the enemy's defense in the south. The man who was responsible for Warren's and Jesse's deaths.
Deep in these mountains, Klaus had left his footprints everywhere. From the propaganda flyers dropped from the sky to the radio broadcasts to the Germans hiding in foxholes on the ground. He called for his troops not to surrender, to take their last stand and fight to their last man. His rallying calls spurred the German troops to keep on with their fanatical resistance.
Beyond the noise and fervor, the German forces had regrouped. The enemy had sent new armies and Panzer units to reinforce their troops along the German West Wall. Known also as the Siegfried Line, the West Wall was a defensive barrier that stretched three hundred and ninety miles from Switzerland to the Netherlands. It was made up of a network of hundreds of interlocking links of pillboxes, trenches, and observation posts, fortified by acres of mines, tripwires, and tank traps.
The West Wall was said to be invincible. No army in history had ever defeated an enemy defending the Vosges.
Undaunted, Anthony pressed on. The West Wall might indeed be invincible, but if he could take down the tallest tree in the mountain, if he could pierce a hole in the wall, it might cause a crack that would lead the wall to crumble. That was why he must get Klaus.
When he did get Klaus, perhaps then, the lives of all those who had died would not be in vain. Perhaps then, he would have finally done enough to be worthy of being alive again.
His driver took him back to the command station, a large open tent in the rear where he spent most of his time now when he was not out on the field. He poured himself a cup of coffee. A cold breeze blew past him, bringing with it flurries of snowflakes drifting in the air.
Back in Chicago, the night of New Year's Eve two years ago, light flurries of snow were dancing in the air when he and Tessa walked along the Michigan Avenue Bridge. That night felt like a lifetime ago.
He took her letter out of his pocket. He had had the letter for two weeks, but he ha
dn't opened it. He wasn't ready. Not yet. If she told him in the letter that she loved Jesse and that she felt any regrets, he didn't know if he could still hold himself together and do what he had to do.
When he got Klaus. When he had repaid Jesse for the sacrifice of his life, and made it up to Tessa for the loss of Jesse, he would go back to her and take back what belonged to him.
Only then.
In the nurses' quarters, Tessa mindlessly sketched the illustration she had made on her notepad while her fellow nurses gathered around a small portable stove to fend off the chilly temperature. One of them noticed her sitting on her cot by herself and called out to her, "Tessa, want to come over here where it's warmer?"
Tessa smiled and politely shook her head. She returned to her drawing. Sketching had become her new pastime. Tyler had suggested it last week when he came by the hospital.
"If you can't paint, why don't you make pencil sketches like me?" he asked her.
"I'm not funny like you. I don't know how to draw humorous comic characters."
"Then draw something serious. Draw something meaningful to you."
She agreed to give it a try. The more she sketched, the more she was hooked. Everything she found difficult to say in words, and all the emotions she felt but could not express, took on tangible forms in her sketches.
She darkened the edge of the horizon over which the sun set on Anzio beach. On the beach, she shaded the tiny silhouettes of the young couple looking out to the sea.
"Look at the sea, Tessa. Look how vast and beautiful it is. What we have ahead is this sea. It won't change. The war can't take it away."
The war can't take it away.
Those were Anthony's words. She had to hold on to these words. She had to believe that no matter what happened in this war, it couldn't take away their love. Having faith in what Anthony himself had said was all she could do to maintain hope after what happened in Paris.
"We have to be like the sea. Try our best and hold on to who we are. The sea, the things that are beautiful, those are what we have waiting for us."
Could they really hold on to who they were? Could they go back to loving each other as they did? She stopped her drawing. Where was Anthony now? Had he received her letter yet? Why hadn't he written back? Did he remember these words that he had told her back in Anzio? She needed to hurry and finish this sketch and send it to him. Maybe it would remind him of all their dreams.
She flipped back to the sketch she had drawn a few days earlier. The sketch was one of Jesse the way she remembered him, dashing and radiant under the evening sun in Rome.
Jesse.
A sharp pain cut through her heart.
Her thoughts were interrupted when Ellie entered with a parcel along with a stack of papers. Mail! The nurses sitting around the portable stove rushed toward Ellie. Everyone hoped they had gotten letters from home. Anxious, Tessa went over to join them. One by one, Ellie distributed the V-mail. Nothing. Nothing for her. No word from Anthony.
Heartbroken, she returned to her cot. In two weeks, it would be Christmas. Last Christmas, they had hoped the war would be over by now. She never imagined that everything would turn out like this.
Ellie came over and asked, "Are you okay?"
Tessa tried to smile, but couldn't.
Ellie sat down next to her. "I heard the war's going very tough for the Seventh Army. I'm sure Anthony has written to you. It's probably just mail delay."
Maybe, but deep inside, Tessa doubted that this was the case.
"Look." Ellie showed her the parcel she had brought with her. "I got a Christmas package from my parents." She opened the parcel. Inside, there were canned meats, salami, cookies, candy, books and magazines, even socks and mittens. An envelope, already opened, lay on top of the goods. Tessa noticed the sender was Aaron Haley. She glanced at Ellie. Ellie's face turned red. Quickly, she moved the goods around in the parcel to conceal the letter. "I asked my folks to send me gifts to pass out to the troops. Why don't we go to Honsfeld? We can give some of these to Tyler and the boys in his medical battalion who are resting there. I bet they'll be thrilled to get some Christmas presents."
Tessa agreed. She could use a diversion, and delighting Tyler and his friends could lift her spirits too. She put away her sketches and notepad, and left with Ellie for Honsfeld, the little village that was the 99th Division's rest center.
Outside the nurses' quarters, the Blade and another soldier drove by in a jeep. They noticed Tessa and Ellie trying to catch a ride and pulled up. "Going somewhere, Lieutenant Graham?" the Blade asked.
"Yes. We need to go to Honsfeld," Tessa said.
"What do you know? We're heading that way. Hop on in."
Tessa climbed into the vehicle. Ellie joined her in the backseat and gave the Blade a nervous smile. Like most of the other nurses, Ellie was uncomfortable around the Blade.
They closed the jeep's door. The driver, a staff sergeant with a small frame and a crew cut, stepped on the gas pedal. Vroom. The jeep's engine propelled the vehicle forward, jerking the passengers out of their seats.
"Sorry," the driver said.
"Don't mind Cohen," the Blade said. "He's still learning to drive."
"I know how to drive. I'm just not driving the Army way. It's counterintuitive, like everything else with the Army." Cohen drove on.
Ellie watched Cohen talk back to the Blade, who was nearly twice his own size. Her expression eased and she relaxed into her seat. "Sergeant Cardozo, Sergeant Cohen, I have candy." She took two chocolate bars out of her parcel. "Would either of you like some?"
"Candy bars?" the Blade laughed. "No thanks, Lieutenant Swanson. But if you have any spirits, we'd take those."
"Oh. No," Ellie said. "I'm afraid I don't have any liquor unfortunately."
While they talked, Tessa stared out at the trees lining the road. The thick forest filled with evergreen trees seemed to be hiding sinister secrets unknown to the human world. The gray gloomy clouds shadowed the eerie mist of fog hanging in the air. The entire scene made her uneasy. She felt isolated. She had an odd feeling that they shouldn't be here.
"Hold it. Stop," the Blade said, his voice cautious.
Cohen stopped the jeep. The Blade remained still as a rock, listening for sounds. They looked around but saw nothing unusual.
"Is something wrong, Sergeant Cardozo?" Ellie asked.
He held up his hand, indicating for her to be quiet. His behavior made Tessa nervous. The Blade had the instincts of a wild animal. He could sense anomalies in his surroundings like no one else.
"Something's not right," he said. "Why are we the only ones here? Where are all the others? There should be 99th vehicles coming up and down these roads."
Tessa's own senses rose in alert. The Blade was right. It had been a while since they had seen other U.S. army vehicles. Honsfeld was only a few miles away. Why wasn't there army traffic coming in and out of that little town?
"Let's go a little further and see," the Blade said. "But get off the main road." He pointed to a dirt trail leading into the forest. "We'll take the back road instead. I want to see what's going on."
"We're going in there?" Cohen said, about to make a joke, but thought better of it and drove on. Cautiously, he took them onto the dirt road into the forest, where they were less conspicuous. The Blade's eyes darted around in every direction as they moved forward, scanning the area around them like a panther on a hunt. The rest of them fell quiet. Not a sound could be heard except for the low humming of the jeep's engine and the occasional cracks of stones beneath the tires.
"Stop," the Blade said when they came upon an area with a patch of bushes. Cohen halted the jeep. The Blade trained his eyes on the bushes. "Bastard's not shooting. I wonder why." He grabbed his rifle. "Stay here." He told everyone, then got out and headed toward the bushes aiming his rifle, ready to shoot.
Holding her breath, Tessa watched him. As far as she could see, there was nothing in the bushes. Everything was quiet and still.
>
"Come on out, hands up," the Blade said, still aiming his rifle.
Lightly, the bushes swayed. Tessa's heart skipped. Ellie jumped in her seat and she grabbed Tessa's hand.
"Don't shoot." A voice whimpered from behind the bushes. "Please...don't shoot."
Tessa recognized the voice before she was able to see the person in hiding. "Blade! Don't shoot!"
His gun still pointing at the direction of the voice, the Blade held his fire. A figure emerged slowly from behind the bushes. "Don't shoot. It's me! It's me!"
"Tyler!" Tessa shouted and jumped out of the car. Ellie and Cohen, too, followed.
Tyler rose with his arms up. Tessa could hardly recognize him with all the dirt and mud smeared on his face and uniform. The Blade lowered his rifle.
"Tyler!" Tessa ran up to him and grabbed his arm. "Tyler, what happened?"
Tyler fell to his knees and sobbed. "They're gone. My entire company's gone." His voice was shaking so badly, it was hard to make out his words. "The Nazis came and killed everyone."
They listened to him, stunned.
"It was so early. The sky was still dark. I was with a buddy of mine from infantry. He was on guard duty on the first watch. I stayed up to keep him company. We saw a tank and a formation of men moving in, but they were moving so slow, we couldn't make out who they were. We called the company HQ but all the lines were jammed and we couldn't get through. Then daylight broke and we started to see what was happening. They weren't just Wehrmacht soldiers. They were Nazis." He broke down again. Tessa knelt down and put her hand on his back. Her touch calmed him and he stopped crying.
"They moved into the entire village," he went on. "We didn't see them coming. They came into the town from every direction. There were Panzers and SS troops on every street, every entrance, every road. They had paratroopers dropping down too. I don't know where they all came from. I don't know how they got to Honsfeld without us finding out. Honsfeld's supposed to be miles from the front line. The Nazis snuck up on us at night, and then they were everywhere. Everywhere."
