HOME IS WHERE THE HEART IS
November 11, 1918 was the day that the war ended. At exactly 11 am, the firing stopped, the guns put down, even though the ringing in my ears continued on.
The silence was eerie, unnatural, and surreal. I longed for noise to fill it. Then the realisation hit me; I was alive, I had survived. I was going home; I was going home to my Isabella. I had kept every letter she sent me while I was here. Just the thought of her brought a smile to my lips.
I tried to remember they way her voice sounded but I couldn't. I closed my eyes to remember what hers looked like, but instead of seeing her large chocolate brown doe eyes all I could see were explosions and dead bodies.
"We did it buddy, we're going home!" Emmett yelled at me and Jasper. I've been friends with Jasper and Emmett since we were kids and we were lucky that we ended up in the same unit and even luckier that we had survived.
"Back home to our girl's." Jasper replied.
While on the outside they seemed okay, I knew on the inside they were like me. You couldn't close your eyes without seeing what we had, the feeling of never being clean, feeling what it's like to lose many of your buddies and seeing them die or being injured. But I, we, tried not to think of that as we pulled into the dock to get off the ship.
We didn't stay on deck to wave to the crowd; we waited below so we could get off quicker. We grabbed our bags and patted my pocket to make sure that the small box was still in there.
We walked off, one behind the other and started searching for our parent's and our girl's, but there were so many people I didn't know how anyone was going to find who they were looking for. We walked through the crowd, some cheering, other thanking and patting us on the backs. What they were thanking us for I'm not sure, because all we did was survive.
I stopped for second to have a quick look round but in that second I lost Jasper and Emmett. Not long afterwards I heard Emmett's booming voice over the roar of the crowd, somewhere over a speaker system someone was calling out names of the fallen. I had fought along side some of these men and even though I may not have known them it was sad to lose anyone.
I followed Emmett's voice. I found him and Rosalie along with Jasper and Alice embracing each other, my Isabella looking the other way giving them privacy. I had the biggest smile on my face just from seeing the back of her head.
"Isabella, what are you thinking?" I called out to her. Her head shot up at the sound of her name. Slowly she turned, her hair flying around her as her head whipped around. She was more beautiful than I remembered.
"Edward!" She ran towards me and jumped into my arms as I dropped my bag. Her lips crashed into mine. Her kisses are much better than what I remembered.
We were panting as we broke apart.
"I missed you so much and I love you more than I can say." She was my only reason for coming home alive, apart from my parents; I couldn't stand the thought of her being with another man.
"I love you, too Edward."
"Never leave my sight again."
"And how do you propose we I that?" she asked.
"By doing exactly that." And I dropped to one knee and pulled the box out of my pocket. "I've wanted to ask you for a long time, will you marry me, Isabella?"
"Yes, yes a hundred times yes." I stood up and placed the ring on her finger where it would stay forever.
I knew that she was going to say yes, we had been talking about marriage since before I left, but hearing her confirm it now...the feeling was undescribable.
"Congratulations, buddy." Jasper said, patting me on the back.
"Thanks."
"Thanks Edward, you've now got the idea in her head. She'll want me to propose now." Emmett said gesturing to Rosalie.
"Well do it before she nags you about it." I pulled my bag over my shoulder and took Isabella's hand and pulled her away from her friends.
"I think we need some alone time, what do you think?" she blushed at my question, which reminded me... She nodded in answer and we moved quickly through the crowd of reunited couples and families and those grieving over lost sons, brothers, fathers.
When we were finally away from the crowd...
"You didn't tell me, what were you thinking?" I asked her.
"I thought that you weren't coming out of that ship alive." She closed her eyes and tilted her head down. "I thought you were dead." A tear slipped down her cheek.
I wiped it away with my thumb and lifted her head back up.
"Shh...It's okay. I'm alive and well and a bit hurt that you would think that I wasn't coming home to you. I told you that I would and I'm here now." More tears escaped her eyes. I brought her body to mine and wrapped my arms around her petite frame as even more tears wracked her body.
"I was so scared, Edward. I love you so much, you can't ever leave me again."
"I won't, I promise." And this time when I closed my eyes I saw our future of me coming home to her while she was cooking dinner and looking after our children. Our children. I couldn't wait.
LEST WE FORGET