You and Me Always.
Alright, so I just wanted to let you all know that I'm tweaking the chapters a little. I've gone and read it all again (I know) and I just wanted to change some things. I hope you'll still enjoy reading it. Please also note before reading, the surname is pronounced D'LACEY, it's a variation of spelling. The forename is my own take on the alternate spelling of the Greek goddess' name Eileithyia alternatively spelt Ilithyia, and pronounced as IH L IH TH Y AH. Sorry for the lecture!
This is also the rewritten version. I personally like it a lot better now that the main narrators are Thea and Malarkey. The chapters are more or less the same, there are bits in it that have only had the tense changed, and there are some that have been totally revamped. Some chapters have been added in, and what was chapter two is now chapter three.
I hope you enjoy this version better than the old one! Please R&R!
You Knock Me Off My Feet
My name is Thea D'Lasey; Aelythiea Aurora Berengaria D'Lasey, if we're being exact. I am 5 feet 3 inches tall. I come from a family of Irish immigrants. I was born, in my parent's bedroom on the 6th of June and I lived in the same cottage for all but two years of my life. It sat on the coast of Cornwall, England, and my bedroom over looked the sea. Every night, I went to sleep by the sound of the rolling waves, and every morning I'd wake up and gather the heather that grew around the house for my mum.
I had a brother, three years younger than me. My dad owned an Irish pub in the centre of Newquay and my mum would often take my brother and I in to see him. Aside from his wife and us two kids, the pub was his pride and joy, and when I came back from college, at 18, I worked behind the bar. I knew all the regulars there.
My mum, from the moment I could bang on things, taught me every day, how to play the piano. I practised and practised, sometimes with her, mostly without her, until I could play by ear anything that I wanted or heard. I would play while she read. We both loved that. My favourite songs to play were La Cygne, Clair de Lune, The Heart Asks Pleasure First from the movie The Piano, the Peer Gynt suit – In the Hall of the Mountain King by Grieg, several songs from the Studio Ghibli movie collection and (strangely) Perpetuum Mobile by the Penguin Café Orchestra.
I loved to sing, I did Irish dancing, ballroom and ballet; for my eighteenth birthday my dad paid for me and my mum to go and see The Nutcracker ballet in London. It was my favourite.
My hair was long and a dark chocolate colour that sometimes grew lighter in colour, and often-times I would wear it up in a ponytail, or a bun, and sometimes I would do it like Veronica Lake or in victory rolls. My granddad used to love the old films and would tell me I looked like Veronica Lake. I didn't mind; she was my idol. He used to say my eyes were his favourite thing about me and would call me Bambi because I had the doe eyed look, next to my smile. They were shaped like rounded almonds and the lavender colour of my iris' surprised everyone when they noticed. Apparently it was a gene mutation that caused that and my high metabolism.
My height would often trick people into thinking that I wasn't very tough or couldn't look after my own, but they'd be surprised to learn that I was, in fact, very good at martial arts and very strong. The high kicks I was especially good at, thanks to the fact that I did ballet and I could hold one of my legs in the air for a while before it got tired, which was just long enough for them to realise that they shouldn't have doubted me.
I only had two friends, Danielle 'Elle' or 'Ellie' Toya and Taylor Roebuck. I had met them a week after I had come back from college. They had come over from America, to visit the place that their grandfathers had been posted to during the war. The two girls had come alone and were totally lost. It took a day before we became almost inseparable. When they had to go back, Taylor would go to Elle's and they would call me on a Friday night and we spoke for as long as we could. They made frequent visits to come and see me and would stay at our house, and I'd go and see them too, staying at Elle's house.
Elle was the oldest out of the three of us, being 21 when we first met. She was also the tallest, at 5'6. She was slim, with a warm, summer tan, from living out in California, by the sea and had bright blonde hair that she kept in a bob and later, a pixie cut. Elle was quite motherly, sort of what you'd expect from the eldest, and had an elegant air around her, when she walked or spoke. Always tried to be the mature one, but usually ended up getting in on our shenanigans. She was the voice of reason, when Taylor and I began to squabble like two brothers.
Taylor was a bit of a tomboy. While she was just a month older than I was, she loved football (the British kind), played hockey and basketball, while I was more arty. She was taller than me, at 5'5 but wasn't as fast or as agile as I was, since I was smaller and danced I was more fleet footed.
She always cracked the rudest and funniest jokes, and had the three of us laughing till 3 in the morning.
Her hair was a bit of a contrast to her personality. You'd expect her to have short hair, but it was actually quite long and she wore it down, in ruffled waves, unless she was playing sports.
I was happy. I was loved. That was my life and I wouldn't have had it any other way.
I was 20 years old when I died.
"Thee, if you keep zoning out like that, you're going to end up getting hurt." Elle's motherly voice called me out of my day dreaming state. I looked behind me in a daze, not really having heard what she had said, as I carried on walking.
"What did you- oof!" I yelped, half way through my question, as I collided with something far taller than myself and caused the two of us to fall down.
The person that I'd bumped into, was barely able to stop themselves from falling completely on top of me; their knee landed between my legs, hands at either side of my hips and their mouth just millimetres away from mine. I could already feel an incredible blush on my cheeks, and it only seemed to grow hotter when I saw who it was I'd bowled over.
I wasn't very tall to start out with, but Donald G Malarkey towered over me. He was around 6 feet tall and I barely made it to 5'3.
His warm brown eyes stared into my lavender ones for a little while, embarrassed and surprised. My long, chocolate hair had been up in a loose, high ponytail, and as I'd fallen, a shorter strand from my fringe, had fallen out and had settled itself across my nose. Malarkey's warm breath tickled my lips as he looked at me and my stomach began twisting into nervous knots.
I'd not really spoken to him much; it was only when I was with Danielle and Taylor that I'd actually been in close proximity to him, unless I passed Skip and his friend Alexander 'Penk' Penkala on my way to and from the mess hall and I stopped to say hello how are you. Even then we didn't really talk. He just kept quiet, like a shy little boy, looking everywhere but at me. Not that I made anything better, since I did the exact same.
"Well would you look at that," an amused voice came from behind Malarkey, and Skip's torso and head came into view, "They're falling for each other already."
Malarkey quickly turned around and told his friend to shut up, a blush spreading across his face the whole time.
"You're hilarious." I dead-panned, while Malarkey rose to his feet. The red head dusted himself off, before he held out his hand to me. I took it and allowed him to help me up, my stomach once again forming knots at the physical contact.
Like I had said before, I had seen him around, but not spoken. He did, however, seem like a nice guy. He was tall, cute and youthful, with brown eyes that looked like warm pools of melting chocolate and incredibly bright orange hair. I'd noticed he could be a little bit sarcastic, but I could be too, so I didn't mind.
"I told you to stop zoning out." Taylor smirked, crossing her arms over her chest, as she looked on. I replied to her smirking face, with a frown of disbelief.
"No you didn't, Elle said that."
"Yeah well, I thought it and it's always the thought that counts."
Elle rolled her eyes at the two of us, and came to stand by Skip.
"I'm sorry, by the way. I didn't mean to knock you over." I apologised sheepishly, tugging on my ear lobe, "I wasn't really paying attention."
Malarkey shyly smiled back, looking at me with a blush, as he rubbed the back of his neck, "It's alright, neither was I."
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Taylor and Elle sharing a knowing look. Our group talked for a little while, before Elle remembered that we were supposed to go and collect our new uniforms from the stores.
We watched the three of them walk away, before we turned to leave. Taylor began to tease me about Malarkey, but I didn't take the bait and rolled my eyes instead. It was at that moment, that I noticed something lying on the floor. I turned my head towards it and noticed that it was a garrison cap. Figuring that Malarkey must have dropped it when I knocked him over, I picked it up and told Elle I was going to return it to its owner.
"Alright, we'll grab your uniform and boots for you. Don't be late back."
Nodding my in acknowledgement, I set off in the direction that I'd last seen the handsome soldier head in.
Jogging in the general direction that I'd last seen them walk in, I looked around, hoping to catch them before they disappeared into their cabin, since I didn't know which one it was. It was no use. I'd had to have been looking around for 10 minutes and I'd not been able to find him. As I started back to the hut I shared with Elle and Taylor, deciding it was best to ask them where their hut was to go looking again after I'd changed, I heard some voices as a door opened a few huts away from where I was standing. Suddenly, the man himself walked out of the hut, hurriedly, closing the door as he began to make his way in the same direction as me.
"Hey, Malarkey!" I called out, as I started to jog after him. When he turned around, I saw that he wore an anxious look on his face, and I had been right in thinking that it was his garrison cap that I had found on the floor. He smiled when he saw me, the anxiety that was plastered all over his face seemed to wash off a little bit and he stopped walking.
"Hey Thea." he greeted, as I waved to him.
"I'm glad you walked out when you did, I've been looking all over for you." I beamed up to him. His smile turned into a look of mild surprise.
"Y-you have?"
I nodded, "Yeah, I found your cap on the floor. I thought you must have dropped it when we bumped into each other, so I came looking for you to give it back."
He blushed and rubbed the back of his neck nervously, as I handed his garrison cap back, visibly exhaling in what seemed like relief.
"Thanks, that's awful nice of you." I grinned at him and told him not to worry about it. I was just turning to leave when he quickly said my name to stop me.
"Wait Thea!" I turned back around and looked at the man curiously, waiting for him to continue. "I was wondering..."
"Yes?"
"Well... would you want to...uh" It was like having a conversation with someone in Morse code. "Would you like to get lunch today? I mean if you don't mind… I didn't mean like a, you know, like a date or anything... I meant, you know, sitting with us…"
"Malark, I get it." I laughed, patting his arm. His face lit up and he began to rub his temple.
"I'll meet you at the mess hall?"
"Sounds like a plan." I said, grinning as we parted ways.
Bumping into Malarkey that day seemed almost like a fated meeting. He was like my other half, a friendship soul mate. He and I were almost never apart, we ate together, ran Currahee together, smoked together, we went out drinking and shopping together when we had passes, and the two of us even waited for each other while one showered.
Taylor, Elle and I had all settled into separate groups; Taylor stuck with guys like Denver 'Bull' Randelman, Floyd Talbert and the men's men of the company, while Elle hung out with Skip, the Harvard man David Kenyon Webster and other learned persons. Sink was thinking about sending Elle off for OCS and over time, Taylor and I had been offered promotions, but we declined. We didn't want that responsibility. We still spent most of our free time together, still walked together on the night marches and when we did the assault course we'd do that together too, since we'd be able to help each other out.
One evening, before our night march, I was late getting a shower, since I'd not been able to clear the wooden wall the first try, Sobel had made me do it all over again. I'd heard from Elle and Taylor, when I went to get my toiletries from our cabin, that the Black Swan had also made Malark run Currahee again, because he was the last man up this time.
When I reached the shower block, I listened out to see if I could hear the showers going, but I couldn't hear anything, so I figured it was safe for me to go in. Oh how wrong I was.
As I walked in, it was all quite. Then I heard a low hum, and as I turned a corner, there stood my best friend, in the process of removing his clothing. I stopped in my tracks, as I watched his muscles in his shoulders and back flex when he took off his olive drab army vest.
In my awed state, I forgot that I was holding my shower things, and my bar of soap dropped and skidded across the floor. I inwardly cursed, as I tried to sneak over to retrieve it. Malarkey whipped his body around to see what the noise was, obviously not anticipating anyone else to be in there with him, let alone see me half bent over, picking up a bar of soap.
"Thea?" his sweet voice questioned, as I winced, embarrassed.
"Hello." I replied, standing up straight, with the wincing expression still on my face. My entire body felt like it was suddenly engulfed in flames when I saw his sculpted body, glistening with sweat. Oh shit.
"What are you doing in here?" he slowly asked me, turning around fully.
I gave him the same, 'you're really asking that' look that I gave to Frank Perconte, when he said something stupid. Which was a lot.
"Oh just having a meeting with the Drain Monster, what do you think I'm doing here, covered in mud?"
"I don't know, the way you were trying to sneak around, maybe you were hoping to peep on me. Pervert."
"Only in your wildest, most hopeless dreams."
Malark smiled his sweet smile at me, and shook his head.
"Alright very clever."
The two of us stood looking at each other, before we awkwardly remembered that he was undressing for the shower and I'd walked in.
"Oh uhm, I'll.. I didn't mean to ah... yeah." I awkwardly announced, pointing, with a blush, to the exit.
"You're going to leave?" he asked me, innocently.
"Well, yeah? I can't really stay while you shower."
"But don't you need to shower too?"
I paused. The man had a point.
"Well, yeah, but I'm not going to do it while you're here!"
"But then I'll have to wait to make sure no one comes in to get you."
"Get me?"
He pulled a face, "Look, why don't you go to the far end? I won't look, I promise."
"Are you sure?" I raised my eyebrows at him, but he just rolled his eyes.
"Yes, I'm sure, now will you hurry up, we could have been in and out of the shower by now." He huffed, "Goddam pain in my ass."
