Tu sais que je t'aime

1.

Renée Lemaire, coughing, crawled out of the ruins of what used to be a church/hospital. After the hours she'd spent there, the days and months filled with labour and blood, it had felt a little bit like home.

Her arm was dislocated and she could hardly see because she had blood pouring out of a big gap across her forehead. Her left arm and legs were covered with gashes. But despite all of this she thought she got off very lucky.

"Merde!" She yelled tripping over a giant piece of rock. A part of the church tower.

All she could think was: How will I get out of here – and where will I go to? It was obvious that she could just quit the army, could she? But what of her family? Would they think she was dead now?

First things first, she commanded herself. Viens à l'hôpital, Renée! Only, where was the hospital she had to get to? The church was abandoned and they must have made a new emergency hospital. At least, she hoped they had. She drew her shivering hand across her forehead and wiped some of the blood away, enough to see.

She saw a soldier slowly walking away, some cloth in his hand. For a moment she thought she recognized him, but she knew she couldn't possibly know him, she hardly knew non-wounded soldiers. And most of those were dead now. Still she cried so that he would hear her. "Hé! Allô! Au secours! Hello! Help!" Yelling partially in English and French, she hoped he would understand. But he didn't hear it.

Someone else did, apparently, she felt how he took her right arm, the dislocated one. The man instantly let go. "I'm sorry, I hurt you. You're lucky to have survived that bang, girl. Come, I'll help you."

"Thank you," Renée whispered.

The soldier carefully lifted her up, holding her by the waist. She grasped his clothes with her left hand. It didn't hurt as much, luckily.

"Easy, girlie," the man said. "You okay?"

"Y-yes." She allowed him to carry her about – honestly: she was glad that he was here to help her. She needed someone to help her, not the other way around, for a change.

While they searched for medical help, he talked randomly in order to take her mind off things.

"So I never properly introduce myself. I'm Dan. Dan Ayers. What's your name?"

"Renée. Renée Lemaire." She found it hard to talk, so she let him ramble on and she just listened to him.

"I'm from the Airborne, y'know, paratroopers. We're in the woods there, but I came here 'cause I got wounded and I was just about to go back to the line when I heard that explosion. So I came back here and found you. Thought that I could at least help you, right? Does it hurt a lot?" he suddenly asked in a concerned fashion.

She shook her head, pretending to be strong. Even that hurt. With every passing second, everything began to hurt more and more.

"Good. But it'll start to hurt soon. You're probably in shock. Guess that's it. Well you should know, you're the nurse. But you're probably too shocked to think 'bout that right now. So where are you from? Big family? Brothers, sisters? What job d'you do before this war? And your parents?"

When she didn't talk he continued. "Well sorry, you probably don't want to talk right now. You're too tired and scared, ain't ya? But we'll soon find you a nice place to sleep, and…"

His words made her doze off. Sleep… To sleep would be heaven. Before Renée knew it, she was sound asleep in the man's arms while he still carried her about in search of a hospital.

Dan walked in building after building, wherever he heard noise. At last he ran into a group of soldiers that knew where he needed to be. They explained him where it was and he took off quickly.

Through another street, through an alley, across the plaza. All he could think about was Renée, safe in his arms, and he wanted to deliver her to an even more safe place.

The new hospital consisted of a couple of roughly set up tents in which doctors and nurses rushed around to help the wounded, the ensemble strategically placed underneath the canopy of a large building to keep it from undergoing the same fate as its predecessor.

He quickly walked inside and stopped a doctor. "Hey, you! She needs medical attention, help her!"

"Well, son, I can't just abandon –"

"You're gonna help her, right now!"

"Just… Lay her down, wherever. Not that there's a lot of room here but –"

Dan didn't even listen but carefully gave Renée a nice place to sleep on. He annexed a spot next to her and curled up to rest, protectively watching her every breath.

When the doctor finally found the time to tend to the girl's wounds, the soldier next to her was fast asleep, a hand softly across her cheek.

Renée woke up, feeling something pressing against her hip.

It was Dan's knee, who was asleep next to her. Surprisingly enough, he had cleared out quite some space around them.

She pushed him away, just a bit further, and looked at herself. Her right arm was tended to, her legs seemed okay, just like her left arm, which she could actually use properly now. Her neck was stiff though, and there was a huge bandage on her forehead. She felt exhausted, but also happy. She had all of her limbs, didn't lose a leg or arm like so many soldiers, so overall, she wasn't severely wounded. She'd been lucky to be out of the way of the explosion.

Dan groaned and opened his eyes. It was quiet for awhile, but then he whispered: "Renée?"

"Mm?"

"You're okay," he stated with some relief in his voice. Then he seemed to draw some reservedness back to his face. "I-I'm glad to see you're okay. Good. Real good. Fine. Yeah."

"Thank you for helping me," Renée said politely.

"You're welcome. No problem. What are you going to do when you're – okay again?" The pause in his voice sounded in her ears as disbelief.

"I'm perfectly fine, Dan. I don't need further healing, or whatever you think I need."

"First time you called me by my name," he grinned. Then he looked serious again. "But that statement coming out of a nurse's mouth," he said. "You should know better."

"It's just some bandage, I can move my arm," she reacted, gesturing at him with her left arm. She shrunk when the pain hit her. Maybe she wasn't as 'ok' as she thought she was – to use Dan's expression. "Merde!"

"What?"

She frowned. "I'm not going to translate that."

"How bad can it be? Everyone here swears all the time…"

"Fine then. It means 'shit'."

"So what, I use words like 'shit' and 'fuck' all the time."

"I don't – normally." That might have been a lie, because she used to cry out 'Merde!' whenever she failed, like that time when E – … Eugene… It was the first time she thought of him since the bombing. She tried to remember his face, but she only caught a vague figure staring at her with anger in his eyes when they'd tried to save that man and failed.

Her face gained a slight red colour and Dan mistook it for shame.

"Now, now, everyone swears, I told you – you don't have to –"

Renée looked up, confused. "What?"

"Never mind. Look, when you're ready to go, I'll take you somewhere safe. Until then, we wait. I'll stay here with you."

"But the line –"

"Fuck the line!" He suddenly shut himself up. "Sorry, I shouldn't swear. Point is, I'll wait till you get better. No arguing."

"Fine then. But don't blame me when someone shoots your best friend."

He stared at her, then murmured: "My god, nursing has really made you stone-hard inside."

Renée broke. She cried. His hand on her shoulder caressing her, comforting her, was too much; she shook it off. "You don't understand. You don't know what it's like. You see soldiers, friends die or get injured or go crazy. Mais mon Dieu! You don't know what it's like to look at them, crying like a child, begging you to save them; and when you cannot… You know you tried but you failed – and that failure is worse than trying. It overrules any thought left in your head. And when failures follow failures, you lose hope and even get lost yourself." She averted her eyes from his face, that begged her for more words, for the exposure of her soul. "Nothing makes you feel…" Her voice faded away. "There are no words to describe it."

Dan tried to comfort her, but his hug hurt her arm and he simply rubber her on the shoulder and rose to leave her to her thoughts ("Maybe you need some time alone, Renée. I'll be right there if you need me.").

The image of Eugene Roe came back, clearly now. His mouth a thin sharp line of disbelief and despair. His eyes dark-filled with the longing to be emotionless. Nostrils widened in anger. Black hair all wet and dirty. It was unfair to Dan, but she knew that Eugene would have understood. He, too, suffered. Despite what he'd said to her, that they got to save lives, she knew that he shared her opinion. Only he might not give up so quickly.

She suddenly thought: I'm weak. I'm weak. I can't give up. Dieu, aidez-moi. God had to help her; he had to. The promise of a hand that had her name written in it, a hand that looked after her and would pick her up if she would fall, out of the depths, convinced her that there had to be something more. And that something could as well be caring.

But Roe wasn't here to care. He wasn't important. Not Eugene, but Dan had been sent to look after her. The faiths had decided to lay her life in another man's hands – maybe for the best.

It took her a few days to recover, but Dan helped her a lot and was determinate to help Renée during her stay in the hospital. He made sure she got enough food and water – not too much, because she didn't want the other patients to suffer. The two of them grew closer and soon they dared confine in each other. Dan told her a lot about his home, his thoughts about this war, his feelings, and she did the same.

Dan's parents were farmers. He had always worked on the farm and had been glad to do so, but when war came and it became more clear that he wouldn't be able to escape it, he realized – like many other paratroopers – that if he had to participate in this war, he could as well be part of the best. And he had learned that that was true; they were the best. He had a little sister, Jane, ten years old, and she was the one person he loved most in the entire world. He also told Renée that he was his parents' hope to continue the farm. With his eighteen years he had a great sense of responsibility and a great strength – both physically as mentally – that his parents missed. They were growing older and needed his help. When he talked about them, there always appeared a small wrinkle on his brow which expressed worry and love, both entangled, and the will to protect them – which, he believed, he could do best fighting Hitler. "Damned Hitler," he said a lot. "If that stupid idiot hadn't gone mad I wouldn't be here, the fucker!" But then again, Renée saw that he was proud of what he did, for wrong or right, with or without Death surrounding him.

Renée, she was a single child. Her parents and grandparents had fled and left Bastogne to go and live with relatives in Paris, since long a liberated city. When she was little she'd gone to school in town and she remembered the announcements on the radio that war was at hand vaguely. Her life had been boring until then. Now it had too much action. She wanted time for herself. Time that Eugene – here he slipped in her mind again – had given her.

She had never spoken to Dan about Roe, and she didn't want to think about him. Not now, not when she could not see him, no longer hear his voice that seemed to shiver sometimes like the wind did, howling in a moonless night. She wanted to forget his handsome face and eyes, blue-green like the North Sea on that one beautiful day she'd gone there with her family, long before the war.

But her family was far away, so was Eugene. It did not matter.

It was on one cold winter night that Dan came to her and asked her if she wanted to go for a walk. She accepted, glad to be away from this hospital for awhile.

They crossed several streets under the pale moonlight and when they passed the church, Dan took her by the shoulder and led her away.

"You don't have to watch it, Renée," he said in an affectionate tone.

"It's fine, Dan," she said. "There are other things troubling me beside that church."

He held still and eyed her closely. "What troubles you?"

"Nothing." Renée continued to walk waved her hand as if she wanted to change the direction their conversation took manually. "Just… Don't worry about it."

Dan followed her but his eyes forced her to watch him. "No, you wanted to say something," he said with the stubbornness she was used to by now. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing, Dan! Merde! Give it a rest!"

"Sorry," he murmured, far from being frank.

"You're not sorry," she said and then ignored him. Her pace quickened and even Dan had trouble following her. The anger she suddenly felt controlled her breathing, steps and thoughts. I will not tell him about Roe, and nothing about my family either. But especially nothing about Roe – what am I saying why is Roe that important – why –

Dan caught up with her. "Renée! What are you hiding? You know you can tell me anyth –"

He stopped when he saw she was crying.

"Renée?" he asked cautiously.

"Leave me alone, Ayers!"

It hurt him that she suddenly used his last name. "Renée…"

As his voice faded away she'd reached a big tree – oak – with a few ripped off branches at the far end of the city. She sat down and stared at him.

He approached, sat down as well, and carefully placed a hand on her shoulder. "Renée? What's the matter?"

She just uttered one word, one syllable: "Roe…"

"Roe?"

"Roe. Eugene Roe."

"As in – a person?"

"Yes."

"What happened? What did he do to you? He did not… hurt you, did he?"

She sniffed and grabbed a handkerchief. After blowing her nose, she said: "No. He didn't do anything. Maybe that's the entire point." She told him the entire story: how Eugene Roe had appeared out of nowhere and controlled her entire world from that moment on, or so it seemed. "He just… it seemed as if nothing else filled my head but his charming smile, his beautiful smile… When he… When the church… was destroyed… I thought I'd lost him, and my family, and… But Roe – I don't know why I think about him all the time – I'm probably boring you. Don't mind me. I know I won't see him again, but I –" She shook her head. "Never mind. It's over. You're my friend now."

She leaned against his chest and Dan protectively placed his arm around her, determinate not to let of her like this Roe had done. He swore to protect her, at all cost. She would never be alone again.