A/N: You are all going to HATE me for what I do here, but I couldn't help it! All I know is that my mother cried when she read this chapter and she hates SA so I can't have messed up too bad!
I stare at him a moment, unable to comprehend what he's saying.
"Oh, Wendla." He wraps his arms around me. "She was making a delivery and got hit by a carriage with no driver."
I'm numb as I say "Is she…"
"She's alive." Melchi replies and his words make my blood run cold. "But not for long."
"I have to go" I hear myself saying and I tear away from him and sprint as fast as I can down the road. I feel out of breath after just a few meters but I don't stop. I have to see her. My heart pounds in my chest as I run, throwing people out of the way until I find the street. There's a large crowd of people gathered around a spot in the road and there's a trickle of dark liquid running down the road. Blood. Dear God, there's blood.
"Get out of the way!" I shriek shoving my way through the crowd, taking advantage of the fact that I'm larger than normal. I finally reach her, and she's lying on her back, with a few coats piled on top of her. A deep cut is etched into her forehead and it's liberally oozing deep red blood. And her eyes are closed.
"ILSE!" I scream and fight off the restraining arms that try to stop me and crouch next to her. "Ilse, wake up." I say desperately, shaking her. Her eyes open slowly and her mouth curves slowly into a small smile.
"Wendla." She murmurs, slowly taking my hand. I clutch it with all my might.
"Ilse, stay with me." I whisper, holding her hand up to my heart. "You're going to be okay."
She shakes her head but her smile still stays. "I hoped I would see her." She says, moving her hand down to my stroke my stomach. "She's going to be beautiful."
I start to sob, the drops landing on my dress and her hand. "No, Ilse, you're going to be okay." I cry.
She puts her hand up to stroke my cheek and a tear escapes her eye and rolls to join the pool of blood. "Wendla, don't worry about me. I'm with Moritz now." She turns her head to look at the darkening sky and begins to sing, a song I heard her sing before. "I believe, all will be forgiven." She suddenly turns back to me with a cheeky smile. "Wendla, do you remember how we all used to play pirates? Me, you Moritz and Melchi?"
I let out another sob and clutch her hand. "I remember."
She lets out a small laugh and turns back up to the sky and finishes her song. "I believe, there is love in heaven… I believe."
Her voice dies away and her eyes shut slowly. I sit up and shake her hand fiercely. "Ilse! ILSE, DON'T GO! ILSE! ILSE, STAY WITH ME! ILSE, DON'T LEAVE! ILSE!" I scream, shaking her more and more, but it's no use. She's gone.
"Come, child, away from there, you're distraught." A hand grabs my arm but I shake it off.
"We have to move the body." A man's voice says, as another hand reaches out to try and lift her up but I lash out.
"DON'T TOUCH HER!" I shout at the man. I lean down to Ilse's face and plant a kiss on her bleeding forehead. "I love you, Ilse." I whisper through my shaking sobs. "I will never forget you." I feel another hand on my shoulder, but I know this hand. I let him guide me to my feet and he pulls me into his arms. I sob uncontrollably into Melchior's shoulders until I taste something metallic in my mouth. Blood. Ilse's blood. Horrified with it, I pull away from him and vomit on the side of the street, shaking with fury and disgust.
"Here." Melchi passes me a wet rag and I wipe my mouth with it. "Come, we should go home. We'll visit tomorrow." He says, taking my hand and leading me away from the crowd.
I try to stop, but the tears keep on falling. Why Ilse? Why? Haven't we suffered enough? Why Ilse? She was so strong, so brave, always brave enough for herself, always brave enough for everyone else. Dear God, why Ilse?
And now I know that all that Melchior said about God not existing is true.
Because if God existed, he wouldn't have taken Ilse.
We finally reach the cottage and Melchi opens the door for me, putting his coat onto the table and setting me to lie on the bed. He then turns to the grate and tries to light a fire with one of our matches, though his hands are shaking so much that he barely makes a spark. In the end, he gives up and comes to lie next to me on the bed, putting his arms around me and I let the tears flow steadily into his shirt.
"Melchi – why her? Why?" I murmur into his shoulder. "She was such a wonderful person, so full of life…. Why her?"
"I know." Melchi whispers, rocking me back and forth in his arms. "I know."
"Why couldn't it have been me?" I say, louder than I expected. Melchior pulls me away to look me in the eye, daring me to say more. "Why her, when he could have taken me and it would have made no difference to anyone!"
He stares at me a moment before he puts his hands on my shoulders. "Wendla, never say that again." He whispers in a shaky voice. "Never say anything like that again!" He almost shouts, sitting up on the bed. "Wendla, it would kill me if it were you!" he shouts, standing up and looking at me. "You leaving me, it scares me too much to think about, never say anything like that again! Please Wendla" He stops before sitting back on the bed with his head in his hands, shudders rippling through his body. He raises his head and his eyes are bloodstained red. And as he pulls his knee up to wrap his arms around, he looks like that boy I once remember, that boy in the hayloft.
Perhaps we are there right now and I am still that girl in the hayloft, with no way to handle things.
"Melchi, I'm so sorry." I say, crawling over to him and putting my hand on his shoulder. "I love you, Melchi, I didn't want to hurt you."
He turns his head slowly, his eyes boring into mine. "You love me?"
"Yes." My voice is stronger than I expected it to be.
He looks back at his knee. "I suppose I could say that I loved you back." He shakes his head. "But it's not enough, it will never be enough." He turns to kneel on the bed in front of me. "Wendla, I will never leave you behind. You have meant so much to me ever since we were in the hayloft together. I couldn't imagine life without you, I don't remember life before you. I heard some men who left women when they found out they were having a child but I would never do that. I want to stay with you, have this child with you, go to America with you, grow old with you, die, with you holding my hand. Love" He scoffs. "Love is something made up by religious people, something to try and make us feel things. But I never feel anything when I say it. But I feel something when I look at you, something stronger than any 'love'. That's all I know." He finishes.
We watch each other for a moment, not quite sure what to say or do. Then in one swift movement, my arms are around his neck and his head is resting on my breast, as it did all those months before. We were children then, sitting in a hayloft, not quite understanding what was happening, not quite caring. How much we had grown.
"Wendla, I hear your heart beat." Melchi says from beneath me and tears begin running down my face again. He looks up at me, shocked. "Why are you crying?" He asks.
I shake my head. "I remember it, every minute of it and it was a nicer time, when we had Ilse and Moritz and our friends and… and…" My sobs are muffled by his shirt as he pulls me to rest my head against his chest.
"Hush, don't cry, Wendla." He rocks me back and forth like I'm a child with a scraped knee. " We were prisoners back then. You're here with me now and that's all I need." I erupt in another fit of crying and he hold me closer. "Wendla, Ilse and Moritz are still here with us. They're not gone. Not gone. Not gone." He repeats this, rocking me back and forth until I fall into a troubled sleep into Melchi's arms.