AN: SM owns twilight.

Chapter twenty one. Surprise, surprise!

Major's POV.

I don't know why the damn plane is delayed.

I so want to see ma petite cheri, Bella.

I'm beyond frustrated! My eyes rolled in my head, I gritted my teeth. It had been a long time since I had been so very frustrated.

Ughhh! I tried to move quickly to the help desk, in order to find out more information on what on earth was happening. Lucille was taking her own sweet time. She'd already refused to let me get her a wheelchair. Telling me to calm down and she would be just fine, making her own way.

I can't believe Lucille insisted that she should come with me!

I didn't have any time to pack properly; I just grabbed my small backpack, wallet, keys phone and my sunglasses.

Lucille just grabbed her little handbag, her walking stick and gripped my hand; she wasn't letting me go, she dragged me along to the car.

"I haven't much time left! I must meet her!" She snapped at me, looking pretty fearsome for someone standing at a full four foot six inches.

Lucille forcefully thumped her stick, to get her point across as I attempted to get out of town without the company of my determined, little, old aunt.

"I insist mon fils! You are going into an unknown situation, if I'm not there, you'll mess it up completely!"

She waved her walking stick at me, nearly hitting me in the face. Crazy old bird!

"What do you mean an 'unknown situation'? I can handle myself. I've commanded many men, solved many problems, been in the firing line and survived. Of course I can handle this!"

"Jasper Whitlock! I'm not talking about the 'field of battle'. I'm not questioning your bravery, or anything else. I'm talking about the one area in life you know absolutely nothing about."

"What's that?"

I wish the old bat was making some sense, so I could hurry up, get in the car and drive off.

"LOVE mon fils! Amour! The strangest, most difficult, most crazy thing that any sane person can ever involve themselves in! You have never been in love before ...and you will make a mess of it, if I can't come and show you the way forward that you need to carefully take with your Bella."

I huffed; I was already going to be cutting it fine, for my drive to the airport.

I didn't have a reservation for Lucille either, how the hell was I supposed to get her onto the plane to Vermont?

I couldn't take her in the car and then leave her there alone at the airport... a frail, aged lady... who'd probably never even left the State in her life, let alone flown in a plane before.

"Come on Jasper! It's not time for us to delay! We will be fine! There's a seat with my name on it and I'm coming with you! ALLER VITE!"

I had to just trust that things would turn out fine.

Lucille had a way of knowing things, and she always made good decisions, especially when she was all fired up.

"Ok, aunty I'll take you with me," I sighed, "and on the way to the airport, you can fill me in, all about the mystery called 'love', that I apparently know nothing about."

"Ah mon petit fils! So much to learn and so little time to tell you!"

I settled Lucille into the car and made sure she was properly belted up. I shut her door and raced around to the driver's side, jumped in, threw my backpack over to the backseat and revved the engine, in less than two seconds.

"Hold on tight! We'll have to really move, if we want to catch this flight!"

Lucille just laughed at me.

I rolled my eyes as we raced down the driveway and onto the main road.

I sat in the waiting lounge staring at the flight information.

Several long delays had caused the flights leaving New Orleans to be all mucked up. I ran ahead of Lucille, to reach the airline booking counter. I really wasn't hopeful about catching anything out in a hurry and I would miss seeing my girl on stage.

At that very same moment I'd reached the desk, the attendant got off the phone, sighing and looking fairly flustered... there had just been a large cancellation of twenty, first class seats. The first time today, I was starting to feel a ray of hope.

Lucille made her way to the counter beside me, and started smiling like a cat with a canary in its mouth.

It didn't take long to book another economy class seat, for Lucille.

"Oh well Miss Whitlock, the attendant smiled at my aunt, it looks like the whole first class section has just opened up due to a sudden cancellation, and I will be very, very happy to be able to upgrade both of your economy seats, to the premium seats. There will also be a nice meal waiting for you too, as the cancelled guests ordered a chef's special meal, with complimentary wine. So you will be in for a real nice treat, courtesy of our airline. We are expecting your flight to Vermont to depart in around an hour. Please make your way to gate lounge 8 and here's your boarding passes." The attendant looked pleased to be doing something nice for us, after a horrible confusing day.

"Why, merci ma petite! It's such a nice treat for you to give us; this is my first time on a plane." Lucille crooned.

I smiled and winked at the attendant. It was our lucky day after all!

Two first class seats with a fine dining experience added in, for good measure! Yay!

Lucille always got what she wanted.

I sighed, there was no fighting it. I should just accept it and let her guide me, because she was right about one thing.

I really had no idea about this love business!

After all of that mad racing to the airport, we were now waiting... waiting for our delayed plane to come, it was more like ninety minutes late, in the end.

Lucille was cheerful, admiring the gate lounge and all of people rushing around her.

She charmed a crying baby next to her, she chatted to the stressed out mother and sang a little French song to a curious toddler.

I found myself being charmed by my old aunt; she was quite a different person with others, than she was with me.

Lucille seemed to be in her element, just loving the newness of her surroundings and the excitement of travelling by air for the first time.

She looked over to me suddenly and laughed.

"I remember the last time I travelled, it was nothing like this. It was a long slow journey, back home to New Orleans. I was pleased to be home, and I never wanted to travel again, I'd been away so long."

"Was it by ship? Where had you been?"

"Ah Jasper, I've never told anyone at home what I did and where I went, but I spent much of the time I was away, in and around France."

"Really?"

"Oh yes, I went there to study at the Sorbonne, as a young woman in the late nineteen thirties, just before war broke out in Europe."

"So did you come home when war broke out?"

"No, no, I stayed!"

"But why?"

"Ahh, l'amour!"

"You stayed in France during the second world war, for...love?"

I couldn't believe what I was hearing.

I had no idea Lucille had left Louisiana, let alone, gone off to France and stayed there during the war.

"But yes, of course! Nothing else would have gotten me to stay in the middle of the German army's assault on our homeland!"

"But Aunty, you're American, not French, France isn't our homeland."

"Jasper, Jasper, mon fils! I'm French! That's it! It was a fight to save France! And I loved giving the Germans a lot of horrible, big headaches!"

"But Aunty, you were a young woman, vulnerable and at high risk of being killed or injured, during all the fighting."

She started laughing.

"What? Did I just say something funny?" Oh hell, I was so confused! Who was this woman, and what had happened to my Aunt Lucille?

"Of course I was at risk, and I thrived on it! It was something I faced everyday. My comrades were worth it. We made it hard for those Nazi bastards and did some good work for France."

"What do you mean?"

"I was in the French resistance of course. I stayed in France because my lover was one of the great fighters in the underground. We met in Paris and it was love at first sight. I wasn't leaving his side. I wasn't a person who was ever suspected by the occupying forces. I was just a little woman. Many, many men never saw me coming, and never saw their death sneaking up on them silently, stealthily."

"Oh!"

"Yes, that's what many of them said too; just as I shot them between the eyes, or snuck up and put the rat poison in their food." She said smugly.

"Wow! You're an assassin, a fighter like me! I never knew!"

"Oh yes, we have a great deal in common, remember who first taught you to use a shotgun? Who showed you your first self defence moves? Who showed you how to understand your energy field and how to influence people with it?"

"Now that you remind me, it was always you! Oh my, my aunty, you've taught me so much! ...You're a real life war hero!"

"Sure, just like you are. And when I die soon, there are some things under my bed that will be just for you. Only you, got it?"

Please leave a little feedback.