When presented with two options of where she could work that day, Caroline had shocked Matron as much as herself when she chose to accept another shift in the post-operative ward.
"Are you quite well Nurse Robinson?" Matron had queried, looking down her nose at Caroline as she stood in front of Matron's desk with her hands clasped firmly in front of her. "There are some rather intriguing surgeries in the lineup today."
"Yes, Matron. I am certain," she replied firmly, giving no reason. The cause of the lack of reasoning she had fought with the entire night, tossing in her bed as she grappled with the idea of why she was caught in this soldier's gravitational pull. It clearly had to be the fact that her entire career she had been able to control every stubborn soldier that had crossed her path. She couldn't possibly let this one win. At least, that was what she told herself as she marched onto the wards, twenty minutes early and ready to take on Private Shelby now that she knew what she was up against.
"Thank God you're here," her fellow nurse and friend Penelope Hamilton yawned, covering her mouth quickly. The golden rule of nursing had always been to never show a single ounce of tiredness, fluster, or displeasure when on the wards. Matron had instilled in them over the years that each woman was to be the essence of calm; the angels of mercy that swept down the wards in their veils and aprons without causing a ripple.
"Show me your ways, Caroline." Penelope pleaded, gripping onto her sleeve and leaning in close to dip her head against her shoulder. "You are Matron's shining example of composure every day, regardless of the situation."
What the other nurses did not realise was that Caroline was born tired. Born working and cleaning and hustling to scrap for any piece of comfort. There were many times she could remember that when she didn't steal, she didn't eat. Working at the field hospital with almost guaranteed meals, a camp bed to sleep in and a quiet ward to work on was better than most days she remembered back in London. Even the rare threats of stray artillery coming close to hitting the hospital inflicted less stress than having to walk down the streets of Shoreditch alone.
Caroline remained silent, knowing how difficult it must be for Penelope, who came from a sort where not being able to bathe every day in lavender oils was considered the height of impoverishment. Despite the bombardment of messaging she received when she was a child that people like Penelope and her family were the root of all evil in England, she had come to enjoy her company. There was a lightness around her, a naïve complacency that peace and comfort were never far from reach, or difficult to obtain. In a war such as this, which had been dragging on for three dreadful years; such hope was a welcoming beacon.
"I'll relieve you early. Go on. Hop in the shower before someone uses all the warm water up." Caroline cooed, patting her on the head to hear Penelope's satisfied groan.
"You are a rock, I owe you one." Penelope's head shot up, the sparkle returning to her eyes as she reached down on the desk in front of them to retrieve the ward roster. Penelope read out each man's name and recited any notes that were imperative to their care while Caroline took over.
"Bed three. I can't seem to get him to stop crying, the poor dear." Both of their eyes floated towards the man in question, who was lying in his bed curling up in a ball trembling, his tear-stained face grey with exhaustion.
"Bed seven claims that he is still in pain, though he's had more than enough morphine to make an elephant sleep for a week."
Caroline responded silently as her stomach contracted with the mention of the word. She was still exhausted from her previous nights' escapade, with the anxiety still set deep within her as she was still uncertain if no one had seen her out abed.
"I'll observe him," Caroline finally added, quickly changing the subject.
"And that one," Penelope remarked, her finger lingering on the paper, her voice full of exasperation, "has been driving his neighbours, and myself to be honest, simply bonkers. Half of them have already asked for cotton battens for their ears so they can catch some sleep."
Caroline's eyes followed where Penelope's finger was pointing out the name.
Private John Shelby.
Somehow she was not surprised in the slightest, given the brief interaction she had with him when he was admitted.
"Private Shelby," Penelope continued, causing Caroline to unconsciously adjust the veil on her head, "got out of surgery last night, and frankly, hasn't shut up since. His wound is healthy, and healing nicely, though. So hopefully he won't be lingering around for too long. The doctor said there is no need for him to convalesce back in England. So he will be here for the rest of his recovery."
"I'll manage him," Caroline responded, having faith in herself that she could easily put a man like Private Shelby in his place.
"Good luck!" her friend added sarcastically as she reached out and squeezed her hand. "Maybe tonight when you return I can braid your hair for you the way you like."
Caroline relished Penelope's ability to transform hair into a work of art. Her own mother wasn't the type to bother with such frivolities and Caroline had grown up with her hair cut short, to keep out the nits and to prevent her thick, wavy hair from getting matted. For most of her early life, she was used to being mistaken for a boy, which was a privilege she quickly discovered. Especially when it came to being able to run around the streets of London mostly unbothered.
Keeping her hair long as an adult had been a small act of rebellion against her childhood, even in nursing where many other women had shorn their hair out of pure frustration. Her waist-length hair was an indulgence she had refused to give up no matter how much effort it took to maintain its loveliness.
"I just noticed that you've been fussing with it since you walked onto the ward, so it must bother you," Penelope remarked casually, as she gathered up a few things from the desk, while Caroline's hand shot down to her side, away from her hair.
"Enjoy your shower," Caroline said, again skipping her friend's pointed comments.
Caroline watched as Penelope practically skipped down the wards towards the showers, and once she was alone again she took a moment to organize the desk to her liking before eyeing the roster once more.
She had a preferred order to complete her rounds upon the wards, which typically would have seen her starting rather from the back, where Private Shelby's bed was. But today, she felt the need to change up her routine and she started at the front this morning, taking her time as she made her way down the rows attending to each soldier with care.
"How are you fairing, Corporal?" Caroline asked as she checked the dressings of a corporal who had been with them for the past two weeks.
"Hanging in there, Nurse. But starting to feel my feet getting rather tappy."
Boredom was one of the worst symptoms of healing that soldiers had to endure in the hospital. One could only smoke so many cigarettes or write so many letters before some men began to lose their minds. Especially when the men were so severely wounded that they were completely bedridden. When their inner thoughts were their only company for hours, men tended to ruminate on the horrors they had witnessed. And the longer they remained in their beds, the louder their demons got. The nurses' fight for morale was often as hard-fought as the battle against infection.
"It's your lucky day then, Corporal Monaghan, I've probably got a few minutes and I've been looking for a willing audience to listen to this," she smiled as pulled out a new copy of Sherlock Holmes that she had been keeping on her for occasions such as this.
Corporal Monaghan sat up in his bed, returning an equally beaming smile, "I'd like that very much, Nurse. Thank you."
"Excellent, I just have to see another couple of patients and I'll be back in just a moment." She replied, standing up and leaving the book on his bed.
Straightening out her skirts as she stood up her eyes floated across the remaining beds until she locked eyes with Private Shelby's startingly blue ones. He visibility perked up in his bed, lifting his hand to give her a wave.
She swallowed hard, knowing that she couldn't take any more time before having to see him. Never in her nursing career had a soldier been able to get under her skin and into her mind as this one had. There was nothing special about him, she thought to herself as strode her way toward him. He was no different than any other young soldier who came through her wards: cocky, restless and looking for trouble. And Caroline would have none of it. Except this one is handsome, her brain teased as she walked over to his bedside, and she shook her head trying to eliminate the traitorous thought.
"How come it always seems to be me who's last checked on?" Private Shelby remarked, staring her down while taking a drag off the last bit of a cigarette.
"Private Shelby, Nurse Hamilton has informed me that you have been rather disruptive on the wards today. Boisterous behaviour cannot be tolerated."
His face was straight, but there was something about the set of his mouth that made her certain she was being laughed at.
"Don't you have anything to say for yourself?" She demanded, her eyebrows raised in indignation.
"I'm not one for having to lie on me arse for long, Nurse."
" You have been here for all of about five minutes in the grand scheme of your recovery."
"So just let me walk around a bit. Alls I need is a bit of fresh air."
"Private Shelby, you've just been shot, have a broken bone, have just received surgery under aesthetics. This is not something you can simply 'walk off'".
"I'm only asking for five minutes," he said, attempting to swing his legs off the bed.
"Sit!" she commanded, blocking his escape by standing in front of him with her arms firmly crossed. "I need to inspect your incision line. All I need is five minutes of your time. Now lie back, please."
"Only because you asked so nicely." He replied, his grin returning.
"Thank you."
Caroline began shimming his pant leg up over his bandages and looking underneath them. All signs pointed to a textbook case of a healing bullet wound. There was minimal bruising, the swelling under control, and no signs of inflammation or heat.
"All set, Private Shelby." She quipped, replacing the bandage and rolling down his pant leg.
"Great, so I can go then?"
She only returned his comment with a dubious gaze, staring him down until his body relaxed into his pillow.
"Just kidding," he added with a small wink.
Caroline fought the urge to roll her eyes at his ostentatious attitude but shot off a murmur of annoyance instead. Just to make sure he received her point.
"I'm only trying to make you laugh, Nurse."
"Laughter is not a part of my job description, Private."
"I know you've got a sense of humour in there somewhere. I've seen a glimpse." He added, and she remembered the night he was admitted and her involuntary giggle at his playful comments.
Caroline knew to not engage any further with the smooth-talking Private. Each moment locked in conversation was an opportunity for him to chip off a piece of her, now that he knew he could affect her. As the warning bells rang in her head she knew she had to end the conversation so without saying another word she turned her back and walked away towards the bedside of Corporal Monaghan.
"Sorry for the delay, Corporal. Are you ready to read now?" She asked sweetly, the visage of a perfect nurse effortlessly slipping back in place.
"Whenever you are."
"If you don't mind though, could I wheel you over to another area? Just so some other soldiers may hear?"
"Whatever you need, Nurse. It would be nice to get out of this bed."
"Lovely," she replied, wheeling the chair over to his bed and helping him in while covering him with a blanket.
She didn't say a word as she wheeled Corporal Monaghan to Private Shelby's bedside. Quietly, posting up in an old wooden chair between them and she cleared her throat before opening the book to chapter one.
Before beginning, she could feel eyes upon her and she glanced up from the pages.
"Not a single word, Private Shelby. Not a one." She chided, looking over at him to see his mocking mouth firmly closed, but a glint of mischief still remaining in his eyes.
The ward was magically silenced as she began to read, each man falling under her spell as she brought to life the streets of her familiar London. She read for an hour in suspended reality, her words having all of them chasing Holmes and Watson through the sordid backstreets of her home neighbourhood, chasing around the villains that in the real world, Caroline would have called family. At the end of chapter three, she finally glanced at the clock and noticed the time.
"That's all for tonight gentlemen." She said looking up and around at the concentrated faces erupting into a chorus of groans.
"Holmes is a very patient man. A quality I think you should all aspire to." She replied, though not too harshly before looking over at Private Shelby and catching his eye. She didn't appreciate the quickening of her heart as she did so, prompting her to quickly break the gaze and stand up positioning herself behind the wheelchair.
"Goodnight, nurse." His low voice called out behind her yet she didn't turn around, trying to hide her face as colour bloomed across her cheeks.
"I think my feet have grown two sizes today. My mother would be horrified," Penelope groaned as she propped up her bare feet on her foot locker at the end of her bed.
"Well look at my hands!" Emily lamented as she pulled the kettle off the woodburning stove in the centre of their tent. "If my mother saw the calluses on my palms she would have me shipped off!"
Caroline sat on her bed, happily listening to the levity of the other womens conversations. If only her parents had cared as much about something so little in regards to her development.
"How about you, Caroline?" Penelope asked, her head rolling to the side of her bed as she massaged her temples.
"I'm feeling perfectly well, actually." Physcially that was, on the other hand she found her mind much more unruly than she cared to admit.
"No, you ninny! I mean, how do you parents take to our current situation?" Penelope clarified.
Even though Caroline had been working with Penelope and Emily for almost the better part of a year, she kept personal life under lock and key. Only occasionally did she give them a little bite, one that she could adorn with something that came wrapped in the semblance of properiety.
"My parents rarely had the time to bother about the minute details of my life."
"I understand that. When my parents would travel abroad for months, I would be furious with them for not taking me with them."
Caroline was certain that neither of her parents had never even left London. But she played along all the same.
"I always found that the independence kept me busy," she said absentmindly as she reached for her small comb to begin brushing out her plait.
Though she hadn't meant her words to come across as salacious, Emily scurried over to her bed and Penelope sat up while tucking her feet under her, as if she was ready for a bed time story.
"Caroline Robinson we've always known you've been a girl with all the stories!" Emily gushed, her hands underneath her chin, begging for more.
"There isn't much to tell." She reported, feeling sheepish.
"Come on! We need a little taste of the mysterious life."
"Have you been kissed by a man before?" Emily finally burst out, practically bouncing off her bed, while Penelope let out a surprised yelp. "Emily! You're not to ask of such things!"
The question caught her off guard, not expecting her demure roommates to even know how to begin a conversation like this. But despite how frustrated she had been earlier on the in the day, Caroline was in a good mood and was enjoying the lighthearted conversation that they so rarely indulged in.
"I have…" she trailed off, not daring to tell the other women that she had done just that and far more.
Her response was met a high pitched squeal from both women, their faces flushed with embarrassment.
"I've only been kissed on the cheek once," Emily lamented.
"You're not missing out," Caroline lied. Though she hadn't been tempted since she'd been in France, the fleeting memory of a man's touch did leave her feeling lonely from time to time.
"Do you think any of the men on the wards are handsome?" Penelope asked, her eyes studying the floor.
"They are not deserving of us," Caroline responded haughtily.
"Though I bet that Corporal James knows a thing or two about kissing. I swear every time I walk past him his eyes could burn my uniform right off."
"What do you expect when you they haven't been near a woman in months!" Penelope giggled.
"If that Private a Shelby wasn't such a nuisance, he really isn't a sight for sore eyes." Emily responded, her eyes a light.
"He's trouble." Caroline stated more for her own good than for anyone elses.
" I can see he's giving you that, yes." Penelope said, eyebrows raised.
"He's just another man looking for attention in any way he can get it. He'll settle down soon."
"I had hoped that by this point I would be used to talking with strange men. But I still get to be so tongue-tied, especially with the cheeky ones."
"They're just people, Emily, that's all they are. Just men who have lived through the worst humanity have to offer. Mostly, they are just looking for a smile."
"You really do have all the answers, don't you?"
"Please," Caroline responded, brushing off the comment.
Though becoming a nurse in France had always been a means to an end for her life in London, she had come to care deeply for her work and the job that she was doing here. For once in her life, her accomplishments were hers alone, her successes due to her hard work and diligence. Not just piggybacking on the, often ill, reputation of her family. The people that she was surrounded with at the field hospital were kind to her, not because they feared her because of her last name, but due her kindness and strong work ethic. For the first time she could see right in front of her, everything she had been risking these past few months. This hospital was her home and she needed to protect it and the life it had given her.
As the full moons light illuminated the interior the tent, casting king shadows upon the ground in front of her, she knew she had a decision to make. She had two weeks before she was to meet her brother under the new moon. To either tell him that she was done, or continue the deception that clawed away at her spirit every time she met him with the stolen goods that she scavenged the month before.
"Your leg will never heal right if you keep moving around like this against orders!"
Caroline had been sent to the post-operative wards again, this time without Matron even giving her the choice. She was rather good at it though, and there had been a sharp decline in errors in patient care once she had been the ward for nearly a week. Though she had tried to keep her distance from Private Shelby's bed, she found herself lingering there a few more minutes each day, locked in conversation or more frequently chastising him for some juvenile stunt he had pulled earlier on in the day. Usually, she tried to ignore him when she first started her shift, but this moring when she saw him standing up beside his bed she couldn't help but stomp over to put him back in his place.
He brushed her off with an annoyed huff, ignoring her words and continued to attempt to swing his legs over the side of the bed to stand.
"I've never been one to sit still for long. I won't get right if I don't get some air from this fucking place."
"I bet you must've been a right treat in school." Caroline rolled her eyes as she walked over to him and grabbed him by the shoulders, preventing him from standing. "Probably a little tornado of mischief and always running that mouth too I presume."
"Don't know, never went much." he grinned up at her, his eyes sparkling with that mischievous glow which tugged at the invisible string that was connected to her heart.
Somehow this took her aback. Could that be the reason why she had not seen any letters come through to him? She hadn't even considered the fact that he might be illiterate, there being so many others that came through the hospital that were. For that reason, the hospital kept a stack of prefilled postcards that the nurses would help fill out so that the soldiers families could at last recieve some news. It was critical to ensure the dignity of each soldier in these cases and her mind raced, thinking of how she could provide him with one if he so needed it. She swallowed hard, eyeing the postcards in the corner and his gaze matched hers, following it over to the matron's desk.
"Bloody hell, Nurse. I'm not a fucking dimwit. It's just I always figured school was a waste of my time, I could teach myself twice as fast as that schoolteacher without having to sit my ass down for eight hours a day. Not once did I see her complain when I stopped rolling by."
"I never said anything."
His gaze flicked back to hers, a fire set within the blue, and Caroline realised that her hands were still resting on his shoulders so she immediately snatched her hands back, crossing her arms over her chest as if she'd been burned.
"You didn't have to." he quipped, lying back on the bed with his infuriatingly coy grin as he rested against the pillow with his hands behind his head.
"Nurse!" Doctor Wallace called out to her and she snapped her head in his direction before quickly shuffled over to him, abandoning Private Shelby's bedside.
"Yes, Doctor? How may I assist?"
"I need you to check my numbers. I'm running on steam and I must be certain of the dosage for these four."
"Yes, Sir." she nodded, scanning the clipboard page with the doctor's frantic scribbling and crossed out calculations in the margins.
"Read it out to me, please."
Caroline diligently recited the medications and dosages carefully, each accompanied with the patient's weight.
"It should be six milligrams per kilo of each man, Doctor. You seem to have been doing the opposite."
Just as she spoke, Private Shelby's languid voice carried out across the tent.
"That lad gets 452, that one 521, next to him there 503," he rattled off, pointing his lit cigarette in his fingers at each of them, still laying back against his pillow. "And the last one on the end, well he just had tea, so you might as well round him up to an even 600."
Both Caroline and the Doctor looked at John blankly, her fingers curled tightly around the clipboard, checking the maths as quickly as she could.
"Does that sound about right?" John cooed, taking another long drag of his cigarette and letting the smoke pool out around him.
Trying her utmost not to smirk along with him, or worse let the giggle in her throat erupt, she looked down at the sheet, unable to meet the doctor's furious gaze. "The calculations are accurate, Doctor. May I proceed in administering the medication?"
Doctor Wallace gave a terse nod and slammed his patient folder closed, unable to meet her eyes as well.
"That'll be 2,076 total by the way. Or 4.13 bottles, cause I've seen they carry 500mgs each…" Private Shelby continued as Doctor Wallace walked past the end of his bed, Caroline watching closely as he raised himself off his elbows, eyeing him down as he stormed past ignoring him completely.
The rest of the soldiers had clearly enjoyed the show as most of the ward was now sitting up in their beds, craning their bodies to gain a better view of the situation.
Caroline swallowed her immediate reaction and replaced it with an obstinate stance at the end of his bed, her hands on her hips staring hard into his mocking eyes and quivering lips as if begging her to take his bait and give him a reason to continue his show.
"Thank you, Private Shelby. That will be all," she said loudly enough for all the soldiers in earshot to hear, therefore hopefully putting the matter to bed. "You've made your point well enough." she added in hushed tones under her breath. On her way out she accidentally caught his eye only to nearly stumble as he gave her a quick wink before taking another puff of his cigarette.
If she could have run down the aisle of beds she would have, she needed space from this man. His ability to shake her off her guard dangerous to everything that she had developed for herself here. She had more important things to think about that didn't involve the raucous behaviour of a soldier who would be out of her life in a few weeks' time.
Just as she had made her way out of sight and back to the nursing station she could hear his voice again, travelling behind her, nearly drowned out by a chorus of laughter.
"The pleasures of all mine lads, I'll be here all week. A month, if I play my cards right you lucky bastards."
