Parting of Ways
"Nothing can come between true friends"
~Euripides
"Oi, Catalina!"
Rebecca turned to find her roommate, Angela Fisher, hurrying down the steps towards her.
"Hey Angie, what's up?" Rebecca asked cheerfully.
"Your girl Hawkeye got yanked out of our last class," Fisher said in a low, breathless voice. "Asked me to tell you where she'd gone."
"She was pulled out of class? What on earth for?" Rebecca repeated, surprised. Fisher shook her head.
"That's what we all wanted to know," she said. "Right in the middle of class, this cute warrant officer comes walking in with a note for Major Winchester. He read it, looked really surprised, and told Hawkeye to go with him - with the warrant officer, I mean."
"That's it?" Rebecca cried. "They didn't say if she was in trouble, or anything?"
"Nope," Fisher bit her lip. "But after they'd gone, the Major said: 'Those of you who do not have a meeting with a high ranking official had best return their attention to me,'" she quoted, imitating the man's slightly pompous air. "You know, all snooty like he does."
"High ranking official…" Catalina repeated, bewildered. "What the hell would a 'high ranking official' want with Riza?"
"Dunno," Fisher shrugged. "But Hawkeye looked like she was gonna be sick or something, so whatever it is can't be good."
"Shit," Catalina whispered. She'd better be okay.
"Yeah," Fisher agreed. "Hey, I've gotta run. When you see her, tell her she can copy my notes if she needs, 'kay? See ya!"
"Right, thanks," Catalina replied half-heartedly, and Fisher darted off down the hall.
Deep in thought, Rebecca stood there for several more minutes before she remembered that she was due on the firing range. The building had emptied while she and Fisher had been talking, and she hurried along the deserted hallways hoping that her instructor would be in a lenient mood. For a fraction of a second, she considered ditching, but she abandoned the idea just as quickly. She had no way to know where Riza's meeting might be taking place, and anyway Riza would fill her in on whatever was going on as soon as she was able to.
As she passed an open window, a familiar voice stopped Rebecca in her tracks.
"Riza?" she looked around, perplexed. That had definitely been her friend's voice. But there was no one in the hallway behind her. Then she heard another, deeper voice murmuring something, and Rebecca realized that the sounds were coming from outside. She moved closer to the window and cautiously peered through it.
The window overlooked an enclosed courtyard tucked in between buildings, no more than 500 feet square in size. A few benches had been arranged in between the overgrown planter boxes that lined the walls of the square. And seated on the bench directly across from Rebecca's window were two persons: none other than Riza Hawkeye and her 'high ranking official.'
Squinting through the dirty glass to read his rank insignia, Rebecca nearly yelped in surprise. A major general? All thoughts of the firing range long forgotten, she edged even closer and tried to work out what exactly she was looking at here.
Riza was reading a letter, and the older man was studying her face with an unreadable expression. Patient and watchful, but with something else there, just underneath. Riza looked up from the letter at last, and said something to her companion too quietly for Rebecca to hear. But the general nodded, looking grim.
"I'm sorry to spring such news on you so suddenly, my dear," he said. "But I wanted you to hear it from me first."
"I…I don't know what to say," Riza managed. Her face was white with shock, and Rebecca's heart raced as she considered the sort of news that could possibly make her friend react that way. Was someone dead? But since when did brass send a major general to make the notification? And Riza hadn't had any living family left to be notified about…right?
To the left of the pair on the bench, a warrant officer stepped into view from the arched doorway that led out of the courtyard. (And he was cute, Rebecca thought fleetingly). He gave the general some sort of signal. The older man simply nodded in reply, and the soldier retreated again.
"I'm afraid I can't stay any longer, my dear," the general said gently. "I know it's rather a lot to ask, but… would you mind terribly dropping me a note every now and again? Just a few lines to let your old grandfather know how you are?" Riza didn't answer right away, and the general smiled sadly. "It's all right; I understand. Good luck, child. Farewell."
As he stood, Riza blinked and seemed to recall her manners. She rose as well and offered him her hand. He enclosed it in both of his and held on while she spoke.
"I beg your pardon, sir," she said. "I'm just…this is all a bit much to take in," she added. "But I do appreciate you coming to speak with me in person. Thank you."
"You are most welcome," he replied. "If you need anything, anything at all, you have only to ask." Finally, with one last sad smile, he relinquished her hand and turned to go. Riza stayed where she was and watched him leave.
Reeling, Rebecca turned and sprinted down the hallway. She reached the arch leading to the courtyard just in time to see the General and his aide passing through it. She skidded to a halt and saluted, red-faced and out of breath.
The General regarded her with amusement before tipping his hat and winking rather rakishly at her. If she hadn't been so stupefied, Rebecca might have winked back, but as it was the General and his aide were already striding purposefully down the steps and out of the building. Why did his face look so familiar? she wondered. And more importantly, had he really referred to himself as Riza's grandfather? So…had Riza known about him? Or had she been lying about her family all this time?
And then Riza herself drifted out into the hallway, looking somehow small and lost. She seemed not to even see Rebecca approaching from her right side.
"That man's really your grandfather?" Rebecca said incredulously, nearly in Riza's ear. Riza jumped and whirled around to face her.
"Catalina, what are you doing here?" she managed to ask, her heart in her throat.
Hands on hips, Rebecca shot a significant look in the direction of the rapidly departing Major General.
"The fuck, Riza, I thought you told me you didn't have any family?" Rebecca pouted, trying to conceal the depth of her hurt. Don't you trust me?
"I-I didn't…how much did you hear?" Riza choked out.
To her shame, Riza felt her eyes well up with tears. The last hour had been an emotional roller coaster of fear-shock-relief-hope-fear-shame-pride. And now her best friend was looking at her with hurt and accusation in her eyes when she was in desperate need of a hug, and it was all too much for her overwrought nerves. Clamping down on what was left of her self-control, she tried to surreptitiously blink back her tears before Rebecca noticed, but it was too late. And Rebecca was having none of it. She grabbed Riza's hand and hauled her into the closest classroom, which was blissfully empty.
"I wasn't trying to eavesdrop," Rebecca explained, slightly defensive. "But I overheard the last bit, there. The part where he referred to himself as your grandfather," she added, fishing around in her pocket for a handkerchief. She chose her next words carefully. "But…you told me you didn't have any living relatives."
"I said I didn't have any relatives to speak of," Riza clarified, swiping at her cheeks with the back of her hand and waving away Rebecca's offered handkerchief. "I didn't know whether he wanted to acknowledge me, so I wasn't going to force the relationship on him. Plus, I knew that he was a general, and I didn't want anyone to assume I was using the connection to get some kind of unfair advantage."
"Acknowledge you?" Rebecca repeated, confused. "What do you mean?"
"I –I'd never even met him until about a year and a half ago - three weeks after my father's funeral. And he introduced himself as an old family friend, then."
"So, wait…he's your dad's dad?"
"No, my mother's," Riza corrected her. She started to pace the room, and Rebecca perched on one of the desks and listened intently. "I don't really know the whole story," Riza finally said. "Except that they'd been estranged since before I was born. My parents never mentioned him at all."
"But he came to see you, out of nowhere, once your dad passed?"
"Yes. He just turned up on my doorstep one day. I recognized him from my mother's old pictures and things. But I didn't let on that I knew who he was. And he didn't actually tell me that he was my maternal grandfather until just now."
Old pictures? Yes! That was it! That was why he seemed familiar! He was the man she had seen in Riza's photo! Not with Riza, evidently, but his own daughter sitting on his knee.
"Wow," Rebecca said softly. "Okay. What, then, he didn't know who you were, when you met before?"
"Oh, no, he knew," Riza replied quietly. "He says he wasn't sure how to approach me. He thought I wouldn't want anything to do with him, given how he and my father felt about each other," she explained, still pacing slowly back and forth past Rebecca's perch. "At the time, he just suggested that I might do well at the Academy, and told me what I would need to do to enroll and enlist. But he never breathed a word about our relationship."
"What changed?" Rebecca asked. "If he wouldn't say anything then, why did he bother coming to tell you all of this now?"
"He found out about my early graduation and pending reassignment," Riza replied. Only then did Rebecca realize that her friend still had a piece of paper clenched tightly in one hand.
"Your—what?" Perplexed, she slid off the desk. Riza let her take the crumpled letter from her hand.
"He wanted to tell me in person; to talk to me before I left. I…I ship out in three days," Riza said, softly.
"Is this for real?" Rebecca whispered, skimming the letter.
"Looks like," Riza replied.
"But…you're still just a cadet! Even with your advanced placement classes, you shouldn't graduate for another year! How can they—?" Rebecca cried, shocked.
"The eastern rebellion has been going on for a while now. They're running short on man power," Riza explained in a low voice. "And snipers are in especially high demand, as well as difficult to train…and my scores are above and beyond the best in the class."
"Geez, way to reward success," Rebecca grumbled. That brought the ghost of a smile back to Riza's lips.
"Well, what'd you think we were signing up for?" she replied, almost amused. "We're attending a military academy while our country is in the middle of a war. Getting deployed is sort of the end goal, isn't it?"
"Yeah, but…you were supposed to have more time. And, fuck, the front lines? I guess I assumed they'd send the newbies somewhere less...you know, intense," she murmured. She absolutely refused to say 'deadly.' "Aren't you scared?" she asked, her voice quavering a little.
"Yes," Riza admitted. "But…this is what I've been training for. I wanted to serve and protect, and if my country needs me badly enough that they're willing to graduate me early…" she shrugged. "It's my duty, isn't it?"
The two girls were quiet for a moment.
"I suppose this means you won't be needing Fisher's notes on field medicine, huh?" Rebecca said. Riza's laugh was a little forced.
"No, I don't think her notes can help me, now," she murmured. And then she abruptly dropped into a chair. "God, I never expected…when they called me out of class, I thought—" she checked herself. "Stupid, I know…why on earth would they notify me? But just for a minute, I really thought…I was really afraid that he was…"
And Rebecca suddenly realized what had caused Riza to go so pale when the general's aide had come to collect her.
"Your friend?" she asked gently. Riza nodded, letting out a shaky sigh.
"It's stupid," she said again, embarrassed. Rebecca shook her head.
"It's not. You care about him, of course you'd worry. And it was more likely than...I mean, how could anyone have guessed you'd get graduated early?" she said, quickly. "It's not like that happens every day. It's probably not even one of the options on the betting pool that I'm sure they'll have started by now. Major Blabbermouth let it slip that you had a meeting with some sort of bigwig," she explained, when Riza looked blank.
Riza huffed out a little laugh.
"Three days," she said. "I leave in three days. And there's so much I need to do before I go; I don't even know where to start." Riza was suddenly overwhelmed. She would need to make arrangements about her property with her solicitor, among other things. She might not be as easily reached out east as she'd been at the Academy. "I was supposed to have more time," she said aloud.
"I'll help," Rebecca promised, earnestly. "Whatever you need. I'll help you."
"Thanks. Hey, Rebecca?" Riza asked softly.
Rebecca blinked in surprise. Riza rarely used her first name, sticking stubbornly to the more formal terms of address even when it was just the two of them. No matter how often Rebecca teased her about it.
"Yeah?" Rebecca replied, concerned.
"Can we just…pretend this isn't happening? Just for today?"
Rebecca's lip quivered for just a second, and then she nodded firmly.
"On it. Hey, wanna go get drunk?" Never mind that it was barely two in the afternoon, and damn the consequences. If she had to face another year here without her best friend at her side, then she was going to need a drink or three.
"Yes, please," Riza replied in a small voice.
"Come on, then, I know a good place," Rebecca said, slipping her arm around her friend's waist as they slowly left the room. "At least, I'm pretty sure you'll like it."
"I trust your judgment."
A.N. A little angst to balance out the fluff overload from last chapter :D I'll be skipping over the war itself, FYI, so the next chapter will deal with Hawkeye's return. (Those of you who've read 'Scar Tissue' will know exactly where this is headed.) Thanks again for all of the follows, favorites, and lovely reviews!
xoxo Janie