She Knew
Chapter 2
She knew.
As soon as she saw the number flash up on her phone... she knew.
All the time they had been together they had kept to a strict routine when either of them were away on tour.
They had days planned when they would speak to one another, a pattern they followed, and today wasn't one of those days.
That's how she knew. It wasn't right.
She picked up the phone and answered it with caution. Dreading what she was going to hear as soon as he spoke.
"Molly?" His voice was croaking out down the line.
She managed, though looking back she does not know how, to whisper her reply.
"Yes, it's me. Charles you okay?"
"No, I'm not... shit no." And then she heard him let out a sob. The sound of the sob coming from her brave husband thousand of miles away broke her heart as she prepared herself for the dreadful news she was going to hear.
"Tell me? Tell me please." She begged. "Please Charles speak to me; talk to me."
"It's Elvis." He cried out. "He's dead!" And then the line went silent for a while. She wondered momentarily if he was still there but then she heard him almost in the background still crying.
"Shit." That was all she could say. "How?"
"It was all my fault." He continued. "I killed him. I was in charge I should've known. I should've realised."
"Hey hey hey." She tried to take control of the conversation but he was running away with it now.
"It was my fault Molly all my fault. I should've listened I should've paid more attention. How could I have been so fucking stupid?"
"Charles. Baby please tell me what happened."
"It happened right before our eyes. We saw it all. Lane saw it all."
"Tell me?"
"Oh, Christ and Georgie! Georgie she was there standing there watching him die. He died in front of us. Oh God Molly! "
She tried to calm him down during the telephone conversation. Tried to give him the sympathy he needed but in truth she too was distraught by the loss of her friend Elvis.
The conversation continued but she got very little news from him and it took several telephone calls over a few days to get the full story.
Yet each and every time she spoke to Charles she knew he was broken. She knew this was something he wasn't going to shake off. This wasn't something she was able to fix. This was something bigger than either of them. Bigger than just her love.
Weeks later she watched as he walked through the house on his return. In those first moments she saw how destroyed he was. He'd asked her not to meet him at the airport on his return, and she agreed. So, she waited diligently at home for him. As soon as he walked through the door she could see it written on his face, and she knew that this was going to be one of the hardest things their marriage had ever faced.
She tried. She really tried.
As the days passed there were times when she actually thought that she was helping and he was trying too. But as the days went on into weeks she gradually realised she truly wasn't any help to him at all.
Yet she refused to give up. She showed all though the fighter that everybody knew her to be.
This was Charles. Her world and she needed to get through to him. She needed to make him better. She needed him to realise that this was not all down to him.
However, it continued months and months after Elvis' funeral. A funeral Charles had bravely carried himself with dignity and strength throughout. But she knew it was just an act. A good one, but still an act.
As she watched him, and their friend Georgie, she realised that they were both pretending to live. To move on. Molly knew she couldn't ever take away the grief, or the love they both had for Elvis. All she could do was to be there for them. Be the shoulder to cry on, the sounding board for their grief and never giving up on either of them.
In the beginning Georgie was a constant in their lives. Yet as time went by Georgie was the one who depended on Molly less and less, and Charles more and more. Eventually though Georgie moving back home to be with her family, she saw this as a positive step, and for while she thought that Charles saw that too.
And so now alone they became more of a couple again. Molly and Charles started to go out. They started to enjoy themselves, and every now and again she would see him smile, but every now and again she would also see how the grief still consumed him alongside the guilt.
"I'll never forgive myself until the day I die." Charles admitted one night as they were walking drunkenly back home from the pub. "It was me, my stupidity, my arrogance, my unwillingness to listen that caused Elvis' death. "
"No, it wasn't Charles and you've got to stop saying that. Elvis died because he was Elvis doing the thing that Elvis loved doing."
He held onto her hands tightly as they walked; still needing her; still wanting her.
"I know you say these things because you believe them but I just don't Molly. I don't. I believe it was my orders that killed him. I have his blood on my hands."
"Then maybe Charles it's time that you spoke to somebody about this. Maybe it's time Charles that you started to get help from someone."
He had stopped dead in his tracks at that.
"What do you mean? What do you mean speak to somebody? You think that I'm mad?"
She sighed and recognised how this was going to end. She had tentatively mentioned counselling to him before, more than once and it had always ended badly.
"Charles I love you." She said. "And I will do anything for you. But maybe this time I'm just not enough. Maybe this time we really need to speak to somebody about this."
"I don't need to speak to anybody about this." He said. "I've got you. I've spoken to you about it I've got Georgie I don't need anybody else."
"I think you're wrong." She said really quietly. "I really think you're wrong."
He pulled her in for a bone crushing cuddle.
"You are everything that I need Molly. I don't need to talk about this to anyone else."
And that's when she knew the conversation was over. Probably, she guessed, never to be addressed again.
She knew that he needed help. She knew also that he was too stubborn to accept it.
So, their lives simply ticked on, slowly, but always with a shadow hanging over them.
Molly took very few tours. Always wanting to be at home for Charles. Besides her role in the UK was quiet, defined and steady. She thought Charles was happy as well doing what he did, coming home every night, that was until he told her that he was heading back. Out into something he had volunteered for. Out into something that he had considered and had agreed to all without discussing it through with her.
That's when she knew the small cracks that had started to appear in her marriage were becoming larger and more visible than she had ever dared to believe.
He went away on the tour to Nigeria and it wasn't simple. It wasn't easy, but still he came back to her. Back to her almost but not quite totally. He now constantly talked of Georgie, of what they had seen and about how brave she was and how Elvis would have been so proud of her.
She tried to fool herself that he talked of her as a father would of a child. He talked of her like a brother would of a sister. Yet Molly couldn't fool herself completely. She knew he now talked of her as though he was now the only person responsible for her.
That was when she knew that his feelings about Georgie were becoming confused and were becoming and issue in their marriage.
Charles and Molly still remained physical, they still remained close. They still saw Sam. They still saw their families, and they still functioned as a couple on the surface. But some nights they went to bed and they missed the final good night kiss. Some mornings they woke up and they weren't cuddling each other. Some evenings when they were both home they would give the excuse that they were tired and conversation wouldn't exist; sitting instead in separate rooms, doing different things.
She knew his world no longer revolved around her. She also started to realise that her world no longer revolved around him.
He took on more tours. He went away and she tried, she really tried. She kept trying each and every day until that day she came home to find him sitting on the telephone talking to Georgie.
He was talking to her in a voice and manner that she hadn't heard him use for such a long time. That was how he used to speak to her. They were laughing. They were happy. She didn't interrupt him.
Instead she slipped into the kitchen and listened. She listened to the giggles and jokes, and the topics of conversation that would be irrelevant, but still kept them hanging onto the telephone talking to one another.
She missed that they used to have that once. He used to be like that on the telephone with her, but he wasn't like that anymore. And so, she sat there in the dark kitchen listening to a husband, for want of a better word, flirting with his dead best mate's fiancé. And she knew.
She didn't tackle him about it. She didn't broach the subject. Too scared to admit what she thought was happening. Though she knew that her life was changing. And that maybe now she wasn't the Molly Dawes that she wanted to be, or with the person she had wanted to be with.
The day came for him to go on another tour, and he was excited to go. As she dropped him off at the base to say their goodbyes she saw how quickly he walked over to the rest of the section and how his eyes instantly found what he was looking for.
She saw Georgie beaming her smile back at him, and she saw the bond that they shared was stronger than she ever dared imagine.
Still she put on an act, she talked to him, she said goodbye, she held him, and she kissed him that final time. But the kiss she got back wasn't deep, wasn't passionate, wasn't regretful. It was short, it was distracted, and then he was gone. Sitting on the bus with the rest of the section pulling away from her unreturned wave; she knew.
The tour was a disaster and this time a telephone call came that didn't come from him, but from his senior. Charles had been injured, he was hurt, and he was missing. Somewhere in the jungle of Belize. Out there without her. Alone; but with Georgie. Missing together.
For one crazy moment she considered that maybe they weren't missing. That maybe they'd just run away together but then she quickly dismissed it. Her Charles would never do anything like that. Yet there again she doubted that he still was her Charles.
When the call came that he'd been found the relief flooded her heart, and she knew that she loved this man more than anything. That she wasn't going to give up, she was going to keep on trying. Molly hoped once he was home this was their chance to make things right.
When he returned back to the UK he was a mess. Semiconscious and delirious. Unsure what he was saying, and she was not even certain as to whether he recognised Molly or not. She spent days and days by his bedside holding onto him, being there for him. Listening to him call out her name sometimes, and Georgie's name other times. Yet Molly still remained by his side. Guarded him from any unwelcome visitors. The relationship they had in the past she knew that this was what he would want; that he would need. After all he'd always needed her there, and she could only hope that was still how it was.
"I love you Charles." And she prayed and hope that he would hear those words and eventually say them back to her.
Slowly the day came when he did open his eyes, and he stared at her shocked. Not with love or longing, but shock. He was good though he tried to hide it, he tried to put on a smile that was genuine, he tried to put on an expression that showed he was pleased to see her. But all the time she was there she saw his eyes searching for the door. Searching, looking for some other body to visit.
Of course, the usual people came. His parents, her family, Sam. They all came to visit, all came to wish him well, but that wasn't who he was looking for. She knew who he was looking for but still said nothing.
The injury to his leg was horrific. He cried, he worried. He didn't know whether he'd be able to fight back from this. And so, as the days slowly passed by she wondered whether or not everything in their lives had just gone to shit.
It took her by surprise one day though when he was the first one to broach the subject. He was the first one to open Pandora's box.
"You know I still love you Molly!" He said on the first day she visited at the rehab centre. "Always have and always will. It's just..."
He never finished. She stayed quiet hoping that he never would. But she couldn't hide away from this any longer.
"What is it you want Charles?" She asked him dreading his answer.
He looked imploringly into her eyes, and she saw there were tears. Wondering if they were for them or for the pain he was still suffering with his leg.
"I want us back. I want what's in my head to go away. I want you to be the last thing that I see still... but I just don't know how anymore."
"What is it you're saying Charles?" The tears flowing freely down her face.
"I'm saying that I just don't know if I can do this any more Molly."
"Do what?"
"Pretend." He simply said.
"Is that what we're doing? Pretending Charles? Is that what you're doing?"
He stayed silent and broke her heart as he did. She always thought that there was going to be a happy ever after for them, but maybe just maybe there wasn't going to be and she knew she had to face the truth.
She kept visiting him though whilst in rehab and slowly saw the improvement.
But her visits became less regular, and each time were shorter than the last. Often ending in a small argument, or disagreement, and always a failure to connect. So, both felt when it was done, time for her to leave, relief was the only emotion they took away from each visit.
He didn't want to talk to her, and now she found it hard to talk to him. He was suffering mentally and physically. He needed more help, and each time she brought up the subject he knocked it back and shouted her down. He no longer listened to her counsel, now unable to move forwards and they couldn't move backwards. They were nothing, they were in limbo waiting for Charles to make his mind up as to what he wanted to do.
She knew he was the broken one. She knew he was the one that needed to be fixed. She knew that she was not the one that could fix him. He needed help, but he did not need or want her.
A break through eventually came. She found him one day sitting in his PE kit with a very determined expression on his face.
She didn't ask whether or not he was about to go in the gym or had been. It was irrelevant, but she needed to know.
"What's going on?" She asked as she watched him play with a get well card from his section. He held it with such care. A grim look on his face.
"I'm going to leave." He said. "The Army. I'm going to leave. Concentrate on getting better; concentrate on..." He stopped right there when he saw the expression on her face. He thought he was doing the right thing.
"Concentrate on what?" She asked.
"On us." He said with very little enthusiasm or conviction in his voice.
This shocked her more than pleased her. Over the past months their texts, emails had been their only true frank method of communicating. They had never really talked face to face about their future.
"What." She asked. "Do you mean?"
"It means that I think we should keep on trying."
"Keep on trying!" She shot back with a sarcastic laugh. "Charles I've been doing nothing but trying and trying for months. I've begged and pleaded, and all you've done is ignore me."
She picked out her phone from her bag and showed the texts.
"For weeks I've been messaging you... asking you to try...asking what it is you wanted...and you've never reply to me not once. Why is that?"
"I don't know." He couldn't look at her.
She sat down heavily on the bed next to him.
"Doesn't that say something Charles that you don't know... you still don't know? Doesn't that say something that you don't know if you want to try? Doesn't that just say it all?"
"I don't know." He repeated.
Molly started at him. "Why now Charles? Why now? What has happened? Why do you suddenly want me? Us again?"
He dragged his fingers across his hair and threw the card down on the floor.
"Because you're all I've got."
She knew though that wasn't enough. That he was settling. And so, they were the last words she heard him say to her face to face.
She had arrived that day to tell him that she was leaving on a short tour, that it would be weeks before she'd see him again. She left with a naive promise though that they would try again when she returned. He'd leave the Army, and that they would make a go of this.
It came from nowhere his call. The one when she discovered he had changed his mind. That he had turned down the medical discharge offered and agreed to go back out on tour. Back to time with Georgie. Then she knew it was written in the stars. They were over.
Another tour. This time to Bangladesh as a replacement CO for 2 Section following the death of Bones. This time he didn't even have the courtesy to speak to her directly. Instead all she received from him was a short telephone call and a text.
"It's something I have to do." He admitted once he'd delivered the news. "They need me the section...and Georgie. I can't abandon them."
"What about me, us?" She had asked. "You said you were leaving. Gonna get help. We were going to try."
"I don't need help." He snapped. "I need the Army. The job. The role I'm good at."
"And us?" She asked hesitantly. "Do you still want us?"
"Molly." He sighed. "All we do is fight. Bicker. Are we even happy anymore? Are you?"
It was a question she hadn't expected but knew the answer immediately.
"No. Are you?"
"No. I don't think I am." He waited. "So, what are we going to do?" He asked.
"I need time." She begged. "Time to sort it out. I'm back home next week."
"Yeah. I know." He answered. "I'm back in two months."
"We could talk then?" She offered.
"We could talk then." He suggested. "But..."
"But what?" She shot back.
"You deserve to be happy Molly. I don't make you happy anymore."
"You do." She sobbed. "You did."
He said nothing.
"Do you still want me Charles?" She asked.
"I don't know." He answered with the most honesty he could muster. "I don't know anything anymore."
She couldn't reply to that admission. She couldn't speak what she wanted to say. She couldn't scream at him that she loved him with every ounce of her being. So instead all she said was.
"Take care Charles. Stay safe." And then she was gone.
"Hey, you muppet." She shouted out at him as he crossed over the street from her. "Didn't you see me there?"
He turned. Shocked and guilty at seeing her again. He hadn't wanted that. They had been UK side now for three weeks since their return from Bangladesh and he knew this moment would come.
"Hi. Mols," He said and plastered on a false smile.
She hugged him.
"Brains. What up?" Stepping back from the hug he didn't cooperate in. It was then she knew.
Brains couldn't look at her. Her old friend and comrade. He couldn't look at her in the face and she knew he had an awful secret to keep from her.
"Tell me?" She asked and guided him to a quiet area in the Med Centre where she worked.
She knew they were back home. Charles and the rest of the section. She knew there had been trouble on their last few days out of there, but she hadn't spoken to Charles yet.
The last long distant telephone conversation she had with her husband, weeks ago, was to finally admit their marriage may have ran it course. She had offered to put their relationship out of its misery, to end it and he agreed. She offered to leave their shared quarters, and he agreed to that too. He put up no resistance. He didn't beg her to stay. If he had, then she would have, but by this stage she knew he was lost to her. There had been one or two calls since then. Civil and practical, and each time she'd hoped he would have given her some sign he wanted her back. But he never did. She knew he never would.
So now weeks since those phone calls had passed, she had had no further contact with him or any idea how he was. It was too soon she felt. Needing to be stronger before she saw him or spoke to him again.
Brains started off slowly and with little detail but saw that it wasn't enough for her. So, he picked up the pace and told all he knew.
She listened and nodded, when the tale had been told she thanked him for his honesty. They parted as the friends they were, but everything had changed.
Now she knew. Now she knew everything.
Now she knew her marriage to Charles was definitely over. He had slept with Georgie, and although her heart was breaking, her mind a mess, and had hundreds of questions that needed answering, there was one thing she knew very definitely.
She knew with absolute certainly that there was no going back for them...ever.
She knew she could never forgive him.
She knew that her and Charles James, their marriage, the love for each other was over.
She knew.