Dear Dad,

How are you? I finally got your letter; post takes forever to get here so heaven knows when you'll get this. It's a pretty good crew here but very young, I feel like I ought to be reminding them to wash behind their ears the way you always did with me.

I miss the sea. I suppose that's a strange thing to say when I'm currently posted on a very small island but it's true. People have probably written reams of poetry about the beauty of the Mediterranean Sea, it is the purest blue you can imagine but I miss the Channel with all its gray imperfection. I should ask Uncle Charles which one he prefers.

Truth is the water's so blue it gives me a headache, I thought it was just the travel and time change at first but its been over three weeks now. Bloody annoying on ops but it can't be helped.

Foyle checked the date on the letter and frowned deeply, this had been written months before Andrew had been demobbed and sent home 'Had he been dealing the sinusitis all that time?'

Knowing Andrew he must have felt pretty rotten to admit it so openly in a letter. 'How the devil did he fly for all those months feeling like that? Damned foolish thing to do, could have cost him his life!'

The flare of anger in his chest was extinguished almost immediately by a combination of relief, pride and love and he turned toward Rose's picture again, 'Our son is a very brave man my love, you would be so proud of him.'

He had read the paper over breakfast just as he always did but when he took his second cup of tea into the lounge he had crossed to the desk to retrieve the stacks of letters he left there the night before.

Now he rethought his original plan for the day and went back into the kitchen to make another pot of tea. He had spent what felt like half the night thinking about the letters he read yesterday so the idea that he could read a few and then move on to other non-urgent errands was foolish from the beginning.

Besides Andrew would be home tomorrow evening and if he didn't want to tell him he'd read the letters then he'd need to be finished with them by then. He would read them now and then go to the river tomorrow morning.

Once again properly supplied with tea he settled back in his chair and reached for the next letter.

Dear Dad,

I know I haven't written in awhile and I'm sorry for that. There just never seems to be anything to say. We fly ops as required, some good some bad, and the rest of the time we are in briefings or trying to catch a few hours sleep. I miss England more fiercely than I ever thought I would. I'm glad to be operational again but mostly I just want all this to be over, Wing Co seems to think it will be soon but I've been hearing that since 1940…

How are Maggie and Gracie? They must have grown so much since I saw them last, damn war. I'm so tired Dad and ((my head's pounding))

The next sentence had been scratched out and Foyle couldn't be sure if Andrew had been called to duty or had given the letter up as a bad job. What he had written was enough to make Foyle's heart ache though.

He sounded heart sick and tired; Foyle hadn't needed the admission at the end of the letter to tell him that. Andrew had been exhausted and… he squinted at the scratched out sentence again trying to make it out. "My head's pounding" 'Exhausted and ill and still flying god only knows how many operations a day…'

Foyle rubbed at his forehead as he sipped his tea, the more he learned about Andrew's service the more amazed he was that he'd come home alive. 'First the Battle of Britain and then flying all those months with sinusitis…'

Of course Andrew had not returned to him the same young man he had watched climb into a taxi bound for Scotland in 1940. He had still been a boy in so many ways then and he had come home a man, having seen and done more than any man should have at just 25.

Foyle had seen it in the sallow sharpness of Andrew's features, heard it in the conflicted question "Do you think it was worth it Dad?" and he hated the war all the more for what it had done to his boy.

There were only a few letters left and in some ways he was glad, reading them was much harder than he had anticipated, even knowing that Andrew had gotten through everything.

Dear Dad,

I've been grounded and no, I didn't do anything foolish. Medical grounds, (stupid really it's just a headache), anyway I've got to get checked out at the hospital if it doesn't get any better by tomorrow.

Want to know the worst part Dad? I'm glad, not that I feel wretched but that I don't have to fly, bloody awful thing to think when you're the squadron leader but it's true. I hope it's just the headache making me feel this way but I've got the awful feeling that it isn't.

I'm supposed to be trying to get some sleep the doctor said it would probably help. Please don't fuss Dad, like I said it's just a headache, I'm probably just tired and I'll be fine by tomorrow.

Foyle looked at the date of this letter and then the date of the first unsent letter from Malta, 3 months separated the two. 'Christ! Andrew had said he'd been feeling unwell for three weeks already in the first letter. That meant that his son had flown for almost four months with sinusitis.'

He picked up the small picture that had been taken when Andrew first got his wings and studied it carefully. Regardless of what Andrew had said about the good pilots being the ones who got killed first the little he'd gleaned of Andrew's service record would suggest that his son was a very good pilot in his own right, otherwise he wouldn't have come home alive.

The thought made him shiver and he had to sit and drink his tea for several minutes before he felt composed enough to read the next letter.

Dear Dad,

The nurses' keep saying I should write to you but I don't want you to worry, well I suppose worry more than you do already. Thing is Dad I'm in hospital, turns out the headaches I've been having are actually sinusitis, and what they need to do to treat it is actually more painful than the headaches were. I can't lie I've said some things that would have made Mum wash my mouth out with soap, (I'd prefer that to what they're doing instead).

I'm not sure when I can fly again, the doctor was pretty vague when I asked, something about seeing how I respond to the treatment. Wing Co came by earlier, said the lads are getting along fine which is a relief but I still hate the idea of them going up without me. It doesn't make sense Dad, how can I be so sick of flying ops but hate the idea of the lads going up without me at the same time?

Time for another treatment so I'd better go ((I wish you were here))

Foyle read the letter over twice and then closed his eyes and rested his head in hands. It was a long time before he raised his head; wiping his eyes and wishing it were an acceptable time of day to have a glass of scotch.

His son had been in hospital, undergoing some bloody painful treatment and he hadn't been there. Never mind the fact that he hadn't even known about it till Andrew got back and that there was no way he could have gotten to Malta even if he had. Andrew had been ill, in pain, and had wanted him and he hadn't been there.

Foyle set the letters aside and paced the room chewing on his cheek for over ten minutes but felt no better for it. He rubbed at his forehead in irritation and then made up his mind and placing the letters back on his desk he picked up the tea tray and carried it back to the kitchen.

When he came back to the house two hours later Foyle finally felt composed again. It felt like an odd regression back to the stormy years of Andrew's adolescence when he had so often visited Rosalind's grave in search of solace. Since Andrew had come home he had found himself once again frequenting the graveyard as he struggled to help their son cope with all that he had endured.

Today's visit had been more about himself than Andrew. Reading these letters had left him with the distinct feeling that he had failed their son in his greatest time of need, and it was only standing in front of Rosalind's headstone that he had been able to start to move passed that feeling and accept the realities of the situation.

He had done everything he could, within the bounds of wartime restrictions and reason, to help Andrew during the war. No matter how badly he wished to he could not change the past; the headstone he had spent over an hour staring at was proof of that. What had happened couldn't be changed, Andrew had come home and now that he had a better understanding of what he had endured he would be better able to help him deal with it.

He made himself a fresh pot of tea and a sandwich before going back into the lounge to read the remaining letters.

Dear Dad,

Remember when I told you that the waiting was the worst? Well it still is; instead of giving me a straight answer about when (really if at this point I think) I can fly again I keep getting bumped from one quack to the next. They all ask me exactly the same questions peer into my ears and eyes and then tell me the same bland nothings as the last one!

Sorry, I'm just frustrated. If you were here I bet you would just look at them, raise an eyebrow and they'd tell you whatever you wanted to know. Always worked on me and I assume that's how you get all those criminals to confess. I wish you were here Dad, and not just so you could pry information out of these doctors, I miss you.

I hope things are all right over there and work isn't getting on top of you too much (although I doubted you'd tell me if it was). Looks like it's finally my turn so I'll have to finish this later.

There is was again, 'I wish you were here, I miss you' his son's words cut him to the quick and Foyle took a long drink of tea trying to ease the ache in his chest a memory coming unbidden to his mind.

"You have to stop blaming yourself for things you cannot control Christopher, it is tearing you apart."

"I'm sorry Rose but it feels like my responsibility, like there must be something I could have done to prevent it."

Rosalind nodded understandingly but spoke firmly, "Then you will have to take my word for it, it wasn't your fault and there was nothing you could have done differently, it was war Christopher."

The conversation was more than 25 years old now but as he looked at Rose's photograph Foyle could picture it all as clearly as if it had happened yesterday. It had taken place after a particularly bad nightmare when he had confessed to Rosalind that he still felt responsible for the men who had died under his command.

If she were still alive, he knew she would be saying the same type of thing about his feelings that he should have been with Andrew in Malta and he tried to cling to that as he picked up the final letter.

Dear Dad,

((I've been))

((I just met with))

((It's all))

Sorry, I just really don't know how to say this. I thought I wanted this but now that it's happened I don't want it at all. Sorry that doesn't make any sense does it? I'm done Dad. They won't let me fly again because of the sinusitis; "honorable discharge on medical grounds" is what Wing Co called. It feels like a cowards excuse; I'm going to go home but the rest of the lads aren't.

I thought I'd be happy, I've wanted this to be over for ages but not like this, I wanted to come home when it was all done, when there were no more ops to fly. Yet as much as I dislike it I'm also so incredibly relieved, I don't want to fly anymore Dad, some Squadron Leader I am…

I'm not sure when I'll get back, transport around here is iffy at the best of times and the doctors didn't sound keen on letting me fly, something to do with altitude and a possible relapse. It might be weeks before I'm actually back in England

Foyle read the letter over several times and then let his head fall back against his chair. The knowledge that his son, who had been award the DFC for flying through the Battle of Britain when the very fate of England rested on his young shoulders, could believe that a discharge on medical grounds marked him as a coward made him feel sick.

The fact that military discipline taught brave young men to think of themselves as cowards when they were simply too exhausted to go on left him seething. Wing Commander Turner had understood and Foyle suddenly wondered if he was still based in Hastings and if speaking to him might not do Andrew some good, 'I'll look into that on Monday.'

He surveyed the stack of letters and rubbed his face wearily; by complete chance he had learned more about his son's wartime experience in the last two days than Andrew might have ever chosen to tell him. His job now was to use that knowledge to help heal the wounds that Andrew kept hidden and pray that time would do the rest.

When Andrew came home the next day the letters were once again wedged between his laundry hamper and the wall and if he noticed that his father returned his hug a little more fiercely than usual he didn't mention it.

The End