His sense of loss was enormous. He had often heard the expression 'the bottom dropped out of his world', well now he knew what it felt like. She'd gone. Okay he knew she'd be back, but he'd spent the last two hours in a frantic whirl of 'keeping busy' and, if the sideways glances and raised eyebrows of the lads were anything to go by, he was driving everyone else insane. They were obviously wondering what planet he was on, but to hell with it, he was the boss, he could call the tune and be as unreasonable as he liked, he was in charge. Except he wasn't! Inside he was such a mass of misery that he felt like lashing out at someone, anyone. He pulled himself up short when he intercepted a very telling glance between Kinders and some of the lads, which told him that he had to pull himself together before they started to join the dots and make connections, they weren't all stupid! And he was being a total arse. He publicly asked the medic for an aspirin claiming he had a headache and tried his best to remain civil when she started questioning him. He tried not to resent her, after all, it wasn't her fault that she wasn't Molly and Molly would have questioned him as well, it was their job, except he would have told Molly to "Shut the fuck up" and she would have laughed. But, for fuck's sake, he hadn't got a headache and he didn't need a full medical for two bloody aspirin.
He was glad when it was time to hit his pit, when he could stop pretending that everything was okay, that he had just had a bit of a headache and had just been in a bad mood but that he was back to normal now. He was relieved that he could finally lie on his bed and think about her. It would take at least another 14 hours for her to be back at Brize, well maybe even 15 allowing for delays, and it was 22.00 here, so that meant that she still had bloody hours airborne with Smurf. God, he hoped she was okay. He knew that he would give anything at that moment to trade places with the Welshman, to be spending hours 'alone' with her, even on a bloody transport plane where they wouldn't be able to have any sort of conversation, but just to be with her would be enough.
God, this was ridiculous, he was supposed to be getting his act together. Constantly trying to work out the time differences and what she would be doing was going to drive him nuts by the time she got back. Okay, he would start tomorrow, taking back control over his life, after all he wouldn't be able to visualise her at home, he had no idea what home looked like or even where it was. He knew she came from east London, from somewhere near Upton Park football ground and for a few minutes he was tempted to 'Google' it, he had her address, but then he realised that that wouldn't make any bloody difference at all, she would still be half a world away and he would still be missing her. He knew that home meant Mum, Nan and lots of siblings and that Dad was presumably still there, even if she never talked about him, but that was all he knew, in fact, if thought about it, he knew very little about her at all. He wished he had spoken to her about her relationship with Smurf. Okay it was none of his business, he knew that only too well, and he didn't think she was involved with Smurf, well not in the way he tried to depict it anyway, and he didn't think that the expression on her face when she left that afternoon was an act, but he just didn't know and he was still very uneasy that she and Smurf were together and he was left here.
Morning bought P.T., breakfast, routine preparation and then patrols, business as usual with a conscious decision not to keep doing time checks between here and the U.K., but time was passing so slowly that he had to keep checking his watch to make sure that it hadn't stopped, as he asked himself why the hell time stands still when you are wishing it away. Keeping busy was the only answer so he began to tighten up on drills and procedures that had got a bit slack recently, working the lads so hard that they were now firmly convinced that he had totally lost the plot, either that, or he was expecting some massive problem with the Taliban in the near future that he wasn't telling them about. They were so convinced that they had even got Kinders to ask him, then disbelieved him when he denied that that was the case. The news came through that they were back to Bastion the day after Molly's return so that would make spending any time with her even more difficult, but on the other hand it gave purpose to the days that were left, packing up and getting ready to leave.
As time went on, he managed to spend more and more of his day back in control of his life, outwardly he was back to normal, very much the relaxed and confident CO they all knew, but internally he had become more and more aware of the drip feed of gossip and innuendo that was going on in the mess tent and during down times, all of it speculation about Molly and Smurf. He knew that they had opened a book on "will they, won't they" and that the odds were terrible on "will they", he seemed to be in a minority of one in thinking that it was a load of rubbish. He was tempted to put a stop to it by pointing out that Molly would be livid but decided not to as he was afraid he would give himself away. It came to a head for him one evening as he was eating dinner and half listening to some scurrilous comments, when he suddenly needed to get away from it, to shut it out, so he got up abruptly and, scraping half his meal into the waste bucket, marched out of the mess tent. He had only gone a few steps when he felt a light touch on his arm halting his flight, and Quaseem's soft voice saying quietly "It's nonsense, don't take any notice, just ignore it." Quaseem patted his arm and walked away before he could marshal his thoughts enough to reply.
Oh fuck, Quaseem knew and who else? Actually Quaseem wasn't too much of a problem, he adored Molly and wouldn't do anything to hurt her, but Kinders? Or any of the others? Fuck, fuck, and double fuck! What was he going to do now? Nothing, there was nothing he could do. He began to wonder whether he was the one who was not seeing it clearly, were they, as the lads believed, an item? Were they at this very moment together somewhere? Was she 'with him'? Had she told Smurf about what happened in the med tent? Were they laughing about it? Everything he knew about her suggested that she wouldn't do any of that, but he was in a panic and as he had realised before, he didn't know her that well.
His dad had always said that if they cut him in half he would have army written through him, like a stick of rock, and his dad was right. He knew he was army through and through, had been all his adult life, full of rigid self control as he adhered to all the rules and regulations to the letter, but now as he lay on his bed, he began to wonder just why he was torturing himself like this, maybe he should just give into the longing he had for her, ignore the bloody regulations, and, always supposing she felt the same way, do what his heart and body craved, tell her how much he loved her. Then kiss her until they didn't know which was up, take her to bed and make love to her until they had a mutual explosion of pleasure, then sleep with her limbs entwined with his in his very small single pit! The big problem was that even if he tore the rule book up, he wouldn't give you tuppence for his ability to control himself and there was no supply of condoms in war zones, so the probable consequences would be career suicide for both of them, more than likely before they even got to Cyprus. What he needed to do was talk to her, where and when he had no idea, but he had to ask her somehow to wait for him until they got home, otherwise he was going to go insane.
The longest two weeks in history ended in the late afternoon.
He had been on pins all day searching the sky for the helicopter every time he had heard a sound even though he knew it was far too early. He was talking to Azizi when it finally arrived and he could hear the lads cheering and chirruping and taking the piss about what had supposedly gone on while they were at home, which of course Smurf was lapping up. He watched with envy as the lads hugged and kissed her, delighted to see her and grabbing their shopping out of her Bergen. He always forgot how tiny she was! He would have loved to have been able to greet her like that, instead he felt a bit awkward and shy, remembering the last time they had seen each other and not being sure what to say to her now she was finally back. She was doing the handover with Jackie when he went into the med tent to see her, still unsure about what he was going to say. Then, when Jackie left, she started to say that she was glad to be back, that she had wanted to come back and her eyes were smiling at him as everything started to sort itself out, as they began to chat and smile at each other, normality was returning, happiness was creeping in and he had begun to relax when Kinders burst his bubble.
"You went to bloody Newport and you weren't even a hostage….."
He saw her laugh as he looked at her with incredulity, she had been with Smurf in Newport, his worst nightmare had just come true in front of him, the gossip had been right and he couldn't get away fast enough. He couldn't look at her, couldn't speak to her, except to repeat what Kinders had said, then he turned and walked away. Oh, she tried to stop him as he walked across the square, tried to talk to him about it but he didn't want to listen, he just wanted to get away and be on his own. The pack of coffee capsules on his bed that night made him stop and think for a second about 'might have beens', but he did his best to shut his thoughts off as he contemplated the journey to Bastion next morning and how difficult it was going to be. He couldn't remember ever being so miserable.
The morning bought an uncomfortable niggle that maybe he had over-reacted slightly, that not letting her explain may have been a bit stupid, but he still avoided eye contact with her as they sat opposite each other in the troop carrier, he didn't know how to react to her anymore! Then it was taken out of his hands as once again she ignored a direct order! The body under the sheet in the middle of the road was dangerous, mined or booby trapped at the least, so he ordered her to wait as he walked slowly towards it checking for explosives as he went, when she ran up behind him and started to talk about quality time. Then she turned his life the right way up as she said that she hadn't been with Smurf, well not the way he thought anyway, and that his jealousy had made her think he cared and that he wasn't out of her league after all. She was the most beautiful and exciting girl he had ever met and she thought 'he' was out of 'her' league, what was she, nuts? She told him she loved him, or words to that effect and she wanted him to know in case they got blown up, then, as they got closer to the body and she got more and more scared, she asked him if he loved her? He was just about to tear the rule book up when Sohail, who was under the sheet, stuck his hand out and grabbed the Vallon, scaring them both shitless. He watched and was, once again, amazed at her ability to turn into a professional medic in a heartbeat as she fought hard to save the life of someone she had detested, someone who had treated her with an utter lack of respect.
She couldn't save him, his injuries were too severe so he died, but not before he told them that she had been the Taliban's intended target but that he had refused to kill her and that was why he was beaten to death. She was devastated and started weeping, but he was not sure whether that was because they had wanted her dead or whether it was that Sohail was dead for refusing to kill her. Either way, he wanted nothing more than to put his arms round her and hold her against him until she stopped crying then kiss some of the horror of the day away. He had to content himself with wiping away her tears and resting his head against hers, then telling her that they would talk tomorrow. He needed to think about what he would say, because to get everything out in the open without breaking regulations was some task!
They sat there looking at each other in silence as he felt a huge bubble of happiness build in his chest. She had started to apologise for what she'd said, but he was not convinced she meant it, he thought she was trying to fill the silence because it made her uncomfortable so he told her just how happy her words had made him then he told her how much he would like her to share his accommodation and then stopped, a bit horrified that he might sound like some dirty old man trying it on! He wanted to tell her that it wasn't only that he wanted to sleep with her, he wanted to be with her full time, that he was in love with her, that she had become the most important person in his world and to tell her all of this without saying any of it at all, so he could only say that there were so many things that he wanted to say and do and he wasn't allowed to and he hoped that she understood. He felt completely inadequate. Rehearsing hadn't really helped at all, words weren't enough, he badly needed to touch her, to hold her but instead all he could do was to ask her to wait out because of fucking army regulations and she said she would, but he had serious doubts about his own ability to stick to the rules. He said something stupid about it being hard because he didn't recognise the 'double entendre' until after he had said it, and he could feel himself blushing which was actually a blessing in disguise because it meant that they collapsed with laughter as he told her to "piss off" so that they parted happy and pleased with each other. She blew him a kiss as she left, which made his day!
After she left, he began to calculate how much longer it would be before they got back to Brize, and he wondered if he could deduct the time they would be in Cyprus. It would be fantastic to take a long walk with her in Cyprus, to lose the prying eyes, to spend time on some secluded bit of beach, just the two of them and Cyprus had shops! He did his best to suppress the niggle of worry that had entered his brain, he still hadn't told her about Rebecca and Sam and the nearer they got to going home, the harder it was going to be! He needed to face it and stop putting it off, it wasn't going to go away.
Authors notes: I wanted to create a picture of how he felt when she was away and what happened to provoke his very strange behaviour when she got back, both the awkwardness and the extraordinary over-reaction and jealousy when he heard she had been in Newport! It's always difficult to write about things that we didn't see because everyone has their own mental picture of what went on, i.e. 'the wait out chat' so if my version is miles away from yours, I'm sorry, but I can only go with how I imagined it would be. Thanks for your lovely reviews, please keep them coming, I really do appreciate them.