Jack didn't think of anything special when he woke up one morning. His heart ached dully and his eyes welled with tears at the thought of the person he shared the room with. Today was the two year anniversary that he hadn't seen Henry, two years since he was drafted, two years since he'd seen or heard of his precious Henry. His finger yearned for him, and his image was perfectly preserved in his mind.

Emelia was already up, starting on the rosemary bread she was making. Jack deftly helped her, his eyes glazed over, his body working by muscle-memory. Emelia looked at her brother worriedly, she knew what day it was and felt her brother's pain. She shoved the dough into the brick oven, and hugged her brother tightly. Jack hugged her back, in the same way he did everything now: blankly.

Henry's father walked into the kitchen, his eyes sad as he spotted the two children he took in as his own. He gathered them up in his arms automatically without uttering a word.

The hug broke, and Jack sniffed loudly. He wasn't crying because he promised himself that he would stay strong for Emelia, who looked up to him, and Henry's father, who counted on him to take care of them now. But mostly, he was being strong for Henry, awaiting his return as if he was a faithful spouse.

"I believe the post is here," Emelia said, pointing towards the front of the house. Jack nodded numbly, and went to go retrieve anything that could have came in.

The letters were few, but the last one in the pile were all that mattered. In thick, scrawling letters, the envelope was addressed to: "Jackson, Emelia and Stephen Haddock." At the seal, it had a stamp, proclaiming it was from Britain's army. The first thought that crossed Jack's mind was "Henry."

Jack held this letter in his hands tightly as he stood outside the house. He had been so excited to receive a letter from Henry that he didn't even wait to get inside to open and read it. He read the letter excitedly, soaking up every word that Henry wrote down… until it wasn't the same scrawling, beautiful handwriting on the page anymore. At the end, it was dirtier, some blood smudged here and there, and some sort of water blotting out some of the words. The statement was clear though.

I'm sorry for your loss…

Jack fell to his knees, holding the letter away from him as he wailed onto the floor, tears streaking down his face quickly. There was a pain in his heart, gnawing at his insides and eating him from inside out.

Emelia came running outside, hearing her brother's crying. He never cried, she knew this, not even when they were little. Believe it or not, she didn't have a memory of her brother crying. The sight of him collapsed onto the floor, sobbing violently and clutching a couple pieces of paper in his hand made her panic.

"Jackson!" She yelled, kneeling down and placing a hand on her brother's shoulder. He moved her hand off him, and, as if on second thought, gathered Emelia up into his arms. He stroked her hair as he cried, hugging her close to him almost to the point where she could not breathe properly.

"What's… what's wrong, Jack?" She asked, a bit scared to hear the answer, herself, but she needed to know.

"H-Henry…" He managed to sputter out before sobbing loudly into her ear unintentionally. His tears seemed never-ending.

"Jack!" Henry's father said, running outside and spotting the two. "What's the matter?" Shakily, Jack handed him the papers, a little reluctant to let them go, but he had the right to know what had happened to his son. He read the papers diligently, and at the end, he slapped a hand to his mouth to stifle a sob.

"What?" Emelia asked, looking at the two crying men. "What is the matter?"

"Henry… Henry is dead."

Their sobs continued for the rest of the day. Jack was crushed, his head swimming with images of his late Henry, the sound of his beloved's voice resounding in his head. He numbly stumbled into their room, his room now. He collapsed onto the two mattresses that remained pushed up against each other.

Jack scooted closer to Henry's side of the makeshift bed. His earthy and unique smell still imprinted on his pillow was bed's sheets no matter how many times Jack had washed them over the past two years, He thought of this as annoying and infuriating beforehand, now he counted it as a blessing. Burying his face into his pillow, Jack breathe in the scent.

Someone touched his shoulder, but he didn't react to it. Jack clutched the pillow tighter while someone slipped next to him, holding onto him tightly. Whether it be the smell of Henry getting to him or the familiarity of it all, Jack had a small glimmer of hope that it was Henry that was holding onto him. With a quick turn, Jack faced the someone who was holding him, and his heart fell farther down. It was only Emelia.

"I miss him too…" She said quietly, her voice breaking. Jack saw the tear stains that ran across her cheeks, and he futilely tried to wipe them away. He placed the pillow gingerly back in its place and hugged his sister tightly.

They both got up and walked to the front of the house, only to find Henry's father sitting on a chair next to the kitchen table, his eyes glazed over. There were fat tears rolling down his face and dripping onto the tabletop. Jack slung his arm around the man's shoulders.

"He… He simply cannot be dead." Henry's father said weakly, his lip trembling with the effort it took to choke that one sentence out in between his body-wracking yet silent sobs. "My son is not dead."

But they all knew otherwise. They all knew, thanks to the media, that Henry's body lay in a trench somewhere. He was slowly rotting next to his fallen comrades, the good-sized rats scurrying towards him as a promise of new food. They hoped that, sitting nearby, Jeremy Blake was warding off all the rats as best he could, honoring his friend in these actions. They knew that even though this war would be over, there would be nothing left to be happy about when the troops were deployed.

They knew that Henry Haddock was dead, and maybe, one day, they would accept that fact.