Chapter XIII

Dear Julia,

I think I will never quite believe that today is the very first day of July 1941, can you? It seems so far away; the last Christmas, you know. Although people say that when the exams come and with them revising, the time goes as quickly as ever; well, certainly not for me. At least I'm finished with Redmond now, and I actually don't know what to do with myself, with no you, Gil, Jake or Merry around during the whole summer.

Me and our family are so very proud of you. I can feel that I'm almost drinking up the pride whenever I think of you, and that happens very often, I assure you. I have no idea how much hope and faith you do have in you to still getting more experience in nursing while saving other poeple's lives as bravely as you do, every single day. You must lend me one of your recipes for "keeping faith", and I shall try ot out immediately.

I wish I was just half as brave as you are, Sheba. I think that I feel like Uncle Walter once did, twenty-five years ago. I am so scared of going to the front, so so scared. I can't imagine things that are happening on the front without getting shivers or goosebumps. But... I can feel that everyone expects me to go. I know that now you're probably saying that you don't want me to go and I'll believe you, Sheba, but others I just know they want me to. Whenever I hear my Dad talking with your Dad about Merry and Gil at the front, I feel as if I was the odd one, the one that stands out, in a bad way.

I know that I should go, I think I might go after all, but I'm so frightened to go there and kill other people who are as innocent as we all are. Ironic, isn't it? Poeple fighting against people, people killing people… I sometimes wonder if there really is a God. I said this to Cornelia and she looked at me as if I was a traitor and said: "How can you question such a thing?". But I think that inside she is asking herself the same question, with her brother at the front as well.

I'm sorry, I shouldn't be talking about war for so long, especially to you who knows more about it than I do, or maybe ever will. You ask me if I wrote any new poems lately; the answer is yes I did and they will be published in the next "Journal". By the way, I feel very proud that you still have my poems from before Christmas and read them from time to time, becasue I actually wrote them mostly for you. I'm sending you my new ones today.

I'm really glad that the Blitz is over for you, I've seen photos of London from about a month ago and I couldn't believe that this is the place you describe to me in such wonderful terms… There, I talk about war again! Tell me, dear, what do you think about me enlisting? But be honest please.

Mum calls from downstairs and so I'll have to go.

Rose has some big news to tell you but I'll let her do the job.

I'm impatiently waiting for your next letter.

Yours,

Blythe Ford

Dear Juliet,

I am the happiest person in the world! Although my husband is at the front, I can feel nothing else but happiness! Dearest Bathsheba, I am pregnant! Almost 16 weeks along! Julia, I will be a Mother! A Mum, a Mummy, or a Mother-dear like you call Auntie Faith.

I must be selfish to think about such things when the war is going on around me and people, our own Canadian boys are dying every single day, but I can't force myself to think of anything else. I think it will be a boy, you know, I can feel it, although if you would ask me how, I cannot tell. It's Mother Nature, I suppose. If it will be a boy, I'll call him Jake for my bravest of all brother, or Jerry for Dad. However, if it will be a girl, I'll call her for you my darling, Juliet or Julia.

John is over the moon and he said to me in his last letter, when he was still on land, that he can't think of anything else as well now, even though he will be sent somewhere on the Atlantic in three days. I told John's parents about the baby too, and they immediately invited me for a month long stay in Medford in August and I accepted, they'll be grandparents after all.

My parents are delighted, especially Mum. She even said to me after Uncle Jem, your Dad I mean, examined me "Gosh, this is the happiest thing that could ever happen during the war!" and I couldn't agree more.

Anyway, you probably want to know what John and I plan to do after the war; when John will come back (and I know he will) he and I will probably move to Montreal, where his uncle works as a Maths proffessor, other than that, I think it's quite too early to think about what will happen in a one, two or maybe three years' time.

And with that I have to go to Grandmother Rosemary because she asked me to help her with preparing dinner (our whole clan is invited) for tonight.

Write to me as often as you can, sweetie.

Yours,

Anna Rosemary Richardson

Dear Sister,

You probably know already how proud I am of you and your huge achievement. Compared to you, my diploma from Maths is really nothing to what you do every day.

This letter is short because I am very very busy because you see, I'm giving Maths lessons to all the kids in our Glen, Four Winds and at the weekends in Charlottetown as well. I'm doing fine and the summer will go very quickly for me, although I don't really want to do this kind of job my whole life.

Lily already declared that she will come to Glen for the next Christmas and I'm so happy I can feel how my feet are lifting up. I just hope that you will like her when you two will eventually meet! But I'm sure you will, you are quite simmilar in a way, you both love books, and nature and history. I'm almost positive that you will become friends.

I will be honest with you, dear sister, and I will tell you that I'm thinking of signing up. I'm not very scared, not as much as Blythe seems to be at least. I'm actually alright with the thought because I really feel that this is my duty which I must follow. But don't worry, I won't follow the Piper soon, maybe after New Year's Eve. But I'm still thinking and debating with myself about the idea of going overseas.

And you know Mother, she doesn't want me to go but Father said: "Merry got my permission and so will you if you feel that you must go.".

I really have to go now, Julia dear, or otherwise I will be late for my lesson in Four Winds which starts in half an hour!

Love you always,

Your brother and a friend,

Walter Blythe

Julia sighed and sinked down in her bed with her hand holding the new arrived letters, resting on her forehead. The day-duty, to which she was signed in for the next three months has just finished and both she and Olive had time to read their letters from their family while Claire was taking a shower in the bathroom.

"I am too exhausted to go to sleep." Julia said and put the letters on the side of her night-table, sighing.

Olive looked at her friend and chuckled "I've never heard of anything like this before but I must say that I believe you." she said and sat next to Julia, putting her hand on Julia's arm.

"How's Michael?" Julia asked her.

"Very bored." Olive replied looking at the letter she was holding in her hands "He says that he feels as if he signed up to just sit and stare in the sapce in front of him in the trenches." she and Julia chuckled together.

"He probably did." Julia answered and then sighed again "Walt and Blythe are thinking of enlisting." she said eventually, her eyes watching the ceiling.

"You knew it will happen sooner or later." Olive said with a raised brow.

"That's true." Julia agreed, still looking at the small empty hole in the ceiling above her head "But I just can't bear the thought of all my cousins, friends and brothers going to the front!" she exclaimed and groaned while putting her letters aside.

Olive squeezed her arm friendly "It will be fine, you'll see, besides think at the bright sides. Don't you want to see your Blythe in a khaki unifrom, looking so dashingly handsome?" she raised her eyebrow and grinned at Julia meaningfully.

Julia sat back on her bed and looked at Olive sternly "No, I don't." Julia replied seriously.

Olive nudged her at the side "Come on, cheer up, sweet! And don't think about it until they do enlist. Who knows maybe the war will end before they do?" she said optimistically, waving her hands.

"I don't think it will, Liv." Claire came out of the bathroom while brushing her long blonde hair.

"Don't listen to her." Olive said to Julia again, rolling her eyes "And just write them back and eat those cookies my Mother sent to me yesterday." she pointed at the bag standing on the windowsill.

Julia smiled at Olive and quickly grabbed the cookie from the bag "Claire, where are you going?" she asked her friend as she was walking up and down the room, putting on her red polka dotted dress and her red lipstick at the same moment. Both Julia and Olive knew perfectly well that Claire never put on make-up after her duty.

"I'm going out with Captain Lewis Andrews who invited me to a dinner at Leicester Square." she said with her cheeks fiery, not looking friends at all.

Julia and Olive exchanged their hidden looks knowingly "I see…" Julia said and couldn't help herself and so she ended up giggling.

"Stop laughing!" Claire demanaded when she eventually turned around to face Julia rather than the mirror in front of her.

"How long do you know him, Claire?" Olive inquired when she could catch her breath at last.

"Two days." Claire replied in a matter-of-fact tone.

"Well, that's very quick then!" Julia said with a mocking surprise in her tone "What's he like?" she asked, this time with a real interest in her voice.

"Positively handsome, I assure you." Claire said emphasising the word "assure" so much that Julia and Olive rolled their eyes again.

"Is that all you ever think of when it comes to a man?" Julia asked her.

"No, but it is important, isn't it?" Claire said sarcastically and put on her high heels swiftly "Well, then I'm going. Cheerio, girls!" she said in a high-pitched voice.

"Cheerio, Claire!" Julia and Olive said together in the same tone as her. When the door closed behind her, the two of them started laughing so hard, they were sure that they won't be able to go to sleep in at least three more hours.

Dearest Luna,

Thank you so much for your perfect brownies! Olive was simply in the highest of Heavens when she tried them and even Claire agreed with me that they really are wonderful in every possible way. I'm so glad that you, Leslie and Cilia do some knitting work for the Red Cross and I'm really proud of you, my lovely girls. How I sometimes wish that I could sit by the Ingleside's fireplace with you, Cilia, Leslie and Rose by my side and just talk, talk and talk!

But I love what I do, don't get me wrong, Luna-Moona. Helping others really is my goal in life and I feel that God made me in order to save other people's lives, just like He destined Father and Grandfather to do exactly so. Don't worry about me, dearest, the worst time for London is over and I'm in no dramatic danger, except for some bombing which happens once in a while, but it's nothing like the Blitz, believe me.

Sweetheart, you ask me about my feelings for Blythe… Well, they certainly didn't change and there are times when I wish they did and just a second after this thought I want to spank myself for it! I really love him so dearly and with ever letter he sends me and a poem he writes and gives me his own copy in his hand-writing (Blythe's hand-writing is so unbeliveably neat!), I feel as if I grow a second heart, made up just for him to love him asdearly as I do in this very moment.

Have you read his book of poems called "The Violets of Yesterday and The Roses of Tomorrow" yet? Oh, I think that even Shakespeare would like to steal this bunch of poems from Blythe! Do you know what he said to me in his last letter? He said that "he misses my voice like the trees can miss the wind when it's not blowing". And because of such small statements he makes, of which he isn't even aware of making, my heart is just melting and melting and melting all over and all over again.

But enough of my "Blythe thing" as Rose calls it. I know I just have to let the Providence do its thing. Gosh, I sound just like Mary Vance! I mean Mary Douglas… Tell me, Luna from the Moon, does your heart have its desires too? Or maybe not yet? You know, I think that Merry really loves your letters you send him. He wrote me that somehow, they keep him strong and positive throughout this "war situation".

I have to go to sleep now,

Take care, darling and write to me whenever you like!

Your crazy cousin and a loyal friend,

Nurse Julia Una Blythe

Summer was very exhausting. Julia, Olive and Claire had lots of work as always, but it was much worse when the temperature got quite high and all wounded soldiers started moaning even more than during the winter-time. Claire was seeing her "boyfriend" Lewis Andrews ever so often that Julia and Olive expected to see the diamond ring on her finger any minute.

Merry, Jake and Marshall got transfered to Newfoundland, and that was when Merry accepted the position of a Captain and began his training there. "My hands are shaking from excitement again, Jules!". However when it came to Gil, nobody could be sure where he was each passing day, as one day he was flying over Greece, then the week after he got transfered to Germany and then to Finland. But it seemed to Julia that all of her boys actually enjoyed themselves at the front and weren't as frightened as she thought they would be, for which she was extremely thankful.

Luna wrote back to Julia and said that she might feel something for Merry, but she's not sure at all yet and is too scared to even allow herself to love a boy who could die any minute at the front. Julia smiled at the thought of a couple containg of her loud tap-dancer Merry with his red curls and wickedness spread across his frecled-face, and a small, lovely and shy Luna, looking like a real fairy in the moonlight. But to her own surprise she thought that they would make a splendid match together however big their differences were.

"And this only makes me wonder," she thought to herself "How did God invented love? It is the most precious of all the treasures out there in the world and at the same time, so strange and mysterious.". And then she remembered what Blythe once told her about love: "Love is such an unexplained mystery and I should hope that maybe one day in the future I will be able to explain it in a way my wife will only understand. Don't you think it would be quite an impressive achievement, to actually make her and only her to understand?"

And with this Julia sighed bitterly again, closed her eyes and allowed the ghost of dreams haunt her soul for the rest of the night.

Thank you everyone who is reading my story! Please review and let me know what you all think/like/dislike about it! :) - Bathsheba Blythe