A soldier walks into the church. He comes baring a letter, a letter with her name typed neatly on the front of it. A letter from the nurse corps. Normally she would place the letter on her bed and wait until later to read it. But this is different, this letter could contain what she's been waiting to hear for months, that she would finally be getting the hell out of Bastogne.
"Sorry," The soldier says, "The letter got lost in the mail."
She all but snatches the letter from his hands and tears open the envelope. Quickly she scans the letter for the key phrase, and nearly yells out in joy when she finds it. 'You will be transferred to Paris, France on January 5th, 1945...'
"What's the date today," she quickly says to the soldier.
"Well I believe its December 22nd today ma'am."
She nods and mutters a quick thank you before striding away. She can hardly contain her excitement as she goes to place the letter down with her belongings. The joy of being able to go back to France is coursing through her veins. Ever since she got to Bastogne she's wanted to leave, and now the chance is finally in sight. She thinks of what she'll do when she gets there, what it will be like to take a proper bath, to feel clean again, to be able to do things on weekends and not be completely terrified of being bombed at any minute, or have to deal with seeing dead men brought to her.
When she tells Anna and Renee they're happy for her, she's been in Bastogne longer than either of them. She was here before them so its only natural that she leaves before them as well. But she can see their disdain too. They'll still be trapped in this frozen wasteland, while she heads back to civilization. They'll have to deal with more since they'll be short one experienced nurse, they'll have to train another girl and compensate some.
She almost feels selfish really. She rejoices at the thought of going somewhere more civilized, where she isn't dealing with the immediate effects of war, where she doesn't have to bandage fresh wounds all the time, where she can be clean and sleep well into the night. Where the whole threat of war seems just a little bit further away.
She finds herself quickly slipping out of the melancholy that had been taking over her for the past few days. While she doesn't do things exuberantly, she's more amiable than she's been in awhile, and she finds herself starting to give more real smiles than fake. It's as if the letter has given her a new lease on life, as if she now has another chance. The fact that the number of casualties is lessening adds to her mood. She feels as though God has finally acknowledged her prayers at least, perhaps she'll have an easy last few weeks while she's in Bastogne, she knows she's getting a little beyond herself, it's all just fanciful thinking, but she can't help but hope for it anyways.
December 22nd,1944. It's probably the best day she's had since she's been in Bastogne. Her day is relatively quiet, she gives a few men baths, dresses the wounds of others, has conversations with some more. Anna and Renee want to do something for the men for Christmas, and she likes the idea of it. They don't have much of anything, maybe they'll give extra rations of chocolate or somehow they'll find a little time to make something nice for the men, though she can't imagine what.
However by mid-afternoon December 22nd doesn't seem like a such a great day after all. There was an air strike in the woods, and she could see medics coming adding more bodies to the pile of dead that lay not far from the church.
Soon enough wounded started piling in. Its enough wounded to almost make her forget about the good news she'd received earlier. Its enough wounded to keep her busy and on her feet for what feels like forever.
She's not happy anymore, her face is pinched into an almost permanent frown, and she can't find it in her to at least try and smile at anyone. There's nothing to smile about anyways, there never is. She feels bad for all of the men who come her way, they're all thousands of miles from home and their lives will never be the same again. She doesn't see those with minor wounds anymore, after all that's why there are medics to deal with things of that nature. But after seeing so many extremities hanging barely on by tendons, or bones protruding out of flesh, and seeing the deep color of blood everywhere, she honestly does miss the lesser cases. She'd much rather see little cases of frostbite or trench foot, she wouldn't mind even lancing a few boils if it got her away from the gore that consumed her everyday life.
She begins to feel more and more selfish with each passing minute. She was saving lives, she was a hero and some respect. Perhaps God is blessing her with the ability to save lives, to do something for the greater good, something beyond herself. Her mother had always told her that it was important to look after everyone, to pray to God that everyone might be safe and okay not just the people she cares for. Her mother would tell her how the selfish would find no friends and no place in heaven, and a young Marguerite always believed her. But then she remembers what Renee had said to her once:
"God would never give someone such a curse."
And she starts to think Renee is right. More men die in her hands then survive. She's lost count of how many she's actually saved and how many she's failed. But she knows the dead far out number the living. They have to, because she can remember the face of every single dead soldier, and they're numerous, but the living don't have the same effect. She can't remember them, sure a few faces stick out to her. But it's not the same. She can see the faces of the dead men in her sleep, she can see them everything she sees a men lying on a makeshift cot beginning for his life. It's all she can think about after awhile.
She has the last check for the night. She walks between all the cots making sure that every last man is as comfortable as possible, that all bandages are changed, that stitches are done correctly. Then she finally goes to the nurses quarters.
She changes out of her dirty, blood stained clothing, into other clothing that isn't quite as dirty or stained. She then climbs into her bed, unable to sleep. She stares at the letter that she was so enthused about for a minute or two before dropping it on the ground.
It's quite times like these that she thinks of what she might do one day. She wants to get married and have a family. She wants a simple life, in the country somewhere. Somewhere where she can raise her children in peace, somewhere where she's not in surrounded by death, she's had enough for a lifetime. She wants her husband to do something simple, like being a tailor or a farmer. She craves a simple life, like the life that her grandmother would tell her about. Where days were long and their was never a care in the world other than daily tasks. She tries not to toy with this dream life too much though, of this war has taught her anything it's that nothing is permanent. But still she likes the idea of it.
The next day she's awake before Anna and Renee. She tries to go back to sleep, but sleep never comes to her. So slowly she gets out of bed and decides to go forth and do her rounds. The wounded are doing as well as can be expected given their situation. Some manage to make small jokes, others just lie still in a deafening silence emulating the dead.
Everything is the same way its always been in a sense, and Marguerite knows she'll never miss that fact of life, she makes a mental note that she only has thirteen days left, less than two weeks in this frozen tundra of hell before she's been stuck in for what feels like forever.
Eventually Anna and Renee come and join her. They insist that she go back to bed, because as per usual they know she hasn't sleep her face tells the entire story. But she refutes them, saying its useless and it won't do anybody any good, because deep down they all know that its the truth.
At some point a medic comes in with a wounded man. He says something about there just being a drop somewhere in the forest, saying that he can take one of the nurses to go pick up more supplies. Anna and Renee volunteer her, saying that she's too tired to be of any service to the men so she may as well go get the supplies. And so she leaves with the medic.
The medic is a little over friendly for her taste, he's buzzing with words, never stopping for a minute. He tells little stories of what's happened and tries to keep the conversation light. He speaks so fast that she can hardly keep up, but she's glad that he talks about things other than the grim destruction that lies around them in the snow.
On the way their she's pulled aside a few times to see if some of the injuries the men have are worth going back to Bastogne for. One man has such a bad case of trench foot that she can hardly stand to look at it, and she recommends that he go back to Bastogne immediately. Another has a gaping wound on his thigh, and what looks to be blood poisoning, all she can do is have the medic get a truck for the man while the soldier gives a delirious and grim stare.
She finally reaches the drop site, and what she sees isn't a lot. Some bandages and morphine, a little bit of food but not enough to really do anything. The medic apologizes profusely saying he swore that there had been more, and if he didn't know any better some of the men had scavenged the site. She shrugs off the apology, saying they can survive another week at the church before they'll be in desperate want, and the medic promises her that they're will most likely be another drop in the next week, so she need not worry.
They have to wait for a few minutes while another truck makes it back to their dense section of the woods, and in those few minutes she tries to make herself that much more useful. She wraps wounds, checks for infections, basic things that the medics are probably too busy to do. Finally the truck comes, and she's thankful, because while it's quite cold in the church the front lines is a completely different story. On the front lines men are practically freezing to death, she has now clue how they actually stay warm enough to move let alone fight. And she's happy that she's not one of the front-line nurses, she doesn't think she'd be able to survive it.
The ride back to the village is relatively silent and peaceful. Too peaceful for a war zone, and just as the driver of the truck goes to comment on this fact a deafening noise overcomes them, and the next thing Marguerite knows she's being pulled under the jeep by a soldier, who's holding her tightly. She can hear one of the men cursing as loud as he can, cursing the Germans with every word imaginable. She herself can't form a coherent thought, they're all rushing past her. All she can do is scoot closer to the soldier holding her, who proceeds to hold her tighter. Maybe he can sense her fear because he tells her that they're going to be alright, and she's so far gone that she believes him.
Eventually the bombing lets up, and the men are nearly one-hundred percent sure that the Germans are done with Bastogne for now, and they drive into the city. But nothing prepares them for what they see.
The whole village for the most part is in shambles. Great hulking stone buildings that had been there is decent condition are now piles of rubble. It looks as though the apocalypse has struck, and has left no survivors. There are burning buildings in every direction, the stench of death surrounds them.
They don't have to pull up to the church to know its destroyed, but they do anyways. The building's not on fire, but its hot. The bomb that hit it incinerated most of the building.
Marguerite knows that Renee and Anna must be dead, the odds of them surviving the blast are little to none. But she jumps out of the jeep anyways. She runs over to the only part of the building that's still somewhat there and finds not a single living person. She begins to move the rubble, she nicks her hands on the heated rocks, but continues on anyways. She pushes away brick after brick, with her now bloody broken hands. Still she finds nothing. So she moves on to another area, because if its t he last thing she does she'll find Renee and Anna. Renee and Anna was essentially Marguerite's entire family in the frozen wasteland. They were the only people left that were helping her keep sane, helping her keep hope of a better, brighter future. So she keeps digging, to save her family.
"Ma'am," someone says to her placing a cold hand on her shoulder, "I'm sorry ma'am but we're going to have move you away from here. It's not safe."
She looks at the soldier talking to her. He's young, though maybe a bit older than she is. He has a sad compassionate look on her face. He holds her hand out to her, but she doesn't take it.
"No," she says shaking her head, "no, I have to find my friends first. I need to know they're alright."
The soldier doesn't say anything back and squats next to her. She's not actually moving the rubble anymore, instead she's sitting in the snow, looking at a piece of cloth that looks rather similar to the one that Anna had, but she shakes her head. Because Anna and Renee couldn't have died, because if they had that means she would be dead, and she most certainly was not dead.
She continues to sit there until she's so could she's in in pain. She feels pins and needles over her entire body, and only then when its nearly unbearable does she start to move. She nearly falls over from moving too fast, but to her surprise someone catches her. Its the same soldier from before. He helps her over the piles of rubble. He says absolutely nothing to her, and she's thankful that he doesn't because she has no words. Anything resembling a word dies in her throat, rendering her speechless. He leads her to the tailor's shop. Only now it's not a tailor's shop anymore, its a makeshift hospital. The shop is less than half the size of the church, if even that.
Once she's inside, she doesn't stop to look back on the gravity of what just happened. She walks over to a bloody man screaming in pain. It's fair to say that she's the most medically savvy person in the room, and when she pushes past the medics and soldiers in the room they don't stop her. She goes about her work quietly, repairing the gaping hole in the man's leg as best she can.
Once she's done doing all the tending that she can, she walks out of the cramped space and sits on the steps of the building across the street.
She's not sure what she feels, she's not sure what to feel. But as she looks over the scape of the destroyed town, she sees a familiar figure of the soldier who held her during the bombings walking over to her, and with that she feels a small wave of relief overcome her.