Promise You Won't

“Promise you won’t wait for me,” he muttered into her hair. He felt her hiccup and he hugged her closer to him. “Promise me.”
“I can’t. You wouldn’t let me save you, and you expect me to just…”
“Yes, I do expect you to just forget me. Who knows what will happen to me over there? I don’t want the only thing holding you back to be me.” He felt her pull away from him.
“You won’t be the only thing holding me back,” she said, almost sounding offended. He smiled at her softly and she balked. Her gaze quickly fell to her feet and he sighed, the smile not leaving his face.
“I can’t make you forget me, but please tell me you’ll try.” Unwillingly, she nodded, returning her gaze to his face. His heart skipped a beat, seeing the tears streaming down her face, but he shook the sinking feeling from himself. Where he was going, there was no room for compassion. He hugged her to him one last time, as a piercing whistle cut through the thick air that hinted at rain. She wrapped her arms around him, trying to hold him back from the ship that ominously rocked in the harbor. This time, it was he who pulled away from her and when he turned to board the ship, he didn’t look behind him.
‘I will be nothing to you now,’ he wished. ‘Please, do not let me hold you back.’ He could feel her gaze on his back and he quickened his pace as he boarded. Where he was going, there was no room for compassion.

Letters couldn’t take the place of his face or the sound of his voice. They were few and far between, and then finally they stopped coming at all. She, at first, worried. Had be been captured? Killed? For months she would stay awake at night, pondering his gruesome fate. Then, she forgot. Like waking up from a dream, she couldn’t recall his face, or his voice. She forgot what he had meant to her, and what she had hoped she had meant to him. For years, nothing held her back.

“Did you hear? The boys are coming back next week.” Her attention snapped back to the friend that sat next to her.
“So?”
“Didn’t you have someone who went overseas?”
“I don’t know. Probably,” she laughed casually. Her laugh quickly faded as memories began to resurface and she could feel a dead weight beginning to form in her chest. “Hey, what time are they supposed to pull in?” Her friend looked at her with a bit of surprise.
“The paper said around three in the afternoon on Friday. Why? Are you gonna go wait for someone you won’t even recognize?”
“No, I was just…curious.”

Two-thirty on the next Friday found her standing among a crowd of anxious mothers and lovers. She felt out of place, and on more than one occasion she caught herself thinking about abandoning the whole idea, but each time she convinced herself that there was a chance that he was still alive, that he had survived the whole ordeal… A piercing whistle that suddenly became familiar cut through the thick air and she felt herself shudder. Thoughts raced through her head and she lost track of time. He could be so close to her at this very moment, alive, breathing, thinking that no one will be waiting for him. But then…he could be cold, dead, buried across the sea. Would he have left her alone…?
The shrieks of the young woman next to her as a lover greedily snatched his darling up told her that the moment had come. She moved away from the scene, so public yet so personal that she felt the urge to look away and give them privacy. She made her way closer to the dock, watching the line of soldiers file off. She waited for what seemed like hours, but finally there was no one left to leave the ship. She turned away, a forced smile on her face. He was gone, wasn’t he? Where had he fallen? How had he been captured? She covered her mouth with her hand, trying to hold back tears that threatened to fall.
“I told you not to wait for me, and what do you do?” She stopped. The voice sounded familiar, but it seemed tired, or maybe annoyed. She didn’t turn around, but remained still.
“I waited for you. Isn’t that what you wanted in the end?” She looked over her shoulder and saw a face. It bore the same tender smile it had when it left her. She could feel tears welling up in her eyes again.
“Yes. That’s exactly what I wanted.” He took a step forward and she turned to face him completely. Without words, they met, and the thick air gave way to rain that refused to fall earlier.