The Spirit of the Corps » Band of Brothers

111: Every Beautiful Thing

If they never went to sleep then morning would never come. They could pretend that this was it, forever. The two of them together in a warm bed, with the soft light of the lamp on the nightstand giving everything an ethereal glow.

Charlie and Floyd had their arms wrapped snugly around each other and their legs tangled together. They'd been talking for hours and still it wasn't enough. It would never be enough. They could have had a thousand years more and it still wouldn't have been enough.

"Tell me about," Charlie requested in a whisper, as was the way of their little game, "the most embarrassing thing you ever did."

Floyd smiled. "When I was fifteen I got dared by my buddies to run across town completely naked. I ran into my grandma on my way back."

Charlie laughed. "What did she say?"

"Oh, she was not impressed," he replied, grinning. "Gave me all kinds of hell for it, as you can probably imagine. I couldn't look her in the eye anytime I saw her after that." He watched Charlie for a moment, smiling and silent, before saying, "Tell me about your favourite Christmas present."

"When I was sixteen my parents gave me my locket," she said.

His eyes flickered down to look at it.

"I put in the picture of my parents on their wedding day as soon as I got the chance and left the other side blank ready for you."

He laughed softly. "For me?"

"For the love of my life," she explained. "When a man came along and made a place for himself in my real heart then I'd know he deserved a place in my locket. You took care of that for me, though, so thank you."

Floyd grinned. "You're welcome."

"Tell me about your first day of boot camp," Charlie requested next.

"God, where do I start?" Floyd laughed and went on to tell her all about not just his first day but a lot of what boot camp had been like. He told her of the company's first commanding officer, Sobel, who the NCOs had mutinied against in Aldbourne because he was so inept. Floyd told her of Mount Currahee, and how they'd had to run the three miles up and three miles down in full pack in the boiling heat, and how on Friday nights, while every other company was out in town on weekend passes, Easy would walk for miles on end in the pitch dark and not be allowed to drink from their canteens. But, in amongst all of the intense training and horrible leadership, Floyd told her of all of his favourite memories from back then, too; pillow fights and drinking competitions and the time Duckie Wells bet Skinny Sisk he could outdrink Bill Guarnere with milk. And Floyd smiled so fondly as he spoke, his eyes faraway as his mind went to a different place, that Charlie felt herself fall even more in love with him, at perhaps the worst moment. Now was the time to start detaching herself so that she'd have something of her heart left to take with her in the morning when she had to leave for Germany, but Floyd seemed to have different ideas about that. He wouldn't be letting her leave with anything of her heart left at all. He would be keeping all of it.

"Tell me about your training," Floyd bid Charlie once he had finished regaling her with stories of boot camp back in the States.

Charlie smiled ruefully and reached out to push back a lock of hair which had fallen into his eyes. "Well, it was nothing like yours," she began.

Floyd laughed. "I bet."

Charlie let out her breath as she admitted, "It was lonely."

"Yeah?"

"Mh-hm," Charlie confirmed. "I didn't know Mabs or Boo or Autumn yet. I met Autumn on the ship coming to England, and Mabs and Boo at the train station in Aldbourne, since we all trained at different colleges. But I didn't have any friends back in training. All the other girls either seemed to all know each other already or else not have any interest in getting to know anyone. I tried to make friends a couple times but -" Her cheeks flamed as she recalled the embarrassment of it. "- nothing ever really stuck."