The Spirit of the Corps » Band of Brothers

115: The Next Four Years

Once upon a time Charlie and Floyd had talked for hours on end and still had more to say. Once upon a time there hadn't been a single thing they couldn't say to each other. Once upon a time they'd known each other better than they'd known anyone else in the world.

Now, they were as good as strangers. It had been two years since they'd last spoken and yet they walked in silence as though they'd exhausted everything they had to say.

Charlie's heart was beating hard in her chest, confused by its own push and pull. The happiness that had filled her when she'd first seen him, for that one shining instant before she'd been all nerves, remained, but it was accompanied by fear now, too. She hadn't realised how badly she'd been hoping they would reunite and find that they still felt the same way. It was all she'd wanted to fall into his arms and forgive him everything - for not replying, for moving somewhere she couldn't find him, for breaking up with her in the first place - but she realised now that things simply couldn't be that way. They weren't the same people they'd been when they'd said goodbye in Austria. It was the biggest heartbreak of all to realise that she didn't know him anymore, not really.

"You have a dog," Charlie said when they'd already been walking in silence for a while.

Floyd nodded but he didn't look at her. Instead, his eyes found the Cocker Spaniel walking happily down the sidewalk in front of them, wearing her own little Christmas sweater to ward off the cold. "Her name's Rosie," he said.

"Rosie," Charlie echoed. "That's a cute name. Is she yours or your family's?"

"She's mine," Floyd replied. He coughed once into his fist. "I got her just after I moved, 'cause one of the guys at work had a litter of puppies."

"How old is she?"

"Seven months. She'll turn one in April."

Charlie nodded even though Floyd wasn't looking at her. Why did all of this feel so strange?

"Where do you live now?" Charlie asked next. She wasn't sure he'd answer her, since he'd never passed along his new address to anyone from the war, but was surprised when he did so with little hesitation.

"Alexandria," he said. "Not far. About forty-five minutes from here."

Charlie looked over at him and found him stiff. His shoulders were up by his ears, his head bent low, his eyes on Rosie ahead of them. His free hand was buried in his coat pocket and what she could see of his face was blank but tight, as if he was holding a lot of tension there.

"Do you still live in Lancaster?" he wondered all of a sudden.

"Some of the time," Charlie replied, attempting to hide her surprise at being asked a question. "I started college in the fall, so I'm splitting my time between home and California."

"Which college?"

"Stanford."

He let out a low whistle, impressed, though he didn't exactly look surprised. "That's amazing," he told her. "Congratulations."

"Thank you." She smiled to herself, pleased with his praise.

Rosie stopped to sniff a patch of grass outside someone's house so Charlie and Floyd stopped to wait for her. Although Floyd kept his eyes on his puppy, Charlie turned to him. "Why didn't you write to me?" she asked quietly. She was tired of the small talk. It was only making her upset; they used to be so close, had told each other everything, and now their conversation was formal and awkward, that of strangers meeting for the first time, not two people who had once thought of themselves as soulmates.

Floyd avoided her eyes. "I wanted to write to you," he said.

"Then why didn't you?"

"It's complicated."