Evelyn's Tale

-Forty-

Evelyn groaned as sunlight streamed through the open curtains. The sofa she had slept on all night had been far from comfortable and her back was aching in places she didn't even know could ache. No wonder her dad always grumbled about it when her mom threw him out of the bedroom after an argument. Maybe bad backs and marriage just went hand in hand?

The small living room was devoid of any other bodies and she wondered just how late she had slept in. Sitting up, she stretched her arms above her head, groaning again when her back clicked and the aches eased a little, and yawned. She still felt tired, which was absolutely ridiculous, and she was beginning to think that perhaps there was some truth in what her mom used to say about too much sleep being bad for a person. As a teenager she had thought that was just an excuse to get her up early at the weekends but perhaps there wasn't a ploy after all. Or maybe she was still tired because despite the first night in months of no nightmares, the lingering oppression and pain of that horrible place lingered inside of her.

"Morning, sleeping beauty."

Evelyn couldn't even be bothered to force a polite smile on her face when George appeared in the doorway. She just sighed and took the rubber band off of her wrist to try and tame her messy hair into a bun. Running her fingers through the tangled knots in her hair made her eyes prick with tears when she thought about some of the women in the female camp the day before; the way they had stroked her hair and eyed it with such sadness and longing. It had been one of the things that shocked her the most about the whole place; hundreds upon hundreds of women with shaved and shorn hair. Perhaps of all the atrocities those poor people had gone through in the past few years, having their hair shaved wasn't the worst but Evelyn knew that for most women their hair was the thing that made them feel like themselves; pretty and feminine. To have that taken away was degrading; a physical reminder, along with their tattooed numbers and striped uniforms, of the fact that for so long they were seen as nothing.

Sitting down beside Evelyn, George set a plate of scrambled eggs and sausage on her lap and she felt herself baulk when the smell drifted up her nostrils. Shaking her head, she gave it back to him. There was no way she could eat. How could she when all she could see was skeletal and diseased bodies in her mind?

"You gotta eat, sweetheart," George murmured, sliding the plate back towards her and holding out a cup of steaming hot coffee. "You missed dinner last because you were still at the camp."

"I aint hungry, Georgie," she took a tentative sip of the coffee but set the plate of eggs down on the floor beside her boots. "But thank you for thinking of me."

"So uh, Bull told me you and Joe had a bit of a falling out last night," George picked up the plate and stabbed at the eggs before forking some into his mouth. No point in perfectly good eggs going to waste.

"We didn't have a fall out. Joe was just upset, and understandably, so he wanted to be alone. And well, you know me, I couldn't just take it for what it was, I had to make it all about myself by taking it personally and getting upset about it," Evelyn muttered. "I just... I know he's hurting and I wish I could take it all away from him, you know? I feel like if our roles were reversed he'd know how to help me."

"I think you're wrong about this," George wrapped an arm around her shoulder and kissed the side of her head. "What happened yesterday, that place, it was... I don't think living hell would even be a bad enough description. It was worse than anything any of us could ever imagine existing and we're all gonna have to live with what we saw there for the rest of our lives. It's worse for Lieb in many ways because they're his people, but if it had been you in his position then I can absolutely guarantee he wouldn't know how to help you. You gotta just let him deal with this in whatever way he needs to and you gotta know that nothing he says is personal against you."